Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Ten Months of Charlie...






Charlie is now a whopping 10 months old!  This was a big month for him, he has 5 teeth now, started making animal noises, and is eating more solids.  We have finally introduced wheat, but he is still failing corn, big time.  It makes him so sick, terrible rash and frightening diapers. He adores grahm crackers and cheerios.   He loves to be read to, and will even flip through books on his own.  He especially loves books with animals and babies in them.  He makes sounds for the polar bear, gorilla, and lion.  He says Mama and Dada, and will sometimes say Amma for Grandma.  He still loves to be held, and tries to kiss you with a big, wide, wet mouth.  Eww.  Sleeping hasn't gotten any better and we have just kinda come to accept it. He typically goes to bed at 8, then wakes at 12, 2:30, and 5.  Grandma takes him from 5am or 6am on, and Jason and I then sleep until 8 or so, that way we don't go totally crazy.  Despite that, Charlie is such a joy to me.  I love playing with him and teaching him new things.  William is really starting to play with him and Charlie just eats it up.  I love seeing these two guys become buddies!

Frying Pan Farm...




Spring is slowly arriving here.  We have a few days of cold and then a lovely warm day, and then it reverts back to cold.  So, when a warm day comes we take full advantage of it!  We headed out after preschool to Frying Pan Farm in Virginia.  It is such a great place, so many things to do, and such nice animals.  It has a great playground too, which adds to the appeal.  We hadn't been to the farm since Charlie was about a month old, and I must say he enjoyed himself much more this time around....

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Fort Washington...A Little Boy's Paradise...

Fort Washington National Park...

The beds in the captains quarters...I can't imagine those were very comfy...


The door to the solitary confinement cell...

The solitary confinement cell...Can you imagine spending time in that???












On President's day Daddy and William went to Fort Washington to burn off some energy and explore.  They had a great time and Will came home with many, many fun things to tell us.  I stayed home with Charlie, who was still pretty crabby with all this recent teething he has been doing.  Spring seems to be coming early to DC...

Friday, February 17, 2012

Time Keeps On Ticking Away...

It's so fun to see Charlie enjoying the same things William did...

Will still loves the orange truck park as much as ever...

Charlie is still howling with glee in the garden...

He has figured out how to open and close the door and walk through it instead of crawling...

William has been pretending to be a knight for much of today.  He and his trusty steed have saved me from many dragons today!

Check out this kid's lashes...

Boys always get such lovely lashes and will never even appreciate them! ( :
We are still living life at a crazy speed, but things are really starting to change.  Will and Charlie are becoming much more interactive and Will is interacting more with him all the time.  I LOVE it.  I love seeing my two boys become "brothers".  Charlie is cutting teeth like crazy, and seems to be adding two top teeth to go with the 3 on the bottom.  I keep looking for the 4th bottom one, but it's still MIA.  Charlie has been caught standing a few times and seems to be holding on to things out of habit more than anything else.  I think he will be walking well by his birthday.  He is starting to explore more and more and is trying to work out how things work, like fitting in puzzle pieces, and getting things in and out of containers.  He is still a horrible sleeper, but I figure it won't last forever.  We will sleep again someday. 
We had Will's parent teacher conference on Thursday and the teacher said he has made a lot of improvement.  I was very happy to hear that.  I am signing him up for 3 days next year from 9am to 1pm on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  It will be his official PreK class, but I am not sure if he will go to Kindergarten in 2013, or if I will keep him in PreK one more year.  I would rather keep him back until he is ready to settle down than make him go on time and set him up for disaster.    He is working hard at learning to cut with scissors and writing his letters and numbers.  We are gearing up for his big 4 year birthday that is coming up all too quickly.  I am trying to pin him down on what he wants and what he wants to do for it.  I don't think we are going to have a big party this year, I think we will do something fun instead.  All I know for sure is that he wants a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting....

Monday, February 13, 2012

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Status Update...

We finally captured the elusive teeth a little more clearly!

Will was trying to lift Charlie up onto the couch with him by using his monkey feet...

Will and Charlie are actually starting to play together! 

Charlie is becoming a toddler.  He has started to throw real fits, including outraged screaming and back arching!

Will insisted on sleeping in his Star Wars pajamas, Cowboy hat, and Cowboy boots.  We snuck in later and removed the boots...


Life has been a complete whirlwind lately.  Since Charlie's head injury we have had more fevers, and now Charlie has a double ear infection.  He is now on antibiotics for the second time in his life, but they seem to have made a world of difference!  Go Amoxicillan!  Will has been working hard on writing his name, and is really trying hard to do things on his own these days.  He has become buddies with 2 little boys down the block and they are spending all the nice afternoons riding bikes and shooting off the stomp rockets. I took the boys to the park today, and debated before leaving about bringing a change of clothes for Charlie.  I decided that I probably didn't need it.  You know how this story will end.  Antibiotics and a baby.  Well, I pulled him out of the carseat and it was plainly evident that it had been a BIG mistake.  I tried my best to clean him up with baby wipes and wiped off the inside of his shirt and pants the best I could.  Then we went to a store and bought an outfit to change in to.  We were a long way from home.  Ugh.  Tomorrow I am determined to catch up on all the boring things like laundry and floor cleaning before my work over the weekend begins.  Before I know it, it will be Monday again!

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Charlie Fell Down and Broke His Crown...

Fast asleep on the gurney...

Awaiting the CT scan...Feeling fine!
Thursday morning Jason took William to preschool.  Charlie and I were spending some time together on the big couch.  Charlie LOVES to jump on the couch, he stands on the cushions at the back, and bounces up and down like a monkey.  He was about an arms length away and all of a sudden he fell back and toppled off the couch head first.  It happened so fast I couldn't stop him.  He landed on the crown of his head.  He was screaming like crazy, but stopped crying within a few minutes and seemed fine.  He didn't fall asleep, didn't vomit, and seemed to eat, sleep, and be drinking ok.  I checked his pupils and he seemed fine.  I called the Dr and she told me to do all the things I just did.  A large goose egg swelled immediately on his scalp, and I was expecting that it would bruise quickly, but it didn't.  I kept watching him closely all day, but he still seemed fine.  I noticed that the spot on his head wasn't bruising, and it was staying very soft, instead of hard, like a bruise, this was really soft, like a blister.  A really BIG blister.  It literally was the size of an egg.  I also noticed that it didn't hurt when I touched it.  I mulled over all evening what to do, but something wasn't right.  The next morning it had changed shape, but really wasn't smaller, just longer and slightly flatter, basically more spread out.  I felt it again, and I felt a wierd ridge/dip.  I was freaked out.  My first thought was - The reason it isn't bruising and the reason it's soft is that it isn't blood it's cerebral fluid!!! AHHHHHH!!!!  I told Jason that I needed to take him to the ER NOW! I got in the car and headed in.  When we arrived at the ER there was a serious emergency ahead of us, and so we waited a really long time, but when they call the chaplain to the Pediatric ER, you are happy to wait when you realize how lucky that your baby is stable and happy.  The Dr came in and agreed with all my observations and said that a CT scan was needed.  I was very worried that he would need an IV for sedation, but the Dr said that hopefully we wouldn't need that.  This is where the story gets complicated.  Will and Jason came to the ER after bringing Grandma to work.  I needed to leave to go in with a patient for an egg retrival, (not something that can be put off, and I had already committed to this very nice lady, who has no one else since she is here alone from another country).  It ripped me apart to leave my baby, but honestly, I knew that Jason was there and it would have been so horrible for me to see Charlie be poked or prodded.  I am really not good at seeing my kids be made to suffer.  So, I left, but was calling every few minutes, and I went across the street to work and met my patient.  While she was having her eggs retrieved Jason called me and said that the CT scan was done, and it showed a skull fracture.  Thankfully, it was closed, and there was no bruising, or bleeding on the brain.  I felt very relieved, but they told him that we should try and not let him hit his head for the next 6-8 weeks while it heals.  I need to find him a helmet!  Babies hit their heads all the time!  At this point Charlie is doing fine, he just has a big blistery thing on his scalp, but it is smaller each day.  It still doesn't seem to hurt him much.  We follow up with his Dr on Monday.  I have learned a couple big lessons with all this:  Don't let the baby play on the couch, and Trust your instincts!  Poor Charlie!

Amazing Weather...



William had a fever earlier this week, and then poor Charlie came down with it.  After the obligatory "trip to the Dr to be told it's a virus", we stopped at the park since it was over 65 degrees!  Charlie loves to crawl on the bridge just like William did when he was a baby, and William is looking shockingly old these days....Where did my baby go?

Finally! First Teeth...

I realize that this picture is really terrible, but you can see the little white spot poking through his gums...

Charlie has a cold on top of everything else so he is pretty crabby these days...Who can blame him?