Playing Catch-Up

Wow, I haven't posted anything since Christmas. Did you miss us? I am sure most of you follow us on Facebook, but I will keep doing the blog for those who do not, and just for fun...

Darren had a great time in Singapore. He taught a large class in an auditorium one day and then also three additional days of classes... or was it two... it has been so long that I no longer remember. It was hard to have Darren gone for the week. Charlotte missed him.

One of the days he was gone her teacher pulled me aside and said, "I wanted to let you know that we took down your family photo today because Charlotte went up to it a few times and started crying"... uh yeah... poor baby, she missed her daddy. I told the teacher that Darren was out of town, so it was ok to leave it down for the week if it was upsetting her.

Charlotte and I stayed busy to pass the time and went lots of places and did some shopping...and before we knew it, Darren was home again. Here are a few pictures from the two days he got to spend site-seeing after his work was done during the week...

Now that Darren is home, life is returning to normal.

Charlotte and I started a gymnastics class on Saturdays with her friend Ashur and his mom. It is a lot of fun. It is mostly unstructured play in the gymnastics are of the recreation center, but that is perfect for this age. She really loves being able to run and be silly with her good friend.

I

have been staying busy running... yes... running. When we lived in AZ I ran all the time, but after moving here I had stopped. A friend mentioned in December that she was interested in training together to run a 5 mile race and that really started me back on the trails. Kelly has been great to run with. We both run about the same speed, which is really crucial in a running partner, and she has the same goals as I do, which helps too. Our first race is in just three more weeks. We are up to three miles (all running, no walking if you are wondering), so we still have a lot to go before the race, but I know we can do it. Plus, it just feels great to be doing something for myself! Yeah me.

But... back to Charlotte...

She is talking A LOT more. Her teacher is a retired speech therapist and she has really helped Charlotte learn to imitate the words and speak-up more. It is fun and her voice is so darn cute. She is acting so old these days... time goes so fast. I feel like last year went by in a blur... so, I feel like I really have to document this year with pictures and more videos... so here is a start.

Christmas 2009

We have had a wonderfully quiet Christmas this year.

We celebrated Christmas in Colorado this year, so it was really nice not to travel and to be home for the holidays. I am glad Charlotte will be able to enjoy some quiet Christmases at home and a few holidays traveling to Minnesota to visit her big family back there. This year, Charlotte is in an odd stage where she doesn't understand why she is getting presents, but really loves to open them, and in fact, opening them is sometimes the fun part. I think she would have been happy with just one gift... but I didn't want to chance being faced with the face shown below... Darren and I celebrated Christmas Eve by sending Charlotte to school (sorry kiddo) so we could spend the day together... breakfast, shopping and then a movie (Avatar). The movie was fun. We hadn't been to a movie in, well, a long time. We saw Avatar in 3-D at an IMAX and it was amazing visually, even if the "science" behind the movie plot was a bit annoying and it was a little bit (A LOT) preachy.... but still well worth our time and money just for the special effects.

Christmas Eve Charlotte was a rock star at church (Christmas mass is always a marathon, well, it is anywhere except for the church my family goes to back home... why can't more churches follow Assumption's example?!?!?). After the first song ended Charlotte yelled, "YEAH!" and made the whole church laugh. Then after the second song started she jumped out of my arms and yelled, "Let's dance!" Uh, no honey.... not right this minute. It was pretty funny... but, who can blame her.... Christmas music is the best church music of the year...

Santa brought Charlotte lots of toys (well, not lots, but some fun ones like a shopping cart and a numbers puzzle). Of course, she liked her princess tea set the best (thanks Grandma and Grandpa Roedler). She spent her morning watching Dora and playing tea party... a pretty good day for a toddler.

We got to spend the evening with Grandma Vickey and her friend Andy. It was a bit sad since it will be the last time we see them for a bit since Vickey and Andy are going to Arizona for a couple months, but we had a marvelous time. Charlotte loved a little dog that Andy gave her that laughs and rolls over and she loved her new twin dolls from Grandma V.

This kid had a pretty good Christmas! So, on to other things...

I hadn't posted on the blog for a while because we have been pretty busy. Darren travelled to Austin for work early in December and he is going to Singapore next month for about a week and a half. It will be a wonderful experience for him, but it will be hard to have him gone for so long. He is starting to feel better though, which is the best Christmas present of all. His doctors believe he had been suffering from "atypical facial pain". No really, that is the name of it. The new medicine that is for that type of pain is starting to work, but he has to increase the dose very slowly, which is frustrating since now that we know it works, it is so hard not to just be able to jump into the meds and get it under control.

Charlotte transitioned to the "Mini" room at school after her birthday. She is doing wonderfully and is talking a lot more now. Her new classroom is all two year olds (God bless these teachers). It is a nice group of kids and her teacher is a retired speech therapist, which has been wonderful for Charlotte. It is amazing how much she is talking now just in the last few weeks. The transition has been a bit tough though since now she is getting a little separation anxiety again in the mornings, which makes it very hard on her and I every day.... but I know it will get better with time... plus, all next week she gets to stay home with Daddy! What fun.

A few weekends ago she got an early "Christmas present" - a swing set for the back yard. We had it installed and it is wonderful - it would be even better if it was warm enough to use! Charlotte was really surprised the day she came home and saw it.

We had a lot of fun showing it to her. But she cried and screamed when we brought her inside when it got too dark to play outside....

Anyway, like I said, this has been a busy month for us. I am looking forward to what our new year will hold.... hopefully, it will be even better than this past year.

Fall 2009

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Halloween!!!

We had a wonderful Halloween, and we were sooo busy with fun activities.

Let's start with the best stuff: On Friday afternoon Darren found out that he is officially still in remission based on last week's PETscan. Hurrah!!! He will be on the "yearly plan" for future PETscans so his next one won't be until next October (although he will still have a medical check-up in six months too).

It is the best news and quite a relief. Plus, after speaking with his oncologist, he has decided that it will be best to just stop the maintenance rituxan - so no more treatments next year!!! We couldn't be happier.

Then, after getting that wonderful news at the cancer center, we went to Charlotte's school for trunk-or-treating with her school friends. It was fun and Charlotte really enjoyed getting treats from the various moms, dads, and teachers. It was a really nice event. Charlotte dressed-up like a little train engineer. She LOVES choo choo trains! It is also really comfortable, which was good since she wore it quite a bit this weekend!

Charlotte got to eat some of her candy on Saturday morning, which resulted in her running around the house non-stop for about 15 minutes, which was quite funny. We also learned that Charlotte gets the hiccups when she eats candy... it is quite funny to have a child in a sugar-high who is also hiccupping...

On Saturday, we went to Bayley's birthday party. Bayley is turning 2, just like our Charlotte. It was a costume birthday party so it was really fun to see all the kids in their costumes. Charlotte enjoyed having more sugar (cake, treats, etc). Here is a picture of Bayley telling Charlotte she can play with her kitchen... how cute, and what a great hostess :)

With her all hopped-up on sugar we then went by Grandma's house so she could see her in her costume. It was quite fun to watch Charlotte (on her sugar high) running around Grandma's house after the two dogs.

Of course, we did do a little trick-or-treating in our neighborhood on Halloween. Charlotte loved it!!! She didn't quite get the idea right away though: At the first house she walked inside when our neighbor Sandy opened the door to give her a treat. She just walked right by Sandy and into their living room. After that she did get the idea though! We thought we would go just to a few houses, but when we got home another little girl rang our doorbell and Charlotte very quickly realized, "hey, other people are still out there getting candy? What's the deal? Let's go back out there!"... so, Darren took her to a few more houses :)

On Sunday the weather has been so wonderful that I decided we had to go to Boo at the Zoo. So, back in her costume (for the THIRD time!) and off we went. Then a major surprise: We saw her best friend Ashur (and his mom, dad, grandma, and grandpa) in the parking lot at the zoo! So, we got to spend the morning at the zoo with her friend Ashur the Giraffe. It really made for a fun day.

I will end with my favorite picture of the day:

Our Little Pumpkin

Sometimes words aren't necessary to describe what we have done today...

We had a lot of fun at Rock Creek Farms today picking out our pumpkin. Next year, we will try to go earlier because we had snow last weekend, so all the pumpkins were kinda soft and icky. Luckily, Darren and Charlotte found one that was really in good shape!!!

Charlotte also really enjoyed chasing mom and dad around the hay-bale maze and looking at all the animals. It was absolutely a wonderful day for being outside.

Other than this, we didn't have much planned for the weekend. I am thinking about taking Charlotte swimming at the Rec Center tomorrow morning, but other than that, we really plan to just hang out and take it easy... which, of course, means getting things done around the house... like raking leaves!!! Charlotte LOVES to rake leaves, so lucky for her we have quite a few in the back yard that need to get bagged-up.

Snowflakes in October

So, Charlotte had this great reaction to our first snow of the season. She looked outside with wonder and said, "Outside? outside?... SHOES!" She was so curious and eager to get outside in the snow... so, I broke out the new snowsuit, ripped the tags off her new boots, and outside we went.

She took one step outside and just looked at me as if to say, "you have got to be kidding me" (see pictures above for proof). I think she was cold and not exactly eager to play in the snow. I got her to stand in the grass for about two seconds before she slowly turned around and walked back to the front door (where the pugs were begging to join us).

Oh well...

I haven't posted a blog in a while because we have been rather busy (as always). Last weekend I took Charlotte to the Children's Museum. We had a blast. It was Race for the Cure day and there was a Broncos game downtown, so I think a lot of people just chose not to go downtown, so we had the Children's Museum to ourselves most of the morning. It was great since Charlotte could spend hours in their little "grocery store" playing with the register at the check-out area and with no one else around she got to play and play and play until she finally tired of it.

Charlotte also got news that she will be moving up to the next classroom in about a month. She will be moving to Mini 1. Unfortunately, most of her school friends that are turning 2 the same month are moving to Mini 2. I am sure she will enjoy making new friends though... plus, she will see Lucy in the mornings, who she simply adores and was moved up to Mini class a few months ago. I think Charlotte will miss her teachers Lulu and Debbie (who she calls Bobbie) a whole lot though, but she can still see them. Her old infant teacher Kendall comes to visit her almost every day, which Charlotte LOVES... so I am sure she will still get a chance for hugs from Lulu and Debbie even after her move to Mini 1.

I joined the Parent Partnership group at her school this week. It should be fun. We plan the staff appreciation events every other month and plan other little activities. It will be nice to meet some of the other parents since I never see any of them because I pick-up and drop-off at such odd hours.

Not much else new, but I thought I would share some pictures of Charlotte's Halloween Gingerbread house. It was really cute, fun, and messy. I think we will do it again next year or maybe for Christmas.

Of course, we might just do cookies or something though since I think she would have had just as much fun decorating cookies, and then we would have the pleasure of eating the cookies too... although, I think Charlotte ate enough of the candy decorations that she wouldn't have had room for cookies after all the fun.

Darren's next PET scan is in two weeks, so that kind of makes things weigh on our minds more than usual... we will get the results at the end of the month. I am sure all is well, but having the annual PET always brings the questions of, "what if"...

So, that is all for now. Hopefully we will get some pictures of pumpkin picking and other fun stuff for the next post...

Impetigo? What's that?

Well, we learned a new word last week (let's all say it together): Impetigo. It is a contagious skin infection. Ahhhh, I see. Well, now I do anyway.

It all started out so harmlessly... just a day at the zoo. In Charlotte's excitement when she ran toward the big tortoise statue, she tripped. I looked at her knee and it didn't look bad. I didn't even think she broke the skin. I was wrong.

Two days later, it started to get all red and "mean" looking. I put neosporin on it and covered it up with a band-aid. We used band-aids for four days until the abrasion fully healed... but then the trouble started.

The wound was healed, but the area under the band-aid got all red. I thought it was an allergic reaction to the band-aid adhesive (I had switched to a new band-aid). But then, it got worse.

She developed blisters in the area around where the wound had been. The blisters popped (on their own), but wouldn't heal. So, I called the nurse-line at my pediatrician's office to see what I should do to make it heal since at this point I was starting to get a bit concerned. She said I needed to come in.... good thing I did... because it was impetigo. The dr. could tell just by looking at it (uh, well, glancing at it) that it had already started spreading and sent us home with oral and topical antibiotics. He said she might not feel better until Sunday (this was on a Thursday).

When I got home I told Darren and he said, "hmmm. Uh, I think I have that too." Sure enough, after a quick visit to his dr., yes, he also had a staph infection. Having a weak immune system around a toddler sucks.

So, both Darren and Charlotte started their meds, but Charlotte started a horrible fever on Friday and was not happy at all until Sunday morning (just as predicted!). Darren felt sick from the antibiotics because they didn't "mesh" with his other prescriptions, but once we got that fixed, he started to feel better soon....

So - lesson of the day: no matter how small the cut/abrasion, you STILL need to wash it and bandage it until it heals. Arghhhhh. Poor baby... it really was horrible.

Oh, and second lesson of the day: You may ASSUME that your dr. or your pharmacist checked to see if your prescriptions work together, but maybe not - best to check for yourself. The Internet is a wonderful thing.