Halloween was fun. We took the kids to the pumpkin patch and to a Halloween festival at the Zoo prior to Halloween. Halloween night, we ended up taking the kids to a church down the road from us because they had a big festival with bounce houses, games & food. Usually, we take the kids to my parents neighborhood but with Halloween falling on a week night, it was too difficult to get home from work, get the kids ready, feed them dinner and then drive there only to have them go to a few houses. The kids had a fun time and were dressed as Superheros! Ryan was dressed as Spiderman and Katelyn dressed as BatGirl complete with a tutu! With all they have been through, they truly are our Superhero's!
The weekend that followed Halloween ended up being special, although we didn't know it at the time. Dean's mom had been admitted to the hospital a few weeks prior due to falling and being disoriented. We all found out what she already knew; that her cancer had spread. She spent about 10 days in the hospital and then was sent to a nursing facility to start rehab and continue with radiation. Dean was visiting her during the week and we would all go on the weekends to visit. I took pictures of the kids with their Grandma this particular weekend and I'm so glad I did. As it turned out, this would be the last pictures we would have of the kids with Grandma. She passed away two weeks later. Fortunately, she was at home and had Dean's older and younger brothers there with her. It's been a tough few months since then (having to spend the holidays without her) but we know she is watching from Heaven and we will all see her again one day.
Thanksgiving was different for us this year because my parents went to visit my sister and brother in law out of state. Normally we would go to or make dinner for Dean's mom & brother so this year we just decided to have a quiet day (well, as quiet as you can get with two kids!) inside and eat in our comfy clothes (yes, think sweatpants!). We stuffed ourselves silly..even Katelyn ate good.
December was busy just trying to get all the decorations up, shop and get over sicknesses. Mainly Katelyn was sick with congestion and a cough but by Christmas she was thankfully over it. We visited Santa and Katelyn was still not a fan of him. She was SO very excited IN LINE but as soon as it was our turn to go next, she said "Ryan can go first, Ryan can go first" and I told her that they were going together but she grabbed onto me and wouldn't let go. Then came the tears. I did manage to get her loose from me and told her to just stand by Ryan. This is the picture that followed:
The kids were blessed with a good Christmas from "Santa",us and all our family & close friends. Ryan's favorite gift is his Kurio tablet that we allow him to play a couple hours a week, mainly on the weekend since we don't want that to interfere with his school work. Katelyn loves her Doc McStuffins doctor bag, all her DVD's,her new books, her princess computer and her Leappad. We had fun visiting with my sister and brother in law as always and are looking forward to their next visit soon.
The sicknesses arrived again in the household in early January and still haven't really left. My mom was first to get sick with the coughing and congestion and then it just moved on to the rest of the family. Dean, Katelyn, Ryan and myself. My mom and Dean are still coughing and it's been about a month! Katelyn ended up getting an ear infection and pneumonia. Luckily, the pneumonia was in the beginning stages so she was better once she started taking an antibiotic. Unfortunately, once the 10 day dose was done (early last week), she started coughing again. We are back to giving her the puffs of Albuterol hoping that will help.
Other things that have been going on; Ryan lost his FIRST baby tooth!! It was his bottom front tooth. He was saying for a few weeks that it was wiggly but when I had taken him to the dentist in December the dentist had said, it would probably be 4 months or so before it came out. Well, I guess Ryan wiggled it enough and it just came out on it's own at school. The nurse at school put it in this tiny holder that looked like a tooth..it was very cute. Since it caught me by surprise, I was not prepared and had not made anything special for this milestone. With no computer and very limited ink in our printer, my resources for making something was slim. I did manage to find a website that allowed me to print a certificate from my phone and the tooth fairy left that under his pillow along with $5!! Ryan was very excited when he woke up the next morning. Now the tooth next to it is very loose. The tooth fairy better get to the bank to get those silver dollars!
I can't believe in 7 weeks Katelyn will be 3 years old!! Where has the time gone?? She (and Ryan) make us laugh every day. In the evening she usually will whisper to me "I just want a little teeny bath mommy" and make her "teeny" hand gesture when she's saying it. I have no idea where she came up with that but it makes me laugh every time. She LOVES taking a bath but does not love getting her hair washed (hence the meaning of "teeny bath"; short bath with no washing of her hair)! We're making progress (with bribes) but it's baby steps.
Her and Ryan love each other but definite have their moments when they just want to be left alone. But I opened up the door to Katelyn's room one morning two weeks ago and found this on the floor:
It made me so proud and teary eyed.
Oh and how could I forget all the SNOW we've been getting! The first round was the third week of January and the kids were out of school for two days (and my work was closed as well). This is when the kids and I were all sick so we all ended up staying home Wed-Fri that week. Ryan had a make-up school day the following Monday but we were still sick so I stayed home with him and Katelyn. Thank God for my mother though, because she came over to help watch the kids so I could sleep. Then Tuesday afternoon another round of snow began (Ryan was already off from school due to a teacher work day). I was able to leave work early and then we hunkered down for the rest of the week. We ended up getting about 10" of snow!! I enjoyed being able to stay home and recouperate but I hated the fact that Dean still had to go to work and work hard clearing the snow from the properties he works at. We did go out at the end of the week to play in it since we were feeling better and the kids had fun; although Katelyn thought it was too deep. We had a dusting of snow a few days ago but it turned to rain quickly after it started coming down. This week it's supposed to be in the 60's! Go figure.
I'm not making any promises on when my next post will be but I'll try to update after Katelyn's next surgeon appointment at the end of March since we might nail down a surgery date or come close to it.
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