I would like to say that my lack of updates to the website over the last couple weeks have been due to the fact that I’ve been really busy and things have been completely crazy but that just wouldn’t be true. The truth is that just about every night this week I’ve ended up going to bed about eight o’clock which really hasn’t left that much time to do much of anything. I’m not sure what the deal is but I’ve been really tired and the other night I was asleep before Alex fell asleep.

We started spring cleaning last week and in the process we ended up making things worse before before we could start to make them better. We emptied out one of our closets with the goal of sifting through all the stuff, throwing some it, keeping some, and generally trying to consolidate things into smaller containers. It’s amazing how six months ago there was no way that we could part with something but now it just ended up in the junk pile. Additionally we ended up side tracked from the main task and coming across things we haven’t seen for a long time and it turns into “Oh, remember this” and “Oh remember when”. Reading the comics this week, (I a big comics fan), For Better or Worse summed up what ended happening to us.

We are still working with Alex on trying to tone down the “poopy” usage. Somehow it seems that every conversion we have with him somehow finds its way back to poop. We were sitting at the dinner table the other night and Jen sat down and said,

“Man, I’m pooped”

“What does that mean?” Alex asked.

“When people say they’re pooped it means they are tired or they are worn out.” I told him. This got him thinking for a couple of seconds then he said,

“But you know when we say “poopy pants” it means that someone has pooped in their pants”.

Just in case you were in doubt on the exact meaning of “poopy pants” Alex is here to sort it out for you.

It was a busy weekend around here. On Saturday we had Alex’s big birthday party and on Sunday Jen and Amanda ran their Half Marathon.

We decided to have Alex’s party this weekend since Jen’s parents were going to be in town and Amanda was also going to be here for the Half Marathon. Since Alex is so into dinosaurs Jen found out that the Dallas Museum of Natural History does “Dino” parties so we thought what a perfect fit. We invited all the kids in his class and then a couple of other close friends and I pretty sure everyone had a good time. They started off with a small dino arts and crafts activity, then they got a tour of some of the exhibits at the museum including a T. Rex skeleton, (one of the highlights), and it all culminated with a “dino dig”.

Wade was our official birthday photographer and took some great pictures which I’m currently working on getting up on the web site. I have all the picture parts done and now I just need to add the write up and then it will be complete.

Then on Sunday morning Jen and Amanda ran in the Half Marathon race. The race started at eight in the morning and even at that hour it was pretty hot out. I would guess by the time they finished it would have been in the mid 70′s, close to 80, and humid on top of that. Since I wasn’t running I brought my bike down and after they had started the race I rode backwards up the course and met them just past mile eight. Kelly and Wade also drove down and we all stood together to cheer them on. After they past us I rode the course back to the finish to meet them there. I got some pretty good pictures and I’m working on getting those posted so look for them in next couple of days as well.

Read all about it.

The other day Alex was talking about dinosaurs. What am I saying, he’s always talking about dinosaurs and if it isn’t dinosaurs the conversation seems to end up with “poop.” He’s definitely a boy.

So back to the other day. We were walking upstairs when he says to me.

“Dad, we know what the dinosaurs ate because we can look at poop fossils.”

Nothing like combining two of two of your favorite things into one sentence and what seems to happen more and more I’m just left standing there not quite knowing what to say. The best I could come up with was “Yes, that’s right son, we can look at the poop fossils to figure out what the dinosaurs ate.”

Andrew has just up and decided he’s done with baby food. I guess it was a couple of days ago now he just started refusing anything that has a baby food consistency or looks anything like baby food. When we first started with the baby food we went with the green foods like beans or spinach. Once we was eating those we moved to the orange foods like squash and sweet potatoes, and at some point in there we introduced fruit. When we moved to the “threes” food we tried the new and exciting flavors like lasagna, spaghetti, macaroni and cheese, Thanks giving dinner, Sunday brunch smorgasbord, but he never ate any of these. In some cases I think he managed to try a whole spoonful before giving us a fine display of his highly refined gag reflex.

Since then we have been struggling to find anything to feed him. Typically in the morning we give him a piece of buttered toast, and then he likes to eat cheerios and quarter wheat squares. We have still been able to still sneak some baby food in by mixing it with lots of wheat germ to thicken it up but even then it’s difficult.

Tonight during dinner we decided to try and just give him a couple of green beans. We put them on the tray of his high chair and watched what he would do with them. He picked it up, gave it good look over, took a bite, and then promptly threw the rest of the bean on the floor. He hunted out the other three beans we had put on his try and picked those up one by one and threw them on the floor.

I tried to encourage him by showing him that I was enjoying my beans and eating them up by making a big production of “Andrew, look, I’m eating my beans.” Jen joined in and added “I’m eating my beans.” Alex chimed in right after that, “Andrew, I’m NOT eating my beans!” Ahhhh…

I just have to add this.

The other night I was watching the kids and struggling to get them organized for bath time. Alex was all wound up playing dinosaurs and was pretending to be a T. Rex and I was having no luck convincing him that it was time to head into the bathroom. Frustrated I left them alone in the hall playing while I started running the water for the bath and getting the towels out and by the time I got back Alex was rolling around the floor with Andrew in mock battle.

“What are you doing?!”

Without skipping a beat Alex replied like it was totally obvious and how could I have possibly not known,

“We’re fighting for dominance.”

“You’re not a Dinosaur!” …..

A man went to the zoo but all it has was a dog.

It was a Shitzu.

When I came home from work yesterday I dropped my stuff on the counter and Andrew was standing behind his little red push cart watching me. I turned around and looked at him and as plain as day he started pushing his cart over to me and said “Hi Daddy!” Now if Jen wasn’t there to hear it as well I would say that I was just hearing things but she heard it too.

He is just started to say things like “MaMaMa” and “DaDaDa” so I’m sure it was a fluke that he said something that sounded like “Hi Daddy” but it doesn’t make any difference to me, that’s what I heard.

Went back to the foot doctor today and since I’m not getting any better he wants to try some new type of therapy that I totally can’t remember the name of. To get it done I need to get hooked up to some kind of machine that they only have one of in the entire metroplex. If I decide that this is what I want to do they have to book an appointment and the machine will make a trip to his office where I’ll get hooked up to it for a one time treatment which will require four weeks to recover from. Apparently it stimulates the area by breaking down any scar tissue and then it allows the body to naturally heal itself. (Sounded awfully painful to me.) Of course none of this would be covered by insurance and I would have to pay for it out of my pocket which wasn’t exactly selling me on the procedure.

So I declined the super treatment for now and I’m going to take a wait and see attitude for another two weeks to see if it gets any better on its own. I’m kind of hoping with taking some more time off and giving it some rest it will start to heal on its own. Just so I wouldn’t leave empty handed this week he did give me a boot that I’m supposed to wear for the next two weeks whenever I’m walking. (Kind of like the ones pictured here.) Great..

I’m not going to worry, this will just give me time to focus on swimming instead, maybe I’ll try and do a little cycling and see how that feels, and I’ll cheer Jen on during the half marathon race.

As for me my half marathon is over. I went to the doctor again Friday and he added some home made orthotics to try out in my shoes and then he wanted me to run again this weekend. So I went out and ran again this weekend and I feel worse today then I did last week. So back to the doctor this week but at this point I’m really not sure what he’s going to do for me.

I’m slowly getting the web site updated. (Slowly being the operative word here.) I just got finished organizing all the Hurricane Katrina pictures. I have a couple pictures that Jen’s dad took when he got back into the city after a couple of weeks after the hurricane and then we took over 100 pictures of the neighbourhood and the lower 9th ward that I’ve put together for a six month review. So my plan is to get all the New Orleans trip pictures finished up by this weekend. (I’m pretty sure I said the same thing before last weekend too.)