A daddy moment: My baby's breath and answered prayers

Julie doing what she does best

This is one of my all-time favorite photos of Julie. I think it captures so much of what I love about her. It's how I know her so well. She's just loving on a baby. There's more than a few of these photos around believe it or not, but this one just captured my heart. I think that's because there's a tenderness to it, on many levels.

You can see Julie's right hand is in mid-pat and little Seth is asleep, looking quite content and loved. The way babies should feel. I'm guessing he has a full tummy from nursing, judging from the blanket over Julie's shoulder. I also like how Ezra is in the background reaching out and has his hand on his little brother. Our older kids have always loved our babies so much. It's always been so sweet.

I had forgotten the back story to this photo until it showed up on my Facebook news feed today under one of those "Three years ago" notifications. Indeed the photo was taken three years ago and there's a story to it. It turns out little Seth was really, really sick. He had been suffering from a cold and had a fever.

The next day he was admitted to Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters in Norfolk because he couldn't breathe. He wasn't even two months old yet and I'm pretty positive a lot of parents can relate to the torture of listening to your babies struggle to breathe. I remember many, many sleepless nights when our babies have been sick and neither of us sleeps. Or we try and take turns sleeping while the other holds the baby. Rough, rough nights. And rough days to follow.

The day after that photo was taken, after what I'm sure was another sleepless night, Julie took him into the doctor. The doctor didn't take long to advise Julie to go home, pack her things and take him down to CHKD. Right away.

Seth having a rough couple of days at CHKD

He spent a couple of days, maybe three at most, at CHKD while they got his lungs cleared up. I remember driving down there late in the afternoons and spending several hours in the room with Seth and Julie, who didn't leave of course. I like to say she nursed him back to health -- literally. I remember driving home at night, saying prayers across as I crossed the James River on the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel, prayers that didn't stop miles and miles later as the Coleman Bridge carried me home over the inky night darkness of the York River 90 feet below.

I'm thankful for doctors and places like CHKD. We've spent more than a few days down there with various Sabo kids for various reasons. They've always taken care of us.

When the photo of Julie and Seth with Ezra in the background popped up in my Facebook feed it brought an immediate smile to my face. And as I looked back through the photos around that time three years ago and remembered the trauma of the moment, I thought how blessed I am by the Lord with all these healthy babies we've had. They've had their moments of illness, but they've always been relatively brief.

And I don't think it's so strange that I found myself missing those moments. Those times of holding a tiny little baby in my arms, snuggled up against my chest with his arms and legs all folded up and wrapped tightly in a blanket and listening to him breathe easily. And knowing that prayers are answered.

The foodie truth, or why winter and Pinterest go together

A power chowder: Just add bacon

I have come to the conclusion that winter can be useful. I'm not a great fan of winter by any stretch of the imagination. If I were to rate the four seasons from favorite to permanently exile it to Siberia, it would go like this:
1) Summer
2) Fall (Truly, Virginia falls are absolutely splendid and a very, very close second to summer in my book. It's almost a photo finish. The only real issue I have with fall in Virginia is that every day you are that much closer to winter.)
3) Spring
97) Winter

So you can see that winter isn't exactly my favorite. I hate being cold and winter here just off Chesapeake Bay -- where the air is so thick with humidity on some days that you can actually catch it, put it in a Ziploc bag and watch it turn to water -- is a bone-chilling cold. It's a damp, miserable affair in which there are days where if I spend too much time outside I just can't get warm for the rest of the day.

One of the few redeeming qualities of a Tidewater Virginia winter is Pinterest. Seriously. I'm on Pinterest and I get the occasional Pin on my board or whatever you call it that just doesn't seem right to me.

For example, from actual things on my board I saw this morning it might go something like: "Top 10 Tips to Reduce Swelling During Pregnancy" (I don't even know where to begin with that. What sort of Pinterest algorithm came to the conclusion that I might be having problems with swelling when I'm pregnant? I've never, ever had swelling during pregnancy!) or "Amazing 2 Ingredient Makeup Remover -- You'll never go back to expensive department store versions again!" (I'm going to nip this in the bud right now before you draw conclusions about the things popping up on my Pinterest board: When it comes to makeup, I'm okay with using expensive department store versions of makeup remover because I believe that's something you definitely don't want to mess around with.)

What I find Pinterest useful for, when I don't need pregnancy or makeup tips, is finding recipes. Yeah Pinterest has lots of other cool features, like DIY stuff, parenting stuff (The one that cracks me up lately is all these Pins about "How I Survived Going From 2 Kids to 3" and "How to Decide If You Can Handle Going From Two Kids to 3" ... so naturally I'm thinking of writing a useful blog and throwing it up on Pinterest with the title, "How to Decide If You Can Handle Going From 13 Kids to 14" ... I bet it will get a ton of Pins.) and links to somewhat interesting and useful blogs.

But far and away the #1 Pinterest feature in my book is recipes. Especially on bone-chilling frigid winter days where the only redeeming quality of it is that it's a great excuse to make soup. I think that is the one thing I am thankful for when it comes to winter: It's the season of soup-making.

Recently I came across this soup recipe on Pinterest that I tried and let me just say -- and it's not bragging if it's true -- that the day I made it is the day I made the best soup in Gloucester County. I also want to say that Claire helped me out ... well technically she did all the heavy soup-making lifting and I was more like the sous chef to her head chef. Claire can flat-out cook. She's a force to be reckoned with in the kitchen. So the other day for this soup, I did the chopping and dicing and prep work and Claire expertly assembled, added, poured, stirred and lovingly coaxed greatness out of that pot.

The soup is called "Smokey ham, potato and corn chowder" and it was a huge hit in the Sabo house. I mean, it's got bacon, ham, cream cheese, potatoes ... there's a lot of things going right just in that grouping. So go ahead, hop on Pinterest and weed through the pregnancy, makeup and parenting pins and find it. You won't be disappointed.

A Winter Respite, A Taste Of Spring In Virginia

Our beach

A week ago we were snowbound here in Virginia, the kids sledding down our homemade toboggan hill in the back yard. Today it hit 66 degrees and we trekked a few blocks down to the beach. We didn't exactly work on our tans -- it was windy and the water is cold, cold, cold -- but we had a blast and were joined by our friends from Harrisonburg, Matt and Karmen Basinger and their 8-month-old son Mason who spent a couple of days with us.

One of the things that's always been remarkable about our time here in Virginia over the past almost 12 years is how winter can have these lovely spells of pleasant weather. I remember years when we've had a week of 70s and even 80s in January, the kids playing outside in their t-shirts and shorts and even the occasional winter mosquito bite. The warm days -- not the mosquito bites -- are a nice break from the onslaught of cold. I'm not a fan of cold. Actually, I hate being cold. Every year about this time I dream about relocating to Aruba. Today, no so much.

The weather here can definitely be schizophrenic. Or maybe it's bi-polar, like what looms ahead. The forecast calls for 70 degrees and even thunderstorms on Wednesday. Thunderstorms in early February is plain crazy. Then Friday just might put the polar in the bi-polar weather forecast when the North Pole might pay a visit and there's a chance of snow.

Julie said it best today when she was talking to Matt and Karmen about Virginia winter weather. You never put away all the summer clothes -- the kids broke out shorts today, for example. But you also never put away the snowsuits too early. Late this afternoon I took another jaunt down to the beach at sunset. Here's what I found.

Captivated by winter in Virginia