Zachary - 2 year checkup

Today was Zachary's two year wellness checkup. It cracks us up that every time we go to the pediatrician's office, the FIRST think Zach does is head to the candy bowls. I think he downs a dum-dum sucker and some smarties before he even sees the doctor. Today - the red bowls looked to only have smarties in them. Zach was NOT happy. He actually started crying. So after they took all his measurements Dustin took Zach back out into the hallway to show him there wasn't any dum-dum suckers in the red candy bowls. Well - leave it to Zach....he stuck his hand in that bowl of candy and dug and dug and dug...and FOUND a root beer flavored dum-dum sucker at the very bottom. Good think root beer flavor is his favorite. He was all smiles for the rest of the pediatrician visit (except for the Hep A shot of course).

Here are his stats for two years old:

Height = 34 inches (25th percentile)

Weight = 27 pounds 12 ounces (50th percentile)

Head = 49cm (50th percentile)

We were a bit surprised they said he was only in the 25th percentile for height...Zach is taller than most 2 year olds we have seen. The doctor wasn't concerned....to take this measurement they lay him down on the table and mark the top of his head and the bottom of his feet on the paper covering the table and then measure the distance on the paper. The weight....I think Zach has enjoyed his holiday goodies ;) He was stuck at 24 pounds for the LONGEST time....and for the past three months has been around 26 pounds. Since we have been to the doctor a lot with Zach the past two months....it does look like he gained almost a full pound in the past month. As soon a summer rolls around and he is running and playing outside again I am sure the weight will stagnant again!

The doctor looked at his ears and they looked good! No more infections (good think too as we only have two days left of our 20 day treatment!). We also got a referral to have his speech looked at to see if we need to start doing any type of therapy - so hopefully that turns out good ;)

No more wellness visits for Zachary until he turns THREE!! Fingers crossed for no more ear infections too!

Our TWO year old

Today Zachary turned TWO years old!! We can't believe how fast the time has flown by. We decided to forgo the big party this year...just too much going on this year with the addition of Logan to our family. We wanted to make the whole day about Zachary and enjoy our time together.

The day started out with giant Costco muffins for breakfast. Zach made a pretty good dent in his muffin.

Next....hamming it up for the camera with a special "I am 2 years old" ribbon.

Lunch was at McDonalds - we ate and played in the playland with Grandpa Gray.

...and apparently Zach knows how to flirt with girls now ;)

This is the cake that Jen made for Zach - it is a giant cupcake cake. It is a chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting. Zach was drooling in the kitchen the whole time Jen was decorating it.

Got to love the party favors ;)

We sang and blew out the candles about ten times......Zach loves his birthday.

The cake was soooooo YUMMY!!! This won't be lasting too long in our house!!!

Happy family!! Logan was sleeping so he didn't make it into this picture ;)


Zach had so many presents from all the family - he is the king of cars and tractors now....here he is with Grandpa Gray with some of his new vehicles.



Zach is such a grown up boy....we call him our little man. His vocabulary is improving more and more every day. He is a happy kid and we love having him in our lives!

10 days of antibiotics

Today marked the 10th and final day Zachary was suppose to be on antibiotics for his double ear infection. We had the inclining that something was still not right. Zach is still putting his fingers in his ears and has been losing his balance a bit here and there. So after a cranky morning with Zach - Dustin graciously took Zach back to the doctor during his lunch break today.

Well - the worst ear from 10 days ago looks good, it is the second ear that wasn't "as bad" 10 days ago that still looked infected. Apparently 10 days of amoxicillin wasn't enough. So now we have 10 days of Omnicef. Fun oh fun. We have Zach's 2 year appointment with the pediatrician next week - so these ears better look brand NEW by then!

2 week check up

Today we had Logan's 2 week check up. Here are his stats:

Length = 21.0 inches (75th percentile)

Weight = 9 pounds, 13 ounces (75th percentile)

Head = 37.25 cm (50th percentile)

We were amazed that Logan gained a whole pound in two weeks. He weighted 9 pounds, 1 ounce at birth but only weighed 8 pounds 12 ounces when we left the hospital four days later. He definitely LOVES to eat!

The only issue we have right now is a bit of gas - we started the Mylicon and it appears to be helping (whew!).

Gingerbread house

We decided to do a gingerbread house this year - after Christmas. With everyone that was going to be in town after Logan was born we figured it would be a great activity for everyone to enjoy. We even got the gingerbread house kit 50% off as we bought it the day after Christmas. Of course - it was the day before Jen's parents were leaving town that we ended up actually decorating the gingerbread house.....I guess we can say this is our last piece of "Christmas" for 2009 (even though it is 2010!). Zach had a blast helping "decorate" the house...and of course eat all the candy pieces. I think we was on such a sugar high all he wanted to do was sleep later on!!

And the next day this is what Zach wanted to do with the house (can you blame the kid?)....
I think this will be a tradition we do every Christmas season!

Apple Pie

Jen's parents brought a ton of fruit with them from California - fresh from the farm itself! We decided one way to get through all the apples was to make an apple PIE! None of us had ever made an actual homemade apple pie - so we cracked open the Betty Crocker cook book.....and went to work....

These are the apples we still have left!
Ready to bake!
Oh so delicious!!

We were surprised how easy it really is to make a homemade apple pie...and how DELICIOUS it was...I think we will be doing this again REALLY SOON!

Garfield

I think we are all a bit jealous at the rate he can grow his hair!

Garfield has some serious chops!

All boy

Zach LOVES his tractors and cars. Of course he got TONS of them for Christmas this year ;) He has been having fun hauling ALL of them throughout the house the past week. His favorite place to play with them is at the top of our stairs. Of course mom and dad don't exactly like him hanging out at the stairs....but this doesn't stop Zach! So if you are headed to our house some time soon - be sure to look before you step down our stairs!

Double - AGAIN?!

Remember the events of our lives at Thanksgiving time? Zach with a febrile seizure and double ear infections? Well.....

A visit to the pediatrician today revealed Zach has yet ANOTHER double EAR INFECTION. No joke. He was rather cranky this past weekend and had a runny nose since Friday. He would stick his finger in his ear every once in a while, but never make it seem like they hurt. No fevers. How can you have a DOUBLE EAR INFECTION and it not be obvious? We are baffled.

This makes 6 trips to the pediatrician in the past year that confirmed ear infections. Somehow our pediatrician thinks this is "normal"......we may be getting a second opinion.

Logan - 1 week old

What? Logan is already one week old?! Dang. Our little cutie pie is keeping us smiling. He is a happy little guy and doesn't do much fussing - of course he lets you know when he is hungry. He has pretty long legs (which you can't tell from the picture below). Most of the size 0-3 month onesies we have that have pants end up being too short in the legs for Logan. Go figure.

Logan - 1 week old

And then there were FOUR!

Meet the newest addition to our family:

Logan Alden Gray

Born December 28th, 2009 at 7:07am

9 pounds 1 ounce and 20 inches long

Logan was another planned and scheduled C-section. Jen's original due date was January 6th, 2010 - so the 28th of December was 9 days early. The doctor could justify the pull in due to the size they estimated Logan to be (by ultrasound and belly measurements)....and after the delivery and hearing his stats - we are kind of glad that we went with the 28th of December.

Our day started by arriving at the hospital at 5:15am - our surgery time was for 6:30am. We were pleased to learn we had the same anaesthesiologist as we did with our delivery with Zach - a nice older gentleman by the name of Bob (turns out this is his last week of work before retiring!!). Everything about the prep prior to the surgery was the same as with Zach. The first incision started at 7:01am (so much for a 6:30am surgery time, eh?). Six minutes later Logan was born.

The doctors had a hard time getting Logan out of Jen's belly - he had some seriously broad shoulders and as we learned a bit later was NINE POUNDS. It also turns out the umbilical cord was wrapped around Logan's neck - so if Jen had decided to try VBAC, it would have ended up with an emergency C-section.

Dustin left the operating room with Logan - they take the new babies to the nursery to clean them up and check them out. The pediatrician and nurses kept saying Logan was "grunting" - meaning his lungs still had fluid in them and were trying to compress. So they ended up putting Logan on some type of breathing machine that had positive air pressure which was suppose to dry out his lungs and help prevent them from shrinking. They also took x-rays and had the respiratory specialist check things out to make sure there were no abnormalities with Logan's lungs.

So SIX hours after Logan's birth - he was brought into Jen's room and she was FINALLY able to hold the newest addition to our family!

Christmas 2009

Merry Christmas from the Grays!

 

Zach loves Dinosarus.. as if you can't guess based on his snazzy pajamas.. Roar!

He also loves dump trucks.. especially ones that he can ride around in.. He loved this truck.

Grandpa Gray got Beef Jerky.. Zach requested to be his taste tester

 

Grandma and Grandpa Twogood also shared Christmas with us this year

 

Jen got a Dust Buster!!! She has been asking for one for a while :-)

Zach got a new work bench! Now he can work on project with Daddy!

 

Grandpa Gray showing Zach the proper way to use a table saw :-)

Zach helping Daddy open his gifts

Zach's Christmas snack

Yes, that is a twinky that Zach just enjoyed..

 

We don't mess around here.. Especially on Christmas!  ;-)

If chocolate exists....he will find it.

When things start getting quiet in the house you know he is up to something....this morning it was this...

Santa's little helper

Jen has been busy the past couple of nights doing some work for Santa. Santa is going to make an appearance at her work Christmas party this Friday and Jen volunteered to make 40 of these:


The sewing machine had the dust blown off and went to work! Now it is time for bed....

Two weeks

In two more weeks our baby #2 will be here!