Today was a great day.  It worked out today that the for most of the afternoon the boys were all doing something and I had some great one on one time with Sydney.  We had a great day, doing nothing much but playing and hanging out together.  Today was just a regular day, but Sydney did THREE things that were amazing milestones.  The first thing was her rolling across the floor to get to Anthony who was playing with some beads.  Up until now she will roll one time to reach something, but if something is more than one roll away she doesn’t even think about moving towards it.  Today seeing her figure out that she can reach something that is “far” away was HUGE!!  I am positive that she triumphed in reaching the bead tray.  Poor baby, she reached her destination and we moved it away from her. =0(   The second thing she did today was pull a washcloth over her head and drop it back down, not by accident, but purposefully.  In the past she would pull the washcloth off if I put it there, but she never did it herself.  It really felt like she opened a new avenue of communication.  It just melted my heart to have that “conversation” of peek-a-boo.  The last thing she did (as if two milestones in one day was not enough) was look for the toy that she dropped.  Typically she drops a toy and it is just gone.  Today she dropped some rings off of the highchair and she leaned forward to see where they were.  GOOD GIRL!!!  I know these are tiny things, but in our world they are the equivilent of climbing Mt Everest.

Wow, time is flying by.  Our sweet Sydney is 9 months old.  What is she up to these days?  Well, she is sitting up very well, rolls around the floor to get to what she wants, eating LOTS of baby food and is dabbling in the big girl foods!  Her favorites are the star shaped Gerber puffs, which we lovingly refer to as Scooby snacks.  Now before you judge…  that is because of Anthony (4) who will do anything for a few puffs.  For those of you who are not new baby savvy, Gerber puffs are little star shaped puffy treats that are similar to Cheerios except they melt very easily.  Another favorite of hers is Graham crackers.   Between Anthony and the dogs, its a wonder that she gets to eat anything.  =0)

 Her physical Therapist came by this week and Sydney is doing great.  As I mentioned, she sits up without assistance, but unfortunately she can only self-correct so much before she topples over with a look of surprise.  She is getting more and more stable by the day and we have seen vast improvement in the last two weeks in her ability to use her back muscles to stay upright.  Now that the poor baby has mastered this skill, it is time to make thing tough again by working on the next steps to crawling.  After my stent at Dell is complete, we will bump up the PT visits to every two weeks.

Below are some recent pictures:  Sydney in her Hawaiian Mumu from Grandma, Sydney’s friend Olivia planting a big kiss on her, A sweet smile, and Brotherly love from Anthony.

The title of this post may be a little deceiving, no Sydney is not a year older, but it was about 1 year ago that we received the news that she had been blessed with an extra chromosome… That might sound a little weird but that is how I truly feel today.  A year ago our lives changed and continue to change by this blessed event. The one year anniversary of the news has been on my mind a lot lately and how it has changed all of our lives. There are many things that remain the same, but are even more magnified, for example, both of the big brothers are still loving brothers, but are even more loving and more accepting of other people. Another thing that has changed has been Jeanette, some of you knew her before a year ago, and if you knew her well, except at work where she did a good job of keeping it hidden, you know that she was a worrier. She worried about a lot of stuff, not everything but a lot of stuff. This was something she struggled with, and I did as well, I am not a worrier, which of course did not help the situation. Before a year ago, Jeanette struggled with Letting go and Letting God, she wanted to but didn’t know how.

About this time last year, we got the news our baby would have Downs Syndrome. We went through what I am coming to think of as the “normal” stages of dealing with this news. We grieved; We thought about all the thing she would NOT be able to do; We wondered if we would be able to love her as much as our boys. As we were going through this I prepared to listen and assure Jeanette it was going to be okay and to answer all the “yeah but…” questions/statements. They never came. At one point I had worked though a lot of the process and I came out of it having given it to God and was walking with him and his loving Spirit. I think I actually made the statement, “It’s going to be okay.”  ready with the answers, or at least ready to deal with the “I know but…” instead I was met with “Your right”.  She had truly given it to God and was walking with him. The amazing thing about this is it was not just that one time, since then Jeanette has Let go and Let God in more ways then you can imagine. And, as promised by Jesus, it has been okay. We have had some rough times, but they make us stronger.  

Two things, which God has used to teach me recently, come to mind when thinking about the rough times. The first if from a devotional Jeanette and I are starting called Songs in the Key of  Solomon This particular devotional was talking about treating marriage as a marathon rather than a sprint, especially in the hard times. Not to rush though it but rather take is slow, learn the lesson, feel the burn if you will, it will only make you stronger.

The second thing, I was catching up on our older TV shows on the DVR and was watching an episode of the Big Give (if you haven’t been watching this, you should… a great example of paying it forward with Oprah) The premise of the show is that contestants are given time and money to go out and Give Big, they often use the money they have to host events to raise even more money and sometimes they just give it away.  The show has been on for a while and you can see that some of the contestants are starting to understand that it is not always about money that just being there is what people need, my good friend Robert calls this the “Ministry of Presence” At any rate one of the contestants had given some money to an outreach program, had served some of the visitors dinner he then went into the kitchen to help with this dishes. While there he was working with a young man who proceeded to tell his story, after the army and collage he had started doing drugs and had lost everything, but he was trying to stay clean. He has 4 kids and has been clean for 7 1/2 months and was working at the shelter as part of his community service.  The contestant then asked him, “what can I do to help you?” The young man replied, “You already have. You came in here and did not look down on me because I was doing community service, you worked with me, side-by-side, you listened to my story, and you treated me with respect.” The contestant said in a voice over, “I am starting to see that it’s not always about giving money” Then (this is the second thing God touched me with) the young man went on to say “I have learned that no matter how bad it seems, no matter how rough life gets, there is ALWAYS someone who is worse off than I am. It is because of knowing this that I am ALWAYS thankful, no matter what.”

So a year later, I can say I agree with that young man, no matter how bad it seems I try to be thankful; And I try not to sprint through the rough patches but rather take time to learn the lesson, thank God for the opportunity to grow, maybe personally, maybe closer to my spouse or friends or kids, maybe closer to Him, but if I take my time, I will grow, especially if I walk with God.  I will leave you with.  Psalm 117

 Peace,

Proud Papa

Today was an interteresting day which marks the beginning of the end of my corporate career.  I wrote yesterday of my dad’s dream of becoming a priest finally coming to fruition, well today is the first step of an answered prayer…  being able to be with my kids full time.  Yes, today I gave my resignation to Dell.  I am excited and a little nervous.  I have been working since I was 16 years old, so this will be a definite paradigm shift.  I will be with Dell through the end of the month and then I can give my kids the full time mommy they deserve.  The process was a little tough.  We have been working for quite some time now to be able to financially make this move.  God has been laying one opportunity after another in our path over the last two years and we finally made it.  The last 24 hours has been rough, I barely slept last night dreading the conversation that I would have with my manager today.  Having just come through year end reviews and doing well, I felt a little guilty about leaving my team.  Of course one Sydney smile and an Anthony hug can quickly shrug that guilt away in no time flat.  As I showed up for my 1×1 meeting with my manager today I was reminded of taking Anthony to his 3 year doctor’s appointment last year.  When we arrived at the clinic, Anthony excitedly announced that he was getting shots.  Yikes, how do I break it to him that shots are not fun and they will hurt, only for a short time, but hurt nonetheless.  Although I tried to gently warn him, the poor kid never saw it coming.  Like Anthony, poor Paul never knew what was coming.  When I arrived for my meeting he was innocently taken by surprise at my ”out of the blue” announcement.  Now, for the record, I am very happy with my job, with my manager, team, business partners and Dell itself.  It has been a good four year run for me.  The problem is that they cannot compare to the joy that I find in my family.  My heart is with my kids and that’s where I will be.  One of the benefits of leaving the corporate world is that I will be avaliable to focus more energy on the Down Syndrome community and do some volunteer work.   Praise God for answering my prayer!

My dad was in town this last week.  Due to a tyrannical job that he works, he has been unable to break away and come visit in almost two years.  The main reason for his visit was to attend Orientation for the Episcopal Seminary here in Austin.  He will be starting a one year program in September to take the final step of becoming a priest.  We are so proud of him and glad that he will finally be able to fulfill a life long dream.  Although seeing my dad was wonderful, the BEST part of the visit is that this was the first time he got to meet Sydney.  The two of them got along famously.  Was there any doubt?  We had a great time together on this short visit and we are so excited about having him come here in the fall.  Unfortunately, my mom couldn’t make the trip this time.  She is holding off for a longer summer visit.  We missed her, but enjoyed the time with dad/grandpa.