Week 157: The first three years of life

We made it.  Lemon is 3.  What a year he (and we) have had.  Weeks and weeks of oral antibiotics.  Two hospitalizations and two courses of IV antibiotics.  A surgery.  Something like 400 hours of time spent in the vest.  4.5 liters of nebulized medications.  Over 100 liters of Pediasure. And all the usual shenanigans of having a bright, active, curious, opinionated two year old--including a broken arm.  And an infant doing his thing alongside.  I had every anticipation that the 0/2 year was going to be a doozy, and it did not disappoint.  I am (mostly) not disappointed to have it in the rear view mirror, and am looking forward to seeing what the 1/3 year has to offer.







Lemon and Nona have birthdays just a day apart, so we had a joint birthday party for them on Saturday. Lemon was a bit skeptical about the consumption of birthday cake (cake being a food after all), but Lime really showed him how it was done.  

Lemon got lots of nice things for his birthday--a new backpack to carry to three-year-old nursery school in a few weeks, a new tricycle, some more Duplos, and so forth. 

The birthday celebration continued at Fire Station Fun Day at our local fire station.  In spite of his fascination with fire trucks, it took Lemon a while to work up the courage to actually get up close to one and climb inside.  Once he warmed up to the idea, though, he had a good time.

One change that we've really seen just over the last week or two is the blossoming of the relationship between Lemon and Lime.  Lemon has figured out that Lime is his #1 best audience and will crack up into peals of baby laughter if Lemon does anything even remotely amusing.  He's also figured out that Lime has the potential to be fun to play with.  Unfortunately, he hasn't fully mastered the whole concept of "playing with" someone, so "playing with" will quickly devolve into either "grabbing from" or "sitting on."  But, the potential is there and I'm looking forward to watching it grow over the next year.

Earlier today, a friend of mine posted a picture of himself and his brother getting ready to run a marathon together, and it's really stuck with me, but it took me until mid-way through mowing the lawn to figure out why.  It stuck with me because this is something I want so much for my two little guys--to grow into the kind of men who will run marathons together in their 40's.  We CF families live very much in the present, and I try not to dwell too much on what the future may bring. But during this birthday week, I can dare to dream a little. Here's wishing for health and happiness for all of you, and all of us, in the year to come.