It sure didn’t feel like Christmas day around here. There is so much going on with the change in nursing and stress from jobs and other responsibilities. It should have been more relaxing and fun. We had good times though. There is always some part of the day that will make us smile.

Trevor found a way in to Brendan’s fort!

The boys are not old enough to really understand presents or Santa or all of that, so we didn’t put effort in to wrapping gifts or doing stockings. Next year they will definitely be more in to it. They did have a few wrapped gifts from friends. Trevor enjoyed tearing the paper and crinkling tissue but Brendan did not like it!

Trevor picked out this gift at Toys R Us when we did our shopping trip. It has real strings that we thought would be perfect for Brendan’s scritching fingers to strum.

Trevor took this picture. Not bad!

Brendan’s former nurse came by to visit for Christmas. Coincidentally, she also picked out a guitar (and boombox!) for the boys. It is perfect because now they can jam together and make all kinds of noise!

Both guitars play all kinds of little songs that will surely get stuck in my head.

This blue one plays an electric guitar version of “Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes”, in addition to “Wild Thing”, “Oye Como Va”, “Yankee Doodle”, and “In the Hall of the Mountain King”. Who picks this stuff? What a variety!

After playing with guitars, my memory card got full and my camera battery died, so the rest of the cool new presents will have to be photographed tomorrow. Tonight, Bill put together the workbench playset from Great Grandma Bobbie. We can’t wait to see what Trevor thinks. We got some really cool light up CAT trucks from Bailey. Brendan got an exercise ball for therapy from his new nurse that he loves to bounce on. I have more stuff for them that I haven’t even taken out yet. It can wait a while, they certainly have plenty to play with!

We are very grateful to Jonah & Christine tonight for delivery of a delicious turkey dinner. We probably would have just had something from a can otherwise!

We are missing our families and traditions and hope that things will be so much different next year. Looking back to last Christmas and how much things have changed, we can only imagine what lies ahead!

I took pictures with my old phone today instead of my nice camera and most of them didn’t come out. They were just blurs!
For those of you that read the blog in the morning, Merry Christmas!

Our Christmas eve was about the most un-holidayish day we could have. Trevor and I ran some errands and the stores were really not too bad. I expected more chaos. We had to go to Sam’s Club because I overbought size three diapers. I was able to exchange the unopened boxes for size fours. Brendan’s diapers were starting to look like little low cut speedos!

Bill had to work today so we didn’t do a whole lot of anything different. We video chatted with the Christmas Eve party at Gramma’s house and it was good to see everyone there. We wish we could have been there! We had enchiladas for dinner instead of their prime rib with all the fixin’s!

We did put Brendan on an HME and took him around the house a bit. He doesn’t get to roll on our bed like Trevor does so today he got his chance.

Brendan did do 14hrs of his mist collar, that is a big deal!

Trevor learns the best part about receiving holiday gifts in the mail, the boxes!!

Staying up with Brendan really takes it out of us more and more as time goes by. Bill and I are both tired and cranky tonight and looking forward to a little sleep. We are grateful for nurses that are willing to work on holidays!

Tonight should be the last night for some time that we don’t have night nurse coverage. Our new night nurse is going to work Sat-Wed and then we will have our normal Thu-Fri help. We were cleared by the state for at least another 90 days of nursing support, and most likely 90 more after that. As Brendan spends more and more time off the ventilator, he will possibly not qualify for coverage.

In a continued effort to help Brendan do new things and escape his little corner of the room, Bill built him a “pillow fort” on the end of the couch. He LOVED it.

Trevor was trying to figure out what was going on and why he was not invited.

Brendan likes being safe from Trevor attacks. Trevor can’t steal his toys in the pillow fort.

He still did plenty of floor time with tummy time, kneeling and standing practice with his monster pillow.

Trevor relentlessly pursues the camera to click the LCD screen button.

He does an awful lot of “talking” lately and comes out with some of the funniest sounds and makes these long sentences. Sometimes I wonder what goes through his little head though, he is one strange baby!

“Gee, Mom, I don’t know who threw all of those green beans on to the floor. If our dogs were normal dogs, you never would have seen them.”

I am going to make some coffee and figure out what quiet project to work on while the boys sleep. (and they had better stay asleep!!)