And Baby makes Four...

Riley turned one recently and she gave us two presents. The first one came out of the blue as Riley finally decided that flinging herself forward in body slams wasn't her ideal mode of transport. She finally got her co-ordination together and realized she has these things called "knees" and started crawling properly on them. We let out a huge sigh of relief because people kept telling us that maybe she missed her "window" to learn how to crawl. In the grand scheme of things we weren't extremely worried because I can't imagine that Riley was going to become an adult who had no idea how to crawl; somewhere along the way she would have figured that one out. But it's nice to see your baby do the normal things. So now our days consist of being unable to escape her. You use to be able to just set her down near her toys while you went about your business but now she is following right behind you. I went for a shower the other morning which is all the way down the other end of our house (if you haven't visited our place, it has not one but two long corridors) and no sooner had I turned the tap on then my daughter squealed with joy right behind me giving me a scare. Yes my one year old daughter managed to make me jump. She is very sneaky.

Friends warned us that we should try and put off the crawling stage as much as possible and enjoy a child

that is stationary. But seeing as she should have been doing this months ago; I think we experienced more of that than most so we can just now appreciate this new stage. But that wasn't the only present she had in store. Probably only a day or two after she learned to crawl; she began pulling herself up on furniture and moving around it. For the past few months Riley seemed to have an aversion to pulling herself up on anything but Jess and I. It's like she only trusted us to support her. But like crawling; something must have clicked. We now spend bath time trying to stop her from standing up. The other night was particularly "fun" as I had to keep sitting her back down after she stood at least eight times in a row. It's very tiring trying to keep your kid from injuring themselves but I guess this is our life now.

Riley has a developmental clinic in Brisbane coming up at the end of the month where they check in on all of her milestones as well as her health. So it's a relief that we can enter the appointment saying that she crawls and pulls herself up. However when Jess went for an appointment with Riley at our local hospital a couple of weeks ago; she made mention of how Riley is progressing. To which they responded "That's great. So does she speak four words yet?". It's like a never ending cycle. You reach one milestone and feel especially proud until they point out to you that there is another one after that. By the way we "think" she says three so she isn't doing that bad in that department.

Bub No.2 at 10 weeks

So even though it was very nice of Riley to give us a couple of presents before her birthday; we made sure we spoiled her as well. She had a wonderful party with lots of food and presents. She received dolls, jigsaw puzzles, clothes, books and so much more. But there was one gift we had in store for Riley that nobody really knew about. Riley is going to be a big sister. We are currently about three months pregnant with our second child; with the due date of August 4th. So she is going to have to wait a little while before she actually gets to meet them.We had only told a small group of people; family and close friends; But the reactions we we got were very funny. It has been a mixture of shock and excitement. Mostly shock. People were not expecting us to have another kid so soon so it takes them a moment to realise that we are serious. Even one of our friends humorously made note that "You guys were keen". The news was completely unexpected to us as well to be honest. We had planned to fall pregnant maybe at the end of 2015; so it was a surprise to find out we already were. We went through quite a lot to get pregnant with Riley so it's kind of a relief in a way to find out that it's happening without any of the stress or impatience that we experienced the first time.

I am going to address something that may be on your mind right about now. I think the question that some people would be too polite to ask though couldn't help but wonder when they hear that we are having another baby is "What are the chances of a congenital heart defect happening to the next one?". Can lightning strike twice? The answer is it's possible but it's rare. There are families out there who have not just a kid but kids with congenital heart defects; in fact if you already have one with CHD then your odds increase. However it is definitely not the norm. So even though we have confidence and trust God for everything to be alright; prayers are always welcome. We are still two months away from a scan that could give us those answers. In the meantime we are believing in faith that our next child won't have to deal with the kind of challenges that Riley has had to deal with.

But for now we put all of that aside and just celebrate this new addition to the family and the promotion Riley has gotten from being an only child to a big sister. Big responsibility on her shoulders but we are sure she will do just fine! Happy Birthday Riley!