Pages

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Girls' Night in Fort Worth

A few weeks ago, I joined some of my favorite girls - Lauren, Molly, Carrie, Jennie, and Kathleen - for a fun night out in Fort Worth. We started with a wine tasting at Times Ten Cellars.



Carrie was a complete trooper and busted out the pump for a mid-wine-tasting session. #pumpanddump


After enjoying all the fabulous wines, we got a tour of the facilities.

(Molly had to leave before the tour, so I didn't manage to capture her in any pictures. Sorry, Molls!)


Can you tell that we were a wee bit tipsy by this point?!




Times Ten is in the "West 7th" section of Fort Worth, which is totally different than when I was at TCU. It is such a neat area, and you can walk to all kinds of restaurants and bars. 

So, after our wine tasting, we enjoyed a casual dinner on the patio at Social House. Then we strolled down to Eddie V's for dessert...and more wine. One of my guy friends from high school is the Executive Chef, and we let him crash the girls' night for a bit.



I had such a wonderful night with these lovely ladies.



Shout out to Kathleen for letting us crash at her house after all that fun, and thanks to Josh for holding down the fort at home!



Monday, May 18, 2015

Rylan's First Report Card

Rylan technically got his first report card in August, but he had only been in school for two weeks, so it didn't say much. So I'm counting this one that he received last month.

His teacher had nothing but wonderful things to say about Ry, and we were definitely proud parents. I love hearing their perspective on our little guy.


During the parent-teacher conference, his teacher also mentioned that Rylan loves to play peek-a-boo with the baby girl whose crib is next to his. So, he gets a check plus in flirting.


Let's hope his grades are this good all the way through grad school :).


Sunday, May 17, 2015

School Pictures 2015

I love seeing how school pictures turn out, and this year's were pretty fabulous as usual. Definitely keepers. (Although, I really wish they would stop fixing Ava's hair before the pictures…I had nothing to do with this lovely half-up side-pony.)

Ava is a school picture pro at this point.


Rylan's first school picture :).


They both look so old!


Thursday, May 14, 2015

Stitches and Surgery

The Wednesday after Easter weekend, I got a call from Ava's school that she had fallen on the playground and had a pretty deep cut that likely needed stitches. I hurried to pick her up, and we headed straight to the ER.

Luckily, we have friends in high places (thank you, Jesse!) and were seen almost immediately despite the five-hour wait.

I finally got a full look at the cut when the nurse removed the bandage they had applied at school. It was still bleeding like crazy. Bless her heart!


Despite the fact that we avoided the initial wait time, we were still at the hospital forever! We had to wait while the numbing medicine took effect, and then they gave Ava some medicine to make her loopy. The nurse described it as the equivalent of her drinking a couple margaritas, and that couldn't have been more accurate. (Upon getting her popsicle, she said "orange…tastes like orange"…ha!)

Five hours, four stitches, and one popsicle later, our baby girl was ready to go home. 


However, as we were getting in the car the loopy medicine started to wear off, and things went downhill fast. Ava screamed nearly the entire ride home, and insisted that her house was "that way...not this way!!" When we pulled up to our house, she continued to scream that "this is not my house," and I had to explain to the sweet couple out walking their dog that it was in fact her house and that I was not attempting to kidnap this child. It's funny now. 

We finally got her in the house, but the next hour was a complete mess. Due to the medicine, we weren't supposed to let her stand/walk, but she refused to get in her bed, sit on the couch, or be held. She didn't even want us to be in the same room. And she was crying like a crazy person. Needless to say, it was not a pleasant experience.

The medicine finally wore off, and just like that, Ava was back to normal and requesting the ice cream I had promised her several hours earlier.


The scar doesn't look great at this point, but we are being diligent about putting on Vitamin E and silicon strips. We will also be keeping it covered from the sun for quite some time. So, this is going to be "the year of the bandaid" when it comes to pictures of Ava.

A few weeks after Ava's trip to the ER, Rylan visited the hospital as well. 

One of his testicles was undescended when he was born, which is evidently pretty common for boys born early. The general practice is to wait 6-9 months to see if it drops by itself, and if not, it has to be fixed surgically. Our doctor recommended having the procedure done before the one-year mark in order to avoid any future issues with fertility or a higher risk of testicular cancer. 

The procedure itself is very routine, but Rylan did have to be put under general anesthesia for the surgery. As a result, I was a nervous wreck.

Here is the little patient in his tiny (but still too big for him) gown before they took him back for surgery. 


Despite the fact that he couldn't eat or drink anything that morning, Rylan was as happy as can be (the dream-feed I gave him in the middle of the night helped). All the nurses loved him :).

The surgery only took about 30 minutes and was a complete success. I finally got him back in my arms, and we snuggled until the anesthesia completely wore off.


(His hand was bandaged to cover where the IV had been.)

After a couple days, Rylan was back to normal and back to school...with strict instructions to avoid PE class for a few weeks ;).

I am so glad the surgery is done, and I really hope we avoid more trips to the hospital for as long as possible. April was a tough month for this mama's heart.

Sunday, May 10, 2015

Rylan - 10 Months

I know everyone says this about their kids, but Rylan is seriously the best baby. He is always so happy, will eat anything you put in front of him, and has become quite a good sleeper (rarely waking up at night, two naps a day, and mastered the 2-3-4 sleep schedule). It doesn't get much better than that. 

 Rylan learned how to pull up and cruise around last month, and he absolutely loves this new vantage point. I don't know if it is this new-found mobility, but Rylan seems so much older to me now. He is slowly leaving babyhood behind and will be a full-blown toddler before we know it (tear!). 

At his parent-teacher conference a few weeks ago, Rylan's teacher mentioned that he has an exceptional attention span for his age, which I have noticed as well. For example, we went to a birthday party at the Perot Museum that featured a 30-minute Sesame Street planetarium show. Most of the younger kids didn't last five minutes, but Rylan absolutely loved it! He laughed at Elmo and was enthralled by the stars. He sat calmly on my lap the entire time. 

He is definitely a studier of all that goes on around him. But his all-time favorite thing to study is his sister. Rylan loves Ava so much, and she gets the best giggles. I'd be jealous if he wasn't a complete and total mama's boy :).





Stats:

No official stats this month.

Milestones/Firsts:
  • First Easter.
  • Waving. It has become more of a real wave recently, but it started as a fist of solidarity in the air. Hilarious.
  • Eight teeth (four on top, four on bottom).
  • Pulling up and cruising. At first, he had a hard time getting back down, but now he dive-bombs instead of just sitting. I'm in trouble once he is a toddler.

Likes:
  • Playing peek-a-boo.
  • Taking baths.
  • Doing anything outside. 
  • His mama :).
  • Watching TV. I let him watch five minutes before we leave for school/work (so I can frantically put on my clothes/grab all our stuff), and five minutes when we get home (so I can frantically get dinner on the table for him and Ava). It is the only thing that will keep him calm during those times...call CPS. Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is his favorite...especially the "Hot Dog Dance" at the end.
  • Seeing mama and dada kiss. He thinks it is hilarious.
  • Food! I don't know that he even has favorites. The kid will eat anything (I hope that never changes), and is a bottomless pit.



  • Reading books. As I mentioned earlier, he has a great attention span. His teachers commented that when they read books, he really studies the pictures/pages rather than just trying to touch the textured parts.
  • Sleeping on his tummy with his cute little booty in the air.

Dislikes:
  • Going down for his afternoon nap. He fights it so hard!
  • Having his nose wiped.
  • When mama leaves the room. (But he usually calms down very quickly.)
Finally, some of my other favorite pictures from last month.


Ava took this one...


One can never have too many NuhNuhs.


Those baby blues. 



Sunday, May 3, 2015

Easter 2015

While Josh and I were celebrating PB and Aarthi's wedding, my Mom and Charlotte took the kids to the Easter party at the Austin Country Club, where they enjoyed face painting, egg hunting, cupcakes, and a visit with the (creepy) Easter Bunny. 

They made sure to send me lots of pictures...







It is safe to say that they had a blast!

Back and my Mom and Jimmy's house, Ava decorated cookies and dyed eggs (all in her fabulous bunny face paint).



She also played her favorite new game...hide Nello :).


On Sunday, Josh's parents drove up from San Antonio to join us for the egg hunt and brunch.

Ava was ready to see what the Easter Bunny had brought.






The Easter Bunny got a little ambitious with the distance of the eggs (particularly in light of the drizzly weather), so Bru and Josh had to do some quick re-positioning :).



Ava got quite the haul. 


And the big ones were filled with undies. Ha!


Rylan enjoyed watching while swinging with Bunny and Grammie.





Both kids loved the baskets from us.







After brunch at my Mom's, we headed over to Grampsie and Nana's house to hang out and enjoy an early dinner before hitting the road back to Dallas.





It was such a wonderful weekend!