Merry Christmas from Wisconsin!

I hope your Christmas was filled with peace, joy and a bit less excitement than ours. Our day started with a 5:30 alarm (because apparently AJ was afraid he wouldn't wake up Christmas morning). That woke him up, along with us because he was sleeping in our room due to his aunt, uncle and their  puppies in his room. We heard Teddy stirring, so we decided to bring him to our room for family snuggles until 6 a.m. when we'd go downstairs to check to see if Santa came. 

Teddy was so excited to come into our room so early that he somehow stepped in a basket (that isn't anywhere in the walking path) and cracked his chin on our dresser, knocking down several things with a clatter that accompanied his cries. We saw quickly that he was dripping blood, unfortunately from his chin. That's a tough area to get to stop bleeding, especially when he wouldn't let us apply pressure and barely would let us keep dabbing it after the first couple minutes. After just a few minutes he was done crying and wanted to bounce all around our sheets, rolling around with his face on the sheets. Let's just say we got to do a couple loads of blood-stained laundry. 

After a bit, it seemed to stop dripping blood, no thanks to liquid skin which only resulted in protests. A shower seemed to help stem the bleeding and at least get him clean. So we went downstairs to see what Santa brought while debating whether we needed to head to the hospital for stitches.

We had excited kids for opening presents but determined we really did need to take him in for medical treatment. Fortunately urgent care was open with a short wait posted online. (Urgent care is a much quicker process and typically way less traumatic for Teddy as he has really bad memories from the ER.) We had family at our house to hang out with AJ, so we took Teddy in for a Christmas visit to the hospital.

This was before the trauma of treatment started.

The doctor and nurse realized pretty quickly that it did indeed need stitches ... and that applying a bandage with numbing cream wasn't going to work. That sent Teddy into hysterics because he really does not like bandages on him, and I'm sure it felt funny to have it being numbed. So instead they rounded up probably all the doctors and nurses working at 7 a.m. Christmas morning to have a team of 4 people to assist. 

We did a blanket wrap, literally restraining his arms and legs with a blanket and then applying pressure. It took 5 of us holding him while the unlucky doctor put in 4 stitches into a hysterical Teddy. There are few things worse than having your child hysterical (or lifeless after seizures) and being unable to do anything to make it better. 

However, as soon as the stiches were done, Teddy bounced back quickly, smiling as we left the hospital and excited by the time we got home to ring the doorbell and see everyone inside. 

Once we got past that excitement, we had a splendid Christmas. The highlight was seeing my 99-year-old grandfather and making memories with him and the boys. The kids loved their presents, and we even managed a Christmas morning run for some of us. 

Unseasonably warm weather allowed Teddy to join us for our Christmas run. 

We're not too excited we get to start the New Year at urgent care because that's when Teddy's stitches need to come out, but that should be less traumatic for all of us.

Family Photos - Our Family Is Growing!

We did family photos last week. Last year we added Sigrid, and this year we added Bri. We joke that they are our adopted daughters, but the reality is they have become family. Heck, some days, they are our favorite children. ;-) We're so blessed to have these ladies in our lives, caring for our boys and making our lives easier and happier.

Weird how most of our children don't look like each other ...

This would be the best picture if AJ wasn't crying from Teddy head butting him. 

At least our daughters are photogenic. ;-)

Santa at the Zoo

Last weekend we headed to the local zoo with Dave's parents (while he was home recovering from a minor surgery). It was great to see the animals that were out and about, and I think it made me appreciate some animals that normally aren't that interesting to me. We saw huge snowy owls, ducks with funny-looking mohawks and my favorite little monkeys. Teddy really enjoyed those guys!

There happened to be a scavenger hunt searching for monkeys dressed as elves, so AJ had a blast searching for those. In fact, we were nearly done walking through the entire zoo when he said that after we found all the monkeys that we'd have to go back to look at the animals. 

AJ's highlight was getting to see penguins up close and personal. They are one of his favorite animals (along with groundhogs and then cats for domesticated animals). He thought it was pretty cool to see them up close and hear the braying sounds they make. 

So close to his beloved penguins!

Teddy was pretty excited to see Santa. He's gotten braver with Santa through the years. He's always been fascinated by him but on his own terms. He's always so excited to see him that it's hard to get a picture with him looking at the camera rather than Santa. But we got a really good picture with me and the boys and a pretty good picture with the grandparents as well.

I swear I was crouching to hold Teddy. I'm taller than him still.

In Wisconsin, you have to embrace winter and still find the fun things to do to get fresh air. This was a great way!

All smiles, who cares if we're not all looking at the camera?

Life's Been Busy

Sheesh, no wonder why I feel like Christmas is almost here. It's been a hot minute since I last posted here. Life has been busy. Here's a few highlights and ordinary moments in our life:

Both boys are fully vaccinated as of this week! As great as that is, it doesn't really change anything in how we'll act as a family. With extremely high COVID in our area (and, um, world), we still are keeping a very small circle. We're hoping to be able to celebrate Christmas with both our families separately, even though we stayed away at Thanksgiving to avoid unnecessary risk for a couple hours of eating together. (Our Thanksgiving was really nice, even though it was just the 4 of us and rather mellow. We'll take mellow.) Teddy still will continue his adapted education for the time being until the numbers change drastically. 

The boys had a nerf gun battle with their "sister" Bri this past week. I walked upstairs from work and chuckled to see Teddy running around with a gun and his safety glasses. (Safety glasses are mandatory following a nerf bullet to the eye incident.) He thought he was pretty cool.

He was so excited to join the fun!

He thought he was really cool this week when he managed to video call his grandma. None of us are quite sure how the two of them managed that, but Teddy called, she answered and Teddy thought it was the coolest thing ever. 

Notice the pride on his face!

The little things are not so little for us. I love hearing what new adventures Teddy finds with Bri, as long as he's safe. It's great to run upstairs to grab lunch to find them having a dance party, doing crafts or simply making memories being goofy.