On December 1, 2017 at 1:35 in the afternoon, my husband and I welcomed our newest addition to our family, a baby boy we named Everett Ryan.
Everett was due on Christmas Eve; however, he had decided to grace the world with his presence at 36 weeks and 5 days. He was 6 pounds 7 oz and 20 inches long, and I can't imagine how much bigger he would be with an additional 3 weeks. I never would have thought we would end up in the NICU, but we did when his blood sugar count came back at a 15 (avg 40-60) and he immediately was whisked into the NICU while I was wheeled to my room and forced to wait.
17 days.
17 days we were in the NICU.
I need to write a whole post or more on our stay in the NICU, but this post is about how
Mother Goose Time created some normalcy for my family when nothing was normal at all.
With Everett and I in the NICU, it was Daddy and MGT to the rescue for our girl. Due to our situation, Jason requested paternity leave for the month of December and was approved.
Praise the Lord!
I showed Jason the teacher guides and the daily discovery bags and told him to just pick one that looked interesting for them to do together. So he did.
We could only visit Everett every 3 hours- on the 3 o'clocks, 6, 9 and 12. In between I would pump, eat, and try to visit Jason and Avaleigh. Sometimes, I would make it home, set up MGT for Daddy and then leave again.
I was able to catch them in action when I came home one morning and snapped this pic above.
They built an igloo here for one of her little bird toys using our cube manipulatives from the
They made snowflakes, practiced tracing her name with glue and a paintbrush, used glitter (that's true love right there! Jason hates glitter), built igloos, played games and puzzles, and of course read many, many books. Jason would take pictures of their learning and send them to me throughout the day.
MGT made it so easy to pull a bag, set up the activities, and leave to go back to the hospital for me. All the while, creating simple opportunities for my husband to continue fostering Avaleigh's learning, and giving them activities to have fun together and keep her everyday pretty normal.
As chaotic as our December was, Mother Goose Time made our month manageable, provided memory making opportunities for my husband and little girl, and kept a sense of normalcy to our crazy days.
This little school bus box is more then just preschool curriculum-
it's a lifesaver for days you barely know how to survive.
Avaleigh and Everett holding hands Christmas morning 2017.
