House Full of Boys!

Man do I love this little boy! He is full of squeals, smiles, slobbers, hugs, crumbs and dirt. He is at such a fun age. Liam says a lot through the faces he makes because he is quite stubborn and shy and still not wanting to talk much. He says a hand full of words, shakes his head yes and no and is starting to make different sounds. He is making progress so I am not too worried anymore. And if you haven't heard or noticed....no more pacifier....Yay! Liam is growing up so fast but is still my most snugly baby. He loves to rock in the chair before nap and bed and when he gets up in the morning he often times runs to my room to crawl in bed with me for more snuggles. I just love it! Up next, to turn his crib into a toddler bed....then all signs of 'babyness' will be gone, ah so sad! Liam learned how to climb anything recently, kind of scary! This was a search for his paci back in March. The boy would do anything for that darn pacifier, but surprisingly it was prett...

Recently I was contacted by the Bone Marrow Registry stating that I was a match for a patient. This caught me off guard as I signed up with the registry in 1998, while living in Arizona and in college. I think I went to give blood one day and they asked if I wanted to be on the list, I said yes, they took a swab of my mouth and that was it, very simple. After the first call to see if I was willing to move forward, which I agreed to, they set up a call for a health history review. That is now completed and tomorrow I go to get my blood drawn to run more tests to see how good of a match I am for the patient. The only information that I will ever know about the patient until a year after transplant is that he is a 63 yr old male with myelodysplastic syndrome. If I am a good match the donation could take place in the next 2 months. I am of course nervous of the process and have tried to research it the best that I can. There are 2 donation methods - harvesting bone marrow from my hi...

Yes, I know it's June and I'm posting about Easter - ridiculously behind, but I'm going to do it anyway. I was lucky enough to be on-call on Easter and spend the time with family. I love the food and watching the kids hunt for eggs. I remember even when I was in college and came home for Easter my parents would still hide eggs for us...some with candy inside and some with $ inside. That will probably be a tradition I uphold in the future. I also like Easter because of the message it sends and the reminder it gives us all. Aidan does not like getting his picture taken. I love the look on Liam's face When Aidan turned 8 he started his journey in scouts. We did a cake contest for the Blue & Gold banquet. His cake won. I thought he an Jared did a fantastic job. I didn't help one bit in the making of the cake. It was all the boys.

Eli finished his first year of preschool in May. They have this big program for the 4yr old kids and the 3yr old class gets to participate as well. Eli loves school. He asks me everyday if he gets to go to school tomorrow. He only goes 2 times a week. I hope his love for school doesn't wear off like it has for Aidan. I think it's because Aidan is bored. I wish his teacher could see that and challenge him more. Maybe in 3rd grade it will be different. Did I just say 3rd grade - time sure does fly and I'm certainly not getting any younger. Anyway, back to Eli. He did a great job in his program. He yawned a lot, poor kid we were at Dollywood the day before and didn't get home until late. But he did flash a few good smiles... Eli with Miss Linda - he loves her and we do too! Eli being silly at a store on Main Street. Also while my parents were here we went to Discovery Place in Charlotte. It was so much fun. We also saw the IMAX while there called "Born...

A wonderful video about EB. These children constantly amaze me! Video done by: http://thebutterflyfund.org

Pictures from our trip to Dollywood with my parents. It was a great trip! Good food, great weather and we wore the kids out! Going to get wet! My dad & Adley in the back row! Flying elephants Aidan is not a fan of a lot of rides. He waited in line with us determined to ride and backed out at the last minute....maybe one day. Liam loves this ride...doesn't he look so little on it! Water fight! Driving home - someone napped at Dollywood! However these boys did not! They slept the whole way home and into bed.

Well I think I am anyway...I'll give this whole blogging thing another try and see if I can't keep up with it better than I have in the the last 4 months. Let's see where do I even begin... in the last 4 months... **Eli turned 4 and is now completely potty trained - Hallelujah, only 1 more kiddo to go! **Liam turned 2 and is starting to make lots of jibber jabber noises and the occasional word comes out too...often times surprising himself just as much as me. We are weaning down the paci - most days! Is it bad that I like the darn thing as much as I hate it. **We celebrated Easter. **Saw two movies - Rio and Kung Fu Panda 2 - both excellent! **Aidan finished 2nd grade and Adley finished kindergarten. **We moved into our new house and all that comes with that....which is a lot and a lot more expensive than predicted. **Eli finished 3yr old preschool. **We've been to Dollywood twice and Charlotte's Discovery Place once. **Adley started and finished his entire soccer ...