Why I run...

So, if you know me, you know I am preparing to run my first (and probably only) 1/2 Marathon soon! I am hoping just to survive the experience but am looking forward to seeing all this hard work 'pay off' (i.e. I finish the 13.1 miles!). 'Meredith' you ask 'why do you want to do this? you are not a runner?'. Right you are! Even the fact that the registration form/waiver says "athletes signature" kind of freaks me out because I am by no means an athlete. I do have my reasons for running and I thought I'd share them! Besides the 'check it off the bucket list', here is why I really run. Because I can. I am not trying to be glib or sassy in saying that. I run because there was a time when I couldn't. To spare you a very long story, when I was a freshman in college I got really really sick with a lung infection. It wasn't exactly life or death but required surgery and 9 months of medication and it left my lungs weakened and me unable to work out much at all, let alone run. I was never really a 'runner', in grade school I could run the mile without too much effort but I was never the fastest or the slowest. But when I COULDN'T do something it made me mad. I couldn't hold my breath underwater for as long when swimming, I couldn't do 20 minutes on an elliptical without being sick, couldn't run 1/4 mile without stopping, etc. With my personality, if you tell me I can't do something you might as well have told me I have to. So between grad school, having a baby, etc I've never made found the time to train. Having a toddler really doesn't help in the extra time department but I decided that before I am no longer 30 I want to finish this goal! This whole goal makes me think of the verse from Hebrews 12 "...let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." Not just because of the word race, but because of the persistence and time it has taken to get to the point of being ready for the race. I wish I would set my eyes on Jesus and put the same effort into my pursuit of him. I would desire to spend time thinking on him, studying him, learning about him. However, just like in my pursuit of the 13.1, I often let other things get in my way and don't prioritize my time. I don't want someone or something telling me "you can't" to help shift my priorities. I want my love and desire to worship our Savior to capture my time! I want my time, words, and actions to reflect what is important to me. That is why I run. That is why I will continue the race with perseverance.

Chatty Cathy

So first of all, after I wrote the title, I realized I feel sorry for anyone named Cathy because I am sure at some point in their life they were referenced as a "Chatty" or a "Not so Chatty" Cathy. Anyway....that was way out of left field!

So I had an old copy of the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventory from grad school (I've since used it a couple times at work) so I brought it home and Jason, Harper, and I filled it out tonight. Among other things it includes a vocabulary checklist (divided into categories such as Descriptive Words, Pronouns, Prepositions, Question Words, etc.). We used this to calculate Harper's total number of words said spontaneously as of today, 4/3/2012. She gets a new one almost every day so if we did this in another week it would probably be different. She currently has 186 words!!! That is so wild to me. But this mommyspeech-languagepathologist is very happy with that. I included Harper in the "help to fill it out" because we talked about it at dinner and she would pipe in every now in then with a word that we would be talking about "Does she understand what ___ means?" or "Does she say this spontaneously?". I am saving this in her baby book and will fill it out again maybe around her second birthday. I am just including it in the blog mostly for our families who I will probably forget to tell!


PS- If you are ever concerned about your child's language or speech please don't hesitate to ask your pediatrician for a referral for an evaluation. If they try to 'yeah yeah' you but you are still concerned press the issue. It never hurts to check it out and in most cases your insurance will pay for all or most of the cost of the evaluation.

Harper at 18 months "Doggle"

So I am writing this a few days late, but such is life with an 18 month old. So sad to see the sweet babyness fly by so quickly. We have a full blown toddler on our hands. For anyone that reads this (my mom), here are Harper's stats at 18 months (I will update this with height and weight after our Dr's appointment on Friday):
Speech and language: we have lost count of the number of words this child says. It is literally in the 100's now. However, many of those are word approximations that Jason and I would probably have to translate or you'd need a context to figure out (i.e. /mok/ is milk, /Emo/ is Elmo, /dada/ is that that, meaning 'what is that?' or 'I want that', /dIt/ is sit, etc.). She also says many words really clearly, too, now, like Toby (she rarely says "TobyDog" any more or "dog dog"). We are thrilled that she is saying everyone's name in the family, now. Guhdaddy is grandaddy, mamama is grandmother, Poppa and Nonnie are just as they sound, Katie is Tatie, and Meghan is /DedIn/. She says something for Rusty but we can't figure it out. She also can say "I love you" now which is probably my favorite word/phrase that she has ever said besides 'Mommy'. She also wants to know who loves her so at night or in the car she will ask "Daddy" and I have to say "Daddy loves you" or else she repeats it until I say that. She will run through everyone in the family, even Toby, until she is told that everyone loves her. She also likes to talk about all the kids in her class and I can even tell the ones who get in trouble a lot because she'll say "No no Jojo!". She is putting lots of words together, now, like "Mama sit" or "Good dog" or "no no dog dog". She understands SO much, a lot more than we even give her credit for, and we have to remember to be so careful what we say around her. For instance, I was on the phone with mom mom today and I said "Jason" and Harper says "Daddy?" she knows that Jason=Daddy. She also knows that 'not' and 'don't' are words of negation because if I say "Daddy isn't coming home yet" or "We don't have any juice" she says 'no'. She also has difficulty understanding things like why we have to obey mommy and daddy the FIRST time and why we can't eat the ENTIRE box of cheerios, etc. etc.
Motor skills: In February we enrolled Harper in JumpBunch, a class for toddler's that teaches motor skills in a non-competitive environment. They work on throwing, balance, kicking, etc. Our favorites they have done so far are karate and golf! We have already seen improvement in her throwing and balance and love that she can participate while she is at daycare. Harper can run and jump and balance while walking on a curb (with a hand being held), and she can climb up the steps of her playset and go down the slide all by herself, even decaring "yaid!" . She can climb up onto almost anything and gets down off the couch or bed easily. Sometimes the climbing is a bit of an issue!
General development: Harper enjoys being where we are and doing what we do. She likes to 'help' and generally is 'helpful' if we give her a way to help (i.e. give her a broom while I sweep, etc.). She also is really getting into pretend play and likes to make her babies or animals do things like she would do (swing, slide, eat, walk, etc.). She tends to be fairly bossy with her play and directs everyone as to what to do! :-) I don't know anyone that was like that! ;-) She enjoys reading out of her Bible and often gets mad if you don't pick it to read (though she can't make it through a whole story, generally). She says "bible" with a really southern accent, which is so funny! She enjoys all of her other books as well and we often have to read several books at a time. She pretends to read some on her own, as well, and even has memorized parts of some books (usually just one word at a time). We are also working on praying, which she enjoys, but does not want to pause on the eating to pray!

As for 'doggle'...this is a word that she says frequently and we think it is hilarious but we have no clue what it means! Maybe one day we'll figure it out!!!

Time

Yesterday Jason and I had the wonderful pleasure of going to see BB King perform in Montgomery. It was such a fabulous show and it was nice to see a true musician put on such a classy performance (I love that the entire band wears tuxedos!). After the show Jason and I got lured into Krispy Kreme by the Hot Doughnuts Now sign. Auburn- why no Krispy Kreme? Anyway, that is not the point of this post. The point is, I took my own President's Day holiday because I knew I would be worthless today because we got home so late. SO, I had all day to hang out with my little girl (oh yeah, and do massive loads of laundry). I have been reading a book recently World Enough and Time (have I already blogged about that? If so, then I am still in the process of reading it because of..well, that pesky little Time.). In the book there is a section devoted to what the author calls "Child Time". Child time is the time that children have free of demands and chores and outside influences, "time to muse and dream and do a blissful kind of nothing". Most examples of child time are out of doors. We as adults rarely understand child time, we try to do everything on our crazy warp speed adult time. At the end of every chapter in the book she gives you assignments. The one at the end of this chapter was to take a walk in child time. I decided today I would let Harper take me on a walk at her speed. Which we have never done. I always put her in the stroller and we go at my speed (which is usually a slow run). Oh, she always seems to have a good time but I thought this would be a good exercise for both of us just to go at her pace. It was HARD for me. I kept wanting to direct her saying "no, let's go this way" or "Don't walk in those leaves, you'll get dirty" but I just bit my tongue for the most part and let her go. As long as she held my hand while we were in the road. It was such fun! We picked flowers (weeds) and found that they had little purple spots on them in the shape of hearts. She was fascinated by the water trickling down the gutter. We watched the ants try to cross the water. We listened to birds. "bird! bird!" she says. We walked over to my neighbor's car several times so she could see the Aubie tail hanging on the back "hi Aubie!". As we went for a rather meandering walk that took a long time but we didn't go very far (I never considered going back to a place you had already investigated) we just got to enjoy creation. After a gloomy, rainy weekend it was nice to just be outside in the sun and see things in child time and from Harper's perspective. While walking my neighbor's son and his friend were out playing basketball. I heard the friend ask "Do you have a basketball game for your X-Box? Can we play it?" Really? You are outside on the gorgeous day playing real basketball and you want to go inside and play pretend basketball? It made me sad. I want Harper to enjoy Child Time as long as she can. I hope that she prefers REAL to X-Box (not that we will ever own one). If you have time I would a) recommend reading World Enough and Time, by Christian McEwen and b) take a walk on Child Time. "Go for a walk at the pace of a small child. Saunter, wander, loiter, look around; allow yourself to pause and to digress". No agendas.

Video of Harper talking

Even though my one year old rarely sits still, I caught her in a rare moment of cooperation but obviously some of these words still had to be prompted. She says all of these spontaneously, though. And a lot more, too! Enjoy!

Love

With Valentine's Day fast approaching all the stores look like some pink and red heart fairy has exploded all over! (Not to mention all the Easter stuff that is already out...but that is another post). I actually really do like Valentine's Day, I always thought it was fun to send your friends cute cards and you know any excuse to eat candy is okay by me. But LOVE has gotten so distorted in our society many people loathe Valentine's Day because it represents something they think they should have but don't. Anyway, I recently read this blog post, a response to the Huffington Post article "How to Talk to Little Girls", and I just had to share it with you. If you've read this blog before you know my take on the futility of trying to get joy from worldly things (and also how I feel about Proactive! Curious? Read this!. As a completely random thought- they no longer play those commercials. Thankfully.) However, as a mother (I think this should apply to any mother, not just mothers of girls) I am constantly questioning how I can instill in my daughter the idea that she has worth beyond what the world can give her. One of my 'resolutions' for this year is to be more intentional about modeling my faith to Harper and more intentional about talking with her about it. While she may watch me fail at that again and again, I want her to understand the simplicity of the love of God. He loves you. The end. No "what if..." or "I didn't..". He. Loves. YOU. Below is an excerpt from the blog I referenced before. This is how the author says he will talk to his little girl:
“I love you. I love the way your hair rolls into ringlets and falls into your eyes. I love the way you read yourself books, even though you can’t read. I love the way you dance and twirl around the kitchen. I love the way you wave at cars that pass on our walks. I love the way you scream “Dad” in the middle of the night. I love the way you say “do it again” when we do something fun. I even love the permanent marker custom design you put on my new Mac. But as much as I love you, Jesus loves you more. I sacrifice a lot because I love you, but Jesus sacrificed everything because he loves you. So if somewhere along the way you fail a test or love a boy who does not love you back or have a mastectomy or develop Alzheimers or gain some weight or lose a job, you will still hold infinite value because Jesus loves you. No matter what. You are loved exactly as you are. Always.”

Always.

15 months- a little late

Harper at 15 months (on Christmas Eve):
-I seriously can't even count the number of words this child says. New (ish) ones that I haven't listed on the blog before include: Grandaddy (dadadi), Grandmother (mamama), rock (as in on a horse or in a chair), bed, eat, door, open, close, roar (lion/tiger/dinosaur sound), horse, moo, meow, no maam, no way, good dog, sit, treat, tree, teeth, sign for drink, baby doll, happy (pronounced "Abby"), button, walk, bus, truck, ow/ouch, and go. She probably has more new ones than that but that is all Jason and I can remember. And that is plenty for a 15 month old! She puts together novel two word utterances now, like 'mama button' meaning "mama's button". She also copies us (when she feels like it) doing funny things like finishing the old Tom Jones song...if we say "What's new pussy cat..." she says "whoaaaa". Jason also thinks getting her to repeat the diadochokinetic rate ("puh tuh kuh") is funny. And she does it fairly well. I recently gave Harper a standardized language test. She scored a 128 on her understanding of language (following directions, understanding what certain nouns and verbs mean, etc.) and a 129 on her use of language (number of words she says, social use of language, etc.). Her overall language age was one year, eleven months. That is 9 months ahead of her actual age! Her age equivalency on the language use subtest was 2 years!
- Sassiness. Unfortunately (and fortunately) Harper is learning how to stand up for herself. She tells Toby 'no maam' if he accidentally knocks her down and shakes her finger at him. She also sasses us occasionally and tells US no. We are having to find other ways (NOT using the word 'no') to correct her behavior (i.e. 'feet down', 'be sweet', etc.). Sometimes she tells herself 'no' as she is doing something she shouldn't. I am not sure if she is trying to correct her own behavior or just remembering that she was told 'no' when she did it before!
- Social- she is fitting in well in her now not so new daycare class. She still does not like it if the kids get really rowdy and cries sometimes if it gets too crazy in her room, but overall she has adjusted well and is slowly learning to play with the other kids. She also tries to correct her friends at school sometimes when I pick her up, telling them 'no' if they are doing something she thinks they shouldn't. She thinks she is everyone's little mama. She takes a few minutes to warm up to new situations but once she has she wants to be the center of attention. When we flew to Virginia a few days ago she got the chance to wave to the entire plane and ate it up! She did her queen wave!
-Physical- Harper is quite the climber now. She will declare 'rock rock' and climb in her rocking chair in her room and sit and rock. She can climb on everything now! She also jumps now (in her bed!). She is still very much into dancing. And swinging between us if we each have a hand while we are walking.
Misc.- Harper's pretend play skills are really developing. She loves to feed her babies and makes eating and drinking sounds when she does it! She will also brush the baby's hair and carry it around. Her new play kitchen has been quite a hit, too, and she enjoys stirring things on her stove like mom!
Well, that is Harper lately. I find it hard to believe the difference between this Christmas and last year! Time goes by too fast!