LONG Weekend &Thanksgiving & Mom's Birthday & The Crud

Phew, Ya'll. I have quite a bit of updating and sharing to do...so let's get started, shall we?

We started off our LONG Thanksgiving weekend just great! Dinner out with surprise visitors (Ms. Junior and Mr. Jason who I was VERY excited to see walk in the door), and a relaxing evening at home. Thursday was Thanksgiving AND Mom's Birthday. We wasted no time getting dressed in the morning and going to one of Mom's favorite Bagel spots: Einstein’s!
Enjoying some Bagel Poppers, OJ, and fresh fruit:


Dad enjoying his breakfast:

Mom getting ready to enjoy her Bagel sandwich and latte on her 31st Birthday:

After breakfast...we came home and watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. FYIL Dad makes a REALLY comfy pillow for watching a parade.

And ya'll? IT WAS 71 DEGREES HERE IN COLORADO!! Amazing November weather!! So, we decided to take advantage of the beautiful weather and walk on down to the park.



Yes. I enjoy going head-first down the slide! Let's hope my baby sister is in a similar position here in a few weeks!



After a trip to the park, Mom came home to prepare Green bean Casserole. The ONLY dish she was responsible for bringing to Thanksgiving Dinner. You got off pretty easy this year, Mom! After we packed all of our goodies, we met Grandma and Grandpa over at Don and Margaret's for Thanksgiving Dinner. I'm pretty sure the last time I was at Don and Margaret's was for Thanksgiving in 2009. I was about 5-6 weeks old at the time.
The table almost ready for dinner:

Dad and I drooling...I mean...watching Grandma carve the turkey and the ham:

Grandma hard at work:

Everyone ready to eat Thanksgiving.

We all have so much to be thankful for this year. It was wonderful to be able to enjoy such a lovely meal with our loved ones. Margaret always cooks an outstanding meal with ALL the fixins. We all enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. After dinner, it was time for a "horsey ride." Grandpa gives pretty good horsey rides on demand.

We all enjoyed some delicious homemade chocolate pie once we made room (compliments of Grandma), and took our full bellies home for bed. It was a very enjoyable Thanksgiving, and Mom reports that she had a wonderful Birthday. THEN...early Friday morning...I started coughing. Nothing too bad, but it definitely caught Mom and Dad's attention. I was not running a fever at this point. Mom enjoyed a planned afternoon with the girls...lunch at Johnny Carino's and pedicures while I hung out with Dad.
Auntie K and Ms. Junior enjoying their pedicures:

Auntie A enjoying her pedicure:

And Mom's view of her enjoying her pedicure. In case you were wondering...she decided to paint her toenails a bright red with red and silver sparkles for the Christmas Season. Too bad nobody will get to see her pretty toenails now that sandal season is over.

Mom was spoiled with Starbucks and Panera gift cards from all her friends. Do they know her well, or what?

After Mom returned home from a fun afternoon out, Dad reported that I woke up from my afternoon nap feeling pretty crummy. A dose of Tylenol, and I perked up quite a bit. Since everyone was WAY to full for Birthday cake on Thanksgiving, Grandma and Grandpa came over Friday night to enjoy some of this:

A Baskin Robbins Ice Cream Cake! Chocolate chip ice cream with chocolate cake. Ms. Junior and her cousin came over and enjoyed some cake as well. I didn't get to enjoy any since I was already in bed. Not fair! As Mom and Dad were sitting on the couch visiting with their guests...they both noticed that they were starting to feel a little "off." They figured a good night’s sleep was in order...but little did they know...I spent the majority of the evening up with a very persistent cough. On Saturday morning...we ALL woke up feeling rather yucky, and we all spent the majority of the day lying around on the couch watching movies.
Not feeling well at all:

Molly and Moses hiding from all of us "sickleys":

Later on Saturday afternoon...we decided to go ahead and make a trip to the Urgent Care right up the street from us. I was starting to tug at my ears, and Dad was convinced that he had the start of a sinus infection brewing. After seeing the doc, it was confirmed: My left ear was pretty red and irritated with an infection, and Dad definitely had something brewing in his sinuses. So off to Walgreens for antibiotics...and then right back home to the couch. Most of the day Sunday was also spent on the couch relaxing and taking it easy. We must have watched Cars, Toy Story, and Finding Nemo each 873 times! Later in the afternoon...Mom decided she was feeling well enough to make a trip to the grocery store for food and drugs. She also mustered up the energy to cook up some delicious chicken and cheese enchiladas. Go Mom!

We all decided to go to bed EARLY on Sunday night. This ended up being a very good call...considering I woke up at 3:00 AM with a coughing attack that NOTHING would stop. I was one miserable little guy. Mom and Dad tried steaming up the bathroom, taking me outside for some cold air, honey, vapor rub, elevating my bed, warm apple juice, Delysum, Tylenol, a cool mist humidifier, saline drops, suctioning my nose, and FINALLY...Dad decided to run to the store at 4:00 AM for some Children’s Benadryl recommended to us by the after-hours on-call nurse. NOTHING helped. So Mom decided a trip to visit Dr. Reich and Nurse Sue was in order.
Falling asleep on my bench after a very miserable night. None of us got very much sleep:

Our visit with Dr. Reich confirmed that I had a 101 degree fever, and that I now had an ear infection in both ears...and that my cough sounded just like Croup. If you remember back a few weeks...I had Croup right around the first of November. For this reason, Dr. Reich decided not to give me more of the oral prednisone. Instead, she decided it would be best for me to have my medication through a nebulizer. She also switched my antibiotic to a stronger form. Dr. Reich has *some* concern that I could have pneumonia, so Mom was given a prescription for an X-Ray on my chest if I'm not doing much better by tomorrow. The first treatment that I had last night seemed to help TREMENDOUSLY:

Mom and I both slept much, much better. Dad on the other hand? He is not recovering as fast as he had hoped and had another rough night. His doctor told him he needs to give his antibiotics some more time to really kick in. So, Dad and I are home again today resting and recuperating.

In other news: Mom has an ultrasound tomorrow where they are going to take a good look at Baby Alex. They want to see how she is growing, and Mom and Dad want to see if the ultrasound tech can spot any hair on her head (like they could with me when I was this far along in the oven). They also have an appointment at the hospital to get all their pre-admissions paperwork completed. The time is growing near! I can't wait to meet my baby sister.

OH, and MORE NEWS: I was apparently feeling well enough this morning that I decided to make an escape from my crib! Remember me mentioning that my crib mattress had been elevated due to my cough? Well I decided to take advantage of this opportunity and went ahead ahead and used the elevated portion to throw my leg over the top of the rail, and climb on over. Dad opened my bedroom door in just enough time to watch me let go and hit the ground. I let out a pretty good cry, and Dad lectured me on the dangers of crawling out of my crib. Thankfully, I was not hurt...just scared. So...Mom just purchased a guard rail, and we will be turning my crib into a toddler bed within the next few days. They were hoping that I would want to stay put for a few more months. So much for that! I will be sure to keep you posted on how well the transition to my toddler bed goes. Mom and Dad are not looking forward to the extra freedom that I will now have, but this time was coming sooner than later.

Have a good week, everyone!

Oh, & School Pics!

Mom forgot to post these yesterday...but I had my "school pictures" taken last week (Tuesday, November 15th to be exact). Mom thinks they are ridiculously over-priced, so she didn't plan on buying any...therefore she didn't plan on dressing me for them. Oh yes...she was completely aware of the day...but decided to put me in a fluorescent hunter orange shirt. Well, they turned out super cute as one of my new teachers (Ms. Nikki) found a way to really make me smile for the photographer. *Maybe* Mom wishes she would have dressed me more appropriately so she could justify spending $50.00 on (1) 8x10 and (1) 5x7. See...ridiculous!

Yep...Mom totally copied and pasted these from the photographers website. Sigh.

Aren’t I adorable, though?

We plan to have more family pictures done by our regular photographer this Spring, when Baby Alex can join us.

Not Much To Report Weekend!

Happy Monday! I don't know about you...but we sure are looking forward to a SHORT week, and a LONG Holiday weekend!

We didn't have much planned this past weekend. We met Ms. Junior and Mr. Jason for dinner at Red Robin on Friday night. Mom only captured a few pictures worth sharing all weekend long. Here are a couple taken after dinner when Dad and I were playing around and bonding:


It was nice to visit with The Gump's, and it was a great way to spend our Friday evening.

On Saturday we were EXTREMLY productive around the house. Cooking and cleaning and hanging ceiling fans and bathing doggies and grocery shopping and more cleaning and organizing and PHEW! Mom is pretty sure she overdid it because her back and feet were really screaming at her Saturday evening. Grandma and Grandpa brought dinner over to the house...shrimp scampi, fresh garlic bread, and salad. Yummy! It was great to be able to spend time with them and enjoy a nice dinner.

Due to such a productive day on Saturday, we were able to slow things down and relax a bit on Sunday. Here are some pics of me digging the chocolate chips out of a slice of Pumpkin Yumpkin that I had for breakfast from Great Harvest (hey...I'm a smart kid...I know the good stuff).


Mom tried out a new recipe in the Crockpot for potato soup. Potatoes, onion, garlic, chicken stock, and cream cheese were all the ingredients she needed, and it turned out WONDERFULLY. I even enjoyed a few bites! We did go to JC Penny's to look at curtains and blinds for Alex's nursery, and went to lunch at Noodles! After naptime, we went for another trip to Lowes and picked up a few odd ball items. Grandpa came over to work on an "oops" that Dad created in one of the pipes in our wall. Luckily, Grandpa and Dad were able to diagnose the mystery leak that was in the basement, and they are hoping they fixed it for $0...but won't know for sure until tonight when we test it out. This all made Mom very, very happy...as she was fearing we were going to have to possibly spend thousands of dollars digging for a mystery leak somewhere hidden behind the walls of our home. Thank goodness!!

Tonight we have a repair man coming over to fix our microwave and dishwasher. We are hoping to have everything in tip-top shape before the holidays and the arrival of Baby Alex. Hope everyone has a great (short) week! We are spending Thanksgiving day celebrating Mom's 31st Birthday, and then Thanksgiving dinner at The Lebfried's house. I can't wait to spend some quality time with my family and friends and eat lots of GOOD food. If you don't hear from me before Thursday, Happy Thanksgiving to all my wonderful friends and family!

Easy-Going Weekend

Hi, All! Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend. We didn't do too much...and it worked out quite well for us!

Mom had a doctor's appointment for Baby Alex on Friday afternoon. The Doc said that my baby sister sounds and feels wonderful! Her head is down, and she is measuring about one week ahead (at 32 weeks). Her heart rate was healthy, and the doc was also happy with all of Mom's stats and measurements.

We met Grandma and Grandpa for Panera on Friday night. At one point I coughed directly in Grandpa's face. Grandpa winced, and I said "Dat's Funny!" I had Mom giggling about it all weekend. We had a nice visit. On Saturday, I was 100% toddler. Meltdown central holy cow. LOOK OUT. Molly and Moses had their annual vet exam with Dr. Pierce. It was quite the circus, let me tell you. Dr. Pierce noticed that Molly's right pupil was more dilated than her left, but she didn't seem to worried about it. Dad had discovered a small growth on Moses' chest awhile back, and Dr. Pierce decided to take some of the cells from the growth and look at them under a microscope. Turns out the cells that she saw are worrisome, and she wants to perform surgery in the near future to remove the growth. So, we will get this scheduled for Moses right away. Molly didn't flinch during her shots, Moses squealed like a big baby! Too funny.

After the vet visit we ran a few errands, groomed the backyard for winter, and Mom went through a bunch of baby's sisters clothes trying to wrap her brain around what she needs and when and where. We decided to drive across town to eat dinner at Pei Wei. I was surprisingly well behaved and content, and we all enjoyed the atmosphere and our food.



On Sunday we spent some time relaxing in the morning. After I went down for my afternoon nap, Mom went grocery shopping and Dad watched some football. Once I was up and had a snack, we decided to go over and meet Gavin's new baby sister. Let me tell you...Baby Gwyn she is TEENY TINY and oh so sweet. I never really did get too close, as Mom was pretty much holding her the entire time. I would point to her and say "Bay-bee," but for the most part...I wasn't very interested in her. I was far too busy trying to wrestle Gavin for his Legos and Thomas the Train toys. Ms. Larissa and Mr. Shawn seemed to be in great spirits and it was nice to visit with them. Mom made them some breakfast burritos that can be frozen, and make a great, quick, meal for those early mornings when little sleep was had the night before. After our visit we came home and ate homemade fried chicken tenders, homemade mashed potatoes, and corn. Yum! Nothing like some good old comfort food.

I'm happy to also report that today was morning #4 of a fairly smooth and tearless daycare drop-off. Although we walked down to Ms. Eva's room to say "good morning," she was not at school today. I was still able to say hello to some of my old buddies, and I gladly went to see Ms. Jessica in my "new" room without any hesitation. This makes both Mom and Dad extremely pleased. Hope everyone has a great week!

Caught The Croup, Exciting Weekend, and Happy Birthday Grandma!!

Greetings, All! Well, not sure if you heard but my healthy streak came to an end last Wednesday. I woke up in the middle of the night with strider (which is like wheezing, but all in the upper- respiratory area). It sounds pretty scary. I think it was a little over a year ago when I had the same thing happen in the middle of the night, and it turns out I had Croup. So, this time Mom and Dad weren’t so panicked, and once they calmed me down I was okay. They made an appointment for me first thing in the morning to see Dr. Reich, and it was confirmed that I had Croup again. Dr. Reich called in a prescription for some Prednisone, and I have been doing okay since then. It had been since the end of March since we had to make a special trip to see the doc. Mom thought we were LONG over-due, and was super grateful that I had been so healthy for so long. With the colder weather moving in, we are all pretty sure this winter will bring its share of illness.

Well, we sure did have a fun and exciting weekend. Saturday was a very busy day for Mom and Dad trying to get a bunch of little things done here and there, mixed in with our normal weekend chores. Grocery shopping, laundry, putting together nursery furniture, cleaning, entertaining ME, etc. After a busy day, I was dropped off at my buddy Gavin's house while Mom and Dad went to a going away party for The Abercrombie’s. Gavin's Dad hurt his foot earlier in the week, and it turns out Gavin caught Croup as well. He may have caught it from me, or somebody else at daycare. Anyway, Gavin's mama was due with his baby sister any day now...and Mom joked with her Saturday night about going into labor since her hubby is on crutches and Gavin is now sick. WELL, turns out Gavin's baby sister (Gwyneth) was born around 7:30 AM in the morning at their home while Mr. Shawn was taking Gavin over to his grandparents house! Turns out Mom's formula wasn't very far off! Mom and Dad are still pretty blown away, and their story will be on the local news tonight! Both Gavin's Mama and new baby sister are doing just great, and are expected to go home sometime today. We are so happy that everyone is healthy and we are excited to meet baby Gwyn! Baby Gwyn and my baby sister, Alex will be together for the majority of their time spent at daycare...just like Gavin and I!

Here are some pictures of The Abercrombie’s going away get together. They are moving to Florida at the end of this month, and will be greatly missed.
Ms. Jen and Dad getting ready to chow down on some yummy BBQ:

Mr. Jeremy trying to lick Ms. Jen's face (silly):

Mom with some of her dearest friends:

Ms. Junior and Mr. Jason:

Auntie Amber and Ms. Jen!


On Sunday morning, Auntie K came over to hang with me while Mom, Dad, Grandma, and Grandpa all went to the Broadmoor for Sunday Brunch. Mom said I'm welcome to join them when I can eat my weight in food, and can behave like a gentleman...maybe in 10-13 years? This was the 4th year carrying on the tradition.
Grandma getting ready to enjoy her first round:

Dad starting off with the traditional breakfast items:

The beautiful view from the table they were seated at:

Grandma and Grandpa posing for Mom outside of the brunch area:

Mom and Dad posing for Grandpa outside:

A wonderful day!

View of the Broadmoor hotel looking across the lake:

We are wishing Grandma a VERY Happy Birthday today, and a Very Happy Anniversary to Grandma and Grandpa as they celebrate 36 years of marriage! They were married the same year that Dad was born ON Grandma's Birthday. Pretty neat!

Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

My First REAL Trick-Or-Treating Experience

I know you are all just DYING to know how my Halloween evening went...so, here you have it! We started off our evening with pizza and candy and cupcakes at a friend of a friend’s house. Can you think of a better way to possibly begin an evening full of excitement and more candy?? I think NOT.

I think I ate a piece of pizza, some grapes, about 25 candy corns, a cookie, and part of Mom's cupcake (oh, and a Capri Sun). Needless to say...I WAS AMPED AND READY TO GO! There were quite a few kids that showed up for the pre Trick-Or-Treating festivities, so Gavin and I had a fun time running around in the yard and watching the older kids run around as well while we waited for it to get dark. It was clear that the sugar highs were in full effect.


Mom DID manage to capture one really quick picture of me IN my monkey costume. It lasted all of 2 minutes, so this is the best she could do:

However, Gavin was wearing the same exact costume and managed to not only leave it on the entire time, but he even posed for a picture for Mom! So, picture my face in this costume and you will get the idea:

You guys? I was a TOTAL TRIP. I had everyone cracking up the entire evening. The first house we went to...when the nice lady opened her front door, I decided to just go right in! Hey! Who could blame me? Usually when a door opens, it is opening so I can come in and visit, right?

I was insisting that Mom open EVERY.SINGLE.SUCKER that I received. When she refused to open it I would throw a mini-tantrum. There were a few times when a nice man or woman would answer the door and instead of saying "Trick-Or-Treat" I would say "CANNY!" (Candy). A few times Mom would remind me to say "Thank You" by whispering in my ear "What do you say?" and instead of saying "THANK YOU", I would say "MORE?" Once folks realized just how cute and adorable Gavin and I were...they would kneel down to our level and stick out their bowl of candy so that we could help ourselves. SUCKAS!!! I would grab as many handfuls as I could before the adults started objecting. At one door, I had Ms. Larissa lift me up so I could ring the doorbell. As soon as she put me back down on the ground...I started knocking on the door. It was clear I didn't have the time to wait around for nonsense! Open the door and GIVE ME CANNY!! After about an hour...Mom and Dad decided it was time to call it a night. I got to chomp down on a orange sucker on the way home...so I was quite content. Here are some more of the shots that Mom captured throughout the evening:








Everyone thought Gavin and I were just the cutest things (and we were). We made quite a few nice folks smile from ear to ear. We had a great time, and I can't wait to do it again next year! Hope Halloween 2011 was great for all of you.