I all but had a nervous breakdown this morning when Brendan woke up with something wrong. He was just crying and needed lots of suctioning. He has had a few of his drainage-throw ups too. He was clingy and tired and went back to sleep for a long nap really early. I was thinking it was some kind of torture to have to deal with this on a Friday again, and he just can’t get sick again.
As the day went on, Brendan got much better but there is still something just not quite right. He is dealing with mommy-jealousy issues and doesn’t want Trevor to leave the room. That accounts for some of the crying. He was having a blast this evening so we will see how he does in the morning.
We were lucky to have old night nurse Jennifer cover the night that Brendan was supposed to be getting his sleep study. Now we just have our two normal nights with no nurse.

We have been waiting all week for Trevor to get this package. As we expected, he LOVES having his own little shopping cart to push around. He pushed it and pulled it all around every inch of the house all day long.

He has an adorable little baby boy doll that he can put in the cart’s child seat. He needs to work on his placement.

Trevor knows he is not supposed to touch the dog food, but nobody ever told him that the baby couldn’t touch it

I tried to catch Brendan’s “maniacal laugh” for Gramma. There is a hilarious face he makes when he does it fully. He learned it from the Muppet movie.

Brendan helped me hammer up a bag of pretzels to make pretzel coated chicken. He was good at hammering!

Before bed when it is slightly less sunny and only 110 outside, we go out and try to crazy the boys out so that they sleep well.
They love their swing.

It is like flying a Brendan kite!

Brendan is planting flowers in his fort

Trevor loves to swing with the misters on

He wanted to have a tube like Brendan

Brendan thinks it is funny!

Silliness:

Now that Brendan is sleeping, I can tell there is definitely something bothering him. His heart rate is elevated and he is very easily agitated and upset. He is acting like it might be his ears again, but it is hard to tell. There are no words to describe how frustrating this is. We will have to make a trip to the pediatrician’s in the morning if I can get in on their Saturday hours.

I can’t believe that I forgot when I was typing the blog last night to wish Aunt Schnah a very happy birthday! We also send out hope for healing to Great Uncle Rich who is battling pneumonia. Get well soon!

The chaos of the daily grind continues. I found out that we had a cardiology appointment today that I didn’t make and had to reschedule and the sleep clinic called expecting Brendan tonight for his sleep study even though that was rescheduled due to his illness.
We are trying to iron out our new nursing schedule and get used to the changes in the day/night hours. I did do something fun with Trevor this morning and it was really nice to get back to doing something adventurous.

Trevor started the day for me by waking up screaming at 5:20am. He wouldn’t go back to sleep, but he did just let me cuddle him and read books and watch videos until 6am before we went out.
Being up early was the best time to go outside.
Outside needed some work though, we took the hose and blasted down the whole play area and mopped the pads. Trevor was a huge help of course!

In cleaning up outside, we found the last missing magnet letter under the slide!

After breakfast, we decided we needed a fun outing. I decided to take Trevor to visit the “Hall Of Flame!” For a kid that loves trucks, how could you go wrong with a firefighting museum with a $6 admission and free kids under 3?

It seems like they have a hundred trucks and carriages on display. It is a pretty amazing collection of vehicles. We had the whole place to ourselves first thing. A construction crew down the street had accidentally dug into one of the electrical mains for the area and most of the museum was without power and AC. It was too bad, but we still enjoyed it!

Trevor says, “What are these, I thought we were coming to see trucks?”

“This is better!” In the whole place, there is one large truck that kids are allowed to climb all over.

Trevor trying to put the hat on by himself. It was a good effort!

They have a dress up section for kids. Trevor is the cutest little fireman I have ever seen!

Big dog puzzle kept Trevor entertained for a while

Right as we were getting ready to leave, two bigs schools buses pulled up and 65 kids (5-7yr olds I think) and 9 adults in matching shirts piled out. Trevor was mesmerized!

When we got home, Trevor was thirsty. He thought Eins needed a drink too.

Brendan had fun ringing the chimes while Trevor had lunch.

Trevor took a 3.5hr nap! I was so exhausted, I crashed too and slept an hour and a half.

Trevor did bring a firetruck home for Brendan because he missed out on the fun.

Brendan loved it. It was THE TOY of the day.

Trevor stole it back at every opportunity.

Despite the good naps today, the boys both went to bed at a reasonable hour. Lets hope they sleep past 6 at least!

Today was full, but I didn’t pick up my camera until dinner time. I was spoiled having Gramma here shooting all the cute pictures.
We piled in the car just before 7am today and took Gramma to the airport. We are glad that she made it home safely this afternoon. It is always hard to say goodbye.

We had our first therapy meeting with the new team leader (OT) and PT today. Brendan startled us all and was happy and playful and showed off all of his tricks and skills. He wowed them with his abilities.
I was less than wowed with the new team. After expressing to them my displeasure over previous speech therapists using things that were dangerous to Trevor and leaving me with a giant mess, they still wanted to have Brendan play with a big tub of dry rice. The OT promised she had a great way to contain it and that it would be safe.
With Trevor climbing in to the tub and both boys swishing, dumping, and spreading it, there was no surprise that Nurse Vanessa and I spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning up rice bits from my floor and furniture. It gets everywhere.

Trevor was taking 2.5 to 3hr naps while Gramma was here, but today it was an hour and a half! At least he is feeling better and his appetite is returning. He was chomping teriyaki chicken, rice and peas.

The chicken must have smelled good to Eins, he was watching the floor like a hawk for dropped bits.

Trevor is extremely observant. He is Mommy’s little helper and has to start doing his chores again now that Gramma is not here doing so much work. He knows now that after you sweep debris in to the dust pan that you have to dump it in the garbage can. He does it all himself, copying what he has seen us do.

Brendan got some “air time” on his little butt after his bath tonight. He has had wicked red diaper rash lately, most likely due to the bacterial upset in his system after being on the antibiotics.
He did some nude chomp n clack.

I can say I have tried a lot of products for diaper rash and some definitely work better than others. Today I picked up some of this:

It is the first product that has made an immediate difference on the redness and bumps. It has an odd smell almost like cedar.

Brendan is convincing Daddy that he doesn’t have to go to sleep by giving him a back rub.

When Gramma is on our network, she can use her iPod to log in to Trevor’s spy cam and check on him in bed. I know she is probably missing Trevor cam tonight, so here is a snapshot. He fell asleep fast tonight, he was so tired!