Monday, December 8, 2008

Natalie's Cast

Ages ago I promised to post a picture of Natalie's cast. Here, at last, is a picture. You can see that her Uncle Jeremy has signed it, but it's hard to read. The cast comes off on December 16th. They'll use a saw to cut it off. It will be interesting to see how she reacts to that.
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Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Natalie's cast

Natalie got a cast today. It was quite a hassle trying to get that arranged. Most doctors' offices seem to unable to return a phone call, probably because of the all the paperwork requirements of the insurance companies, which were the other half of this headache.

But enough complaining. The orthopedist said that the fracture was minor and did not involve the growth plate. She should heal and not have further problems.

The staff at the orthopedist office was very kind to Natalie and let her choose the color of the cast. She chose purple. I'll try to post a picture later.

Natalie has to wear the cast for 4 weeks, mainly as a precaution against re-injury. After that she'll get another x-ray and may have to wear a brace for two weeks as a further precaution.

A colleague of mine told me that his daughter had to get a cast when she was 4 years old, and she then got the chicken pox under the cast. These days, kids are vaccinated for chicken pox, so Natalie should only have to deal with a little itching from time to time.

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Natalie's Arm: A Very Minor Fracture

Last night, Natalie fell at the play area at the mall (which our pediatrician calls "the germ pit"). It was a pretty minor fall. She was jumping off an object about 18 inches high, but didn't quite stick the landing and tripped, landing with her left arm extended. For the most part, she's as tough as nails, so when she wanted to climb into Mommy's lap and stay here, holding her wrist, we knew something was wrong. So we took her to a new urgent care center near the mall and found out that she had a very minor fracture near her left wrist. The x-ray below -- which the urgent care center gave to us on CD-ROM -- shows the fracture, called a "buckle" fracture. It appears in the x-ray as a little bump of the right edge of the bone. As the doctor explained it, kids' bones are pretty soft, and this is more like a crease than a crack. It should heal without any problem. We'll follow up with an orthopedist just to be sure.

Natalie has a splint on her arm now and may get a cast from the orthopedist. She woke up once last night crying, but with a little tylenol, she went right back to sleep. It's going to be interesting getting her through the basic daily routine with one arm. I'm not sure what we'll do about school on Monday if she can't figure out how to go to the bathroom independently.

The urgent care center, incidentally, was awesome. Our local emergency room is famous for 4-hour waits on Saturday nights, but the urgent care center got us registered, x-rayed, examined, splinted, re-examined and discharged in 30 minutes. And we didn't feel rushed at all; they just didn't waste any time. We were in the waiting room for about 2 minutes and went from there straight to x-ray. From x-ray we went to the exam room. The doctor walked in two minutes later and had already read the x-rays. And it went on like that, with each person being cheerful, empathetic to Natalie, and happy to answer questions. And it was a smaller co-pay than the Emergency Room!
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Sunday, October 12, 2008

Rollerskating

Danielle took Natalie to a birthday party at a roller skating rink today.  I have to admit that I thought this was not a great idea.  I mean, what 4-year-old knows how to roller skate?

Apparently Natalie does.  This came rather as a surpise to Danielle and me.  She's never been roller skating before.  But Danielle rented her a pair of skates that strap over her shoes, and she took to it like a duck to water.  Not just skating around, mind you, but spinning in circles and skating on one foot with the other foot up in the air!

Incredible.

Lesson learned:  kids can do more than you might expect.  Let them try.

I'm going to take her ice skating soon.  And this time I'll remember to bring the camera.

Monday, September 22, 2008

Aiden's first baby sign

Aiden is not much of a talker. He babbles a bit, and likes to blow rasberries, but so far it has been just nonsense. Occassionally he'll stick with "ma ma ma ma," or "da da da da" for a while, but we've never gotten the impression that "ma ma" means mommy or "da da" means daddy. In the last two days, however, he has given us indisputable proof that he knows that baby sign for "light."

For whatever reason, Aiden finds lights fascinating (lights and wheels, actually; a future firefighter). He stares at lights and squeals with delight if I hold him close enough that he can touch the lampshade. Because of this intense interest, Danielle started showing him the baby sign for "light": hold you arm up high, open your hand and fingers wide, then close your first and open your hand two times quickly to simulate a light blinking on. Aiden watched closely for about two weeks and now he does it almost every time he see a light, whether it's a headlight, a lamp or the sun.

Tonight's demonstration, which prompted this post, happened when I was bringing Aiden in from the car and pointed out a plane that had just taken off. It was a jumbo jet with the landing lights on (headlights for planes), and lights were illuminating the clouds and mist in front of the plane. Aiden saw it an immediately made the sign for light. Then when we got inside he looked at the lamp, which was on, and made the sign again.

With this little bit of encouragement, we'll be trying to teach Aiden some more useful signs, like "hungry," "bottle" and "more." I suspect those three words will be some of his favorites.

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Gifts

Natalie was very excited yesterday morning when I told her that I didn't have to go to work, and Mommy didn't have to go to work, and she didn't have to go to school. I think she really understands the concept of a weekend now.

Perhaps because she was so happy to be spending time with her parents, Natalie decided to paint a picture for me last night. When she was finished, I praised it like it was the Mona Lisa, and then told Natalie that I was going to hang it in my office.

It was like I gave her a present. She lit up with a smile and ran back to dining room to paint a picture for Mommy to hang in her classroom.

With all that giving going around, Aiden decided to give me a little "gift" in the bathtub. So I got to spend the night washing the tub with a solution of bleach.

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Enthusiasm Wanes Fast

Last night I reminded Natalie that she has school in the morning. She burst into tears and shrieked, "I don't want to go to school! I don't like it!"

I asked her why not. After a few sobs she said, "Because I'm not with my Daddy!" More sobs.

What can do but hug her?

As she started to calm down a little, I pointed out that when she's at school, I'm at work, so we're really not apart any longer on account of school. That, of course, was no help. "But I'm not with my Mommy or my Mom-mom either!"

Natalie went to "camp" over the summer, which consisted of half days at a kid-size gym, so she's had some introduction to being away from family, but I guess the two full days that she spends at school are probably hard on her.

I bet she comes around soon, though.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Rugrat

It's been almost four months since we've posed anything about Aiden, so here's an update about him. Aiden is . . . large. At his six-month checkup, he was in the 90th percentile for weight and off the chart for length. The week before last he weighed in at 22 lbs 4 oz.

Aiden has a very different personality from his sister. He's inquisitive and will study an object, particularly wheels, for quite some time before putting them down. He's also an explorer, trying to find all the places he can get into, going after electrical outlets, plastic bags, pieces of paper -- basically, anything we're not supposed to leave lying around. In that way, he's helping us start to keep a tidier house. Of course, it's hard to keep the house tidy because of another of his qualities: he likes to be picked up and held. In fact, he can quite angry if you put him down, even for a second.

Aiden has something like 8 teeth now. He eats like a horse and will consume any sort of baby food that we put in front of him. He seems particularly fond of sweet potatoes.

Aiden has been crawling for a while now and is able to pull himself to a standing position with no difficulty at all. He's definitely much more mobile than his sister was at this age. We expect that he'll be a early walker.

One more thing about Aiden, he apparently doesn't know that babies are supposed to be afraid of loud noises:


Saturday, September 6, 2008

Speaking of Back to School


Danielle is going back to school, too. She had decided to go back to work full-time this fall, but then the county started having budget problems and was laying off teachers instead of hiring them. Then, a few weeks before summer was over, the county starting re-hiring some of the teachers it had laid off, and it looked like there might even be a few openings. So we waited, but got no calls for interviews.

Finally, a week before classes start, Danielle calls the director of human resources and says that she wants to know if there are any positions to interview for. Sure enough, there is one opening in the county, and Danielle is scheduled for an interview. It goes well, and there is only one other applicant, but Danielle decided to call human resources again. She says that she wants the job, but is willing to interview for other positions as well. Lo and behold, another position has just been created. It's in the school Danielle wants to work in (the one she liked best during her time as a substitute teacher), and it's for 3rd grade, which would be her first choice. She interviews and is hired on the spot.

So, at left and below, you'll see Mrs. Smith's classroom. Danielle has a hard job. While most teachers teach or one two subjects, and has students rotate through so that they only have to prepare one or two lessons, Danielle has her kids all day. So she teaches them everything, and has to prepare a full day of lessons. She's been working 10 or 11 hours days all week. Hopefully, once she finishes getting her classroom set up and gets more into the swing of things, she'll be able to work a more reasonable schedule.
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Friday, September 5, 2008

Off to School

It's official, Natalie is in school now. We enrolled her in a cooperative pre-school (which means that each parent has to be the teacher's assistant twice a month and be on a committee), and Wednesday was her first day. She'll go all day on Mondays and Wednesdays, and then half a day on Friday.

Natalie really liked her first day. The next morning when she woke up, she cried when I told her that she couldn't go to school becayse it was Thursday. And no wonder she likes it. It's mostly about playing with education toys, which are great, even though they're educational, because they're new to her. More importantly, preschool has the one thing she wants more than anything else in the world: other kids to play with.

I suppose her enthusiasm for school will fade over the years. Speaking of enthusiasm that will likely fade, Natalie loves her dentist! She was looking forward to her appointment all week so that she could get prizes and the hygenist would "tickle her teeth." When we left, she said, "I wish we could go to the dentist again." She had no cavities, otherwise her opinion of the dentist might have taken a quick downturn.
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Sunday, July 6, 2008

Benefits for Anna

Hey there folks! Just wanted to pass along that there are some things in the works as a benefit to Anna. She is doing extremely well, but still has a long road ahead of her. She has such determination and spirit, and is pushing hard everyday. Because she has to take a leave of absence from the Baltimore County Police Department, she will lose some health insurance benefits as well as her pay. So, there are some benefits going on to help alleviate her medical expenses and other such things. One is in Rochester, NY (where Ron is from) and the other is a golf benefit here in Arnold (Bay Hills on September 8th). Here's the info for the NY benefit if any of you happen to be traveling there!!! Of course we can always take donations. I am sure we will work on something more local as well, and I will keep you all informed of that. Also, if any of you are interested in the golf benefit, let us know. Dan, who does not golf, is planning to participate along with a good friend of ours! I believe they do this stuff in teams of 4 (I know less about golf than Dan does!), so let us know!!!

Also, I still have the rubber gray bracelets that say "Strength, Courage, and Double "O" They are $5 a piece and the proceeds go directly to Anna.

BENEFIT CONCERT FOR ANNA OTTO
Routine Surgery Turns Traumatic

Anna, went to University of MD Medical Center on Tuesday March 4th for same-day surgery on her jaw, to correct TMJ. Due to complications from Anna’s
surgery, she experienced a brain hemorrhage, which put her into a coma for several weeks. Four months later Anna is still in the hospital, but continues to improve. She is awake and alert, but still has a long way to go. Anna works for the Baltimore County Police Department, but will have to take a leave of absence because of her injury.
The reason for this benefit is to help Ron and Anna, due to the fact that Anna is losing
some of her health benefits and all of her pay.

Please join us at
“The Roost”
4853 W Henrietta Rd
Featuring Music by Local Band 50/50
Sunday, July 27 at 2pm
$10 Presale/ $15 at Door
Family $30
Admission Includes Happy Hour Prices for Food and Drinks
Door Prizes and Auctions
To purchase advance tickets, or if you would like to make a contribution to the
“Anna Otto Fund”,
Please contact Julie Cunico @ (585) 581-1001 or julie.cunico@frontiernet.net

FYI: Julie is Ron's sister. If you are interested in making a contribution outside of the benefit, you can contact me no problem. Julie is in charge of the NY benefit, and has been a tremendous support to both Anna and Ron throughout this ordeal!

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Recital

Thanks to Connie we have some smuggled video of the recital. It was a long day, and despite having strep throat, Natalie did very well.

Natalie:





Me:


Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Natalie's Dress Rehearsal

O.K. I am going to be putting up a regular informational blog here in a little while, but I wanted to put this up as a sneak peak for all of you that are going to the recital or for those who aren't able to go to get a chance to see her dance. For the dress rehearsal we had to have full make-up and costume.

There are only two little girls in Natalie's class, Natalie and Abigail. Abigail was on vacation for the past couple of weeks, so it had only been Natalie in class on Friday. She was starting to get lonely..."It's not as much fun without Abigail." That I can understand with how much of a social butterfly Natalie is. Anyhow, when we arrived for the rehearsal, Abigail was nowhere in sight! The teacher and all of us crossed our fingers, but Abigail still hadn't arrived when it was time for the girls to go on. So, they sent Natalie out by herself. She took cues from her teacher on the side but performed for the small audience all by herself. By the end of that performance, Abigail had arrived, but she was not happy. She cried, and screamed, and they talked her out on stage, but only Natalie did the dance. Abigail stayed in the background crying. So, they asked if we could stay for a little while, and they would try to get the girls on again to see if Abigail would give it a try. I had to race home to get myself ready, but my mom stayed with the kids, and said that Abigail and Natalie did get a chance to get back up on stage, and this time things went a bit smoother. I have no idea how the actual recital is going to turn out, but one thing I know for sure is that Natalie will have no problem performing!!! She keeps asking me who is going to be there, and then telling everyone Aunt Joyce is coming, and my cousin Chloe is coming!!! She is quite excited. She told me that she had " a little bit of stage fright, but not too much."

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8900242728576200265&hl=en

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

May 14th, 2008...Finally a word...













Hi All! Yes, it has been entirely too long since we last made a post. Things have been fast and furious around here lately, as most of you already know. We were finally getting somewhat used to being a family of four when life decided to throw some curve balls.

First of all, for those of you who don't know my best friend Anna has been in the hospital since March 4th. She went in for "minor" surgery on her jaw. There were some complications of the surgery that left her in a coma for awhile, and she is still recovering at this moment. Anna is making tremendous improvements, but it will be a long road.

That same day I was rushed to the ER only to discover that I have a bad gallbladder. Never fear, that bad boy is coming out tomorrow (May 15th). I am nervous about that, but am confident that things will go as smoothly as possible.

The next morning Dan was in another car accident, which resulted in the total loss of our second car the Elantra. Fortunately, he was not hurt in this incident. We are now the proud owners of two new cars, and thus two new car payments.

I also went in, unexpectedly, for surgery at the beginning of April. That went well, and I am ecstatic that is now behind me.

Now that all of that is out of the way, on to the stuff you all have been waiting for:

Aiden and Natalie are doing very well. Aiden is now 4 1/2 months, and Natalie is anxiously awaiting her 4th birthday. We registered Natalie for pre-school this year. She will be attending the Magothy Coop Preschool in Pasadena. The coop means that parents help out in the classroom, which makes it really nice and personal. As as teacher and a parent I love this idea. At his last appt (April 25th) Aiden was a whopping 17lbs 14oz (95th percentile) and 27 1/4 in (97th percentile...wonder where he gets that from). He started smiling at the end of February, and laughing soon after in the middle of March. His favorite things to laugh at, besides big sister Natalie (whom he adores and gets very upset if she ignores him) is having his feet touch his cheeks, playing peek-a-boo, and jumping up and down either in a jumperoo or on Mommy or Daddy. Around the second week in April I noticed he picked up the drooling habit and was "biting" me a bit. Well, lo and behold on April 18th his bottom two teeth popped through!!!! I still cannot believe it. Natalie was easily 7 months or so before her teeth started coming in. Aiden has been rolling over since late March/early April, and while he has not quite begun to crawl (yes, I realize it is still very early for this) he does dig his toes in, pop his bottom up in the air, and then slide across the floor on his face. It doesn't seem very comfortable, but he is like a little inchworm. I thought I would have several months left before I had to worry about him being mobile. I've said it before, "What am I going to do with a boy???!!!" We have not settled into a routine yet, but we are working on it. With everything that has been going on, it's been difficult, at best, to get anything really productive done.

Natalie is still enjoying ballet very much, and is looking forward to her recital in June (the 14th at Northeast High). She LOVES Aiden, particularly his head, and has been a great big sister. We have experienced a bit of trouble with adjusting to a baby in the house, but all in all I can't complain too much. We have to occasionally remind her to be gentle, but she just wants Aiden around all of the time. She loves to show him how to do things. Dan or I usually have to hold Aiden just so and say (yes we are fed our lines), "Watch Sissy brush her teeth. Aiden, do you see Natalie eating her vegetables?" Both Dan and I have found that our patience is much thinner than it is. Part of that is just the hustle and bustle of life in general, but we are both convinced that at the age of 3/4 children lose their minds. At first I was concerned. I thought it might just be Natalie. But, I see my friends' children and my niece and nephew exhibiting very similar behaviors, and their respective parents also at their wits end. So, it's just the age. Dan will say it is the "willful disregard" of what we tell Natalie, and the endless questions that do us in. Yes, we get the typical "Why" or "How" questions. Those aren't so bad. It's the, "Daddy, tell me what question I want to ask you; " or "Why do I love to collect caterpillars?" When we can't give her the right answers (and how could we since, well, we're not her), she becomes furious!!! Just recently she has been getting into some heavy conversation though. I think a lot of it has to do with the events that have taken place recently, and just natural curiosity. I mean in one night Dan went from explaining the creation of the Earth (big bang theory) through evolution. A few nights later we discussed God, Jesus, and heaven. Natalie wanted to know where heaven is. I thought Dan did a wonderful job explaining it to Natalie. He told her that we can't see heaven until we die and our soul goes there (we had a long discussion about what a soul is, how it gets to heaven, how it gets out of your body, etc.), and because of that people like to pretend it is up in the sky. So, we're thinking that it is definitely time for pre-school, and we're also talking about taking her to church sometime. We just need to find the right place. Probably a local unitarian church, but we'll see. It never ceases to amaze me how bright Natalie is. Yes, she's my child, and I am going to think that. That's cool, because those of you who are parents get to feel the same about your children. I just am in awe of this little person that is a part of Dan and I...even if I want to strangle her at times. I mean she is a typical toddler/preschooler in every sense of the word...good and bad. But, I am so proud of her thoughtfulness, imagination, and compassion. This morning, in fact, she thanked the Earth (something she has been talking about since Earth day) for "being the best planet." Oh yeah, and she gave her brother oxygen the other day by waving flowers in front of his face. This, the result of our conversation about how plants and trees are necessary because they put oxygen in the air that helps us breathe. She's our little tree hugger!!!

So far this year we have taken a few small trips with family. We went to Longwood Gardens early in the year with Dan's family. Even Aiden enjoyed this trip. We also were lucky enough to go to the Baltimore Zoo in April with our cousins from NC. That was a great time, and Natalie enjoyed playing with her cousins Alex, Chloe, Samantha, and Ginny! Well, that's about enough for now!! I am posting some pics, which I know is what you all really want anyhow. I promise we will get more up a.s.a.p. (hopefully Dan will have time to work on that while I am recouping this weekend), and we will be sure to post more blogs.

Hope you are all well!!!!

Saturday, January 26, 2008

More family resemblance




O.K. Danielle here for a brief moment. I was looking through some of our pictures, and came across some old ones. I have been taking most of the credit for the looks of our children. I have always stood by the fact, however, that Natalie is now looking more and more like Dan and that Aiden was born with, at the very least, his daddy's eyes. Well, here is a picture to take in. This is actually Dan...but I swear to you this is Aiden in disguise!!! By the way, baby boy is now 11lbs 10oz and 22.1in long. He's doing well, but is in reflux meds (thank goodness). They seem to be helping a bit, but it's still too early to tell. Natalie is still enjoying being a big sister, and I think we are finally getting somewhat used to being a family of four. I am feeling much more normal now...so bring on the visitors (if you so wish)!!!!

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Somebody call Guiness; I think we have a record here.

Aiden pooped on the ceiling.

This entire post will be about this event, so if that's not the sort of thing you'd like to read about, then you might want to browse through the older posts and see if there are any that you missed. Or you can look forward to my next post, which will be a nice one about Natalie's joy at being a big sister.

Ok, now that we've gotten rid of those people, we can continue. So, as I was writing, Aiden POOPED on the CEILING. Mind you, this was not as a result of a game of Spiderbaby (think Spiderpig from the Simpsons Movie). Aiden is too little to appreciate being Spiderbaby -- unlike SpiderNatalie, who laughs uncontrollably -- so we haven't tried it. Even if we had tried Spiderbaby, he would have been wearing at least a diaper, and, in keeping with the law of gravity, one would expect that a game of Spiderbaby would result in poop on me, rather than poop on the ceiling. But I'm starting to digress. The point is that Aiden was on this changing table, which sits 32" above the floor, when he managed to poop on our 8' ceiling:














This actually happened about two weeks ago, just a day or two after we brought Aiden home. I had his diaper off in order to change him, and shortly after peeing on me, he had a particularly explosive bowel movement. I hadn't noticed the mess on the ceiling or the wall at the time, because, frankly, it never occurred to me to check whether he had pooped on the ceiling. So it was the next day that I happened to notice a stain on the wall. Investigating the source of this stain caused me to notice another stain on the wall, and the stain on the ceiling. If one drew a line connecting these three dots, it led right back to the changing table.

I think this may be record-worthy because of the distances involved here. First, he got the ceiling. Based on the way I usually place Aiden on the changing table, I measure the distance between the stain on the ceiling and the launch-point at 6'8":

This picture was taken with the camera on the changing table at the approximate launch point. In order to avoid a distorted sense of scale, I set the focal length of the lens to 35mm, which, for a digital SLR camera, is approximately equivalent to the focal length of the human eye.

With the camera set up the same way, I measured the distance to a cluster of stains located between 7'3" and 7'8" away:

Thanks to my lovely assistant who helped hold up the tape measure, albeit with a lot of sighing and eye-rolling.

Finally, the one that I will submit for consideration as the world's record for distance covered by poo propelled unassisted from an infant less than 1 week old: a wall 9'8" away:

Because of the angle, it was too difficult to get a picture of this one with the measuring tape in place, but the stain is located behind the nightlight, which appears near the center of the frame, just to the right of the first round wooden post.

So that's all for now. As you might imagine, we have quite a bit of cleaning up to do, and not just because of this incident.

No. of times Aiden has peed on Daddy: 6
No. of times Aiden has peed on Mommy: 5
No. of times Aiden has peed on the new carpet: 8