Tommy's First Bike

When we last "talked Christmas" my Aunt Annie mentioned to me that my Uncle Kenny was working on a "special present" for Tommy. Now, Tommy and Uncle Kenny share a deep love of Hot Wheels, thus I assumed it was some type of Hot Wheels themed present and didn't think about it again. Come Christmas day, I found out that Uncle Kenny, who is also an avid and accomplished bicyclist, BUILT Tommy a bike. I had no idea. Tommy (obviously) had no idea. It was a great surprise.

Check out the bike. It is so darn cool. Tommy was enraptured by the flames, or as he said, "There's FIRE on my bike!"



At the end of the day I asked Tommy what his favorite part of Christmas was, and he responded, "I got a bicycle!"

Three Days of Crazy

We have had an eventful few days, to say the least. The crazy began on Christmas Eve. We woke up for a family breakfast and got a very special surprise...Uncle Kevin and Aunt Colleen! A few months back my youngest sibling, Kevin, moved to Seattle and he recently started a new job with a crazy schedule. He had been told that he would not have Christmas off, so all of us thought we would be spending Christmas without him. At the last minute he was able to get two days off (a Christmas miracle!), so he scheduled a flight down but only told my parents. I admit, he totally got me. I suspected nothing. It was a great Christmas treat!

After our breakfast we went down to the beach for a walk and some time playing in the sand. The water was a bit too cold for a swim, but it was beautiful (70s), so at least we got to soak up some sunshine. In the evening we went to church with Jeff's family, then had our "traditional" chinese food dinner with my family.





Christmas morning we started early and had breakfast with my family, opening presents, then went to Jeff's mom's place for a gathering with his family. Tommy spent the majority of that time running around with his cousin, and managed to totally wear himself out, just in time for us to go for Christmas dinner at my Aunt's house (my mom's extended family). By eight o'clock Jeff and I were about ready to fall over, we were so tired. The children were still going, of course.






On the day after Christmas mom, my sister (the pregnant one) and I hit the mall, because I really really needed some clothes that actually fit. We pretty much cleaned out the smalls in Old Navy's maternity department, but that is mostly because they don't stock enough! From there we went to Cox Christmas (my Dad's extended family). With four boys between 3 and 5 it was quite the wild rumpus.



And now, we rest. Well, as much as parents of two boys can ever rest...

Merry Christmas From the Klugs!

Southern California style...

Four Christmases

Rocking Around The Christmas Tree

After weeks of asking for a Christmas tree Tommy's dreams have come true. On Wednesday night we took a trip to In-N-Out burger (yum!) followed by a swing through the tree lot. Tommy was drawn to the shorter trees, and no one objected since for some reason the difference between a 5-6 foot tree and a 6 to 7 foot tree is fifteen dollars. You certainly don't pay by the foot.

Thursday night we had our big decorating party, complete with Amy Grant's Christmas Album (first one, obviously), a fire, and peppermint ice cream. Jjaja, Papa, Aunt Emily, Aunt Katie, and Uncle Jeremy joined in the fun, and it didn't take long at all to get the little tree looking festive.

Picking out the tree:

At the tree lot

Feeling the needles

Smelling the needles

Decorating:

Tommy got to put the angel on this year

But he had to fight Aunt Emily for the privilege

In case you were wondering why Emily and I are looking so odd, we took MANY group photos and none of them are good of all of us. Towards the end of the photo session, Em and I started mocking (with love, of course) Jeremy and Katie's weird baby bump poses (my sister is pregnant too, due May 10). That is why Emily has her hand lovingly rubbing my bump.

All- Clear!

We are done with ultrasounds until 30 weeks! Yay! The doctor finally gave us the thumbs-up in terms of the baby's health- he is SRPS free!

There was a small issue detected during the ultrasound- my placenta is rather low. This is not necessarily alarming, but I do have to go in for a check-up in ten weeks to make sure that it re-positions correctly as my uterus expands. Everything else looked great.

We had a new tech this time, after having the same (wonderful) woman for every other ultrasound. The new tech was very nice, but she had clearly not read our file. I really stinking wish they would read our file beforehand. When she was checking the baby's feet I asked about the presence of extra toes, and she said that she didn't see any, then she added, "you know, there are worse things to have than polydactyly." Which would be true if your child had non-lethal polydactyly, but when extra fingers and toes are a sign that your child will die shortly after birth, well, it doesn't get much worse than that. READ THE FILE!!!

I went straight from the ultrasound appointment to my regular OB appointment. I saw a new OB, and once again the OB was totally confused by my mentioning that I had children (in response to a question about what I do all day). It went like this:

OB: "Oh, I guess we have somehow missed those pregnancies in our records."
Me: "My children were adopted, so I didn't have any pregnancies."
OB: "Oh, well, we only keep track of pregnancies."

Yes, I know because I keep having to explain it. At least I was in a good mood from the earlier scan, but I was a little miffed because I know that during my last appointment the OB made a specific point of entering Tommy and Nic into my records so that this wouldn't keep happening. The good news is that I have only one more OB to meet, so at most I should only have to explain the miracle of adoption one more time.

The only interesting thing that occurred at the appointment was the doctor's parting words to me: "I almost never say this to my patients, but please, feel free to eat as much as you want over the holidays. If you want an extra cookie, have an extra cookie. Eat as much as you want." This is just what I wanted to hear, and in case you wondered, brought about by the fact that despite excessive dessert eating I only gained a pound this month. I actually don't really like holiday foods like turkey and mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing etc (although I don't mind eating them once or twice a year) but I love and adore PIE. Note to whoever is ordering the pies for Christmas day- I want a quarter of a berry pie all to myself, and really good vanilla ice-cream. Also, I feel that a few extra trips to In-N-Out should be in my future. Animal fries here I come!

Let the Intervention Begin

Today we had Nic's early intervention meeting. His coordinator, the two evaluating therapists, and I all met to discuss the "level of support" that our family will be receiving in the coming months. We also had to set a goal for Nicolas, and it had to be in my words. Now, I understand that goals are a positive thing, but really my only goal for all of this is for Nic to not be delayed, and since I was responsible for wording the goal, that was the phrase I chose. "My goal is for my son to not be delayed." Yes, this mom aims high. But what was I supposed to say? At the end of six months I hope my son can recite the entire US Constitution? (Although that would be the height of history-cool for a <2 year old).

The rest of the meeting was the therapists summarizing what they told me before. The developmental therapist reiterated that at first she thought Nic would need services (remember the tongue chewing?), but by the end of her appointment she was convinced that she could not justify recommending them. Instead, she proposed reevaluating in three months to make sure he continues on-track. I agreed. The speech therapist let the other two know that she was only concerned about his expressive speech, and that she was only recommending up to one hour a week of therapy.

On an adoption-frustration side note, one of the things she brought up was our complete lack of knowledge regarding Nic's gestation and birth. Nic was a tiny tiny fellow when we first got his measurements, and we don't know if that was due entirely to maternal malnutrition or if it was linked to prematurity. If Nicolas was born even a month premature, and if we knew about it, then he would not be considered delayed because they adjust for prematurity on the scale. If only we knew.

After the speech therapist made her recommendations I got to pick how much support we would be accepting. I got to choose between twice a month or four times a month. Now, I would have preferred to go with only twice a month, because I suspect that will probably be enough for us, but when I asked what would happen if we went with twice a month and then wanted to upgrade if that wasn't working, I found out that it would be very difficult to do that. Even though the therapist was approving us for up to four times a month, we would have to redo all the evaluations and meetings to switch from two to four times a month. However, if we start with four times a month and feel it is overkill it only takes a phone call to switch to twice a month. I want to keep things flexible, so I chose to start with four times a month. Apparently the goal of the therapist is to teach me skills to work with Nicolas during the week, and so the frequency of meetings and the efficacy of the therapy all depend on how quickly I learn and how well I implement the strategies...and here I thought I was getting off easy when Nic qualified!

I am very thankful that all of these meetings are done, and that we will be able to get started after the holidays. It's odd though, I swear to you in the four days since the speech therapist came that Nicolas has already increased his skills (or perhaps I am noticing skills he already had?). Having her tell me what Nic needs to be doing has gotten me to think about trying to get him to perform tasks or imitate words that I didn't try before. Jeff has also pointed out to me that some of my answers to the therapist's questions were wrong. Not intentionally (of course), but because I can't remember all the little things that Nicolas does (especially if I don't know what I am supposed to be looking for in advance). Oh well, at least this scatter-brained mom will be receiving some "support" on behalf of her deprived second son.

In new baby news, tomorrow is the BIG ultrasound. We are really hoping to get the "all-clear" and be re-categorized as low-risk. Up until this point I have been having three to four appointments a month, and I would really prefer to only have the one with a regular OB. We think the world of our high-risk doctor, so it has nothing to do with not wanting to see him, it's just that we are done with going in so often. Thus far I have not been nervous about the scan. I know I will be tomorrow, but thankfully our hectic schedule has prevented me from dwelling on it. I have noticed that I am absolutely missing Leah and thinking about her more these days, and I don't know if it is the Christmas season or the timing of my pregnancy, or a combination of the two, but it's there. We appreciate all of your prayers, and promise to post a (hopefully excellent) update as soon as possible tomorrow.

Thinking About Jesus

Since Tommy's nap times lately have been sporadic, to say the least, which means we have been working on establishing "quiet times" instead. Some days these have gone great, and others days they have been difficult. We have had a few days where he takes to them very well, and my favorite thing that he has asks to do (instead of laying in his bed) is to study the bible study. It goes something like this:

Me: Tommy, can you please go lay quietly in your bed?
T: But mom, I need to stay up and read my bible and do my BSF. It's time for me to sit and think about Jesus.

Now, I realize this is a stall tactic, but it is an awfully cute one. So I let him get out a bible (he insists on using the big kind like Jeff and I use), I give him my BSF take home pages, and he sits and "reads" the bible, "answers questions," and "takes notes" on the BSF sheets. This all has to be done with a regular pen, not crayons, in order to be authentic.

So, in case you were wondering if your young kids notice that you spend time reading your bible...apparently they do.

Letting the Cat Out of the Bag

We finally told the boys about their new brother! We wanted to wait until we had a fairly good idea about the baby's health and planned on waiting until after the 20 week check, but the results of the 18 week were so good that we moved things up. Also, Tommy was definitely starting to notice that something was up. He didn't make the connection, but he was asking questions about my larger stomach and pants that won't button.

We wanted to tell them while they were doing something fun and special so that they would associate the new baby with excitement. Obviously this was more for Tommy than Nic; after how difficult it was for Tommy to accept Nicolas we wanted to start things out on the right foot. We took them to the zoo for the nightime Christmas lights, and it was a lot of fun. Because of the timing of the event and the lack of easily transportable food in our fridge, we decided to eat at the zoo (always a mistake), and we told the boys during dinner. Tommy's immediate reaction:

T: Mommy, STOP EATING.
Me: (putting down food) What's wrong?
T: Your food will get on the baby's face! (comment accompanied by a dramatic hand gesture to indicate dripping food).

We've had to clear up a few misconceptions about pregnancy, as you can see from the above, but overall Tommy is very excited about the news. So far...

Here are some pictures from the big day:

More Evaluations

Another day, another therapist appointment. Thankfully, this one both started and ended without any traumatic events. The speech therapist was supposed to come earlier this week to do Nic's evaluation, but she came down with stomach flu and had to cancel. I am very grateful for this, as Nic seems to catch everything he is exposed to and then passes it on to me, and I certainly don't feel like getting the flu right now. Today was our make-up appointment, and it went very well. She believes that he is less delayed than the developmental therapist implied (which I agree with) and that his receptive language is actually not too far behind age level. His expressive language is delayed - she ranks his expressive delay at 38%, so we will be receiving "extra help and support" aka almost free speech therapy. I am so excited that he qualified.

Perhaps that sounds crazy...when I first started thinking about going through this process again (since we did the round of evaluations for Tommy), I was thinking that I did not want the stress of cleaning up my apartment to have therapists over every week. It is so small, and the kids have so few places to play, that I feel like we have two carpets: the regular one and the extra coating of toys and books. Then I considered how much more stressed I would be if he was assigned a very large delay but missed qualifying for services (just like what happened with Tommy). This made me reconsider my position. I know that I simply don't have the same quality time with Nic that I had with Tommy. Although I make an effort to spend time with Nic one-on-one, and often we get some good play time in while Tommy plays by himself, it just isn't the same as when you have only one child and they get all your attention. On top of that, I'm more tired than I used to be (either because I'm pregnant, older, or a lovely combination of the two), and I know that that isn't going away anytime soon.

Thus I was practically holding my breath waiting to see what the therapist would say at the end of our appointment. Of course she started with the "good news" and when she said that Nic's receptive language delay was so small I was actually a little worried. Then she started talking about his expressive language delay, and I think she was trying to break the news of his delay to me gently, not realizing that this actually made me more nervous because I was afraid she would tell me he was 29% delayed like Tommy's speech evaluator did (30% is the threshold to qualify for services). Little did she know that I wasn't about to protest or say I didn't need help.

Her theory on his delays was fairly simple: time spent in orphanage + possible fluid in ears + adoption occurring at a key linguistic stage = delay. I was particularly interested in that last part, because in adoption you usually assume that getting a child home earlier is better (and really it is). We were discussing Tommy's language development, which was faster considering he joined our family at fourteen months, and she explained that a child who has a solid language system developed (even in another language) might adapt much better to a new language than a child who was switched languages in the middle of constructing a linguistic system. An interesting theory. My personal theory which is based on nothing measurable or scientific but on my mother's instinct is that regardless of where he was in his linguistic systems, being adopted was more traumatic for Nic than it was for Tommy. After seeing Nic become more and more who he is over the past few months I can say with full confidence that the child we met and brought home was just a shadow of himself. Tommy loves going new places. He loves new people. In general he adjusts to things well. That aspect of his personality was beneficial in his transition into our family and then to the United States. Nicolas is not a transition loving guy. When we adopted him he withdrew into himself and it took him longer to adjust to being in our family. I'm not saying that his first months with us were miserable, or that he never enjoyed himself, just that it took him quite a while to let his guard down and learn to express himself and I think that affected his communication with us.

The next step is a meeting to discuss the course of action for Nic's "support." I don't know how often he will receive "support" (which I sort of wish they would just call speech therapy because that seems more accurate to me), but I assume it will probably be the minimum since his delay is not that great and the therapist said she doesn't think it stems from a deeper problem (in case you are wondering, this one didn't bring up autism or FAS). She also said she thinks he will graduate from "support" before he ages out of the system, which occurs at age three.

On a somewhat side note, in my crazy googling after the last meeting I came across an article on FAS and adoption that featured some study where adopting parents rated the attractiveness of children, and found that FAS correlated with low scores for attractiveness. The conclusion was that people think children with FAS are not good looking, and since my ADORABLE son had just been suspected as having FAS I felt very indignant about this. That last therapist must not appreciate African beauty.

Too Crazy Not To Be True

This morning Nic had his first evaluation at nine. At about eight-forty I finished getting Nic dressed and realized that it might be a good idea for Tommy and I not to be in our PJs. So, I took the world's fastest shower and scrambled into some clothes while encouraging, or yelling at (whatever), Tommy to get dressed. At five 'til nine I ran into Tommy's room to help him with his underwear and pants, and Tommy decided to shut the door for some unknown reason. I heard Nic pawing at the door and playing with the handle, so I pulled Tommy's knickers on and went to open it...and the handle wouldn't turn.

Somehow Nic managed to lock Tommy and me into the boy's room. In case you are wondering, the handle is reversed on that room because Tommy knows how to lock doors and we didn't want Tommy to lock himself in the room with Nicolas. We obviously weren't thinking about the problems that might cause should one of the kids lock us in.

Events unfold: Nic starts crying. Tommy starts crying. I start to freak out. I think, maybe I can hop out the window and see if a neighbor is home so I can call Jeff or our landlord and get back in. I got so far as to majorly bend the screen before realizing that it is screwed in place. I then attempt to twist out the screws, working frantically as I try to remember whether or not I shut the kitchen gate. Were all the caps on the oven dials that Nic loves to turn? Was the bathroom door shut and the toilet lock in place? He sure does love that toilet. All this time, Nic is screaming and pounding the door, and Tommy is next to me bawling his eyes out.

At this point our one hope is that the therapist shows up and that she can call someone for us. Tommy and I start yelling out the window to see if we can attract her attention. The phone starts ringing, and I am desperately hoping that it isn't the therapist calling to cancel. We yell more, and louder. It sounds something like this, "Hello, therapist, HELP! HELP! Therapist, we're in the back yard, please come around," etc with Tommy parroting every slightly incoherent word as I yell it. A minute or two later I hear someone coming. The therapist had arrived, heard our pleas, and came to our rescue. First, we tried calling Jeff at work. We couldn't get him. I didn't have my landlord's number on me, so that was out. She asks if she should try the doors. I said it was a good idea, because every once in a blue moon Jeff doesn't lock the door on his way out. She goes around the house and - miraculously - the door is OPEN. She lets herself in and lets us out. I was/am so so thankful. God knew when Jeff left in a rush and left the door unlocked that we would need that door open!

So, we had Nic's assessment. It did not start off well. First, both Nic and Tommy were hysterical from the lock incident, and took some time to calm down. Then Nic decided to act like a child seriously affected with a mental disorder. I am not joking. Nic is always slow to warm up to strangers, and generally quiet when a new person is introduced, but today he decided to stare blankly with his head slightly down, DROOL, and chew his tongue. It was as if he had lost 50 IQ points in ten minutes. The therapist was obviously taken aback since I had stated in my intake interview that the only thing I was concerned about was speech, and then she arrives to find a non-responsive, drooling, tongue-chewer. Immediately she starts asking about how often he drools, chews his tongue, and so on, and of course I'm responding that this is really unusual behavior, probably related to teething because we are so hoping that he will get his molars in soon, and I know she is thinking that I am in complete denial about my child's obvious mental deficiencies. After all, I'm the mom who got locked in a room by her sixteen month old...clearly I must have a screw or two loose myself.

After we went through Nic's history (which probably convinced her even further that he has serious issues), and about a hundred other questions, she got out her toys. Nic decides that he likes her toys and wants to play. He proceeds to demonstrate above-average gross motor skills, and completely on-target fine motor skills. WHEW. He also demonstrated that he doesn't talk, which I already knew, and she ended up deciding that we will proceed with his scheduled speech evaluation but that no other evaluations will be necessary because there are no other possible areas of delay.

However, as she's giving me her run-down, she mentions that she's glad Nic perked up, because at first she was really concerned that there was something seriously wrong with him. She starts throwing around terms like "autism spectrum," "Down syndrome," and "FAS" and I'm thinking, oh my gosh, what is she saying? I was already completely discombobulated from the morning's events and trying to corral Tommy during the evaluations (which Tommy was longing to participate in). So, I stopped her and asked if she was concerned about autism. She explained that she brought it up just to tell me that she wasn't worried about it, she just hadn't gotten to that part of the explanation yet. Her main point was that a child who spent 8 months of his life in an orphanage is expected to have delays that express themselves in a certain way, and that Nic's speech is completely consistent with that. In fact, she mentioned that she was shocked at how well he was doing overall, even compared to adopted clients she has who have come home earlier than eight months. She did ask that we have his hearing evaluated, as she is concerned that it might be the root cause of his delay. He is congested all the time, so it is possible that his ears are filled with fluid (her theory). Also, I think he was born prematurely and that can lead to hearing damage too. So we will be setting up a hearing test as well. As for FAS, she brought it up because he has a sloping head and wide nose. I might have mentioned that he is African and that his head and nose shape aren't exactly unusual for someone from his country (as far as I can tell he has no common FAS indications). So, I asked her if she wanted me to take him to his pediatrician for an FAS evaluation, because I know there is a strong chance that both of my kids had fetal alcohol exposure, and she decided no. To which I must say, "why bring it up and freak me out?" You know I spent half an hour on the internet this afternoon scrutinizing pictures of children with FAS out of sheer paranoia.

Now I am convinced that both my children have any number of syndromes that logic tells me they don't have because I assume their (many) pediatricians might have noticed FAS, or Down syndrome, or autism, or any other severe issue with highly distinguishable facial characteristics or behavioral features. Have I ever mentioned that hypochondria runs in my family? I come by it very honestly. So, for now I am stepping away from the crazy (aka google), and trying to process my intense day. I am counting my blessings: at least we only have one more evaluation appointment to go!

First Snow

We had our first snow accumulation for the season on Thursday night. It wasn't much, but it was enough to get the boys excited about putting on boots to go crunching around outside. Since this is Nic's first introduction to snow, I wanted to be sure I captured the moment. In my zeal to get his very first reaction things may have gone a little wrong...see for yourself:

And Baby Makes Three...Boys

Thank you all for your prayers! I actually had a good morning, and I felt like I got a little extra measure of peace when I felt the little mister kicking up a tiny storm this morning. Today's ultrasound went really well. It was a bit rushed because we were late (totally our fault), so we didn't get many good pictures, but since we have the standard 20 week level two scan coming up in two weeks I'm fine with that. We'll get much better pictures then.

Anyhow, there is absolutely no doubt that this baby is a boy. Also, this doctor (who was different than our usual) was pretty unequivocal in stating that she has no reason to suspect that he has SRPS. Of course, she also had the benefit of a bigger and older baby. None of the standard "signs" of our type of SRPS are present. No shortened limbs, no shortened ribs, ten fingers and ten toes, his kidneys look great, his heart is well developed, and she got a great look at his face and his lip is not cleft. Her exact words were, "I have no suspicion of SRPS" at this time. She further said that with SRPS dwarfing is typically so dramatic that she really believes it would have shown up by now. All wonderful things to hear. We are very thankful for the good news. I know that I will be on cloud nine for the next ten to twelve days before I start to get nervous about the twenty week.

It is my assumption/feeling that after the twenty week I will be able to relax a little more and finally feel good about this pregnancy (although I've been feeling varying levels of relief/excitement since the 12 week), but our doctor is not so sure. Of course he has the benefit of vast experience of working with women who are pregnant after a loss, and it is his opinion that I should prepare myself for a very hard third trimester. Apparently it is not uncommon for people to re-grieve their lost baby during and after a healthy pregnancy, and that usually starts up right around the time that the baby passed away. Apparently I also need to be more careful than most people about postpartum depression for the same reason. That all makes sense to me, and I always strive to keep a close watch on my mental health because of my family history of issues and for the sake of my children. That said, I am trying not to think about the possibility of re-grieving right now. I hope that I will have some time to just be excited about the arrival of this little one without all the baggage.

Back to the Doctor

Tomorrow we go in for the 18 week ultrasound. It's another level one, but they will be able to measure limb growth and check the level of my amniotic fluid, and that is what is more important at this point. I don't feel like going. I'm tired of appointments. Every time we go in and get good news I feel great until about three days before the next appointment, then the dread sets in. So, please pray for peace.

The Good News and The Bad News

The good news is that Tommy did a great job at his dentist appointment. He had no cavities, despite having very deep crevices in his teeth that make him naturally cavity-prone (just like his Mum!). The dentist also said that he could tell Tommy didn't eat a junky diet, because if he did he would have had a mouth full of problems. Go us! Also in the good news category - Tommy's x-rays came back looking great and the tooth that was the most askew has almost settled back into it's old position. The bad news is that he has some tooth discoloration (although as of right now it is minor), which means his teeth are bruised. The dentist was quite pleased with how light the bruising is, as he was expecting that Tommy's teeth might be quite purple by now, but because the bruising is there we are still on gangrene watch. Also under bad news, dentists and x-rays are absurdly expensive and dental insurance is not as good as health insurance. I can't believe how much this little escapade has cost (or at least how much I think it will cost...verdict is still out on how much insurance will pony up). But since it's December it was time to drain the FSA anyway.

The good news for Nic is that his teeth are now clean. He had some gunky build up near his gums that I just could not get rid of (and we ALWAYS brush), so I was concerned that maybe it was a side effect from all his penicillin or something. However, it turns out that some kids have extra salts in their saliva, and this type of saliva causes plaque to calcify and look nasty...no matter how often you brush. It's a genetic quirk. I'm just glad it wasn't something we were doing wrong. The very bad news is that the dentist informed us we should start saving for Nic's orthodontia. Now, Nic has a HUGE mouth, so I was really hoping that we would skip braces with him, but apparently he has a rather pronounced under-bite that will require correction. Neither Jeff nor I noticed this, so I felt a little silly when the dentist was talking to me about it like I must have known. I decided not to inform him of my ignorance. On the bright side, the thing he will have to wear (it's like reverse head gear) only has to be on at night, and we won't need to start it up for five or six years. It is nice to have the heads-up on that one.

It was funny to learn that both of my kids have unusual inherited dental issues. Nic's got the crazy saliva and the under-bite, which according to the dentist is very rare for people of African descent. Tommy's got baby teeth that look like adult teeth. I know that even if we had contact with either of the boy's families that we would not have information about dental history, tooth shape, cavities, and so one because no one would have dental charts to offer us, but it does make me wonder about where these traits came from. Was it first mom or first dad who had the funky teeth?

The other good news is that the threat of Tommy's teeth turning purple motivated me to take the boys in for some brother pictures. Well, that and I had a great coupon.

How cute are these boys?

Oops, or That Time We Learned How Not To Use The Clippers

Advent

I love Advent. Now that we attend a church that does not observe the Church Calendar at all (which kills me because you miss out on so much), I really miss having Advent as a part of Christmas. Thus we are instituting our own family Advent observances. I really meant to get an Advent wreath, but this first Sunday crept up on me, so we started using just a plain candle, read an Advent devotion, and sang a few songs. Tommy's questions in response to the devotion were priceless (when Jesus comes again, is he coming to our house?) and although Nicolas made crazy noises the entire time because he didn't like being strapped into his high-chair, I'm sure someday he will be thankful for this new family tradition.

After we did our devotion and lit our candle we spent time baking cookies as a family. Tonight we made and decorated sugar cookies. The boys had a blast pouring on the sugar sprinkles. My plan is that we will make a different cookie every Sunday and share some with our next-door neighbors.

Black Friday Fun

Since Jeff had Friday off we decided to have a family fun day. The weather looked promising, so we opted to spend the day outdoors at the zoo. Apparently everyone else was either in a food coma or shopping, because the zoo was the emptiest I've ever seen it. We had a great time hanging out and visiting the boy's favorite spots.






In the evening we continued our annual tradition of attending our village's Christmas parade. We haven't missed a year since we moved here. This was the first year that Tommy was looking forward to petting the reindeer and seeing Santa Claus. He also really enjoyed the parade. Nicolas loved the parade too, although we are certain that he was a bit confused by it.