Sicko

The blog has been neglected because our family has been drowning in sickness. Ok, not the whole family, just Conner who has pneumonia. It seems like the whole family, as we have all been so stressed out. Conner had a high fever from pneumonia for 12 days. We took him into the ER last Sunday when he woke up with a 105.5 fever in the middle of the night. The diagnosed him with pneumonia and gave us antibiotics. Two days later he still had not improved at all, but actually gotten worse. We took him back in and they did another chest x-ray and discovered the pneumonia had gotten worse and now had taken over a lot of his left lung and he was having difficulty breathing. He was so sick that he didn't want to do anything but lay on our laps. He couldn't even get himself to watch cartoons. He complained that his back hurt all the time. He also said each day "I not feeling so good." The sweetest thing was that all day long as he was sitting with me he would tell me how much he loved me. "Mommy?" "I love you" "I love you a whole lot". He would say this to me over and over. He even said it in the car on the way to the ER. What a sweet boy I have. He is finally starting to recover and we are all breathing a sigh of relief.

Swimming Lessons

The boys have started their first swimming lessons (with the exception of Aqua Babies when Braden was about 6 months old). I knew Braden would love swimming but I was a little nervous about Conner liking them because when we went to Chelan this summer he wouldn't go in the pool unless I was completely hugging him and he would only let mom hold him and not even dad. However, after a couple trips to the Great Wolf Lodge, Conner seems to have warmed up to the idea of swimming. He went right into the pool without hesitation.

Both boys are enjoying the lessons quite a bit. They aren't swimming by themselves yet but they will both go out by themselves with a noodle and they are learning a lot about water safety. There are about 6-8 kids in the class and there are two teachers and one "helper". They are excited each day to go into the pool and our friends Ryan and Jack are in the lessons with us so that makes it even more fun!

Conner's 3rd birthday

Conner had his 1st friend birthday party this year at Jungle Playland. We decided to invite just a few friends and go to Jungle Playland. This is one of Conner's favorite places. He was really looking forward to his birthday and kept counting down the days until his party. It was very lowkey and it was just perfect for him. He felt very special having people sing to him and open a few presents. He also really enjoyed running around for a few hours with his buddies. We go to Jungle Playland a lot and this was the first time he was able to climb up all the levels on his own. Normally mom or dad has to climb up and help him up because there is quite a jump between some of the levels. This time he had his big brother drag him up a few times and then he decided he was going to keep up with all the other kids and just figured out a way to drag himself with all of his might. Yippee! We are looking forward to future visits where we don't have to assist so much in the climbing.

Hey, look at my cool fork.....

This is Conner and his best friend Rylan hugging in the ball pit. They go to daycare together and they run up and hug each other all the time.
Jack helping Conner blow out his candles on his monster truck cake that he didn't eat any of. I might have the only kid who doesn't like chocolate or dessert of any kind......(except Starburst and Airheads) I guess I should have made a cake out of Starburst...

Potty Training

We finally got Conner potty trained the week before Christmas. Conner is a child that does not enjoy change. He was happy in his diapers and wanted nothing to do with the potty. We decided just to wait until Christmas break to do it when we would be home from school and could work on it all day. We gave him a lot of notice and told him that there would be no more diapers. It took a few days ( I think mostly due to the fact that he was sick) but we had told him we were starting Monday so we were starting sickness or not. He never had an accident but for the first few days we would spend an hour or so on the potty sometimes before we would get any pee pee. Finally, Christmas Eve he sat down, went right away, looked at me and said "That's not hard at all!". Then, he was completely trained. We went to the Great Wolf Lodge right after that and even with a 3 hour car ride we did not have any accidents. (We put the little potty in the back of the SUV and away we went!) Yeah Conner!

Great Wolf Lodge

We spent two days at the Great Wolf Lodge this week with Braden and Conner's cousins and his Grandma and Grandpa Thomas. We have been there once before so Braden was VERY excited about this trip. Conner, on the other hand, was not as excited. He did not so much enjoy the trip last time at about 2 1/2.

This time Conner loved it just as much. I guess being almost 3 now he was much braver! Conner even ventured away from the baby/toddler area and enjoyed a continuous loop up and down the bigger slides. He still isn't tall enough for the really big slides that Braden very much enjoys but he was very brave on the big ones. He would climb up by himself and even go down himself after mom went first to wait for him at the bottom. It was so fun to watch him sit at the top by himself and wait for the slide worker to tell him to go when I could see him across the park from the line to the big slide with Braden.

Braden loves all things at the Great Wolf Lodge. He goes on all the slides except for the howling tornado (because he isn't 48" tall yet) and the faster the better. He is fearless and loves the water. He loves to go with his older cousins and feels like a big boy! Every time we would go down and splash he would say "that was the best one!" He also really likes the quest wand game that he would play with his cousin Jeffrey.

Both boys stayed up until 10:00 that first night which is a big deal in this household of a strict 7:30 bedtime. They both did well the next day though because I think the pool and slides were enough of a distraction and they did sleep in until almost 8 (yippee). Here they are watching a little Phineus and Ferb before bedtime to unwind. We all had a great time!

Christmas Tree

The boys enjoyed decorating our Christmas tree this weekend. This is the first year Conner was really excited to put up the ornaments. He was very careful and thoughtful about his placement of each one. They ended up all being placed about 4 feet and under so dad and I had to do a little reorganizing afterwards. Braden really enjoyed decorating too. He enjoyed finding all the cool ornaments with cars or sports on them. They want the Christmas tree lights on all day now that the tree is up. Next event, Gingerbread house and gingerbread train decorating!

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Conner replied "Um, I guess just bigger...."