Ickle Greg.

We have been enjoying a rare visit from Uncle Greg this week, or Ickle Greg as Harrison would say.

I think the terrible-two's may have put him off children for a while :)

Here are some photos of our zoo visit!

Harrison has especially loved spending time with his uncle.

Lets hope we get to see more of him now he will be a little closer in Chicago!

Ps- Happy birthday Auntie Lisa :)

Aaaaaaaaah that's better :O)

We have a new car!!!!!!!!!

I am so excited, and I LOOVE it!

For those who don't know, this is what out other car is.......

We love it too, but theres not much room for two boys and two BIG car seats back there! Thats without climbing in the back and trying to fasten everyone in, and then theres fitting in the double stroller, and groceries, and then when I was pregnant climbing in and out.....

Anyhow, trouble no more! This is our new lovely.....

1,2,3,4, yup it has 4 doors and a huge boot! (Trunk)

I can fit the stroller in the back AND groceries, and it has a huge moon roof, satnav, leather, oooh its just gorgeous.

Look.

Its like new (apart from some wear on the arm rest)

And its so so nice to drive, and my back is feeling better already!

Thank you Husband for my shiny new (to us) car!

Now we don't have to fight every morning over who gets to drive the Acura to work, because, believe it or not, getting the kids in and out of the back of a two door is better than driving the old banger that was our other car :)

6 Whole Months Today!

Allister is 6 months old today, can you believe a whole half year has passed already!?

Its crazy, where did my new baby go, he'll be mobile before we know it :)

We have Allister's 6 month well check tomorrow, so I will let you know his stats then, but he is close to 22lb I know, so we have taken him out of his infant car-seat already, and as he isn't completely sitting up yet its been hard taking him places as he cant sit in the trolley (cart) very well, and he is very heavy for the baby Bjorn!

He is eating very well now, loves his food!

He will scoot around the floor allot, and has just figured out how to crawl backwards, we know whats next!

He can get his knees right up under himself now, so I know crawling is not too far off.

He talks non stop, and smiles all day long.

His hair is getting crazy long, and just like Harrison at this age, its looks very red. I'm not sure he will be red though, i'm still betting on brown.

He has kept his big blue eyes, and has the chunkiest, cutest, edible thighs :)

He's still sleeping through the night, and shows lots of teething signs but none have come trhough yet, although he loves to bite while nursing so I am very happy about that!

He grabs at everything he sees and loves Guinness right now!

Here is some cute new photos I took, Enjoy!

Skydiving :)

Allister is on his special quilt from Grammy and Pooh-bah.

Isn't it lovely, thanks Grammy and Pooh-Bah!

He's got legs.

I make skinny jeans look good!

Moms Day Out.

Harrison had his first day at MDO today.

Moms Day Out, for those who don't know, is like a pre-School or Nursery school run by a church.

We went today from 9:30 till 11:30 just to look around and get to know the teachers. He will be in a class of only 4 boys, and they have 2 teachers! Pretty awesome ratio's huh.

They have a separate music, science, story and art teacher who will visit their classroom to teach.

Harrison loved it! They are all boys in his class, the teachers say the class sizes tend to grow throughout the year as Moms realize one day just isn't enough!

Harrison played in his classroom for an hour, and loved it! then we went to the playground and then the science, art and music rooms. Its a pretty awesome "school". I know he is going to have such fun there, and meet some new buddies!

He is the tallest in his class by far, although his class mates are a month or two younger than him.

His class is the "Kittens".

Here he is having a banana before the start of his big day!

Playing with the toys.

Outside in the playground, they try to take the kids out everyday.

So next Friday will be his first full day. Ill drop him off at 9:30 and pick him up at one! What will I do with myself with just one baby to take care of?

Allister Update.

Yesterday we met with a Pediatric Plastic Surgeon regarding Allister's cyst.

He confirmed its a congenital Dermoid Cyst.

Meaning it was something that has been there since birth, and is only now noticeable. He suggested surgery to remove it sooner rather than later. I was wanting to wait until Allister was a little older, but he gave some real benefits to not postponing the surgery.

1- The scaring will be worse the older Allister is, due in part to the size of the cyst and in part to the rapid healing of baby skin.

2- Once Allister is mobile, it will be harder for him to not damage or knock the wound as it heals.

3- A dermoid Cyst tends to start in the bone at birth causing a tiny divot or dip, in Allister's case this would be in his eye brow bone. As the cyst grows so will the divot. At Allister's present age the bone will likely heal completely and Allister will be left with no bone damage, the older he is the more damage and less healing will occur.

We schedule his surgery for September 22nd. It will be early in the morning. The surgery will likely last 20/30 minutes and be done as an outpatient procedure. Therefore he will be able to come home about an hour or two after surgery. The incision will be made in his eye lid crease if the cyst is mobile enough to be pushed down, this will cause virtually no scarring. Alliteratively, if the cysts is not mobile, the incision will be made in his eyebrow line.

I'm not at all worried about the surgery, just the thought of the anesthesia and not being able to hold him. Also, he wont be able to eat or nurse at all prior to the surgery, I'm sure we will have a screaming hungry baby on our hands that morning, which will make it all the harder to have him wheeled away!

We wont know what time his surgery is until they call the afternoon before, so I will keep you posted! Prayers and good wishes for the little guy please.

Fun with Woody.

Walk run.

This past weekend was a fun one! Getting up early (super early!) both days made for lots of time to go hang out.

On Saturday Harrison took part in his first sponsored walk for The American Heart Association. He raised some money for a great cause, and we walked as a family with 100's of others, helping to raise over $800,000. He was very proud of his effort, thank you to those who sponsored him and us, we may make this a yearly family event. It's a good life lesson to help others like this. If you'd still like to help a great cause sponsorship money is still be collected, click here to donate.

I only managed to get one photo, and its not that great! I forgot my camera in the rush to get us all out the door so early. Here is Daddy and Matt at the Columbus Clippers Baseball team stadium, the walk finished inside and Harrison was so excited to see it!

We then went to Gahana and had a wonderful lunch and afternoon walking around, I so wish I brought my camera! Gahana was beautiful!

Sunday we were all up super early again and out the door to watch Matt race the Spirit of Columbus half marathon.

Here are the boys waiting for Daddy to come in.

Here is Matt running towards us.

Harrison running around after the race. Daddy Matt did awesome, and came 19th overall. He finished in 1hr17 I think. He shaved 6 WHOLE MINUTES off last years race time!

This is Harrison last year running around in the same way with Matt's medal.

Having a nice river walk after the race. See Allister sucking on his arm? This is a new thing, he is an "Arm Sucker". Not a thumb, or Binky, or finger sucker, but an arm sucker! He gives himself the best hickeys you've ever seen! Whatever works eh :)

Finger food.

Allister has been showing many signs that he wants to start feeding himself! He watches what we eat like a very hungry baby, and grabs at the bowl, spoon and basically anything he can get into his mouth!

Here he is eating some Baby Mum Mums. There very soft rice crackers, and just turn into mush rise, so there a great first finger food. unlike those scary teething biscuits no big chunks come off!

He looks so cute :)

We had almost forgotten what normal was!

After many bouts of sickness over the last 3 weeks, and Harrison being out of sorts with his lack of naps I had almost forgotten what our "normal" was. Well, this week its back.

And it feels good!

When the house is not running at full steam, things just don't go smoothly, and all the rules and plans go out of the window. We watch too much TV and don't do enough fun stuff, we stay in the house too much because we are all out of whack, and everything seems to slip.

Then, when things start to get back to normal, and we feel better, it takes a week to get our grove back. The house especially gets so messy and dirty when I am sick, and it seems to take days to put it all back together.

Well, we are almost back on track!

We are going out most morning, running errands, the park or playing in the sand box, and then back home for lunch and then naps. Naps are back BIG TIME! Harrison is napping so well right now, with his potty training all done, he is now waking up earlier in the mornings than he used to, as he needs to pee. His is pretty much dry most nights and naps now, and we only have a rare accident during the day. Mostly because he wants to eat or do something super exciting that he just cant be bothered to go, even when reminded. Some things are just way more interesting than peeing don't you know! I put the dry nights down totally to these night time sleep pants. they are pretty much like cloth diapers, but slip on just like underwear. They are super thick, the photo doesn't really show how thick. But as Harrison was taking off a nappy and pull-up these have been great. they only hold about 1 pee, so when Harrison first started using them he would wake up wet in the middle of the night, and we changed sheets a lot for a week or two. But now he knows when he pees, they have trained him to sleep dry at night most nights. Occasionally he will wake up and need to go potty at night, but most mornings he wakes up dry, its pretty awesome!

The bug that Harrison had recently was a bad one, its only now he is 100% well again. After the sickness he got diarrhea, and we had a couple of messy incidents, but mostly he made it to the potty. Then I got sick Tuesday night, very sick. I can honestly say I don't think I have ever had a stomach virus as an adult, all my throwing up has been totally self inflicted if you know what I mean. Well, I was up all night ill, and them Matt had to stay home Wednesday to watch the boys as I was too ill. Then he got sick too, but he got off lucky (although he wouldn't say that!) as he felt terrible but didn't get too much of the other symptoms. I guess I need to get used to these bugs working their way round the whole gang! Allister stayed healthy and strong, thanks to his extra breast milk antibodies I guess!

Allister is finally sleeping through the night.

Can I get a "whoop!"

Thank you.

He goes from 7:30-8pm when he goes to bed, right through till 6 am at least. Its so nice to be catching up on some sleep! He is stuffing his face like crazy with his solids now, and tries to grab the spoon and bowl and feed himself, so finger foods will be coming soon, he is so ready! He is eating fairly chunky food now and says "mmmmmm" all the time.

He still isn't quiet sitting up, but it wont be long! He sits for a little while, so he is working on it! He only has 1 or 2 lbs left till he outgrows his infant carrier, so he needs to sit soon or I wont be able to sit him anywhere!

Anyhow, I'm off to grab a few minutes of quiet time while both the boys sleep.

:)

Painting.

Harrison and I have been spending time doing some fun things now we are all better. This week we have been painting lots, these top two are finger paints. They are made with those special "magic" Crayola paints that are invisible unless you paint on special "magic" paper. Makes for no mess!

These are normal paints, he had some help with this top one, he asked me to help him draw the Toy Story characters.

Skydiving.

Allister has been working hard on his core muscles. He does this "skydiving" move, that is so funny.

He will raise both his arms and legs off the ground and float on his belly, he does it all the time, it looks so uncomfortably, but he seems to enjoy it!

He is also getting his legs up under himself now, and can even scoot a little too. He will roll all over to get to what he wants, so we have to keep Harrison's small toys away from him, everything goes in his mouth now!

He will be crawling before we now it, then I will have two boys to chase around.

Allister eats.

Allister likes to use his high chair now, he sure can put away some food!