Thanksgiving in pictures

Back in May I set a goal to run the Turkey Trot 5 k this year. Early Thanksgiving morning, we all got up and headed out together to get it done. My sister Kim went with us.

Last years, 1K baby trot. . .

Brrrrrr! it was SO COLD that day.

This years photo-- Much nicer weather!

Luke got excited at all the commotion at the end! Or maybe he just knew he would be out of the stroller soon.

This one is a little hard to see us, but Luke has a great expression on his face.

We went to my parents for lunch. Luke was most excited about getting to wear a shirt with a turkey on it like everyone else. He just kept pointing at all the turkeys.

Here's a shot of the whole trot team.

We tried to get just one good picture of all the cousins together--well, this is the best one we got. It's hard to share the rocking chair these days.

Cousin Zoe brought over the most wonderful Turkey hat she made at school. She was so nice to share it with Luke who happens to LOVE hats. You can see how much he enjoys it. Look at those sweet rosy cheeks!

I think Luke's favorite part was the free reign in the food department. Unlimited chips and crackers were all within his reach for a good part of the day. I think he also loved being around so many people. He will just crawl up in your lap and give you a good talking to--we're just not sure yet what exactly he is saying. . .

Here he is having a serious talk with Aunt Suzie.

The Boogeyman lives in my dryer

I had about a million things to do this afternoon. I was to pick up Luke from school, immediately take Hank to the vet, and from there drive to my parents house in Flower Mound to celebrate my dads birthday. That means I had to pack Luke's bag (complete with all three ingredients for his diaper rash concoction and pj's), pack the food I was contributing to dinner, bring the gifts, my bag, snacks for me & Luke, money for our Sonic drinks, money for the vet, Hank's leash and crate. . . . whew!

I was gathering these things together and placing them all on top of the washing machine so that they would be easy to load into the car when I was ready to leave. I kept hearing these noises on the baby monitor (by the way, Luke was at school so there should be NO noises on the baby monitor). It sounded like just random banging and scratching and such. I thought "What on earth is Alice doing? I don't usually hear her on the baby monitor." (Alice is our kitty. Due to past incidences, she spends much of her day in the office with the door shut. It's her little kitty haven.) The hallway is the shape of a capital L. Lukes room is at the top of the L, the laundry room is at the corner, and the office is at the far end of the L. I didn't really think much more about it. There is a factory not far from our house and the baby monitor picks up random sounds during the day, the monitor gets static when cell phone signals cross through. Miscellaneous sounds are not uncommon. However, on one trip to the laundry room to put stuff on the washer I was startled to discover the source of the random sounds was not the factory nor Alice. The scratching and scuffling and banging or whatever was coming from the laundry room. More specifically either in the dryer or behind the dryer. I PANICED!!!

I shut the laundry room door as fast as I could. My heart was racing. I hate rodents. I hate rats and possums and mice. I was certain that there was a possum in my dryer. Don't ask me how it got there, but that's what I decided was there. I should be thankful it was in the dryer and not out on the floor staring at me. This morning Hank had been acting funny in front of the dryer. I thought his ball had rolled behind it, but it wasn't there and we were too busy to pay any attention. Anyway, I had ten minutes before I needed to leave to go pick up Luke and here I was frozen in place worried that there was a possum in my dryer. To make matters worse, my car was not loaded, half of the things I needed were locked in the laundry room with the unknown rodent, my keys were there too. Most importantly, I had no way to get to the car as it was in the garage with the door opener. The only route to the garage is through the laundry room.

After calling Gene, I decided I had to just be a big girl and hightail it through the laundry room to the garage, back out the car, and load everything through the front door. I stood in front of the laundry room door mustering up all the courage I had to open it. I banged loud on the door hoping to scare whatever it was into hiding. Next, I cracked the door and peeked in looking up, down, and all around for the possum. I banged really loud on the washer to give it another good scare. I grabbed my stuff off the washer and shut the door. After piling up all the stuff next to the front door I now had to go through. I took some deep breaths and then ran as fast as I could through the laundry room. I am not going to claim that it was a graceful, nor ladylike trip through the laundry room, but I somehow made it through. I loaded the car with all our stuff and Hank and we headed out to pick up Luke.

Meanwhile, Gene was on his way to the house to meet the representative from the humane society to catch my possum/rat/mouse/raccoon/moose. However, he got home to find nothing. No evidence of a visitor, no noises, nothing. Either my loud noises scared it to death, it escaped out the way it came in, or it is somewhere else in my house. I have yet to know. Gene freed Alice so that maybe she could do some hunting while we were out for the evening. Neither Alice nor Hank have found anything. Must be a leftover boogeyman from Halloween.

It's not a post without some pictures! Unfortunately I couldn't get a shot of bigfoot in my dryer. But I got some shots of Luke yesterday. He just figured out how to get into his swing by himself and make it swing.

Super long post

I haven't updated in a while so this one's gonna be a doozy.

First things first. . . I know you are all worried about my thumb. You will be happy to know that my friend Fara took my stitches out after two weeks and the skin underneath is healed and healthy. I still have a pink scar but I have complete function. I was forced to add Cuisinart to my Christmas list this year.

Grammy, Luke, Grampa, and myself have all been passing around the sore throat, sinus infection, laryngitis bug. The last few weeks have been pretty snotty around here (again!). I thought we were all past it and now Gene says he isn't feeling well.

On to pictures. . .

Luke still doesn't have too many words. He says yessss/thisssss, dadadadadaddaada, uh-oh, and this weekend he started saying uh-huh and shaking his head yes. We have our speech therapist visiting the first weekend in December to check him out. He also is cutting three teeth right now. Yes, THREE.

He is real into shoes. His shoes, your shoes, any shoes. Here he is wearing mama's shoes around.

Next up--Halloween. We spent Halloween night at Grammy & Grampa's house. They had a block party in their circle and driveway. Luke had a blast and ran around like he owned the place. That kid has no fear.

Here he is after getting all decked out in his penguin costume.

We had to lose the beak for dinner, but he was more than willing to put it back on for the party.

After an hour or so, the beak was just too hot. Luke pulled it off and had a big cold drink. Being a party penguin is tough.

Helping Grampa pick out the next song.

Dancing. He was spinning around and around in circles. This song was "I want candy"--how appropriate.

Too much candy, spinning, partying. Looks like we have a dead duck on our hands. . .

No worries! Our little bird only needed a quick rest.

Moving on. . .

Luke was playing real hard one afternoon and his head was kinda sweaty. We fashioned this lovely unicorn-like style out of his sweaty hair. I thought it was funny.

This morning as we were getting Luke ready for school, he found this old hat on a shelf in his closet and wore it all morning. Today he wanted to wear his backpack (he usually doesn't). I told him he looked so cute and that mommy wanted to take a picture. Surprisingly he stood still and smiled for the camera! What a cooperative boy.

(If you can't tell--the hat has puppy dog ears with eyes & a nose.)

The skin graft is taking!!! (don't read this if you are easily queasy)

Whew! What a crazy week this has been. Last Wednesday started out fairly normal. Luke and I spent the morning at home doing normal stuff. I had to work Wednesday night so around lunchtime I started preparing our dinner. I like to do all the prep work while Luke finishes his lunch so that I can nap while he does, and then when we get up I can pop dinner in the oven so that it is ready before I have to leave for work. I was preparing a potato casserole and was grating potatoes on a coarse grater.

I'm not sure what happened next--either I looked away or the grater slipped, not really sure, but I ended up grating off a good portion of my right thumb knuckle. I realized right away what had happened and grabbed a kitchen towel to put tight pressure on it. I wanted to bandage it tightly.

Gene had used some bandage tape a few weeks ago so I called him at work to ask him where he had put it. While I was on the phone with him I got real nauseous and headed to the bathroom because I thought I was going to be sick. Surprise! I was not going to throw up, I was going to pass out. Luke had followed me into the bathroom and grabbed my hairbrush off the countertop. My vision started to black out so I layed down on the floor becasue I didn't want to fall and hit my head. I never completely lost consciousness but I did drop the phone. Luke had been brushing my hair (which was in a ponytail, so he was really just creating snags and tangles) but dropping the phone distracted him enough to stop. He then picked up the phone and hung up on Gene. Of course this caused him to panic a little and he jumped in his car and headed home to check on us. After a minute or so, I felt better so I sat up and phoned Gene to let him know we were both okay. He came home to check on us anyway.

He convinced me to go to the ER where I ended up getting a few stitches. The skin had not completely detached so the doctor was able to sew it back on. He said it would be like a skin graft, but because the area wasn't highly vascularized, it would probably turn into a scab and fall off. In the meantime it would provide a good protective barrier and speed healing. I also had to get a tetanus shot. My arm hurt almost as much as my thumb.

The first time I changed the dressing, I got real light-headed and my vision got blurry. I had to lay down and deep breathe for a few minutes before I could finish. Long story short, ths skin graft has gone from blue to purple, and now it is turning pink and flesh colored. I've decided that the skin graft is thriving and is going to survive! My little knuckle wrinkle is going to make it! Must be the excellent nursing care it has received.

Thursday we celebrated our fourth anniversary. Gene and I went to dinner and a movie while Luke stayed at home with my parents. We exchanged gifts--Gene got a season of the Sopranos and a fancy bottle of scotch. I got a new pair of Uggs.

I had the weekend off, so we just had a nice family weekend around the house. We doggy-sat for Justin and Ashley over the weekend. We had an extra Jack Russell bouncing around, but their dog is so sweet and so much calmer than Hank.

I've been out of work for a week now with this thumb, but I'm going to go back tomorrow. I don't think I can afford to stay off until it heals completely. It is difficult to write and I can't really bend it much. If I hit it on something I get a little light-headed still--but I've been focusing on taking deep breaths and relaxing through the pain. It actually is starting to feel much better and doesn't throb as much.

And a few pics to end this post.. . . .

Luke checking out the train at Trinity park a few weeks ago. He was fascinated by it.

One of Luke's classmates had a birthday party at school. Luke enjoyed the hats so much his teachers sent his home with him. We got LOTS of use out of the had before it disappeared.

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween!

p.s. i have been relieved of my costume picking duties. gene does not approve the penguin. :(

A photo for every month

As of last week, Luke is now 18 months old. Here is some of my favorite pictues of the Luke. . .


Brand new in the delivery room. . .

Sweet baby napping in the sunshine. . . well, what sunshine there was. That was a very rainy season and everytime I would put him in the window the clouds would roll in.

Exactly one month old.

About six weeks old. . .

The biggest smiles yet!

Man, he loved that bouncer. I was sad to put it away but he played in it until he was so heavy he was almost laying on the floor.

Not long after I went back to work Luke found his thumb. I found him like this one morning when I came home from work and it's been there ever since.

I just love seeing his sweet face every morning.

A very thoughtful moment.

My sweet pea in the pumpkin house.

This year's Turkey Trot was pretty cold, but Luke had lots of warmth in his reindeer suit.

Merry Christmas!

Starting to walk along the furniture and walls. . .

Sweet little face!

Happy First Birthday!

This picture is a bit fuzzy, but the expression on his face is priceless!

And the whining begins. . . .


He's always been a bit of a drooler. . .

July was for swimming lessons and vacation to Galveston Beach.

He played under this table for at least a half hour that day.

Getting to be so grown up!