Our Babies

Our Babies
Luke and Claire

"Welcome to Holland"


By Emily Perl Kingsley, 1987. All rights reserved.


I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away...because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss. But...if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Friday, July 13, 2012

Grandma's visit

Guess why Luke is so happy in this picture? Well, other than the fact that he is ALWAYS happy....
 He's extra happy because Grandma was here!!!!!
 Every single night he got a bath, books, and lots of snuggles....
 Since Luke was occupied, the girls had a little bit of extra time to snuggle as well....
 Don't worry. Grandma got plenty of snuggle time with Claire while Luke was in school on some days...

 We even had to make sure that Claire was always wearing cute, matching clothes each day....
 The house was so peaceful and clean with all of Grandma's extra help that even Ralphie had extra time on his paws to sit and relax...
 Grandma helped us with all of Claire's poor belly problems that she has been dealing with for the past two months. We finally think we have her reflux medicine and formula adjusted just right....
 Even though Luke loves his snuggle time with Grandma, he doesn't get too jealous when it is Claire's turn...
 And look at what a big girl she is getting to be! She's four months old today!!!!

Top 4 things at 4 months:

1. She LOVES to snuggle. Nothing makes her happier than to be wrapped up in a blankie snuggled up next to someone.
2. Her magic paci (an oversized yellow one) really is her favorite!
3. When her tummy isn't hurting, Claire likes to just chillax by herself. Sometimes she nestles into her boppy, sometimes she snuggles in her swing, and at night she likes to sprawl out in her bed for about 30 minutes before she finally falls asleep.
4. She is getting to be very observant. One of her favorite things to do is to sit and watch Luke and the dogs. Sometimes she likes the occasional lick (from both the dogs or Luke), but usually she likes to watch from the safety of the rocking chair. Before we know it, she be crawling on the floor with everyone else.

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