29 April 2008

In loving memory

My beloved sassafras tree came down today. It had been dead for about a year and a half, but I was giving it one more chance to show some leaves before we did anything. Not only were there no leaves, but the branches were brittle and brown inside. I started breaking off big ones this afternoon and asked Mike to go for the chainsaw when he got home. He made short work of it.
Here is a picture of the tree several years ago in its glorious, fiery fall color. I'm sure it would rather be remembered this way.
All may not be lost, however: three sassafras babies are growing near the base of the old tree. Funny how they didn't show up until last year when the tree was already dead. Why is that, I wonder?

27 April 2008

The big move

Noel has finally moved in with his big brother. Last night we took the crib out of our room and set it up in what is now Dominick and Noel's room. Mike and I were relieved that the boys went to sleep easily and slept through the night. Noel woke up at 6:30, and because we'd forgotten to put a monitor in the room, we didn't hear him crying until he'd already woken Dom. As expected, Dominick was in the crib with Noel when I came down. We'll see how night two goes. The real test of this new sleeping arrangement will happen when Dominick wakes up in the middle of the night.

After moving the crib, we went to visit the goats that live up the street. Meryl was outside when we came by, so she introduced us to two beautiful, snow-white goats who were born six days earlier. She took the goats into the tennis court next to her house and told Dominick that if he ran, the goats--Olivia and Rebecca, in case you were wondering their names--would follow him. I really wished I'd had my camera with me! It was fun to see Dominick cavorting with the two baby goats. Noel loved them, too.

25 April 2008

Update on Noel's finger

Just a quick post before Noel and I join Dominick for his preschool's Fruit Day picnic. I realized earlier this week that Noel's fingernail is growing back. It's about halfway there. Noel is quite the little trooper. At the hospital, the doctors were less than optimistic about his fingertip surviving because the blood supply was not intact, nor were they optimistic about his nail growing back because the laceration occurred right where it generates. Well, look at him now! It seems as though he'll come through this with nothing more than a scar around his finger.

17 April 2008

From the mouths of babes

I haven't posted any of Dom's recent funny sayings, so it's time to get caught up. A couple of these will embarrass him when he's older, but they're not too bad. I'm sparing my readers the more graphic examples.

"He thinks hands are for hitting."
"Our house is not where we live."
"I don't like fun."
"Daddy wrote 'The Nutcracker.'"
"Everything in this house is mine."
"My stomach's not full. All my food went down the toilet."
"You can wipe my behind if you want to."

Also, Dominick tells me that he has three hammers in his stomach for mashing food. They don't have handles because there's not room, and they work by themselves because he doesn't have a hole in him to reach them. You learn something new every day, don't you?

And now I get to brag on Noel, who has a nice little vocabulary of his own: up, down, ball, book, Mama, Daddy, diaper, bathroom (by which he means the toilet), truck (guck, just like Dominick used to say), door, cheese (dee), hi, bye-bye, no, wow. He's good at combining words with gestures, like when he needs my help and points under a table and says "ball," or when he waves "dye-dye." The funniest thing is when he plays phone. He'll pick up a toy phone (or any other remotely phone-shaped toy), put it to his ear, say "hi," wait a second, then set it down with a "dye-dye." He did this repeatedly while we were driving the other day.

14 April 2008

Show and tell


These are the best I could do. I had hoped for a good smile shot, but Dom's not always the most cooperative boy. Maybe another time...

12 April 2008

The dentist and the dermatologist

The boys have been busy this weekend. Yesterday morning was Noel's long-awaited visit to the pediatric dermatologist. She confirmed that his birthmark is a port-wine stain (nevus flammeus). She called his birthmark small, which I'm sure it is compared to some of the marks she's seen, and said it is not considered disfiguring but rather a distinguishing feature. I like the positive sound of that. Because of its proximity to the eye, there is a very small possibility of complications, namely glaucoma. The doctor said it is unlikely to be a problem, but we can rule out any issues by having Noel examined by a pediatric ophthalmologist. Treatment of port-wine stains is by pulsed-dye laser. For a child of Noel's age, general anesthesia would be required. He'd need to have four to eight treatments. The big question now is whether our insurance will cover the treatments. We'll figure out how to proceed after we find out.

Dominick went to the dentist this morning. It was a pretty quick visit because there's really nothing to be done. Dom will have a slightly different smile for a couple of years until his adult teeth are ready to come in. Oh well! We'll get used to it.

The rest of the morning was spent on more-exciting things. Mike and Dom headed to Whittle's Shortline Railroad store in Fenton from the dentist's office, while I took Noel to the Teeny Weeny Olympics, a PAT event. Then we all gorged ourselves at Sweet Tomatoes. Dom's hilarious. Thirty minutes after we got back home, he tells me he's hungry. Hello?!?

10 April 2008

When it rains...

It has rained a lot this week, but I'm not talking about the weather here. We were getting ready to go to the Y this afternoon when Dominick, who was playing in the laundry basket, flipped over and started crying. His mouth was bleeding, so I thought, "He's bitten his lip." Then I noticed the tooth in the basket. Surprisingly, the bleeding stopped quickly, and Dom calmed down. By that time, I was on the phone with the dentist's office. Because Dominick lost a baby tooth (they called it "deciduous"), it can't be put back in, but the dentist is going to take a look at him on Saturday morning. Dom hasn't been to a pediatric dentist yet, so he'll be seeing our regular dentist. Wish us luck.

After Dom fell, it took him several minutes to realize that a tooth was missing, but he wasn't upset about it. He commented, "One of my teeth is gone. It'll grow back soon," and later, "I don't have 20 teeth anymore." He looks like he's been in a fight, what with the missing tooth and the black eye he has sported since Saturday, when he ran, slipped and hit the front of the computer desk. Cross your fingers that Dom's preschool doesn't call child protective services when they see him tomorrow.

Ironically, I was just telling our PAT educator this morning that, since Noel's accident, people have been telling us that with boys, these things are going to happen. Life with two boys, indeed.