Christmas Day...continued!

After playing with their new toys from Santa, it was time to leave them behind for a bit. The boys got dressed and we headed down the road to MomMom and Big Grandad's house for even more presents!

Cryin' shame the boys didn't get anything......













Chase with his new Handy Manny workbench!













Cole's most favorite Christmas gift! His new John Deere tractor, complete with a bucket scoop and trailer! He hauled wrapping paper, boxes, and bows around all morning! He can't wait for spring when he can take it outside for some REAL work!













Next....(after we had to surgically separate Cole from his new tractor), we went next door to Nonnie and Little Grandad's house! We had our annual Christmas morning breakfast of hot chocolate and Nonnie's famous cinnamon rolls! Yum! Lots of fun was had by all....but unfortunately, Mommy's camera battery died and we were only able to take a couple of pictures! But, trust me....the boys had a great time!


Chase's new John Deere hat!














I think he likes this new tractor!

















The boys really couldn't have asked for a better Christmas! And, the fun isn't going to stop here. Due to the blizzard that arrived Christmas Eve into Christmas Day, Nee-Nee and Herb decided not to make the trip over to MomMom's house for dinner and presents. So, as soon as the weather improves, we will be celebrating Christmas one more time with them!

Santa!!

All that good (?) behavior really paid off! Santa came! And, he left presents!!!

Christmas morning, Mom and Dad got up extra early so we would be ready for the boys when they got up. At 7:45am, the boys woke up and were sooooo excited to see if Santa had really been here while they slept! Cole led the way downstairs and opened the doors to the great room. The Christmas tree was already lit and Santa had left presents!!!!

The boys still standing around after about 5 minutes of trying to figure out what Santa left!



















Santa left Chase a vacuum cleaner! (What can I say...the boy likes to vacuum!)

















Tired Daddy....wearing Chase's new cowboy hat!

















Do you think he likes this tool set?














Meet Cuddles....Cole's new cat. Chase also got a cat. He named his cat "Kitty." Trust me...these are much better than real cat they wanted. No mess!

Christmas Eve

Papa, Nana, and Aunt Robyn came to our house on Christmas Eve! We had dinner, dessert, and presents. As usual, the boys provided the entertainment! Chase opened every present he could get his hands on...even if they weren't for him! And, Cole... *shaking head* After getting new pajamas from Nana and Papa, Cole was so excited to put them on, he stripped down to his birthday suit smack dab in the middle of the great room. Then, he proceeded to do the "booty dance!" (Unfortunately, we all missed that photo op....no embarrassing shots to show the girlfriends in future years!)

Here are the boys hard at work preparing dinner! Cole is smashing and measuring pretzels for the strawberry pretzel Jello salad. And, Chase is cutting the butter (of course!) into the flour for the crust of the pistachio salad!














Cole opening the racetrack and Chase with his Mickey Mouse Choo Choo!














Cole with his new dictionary! (Just what a boy fascinated with spelling needs!)



















Chase....are you in there?

















Mouthful of chocolate!















Cole's new PJs (after the booty dance!)


















After the new PJs were on, it was off to bed for the boys! (Well...first we had to track Santa on the radar...) I had planned to read, "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to them. But, Cole informed me that he needed to go to sleep right away. "No stories tonight mom, okay?" And, who was I to argue with that?!?

Baking Cookies!

Tonight, Mommy and her little helpers baked cookies! While Cole was gung ho at first, he quickly gave up. And, Chase became my little baker! (Actually, he was more of a taste tester than anything!)

And, in the midst of cookie baking, I finally got a picture of "Butter" himself in action. (Chase has earned himself the nickname Butter because anytime he gets the chance, always sticks his fingers in the butter!) I had some sticks of butter sitting out to soften, and when I turned around, there was Chase with a mouthful of butter! He even cried when I took it away!

"Butter"...Eating a stick of butter! GROSS!













What was left of the 1/2 stick of butter I had sitting out to soften...













Unwrapping the Hershey's Kisses!













After countless chocolate chips and Hershey's Kisses....













Cole...taste testing!

Cole's Christmas List

Dear Santa,

One trip to the John Deere store or Tractor Supply oughta take care of this one!

The most important thing about a stocking...

A possible glimpse into the future?

I'm starting to think that Cole may have a future in medicine. Surgery to be more precise. Of course, he has always been fascinated with how things work. And, I used to think he'd be an engineer of some sort.

However, a couple of months ago we awoke to find that one of our neighbors had hit a deer. That deer flew off the roadway and landed in our front yard. While Chris and I pondered over how we were going to remove it (since it was Saturday and no state or county agency was on-call on the weekend), the local dogs discovered this treat as well. When the boys noticed the deer, we were in the midst of breakfast. Cole never missed a single bite of Reese's Puffs cereal. He crunched and chewed all the while watching the dogs try to tear the deer's limbs off and drag the carcass around the yard.

After the dogs finally gave up, Daddy and Cole tromped up by the road to assess the situation. Cole thought seeing the dead deer was nearly better than a trip to see Santa. For days he described, in detail, what the deer looked like....inside and out. Ewwwww. And, I just chalked it up to a "boy thing."

Fast forward.....

A few days ago, we attended the Mayor's Christmas Tree lighting in our small town. It was FREEZING cold out and we didn't last more than 15 minutes. Since our outing was cut so short, we opted to stop by McDonald's for dinner as a treat for the boys. We grabbed the only available booth in the restaurant since we, apparently, we not the only ones who opted for McDonald's that night! Behind us was a table of 6 'tween' girls, without a parent in sight. And, of course they were acting like typical young girls. What started out as joking around, ended up with the girls slapping each other, poking each other in the eyes, etc. You know, fun.

Apparently, one can have too much fun while gorging yourself on greasy cheeseburgers and fries. Because that's when I heard it. That unmistakable sound. Yep, one of them started throwing up. Right there at the table. (Thankfully Chase and I had our backs to the scene and didn't have to see any of it.) At the same time, Chris and I looked at each other and started picking up our food. Dinner was over. NOW! As we are frantically throwing our food on the tray and trying to get out of there as fast as we can, I looked down at Chase. He was completely oblivious! He was just happily swinging his feet and eating his french fries!

Cole.... I looked at him and he is standing up, peering around me in order to get a better view, with the cheeseburger in his mouth. He watched this girl throw up at the table repeatedly, and NEVER. MISSED. A. BITE.

No weak stomach on that kid. It became obvious in that moment that he has to be destined for the medical profession. And, Chris summed it up best....

"Brain surgeon.

The boy won't be able to tie his own shoes, but he'll be a brain surgeon."

Promotion: Yellow Belt

Last night was Promotion at Revolution Martial Arts. And, Mr. Cole has once again been promoted. He moved up from the orange belt to the yellow belt! He still really loves tae kwan do and will, most likely, be moving out of the Tiny Tigers class soon and into Basic Training. Basic Training is a huge class (vs. Tiny Tigers which has less than 8 kids, ages 2-5, each night) of all ages, from 6 to adult. It is much more challenging and will keep Cole on his toes!



Swing those sticks!
















Getting his belt autographed by Master Kasselbaum, 6th degree black belt from Nebraska.

















Good friends!

Getting into the holiday spirit!

Need I say more?

This shirt pretty much sums it up...

Cole's Recipe for Turkey

Cole's Kindergarten class put together the cutest collection of stories! Each child told a story about Thankgiving and Mrs. Ullah bound them all into a book. Here is Cole's story:

Happy Thanksgiving!

Cole made an Indian costume at school! They have been learning about the Pilgrams and Indians the last couple of weeks.

















Here is a close-up of the vest so you can see the coloring he did:














Also,if you'll notice, he only used green, yellow, and brown pasta on his necklace. Green and yellow for John Deere and brown for dirt. (As you can see by the rest of his outfit, he is very clearly into farming these days. He would wear those overalls every day if we let him. And, underneath the overalls is his favorite John Deere t-shirt.)

He also made a placemat at school, but he wouldn't let me take it to MomMom's house for Thanksgiving dinner.














Chase also made a placemat at school this year!




On Thanksgiving, we had a nice dinner at MomMom's and Big Grandad's house. And, Cole was given the very important job of setting the tables before the guests arrived. And, once the guests got there, he was an excellent doorman and host. He greeted everyone and took their coats for them! After dinner, he had the most important job of all....taking the dessert orders! And, for a child who does not like to write, he did an excellent job of carefully writing down everyone's order.

Perhaps the biggest Thanksgiving news of all came during dessert when Aunt Mary and Uncle Dave announced that Baby Barry would be arriving around June 22! Congrats, Mary and Dave! We can't wait to meet the newest Gemini!

Rock-n-Roll

The playground at the Primary School is filled with tiny river rock. These rocks are bigger than sand, but not by much. And, so, inevitably, Cole comes home with rocks in his shoes. Every day. And, from what I have been able to get out of him, he actually LIKES the rocks in his shoes.

When he comes home from school, I generally make him take his shoes off. And, out pour the rocks onto my kitchen floor. So, most days, I scoop them up and toss out out the door (amidst the screams of protest from inside the house!)

So, tonight after school, he had taken his shoes off and was lying on the couch catching an episode of Spongebob while I was cooking dinner. After I put it in the oven, I came over to the couch to sit with him. And, all of the sudden, he started sneezing. Not just once....but continuously. Over and over he sneezed and, all at once, he jumped up and started toward the bathroom. And, that's when I heard it....the sound of those tiny rocks hitting the floor...

Mom: Cole, what was that?
Cole: Nothing! Just a rock.
Mom: Why do you have a rock? And, why are you sneezing so much?
Cole: Well....I was playing with the rock by my nose and it just fell in.
Mom: Did you stick that rock in your NOSE?
Cole: No...it just fell in!

Yeah, I don't know how many times that has happened to me when a rock just somehow FALLS into my nose! Aren't boys fun? And, so....we had to have the talk about not putting things into your ears, nose, or mouth for that matter. And, when nothing seemed to be getting his attention, I think he got the message when I told him if that rock would have gotten stuck in his nose, we would have had to go the ER and the doctor would cut it out with a knife.

So, I think at least for now, he will be content to just stick the rocks in his shoes!

We FINALLY have Broadband!!!!

Remember all those blog posts I promised you awhile back? I put a few up tonight (June and July) and the rest are coming SOON! I promise!

With dial-up now a thing of the past in our house (woo hoo!!!), I can finally get back to my blogging! I uploaded dozens of pics to Blogger tonight and just as soon as I find the time to sit down and compose the summer's events, I'll have them up for all to view!

Thanks for your patience!

Halloween 2009

How cute are these two trick-or-treaters?

Cole's surgery

As you may recall from this post, the dentist recommended that Cole have 8 crowns put on due to the cavities between his molars. And, because the dentist that made this recommendation uses a hospital not covered by our insurance, we were forced to find another pediatric dentist. (...which was honestly fine with me since I wanted a second opinion anyway!)

After showing Cole's x-rays to Mommy and Daddy's dentist who agreed with the diagnosis, we also found a new ("dinosaur") dentist that Cole loved! The office is decorated in dinosaur stuff and the staff is all very caring and friendly. Cole didn't mind going at all! Anyway, Dr. Thomas agreed that Cole needed the 8 crowns and surgery was scheduled for January. However, when just a few short weeks later Cole was in terrible pain, the surgery was bumped up to October.

The surgery took place at Children's Mercy South and took several hours from start to finish. Funny thing was...the staff over in Same Day Surgery vividly remembered Cole from when he had his hernia surgery before! And, they were prepared to do battle with him, as they never showed up alone. Reinforcements were brought into the pre-op room every time they needed to check him for something! To their amazement, Cole acted nothing like the last time we had gone through this. I would almost say he was pleasant about the whole situation! And, the nurses were shocked!

Thankfully everything went just fine during surgery! He had a total of 4 root canals, 8 crowns, a thorough cleaning, and a fluoride treatment! He is good to go for about 6 months anyway!

Here he is....at home after surgery. Poor kid looked like he had been in a fight...and lost! He had a black eye from the tape they pulled off. (Apparently they taped his eyes shut during surgery.) He had a sore hand from the IV. And, some sore gums. And, even with all that, he was a trooper! No complaints from him at all!

New white crowns:


See my hand and my black eye?


Smiling through it all....even if his mouth feels funny!

Trip the ER!

I guess it had been entirely too long since we had taken one of the boys to the Emergency Room! So, tonight we had to make an appearance.

This time, it was Chase who fell down! He was playing with one of those super bouncy balls, and had been for hours. He would bounce it, and then run after it to try to catch it, with the ball bouncing everywhere. It was all fun and laugher, until we heard the awful SPLAT! and knew immediately that it was the sound of Chase's head hitting the hardwood floor. Mommy and Daddy jumped up and ran to him (he was only about 2 feet away). He was lying flat on his back, not making a sound. I scooped him up and he immediately started to cry. And, cry. And, cry. 40 minutes later he was still crying. And, we knew something was really wrong.

He finally quieted down and was still laying on me. With one hand, I was comforting him. And, with the other, I was frantically trying to search my Blackberry for signs of head injury. As I was reading the Mayo Clinic site about concussions in children, Chase began to fall asleep. I knew enough to know that when someone has a head injury, the last thing you want them to do is fall asleep. I tried to wake him and he then began throwing up!! At that moment, I jumped up and yelled to everyone to get in the car...we were going to the emergency room!!!

It was chaos at that point! Cole ran to his room to pack some clothes (boy, was I ever proud of that boy for taking matters into his own hands like that!) and then he ran to the car and jumped into his car seat to wait patiently for the rest of us! Mommy and Chase were covered in vomit so I was trying to get the two of us in clean clothes while Daddy was packing Cole's toothbrush, turning off lights, and doing who knows what!

We dropped Cole off at Nonnie's house and then sped down the road toward the hospital. Before we even got out of our little town, a cop pulled us over for speeding! Thankfully, he was a nice guy who let us go with just a warning when Daddy explained the situation! *whew* After arriving at the hospital, and sitting in the waiting room full of H1N1 patients (ewwwwww!), the doctor checked out Chase who, by that point, was fine. They made us stay awhile for observation and then sent us home with instructions to wake him several times during the night to make sure he was ok.

It was pretty sleepless night for Mommy and Chase. But, thankfully he was just fine. And, somehow, I just know that this won't be that kid's last concussion.

Promotion: Orange Belt

It sure didn't take long for Cole's love of karate to earn him a new belt! Tonight, he attended his very first promotion! And, he was promoted from a white belt to an orange belt!

Here he is "sitting like a black belt" waiting for his turn on the mat:


Out on the mat with his fellow Tiny Tigers:


Swinging those nunchucks!


This picture was taken just after Mom tied on the new belt!

"Feetball" Season!

Today was the KC Chiefs home opener and when game time rolled around, I told the kids I was going to turn off Spongebob Squarepants (or "Spongebob Scare-pants" as Chase says!) and turn on the Chiefs game. Cole immediately went outside to play as he could care less about sports. But, Chase ran upstairs hollering something out needing his helmet. He dug around in Cole's closet until he found his big brothers bike helmet. Next, I found a football for him, strapped on the helmet, and he was one happy kid! He watched the game for a few minutes and then proceeded to host his own game at home!

He ran all over the house kicking the ball, tossing it in the air, tackling the couch, and throwing himself on the ball! It was quite hysterical! I think this kid is going to be our sports fan!

Our little visitor...

After the kids went to bed tonight, Daddy and Mommy were very surprised to see this little guy just sitting on our deck! He probably sat there for 15 minutes or so...just looking around, licking his paws, and trying to find a midnight snack in our BBQ grill!