Caleb's 7th Birthday

Wow. Caleb is seven years old now.





I can't believe that I have a seven year old.

It is great. I love Caleb at seven. I love getting to know him more and more each day.


Caleb was my hardest baby. It was really hard to birth him. It was really hard to nurse him. It was really hard to get him to go to sleep. It was really hard to get him to mind me. He was the ultimate strong-willed child that challenged me on EVERYTHING! (and not just once) There was a time when I felt like all I did was tell that child "no" and then discipline him for not obeying. Then there were all of the hours I spent praying for him to just go to sleep.........


But guess what!!!! That is way in the past now and Caleb has grown into an incredible young man. He has a huge heart and loves others very well. He is the ultimate "people person" and almost overly friendly to other children.
He loves anything with wheels or a motor and if you can't find him these days, it is best to look up, because he is most likely up in a tree.
His favorite toys are guns, bows and knives. (don't cross him)
Caleb has always been very physically able in that he can smash a baseball, flip and dive into a pool, and do plenty of wheelies and other tricks on his bike.
He is a hard worker and loves being outside with Seth.
Hhhhmm, what else about him?
He is very helpful with Annabelle and loves babies.

Yeah, my Caleb has really come a long way in the last couple of years. We definitely still have our struggles, but they just can't compare to the baby and toddler days. So for right now, I am just trying to enjoy these easier in-between years. (please don't mention teenagers to me)


I love my seven year old Caleb.


Here are the birthday party pictures:

We had a pool party at Cheshire.
Thank goodness it was an indoor pool because it was indeed raining outside off and on.

He was quite excited about the pocket knife from Gray.
Annabelle really liked the weird glasses that Uncle Jonathan found and threw in his present at the last minute.

Aunt Lorie, Beth and her brother, and Jonathan enjoyed the cookie cake and ice cream.

Annabelle and Lucie had fun swimming together in the pool.

Tammy, Christian,Chandler and Annika were at the party as well.
Chandler is such an awesome brother. He is always helping Tammy with the little ones.

Tay and Em (neighbors) came too.
Emily swan with Kiah and Lanie the entire time while Tay entertained the boys.

The party was a success......I think everyone enjoyed it.


Oh yes, on Friday Grandaddy gave Caleb his present.....AN AIRSOFT GUN
which is something he has been wanting for a long time now. After clearing it with Seth, Grandaddy went out and bought goggles, pellets and TWO guns so that Adam could have one too. The boys were thrilled to say the least, and our backyard has turned into a major battle zone.


Boys are so weird.






Not to take away anything from the post all about Caleb, but I thought you would enjoy this video of Adam jumping off the diving board yesterday at the pool. He literally did something similar to this EVERY TIME he jumped (and he was so much smaller than anyone else jumping too). It kept me entertained.

the SMASHED thumb

.
As most of you know, we have had a crappy week here at the Harrison house. I am going to attempt to give the "Reader's Digest version" of the smashed thumb incident. Seth is always interrupting my long-winded stories and saying, "Can you just give me the Reader's Digest version?".

Tuesday night, Caleb picked up Seth's 30lb. dumbbell and put in the back of his toy dump truck. It flipped out and landed on his thumb. The thumb was a bloody, smashed mess. As for Caleb, he was screaming BLOODY murder! (I was in the basement with him but didn't realize that he had the dumbbell) We got a neighbor to come watch Annabelle and raced to the ER. They sedated him, stitched him up, x-rayed it, determined the little end bone to be fractured in many places, wrapped it up and sent us home. I took Caleb to the hand surgeon today so he could look at it. He said it would be fine but that there was a chance that the fingernail might grow in a bit bumpy. Then we got a little splint for the arm.











Wow, all of that does not do the story justice.
Remember that we are talking about Caleb here. I left out all of the parts where we had to hold him down with all of our might and when he screamed and cried for hours. Once they got the IV in that night, everything calmed down. Thank God for good drugs. The anesthetic that they gave him was really weird stuff because his eyes were open and looking around during the whole procedure, though he couldn't feel it or remember anything afterward.

Thank God for Mimi too. She came to the ER so that Seth could take Adam home. It always helps to have your Moma by your side when the going gets tough. I thought a lot that night about how many times she had been in my position with us as kids. All you want in the whole world is to take their place. I thought about how hard it was for her and others to see me in labor for all of those hours. It is worse to watch a loved one go through pain than to be the one in pain for most people. She also came to the house the next day and took the boys to get, yet another, Webkin. If all of this keeps up, they are going to have an obnoxious amount of those little critters.

Thank God for sweet neighbors too. Kelly came over to watch Annabelle and proceeded to clean our entire downstairs, which was a bigger mess than usual (go figure). I came home to the dishes done and clean floors.........heavenly! The next day, Taylor (Kelly's son), spent the day playing with the boys and keeping Caleb occupied. They even played in the snow a bit.

Annabelle came out for a few minutes too

Emily and Caleb

the snow fort

I thought today's doctor visit would be easy-breezy.I decided to get a babysitter at the last minute and thank God I did, because I couldn't have done it with Annabelle and Adam there too. The visit was atrocious! They had to remove his dressing which had a TON of dried blood on it, so we had to soak it in peroxide. If Caleb hadn't been screaming the entire time and fighting me to keep it in the cup, I would have definitely taken a picture with my phone. I love putting peroxide on things and watching the bubbles and fizz. Let me tell you about this fizz! The cup was overflowing! I had to keep getting paper towels to catch it. After that, he was completely traumatized for the umpteenth time this week, so when they fit him for the splint, I literally had to hold him in a headlock to keep his arm still. You would have thought he was being branded or something from the sound of it all.

So here we are. Caleb hates his splint. It is super cute as you can see in the picture. camoflauge and navy. I know, I know, you could barely find it at first.

He is on antibiotics again......Lord give us strength! We go back to the hand surgeon on Wednesday.


At least it isn't summer.


By the way, a lesson for everyone is this: We waited for less than 2 minutes in the ER waiting room with Caleb. When Adam had a broken femur bone (leg), we waited over 3 hours, because he wasn't crying. The nurse said that if their is a screaming kid in the waiting room, they do everything they can to get them back to a doctor. So, if you take your child to the ER, get them to scream!!!!!!!!
Also, Popsicles are helpful when giving kids medicine because they help to numb their taste buds.


Nana, Papa, and the Dunlaps are most likely coming up next weekend to visit. We are all excited and with that, I can end on a good note.

Wow. Hard weekend.

I thought that I would break my "only upbeat" posts rule and write this all down. This way when I try to look back at this time of life and think, "oh those were the best days ever!", I will also remember the horrible, horrible times when Caleb was sick. Lets just start by saying that he is such a hard child and always has been. However, he gets about 10 times worse when he is sick. The kid has overactive taste buds or something and is the worst about taking medicine. Add to that the fact that he is just generally pissed off anytime that he is feeling badly.

He started running a mild fever Friday night. So the Motrin battle began. Imagine having to actually spank your child (who has a fever) so that he will gag his medicine down. Oh yes, and he has always thrown up if his fever gets too high. There is no other way to do it. Nerve-racking, I tell ya. He seemed a bit better Saturday but then worse on Sunday.

So I took him to the doctor early this morning.

Ammoxicillan prescription. I asked if we could just get one horrible shot instead. nope. won't work.


We opt for the chewable tablets. This fight is MUCH worse than the Motrin. It takes about an hour to get two tablets down. I end up smashing it up and mixing it with water.
I am tired. In the meantime, Annabelle somehow snatched Caleb's cup and takes a nice long, infected sip.


Well, I have called the doctor and asked for a new prescription of liquid medicine. Seth is going to help when he gets home.




And on top of it all........

Leslie is home but I can't hang out.



Do you like my slideshow below? Sometimes the pictures seem stuck but isn't the music great? I have used most of those pictures in previous posts, but I didn't have any new ones, and wanted to make the slideshow anyways.


Sorry about the rant. Y'all pray for Caleb. Please.

off to clean house.

Cute Conversation

As Adam was sitting down at the table for his lunch of chicken nuggets he said to me, "Moma, did you get my ranch?" I said, "of course I did Adam. Ranch for you, ketchup for Caleb. I know you pretty well ya know. Actually I know you better than you even know yourself." He then replied, "I know you too Moma." So I asked him, "OK, what is my favorite thing to do?" He answered, "clean". What????!!!! I suppose that he got mixed up with what I do all day or something. I thought it was cute so I thought I would share.

Early this morning before Seth was leaving for work, we were having a conversation about money and where we needed to deposit checks (Harrison Homes or personal accounts). It was not a pleasant subject and we both tend to be cranky in the morning at times. About fifteen minutes after the conversation ended, Caleb said, " Daddy, you should put the money in that coffee can on top of your dresser where all of the rest of it is." Yep, he was listening and trying to help us solve the problem. It was way cuter in person and it made us both cheer up and chuckle a bit.

Caleb

I just asked Caleb what I should write about in my blog entry today and he replied, "me!" So here is a little bit about Caleb. Caleb just turned six years old 2 weeks ago. He was the ultimate hard-headed, cranky, strong-willed child until the age of 4 when he really turned a corner. I was driving down the road yesterday thinking, "Oh my goodness, Caleb is going to be one of those stories that parents tell about their kid being a monster........ I mean "strong-willed", and those listening will think, "what? Caleb?" wow. Caleb has learned to obey and is very helpful around the house. He LOVES working with Seth in the yard. I would say his favorite activity (a part from that) would be riding his bike. Grandaddy got him a new bike for his birthday that is quite big and for him to grow into, yet he has it mastered now and can maneuver it down our steep mulch hill in the front yard. He also loves weapons of any sort including guns, bows, swords and knives. Anytime the boys go to Walmart with grandparents to buy a prize, Caleb wants this $4.00 bow and arrow that usually lasts a week before it breaks. Lately he really likes to play video games on the computer. I try to limit his playing time though because he would rather play the corny online dirtbike games versus the learning games on PBS.com...... Of course.

Don't get me wrong. He still can be a challenge when it comes to eating or sleeping. He is a picky eater and still cries and/or flips out at bedtime. He is learning to get along with Adam and to think of others before himself. I do think that it is wonderful how closely Adam arrived after Caleb. They always have a playmate and are constantly learning to share and play nicely with one another. If you can get along with your brother, you can learn to get along with anyone. Well, that may not be the case always, but it is a good practice for life. However, to get along with your brother at this age (in my kid's case), it takes constant parental involvement. People always ask me if the boys get along and I say "about 75% of the time. They are either fighting like dogs or are best friends but they never choose to play alone. They always want to be together."

I will close with the sweetest thing about my Caleb. He loves his cousins with all of his heart! Lucie, Lanie, Kiah, Aaron, Amy and WALKER are his most favorite people. We babysat Lucie, who is 19 months old, overnight about a week ago and he played with her the entire time. She woke up during the night and couldn't get back to sleep so Caleb (who woke up after hearing us) played with her until she got sleepy while I laid on the floor beside them. They next day he cried so hard when she had to leave.