The Revolving Door of Sickness

Ayden's first day of school was somewhere around the middle of August. Since then, some combination of the four of us have been sick. In case you need to be reminded, today is the last day of September, a month and a half after that first day of school. Right now, Allison, Ayden, and Brogan are all coughing. The boys' noses run on occasion. And Allison is making her second trip to the doctor this morning. (On top of everything else, she has an ear infection.) If I had a dollar for every time one of us has sneezed, I'd be able to afford the bigger house we so desperately need. Fun, huh?

Not exactly. All of us have been quite miserable at least one time over the last six weeks. I've been very fortunate in that I've only hit that stage once. The others have not been so lucky. While none of us have had anything major (we're basically running a swap meet for colds), it's been pretty much constant, especially for Allison and Brogan. Adding insult to injury, we can't give Brogan anything because he's too young and Allison's options are overly limited because she's still breastfeeding.

I know, I know. All of this is something most of you with kids in daycare/school have dealt with, but it's new for us. Ayden got two colds while we were still in solitary confinement. That's it. Thanks to his big brother, Brogan has had at least that many in the last month. Brogan has actually handled it all quite well. He's his usual happy self, just with some coughing and sneezing added in for variety. Ayden, however, doesn't handle those things as well, so we've had to do quite a bit of cleaning up after his "incidents." As you might guess, that's not very conducive to making progress with eating.

The irony of all of this is that after 2+ years of having to cancel plans because somebody else has been sick, we've been the ones having to tell our friends how sick we are so they can make the decision to (justifiably) stay away. We're not supposed to be in isolation anymore. We're supposed to be out in the world, doing stuff. (I have quite the way with words, don't I?) This is part of living in the real world, I guess. That doesn't mean we have to like it.

Being a Kid

A little while back, we went to the welcome gathering for Ayden's school. There was food for everyone, games for the kids, and, as the event was held at a park, a playground. It was nice to be able to get out somewhere and basically turn him loose. (Being able to do that really has more to do with Ayden's increasing ability than anything else, though it is nice to not be carrying around a package of Clorox wipes. We're starting to think there are several things he can, and does, do at school that we don't know about. We're thinking he's holding out on us.)

Even though we still have to follow him around to make sure he doesn't get a little too ambitious or off balance, he's way more self-sufficient than he used to be. In fact, when he and I went to our local park recently, he decided, without any suggestion from me, to go down the park's tallest slide. By himself. His trip down wasn't the smoothest - he ended up laying on his stomach by the time he got to the bottom - but it wasn't so bad as to keep him from doing it again.

It comes with some scrapes and quite a lot of bruises, and even an occasional mouthful of dirt if a slide's pace is faster than anticipated, but it sure is nice to see him being a kid.

This was the first time I had used this carrier with Brogan. It may not make you feel like the coolest guy at the party, but it's pretty amazing to be carrying around a 21 lb. kid for an hour and not even feel it.

SIx Months

As hard as it is to believe, Brogan is now six months old. (And Ayden will be 2.5 years old next month; I'm not sure which is more unbelievable.) It's kind of amazing to get to watch a child develop in the normal course, to see him figure out things on his own and without any prompting from us. He can sit up for a long time. He sounds like he's started trying to talk to us (Allison thinks he's now saying my name, but I'm not so sure). He's reaching for things. He's really becoming interactive. And he still puts everything he can get his hands on in his mouth.

Age: six months

Height: 27 inches    Percentile: 75%

Weight: 21 pounds, 7 ounces     Percentile: 95-97%

As Brogan continues to develop, I find it hard not to think about how this is what Ayden could have should have been. I know there is absolutely nothing positive that can come from such thoughts. It isn't fair to either Ayden or Brogan. But I can't help it. I look at Brogan sometimes and see the Ayden that never was. My prayer is that Ayden will soon advance to the point that there is absolutely no way for someone who meets him for the first time to know that he is different. He's really close to that in a lot of ways, but still quite far away in at least one (i.e., eating).

I'll stop with the serious talk now and just post a bunch of pictures of Brogan...

There's no picture of it yet, but I have my first tooth!

Hanging with Gran and Grandad

Earlier this month, Gran and Grandad (Ayden's versions: "Nan" and "Dad") came to visit. Ayden was sick at the time, so we didn't get out of the house very much. Even so, I think they all enjoyed their time together.

It's always nice for Ayden because they come bearing gifts in the form of new toys. This time around, they expanded his collection of Chuggington trains and track pieces. The kid will play with this stuff for hours. I don't know how many characters are on this show, but I know how many of them Ayden has (15). And he can name all of them.

Ayden's train layout continues to grow...

Ayden has also become a big fan of the iPad Gran and Grandad bought him. When they come to visit, not only does he get to play with that, he also gets to explore their various tablet-style devices.

For Brogan's part, he likes to change up his playtime activities fairly often, so having other folks around to entertain is a nice change of pace for him. Now that he can keep himself in the sitting position, he's also a bit easier to play with.

Finally, while Gran and Grandad were here, Ayden showed off the game he had just learned: hide and seek. He will turn his back to you, cover his eyes, count to ten (or sometimes twelve), then come looking for you. Often he will ask where you are ("Nan, are you?") while he is looking. As you'll see from the video, he also has a tendency to cheat. We're still working on that part.