Sick week

After Halloween and Greyson's birthday party, I was really looking forward to a day off to myself. It's been a while since I've had one of those days. My library is closed for Veteran's Day, but Grey's daycare is open. So voila! Mom's day off!

Unfortunately, Greyson's malaise Monday morning developed into a full blown fever by Tuesday morning. Why couldn't he have been sick at the doctor's office? Not that we would have gotten a diagnosis... it's probably just another virus. So I called work and stayed home Tuesday with the little sick man. He's cuddly when he's sick, and he's allowed the indulgence of sitting in front of the tv for several episodes of Yo Gabba Gabba if that's what makes him feel better. And he's spoiled by multiple bottles of milk, and he's fed whatever he asks for, within reason. It's not a horrible way to spend the day, but he is needy and fussy. Mike came home, had a quick nap, fed us all dinner, and then left for the evening at 6pm. He had scheduled his ACE exams for Tuesday and Thursday night, so I was on full time sick baby duty, putting the Goose to bed and hoping he slept well.

On Wednesday morning, he seemed better, but he stayed home with me on my day off just to be sure. Actually we didn't stay home, we went to the grocery store and the park and had a good morning. At lunch time the fever returned, and his afternoon nap was again short-lived. I let the fever do it's job, and he seemed to have a better day.

Thursday all seemed well. But should I risk it, taking him back to school and possibly spreading his illness or getting that phone call to come pick him up again? I was starting to get dressed and ready for work when I asked Greyson what he thought. Did he want to go to school, or stay home with Mommy? He elected to stay home another day, and we got dressed and headed to the park.

It was a grey morning and it ended up drizzling on us at the park so we made a detour to KMart. The toy aisles were enticing, and the Christmas section was in full bloom, complete with dancing penguins and singing dogs with jingle bell ears. We checked out the baby shoes on sale but we couldn't agree on any to buy. We were on our way out the door when Greyson exclaimed "No outside!" and refused to leave his shopping cart. So we took another lap around the store, G asking me to go fast again. Thankfully it was pretty empty in the store so we could run down the long aisles and get our thrills that way. After one more trip to the toys, he finally let me leave the store.

Thursday night was another test night for Mike so it ended up being a very looong week, instead of the Mom's vacation I was hoping for. There are still some party supplies from his birthday out on the kitchen table, and things are not as clean as I would have wanted. But I did get to play stay-at-home mom for a few days. Good practice for our week off together that starts tomorrow. We're headed to the farm on Thursday, Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

DVR

Sometimes I wish I had a DVR for my memories. A Life DVR.

Just the other night Chris and I were talking about the songs that Greyson sings, whether I've gotten it on video. He's too interested in the camera whenever it comes out. Maybe I could record his songs on my phone... because we think we will remember these moments forever, the sound of their voice, the way they pronounce bumble bee. But all too soon we forget, replacing the baby in our memories with the new big-kid version.

I want to remember Sunday morning, and revisit it often. Mike bringing Greyson into our bed at 8am to snuggle for a minute. Me pretending to still be asleep. Greyson finding my hand and saying "Mommy hand. Mommy finger. Mommy fingernail. I have fingernail, too!" Rolling over to see him in his dinosaur jammies, with scraggly, too-long blond hair and tiny perfect little teeth. Smiling at me, with big blue eyes.

Then he grabs his dad's nipple and Mike proceeds to increase G's vocabulary by complaining about the titty twister. "Twitty twister! Tweety, twitty, twister."

Maybe I wouldn't record that part...

Thanksgiving plans

This morning on the way to work, Greyson asked to go back home. I explained that we only had to go to school and work two days this week. To entice him to go to school, I mentioned that we would go to Aunt Gail's farm on Thursday.

Rachel: On Thursday, we'll go to Aunt Gail's farm.

Greyson: Farm!?

R: Yeah, Aunt Gail's farm! Won't that be fun?

G: Aunt Gail's farm! See animals. Donkeys and sheep and horses and dogs!

R: That's exactly right, we'll see her donkeys and sheep and horses and dogs. And kitty cats too.

G: See kitty cats too, Mommy!

R: Yeah, so let's go to school for two days, then you can stay home with Mommy one day while we get ready, then we can go to Aunt Gail's farm for Thanksgiving!

G: Thanksgiving Turkey!

He totally gets it. Unfortunately after talking it up so much, he clung to me a little bit as I dropped him off at daycare and softly murmured "Aunt Gail's farm?"

Now to teach him about time. Three more days buddy, just three more days.

Birthday Boy!

Greyson is two. If you ask him, he might forget and tell you he's one. But with a little prompting, he'll exclaim "I'm two years old!"

There was a lot of lead up to the birthday. We started talking about how he would be a big boy, and he wouldn't drink out of a bottle anymore. Only babies drink out of bottles, you know. We talked about how he would have a birthday party at the playground, and his friends and family would all be there to play with him. We talked about his Jo and Pops and Nana and Grampa Bob who would come see him. He was excited and would even talk about his upcoming birthday party, which would have cake!

The day of, I was prepared and busy. It was all planned out, I had been working hard for days (weeks?) to get everything ready. There was a list of things to be done, and there was family around to help. Unfortunately, Greyson decided he didn't need a nap. Which was the first wrench in my plans, but not an insurmountable problem.

The real problem started at the park. We had a pavillion reserved and lots of decorating work to do. My mom came with me to help set up, and immediately we realized things were not going to go as planned. The wind was so strong, we basically could not decorate. We tied tablecloths to tables only to have them threaten to blow off like parachutes. A patio chair went skidding across the whole pavillion at one point, propelled like a sailboat. I was anxious, I was upset, and I was a little abusive to my poor Mama, but I think I managed to turn all of that off and enjoy the party once it started. Of course the decorations never went up, the tables didn't get set, the gift bags and toys stayed safe in their box, and the birthday boy was late to arrive, but there was food and family and friends and Mike's fabulous dazzleberry lemonade to make me smile.

It ended up being a Yo Gabba Fabulous time. The littlest kids wore their Gabba t-shirts, we played soccer and football and enjoyed the playground with the serious der stuka slide. Most of us ate Muno cake, although Greyson would not partake. It was a fun time, and it was finally over. We went back to the house and opened a few gifts with family afterwards.

On the actual Birth Day, Greyson got up and went to school as usual. I picked him up at 10:30 for a doctor's appointment and his teachers told me he had been feeling puny all morning, just wanting to lay down and relax. Very unusual for Greyson, but he seemed fine at the doctor and in the afternoon. He got a clean bill of health and our wonderful pediatrician pronounced him perfect. She was impressed with his enunciation, and we were on our way with no shots or other trauma to mar our nice birthday.

Mike has been studying non-stop for a few weeks to prepare for his certification tests for work, so Greyson and I stopped at the playground on the way home to give Daddy the chance to study. We tried out the big kid playground at a park we frequent - usually we stick to the tot-lot, but we were the only ones around and we had a blast on the giant play structure. Then it was home for a quick stop and on to Moe's for a Birthday Burrito, G's favorite food. He even ate it like a big boy, no more cutting it up and making a mess of the rice.

Back at home, we opened more gifts, and our living room now looks like a messy toy store. But Greyson adores his Thomas tent, his Hot Wheels, his Tonka "Chuck and Friends" garage, his John Deere "truck on a trailer" with horses, and all of his other new toys. We may have to go strictly necessities for Christmas, where would we put any more toys??!!

I did cry as I put Grey to sleep that night. How did he grow from my tiny little baby into a little man so quickly?

Waiting on the train

He slept in! For those of you waiting in anticipation... he slept in. Even with the time change, Greyson slept until 7:30am. So Mike and I, who went to bed at about 10:30 on Halloween night, got 10 hours of uninterrupted sleep. Whew!

Sunday we didn't have big plans, but after Mike suggested that we grab a pita for lunch, I went on the amtrak web site to find out what time the trains roll through Winter Park's station. The last time we saw the train was a big hit, this time we could even picnic in the park, or at least bring a blanket and enjoy the nice weather. We timed lunch perfectly and arrived in the park about 20 minutes before the train was scheduled. As we approached the park we noticed that someone had soaped the fountain, probably a Halloween prank from the night before. One kid was already playing with the bubbles so we headed over to do the same. It was actually quite fun so we enjoyed the bubbles and walked around inside a giant tree for a while.

Then we waited for the train. And waited and waited, and speculated. If the train is coming from New York, they don't stop and sleep for the night, or stop somewhere for an hour when the time changes. So in all likelyhood they were an hour early on this morning after the time change. Oops. Either that or I really can't read a train schedule. Greyson was a little disappointed, but it was that kind of weekend. No train, but we got to play in the soapy fountain and tree instead. A good Sunday overall.

Not the Halloween we expected

We had a really wonderful Halloween weekend. The best weekend I've had in a while, and it defied all expectations. I had made plans and I had ideas about the things we would do. And most of those things didn't happen, but things turned out great anyways.

Friday night we got busy soon after we all got home. Mike and I had been putting off Greyson's costume for too long. So... we went out to run some errands. Grabbed a burger for dinner, visited Michael's which has aisles way too narrow for a grabby toddler, and spent some time with a Thomas the Train table at Toys R Us. Mike and I wondered if we had such a magical table at home if Greyson would spend that much time playing quietly by himself every day. Just imagine what we could accomplish! Shopping done, we returned home and put the kid to bed. That's when the real fun started! We got out the paints, brushes, rulers, pencils, tape, and kids' books and set to work designing Greyson's fire truck. It's amazing that for over a month he insisted that he was going to be a fire truck for Halloween and he never wavered.

Mike and I had a great time painting, and we had a finished product before bed. Ta daaaa!

That night I fretted and fantasized about what Halloween would be like with our little fire truck. We had plans to go to a church festival up the street (for entirely non-religious people we sure do visit a lot of churches this time of year!) and maybe even enter The Goose in a costume contest.

In the morning, we let Mikey sleep in a little while we checked out the truck. I tried to put it over G's head to see how long the "suspenders" should be, but he wasn't having it. I didn't push, just let him inspect the truck and get to know it a little. He wanted to push it along the ground, and didn't seem to understand why the wheels weren't rolling. At one point he even asked me if it "needs batteries??" !!

After visiting our pumpkins out front (a daily ritual), Mike was up and we started to plan our day. Greyson still didn't want anything to do with wearing his truck, but he tried on his fire man jacket and hat and boots and seemed to like those just fine. We got our things together and were on our way to the church festival for pony rides and visits with fire men!

Well, the ponies never showed up, and Greyson was such a fussbucket that he wouldn't set foot on the ground - insisting that we carry him everywhere. It was very warm (upper 80's on Halloween!) so we didn't make him wear his heavy, fleecy costume. We took a few photos with the fire truck at the festival, but Grey didn't want to sit in it at all. It was turning out to be a bummer of a morning. Poor Goose was in a bad mood and I was slowly joining him.

Then Mike's last-minute phone calls started to pay off. Chuck arrived with Ally, Madi, and Veronica. Clay and Marina arrived with Nikolai and Anton, Chris and Randi arrived with Truman and Lennon. Even without ponies, the festival got more fun :-) Greyson was still a cranky pants, but we had more kids to play with and we all went out for lunch. That seemed to cheer Greyson up (all he needed was a taco!?) and we had a nice nap in the afternoon, followed by a romp in the sprinklers on this record-breakingly hot day.

We made one last attempt to get the fire truck on him in the evening, but it was still a no-go. So we dressed him up as a fireman and went to visit our neighbors. Of course they all oohed and aaahed over the little firefighter, and we got some candy to put in his little bucket. Then we headed home to drop off his truck and pick up the stroller. We thought we might stroll the neighborhood, see if there were any gobblins out and about, admire the decorations and costumes. We ended up trick-or-treating half the neighborhood!

The first house we stopped at was decorated, and we could see the family in the front window. We know them casually so we figured we could stop by. Greyson accepted some candy, and then walked right into the house to visit the family dog. Oops! Of course when someone opens the door for him, he thinks he's invited in :-)

We stopped at a few houses that had candy buckets out by the front door, then some decorated homes that were obviously expecting trick-or-treaters. We ended up on the busiest street in the neighborhood where we did run into a few packs of kids and parents. Our neighborhood is pretty well lit with streetlights, but also full of large mature oak trees, so it can still be dark in spots. We got to a very dark street and decided to head back home. By this point, Greyson was hot and tired and hopped back into his stroller to enjoy some ice water and a ride home. We took off his coat and hat and realized just how sweaty he was underneath it all. What a trooper, he never complained a bit - I guess all that "chocklick" he ate along the way kept him happy despite the heat.

Back at home Greyson gulped down some milk and went right to bed, a little later than usual, but we were hoping that might help us combat the "fall back blues" - I was really worried that Grey would pop up ready to play at 6:30am instead of his weekend-typical 7:30. Tomorrow I'll continute the saga of our wonderful Halloween weekend. Will Greyson sleep in? Will he wake up at sunrise? Stay tuned to find out...

Family Fun

Last weekend Greyson's grandparents came to visit. Our plan was to go to the church festival across the street from our neighborhood. This year he might be able to enjoy some of the games and rides, and he was overdue for a visit from Jo and Pops.

They arrived Saturday after his nap. Greyson and I were waiting on the front porch while Mike finished up some chores inside. We had been sitting in our porch chairs for just about five minutes when that familiar blue car came around the corner. Greyson watched with with a smile as the car pulled into the driveway, thrilled that Jo and Pops had come to visit. We had a fun dinner out (during which Greyson actually tried a new food - a fried onion!) and Greyson impressed his grandparents by reciting his ABC's and 123's and naming most of the construction trucks in his new book. We made plans to go to the festival when it opened on Sunday morning. It's been an unseasonably hot October, so the earlier the better.

After a pancake breakfast (where Greyson sucked on a piece of bacon until it dissolved in his mouth), we geared up and headed over for some family fun. First stop, the merry-go-round. Greyson rode with Pops, and while he didn't smile or laugh he did seem to enjoy himself. Next stop was the kiddie train. Again, Greyson rode stoically, but insisted that he had a good time afterwards when quizzed. We headed over to the game area and G had a chance to hop in a bounce house for the first time. He was all alone and seemed to enjoy it for a minute, but then was ready to get out and try some games.

After another turn on the merry-go-round, the train, and the Wiggle Worm ("Go fast, Wiggle Worm!" he requested), we headed over to the grown-up side of the festival. There, Greyson went on the giant ferris-wheel and his daddy won him a fish (with his second throw, Go Mike!) After all that fun, we were tuckered out and headed home. Oh, we did try the deep-fried snickers bar. You have to try that once, don't you? The Goose snoozed in the stroller on the way home and then woke up as Mike tried to put him in the crib. It was a no-nap Sunday but we all lived through it.

Uncle Mike came over for dinner and Greyson had a blast playing with him. He's a good uncle, knowing just how to keep the munchkin happy and occupied. Mike also gave us some much-needed fish advice and we have managed to keep our fall festival fishie alive for over a week.

Next up, Halloween hijink and birthday party preparations. Oh my!