Dozens of first Christmas photos...

Two sleeps ‘til Christmas…

Mom hasn’t had time to update my blog because I’m keeping her quite busy. Now that I’m crawling I’ve realised that there are LOADS of things in the world to discover – things beyond what I can see – and I like to spend all day doing just that. I’ve decided I no longer want to sleep during the day, only at night. That means Mom gets to play with me ALL DAY and she can just forget about all the boring stuff on her to-do list.

The photos…:

- Maria was so excited to see me crawl!
- Me and Ben playing in the sandpit
- Escaping from the safety of the patio and adventuring out into the great unknown of the garden…
- I’ve encountered amazing things, like Dad’s shoes and Mom’s cupboards and couches and tables and and and…
- I got my first real war wound! I’m so hardcore. I launched myself onto the bricks at Granny and Grandpa’s house. This is me with a cool graze on my chin.
- Rough and tumble with Lola

Wishing you peace on earth and good will to all men this Christmas. May you know the quiet joy and peace of Jesus amidst the food and fun and family festivities.

Mobile!

Hey, yesterday I crawled for the first time! So now Mom is moving the Christmas tree off the floor to some place higher than me... Me crawling was a big concern for Mom and Dad, because VI kids often take ages to start crawling (we don't have as much visual incentive to reach for stuff). So this is an answer to prayer and I'm so chuffed with myself, even though I don't crawl very well yet, or very far, and I find it all quite exhausting...! :)

I'm discovering other kids a bit more lately. I don't normally take much notice of them, except when they cry because that unsettles me (I often don't know where the noise is coming from). But like yesterday Craig was wearing a red shirt so I could see him easily and reach for him.

I love the word impossible

Cameron’s (early) Christmas present from my folks is a sandpit and he’s enjoying it a lot. He really does love being outside, far more than being inside. If I’m carrying him and we walk past a window or open door it’s all I can do to keep him from launching himself out of my arms and out towards the light. He really seems to have a fearless little spirit. He loves looking up at the sun coming through the trees. We don’t know what or how much he actually sees, but he grins and gets a kind of intense, faraway look in his eyes and he seems to be simply drinking in the dappled light. He is enjoying the pool tremendously, and bath time is like sitting in the front row at Sea World – he splashes so much that I’m drenched by the end of it.

The past week or so he’s become quite ‘ma vas’. If he knows I’m in the room or if I walk past close to where he’s playing he immediately puts his arms up in the air asking to be picked up. We’ve been working hard at all the OT/physio activities, like banging on pots and pulling teaspoons from polystyrene…!

His right eye is still doing most of the work, which is quite a worry.

When Murray and I first heard about Cam’s eyes my uncle emailed us saying that he hoped we would be granted the gift of acceptance. The terrain we’ve covered since May this year has been rugged and at times the strain of our journey has been unbearable, but I think we are nearing the quiet waters. We still have moments of sadness and fear of the future. The frozen moment of Mark, Greg and Graeme at the zoo, looking out at the lions, makes me wonder what Cam’s boyhood will be like. Please pray that we will be able to engender in him a sense of unshakeable confidence and irrepressible optimism. To us he is so completely ‘normal’ and so utterly precious, but I know he will face the complications of the big wide world’s reaction to his disability. Already we’ve noticed that some people speak to him extra loudly (though of course there’s nothing wrong with his ears…!).

A friend of ours shared this poem with us a couple of weeks ago:

i love the word impossible…

It’s like joy after sorrow.
People being friends after being enemies.
Rainbows after drenching rain.
A wound healed.
Sunsets on quiet evenings after
Hot, noisy days.
Paralyzed, injured limbs learning to grow
Strong and useful again.
Forgiveness after wrong.
Truth after fog.
New love-made babies.
Birds learning to fly and own the sky.
Bitterness turned to mellowness.
Fresh, genuine hope… once abandoned.
People finding each other at right moments,
in unexpected, obscure places…
for God-ordained reasons.
i love that word impossible because God
believes in adventure
and extraordinary mountains, and He dares
To be alive in a world crawling with terrible
situations.

He promises to be bigger than any impossibility
because He is love…
and love always finds a way through,
in time.
Love isn’t scared.
It builds bridges instead of walls.
It never gives up.
It always hangs on.
It waits with stubborn, strong hope.
Sometimes even years.

Love makes God alive in far more than human souls.
Like sun and clear sky and drooping branches
And dark birds and colour and design and music…
And the sound of water on a shore.

IMPOSSIBLE means that I,
An ordinary young man
Can be something special and significant
In an enormous, hurting world.
I can be love where I live,
And that is Christ…

And He really does make ALL the difference