Monday, December 12, 2011
39 weeks....1 to go...maybe....
Monday, November 28, 2011
36 weeks and counting down....
Waiting on Declan...I cannot believe he is ALMOST here! I am overwhelmed, excited, anxious, nervous, happy, excited, scared, excited!!! :) Declan Meyer Gilreath is about to be in our lives and Joshua and I could not be MORE excited!!! We are anxiously awaiting his appearance and planning for the big day!
Tuesday, November 1, 2011
Baby got Gap...
This comes directly as a result of spending a fair portion of my Saturday morning arranging baby clothes…
I don’t quite understand how it is that those tasked with the designing of clothes with months in multiples of three seem to get their measurements so perfectly. I mean, one day a kid is good to go for three months wearing 0-3, then all of a sudden he is pigeon-holed into a very specific time-frame, in clothes labeled “3 Mos”. Two days later he has to move on to 3-6, because the stop on three is very short indeed. I can only imagine that this is because those times must mean something.
I, thusly, have made the decision to only buy clothes with specific ages (3 mos, 6 mos, one-year, etc.) for equally specific, and event-appropriate milestone events:
Newborn /0 Months – Baby Gap sleeper for coming home from the hospital. Navy, Oxford grey stripes, footies… cute as can be…
3 months – one black Jones New York suit, skinny-ish tie, pressed blue oxford shirt for first job interview.
· These are tough times in this economy, so any additional family income helps, and I feel like this kid may be an over-achiever anyway. I will not limit him.
6 months - One pair of khakis and a polo, Kenneth Cole loafers for first day of work… entry level.
· It took him a few months to get here, but everyone knows it’s tough to get jobs right now. Three months is forgivable, and his mother and I were happy to support him as he lived with us.
9 months – Tuxedo, black. Work dinner… being honored for exemplary leadership and great numbers in the third quarter.
· His boss appreciates and rewards his youth, his new ideas, his ambition, and his MILF. He doesn’t mention all of these in his speech, but I can see it in his eyes. (On a side-note, his boss came onto both his mother and I at the event, and it was all quite confusing).
12 months (AKA, one year) – Second Tuxedo (midnight blue, because, along with tact, he’s added a palpable amount of confidence to his arsenal of traits). His first formal event to honor his philanthropic endeavors.
· Having been recently promoted (taking his sexually deviant boss’ job), he has the expendable income to pursue his lifelong desire to build playgrounds in Africa. Some find it in poor taste to promote heavy exercise for children in areas where potable drinking water is scarce, but those people don’t have events like this thrown for them, do they?
18 months – One pair of pleated khakis, one over-sized golf shirt, and boat shoes. Retirement.
· After breaking away to start his own companies, and then almost single-handedly jump-starting a second Dot-com boom, he surprises the world and announces an early retirement in Forbes Magazine. What began as a start-up in his father’s spare bedroom (with the i-Changing-Pad), and ended with the amalgamation of businesses (ranging from social media, to health-conscious baby food vending machines, to defense contracting), had come to change the world in ways that would have made Steve Jobs piss his diapers.
· He shortly thereafter moves on to days filled with early mornings at McDonald’s, followed by other McDonald’s inside various Wal-Marts, then alternating between visiting the bank and Walgreen’s every other hour, golf, using exact change to pay for all purchases, doctor’s appointments, and Skyping with his grand-parents.
24 months-2T – I feel as though he probably has his sartorial selections under control from this point. Let him be his own man, you know?
These timelines may be slightly off, as this is my first child, but I feel the details to be fairly represented… thanks for reading.
Friday, October 28, 2011
33 weeks....
Declan Meyer GilreathSunday, October 23, 2011
32 weeks and counting down...
I have been terrible about keeping my blog updated. I am so sorry...
Friday, October 21, 2011
Don't Act Like You're Not Impressed...
One thing important to winning your father’s love is impressing him.
Sons have been using this method for millennia. Some try to make good grades, conquer foreign lands, and walk on the moon (these are considered “ideal”). Others have blown up buildings, initiated Ponzi schemes, and killed their fathers (these are generally considered “terrible ideas”, and I would not recommend them).
Now, Declan, you may have a hard time with me, because it comes as no secret that I am not easily impressed. I have seen pictures of the Great Wall, and I think I would have assigned it a less haughty nomenclature… Long Wall, maybe? Or Okay Wall, sure, but “Great” is a little pretentious.
Just a hint: I am in no way impressed by celebrity status of any kind… If a famous person has done something amazing, I respect their achievement, but, unlike most Americans, I could not care less if I get a “star’s” autograph. I once stood in line directly behind Dan-Freaking-Marino and didn’t say a word to him because he was with his family and I, unlike the other idiots in line, didn’t think it prudent to ask him to sign my Atlanta Braves gear.
I am not impressed simply because you are on TV…If I saw Chaz Bono in Wal-Mart, alternating between the women’s blouse and men’s overalls sections, you could be assured that he/she would be surrounded by “fans” at some point or another. Take solace in the fact, my son, that I would not be one of them, as he does not impress me simply because he is the son of a another trans-gendered famous person and is dancing on TV. Now, the doctors who switched up his indoor to outdoor plumbing get some kudos from me, although I don’t see anyone from either side of the gender divide taking the “bait”. Hang in there Buddy/Chick…
This is all to say that, although you will certainly be tempted to do something amazing to impress me in the future, I will accept you being my son as impressive enough.
Whether you come out as a musical prodigy or genius, or whether you come out as a gay Asian child who can’t do math or karate, I will be impressed… because you are my son, and that is something that I have been looking forward to a long time.
Now if you want to be a prodigy and make us some coin in the process, I will not stand in your way…
Monday, October 3, 2011
29+ weeks and counting...
Monday, September 26, 2011
28 weeks down...12 to go....
Sunday, September 18, 2011
26 weeks and counting...
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Long legs and dimples like Daddy...
Declan bent over his loooong legs.
Long legs just like Daddy.
There is that sweet baby smile!
Hands in front of the face...profile.I had an amazing experience today at work. I got asked to help demonstrate a new ultrasound machine in radiology. I thought at first it was just a normal ultrasound and was ecstatic to see Mr. Declan again. Since we had only seen him once since we found out he was a boy. I had been having a couple dreams that made me worried it was a girl...no worries. ALL BOY! Like I said I had expected just a FREE plain ultrasound when in fact I got to experience a 3D/4D ultrasound! AMAZING! Declan defiantly put on a show for al the ultrasound techs...very active little guy! We saw him wrap his legs up by his face, cup his hands over his face, suck his thumb, kick and turn, stretch, and SMILE! Some of the techs were trying to get a shot of his face but he kept keeping his arms and hands in the way. One of the made a comment like, "I wish he would move his hands." About that time...his hands moved away from his face and he smiles...DIMPLES and all! It's almost like he said, "Here...take my picture!" Just like his Daddy, my baby boy with sweet dimples and very long legs. I am IN LOVE!!!
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
24+weeks....
Friday, August 19, 2011
23 weeks....
Sunday, August 7, 2011
The Cave Man...
Whitney wants me to write about our baby, but I find it very hard to write about someone who I have not met, and about whom I, generally, have no reference point other than the knowledge we share at least a portion of some very superior genes.
I would think it comparable to writing a report of some sort about someone trapped in a cave in your neighborhood… (not as unlikely as it sounds in our area of Kentucky, due to our system of underground caves and the local peoples’ proclivity for doing stupid things in a dry/moist county).
There are several things that are clear concerning this trapped man in the cave:
-He’s definitely in there (a couple soil tests and an expensive cave specialist made that abundantly clear)
-It’s definitely a dude in there (we’ll leave the details of this knowledge out at this juncture).
-How he got in there is an unverifiable mystery, but not entirely a mistake.
-He may have memory loss, so it’s probably best no one ever tells him how he got in there… ever.
-Communication is kind of a one-way street.
-You hear and sometimes feel him poking around in there through the walls, but can't get to him.
-Although he is way down in there, you can pass him food and nourishment through a tunnel beginning at a massive opening at the north end that rarely closes up.
-He has to come out of there eventually (I would suggest the same way he got in there, but, remember, no one’s sure how that happened so we may have to look at alternate routes).
-There are going to be pain-killers involved in his exit.
-Everyone will be overwhelmed and happy when he finally escapes.
-Everyone hopes he emerges with all emotional, physical, and intellectual faculties completely and totally intact, because that’s the most important thing in a rescue of this nature.
As you can see, there’s not a ton to know about this constricted cave character until we actually get him out.
I mean, how do I know I’ll even like him once he does escape? How do I know he’ll like me? Will we have anything in common? Will he be a lot like me, and is that a good thing, necessarily? What if he starts yelling at me for no good reason, because he thinks it’s my fault he was trapped in there in the first place (it better be my fault, Whitney)? How am I going to react to the effects of his PTSD, all the screaming and the nightmares? I feel like he’ll want to live with us, at least for a little while, and I wonder how that’s going to go? How long is it going to be before this cave man gets a job and pulls his own weight around here? There are just so many variables and things up in the air that, until he’s actually here, in sight, it’s hard to know what to think about first.
All I know is that we can’t wait to get him out of there, clean him up, take him home, and love him like we’ve never loved any other stranger before.
And he can live with us for at least until he can take care of himself again… even if it takes ten years.
Oh, and I give him about four more months before we drop some serious cash and get that cave specialist to blast him out of there, because this is taking forever…
… time to go…
Joshua
Friday, August 5, 2011
***21 weeks***
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
19 weeks and counting....
So I am a week behind but Oh Well. :)
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
18 weeks...
Crazy Dreams...
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
DECLAN MEYER GILREATH
It's official....it's a boy! We are so excited to finally know that little "nugget" now has a name, Declan Meyer Gilreath. Everyone continues to ask where this name came from. We had the hardest time finding a girls name but immediately when we both saw this name we feel in love. It's gaelic which both of our family ancestry traces back to gaelic so we chose to go with the name besides it's sooo cute! We love it and our families are getting use to it. :)
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
What a funny feeling...
15 weeks
Today, Tuesday June 28th around 7:25 ish this morning, I felt the baby move for the first time! :) Ok...so all the usual, " It feels like butterflies, flutters, tickles, gas, etc."... Mine didn't feel like that. More pertinent to modern, everyday sensations, it felt like a cell phone vibrating on my right side. I was bent over tying my shoes when I felt it, kind-of ignored it then proceeded to tie the other shoe. Again, same feeling. I then stopped, sat back, and felt it for a few more seconds. I then KNEW what it was... no doubt in my mind. I was in shock for a second then yelled for Joshua to tell him of my excitement!