This and that

I haven’t posted for a while, so here is a montage of various recent events and photos-it’s kinda long and as usual wordy but very informative (uh, I hope;-)






Owen’s new shoes:

Owen received his new orthotics Thursday. Aren’t they cute? Best part…he’s about ½ taller in them. He’s doing so well in them and he’s walking all over the place! I would say at this point he walks more than 50% of the time (vs. crawling) and he is also getting really close to standing from sitting (as in from the middle of the floor with nothing but the floor to push up off of-or something like that). He has been “caught” picking things up by stooping down and then standing back up to walk again-very cute!







Here are also some Playgroup pictures-some mommy friends and I get together in the mall play area every Wednesday and I shot some pics this week, as most of us were present. They are all so cute together;-)

Seats taken, old man:

These are 2 cute things TJ has said lately. One evening recently, I was on the couch with Tim and he got up for something. TJ saw his chance and jumped up to sit next to me. When Tim got back, TJ said in his best “dude on the bus on Forrest Gump” voice “SEATS TAKEN!” If you know what line in the movie I’m referring to, you know this was a pretty funny thing for an 8 yr. old to quote. After we stopped laughing, he said it again, but this time he said “seats taken Old Man.” Ahhh, to be an 8 yr. old again and think 32 is “old”.


Owen choking:

Today I was messing around on the computer. Tim was who knows where doing who knows what. TJ was in the kitchen/eating area with Owen playing. I heard Owen cough and asked TJ if he was ok and TJ said yeah, he’s just coughing. Then, just a few seconds later I heard Owen make the most horrendous coughing/gagging/struggling to breathe noise-TJ began panicking and yelling that he was choking, which I was already on my way (the room they were in was the next room over in an open concept type floor plan from where I was) and Tim was there already at Owen’s side. Owen let out one more choke sound and I took him and essentially started the CPR steps for a conscious choking victim. It was incredibly scary and I think I shook for about the next hour. Although I wanted to, I did not perform the “blind” finger sweep but I could see some crumbs in Owen’s mouth as he was struggling. He seemed to bring up or get down whatever it was and I got him a drink to try to sooth his throat from the gagging/coughing. As he was drinking, he either took the choked up item (an old french fry) and tried to put it back in his mouth or took it out-we couldn’t tell for sure which before we confiscated it. I always knew french fries were BAD!!!







Bedhead

Here are some cute bedhead photos. These were after he woke up from an afternoon nap. He never has “bad hair days” with the exception of his constant flyways.






Fussy boy and my cookie fiasco

Owen was a really fussy boy on Friday. Much to my dismay because I really had a bunch of stuff to do including prepping 50 potatoes for a baked potato bar and 3 giant cookies. Well, Owen wouldn’t stop fussing so I kept trying to hold him. Finally, I had Jake hold him in my desperation to get some stuff done. Again to my dismay, my first cookie was underdone. The second I went to flip onto a serving platter and it SPLATTED all over the counter. The 3rd was fine and the 4th (the make-up for the 2nd cookie disaster) was over-baked. Ugh. Oh well. The icing was perfect;-)

Owen feels bigger

I have yet to transfer him into his “king of carseats” so he’s still in the carrier. He sure feels bigger. Much bigger-and he’s eating everything in sight (including old hard fries;-). So, I’m curious to see what he measures in a week or so at his 16 month weigh in.

I think that’s all for now. Hope everyone is well!

A special Valentine's!

If you'd asked me at how my day was at 4pm yesterday, I would've said-"yeah, my Valentine's day was ok"...but at 2am, I would've said "it was great"! The day started off simply enough. I found the card Tim had left for me-which BTW, was the exact same card I got him. Then, I saw the cute valetine TJ made us (see photos). I had to work in the evening, and frankly it was a pretty cruddy night at work (which doesn't look like any night will be any better any time soon;-( But, around 7pm when I was finally getting dinner, the boys showed up to surprise me with their presence and some chocolates. That made my night much better and I really considered V-day over at that point. BUT, when I got home, I found this path of rose petals leading up the stairs with treats and cards and this cute note from TJ (see pic with frog) leading up the stairs. A very sweet sentiment-oh, and I didn't even mention the house was spotless and freshly vacuumed! Mega brownie points for Tim;-)








Here's the (second) new car seat I got for Owen. It's made by Britax-whom I consider to be the industry leaders for safety seats-the style is called "Marathon". Yeah, so what if it costs 3 times more than the seats we bought for our first two-can you really put a price on safety? Well, maybe but this cadillac of car seats should comfortably (and more importantly safely) seat Owen into adolesence! It's approved for up 65 pounds and like 50 inches or so- TJ could almost still ride in this beast-and both boys (TJ and Jake) said it is quite comfy! Owen looks like he agrees but he doesn't say so much:-) Pictures speak a thousand words, right? He does look even smaller in it though-) I figured it was about time to retire the infant carrier since he is over 15 months old! (Even if he hasn't "outgrown" it per se;-) Notice the shoulder straps-they're on the smallest setting-this seat is supposed to be for infants 5 pounds and up-can you imagine???





Lastly, these are some pics of a budding artist and her work! My neice Lindsey's piece was chosen out of all the other 3rd graders in her elementary school for a special art work presentation at our local Art gallery. I attended the reception tonight in her honor. It was very cool! Check out her Picasso!





PS My spell checker hasn't worked lately so please forgive the errors-I did me best proofing but I know some errors remain;-)

A quick Owen update...

I'm afraid I won't get this done if I don't write "less than I'd planned" now vs everything I wanted to say-maybe sometime; so here goes.

Owen's 15 month appointment went well. Dr. Thomas was wonderful just as I'd hoped and it was actually nice to have fresh perspective on Owen.

Now for the not-so hot part. Owen's stats were: 28 inches (a 1 1/4 inch one month gain:-), 17 pounds (for the 3rd straight month-yes, 17 even-not even an ounce more), and his head circumference was the same (which is fine, and better than growing insanely large which is always a concern with hydrocephalus ?sp).

Anyway, I'm encouraged about the length gain, which Dr Thomas is afraid it's just their method is different than Dr. Ho's office where they used an actual board. But each month here on will be interesting to see how the same method pans out.

So, it's the weight that is baffling to me. I am so glad I trusted my instinct and made an appt with a pediatric endocrinologist NOW vs waiting until he turns 2 which is what was recommended to me. That appt is in a month. I guess since Owen's more active and such, he's just going to have a harder time gaining weight-maybe I should take note;-) So, I'm trying not to get too down about it-but it's just so darn baffling-the kid eats and eats-even if he's picky, we give him tons of options and he just seems to eat and he's even on to whole milk.

But, I'm not going to stress too much because he's not scrawny and I bet his little crazy active body just has an incredible metabolism!!! I mean the calories burnt by his dancing alone....geesh!

I also want to end this post by sending a shout out to a fellow blogger Tonya-please pray for her as the mommy of a sick lil guy-her son Knoah had his tonsils removed and has since had some complications-I do believe he's doing better and on the upswing, but I know from our battle last year with pneumonia etc -being the mommy to a sick kiddo while you also have a couple kiddos (and a hubby) at home trying to make everything work can be-ugh, tough. So please pray for them and feel free to click on their blog link and let them know you're thinking about them!

Haircuts, snow and funnies

So, I did 4 in 40 today. Four what, in forty what you say? Ok, enough greek-I did 4 haircuts in 40 minutes-- including showers, clean-up and photos!!! I couldn't even get that service from Great Clips! He, he. How do my "4 men" look? Pretty snazzy, eh? The pics of Owen are before and after and this was his first "real" haircut-he did have another before his cranial banding where I shaved all the fly aways off but no one could hardly tell, so it doesn't really count in my world;-) The picture of all 4 of them was as good as I could get;-)





Up next, some brotherly fun!





Lastly, (well photo wise anyway) the snow "blizzard that wasn't" before and after pix. Just a few good inches which has all melted away and with more rain has caused lots of area flooding. Fog has been an issue too. We've even had multiple fatalities in the area due to 2 days of very dense all day long fog-weird for our area.





A funny for you:

I worked last night and Tim had a meeting for the upcoming "SUPER FUN" auction TJ's school does as a fund raiser every year (called the Eagle auction-a great opportunity to donate, and/or advertise!!!). So, he secured childcare so he could go. Around 6:30pm I was eating my dinner in our staff lounge next to one (of about 50 or more) co-worker and we were just chatting. Her cell phone rang and she went to answer it and said "huh, I don't recognize this number-" I said, what number is it-she said my number!!!! It was my precious Owen calling, apparently hitting on the "older woman"...he's now grounded from the phone until he's 21.

Up next: my findings from tomorrow's (which was postponed from Monday) MD visit. We're heading back to our original pediatrician, which we switched from 4 years ago when our insurance changed. Due to i changing again, we could switch back-we love Dr. Thomas (even if he did stand us up on Monday-that's the last time I warn him at church of an upcoming visit;-).

Also for next time (hopefully) Jacob's artwork! He's an amazing 4 year old who can out color or cut the best of us!

New feature!

I can't figure out how to put it in this post, but scroll all the way to the bottom and you'll find a great slide show of our family! Check back here soon too for Owen's 15 month update!!!