No pacifier - no problem

As I wrote on Saturday, we took away Anna's pacifier after her second birthday. We told her that big girls no longer got pacifiers and the bowl in which we kept her pacifier no longer has one in it.

At the first nap on Saturday, she asked for it and didn't sleep. That night, she again asked for it. I told her that big girls didn't use pacifiers and she was a big girl now. Wanting to give her something in return, I told her that big girls got to read longer stories at night also and have read to her loner bedtime stories from bigger books each night. She asked for it again the next day, but hasn't asked for it since. The first night (Saturday) was the only night she had trouble getting to sleep. But, she hasn't napped since removing her pacifier.

The reading longer stories has worked well. A couple of nights, she has wanted to read her smaller board books that rhyme. Also, there is also the occasional night she barely wants us to read at all because she is so tired. She just says, "night night daddy, night night" and that is our hint to leave.

Anna has handled not having a pacifier extremely well. I think we took it away at the right time as she was able to make good decisions about it. That said, I am tempted to get rid of Madelyn's now so as to not deal with it in 1.5 years. :-)

While you were out...

I took a couple trips in the last week, one to Philly and another to Austin. During those trips I came home to some changes in my girls. Maddie started saying Dadadada as recorded here by Heather and Anna is now able to go through her whole color book and name all of the colors. Previously, Anna could only name "pink", which is fitting since that is what she wears everyday.

Its tough being away from home and missing these little milestones...but thanks to email and video recorders, I have at least been able to keep up to date on what they can do. That doesn't make it completely better..just not quite as bad. I have a trip to Fairfield CT and Hartford CT in the next two weeks...but those at least should just be day trips.

Moments with my little girls

I thought I would show a couple short clips of my little girls from the past week which were just some of the moments which I like to remember with my girls. After my post yesterday, I felt it was appropriate to share some of those Cinderella moments with my girls.

First, from last weekend we set out a sprinkler and Anna played in it for the first time. It was getting late and neither Heather or I felt like going to the pool...so the sprinkler seemed like a fun option to beat the heat. Here she is in a photo and video. I took the video from the deck while holding Maddie, you can hear Maddie talking the whole time:




Last night, I was on the ground playing with Anna and Maddie. When Maddie finished her tummy time, I put her in the Bumbo seat and she was thrilled by the Bunny to the point she was laughing. Here is a picture of Anna and Madelyn in their matching outfits and a video of Madelyn laughing at the bunny.



Note, Maddie still has her little Wubbanub that Lori sent us...its with her pretty much all the time.

I danced with Cinderella

I have been hearing a song often on the radio that just has been breaking me down. I think its lyrics are powerful for any father who has a little girl who may be struggling with the realization that their little girl is growing up so fast they will be dancing away from us so quick. I don't have a boy to know if its similar, but now that Anna is growing up I just realize how much more they need their daddy especially if you have a girl with a very sensitive spirit like Anna.

Back to the song..it makes me desire to cherish the moments I have with my girl more than I do now. It also reminds me to take a step away from what I am doing and hug her when I am busy with something else whether it be work or a chore around the house. The song is even more bittersweet knowing that the artist lost one of his daughters in May at 5 years old.

So, the song is called Cinderella by Steven Curtis Chapman. Here is a youtube video of his song with the story of the song at the end of the video...and of course what I stated above were the intentions behind the song:


Here are some of the lyrics:

So I will dance with Cinderella
While she is here in my arms
'Cause I know something the prince never knew
Oooooh, I will dance with Cinderella
I don't wanna miss even one song
'Cause all too soon the clock will strike midnight
And she'll be gone...

Love her smile

Madelyn is at an age where I the thing that brightens my day the most is her smile. As she grows up, I look forward to the little hugs and holding hands I get with Anna, but for now I just am enjoying this beautiful little smile. Here it is in big version...

My favorite becomes one of her favorites

My favorite book growing up was Richard Scarry's Cars Truck and Things that Go. My mom saved my copy of the book, printed in 1983 and complete with a nametag on the front from show and tell when I was a kid. The thing I loved about the book was searching for Gold Bug, a Where's Waldo like search before Waldo became there. The book is about 70 pages, so memorizing every goldbug appearance was tough. The other things, the story and the cars were interesting later, but finding Gold Bug was always the big deal. Now the book is one of Anna's favorites and she even says Gold Bug...although it comes out more like "Ba Bug!". Below is a picture. If you look close enough, you can see a sticker on the upper right hand corner of the cover with my mom's handwriting and my name on it :-)

Blessed with nearby friends and family

I blogged earlier about the grandparent factor and its importance when having more than one kid...well I thought I would follow up with how blessed we have been with nearby friends and family. Last Tuesday afternoon, Heather started having contractions around 2:45pm. At about 3:45 we called Suzanne, Heather's life-long friend, who came by and took Anna. We also called John, my good friend and roommate throughout college who took Cassie for the next 24 hours. Suzanne's husband Aaron came and helped Suzanne that night so that when Madelyn was born less than 4 hours later, Suzanne was able to come visit Madelyn while Aaron took care of Anna. That night, I came home with my mother in law and we stayed the night at home, leaving Heather alone in the hospital with Madelyn.


The next day, Suzanne took the morning off and Aaron the afternoon off. That was great. Suzanne brought Anna to the hospital to meet her sister. Anna thought she was funny and special from the beginning. Anna went home and took a nap with Aaron taking care of her in the afternoon and getting his first diaper changing experiences. Suzanne is pregnant, so he needs the practice anyway :-) That evening my good friend Derick brought me dinner while in the hospital and I went home that evening to be with Anna and Cassie.


On Thursday, when Heather was coming home, Heather's sister-in-law Stephanie came from Greensboro (~90 min drive) for the day and spent time with Anna while I went and got Heather home. They had a blast, and we were home for lunch. Stephanie left early in the evening and we were on our own.


Beyond that, we had other great help yesterday when one of our neighborhood friends, Ann, watched Anna while both Heather and I went to Madelyn's doctor appointment.

We also have been blessed with 3 meals a week all of May. Our friend Meg arranged it and a variety of people will be bringing them.

I don't feel at a loss right now from not having grandparents because of how surrounded we have been by friends. I am so thankful for our friends and how helpful they have been. I still wish we had grandparents more accessible, but I don't think that is holding us back!

On Paternity Leave

I am off work right now on paternity leave, which is a huge blessing to our family. IBM allows for up to 2 weeks paternity leave at the birth of a child or new adoption all based on manager's discretion. My manager gave me the full two weeks, which was more needed with the newborn and 18 month old. It has been wonderful because someone is here to play with Anna and take care of Madelyn so that Anna can slowly adjust to Madelyn being around. As Heather said in her blog today, Anna has been a great big sister, loves Madelyn, and is always trying to help. Today though, for the first time, Anna seemed real needy of some Mommy time and I got some great Madelyn cuddle time. Hopefully I will get some more of this in the next 6 days I have off :-)

My girls

Once Anna woke up from her nap today, we had Madelyn and Mommy home. I took Anna into my lap and my sister-in-law Stephanie handed me Madelyn. I had my two little girls at that point, it was a great feeling. Anna likes Madelyn, she likes to point to her, laugh when she cries, and touch her hand quickly...we are using the word gentle a lot...luckily Cassie had helped us work a lot on that word before. When we lay Madelyn down, Anna wants to be able to see her. Its sweet.

Anna and Madelyn in Daddy's lap:


Anna touching Madelyn's hand:

Madelyn picture

Yea, this is just to put up another big close up of Madelyn from yesterday...everyone is still well and now at home...we'll talk more about that experience later I am sure.

Madelyn Elizabeth Burckart

Announcing the birth of Madelyn Elizabeth Burckart at 7:28 PM this evening. She weighed in at 7 lbs 11 oz and 21.25" long. Both Mommy and Madelyn are in great shape and recovering at Rex until Thursday.

The Grand Sitter

One of the things that has come more apparent as Heather and I have had children is how far our family lives away from us. Most of our friends have a sibling or parent who live close by or at least a parent who is retired and can come stay the week when needed. Heather and I have no immediate family within an hour drive which means that "stop by" help is almost non-existant. We are blessed by having Heather's best friend since she was born, Suzanne, living just 20 minutes away and she is Anna's primary caretaker outside of us generally.

In this age where grandparents involvement in the raising of their grandchildren is becoming even more commonplace, this has had me at times feel jealous that we don't have that situation. It has never become more apparent than it is as we plan to have our second little girl any day now. Many of our friends, when this happens, will not have to ask other friends to be on call while they have a parent who can be around or stay with them. In general, Suzanne is our one single contact for taking care of Anna while Heather is in the hospital and she has been gracious enough to keep her schedule as clear as possible. Because the doctor is telling us we have to make it quickly to the hospital due to Heather's already advanced stages and history with Anna, we have my close friend John on call just two miles down the road to come and take care of Anna should Heather go into labor again at night. We also have a variety of other friends willing to be called, as well as another set of friends, Andy and Kristen, on call this Saturday when Suzanne is out of town. I recently programmed four close neighborhood stay at home mom's phone numbers into my cell phone so I could quickly reach them if needed. If all else fails, we will take Anna to the hospital with us and hope someone can meet us there to take care of her.

As you can see from that long description of our action plan just to take care of Anna, we are blessed with many local friends who can help but at the same time don't have that simple "call mom to come" type plan that others have. When it comes to having a regular sitter, Heather's family is only about an hour away which is too far to babysit while Heather and I go on a date for example. Other friends of ours have siblings and we are blessed to have Suzanne who is closer to us than many of those friend's siblings. But I see, for example, the situation my sister is in having my mother there and two retired in-laws all to gladly help with one wonderful 6 year old girl. We have other friends in the neighborhood who also have more than one set of parents not to mention siblings local to call on. I do realize we are blessed with our friends who we can call on and I am very thankful for that...but it still would be nice to have the Grand Sitter around when needed :-)

Two kids under the age of two?

Heather is entering her third trimester and even though Anna is growing up quickly, we will have two children 18 months apart. Every time I think this is going to be tough, Heather amazes me with how resilient, energetic and loving she is...even at 27 weeks pregnant. ;-) It it then I know that it is not that this will be difficult, but a fun adventure with the woman I love. Here is a picture of took of Heather putting Anna to bed last night.

Don't worry, I am not stuck in a euphoric state...I still think having two kids under the age of two is going to be a handful. But, Heather helps reaffirm that we can handle it. Also, everywhere we go and meet someone who has already been in that situation, they encourage us telling us that while its tough for a couple of years, its great afterwards. They tell us that the kids are best friends and they all live in some blissful. I am not counting on that...but I do hope our girls will be best friends. Beyond that, I am just holding on tight for the great adventure.

The Rice Pudding Dance

Tonight's installment of date nights with Daddy is about sharing desserts. Anna and I like to share snacks and desserts, and I am often more liberal with letting Anna try things like chocolate and ice cream than Heather...so we have fun. One thing Anna and I both like is rice pudding. I previously talked about the ice cream dance...well today I have a video of the rice pudding dance. The ice cream dance is slightly more excited than this...but this is exciting:


While I don't get quite as excited for rice pudding, my heart jumps in excitement for my little girl and those things which make her this happy :-)

Pregnancy confirms my Pro-life stance

I have heard a lot of arguments over the past about the fact that I am a male especially means I don't have the right to tell a woman what to do with her body. And, I have never tried to disagree with those...but words my wife spoke last night have been echoing in my mind as the glaring reason to be pro-life when taking religion out of it. Here is roughly how the conversation went with my wife, Heather, who is 25 weeks pregnant:

Heather: -- painful sigh --
Erik: What's wrong?
Heather: Just the baby kicking.
Erik: Does it hurt?
Heather: It often doesn't hurt, but its just very unexpected. Not being able to prepare for the kick always causes a little reaction.

This conversation reminds me that the unborn baby has its own brain and moves itself. The woman is not able to control the baby like she can the rest of her body. Our baby girl is 25 weeks old...still the age that abortions are legal. But, from Heather's statements like this one, the baby obviously has a mind of its own. When we saw her on an ultrasound at 8 weeks, she was moving on her own and had a heartbeat that is unique from Heathers. She had her own body parts, heart, and movements.

I think having gone through the father side of now Heather's second pregnancy continually reiterates my belief that the unborn baby is a unique creation from God and it is our responsibility to protect him or her. I am not trying to tell the woman what to do with her body, but protecting the unborn baby's life. My religious beliefs further reiterate the sanctity of life.

Dad alone? Play with the baby!

As I wrote last week, Anna and I have been having Tuesday night date nights. Two of the nights I went out shopping with Anna and noticed that as I walked around with Anna people tended to come up close to Anna more so than normal. Is a Dad all alone a reason to approach the baby? When Heather and I are out, Anna gets comments but not approached and touched. When its just me, people have a tendency to get close to Anna and do things like grab her feet. This seems really odd to me, and I don't think this happens to Heather when she is alone.

Its a girl

My date nights have helped prepare me and get me excited for the arrival of another sweet little girl. Heather, Anna, and I went to the doctor's today for an ultrasound. We found out that everything seems normal and healthy, a huge blessing, and that they confirmed that Heather is almost 19 weeks pregnant,. The due date by the ultrasound was April 27. Anna was 5 days early, if the new baby girl is also 5 days early Mommy and the her may share a birthday!!

The tough part now is that we had a boy name picked out as a carryover from when Anna was around. We had much more trouble with girl's names the first time. Let's see if we can do better this time.

Date nights with Anna

Anna is now 13 months and Daddy and her have date nights when Mommy has plans. Last night was one of those nights, and we decided just to stay in and play. Anna was really busy last night, spending 5-10 minutes on each task before moving on to the next task. They were important things like playing with special toys, pushing around her shopping cart, or pulling all of the DVDs our of the cabinet and putting them back.

I can't forget Anna's favorite playtoy, Cassie. She loves everything about Cassie. Cassie makes her laugh without even doing anything. Cassie also takes a lot of abuse and doesn't even snap at Anna in return. Cassie goes crazy when we have guests over, but she really is an angel around Anna and we couldn't be happier with how she is with kids.