Pizza Treat

And what better reward can there be for surviving a 3 1/2 hour Doctors appointment than pizza at the oceanfront!? :) Yummy!

And oh yes, eating outside in the middle of January. I kid you not, it rained the day before and the day after. After checking the forecast a week or so before we left, I was very disappointed to see that Mon, Tues and Wed all had rain. I was soooo wanting to take Makin to the beach. Sure enough, a day or two later when I checked. Tuesday had sunny skies in the forecast. Amazing.

CHKD Appointment

Makin enjoyed watching the buses and cars out our window Tuesday morning. We stayed at the Ronald McDonald house for two days so we could be near the hospital. It was great not having much of a drive for the two mornings we needed to be there early.








In the room of the speech therapist.

We saw at least 5 different doctors/specialists this morning, and it took 3 1/2 hours! Makin was very well behaved...considering. He definitely raided the snacks though. We felt very good meeting with everyone and it just reaffirmed out decision. It is amazing how much better you feel doing this when you feel comfortable with and trust your child's doctor. And the report we got at this appointment is that, unless any more fistulas develop, Makin will not need to go again until just before starting school, if there are any touch-ups he needs. After that he will have to have orthodontic work at around age 7-8 and go from there, but that will be able to be in Texas. It was great to talk to the different doctors on the team and get a clearer idea of what we have ahead. And, no worries about speech so far he is on track! Woo hoo! (His mom is still worried about that D sound though! :) )

In front of CHKD.

Makin's First Airplane Ride

Oh the fun of taking a little boy to an airport! It was quite the adventure taking Makin on his first airplane trip. Of course, snacks are always #1 priority, and then we had plenty of time to kill, so we got to take a few trips up and down the escalator, which brought us to a TRAIN. I mean, can a boy be more happy than when you can see planes, trucks and trains all in one place!? :) The trip actually went quite smoothly, despite the fact we discovered at about 6 AM that morning that our DVD player battery was no longer working, so we had to make the flights without that distraction...luckily he slept most of the first flight and then had his own seat the second as it was not a full plane. Whew. Always quite the work out. Glad our little guy got to have a new adventure though! :)

Okay Brave Boy

Here we go...







Thanks to all of you who I know are sending up extra prayers for us right now. We are so blessed to have you and just know you are helping so much with your support.

Before The Trip

We had to say goodbye to the longest-lasting balloons ever...40ish days old...crazy! :)


















Grandma and Grandpa came! And brought the coolest new addition to our playroom - a tree! Okay, so its white for now, but we hope to paint it ASAP. Grandpa made the whole thing, assembled it in Nebraska, took it back apart to drive here, and then set it up in our playroom. The kids love it and it is SO fun having something extra-special to use for so many fun adventures. I had this in the back of my mind to put in my classroom for reading someday, but thought it would be awesome for my own kids now! :) And what an awesome Grandpa to make this for us! More to come when its painted I'm sure. :)

And of course, the kids kept them busy right away, including painting and all things fun. So thankful for grandparents who will come take care of our girl while we are away!

Bedtime Snuggles

Love them.

Making Lemons Into Lemonade

Our week has been rough. What we thought was Makin's teething turned out to be some kind of virus, we think started with Brad (but we didn't notice a fever with him) and ended up hitting all of us. Just a low fever with achy body and fatigue. Not a good thing to have going around the house, especially when Brad can't take a sick day for me to recoup since he will miss all next week...so we survived. Lorelei had it mostly Wednesday and I had it mostly Thursday, so we had lots of veg time.

Then this morning started out with Makin waking up at 5:38 and as I was trying to get him back to sleep Lorelei started screaming and Brad was in the shower so I had two kids screaming that I knew needed to get back to sleep...eventually they did for about 30 minutes. I still didn't feel great, but was much better than the day before. However Lorelei, whether it was from just getting over being sick, or in anticipation of what she knows is coming up with us leaving, was having a record-breaking melt down morning. She would cry at the drop of a hat. Sooo it was quite a rough morning with all of this combined. But I had to run some errands that got put off from Thursday (and we also had to cancel a park play-date and supper play-date! grr!) and the errands went better (minus spilling coffee on myself) as we dropped off library books, turned in my papers to the court the dismiss my ticket, and even got Makin's hair cut! (Which was a super-cute moment. He sat perfectly content while she used the clippers. Wonder if it had to do with the lollipop I let him have? :) Then both kids, with lollipops in hand went over to a bench and sat together when we got outside. So fun.)

So by the time we got home it was beautiful out (high of 71 today!) and we decided to have a picnic lunch in the playhouse.


Then after nap we got more outside time. Makin's latest favorite game is for me to stand at the bottom of the hill so he can roll the ball down to me. I find it hilarious when I throw it back up to him and he closes his eyes with a big smile. He knows his mom has a tendency to manage to land the ball right on his head at least once! :)


And the highlight of my day was right before bed time! Lorelei and I came up with a fun plan for us to take some books out with a flashlight and read in the playhouse. :) Oh so fun to see a three-year-old react to being outside in the dark. Something so simple like this is just so much fun through their eyes. :) Loved it.