Belated Updates

Whew, it's been a while since we updated this thing. I guess I'll do this in chronological order.

We spent Thanksgiving with my mom, stepfather, and my brothers and their families. It was great to see everyone. All of the kids had changed a lot since the last time I had seen them. We had Thanksgiving dinner the Sunday before the real Thanksgiving at my mom's house in Statesboro, GA. Then we stayed the rest of the week in some condos at Hilton Head Island, SC. It was beautiful. We were right by the beach. The trip wasn't exactly relaxing (Aaron was a little crazy; turns out he was getting sick and developing an ear infection at the same time...), but it was nice to be somewhere new and see my family.

One of the highlights of the trip was Bartender Joe. We went to a place called "The Earl of Sandwich Pub" for lunch one day. The waiter/bartender was a guy named Joe. He was bald, had a goatee, lots of tatoos, and lots of piercings. Despite his downright scary appearance, he was very friendly. Aaron started fussing a little bit while we were eating, so Joe came up and started talking to him and playing with him, and made him smile. He even held him for a few minutes (he really wanted to); he said that although he doesn't look like it, he loves babies and wants to "eat up their little cheeks" (or something like that). It was so funny. I only wish we had gotten a picture.

Aaron at the airport in Savannah, looking pretty tired.

The view from the balcony at Hilton Head. The ocean was just beyond the trees.

 

Alex chilling with our nephew Todd.

Grandma Elaine with cute babies Derek and Aaron; Derek is only a month younger than Aaron.

When we got home, we took Aaron to the doctor. He said he had a sore throat, but that there wasn't anything we could do except give him Tylenol. Two days later he was getting worse--coughing, throwing up, sounding really congested, not eating--so we took him again. Again, the doctor said we'd just have to let the cold take it's course, but now he also had a full blown ear infection. Personally, I suspect he had been developing the ear infection for a while; he's been acting extra fussy since about a month ago, and at his four month check up the doctor said he had some fluid in his ear but he didn't think it needed to be treated. Bah! Next time I'm just going to insist on antibiotics at the first sign of redness in his ears. 

Aaron, the day we took him to the doctor, in a crazy outfit.

Anyway, we were also told not to give Aaron any more Tylenol for a few days, since he had been on it for a week already. Poor little guy. On top of everything, I got sick too. This is really the worst cold I've had in a very long time. And the only thing worse than taking care of a sick baby is taking care of a sick baby with an ear infection who can't have Tylenol while you're sick. Alex has been the best though; he spent his whole day off the Monday after we got back, and the next Friday, AND all weekend taking care of Aaron so I could rest most of the day. I don't know how I got so lucky. I hope I feel better tomorrow, though, because it's back to the grind. But I'm optimistic; Aaron seems to be doing better and I'm entering the having-to-blow-your-nose-every-five-seconds stage of the cold, which usually means that the end is in sight.

We also got visits from my dad and Alex's mom last week. That was fun. Alex's mom was only here for a few minutes, though, but it was still nice to see her.

Aaron with Grandpa Sorensen

Playing with Grandpa.

In other Aaron news, he has recently discovered his feet and how delicious they are. I'm not exaggerating when I say we have been looking forward to him eating his feet for a year!

Mmmm, feet...

And finally, there's the business of NaNoWriMo. Yeah, about that. We did it the first two days, but that's when Aaron's mysterious (ear-achey) fussiness began. We could've done it if we had more waking hours, but we decided that 20 was enough...