Family Vacation

We went to California this Thanksgiving to visit my wife's grandparents. We knew that it was going to be a tough time on the boys. We decided to break the trip into two days. We drove to St. George the first day and then on to the Los Angeles the next day. The first day Aaron slept almost the whole five hours to the hotel. We were a little concerned because he rarely makes it two hours before he decides it's time to eat again. When I took him out of his car seat I had a thought that I hadn't thought before. That baby is getting heavy! I think he gained a whole pound while we drove to St. George. Now every time that I turn around he is bigger. If he keeps growing this fast he's going to be four feet tall on his first birthday. Noah and Ethan were very well behaved on the trip. They both tolerated hours in the car and hours at restaurants. The problem was bedtime. Noah falls asleep to an episode of Scooby Doo every night. Ethan can only sleep when it's dark and he has no external simulations. As you can probably guess we had a couple of long days. I think the only reason that either of them slept at all was when they passed out do to exhaustion. Vacation is fun, but I think every vacation should end with a whole day at home with nothing to do. Holly is still trying to catch up on the sleep she has lost over the weekend. Hopefully we will have a nice relaxing weekend at home.

Words, words, words

Every time I turn around the boys are saying something new.

Ethan was talking with my mother and asked her about her glasses. My mother told him that they were glasses. He told her that he didn't have glasses. He has eyes.

Ethan asked to watch a Tom and Jerry cartoon. I asked him who the cat a mouse were on the TV. He told me that the mouse was named Jerry and that the cat was named Toman. My wife and I were confused until we listened to how we were saying Tom and Jerry. Because we were speaking quickly "Tom and" was being shortened to "Tom an". Which is why Ethan thought that the cat was named Toman.

Noah seems to use very large words for a five year old. He is always telling me about his science experiments. We watched "Mythbusters" for the first time with him recently and he has been recreating ideas that he saw there with blocks for the last few days.

I'm sure that Aaron would be adding his own unique version of what he sees going on in our home, but he still doesn't talk. What you going to do? He's still only a couple months old.

It's amazing to watch children grow. Their minds are so open that anything that gets in there will stick. The most nondescript word or phrase may only enter into a child's ear once, but they might never forget it. Sometimes I wish that I could remember things like my children, but considering how many times i ask my kids to do something and they do forget, most of the time I'm glad that I can do a little better than them. Of course, my wife would probably disagree with me. She is pretty sure that the kids do a better job of remembering things than I do.

A long time coming

Things have been a little crazy over the past few weeks. Aaron is doing well. He's not gaining weight like we'd like him to. The doctor put Holly on a no dairy diet. I never knew that so many things had dairy in them. On the bright side, Aaron is eating for longer periods of time. That means that he's also able to go longer between feedings. That has helped at night. We are finally all getting at least a couple hours of uninterrupted sleep. Noah and Ethan had a good time with Halloween. Noah was Boba Fett. Ethan was a werewolf. Aaron was a chili pepper. Both of the older boys enjoyed trick-or-treating, but they were more excited about the party that we go to every year with friends. I find myself looking forward to Halloween for the chili at the party than for the candy I will be sneaking out of my kids candy buckets. Noah almost filled his plastic pumpkin this year. Ethan was done after 5 houses. The older they get the more candy they want. I can't remember when I started becoming obsessed with Halloween candy collection, but I can see it building with Noah. Next year he'll probably want us to spend the whole night gathering candy. All in all, it was a good night.

Aaron is home now.

After a little more than a week at the NICU Aaron came home with us. It feels good to have the whole family at home. Ethan and Noah love their new brother. It is a little more stressful now. The first night that Aaron was home was a night of no sleep. Aaron didn't sleep much because his days and nights are a little backwards. In addition, Aaron has to be on oxygen for the next little while and my wife is constantly worrying that the tube has fallen out of his nose. She has spent the last two nights staring at him all night. Ethan and I have also picked up a cold from somewhere and we are very concerned that the baby is going to catch it. Between home, school and work I'm not sure how I'm going to kick this cold. Hopefully with the weekend coming up I can get a lot of good rest. I'm still happy that Aaron has come home. I wouldn't trade our current struggles with the last few weeks in the hospital.

Aaron Watch

Good news for the Hepworth Family. Aaron has recovered from his early battle at the hospital and is getting ready to come home. We found out that he had Pneumonia. He will probably have to come home with a oxygen machine, but we are looking forward to having the whole family be at home. Holly has been receiving some education in infant CPR and all of the equipment that Aaron is going to need over the coming weeks. She has been at the hospital almost constantly which has left me at home with Noah and Ethan. The house is a mess, but all of us are in good health. Holly's mother has also been extremely helpful while I have been at school. Holly and I are so thankful for everyone that has been so helpful to us while we have been working through this latest trial in our life. Whether you brought us dinner or watched the boys all day, we couldn't have done this without you. Thank you.

Ethan's Birthday Party

With the Baby comming we didn't have very much time to plan anything big. We'll have a party with friends later. We wanted to make sure that he had a party though. Ethan was very excited. He got some books, the Diego Rescue pack and a picture drawn by his brother. Ethan's favorite part was blowing out his candle. We did it twice because he had so much fun doing it. The first time Noah helped, but the second time was all Ethan. It was a little sad because we would have liked to have Aaron home with us, but there will be other birthdays and we know that he will be coming home soon.

Pictures