Making up for lost time with pictures

Baby's First Thanksgiving!

For Thanksgiving we always do 3 official Thanksgiving meals: lunch with my Mom's side of the family at my Mimi's house in Austin, then dinner with the Whitesides at Paul's parents house, and then one with my Dad's side of the family on Friday which was held at my parent's house this year for the first time. We have done this driving up and down I-35 for the past few years, but we may have to figure out a way to do less next year... we'll see!

Here is a compilation of some family pics from all the Thanksgiving meals:

here are my kids with my cousin JacyBenjamin laughing with GranddaddyAshlyn, my parents dog Dusty, my sister Carly, and JacyBen with my brother RyanAshlyn and my niece "baby Hannah" Ashlyn and Paytonthe kids table at Mimi's house: my sweet teenage sister (who is too old for the kids' table but never complains about it) and my cousins Sara and Michael
In other news: Benjamin is on the verge of crawling! I thought this wouldn't happen for at least another month or so, this is much earlier than Ashlyn started. He pops himself up on all 4s and rocks back and forth until he suddenly (and violently I might add) dives forward. He uses this tactic to make it quickly across a room- it is funny to watch!
Recently my favorite thing in the whole world is Benjamin's laughter. He is such a happy baby and his favorite funny person is Ashlyn. If she falls or makes a funny noise or face he giggles so hard. It's nice to see them getting along so well.

I do still need to write about Paul's birthday and surprise party...

My hiatus

Sorry to leave you for so long wondering if the kids are still sick or not... I have been running into some concerned readers over the holidays. Everyone seems to be healthy and happy- Hallelujah! I apologize for taking such an extended break from blogging, the past weeks have passed by me so quickly, I am not sure I can even do a very accurate summary. On the 18th Paul's family and I threw him a surprise party up at the church, and he was actually surprised! I'll need to get back to you with pictures from the party when I can... in a related story my wonderful husband also turned 30.... I want to do a good blog in honor of that as well... of course there was Thanksgiving as well.
For now I am going to beg of you some patience while I get my life (and house, what a mess!) in better order and I will leave you with the promise of a couple of more substantial blogs to come. I just wanted to give you a quick post for now so that you won't think that I have quit blogging altogether!

Sick of sick

I am sick and tired of my kids being sick! Really it would mostly be Benjamin... right now he has bronchiolitis from a virus- most likely the adenovirus. Life has not been real fun around here. I am having to give him respiratory treatments by nebulizer several times a day, giving him TONS of oral medications (which he immediately throws up nearly every time!), and trying to get him to sleep as much as possible. Thankfully he is sleeping now and Ashlyn wanted to watch Veggie Tails... otherwise I couldn't be writing. Poor Ashlyn SO BORED. We can't leave the house mostly b/c by the time we get ready to go anywhere it is already time for another nebulizer treatment. Also, we don't want him to catch ANYTHING ELSE!!

Nebulizer treatments

Paul was in Nashville last Thusrsday through Sunday so we went to Austin to stay with my parents. Saturday morning I ended up taking Benjamin to the ER b/c I felt like he was getting worse instead of better (I had taken him to the Dr before we left on Thursday) and he was just breathing so fast and sounding so wheezy that it was scaring me. They gave him a racemic epi respiratory treatment and he showed immediate improvement.

In the ER (notice how fun this is for Ashlyn)

The hospital we went to was the new Dell Children's Hospital which is really nice. My dad did a wonderful job of keeping Ashlyn occupied; since it was a children's hospital there was plenty of fun things to do, just not in the patient rooms.

So we made it back to my parents house just in time for the UT game- which was looking bad for Texas until I dressed Benjamin in his burnt orange. Once he was properly dressed the Longhorns started to play better and eventually won the game! Sunday came and Benjamin still had a fever, so he and I didn't go to church. I did however dress him in his Sunday clothes so my mom could get a picture of the kids on their front porch.

Even through all this... Benjamin can smile!

One more mention of health concerns: you may notice how tiny Benjamin is. He is now 5 months old and he has not gained any weight at all this entire month! We go back to the GI Dr tomorrow. I am feeling so helpless about this, all I know to do at this point is PRAY.