Laundry help

William's adventure

Many of you know about our little scare this week with William. Graham was sick with a cold last week, I had a sinus infection this weekend, and Bea started acting clingy and sniffly on Monday. Tuesday night William started sounding a little congested so we thought he had caught our colds. Wednesday morning he was supposed to have his four month appointment at 10:45. When we woke up it sounded like William was purring because his breathing was so noisy. I called the clinic to see if I could get him in earlier and called our sitter to come earlier. She came at 9:30 and I drove William in for a 10:00 appointment. Our doctor was behind schedule so we got into the room at 10:30. The nurse took his temperature (low-grade fever, like the night before) and listened to him. She said she thought he sounded a little funny but his oxygen was fine on the machine. Our doctor walked in the room, looked at William, stepped out and said, "Call 911" and immediately gave William an oxygen treatment. 10 minutes later we were in the ambulance, lights flashing, on the way to the hospital. What our doctor thought was rsv turned out to be croup with stridor. He received more oxygen on the way to the hospital and we sat in the ER with additional oxygen treatments, steriods, and an iv for most of the afternoon. I was able to talk to David before we boarded the ambulance, even though he was in the middle of giving a final exam. Thankfully, he met me at the hospital. William and I spent two nights in the hospital and came home yesterday. He still is goopy but his breathing sounds much, much better. We are so thankful for the good care we received from our doctors and the hospital! We are also extremely thankful for Paul and Peggy, who immediately volunteered to come and help, even though it would have meant that Peggy could not have taken time off at Christmas. We are so thankful for my parents who drove down that afternoon to spend a few days taking care of our other kids so that David could still work and I could stay with William. Thank you all for your prayers for William and us. Even driving over to the hospital I felt relatively calm and I know it is because we were being lifted up in prayer. We truly felt like we had angels watching us throughout this crazy experience! Praise be to Jesus Christ, our God of hope. And hope does not disappoint.

Here is Bop, trying to eat his breakfast with three beggers. Bop got every fourth bite of egg.

Driving a race car in the living room

The little man who made this mama SO nervous this week, and his cock-eyed smile that reminds us of his Uncle Adam!

New sweater

William received a beautiful sweater from our friend Rachel earlier this week. Thanks, Rachel! We love how soft it is!

Jingle Bells

This is why we have such joy in our hearts each night, and why we flop in bed, exhausted after each day.

GBIW PoD 12.9.2010

Our snowman

We watched The Snowman this morning. It's a wonderful adaptation of Raymond Briggs' book by the same name. Then, while the three littles slept, G and I went out and made our own.

Snow!

Gingerbread House Day!

Graham and I assembled the houses Wednesday night before Thursday's party. They went together really easily this year!

Thursday morning the kids and I made the background for our Gingerbread Baby mural based on Jan Brett's Gingerbread Baby and Gingerbread Friends.

Of course, the second I walk five steps to the sink and turn my back, Bea started painting herself. That girl is going to end up with more tattoos than her Uncle Josh.

A little brotherly laugh

Gingerbread house party time!

Not sure about Inga's look there...

My friend Jina and her three kids did one house

Graham did most of our house. Bea and Inga helped a bit, but they mostly read books with our sitter and ran around in circles with their good friend Ella.

Ellen and her four kids also came. Kate and Jack worked so hard on their house! They were the picture of cooperative teamwork. Their house won the prize for the most candy-laden.

So sweet! Jina had three kids in three years. Look how calm they are. That's how my kids will look, someday.

Bea liked putting on the gumdrops

O Christmas Tree

Yesterday we went into Christmas mode full force. The kids started the day with their advent calendars. They think it's pretty great to eat a chocolate before breakfast!

David came home early so that we could drink eggnog (he and the kids - I hate eggnog) and decorate the tree.

William taking in the action

Lights!

Christmas ornaments!

I ordered the kids' ornaments from Mast General Store this year. It's a fantastic group of stores in the mountains of North Carolina and I thought it would be a fitting tribute to the place we left and loved. Plus, they had really cute bike ornaments and that's the milestone I wanted to commemorate for Graham's ornament. The girls got Raggedy Ann ornaments and William got a teddy bear.

The star!
Or not.

Our ceilings are higher in this house than in our old house. Higher ceilings = a taller Christmas tree = the star putter-upper needs to be held higher = Graham freaked out.
"It's too high, Daddy! I'm scared!"

Ok, we'll try Inga.
"Inga, put the star on top of the tree, honey."
"Dat Tismiss tee!! Yay, Inga!"
"Inga, put it on top! Do you see.....never mind. Where's Bea?"

"Ok, Bea. Do you see this little part on the bottom of the star?"

"Do you see how you can put it on top of the pointy part of the tree?"

"There you go, Bea! A little closer....try again....."

"It too scawy, Daddy!"
(Blurry picture, but David's face really says it all.)

So, Daddy put the star on the tree this year. William was pretty upset about the whole thing. I think he might be in charge of the star next year.