Goodbye 2009

Hello 2010. Here's to hoping that this year brings lots of good times, good health, time with family and friends, and lots of new adventures.

Christmas Part 2...

Well Christmas Eve was here in a flash and I made our usual dinner of Cheese Fondue with Chocolate Fondue for dessert. However, with mom in the hospital since Tuesday, it just wasn't the same. Before dinner I called mom and William got to talk to her. He misses her tons and it was nice for him to get to say goodnight. After dinner William got a bath and then it was time to play for a little while and get ready for bed. That morning Julie and Marcus were at our house and the boys opened their gifts to each other. William gave Marcus the wrong present at first and he got it halfway opened before I noticed. After getting him the right present he opened the Color Changing Hot Wheels track we got him, which apparently was a huge thing for him as he was almost in tears. I missed his face though.. :(
William got a Batman on the Batcycle and he LOVED it. The look on his face was priceless and we just had to open it up now for him to play with it. It definately made his day.
Before we knew it Christmas Morning had arrived and it was time to open presents. William found the Red Dino he had been wanting left out just under the tree. And then he got to open his stocking. Inside that he found some candy and a pack of bendaroos... He had been wanting those for a long time. He's made several things. I'm sure we'll be buying him more. Then after waiting "patiently" for Grandpa it was time to open presents. It was a frenzy of opening gifts when it came to William. He loved all of his gifts and just kept saying thank you to all of us and santa.. He even threw in a few "you are the best mom ever!" in there. Silly kid. I managed to get some pictures for mom.
Later on after getting some of the gifts put together grandpa thought it'd be fun to shoot William with the NERF gun he got him. Thank god William is a good sport.. He laughed and got the biggest smile on his face. It was good for a laugh. Mommy even tried on the Bumblebee Voice Changing Helmet he got and made aunt Anna laugh. I just couldn't resist. Breakfast consisted of sausage and eggs. After breakfast I called grandma back after she called us early this morning to see when we'd be up. Turns out she needed to have a quick simple surgery done and she didn't know when that would be happening. We just have to wait for her to tell us when to come visit. She doesn't wanna miss spening some time with William and us on this day.
I do feel sad for William on this Christmas. Grandma has always been here for Christmas and this is the first time that he's really experienced her being gone for something like this. We have been to visit her and he was almost in tears as we left. He just wants grandma home. He keeps asking when she'll be coming home and he was hopeful that it would be Christmas. Instead we have another 5 days with grandma gone and mommy has to do all the cooking for Christmas dinner.. Let's hope I don't mess up the Ham.. I think Anna would cry. I know I would. I am, however, thankful for what I do have on this day. I have a wonderful son, a great family, wonderful friends, and am even blessed with a wonderful man who has been a blessing this year. William too is thankful for his family, friends, school and most of all the good things he has. It's a reminder this year that even though Mom is sick and not with us at home that she's in good hands getting better, and that this day is meant for more than just presents and for some the big dinner that comes with the day.

Christmas at our house part 1

So Christmas at our house started a couple weeks ago. William just couldn't wait to get the house decorated and the tree too. We purchased some ornaments and apparently $55 is what it costs to do that at our house. William picked out the star for the top of our tree. He picked everything out.. ornaments, lights, decorations, and the tree. He knew what he wanted. We added lights around our window and he helped grandpa get all the lights up outside too. He decorated the tree as best as he could and was so proud of himself. He was especially excited to see Santa.. The whole santa experience was fun for him. And the biggest plus, was that we didn't have to wait in line for 2 hours to see him.
This year I tried something new. We generally put all the presents out Christmas eve so that there is no trying to peak at the gifts, but since this isn't going to be the case everywhere we go or later in life. He has to learn that he can't peak or open presents early. I realize that this could be considered a tease to the kid. Presents under the tree with his name on them, the ability to read his name has made this harder I think, has been a big issue for him. He was able to feel one and "accidentally" ripped the paper. He immediately knew by the feel of it that it was a gift he asked santa for. :( Definately not what I had wanted him to do. But as time has gone on he has been getting better. He has been able to leave the gifts alone a lot more.
This weekend he spent some time with his grandparents and dad. It gave me some time to get the rest of the shopping done, presents wrapped and placed under the tree, except for those few presents Santa will bring Christmas Eve. With all the presents under the tree he has been curious to know whats his and from who. He's even shaken one to see what it could be.. Too bad for him it just doesn't shake well.



Poor kid just can't wait. And I can't wait to see the look on his face when he opens his presents. I also look forward to Christmas Eve.. Even though I work we will enjoy our new traditional Christmas Eve dinner.. Fondue. I make a cheese fondue and this year we are having a milk chocolate and also a white chocolate fondue. We will also enjoy watching A Christmas Story. William and grandpa started that tonight... I can't wait for him to see the whole thing. He really seemed to enjoy the first part of it.
This is just the start of our Christmas posts.. To Be Continued Christmas Eve...

Negative allergy tests and antibiotics.

William had allergy testing done early in November. They tested for several things which we thought would be positive and we were let down to find that all of them were negative. Poor kids been dealing with what has seemed to me horrible congestion due to allergies and then nothing. The allergist felt he could have recurring infections, which wasn't much of a relief, seems like more of a problem. Last night he woke up in the middle of the night with what sounded like a deeper sounding croupy cough and had some trouble breathing. I used his inhaler and gave him a dose of prednisolone and luckily within an hour and a half he was peacefully sleeping again. I made an appointment with his dr just to be on the safe side and after looking him all over she said that his lungs were clear, but that antibiotics were the last thing she could give him for the congestion. He is now on a combo Erythromycin and Sulfisoxazole combo (brand name Pediazole) which we found out is now discontinued and it was only by luck the pharmacy had it. He is taking this antibiotic three times daily for the next 21 days. It took me by surprise when the pharmacist noted that it was for 21 days. He's never been on anything longer than 10 days. Our hope is that this antibiotic will kick the congestion of what his dr is referring to as a sinus infection (must be one heck of an infection) and that he will start sleeping better and most importantly feeling better.

We will see how this goes. He's never had either medication so we will see if this is an ok combo or if an allergy pops up later like it did with another antibiotic just over a year ago. We will continue to try the suggestions his dr is giving and maybe with the right combo of things he will no longer have to deal with the chronic congestion which has been bothering him for months now.

Cali trip part 3

We spent our day Sunday (10-25) in Santa Cruz at the beach. William had a blast playing in the water. That is definately not something that you would be able to do in Oregon at this time of year. It was a lot of fun. And well all the playing led to a nice little nap in the car.

We spent our last evening at a corn maze. Since William and I had never been through one before it sounded like fun. We went through 2 of the 3 mazes and it totaled over 5 miles of walking. It sure didn't seem like that long. Poor William his allergies kicked in and made him have a harder time with his nose.


Soon it was time to head home. It was hard to leave, vacation wasn't long enough, and William didn't wanna leave his new found friends. He was teary eyed in the airport. The flight home went well outside of some turbulance and coming home to lots of rain and cold weather.

California Trip part 2....

We spent Saturday (10-24) in San Francisco. Most of the day was spent at the Steinhart Aquarium and a few of the exhibits at the California Academy of Science at Golden Gate Park. It was amazing and William really enjoyed it. We started out by seeing the T-Rex fossils and some of the animals in the area around the Rainforest exhibit. Then we made our way inside the 4 level rainforest that took on the climate of 4 different rainforests from around the world (Borneo, Costa Rica, Madagascar, and the Amazon), not only was it beautiful, but it was hot and humid.. The kids loved seeing the different animals and all the butterflies.After that we went into the Aquarium part of the building and went through several different sections. They had many different types of fish/aqauatic life from all over the world. William loved watching the octopus climb the glass and seeing the electric eels was pretty awesome to him. The one animal that took everyone by surprise as the white Alligator they had. After the aquarium we checked out the rest of the building seeing penguins and then exhibits showing animals in Africa. The kids were starting to get worn out and definately getting hungry. So we decided we'd head off for lunch to the one place William had been talking about for a couple days.
We ended up down at the piers and had lunch at The Rainforest Cafe. William had been talking about going to that place for a while. The place is amazing and the kids loved it. The animals (all robotic) were all over and some had been dressed up. Every so often the animals would start moving and it would start raining. William enjoyed some tasty mac and cheese for lunch. It's definately a place we'll go back to. After lunch we walked the pier for a while and made our way to Ghirardeli square. We made one more stop before we left San Francisco and drove down Lombard street.. Great view... packed street... and there is no way I could live in that city, the driving alone is horrible.