"cool"...

today i got a phone call from my mom...on the other line i heard this:

"will you please tell your brother (he is 14) that there are other backpacks that are cool besides jansport, they have so many cool backpacks everywhere and all he wants is a jansport."

i was instantly brought back to my teenage years...and i felt for my brother, knowing that my mom had argued the same thing with me...

"tonya, this shirt is cool, i bet half of the girls will be wearing this shirt..."
"no mom, it's not, and no one will" (which was true)

and so i replied to my mom this way:

"mom, get the kid a jansport, they are cool, he won't be cool without one..."

and she replied:

"why would he care about what is cool? he should get what he likes, why would you want to be like everyone else?"

and i replied, " mom he can figure out his likes in other ways, just let him be cool". she gave in.

i hung up the phone, and then i thought about it...

my mom always pushed me to think out of the box when i was growing up, she didn't go to my school, she didn't always know what was "cool", but she always encouraged us to think in our own way, and not how everyone else does...

because of this, i may not have had lucky jeans growing up, i may not have always been the coolest of kids on the block...but i was able to grow into myself. and i am thankful for that.

so thanks mom, for not always letting me get what was "cool" and helping me to figure out my own "cool"...even if it wasn't always on purpose, and even though i may not have talked to you for a day here or there.

so here is what i called my brother back to say: "tanner, i know jansports are cool, and you are safe if you get one, but i also know that the coolest of kids decide their own cool, even if it isn't always the popular thing to do...so get what you like, cool or not, as long as it is what you like."

thanks mom.

lessons...

today as i scrolled through my usual blog rolls, i read through a post from a mother who has an adult child with down syndrome...as the mother described daily life with her child she mentioned what she would have told herself, twenty years ago...

when i think back to camden's birth and what i would have told myself then, right now it is all about acceptance. this mom, twenty years later, had moved past that and onto the reality of daily life...she said "slow down". it took me back a little...because i felt at first like i was working toward that, learning patience in his milestones...but i never really thought about slowing down even our daily life...and as i thought about it, it dawned on me just how personal this lesson was for me.

i am a fast paced person, i talk fast, i move fast, i drive fast, i am always in a hurry, rushing here or there...and on a full day i find myself getting frustrated with my own rushing, i get frustrated with camden when we have to leave and he is taking forty minutes to eat a full meal...and i noticed that on the days i try to pack in twenty things i feel more accomplished, and i wonder, is that really what it is all about? or maybe, it is ok that we just hang out all day...spend time with each other, work on our motor skills, or just play...because maybe it isn't about rushing to fit a quantified number of things into one day, but more about the quality of things that we fit into a day.

i needed to learn how to slow things down, not just for camden, but for myself, because what is life worth anyway if we are consumed with merely filling it? so why not slow down, and fill it with what matters?

i am thankful for my son, every day it is more and more apparent just how perfectly he was made just for me.

transitions...

beside the fact that camden tried to bite his therapist this morning due to unwanted completion of a task (he wanted to take the rings off, not put the last one on), we had a fairly productive day...

we are currently working on getting camden to use a spoon, he has the pincer grasp down and can self feed with his fingers (when he doesn't throw whatever it is on the floor) but hasn't fully transitioned into using a spoon quite yet. his speech therapist recommended using edible things that can also double as a spoon to start out, and having camden dip them into a yummy treat...his favorite combo, vanilla pudding and biter cookies...i think it is working great!


we also give camden a spoon to explore with at the same time, and today he took it out of the pudding and put it straight into his mouth! yay!

(ps. don't mind the fact that the cranberries are on in the background, and i may or may not have been humming along...haha)

tiny hugs...

camden and i have caught a summer cold...who catches a cold in the summer? apparently we do. and although i despise being sick myself, and hate even more the thought of the little one miserable...i do love the extra cuddle time. camden is a fantastic cuddler...he will stop what he is doing and come over and just snuggle...if he is tired...he wants to cuddle...if he sees me crying he stops everything, comes right over and wraps his little arms around my neck ever so tightly. this morning was no different...camden woke up from the sniffles at four a.m. and rolled around on mom and dad's bed until he was ready to go back to bed...about an hour later i felt a little hand on my shoulder and opened my eyes to find my little guy snuggling right in, his head touching mine...so i wrapped my arms around his tiny frame and pulled him in...we slept soundly, together, until eight a.m. when he woke up and rolled into me with a giant smile. there really is nothing better than waking up with that smile of his.

an apple orchard...

thanks to our good friend, natalie, we finally got some family photos done...and i love them so. i was going to wait until monday to post anything but i just can't help myself...so, here are my favorites...

a big thanks to natalie bate and square photography.

weekends...

this is how we start our weekends...

father's day
that's right...my own chair...
parks...

zoos...fourth of july barbeques...
and the occasional lawn mower race...
fireworks! what!?
happy to report that after the initial boom shock, camden sunk right into the awe of that fire lit sky.

red, white and blue...

as we celebrate today i can't help but be ever so thankful to be able to live in the nation that i call home. for the rights that we have been blessed with, for the opportunities, the freedoms that those before us died for...for the men and women who have given up their homes, their families, their lives to secure for us and others a life worth living.

i am proud to be an american...but most of all, i am thankful.

happy fourth!
(pictures coming soon)