Play-Doh Nose

Pulled out new play-doh that Owen put on his cheeks. He asked me to, so I obliged and surprised that it is quite chilly. Then I thought it would be funny to mold it around my nose, which of course Owen wanted to do as well. I helped him and then we sang Rudolph. It was quite funny.

Big Boy Seat

Yes we finally got around to changing Aiden's car seat. I have planned to do this for over a month. Eek! But just got it done this weekend. He seems very happy in his new seat and looks so much bigger to me now.

Train Show

Herndon's ArtSpace hosts an annual train show, and even though I personally am not impressed by it Owen loved it last year and yes he loved it this year too. I had to pretty much hold him the whole time as the tables are too high to really see. He enjoyed watching the trains but mostly had fun making up stories for all the scenes, primarily the ones involving diggers and broken trains. There was one where the train dropped off into the water and the crane train came to the rescue. Aiden enjoyed watching the trains for maybe 15 minutes then Omer took him to the kid room to play with the trains. Much happier being free to play.

Waiting to see the Thomas and Percy trains.

Train Crossing

Train Watching

Happy Train Boy

Train Playing

Hats

I found these pictures on the camera, so I assume they from when Omer stayed with the boys while I went Christmas shopping. They looked like they were having a great time.

Camera

I am going to post this so from now on you will understand why most of the pictures posted are not up to par. The camera is really messed up and we are going to buy a new one now. The auto focus does not work at all, so we have to manually do it which takes too long when trying to get pictures of quick moving kids. As I have complained before the color is off too, not sure why but it is. Very annoyed and will be getting a new camera VERY soon, don't want ugly pictures for Aiden's first Christmas. I am just sad that so many moments will be blurry ones now.

Baller

Aiden loves balls. He crawls to the ball bin and grabs them out. It is cute when he can't reach one and dangles over to get it. He will play catch, chase the call, he has a very nice throw and bounce, and also loves to play basketball with stools. Sadly the stools are going to have to be removed because now Aiden tries to pull them and move them and one fell over on him today. Eek! But he is fine.

Holding his Ball Up

Making a Basket

Chasing the Ball (he also took the shoes out of the shoe bin)
He also enjoys pulling the basket hoop down.

The Grinch

Owen has really taken a liking to The Grinch. We watch it almost every day, read the book and even play the Grinch game. You ask what is the Grinch game? Well Owen created it. He is the Grinch and me and Aiden are the Who's. I play with a toy and the Grinch takes it from runs around the corner and puts it in his sled. We did this no joke for an hour today. Owen told me a couple times he was tired and the Grinch needed a drink. :) The Grinch is also much nicer and will say thank you to the Who, ask nicely for the toy and makes sure the Who knows which toy to play with next. At first I had no idea where Owen...I mean the Grinch was storing all these toys until he ran over, put one down, we heard a little crash and the Grinch called out "Oops!" in the sweetest voice you can imagine. He was piling them on the table at the front. That is when he requested the sled to store his bounty. Love Christmas!

The Grinch and His Bounty

Tree Exploration

Aiden has been pretty good about behaving with the Christmas tree. However, he really likes to explore the new plant in his house. I absolutely love kids at Christmas and how in awe they are of all the decorations.

He crawls to the back to bat at the ornaments.

He also loves to strum through the branches.

Oooooh!
Going after the bird.

Goal!

Chloe, the Rare Case

Since Chloe was diagnosed with cancer two years ago her oncologist has always deemed her the rare case. Why? Because when they determined it was cancer, we opted to do the MRI which is supposed to be 95% accurate. Well it wasn't able to decipher what type. So then we did the bone marrow test, which again about 95% accurate. Guess what, was not able to determine what type of cancer. So she treated it as best she could with her best guess of what type of cancer, a plasma cell tumor. Well two months ago I took Chloe in for her routine blood test and her globulins were up. This number usually indicates that the chemo is not working anymore and the cancer is out of remission. You can imagine what this news did to me. I have been thinking about all I can do for Chloe before it gets really bad again. So this morning Chloe had her appointment with the oncologist (something we do twice a year) and she informed me that either the cancer is out of remission or the spike in her globulins are due from a tick-borne disease. She told me it is more likely that the cancer is returning, mainly that she has been on the lowest form of chemo for two years. I opted to get the extra blood test to see if it was the tick. And what do you know? She shows traces of erhlichiosis, a tick-borne disease treats by antibiotics. I am grateful for the expertise of the oncologist, to even consider that it could be something else before going to the next, much harder chemo treatment. I had the biggest smile on my face leaving there today. Chloe, is my lucky, rare case dog. So we will continue with her current chemo treatment with an additional antibodies for the disease and check her in 6 weeks to confirm that the disease is gone and there is no other issues. Looking forward to lots more Chloe snuggles.

Grocery Shopping

I tend to try to go grocery shopping on school mornings so I only have to take Aiden, but with the school days filled with other stuff I needed to go this morning. This really isn't a big deal, both boys are great at the store. The problem is when I go to Whole Foods, the carts only have room for one child and of course no car style cart (thank goodness, I hate driving those). Owen still really likes to ride in the cart but now he can't because Aiden needs that spot and Aiden is not that happy to be carried in the Ergo. So I figured I would try something new and Owen was estactic about this idea. Aiden rode in the cart and Owen brought along his shopping cart and pushed it through the store. He was so very cute, pushing it through telling me, "Mommy, I'll get the blueberries." He filled his cart so much we had to take some stuff out. We got lots of smiles through our grocery trip. And Owen did great all the way until the pastry section at the end where he knew the cookies were. He pushed his cart so quick over there and got his treat (he always does). So then his cart ended up in my cart because, "I need two hands to eat my cookie." Even with him walking through it, I was still able to get out of the store in 30 minutes. It was a very successful idea. Proud of my little shopper.