Can You See 'Em??

Luke-portation

Here is a video of Luke's crawl now - I put toys all around trying to get him to crawl to the toys. Of course he crawled to me instead.



And this is the new crawl he's been trying out. Apparently he really IS Jared's clone - anyone else remember Jared's one leg creative crawling???

Our Belated Valentine's Day Week!

On Valentine's Day Dan and I went to lunch together at the Panda Inn and then headed to the King's game with Annette and Vanessa. It was a great game - although there was a little TOO much fighting for my blood. The King's tied it with 30 seconds left, which led to overtime, and eventually led to shootouts. Thanks to Allie for taking on our 3 kids!!!



On Wednesday night Dan went to mutual as usual. Shortly after getting the kids in bed, I could hear whispering outside our front door. I waited until it was quiet and then peeked outside. Our door had been heart attacked by the youth for Danny! They also left a nice gift basket with little gifts for everyone in the family! I think he was really surprised when he returned home.



Finally, Jared and Lizzie had a blast making Valentine's cakes and brownies with Vanessa. Jared made a beautiful heart shaped cake for Miss Grosso which he decorated with a "G" in frosting surrounded by strawberry whoppers - delicious! He also made mini cakes for Liz, Luke and himself. There was also a large cake for our family. Finally, there were also brownies in both a pan and ice cream cones. They were quite tasty too!

Here is a pictorial view of what happened:


And here are the finished products BEFORE we demolished them (Jared did bring the cake for Miss Grosso to her the next day at school):



Phew! What a fun week we had celebrating Valentine's Day!

So How'd Your Week Go?

Here's a peek into our week:


Yes, two children checked into the hospital in one week - actually 3 days apart. Lucas was first. On Sunday (Feb. 1) we discovered a lump on him. On Monday the doctor said it was an abscess and put him on medicine to try and reduce the size. By Wednesday we realized it wasn't getting smaller. On Friday (Feb. 6) morning Lucas was checked into the hospital and was in surgery by noon. The abscess was removed and a drain was put in place. This week was filled with washing the area carefully with soap and water, putting gauze over it, and watching for a fever. We had an appointment today (Feb. 13) with the surgeon to have the drain removed. He said it appeared to be healing very nicely. Luke's face speaks volumes of his opinion of the whole ordeal:


3 days after Luke's surgery, Jared wanted in on the action! He came home from school on Thursday (Feb. 5) with a fever and aching legs. He threw up that night in bed - you can imagine the wonderful adventure that was as Dan and I were already preparing that night for Luke to go into surgery the next morning! On Friday he had a fever and a headache. On Saturday he said his neck was bothering him. By Sunday (Feb. 8) his neck was visibly stiff. We called the nurse hotline through Kaiser and they asked a few questions. When he couldn't put his chin to his chest she told us to bring him in. Dan took off with Jared and I stayed with our 2 other children since it was close to bedtime. Long story short they feared he had spinal meningitis. He had a few vials of blood taken from his hand, had an IV put into his arm, and had a spinal tap! After tests came back negative for meningitis, he was allowed to come home.


I suppose we should be grateful Liz doesn't have a matching bracelet too. Funny thing is, she's the only one who would appreciate a new bracelet to wear.

Sitting Pretty

Luke's newest trick is to crawl over to something, halfway sit up, walk his hands around, and pop up into a sitting position. It's proving quite useful - especially when his older brother is about to attack!

Everybody Dance Now!

Liz just began a new tap dancing class. This was her second week in the class and she is already learning a routine! Mark your calendars because her performance will be June 6th - yes, 4 months away. Let's hope she can learn the routine by then!

Here she is tapping her toe. Seriously, little girls in their dance clothes are so adorable!


And here she is learning the oh so difficult shuffle step (she could do the move - but her foot never touched the ground - kind of defeats the purpose of TAP shoes...):


Finally, here is a sneak peek into her routine - buy your tickets now! :)

Totally Tubular!

Danny was asked to chaperone a young men/young women activity to Big Bear this past weekend. He decided he would bring Jared along for the ride! The whole family was invited but it was an evening event and they wouldn't be home until after midnight so we decided that just Jared would attend. Needless to say when we finally told Jay about it (about 1 hour before they left) he was super excited! Danny asked him if he wanted to go tubing in the snow and he asked, "At Big Bear?" Apparently a girl at school told him the mountains in the distance are Big Bear. This kid cracks me up.

Here's our Bishop who spearheaded the event - he's hilarious!:


Jared decided to give the crazy hair a try - what do you think???:


Here's one of Dan's best buddies, Alan, who has also been great with our kiddos:


And two of my favorite boys - aren't they adorable?!:


Here's their first ride down:



Eventually it got close to Jared's bedtime and he drifted off to sleep - in Daddy's arms since it was so cold out there! He slept through the last hour of fun.


The group then headed to Denny's to eat a late night snack. Jared slept through the entire Denny's experience!!!


Dan said Jared didn't move during the entire restaurant visit - even though the group was sitting right next to him noisily enjoying their evening! I guess he was tired! They arrived home shortly after midnight and Jared walked in the house saying, "Hi Mom!" He had gotten a second wind and was awake long enough to tell me all about the fun he had. We all crashed in our beds shortly thereafter!