The time is near

I can hardly breathe for I know I have limited time left with my little Moe Baby. I can barely stand to think that after Tuesday he will soon be going home with his father for good and I will be "left in the dust" of their quick moving trail.

We are not sure what will happen after the final hearing on Tuesday. If anyone knows how this part goes... please fill me in! My caseworker has only been doing this for 15 months and this is her first case to be returning home so she is kind of in the dark as well. We are all excited that his father has come so far and has proven to LOVE his son unconditionally and in that he will be getting him back; BUT it is still very bittersweet!

As far as I know we will see him again. I have been a part of helping his father get everything together. He has told me that we will always be part of Moe's life. But it is not over 'til it is over. I have heard sad stories way too many times where the foster parents were a big part of the parents getting the kids back but then the communication breaks when the child is back "home".

It breaks my heart to think that I could never see him again.

Almost 2 weeks ago for about a 2 week stretch I was ready to ship both the boys off to a third world country! They are synchronized teethers and I was getting a lethal serving of C.R.A.B.A.P.P.L.E PIE! It was undesirable to say the least!

Now it is over and the smoke has settled and so have the crumbs from the pie. Both boys are back to their sweet selves again (with intermittent crumbs) and it is killing me to have to say goodbye to my precious boy. Ask me two weeks ago and I probably would have paid someone to take them both (but only for a day or two)!

I know he is going to fulfill God's intended purpose for his life. I have prayed it and continue to pray it still. I know there are others who also pray for him and his family and wherever he ends up. I don't want to be jealous or even selfish but my heart can only wish that he would grow up here and we would be able to watch him grow and help him become the man God has called him to be.

I pray he would be given wings to SOAR above the world and all it's destruction. God protect him from the unknown. Guide him in the direction of righteousness. Bless him and his family in all that they do Father! Watch over our Moe Baby and his family Lord! Watch over them...

"Birth Blankets"

Okay so I got to thinking one day... "what good is a birth pillow really?"

I mean you get a little pillow and put some info on it about the birth day but what then. They never really use it and it usually just gets stored (or tossed).

So I came up with a more useful idea, something that would be able to be used AND display all the fun facts. And from that idea was born the "birth blanket"

Here is Bear's birth blanket. I still have the final touches to go as far as the border goes. Just satin trimming. But I am LOVING the blankets.

Moe's colors are more calm and his satin backing is cream. The quilted side is green, blue, cream and light tan (I think).


The quilting fabric can be bought at Hobby Lobby if you do not feel like creating your own quilt (not you Mols :)) and the backing is just satin and I took it to a local "monogramming" shop. Pin faces together and sew leaving a small opening to turn right side out when done sewing. Turn right side out then sew'er up. Then comes the satin blanket trim. I will be doing that soon... so ask me later if you need to know how that is done.

The boys LOVE them (ignore the pouty face!). And the blankets are big enough that they cover the boys!

And all this time I thought I was learning the Alphabet!

I have been working with Bear for a while with his alphabet. Not INTENSE or anything just sing the alphabet and go through alphabet books with him. He has a couple posters up on the wall with the alphabet on it and we will go over that from time to time. (we are now venturing into shapes and it is so fun to hear him identify a shape)

Here recently (about 3 weeks ago) I collected a fun nugget from a fellow blogger and started doing alphabet crafts with Bear. So since then he has been able to specify what letter is which when it is presented to him.

(mind the ugly border thingy and the ugly wall... this room has yet to get a coat or 20 of paint!)

Also when we would say the alphabet we would also sign it just for fun and b.c what will it hurt for him to know sign language right. I am by no means a proficient at sign language but we did start him out on baby sign and now that he is learning alphabet in sign language, I feel we are creating a window of opportunity for his future that may not have otherwise been there.

When we are driving I will say the alphabet to him while signing. (YES the other hand is on the steering wheel!). He gets a kick out of this and when I am done he will put his hands up in the air and start moving his little fingers all about while saying the alphabet.

He can identify most of the hand signs when we make them and ask him what they are. We do this out of order mostly also so that he is just not memorizing placement. We also do this with his letters. We will pick out a word and have him spell it from the paper for us.

Conveniently enough J and I usually have on tee shirts with writing on them so when he is sitting on the potty and I am placed on the tiny stool in front of the toilet (for a quick break while he does his business) he will read off the letters on my shirt. I will get him to trace the letters with his fingers. He is cruising right along in this learning season.

I recently bought 3 curriculum books from Mardel geared toward toddler/preschool age children. I found one that is PERFECT for Bear. It has the alphabet in it but ALSO it has pictures with the alphabet that you can match AND it has a picture of the HAND SIGN right along with it! I say Thank YOU JESUS for such a fun little gift.

He has also been playing Memory and loving it. J and I have a collection of children's games b.c we LOVE to play games and children games are always more fun AND we love having our nieces over and getting involved in their world through games.

So Bear has a new game that he plays now. We only take about 5 picture pairs out of the box and use only those so as to not overwhelm him. Then we lay them face up and ask him to find the matches. Or we will pull out one of the matches and ask him to find the other one. He LOVES this and will do it over and over again.

We switch up the 5 pairs and for a bit of a challenge we split the pairs and keep one set in a pile and the other set we lay out in rows on the table before him. I will flip my card over and ask him to look for the match. He will flip cards over and if it is not a match he will say "nope" and flip it back over and continue searching until he finds the match. When he finds one that fits the criteria he will examine both cards and look at me and CHEER so enthusiastically. As do I.

I am loving this new phase of life.

It is funny to see Moe baby right along side him learning also. He will mimick his bubby in everything he does. So we are sure to spread some of the learning on to him as well. I have just been working with him in word recognition. So far he has it down but there are still some words that he is having difficulties saying. His vocabulary has bloomed in the past 2 months, we are so proud of him!

He has been so used to whining for everything he wanted. We have NEVER condoned this behavior but for some reason it was easier for him to whine than to speak (yes I know... duh!). We did teach him baby sign also but he would rarely use it. We would ask him to use his words and he would then sign. But now that Bear has been talking all the time he is picking up on WORDS galore and doing great with them.