Remembering Grandma

As much as this blog is usually for celebrations, milestones, cute stories and overall fun, I also want to include parts of life that may sad but still memorable.  This past weekend, Grrandma/GeeGee passed away and we said goodbye to her in California.  While it is a very sad time and I will miss her every day, it is also important to remember the good times that we had with her and the lasting memories that have been made.

I am so lucky to have had such a strong bond with all of my grandparents, and one that I got to foster years and years beyond those of many of my peers.  Not many people can say that they had all 4 of their grandparents until they were 24, but I am truly blessed to be able to say this.

My relationship with Grandma was amazing and so what the relationship that GeeGee had with her boys.  I am so sad that Riley and Asher will not have the opportunity to grow up with her influence as I did, but I'd like to think that she was able to make a lasting impression on Riley.  At 4 1/2, I think the interactions that they had may make it to the long-term memory bank.  Asher, sadly, will not have the same, but from pictures and stories, he will know GeeGee as well.

These pictures, just a handful of precious memories, show what a loving, caring, devoted GeeGee Grandma was to the boys.  I hope that they do their namesake proud and live a life that Grandpa would be proud to share his name with, and that Grandma will be a part of their memories.

4 and 1/2

Yesterday, I explained to Riley that since it was going to be March 9, it would be his half birthday!  He said he was turning 5 and didn't quite get the idea of halves, but I guess they are not learning fractions yet at school.  So he asked if he was getting cupcakes and we settled on a celebratory pie.

This morning, he came running into our room and said "It's my birthday!  I'm bringing cupcakes to school!"  Once we explained again that it was his half birthday and avoided the cupcake question, we sent him on his way to get ready for school.  Meanwhile, I felt guilt daggers starting to stab - who am I to put a damper on his fun?  If my son wants to celebrate his half birthday with treats, who am I to stop him?  So at 7:15 am, I hopped into the kitchen and got some cookies into the oven.  15 minutes later we had a batch of chocolate chip cookies cut into half in order to celebrate Riley's half birthday at school!

Then at home, we celebrated again - with a half of a (mini) pie and a dinosaur candle each.  We sang "happy half birthday to us" as a duet and blew out the candles together!

And one more very important part of acknowledging the fact that he is older is the fact that he is growing too!  Each month Riley gets bigger and bigger and I still can not believe how tall, mature, well spoken and smart this kid is.  He was telling me today about the planets and the solar system and meteors and how he loves just about everything that is space related.  

People try to tell you how quickly time flies and sometimes you just don't believe them when you are caught up in the minutia of cooking dinner, doing bath time, getting ready for bed, washing dishes, doing laundry, walking the dog, packing up school bags and starting all over again the next day.  But days are long - years are short, and before I know it, we will have a 5 year old on our hands!

Asher's first graduation

This morning, Asher officially graduated from physical therapy!  

When he was born 5 weeks early, a set of events was put into motion.  His muscles were not fully developed which lead to him not having full range of motion in his neck.  Because the muscles were tight, he couldn't turn his head the whole way which lead to a flat spot on his head.  That lead to a helmet and some muscle weakness in his shoulders.  Weakness lead to army crawling rather than getting up on all fours, but at the end of the day, he has made tremendous progress and has now completed physical therapy.

We used to have the physical therapist come every week and then moved to every other week.  Mary was always excited to see his progress and was proud of the new tricks we got to show off.  Today, Asher was walking around the room and crawling up blocks and trying to throw a ball.  All of these tricks show what great strides he has made and he has caught up to the skills that kids his age should be able to master.  

Of course there are still always new things to learn and practice, so our work here is far from over, but Asher has done a great job and you can see how proud he is of himself when he gets up and walks across the room!

Go, baby, go!

In case you've been wondering what's going on here, we have been keeping very busy!  We are very excited to welcome Leo to the family and we all love him already.  With the new addition, Asher realizes that he is no longer the baby of the family and has decided to step it up - literally - and prove that he is ready to move on to the next skill of big boydom... walking!

Now, he isn't wonderful at it yet, but with all new skills comes the time needed for practice and learning.  I don't think he will be running across the room tomorrow, but wouldn't be surprised if it happened in a few weeks.  We are still working on balance and learning to stand on his own.  Sometimes when we try to prop him up to walk, his legs turn into jelly and he has no desire to take steps.

Asher still reverts to crawling, because that is much faster than wobbly walking, but at least the crawling is now 100% on his hands and knees and he has graduated from the army crawl.  I don't think we will be entering him into any 5K races quite yet, but look out - this kid will be a walking pro in no time!

Bunk beds, baby!

Ever since we went to the beach over Rosh Hashana, Chris has had in his mind that he wanted to get Riley bunk beds.  He was in them at the beach and loved sleeping on the bottom bunk and playing on the top.  Add to that the fact that he is a bean pole and was out growing his race car bed, so it was time to give in and move him up!

Over the past few days, Chris and Riley have been assembling the new bed and over the weekend, he got to sleep in the new bed/toy.  I set some ground rules: no jumping on the beds, no throwing things from the bed, sleep on the bottom bed and have fun!  Most of the rules are holding up (within the first 2 days), but the minute he got up to the top bunk, he brought all of his toys up and started launching them across the room... so we'll see!

We may have to figure out one more addition to the bed - a guard rail of some sort - as I was called into his room at 1am and he was sitting on the floor.  Not sure exactly what happened, but either way, he was not staying in bed.  Stay tuned on that.  So now the room's theme is Star Wars/Sports/All Things Boy - but there is plenty of play space and now we have room for friends or family to sleep over!

Riley goes skiing

Guest blogger: Chris

Today Riley and I had a father and son day. For weeks I have been talking to Riley about going skiing. Every time I brought it up with him, he couldn't wait to go and kept reminding me that he wanted to go super fast down the hill. Today was finally the day for us to go on our big ski adventure. Last night I told Riley about our big day and he couldn't stop talking about it.  As I was on the way home to pick up Riley early from school, I became very nervous about the weather as a wonderful snow rain mixture precipitated from the dark and ominous sky. But I wouldn't let the weather ruin our fun adventure together. 

When we arrived at the ski park we got settled and layered up Riley in all of his "ski" gear which consisted of 3T snow pants that were six inches two short on him, pajama pants that served as his long underwear, Erin's red face mask, his dinosaur bike helmet and my old ski googles. It was quite the getup. 

After purchasing our lift tickets and getting our ski gear it was finally time to hit the slopes. I have to admit that I enjoyed a good laugh watching Riley try to navigate the snow in his ski boots. Finally we made it to the bunny hill and the moment of truth. Last night, Erin and I discussed how I should manage Riley as he made his way down the slope. Should I ski backwards while hold his hands? Should I ski down a little ways and have him ski to me? Erin suggested that we bring the jump rope and that I wrap it around him and ski behind him and we would go down the slope together. So that is what we did. 

Riley was very apprehensive as we made our way to the top of the bunny in preparation for our first run of the day. To my recollection, Riley only said that he did not want to go down about 47 times. The only thing I was say about the first run is that it was a process that lasted about 20 minutes. Each run after that got easier and easier as he figured out what he needed to do. Eventually we got into a rhythm and he would stay up for long stretches at a time. 

All in all we went up and down about 8 times. Riley's big reward was a chicken tender and fries dinner in the ski lodge. As you can see from the picture below, Riley was very proud of his prize! I was very proud of Riley. I know it was not easy for either of us but he was a great sport and really had a good time.

Before we headed home we made a pit stop at Zee's office which was right down the street. Riley really enjoyed getting the tour of the place and checking out each and every room at least twice. It was a great father and son day and I can't wait for our next adventure.

Speckles update

Well, here is the update on Mr. Speckles:

When I went in to check on Asher this morning, his little spots had turned into larger dots that were connecting to each other and covering more of his skin.  He still seemed to be unfazed but I took him to the pediatrician to check it out again.  Turns out, the new diagnosis is that he is having a reaction from the MMR shot that he got 2 weeks ago.  Only 5% of the population gets this kind of rash reaction and Asher is in the lucky group!

There is nothing that can be done to get rid of it, besides wait it out, but it turns out that as the day went on, he got pretty uncomfortable.  I couldn't tell if he was itchy or uncomfortable or what, but once I brought him back home, he took a nap and that seemed to help.  Later in the day, he got a dose of Tylenol and that also seemed to help.

By the end of the evening, he was still a little crabby but the spots seemed to have gone down some.  We will see where they stand in the morning, and depending on how he is acting, we will see if he gets to make a reappearance at school where he will hopefully scare less kids and parents throughout the next few days!