One Year Ago

One year ago, today, we were making snowballs, eating snowcones, and building snowmen.

That November snow ended up being our "winter" for the season.

I'm glad we enjoyed it at the time!

Jonah had a blast freezing his teeth while waiting for the school bus.

And also trying to freeze Daddy's teeth.

Today, we have about half of our leaves still on the trees; the zinnias and dahlias are still blooming!

The Columbia River started making its own clouds as the water evaporated and condensed in the cold air.  It was a pretty sight.

Hopefully, despite an anticipated warm and dry forecast for this winter, 

it won't be long before we get a dose of snow.

Autumn Arrival

Autumn has arrived!

It was pouring rain most of the weekend, but Jonah and I took advantage of a small sun break to go leaf hunting.

Our little cutie is sporting an entire outfit of handmedowns.  

Jacket: Jennifer

Long johns: Amy

Boots: Kerry

Thanks to all our friends---we are so grateful!

We have been super fortunate to visit the Oregon Coast twice this past month, and, I'm just realizing now, this outfit has been a staple.

Jonah currently loves learning about the ocean and deep sea creatures, the solar system and understanding why we have day, night, years, seasons, tides, gravity, etc.

However, he thinks to get a "new moon" you pop the old one....so we have a little more to cover.

Jonah is thriving in his role as older brother.  He is currently teaching Ezra sign language and is always very observant of his brother's needs.

I love this little guy so much!

Halloween coincided with one of our very rainy days,
which made staying indoors perfect for pumpkin carving.

Thanks Old Mom for the pumpkins!

But it wasn't too rainy...Jonah got all dressed up for Trick-or-Treating.

For Halloween Jonah wanted to be the main character from the children's show Tumble Leaf.  So here he is as Fig the Fox (along with his best friend Stick).  BIG thanks to Nanna for letting me use her sewing machine for the hat....and for also being so patient (late into the night) while I figured out how to make the darn thing with ears that stand up.  Jonah says he wants be be Fig again next year too.  Whew!

Happy autumn to you!

Jumps

This is Jonah, still three years old in this picture, jumping his bike at our local skate park.

As I'm sure you can tell from previous posts here and here, 

we are really proud of Jonah's love for riding.

I think one of the reasons he enjoys riding so much is because we don't push him...he enjoys figuring things out at his own pace and has fun playing with balance and momentum.

Shadow play...add a basket and we will have our own iconic ET moon rider.

Of course, bicycle advancements are not without consequence.
Most recently, Jonah dropped off an 18" rock wall (intentionally) and went over his handlebars (unintentionally) landing on his mouth.
He chipped three of his top front teeth and the one remaining intact is slowly turning gray.

I'm pondering the value of baby teeth at the moment and wondering whether a mouth guard or full face helmet might be beneficial for this little rider.

One in a Billion

Last week a renowned neurosurgeon said to me, 

"I have never told a parent that their child has as rare of an anomaly as I am telling you."

go on....

Ezra has a cleft in his spinal cord.  His spinal cord splits vertically and becomes two pieces of cord.

Diastematomyelia.

Our neurosurgeon told me that it is exceptionally rare because the cleft location is in his cervical spine.  And by rare, he means that there are EIGHT other individuals who have been identified as having a spinal cord cleft in the cervical spine....since the logging of medical records....in the world.

So I think that means that Ezra might literally be One in a Billion.

Way to go EZ!...

you continue to baffle every specialist,

challenge my threshold for heartache,

live every day happily and smiling,

and teach us that love is all you need.

I love you.