Sunday, August 29, 2010

A broken bone


It was bound to happen at some point in time. We had hoped it would happen much later than it did... but the McDowell boys have experienced their first broken bone. We went to some friend's house for a bbq on Saturday night and Reid was sitting on top of a swing that was a big yellow ball. He was swinging high and fell backwards hitting his head and pinning his arm in a funky position. Reid was crying frantically and couldn't quite calm down or stop sobbing. It took us about three minutes to realize that we were going to go get it checked out. I took Reid and Ross (because I had the infant car seat) with me to Children's Mercy South and Hockey Ross got Russ and Ryan home.

I am the BIGGEST fan of Children's Mercy! We were checked in, triaged, and bumped in front of a full waiting room. After triage we went to get some x-rays. I went in the room with Reid for the x-rays and a nurse stayed with Ross who managed to make quite a few friends in the hallway by the time we were done. He was all smiles and talking to everyone.

When we were done with x-rays the nurse put us in a room with a bed, not the typical room we get with a chair and a stool to see a dr. I immediately felt like something wasn't right. I stepped outside the room and asked the nurse if she thought that I should call Russ to come pick up Ross. She gave me a little look and said that it would probably be a good idea. Not long after the doctor came in and told us that his humerus was broken and displaced. She was calling an ortho to consult but thought that we would need to go to Children's Mercy North where Reid would be sedated and his arm would be set. EEK! Before Russ could get to the clinic the consult was back and they decided that they were not going to set the arm. Russ and Ryan said hi to Reid and then took the baby home. We waited a while longer and Reid's arm was put in an immobilizer and we were discharged with orders to call an orthopaedic surgeon in a week.
We left the hospital a few minutes before 10 and headed to a 24 hour pharmacy with our prescription for Reid's pain killer and to pick up some Motrin. Reid was pretty loopy at the pharmacy. He was talking non-stop to a dad and his grown daughter. They asked if he was loopy or if he always talked like he was. I told him it was a combination of both - but he sure was being quite funny.

On Sunday we rented several redbox movies and we let Reid lay around and watch movies all morning. He started getting restless from being cooped up after lunch and got in trouble for diving across the living room after a hula hoop. He said "having a broken arm is no fun; you won't let me do anything!" We ended up letting him go outside to walk around as his friends played. One of his friends was trying to talk him into riding his bike with one arm and he said "my mom won't let me." One day down, 41 or so to go :)

Reid went to school today and is doing just great. He really hasn't complained about pain much at all. He took a bath last night and didn't like the arm moving at all. His teacher seemed very ready to deal with helping him through his day and said they would figure it all out. I hope he stays calm! Russ and I were telling him that he could not participate in recess or p.e. and he thought it would still be ok if he just went down the slide. It might be a long couple of weeks since recess and p.e. are his favorite parts of school :)

We meet with the orthopaedic doctor on Wednesday at 1:30 pm so we'll see what the long term plan is then.

10 months old

Baby Ross Jacob is 10 months old...


Every week I get an update from a website that shows me what Ross should be doing developmentally. Here were some of the points from this week that certainly show what Ross has been doing:

* show a desire to please you as he becomes even more attached to you—the trust, love and connection between your baby and you are continuing to grow - absolutely, he's at this stage. He absolutely melts my heart when I go pick him up from daycare or come home from being gone for the day. He gets SUPER excited and bounces around to get picked up.
* resist being put to bed or left alone as her attachment to you grows - not everyday but he certainly has a growing attachment to his parents!
* use gibberish in a conversational way - O M G! This kid is talking like crazy. I have had several conversations that I can't get in lately because he's so busy talking in the background.
* go from lying to sitting without any help - he's been doing this for months now. Now he can actually go from lying to sitting to standing to being across the room into a cabinet he's not supposed to be in... in a few seconds tops!


Ross has developed one nasty habit that mom is definitely not a fan of. He has become the biggest daddy's boy I have ever seen. If Russ is in the room then Ross leans to go to him and gets so excited and slaps his neck, grabs his face, etc. If I get close to him and hold my hands out to him to come to me, he does not usually want to come :( Every now and then he will... but not usually. It's a nasty habit, one I'm trying hard to break!

Happy 10 months BRJ!

Oh yeah... edited to add: I KNOW that BRJ's pajamas don't match. He had two very similar pairs and I grabbed a top from one pair and a bottom from another pair. I forgot to take his picture on the 24th and then this was bedtime on the 25th and I knew I needed to get the picture taken (before he turned 11 months old) so I just took it in the mismatched jammies.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

A chocolate chip cookie night

Last night Reid had a goalie lesson and I stayed home with Ross and Ryan. You never know how an evening like that is going to turn out but we had a FABULOUS night. Ryan played around in our "big" tub while Ross had his bath and then he got out, put his jammies on and played with his silly bandz while I fed Ross oatmeal and a bottle and put him to bed. When Ross was down, Ryan and I looked at all of his silly bandz, read some books, and then looked at the Halloween catalog discussing what he was going to be for Halloween. Simple, quiet tasks... VERY out of character for Ryan. We had a really enjoyable night and about 20 minutes of nice, quiet one on one time.

Reid and Russ came home around 7:15 and Russ said that Reid had one of his best practices ever. He said he is really looking good and listened really well. After Reid had showered from daddy decided that we'd make some chocolate chip cookies to celebrate such a great evening.


Touch a Truck

The McDowell family attended the Touch a Truck event this weekend that was held in celebration of the 50th year of Overland Park. The convention center had several trucks that kids could get up inside and look around. There were a couple of ambulances, a limo bus, a fire truck, a combine, a dairy truck, a race car, and several others. There were lines to get into every vehicle so the boys waited for the limo bus, an ambulance, and the fire truck. Then they got to pet and feed some goats that were on location courtesy of Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead.

At the race car the boys got posters...


(once we were able to confirm that the paparazzi didn't follow us into the building we were able to lose the sunglasses)

Lots of pics of the fire truck...


Feeding the baby goats...


Ross had fun too...

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

And... REID

Reid has had some major updates in the last couple of weeks. He had a big hockey camp and he started first grade!!


Last week Reid participated in a week long hockey camp. There were a handful of kids there that were his age but a good majority of the camp were older. He went Monday - Thursday from 8:30 - 3:30. They spent an hour on the ice in the morning and an hour on the ice in the afternoon. They played games and did some "dryland" workouts in the other time. I have to admit that the mom in me was pretty nervous that it was a bit much for him but he really liked it. I thought he'd be totally worn out after the first day but the minute he got home he went outside and played for quite a while. They got a smoothie one day at camp and he became officially addicted to Smoothie King, he even chose it over a milkshake one night.




On Friday, the camp had Big Game Friday. The parents got to watch the kids play a game in the afternoon. Reid looked SOOO little in his goalie gear among all of the other players. The first shot he took went in pretty easily. OUCH! Eventually Reid ended up facing two penalty shots... and stopped them both!! The game ended in a tie (un-coincidentally) and went to a shoot out. Reid faced a shot from a 10 year old and stopped it... his team won! All of the older kids kept jumping all over him and congratulating him. I thought they were going to tackle him.


Penalty shot...



Shootout shot...



Coach Ferschweiler handed out some grey hats for the MVPs of the game and Reid got one of them. He was so proud and happy... he sat in the chair in our living room holding it that afternoon!



Monday night was sneak a peek at Reid's school. He found out last Friday that he got Mrs. Welch for first grade and we got to go meet her, see his classroom, and drop off his school supplies. Reid was pretty indifferent about starting school and nervous about riding the bus for some reason. Mom is super thrilled that he got the teacher we were hoping for... organized, firm, best track record... woo hoo!! She had everything all organized, written out and planned for at sneak a peek - we were in and out of there in under 20 minutes!



Today was Reid's first day of first grade. They had a half day. We did our normal tradition (fourth year now) of going out for breakfast and of course Reid picked McDonald's pancakes and a LARGE orange juice. After breakfast I took Reid to school and left him in his classroom. After school I picked him up and he said he had a great day. He said they didn't learn anything today they just talked about what first grade would be like, etc. He came home with a folder that is LABELED (love me some labels!) with pockets for to school and to home. The folder has a calendar in it where they color each day on whether they were green, yellow, or red for behavior. He had a green day and said he was going to try and get a green day every day but that would be hard because they go to school for over 150 days. He said day 100 is going to be his favorite because they get to have a party.






Ryan update

Ryan came home this weekend after a week at Grandma Cella's. He had a really good time with her. They went swimming, played fake food a lot, did tons of papers/crafts, went to the park with snacks, and rode bikes. I think he would have stayed another week if his parents had let him.

This weekend Ryan put on ice skates for the first time on the ice!! He actually tried it and liked it. He didn't do much skating on his own because dad basically held him up and helped him around the rink. Dad's back was hurting but it was a huge step forward for Ryan to even try something. He had a lot of fun and is really starting to bloom here lately.


Ross Jacob updates

I know, I know... I owe all my faithful followers (both of you) updates! I'm going to start with Ross Jacob. This kid has changed a ton in the last month. He is starting to be a jabberbox, especially when he is in the car. He just talks and talks to himself.

Ross is also starting to spend most of his time on his two feet - pulling up on EVERYTHING!

Exhibit A
and B


and C

He is also getting into everything. Here he is re-arranging everything on the floor of our pantry.

I decided the other night that Ross was ready for some big boy toys so I got out the fire truck coupe car for him to play with. Of course all of a sudden it was Ryan's favorite toy ever :) Eventually he let Ross play with it and they both had a lot of fun.