Just hanging around in the evening

Rough-housing when Daddy came home from work

Logan had gotten a haircut today - pretty proud about showing it off.  "Just one picture, just one picture" - you'd think he was fending off the paparazzi.

Avery got the green light to start on solids.  Which, in our house, means a sippy of water out if she's interested. She hasn't tried the solids yet, but we tried out the sippy tonight.  She was more than happy to dive in, even if she did wear most of it!  Home made rice cereal at breakfast tomorrow...wooo-hoo!

Artistry

My aunt did this recreation of a popular work of art and it hung in the Renwick Gallery Grand Salon. I received this replica in the mail today! It is a Christmas tree ornament and I cannot wait to hang it up next year! It is on display until then.

Mommy & Me

Logan needed some 1:1 time with Mama, so we packed up today and went to the Leisure Skate at the arena.  Granny & Avery came with us, but it was just Logan and I on the ice.  He was so thrilled!  I haven't been on the ice in over 10 years, so it was pretty strange from my perspective.  All I could think about was what kind of surgery I would require by the time the session was over!  I was in brand new skates, too...that didn't help matters any.  I clung to the boards for a good 5 minutes before I was brave enough to venture out.  The dilemna was this:  which is more embarrassing?  Falling on your butt in front a rink full of people or having your 4 year old heckle you from centre ice in front of that same rink full of people?  So, off I went.  By the end of the session I was feeling more comfortable, but it is hard to believe that I used to be so "into" a sport and yet I was a total rookie today.

6 month picture

Here's Avery's 6 month picture with her pig.  I can't believe how much she's grown!  And I can't believe how happy she can pretend to be even though she's been feeling so rotten the past week (we have a new steroid inhaler now, and after only two doses, she is breathing better).  She is 26.75" long, 16lbs 13oz.  She's around the 50th percentile all around.  At this age, Logan was almost 5lb heavier!  He was always 95th percentile or higher.  Here's a look back at Avery and piggy.

6 Months

5 Months

3 Months

6 Weeks

Tubby Time

Thanks to Family Day, I had some help for tubby time tonight, so I was able to take some bathtime pics.  Both kids are sick, but Avery's a little worse for wear. The coughing around our house right now is something else!  Bathtime helps bring out the smiles, though. 

The happy wheezer

And poor Avery's rash.  It isn't the greatest picture.  It covers the majority of her torso and back with some angrier patches on her arms.  It looks so sore...thank goodness for Aveeno Baby Oatmeal Bath.

Happy Valentine's Day

Logan got a Nascar remote control car yesterday as his Christmas gift so he was pretty impressed with that.  And therefore, less than impressed by the pirate towel that we got him for Valentine's Day!!  I thought for sure he'd love it...we have some other "Character towels" that he LOVES to put on and run around acting silly.  Ah well...when you get a super fast remote control car, I guess a towel just doesn't compare next to that.  He was still willing to model though!

Avery got a similar towel except it's a butterfly.  Collective "awwww" now! She's still feeling rough so I didn't make her model it.  She's a tad tiny for it yet anyway.  Here's what she's up to today:

Poor babe has 5 days worth of sleep to catch up on now that she can breathe.  She had a bottle before we went to emerge last night (it was around 4pm when she had it).  When she was due for another feeding, she had that inhalation treatment so she couldn't eat.  When it was done, she just wanted to sleep.  She fell asleep in the wrap about 9:30pm in emerge, woke briefly while we put her in the carseat, and then didn't wake up until 9am today.  I can't believe she went 17 hours without eating, but wow...she really needed that sleep.  She's only been sleeping 20 minutes at a time (most of the time) since Tuesday!!

She was OK yesterday morning so we decided to go to our family function. However, her coughing increased (as did the wheezing) and her breathing was just deteriorating over the course of the afternoon/evening.  You'd never know by looking at these pictures that she was feeling so rotten:

Loving her new Sophie the Giraffe

Loving her brother

And for no good reason...a random pic of my two babes from earlier in the week.  They look so much alike (well more that Avery looks so much like Logan did as a baby...except feminine), so I think it's hysterical that they just happened to share the same expression in this pic

They both have the most plentiful, long, thick eyelashes.  I'm so jealous!

Half birthday

Our baby girl is 6 months old today...unfortunately, we spent the evening in emerg with her.  We had been at our final family Xmas for 2009 (no joke!) and Avery's breathing kept getting worse.  She started coughing and couldn't stop, but couldn't catch her breath, either, so that was the final straw.  Out we went.  We had to wait an hour to be seen (which wasn't bad, considering) and they discovered that on top of having a terribly constricted airway right now, Avery's also battling a raging ear infection.  Poor ladybug :( :( :(  They asked about family history of reactive airway (which is what Logan has) and eczema (Logan has psoriasis) and then asked about Avery's skin.  Ohhh noooo, I said...her skin is fine!  The doctor undid Avery's undershirt to find a lovely pinpoint rash covering her entire torso.  Upon further inspection, she has it on her arms and back as well. Hmm...wasn't there an hour and a half ago when we put her in her jammies before going to the ER!!  So, her immune system is in overdrive right now battling all this stuff, and has decided that now is a great time for eczema as well.  Poor baby girl.

The doctor ordered a neblulizer treatment of ventolin to help open Avery's airways.  How fun was that??? Well, I got to pin her down, hold her, restrain her AND hold the mask on while she bucked and screamed and threw herself all over the place.  We were in a tiny cubicle so they asked TJ not to come back...so I got to do the honours on my own.  Wonderful!!!  Then she got her first taste of banana.  In the form of amoxicillan.  Perfect!  She wasn't a fan of that, either.  She sounded better, but still wheezy, after the ventolin treatment, so they let us go with instructions on giving her increased dosing of her puffer, and instructions on when to bring her back in.  Nobody wants to actually say the word "pneumonia", but they don't say it's NOT pneumonia, either.  Though, they also haven't done a chest xray yet.   So, a few hours at the hospital and a big bottle of amoxil later...we are home.

While we were at the hospital, Logan stayed at Granny's house since the party went on without us.  He partied pretty hard too, and was passed out cold on the couch when we returned to pick him up.


Our pooped out little party animals:

Valentine's Day

 

Logan came home with these yesterday.  The card is adorable and the cookie he took back so he could eat it himself! Haha!   They did the exchange of valentines at school yesterday and I thought it was quite hilarious that he was excited beyond belief to show me his favourite one.  A little girl in his class gave him a Valentine with one of the Jonas Brothers on it.  He was squealing as if he knew who they were "Guess what? Guess what I got Mama???  It's SO COOL...you won't believe your eyes.  I got a JONAS!!!"

 Heh.  This is ammo for future torture ;)

Busy feet

Tonight, these busy little feet that are not even 6 months old yet (officially), were standing up.  We were sitting on the floor and Avery was in my lap, holding onto my fingers.  I had one finger in each of her fists...and she pulled herself up to a standing position. Logan had been showing me all of his Valentines that he received today, and set them on the coffee table.  Once Avery was on her feet and could see them, she took a wobbly little lean forward and let go of one of my fingers to reach for them.  I fear for us all!!!!  I had said quite early on in her little life that she was going to be walking before she was a year...and at this rate, she's going to prove me right.   She is not technically 6 months old for another 2 days.  SLOW DOWN KIDDO!

Je m'appelle Logan

We registered Logan for French Immersion tonight.  He's been so excited to go to "French school" ever since we mentioned it to him.  The teachers were wonderful, the school is beautiful - we're so excited for him to start there!  Even better is that when we were in the auditorium waiting for the info session to start, in walked the parents of one of his best buddies that he started at daycare with when they were both 2.  He'll be so happy to have him in his class!

O'Canada (one of Logan's favourites) - en francais




The cloakroom for the 2 SK classes.  This room was almost as big as the classroom and had the full 3 walls with cubbies.  So organized and neat!








And he just asked me the other day how to say squirrel in French, so I laughed out loud when I saw this board in the classroom and had to take a picture for him!

Do you hear what I hear?

This poor ladybug can't catch a break.  Avery's got a bad cold/bronchitis/chest infection (??) and the wheezing she was doing this morning was unbelievable.  I thought she was making the noise with her voice, and then discovered it was actually just her breathing.  Yikes.  So we went to the doctor and she's now got  a nice new "toy"

Let me tell you, folks, Avery does not think that this little piece of technology is much of a party.  She is definitely NOT a fan.  I guess when you're 6 months old, it might be a little scary to see this coming at your face every 4 hours

Warning: This post contains a picture of a very cute bear bum

Nanny, and maybe Papa, are coming over this morning to play Wii with Logan.  He's so excited he can hardly stand it.  We spent a long time on Saturday making up new Miis for Nanny, Papa and Colleen.  Since Nanny's coming over, Avery decided she should wear her super cute outfit that Nanny bought for her when she was born (since she's finally big enough to wear it!).  Isn't it adorable?   Maybe I'm partial, but I think it's the cutest bear bum I've seen!   Here she is showing off one of her many talents.  She can hold her medicine cup and take her medicine all by herself

And Logan would like to type:


Logan S.

Leaps and bounds

This picture was not taken today - but I'm making up the rules here, so I can break 'em too! Ha ha!  This was taken on Logan's first day of skating last year.  He was the smallest kid out there, and he stood.  He stood there just like that the whole time.  That was followed by months upon months of more standing, sometimes standing while holding onto one of the helpers for dear life.  So you can imagine how much fun it is to go to Sunday Skating Lessons and watch him practically run around the ice.  Today he hit a milestone.  Lisa, a girl I grew up skating with, told Logan that since he's doing so well going forward that it was time to start moving backwards!  Little man was sooo proud of himself when she held his hands and he started going backwards.  I didn't get any pictures because I was too busy committing it to memory.  Now, I couldn't care less if he's an Olympic skater, an NHL hockey player, or never skates another day in his life.  The part I love is seeing him be proud of his accomplishments and overcoming his fears. 

All worn out

Logan has had a busy week.  School on Monday, playdate with Vanessa on Tuesday, school Wednesday, playdate (er, umm... DAY - all day!) with Nicky on Thursday.  Friday was Carnivale at school so it was a long day of activity and then Nicky came home with us after school and stayed for supper.  The boys had a great time playing together and Logan introduced Nicky to the Wii.  However, all of this is taking it's toll on poor Logan.  He woke up with a horrible cough today and so we just had a lazy day.  Logan played the Wii (and coughed his way through it) this morning

then laid down for a 2.5 hour nap.  He got up and played again for an hour and then asked if he could stop playing so he could snuggle with me.  So we snuggled for a while and when I got up, this is what he did

I don't know who this child is.  He's obviously not feeling well - he says his throat is not breathing well.  He's had some cold water, some juice, and his ventolin (because he could not stop coughing).  Hopefully he is only worn down and just needs some extra rest.  Keep your fingers crossed that this is not the beginning of a bug.  

We love chocolate.

No dogs allowed on the carpet in the living room.  Definitely no dogs allowed on the furniture.  When we are there, no dogs dare attempt it!!  Yet, for some reason, as soon as we turn our backs

there is chocolate on the couch.  And this is the look he gives when we ask what in the world he thinks he's doing there.

Comparison Shopping

We used to call Logan our little cue-ball.  He was so blonde that he looked bald.  Here he is at around 5.5 months

But, as you can see, he really did have hair.  I really did have to comb it when he had it washed and we could put it in a funny little mohawk if we wanted to!

Now, Avery, on the other hand.  She's just bald.    Here is our true little cue ball!

A whole new world

Avery can sit up now!!!  She still needs someone right there because she's not overly steady and loves to dive forward to grab at things.  This has opened up a whole new world to her - and as you can see, she is loving it!

Tea for Two

Avery got this cute little singing tea set for Christmas.  We tried to have a tea party this afternoon but my poor baby girl was having a tough day.  She did manage to enjoy herself for a few minutes...she loved diving forward to reach the tea pot and listen it sing!  (She loves her new taggie blanket that made up our tablecloth, too!).

Big Day in the Zoo

A couple of big things happened here today.  We stopped by the French Immersion school here in town to pick up registration papers.  This is much more of a scary decision than it seemed to be before we had kids.  I guess it's the whole "if Logan doesn't do well there, it's our fault because we chose this for him" idea.  Hmm.  I'm trying not to think about it that way, and look at the positives - at least he'll try it.  He's extremely excited to go to "French school" (he LOVES languages, and they seem to come easily to him - he can say a few things in Chinese from watching Kai Lan and several things in Spanish thanks to Dora & Diego), and, coincidentally, he asked today if we could go and see the school because he didn't know where it was.  So we drove by, and he was thrilled! 

On another exciting note - Avery seems to be catching up, developmentally.  I had kind of been thinking of her as a preemie in some ways, because she spent the first 4.5 months of her life crying and in pain, she didn't really hit some of the milestones that happen in that time.  She has never really babbled much, has never tried to roll over, didn't try to push up when she was on her tummy, etc.  In the past few weeks, she has really taken off in those areas.  A few days ago, she found her feet and loves to grab for them all the time.  She's grabbing for toys and taking more of an interest in the things around her, hangs on to her medicine soother and will put it up to her mouth to drink her medicine, knows exactly what her bottle is and what yumminess comes with it, enjoys hearing songs and having someone help her do the actions for them...all kinds of fun things.  Tonight, she even sat up, unsupported, for a few seconds!! Way to go big girl!! 

Pic for today - Flashback or Flashforward?  Thinking about family resemblance

This is Logan

This is his Great Grandfather at the same park, at around the same age.

Just the teeniest, tiniest little bit of resemblance there, huh?