The Fifth Alexander

William Dane Alexander surprised us by arriving six weeks early...on a Sunday (Februry 11, 1996) morning while his Dad was already at church getting ready to lead the morning services. I was at home with TJ and Ty trying to figure out what to wear to church that morning. In a moments notice I no longer had to worry because I then had to decide what to wear in the ambulance on the way to the hospital! I arrived via the "special coach" at 9:00 a.m. Tom was just getting ready to start the first morning service when our friend Randy told him it was time to go to the hospital and that he better go quick. Dane was born in time to announce his birth at the start of the second service! They had to take him early to take care of me...I wasn't in very good shape at the time.

They wheeled me in on a table into the neonatal ICU to get a quick look at him. I was thrilled to see that he had red hair! We chose "William" after my father and "Dane" after some professional baseball player I saw in a program at at White Sox game. We originally planned on calling him "Will," but in the second day of this little guys life we decided he looked nothing like a "Will"...and made the decision to call him "Dane." For the first 24 hours I was only able to see Dane through poloroid photos that the nurses were so kind to bring to me. I wasn't allowed out of bed and he was stuck in his bed in NICU. That was hard for me. The next day they would wheel me down and I would just sit and watch him through his little bed with tubes coming out of his little head. The third day was even harder because they told me if I wanted to see him, I had to walk down to the NICU. Oh, that was a difficult walk...but worth the effort. They taught me how to feed him through a tube that went in his nose and down into his stomach. Twelve days later we were able to bring him home!

Dane is now in the fifth grade at Fairfield Christian Academy. He does well at school although I have to motivate him from time to time. He enjoys sports playing golf, baseball, basketball and flag football. He has been taking violin lessons for five years now as well as some piano. He took up the saxophone this year for the fifth grade band. His red hair is still there! Grandpa Alexander (now grey) used to be a red head and of all of his grandchildren (19 last time I counted) Dane is the only red head! Dane makes for a great middle brother, too! You may be able to see that in the one photo!

I love to tell the story about when Dane was in the first grade. Earlier that year, some of TJs buddies were in the bathroom at school at the same time as Dane and they picked him up to let him think they were going to give him a swirlie. They got in trouble for it, but to be quite honest, I knew they didn't mean to harm him in anyway. Well, it wasn't long before Dane threatened someone in the bathroom with the same act. He got in trouble with his teacher that day. At the end of the school day, the teacher had Dane tell me what he did. He told me and then the teacher firmly said, "Dane, you don't act that way at home, don't act that way at school." Oh, oh. Dane just looked up at me with these big eyes. I gave him that look of "don't you dare tell your teacher!" You see, in the Alexander home, it isn't that uncommon for Mom to do crazy things from time to time. Now, I have never actually gotten his head wet in the toilet bowl, but I have dangled him over it in good clean fun. I did come clean the next day and tell his wonderful teacher that I have done that in the past.

In the photos above: In the top photo, Dane was on a school field trip. They visited an old school house and had to dress in that time period. The next photo is of "Dane, the good big brother." I told him that if he wanted to keep his long hair, he had to let his little sisters pretend to style his hair. He looks thrilled, doesn't he? The next one is of Dane this past Summer as he just made a great shot in Hillbilly Golf in Gatlinburg. The bottom photo was of him jumping from the swing.

There you have it.....the fifth Alexander....Dane Alexander!