Last night was another night of poor sleep for Connor.  He woke up at 10:30pm from a cough spell.  Stuart tried sitting him up to sleep to avoid coughing, but it was unsuccessful, so we put Connor in a steamed room for awhile and did some suctioning.  He did not want to go back to his crib, so we finally agreed to let him sleep with us.  The rest of the night was on and off and he started coughing again early morning.  Other than the cough and the runny nose, Connor was doing ok.

    The school had their annual spring breakfast this morning.  I happened to have a day off from my regular busy clinic today, and so it gave me the opportunity to take my time at school.  Logan enjoyed some pancakes and Connor had some watermelon while we sat in a circle with a few of Logan’s friends and parents.  After some chit-chatting and eating, the boys were ready to go play.  Logan and his friends immediately went to play at the structure; Connor followed their lead and enjoyed his chance to play at the big kids playground.  The cute thing was that Logan and his friends were all very kind to Connor, helping him up or giving him hugs at times.  As more people arrived to the breakfast, the playground became more crowded, so I had to keep even closer attention to avoid Connor being run over by bigger kids.  Logan and his friends were playing with a few kinder boys; they were getting wild, running after each other.  Finally it was time for me to go, so I took Connor back to the toddler playground and said bye to Logan.

    I arrived at the dental office in good timing even before Stuart did.  Stuart and I happened to have the same date and time for our appointments.  Stuart was there for dental cleaning while I was there for the implant follow up.  After the appointment, I went to work doing some projects.  It was fun going to a different site and catching up with other coworkers. 

     At 3pm, I received a call from school to report a fever of 100.8 for Connor.  Apparently he was very tired before nap, not eating much of his lunch, then slept for almost 3 hours.  So the teacher decided to check his temperature as he was looking more flushed too.  The teacher did say that Connor was still in good mood.  I arrived school before 4pm to pick both kids up.  Connor was looking well as normal.  After we were home, we played in the front yard for awhile and took a walk; then Stuart and Logan took off to go to the gym class.  Connor and I decided to eat dinner first.  Connor had his usual appetite; we had fun playing while we ate.  After dinner, we played with puzzles, blocks, then we returned to the table for some fruits.  When the other boys returned home, we all sat at the dining table again for Stuart and Logan to eat this time.  We played after dinner briefly before bath time.  The entire evening, Connor never felt warm and was doing well.  His cough was still there, but slightly less frequent.  He went to sleep well; hopefully he will not wake up coughing again.

     Connor started with a runny nose on Tuesday during his day off with mommy, but he was doing fine otherwise.  That morning, his conjunctivitis was already almost cleared after having several doses of the eye drops.  We had a good day together.  We took a walk to a park in the morning, and Connor had fun playing in the structures.  We had lunch at home, sharing a veggie dip too which was something Logan would never do with me.  After nap, we went shopping at Target. 

     The next day, Connor was still doing well except still having the runny nose and began to have a cough.  As Connor has been well the past month, we totally forgot that this little guy tends to have bad coughs with any colds.  He started coughing a lot at 11:30pm last night.  His cough was so bad that Connor got woken up and cried.  Stuart gave him water, but did not help.  We tried carrying him to sleep or letting him lay down in our bed, but neither worked as he was still coughing a lot and could not get comfortable.  Stuart finally did some spraying and suctioning on him, and the coughing eventually calmed down; Stuart then put Connor back to his crib where he slept the rest of the night. 

    The teacher told me today that Connor was coughing a lot during the nap too.  At dinner tonight Connor was trying to eat his dinner but he could not stop coughing.  It was quite sad to watch him.  Robyn and I talked about honey during work today, so I gave Connor some to try after dinner.  He was reluctant to taste it initially but then loved it and wanted more.  I gave him a dose at bedtime; let’s hope that it will do the trick to give Connor a good night sleep tonight.

      I jinxed myself again.  I know I am being superstitious, but it has happened too many times.  I just told Julie on Friday that the boys have been healthy, then today I got a call to report Connor’s pink eye.  It was 12:10pm, and the teacher agreed to allow Connor napped there before pick up.  So Stuart picked him up promptly at 2:30pm as instructed.  I called the Advice Nurse, and apparently pink eye is so common that they don’t recommend seeing the doctor.  The nurse diagnosed Connor over the phone, prescribed eye drops and gave him a doctor note to return to school on Wednesday.  Stuart brought Connor to my work on their way home as I just picked up the prescription from the pharmacy, and we could give Connor the first dose.  Connor enjoyed hanging out with me for a little bit at the courtyard.  When I was telling Stuart that I had a lot of work waiting for me, Connor was immediately clinging to me.  I talked to Connor to tell him that I would see him again after work and after picking up Logan; he actually understood and stopped holding on to me.  After I walked away and closed to the door behind me, I heard his sad crying then.

    Connor had a fun afternoon with daddy, and tomorrow he will have a full day with mommy.  Because of this infection, I had to postpone Connor’s first dental appointment tomorrow.  I want to keep the boys’ appointments together, so now they both will be seeing their dentist in July instead.

     On Saturday, we were invited to Logan’s friend Rohan’s house for a playdate.  Their classmate Bar was there too.  The boys immediately started playing together, but Bar did not want to join with the boys initially.  Rohan and Logan had so much fun running around playing with different things, and Connor enjoyed chasing after them.  They played, took a break for snack, played again until we broke for lunch.  Lunch was a bit hectic at the beginning as Connor wanted to sit at the small table with Logan and Rohan.  We finally settled him down at a chair next to them, then Rohan and Logan got upset with each other as Rohan wanted to sit closer to Logan.  After the meal, the kids enjoyed some TV entertainment.  Later, they resumed running around, then all three big kids were wild while playing a tug a war with a snake stuffed animal.  At that time, we knew it was time to say goodbye and go home.  After nap, we took a long walk with the boys in the buggy to a local park to play.  It was so busy at the park as there must have been several parties going on at the same time.  The boys enjoyed playing with the renovated structures.  On the walk back home, Connor all of a sudden wanted out of the buggy but he was too heavy to be carried too long, so he had a few minutes of meltdown before agreeing to return to the buggy.

    On Sunday Mother’s Day, Stuart let me pick the agenda for the day; we started by taking a drive to Capitola to hang out at the beach.  We left the house early at 9am to beat the crowd.  The weather was not as warm as we expected; it was cloudy and a bit chilly.  We all had jackets, so it was still fine playing at the beach.  We did arrive at the beach at a good time before the crowds appeared; we found close parking and a good spot for our beach blanket.  There was even live music playing at the beach.  The boys enjoyed playing with the sand; Logan especially had fun digging into the sand cliff.  We packed up after an hour to take our lunch so we could move on to our second half of our plan, the Roaring Camp.  But unfortunately during the short walk to the car, Logan tripped and skinned his knees.  He was very sad; a lot of tears were shed.  We could not find our first aid kit; so Connor and I went to the shops to find something while Stuart tried to console Logan in the car.  We managed to clean up his wounds and proceeded to lunch.  Logan was still sad, so he received some special treatment at the restaurant, sitting on and being fed by daddy.  We had to wait quite a long time before the food arrived, fortunately the kids were relatively content.  The food was very good, but not sure it was worth the long wait.  With the fall and the wait at the restaurant, we knew we would miss the steam train ride at Roaring Camp, so we decided to drive back home after lunch.  This change in plan ended up working well as we all could take a restful nap at home.  Afterward, we decided to BBQ to wrap up this weekend.  We played in the neighbors yard (with a Logan buddy) while taking a walk waiting for the food to cook.  After eating a big meal, the boys went down to sleep easily.

     Recently the morning routine has changed.  The boys now like to carry each others lunch bags to walk into school.  Once we are in the courtyard, Connor takes Logan’s bag to Logan’s classroom and places it into the cupboard while Logan waits for us outside of Connor’s classroom holding Connor’s bag.  Logan opens the door to the classroom, and Connor takes over his bag and puts it inside the cupboard.  Logan and Connor seem quite in sync with this new routine.  After that, Logan and I would say our goodbyes to Connor; Connor sometimes would go with teacher to play or would cry for me.  But the past few days, Logan has suggested Connor to go up to the structure to look through the window, so he can say goodbyes to us.  Connor is happy to follow the advice and has been smiley as we leave.  Logan and I will then walk to his classroom; Logan also wants to look through the window to say bye to me, but in addition, he wants me to take a picture of him too.  My album will be full of pictures of our boys through the windows soon.

     Connor is getting more feisty lately especially if he does not get what he wants, so there have been some arguments between Logan and Connor sometimes.  The most common one is when we tune the TV to what Logan wants to watch, Connor will immediately say "No No No".  Then Logan will reply "Yes Yes Yes".  The two of them may keep taking turns to say their words until we intervene or distract them.  Connor always likes to be close to Logan, but sometimes he may be too close or mess around with Logan that Logan does not appreciate.  So Logan will whine about it and try to gently push Connor away.  Connor usually does not take that well, and tries to swing his hand to hit back.  Stuart and I have to stop this kind of interaction quickly before anyone gets upset.

    Logan has given Connor a nickname recently.  Sometimes Logan and I talk about what Connor does and refer him as being silly, so now, Logan has called Connor “Silly Conn” at times.  When Connor is doing something that is not proper, Logan will call out “Don’t do that, Silly Conn!”.  This morning during the ride, I heard a conversation between them.  Connor was calling out “bar…bar” as he wanted to eat a bar.  Logan nicely said to Connor “Silly Conn, we don’t have any bars.  Mommy has to go to the store to buy some.  No bars, Silly Conn”. 

     We had the same seat assignment in our dining room every night for over a year, but it was finally changed a couple of weeks ago.  Connor used to be on my right and Logan was on my left, but one night, Logan invited Connor to go sit with him and Connor was thrilled.  Since then, Connor’s highchair has been moved to between Logan and I.  Every night, Logan would try to pull Connor’s chair closer and closer to him until there is almost no space between them.  Connor is so happy being next to Logan, and he gets even more excited when Logan helps to feed him.  Sometimes Connor would poke the food with the fork by himself and hand it to Logan to feed him.  At times when Connor became difficult with eating, such as letting food back out out his mouth, I might turn his chair around to give him a time out.  So now when Logan hears that Connor is not cooperating, Logan will say “Turn him around”, but Connor will get mad at his comment and say “No” loudly.  They have a love-hate relationship already.

    This was the title Stuart suggested for this blog post.  Today was the third soccer practice for Logan, and it went a lot better.  We wondered if he learned from last week’s consequence or from all the prep talks we gave Logan since yesterday, either way Logan did quite well today.  He did say a couple of times that he wanted to play at the structure and he wanted me with him sometimes, but he was able to re-focus back to the coach quickly.  Logan did the warm up and the drills as directed.  He kicked quite well and even made a couple of nice goals.  He was happy to receive his stamps at the end of the practice as he did earn them this time.

Connor and I were at the sideline watching initially, and he was happy that we brought him a ball to play with too.  He was trying out his soccer stand, and enjoyed staying at that pose for a long time when I was holding his hands.  Later on, he was just sitting on the ball too. 

     So after soccer, we all played at the structures for awhile before returning to the picnic blanket to enjoy our lunch.  We were able to play some more before it was time to go home to take our naps.

    This morning Logan and I attended Syrus’s birthday party at Pump It Up Jr.  Logan did not need any warming up at all; once the door was opened to us, he went inside, took off the shoes and ran into one of the bouncy houses.  He played inside the basketball jumpy house and the obstacle one, and agreed to do the slide one after I went with him once.  Logan seemed more social today; he played with his friends Nalini and Alex, and he was extra friendly with one of mothers, Masumi.  He asked Masumi to go with him to play and he even reached out to hold her hand.  I think he was fascinated with her tummy as she was 8 month pregnant.  Logan even asked her about why her tummy was so big.  After the jumpy house, we moved on to the eating room to have some pizza and cake before we said our thanks and goodbyes.

     The morning was not as fun for Stuart as he was called with some issues at work, so it was not easy taking care of Connor, feeding him lunch while troubleshooting.  Stuart managed to do all that and put Connor to nap just right before Logan and I returned home.  Logan and I also went to take a nap so we could get ready for the second half of the day.

     Ted and I have been talking about cioppino since we all were at the Fisherman’s Wharf a couple of weeks ago, so we decided to have a homemade one today.  Ted and Michelle graciously offered to cook while we brought over the seafood.  We packed up to arrive at the Kaos shortly after 4pm, and we first spent a long time in their backyard.  Both Logan and Connor managed to get on their bikes

while Mckayla and Marcus showed off their biking skills.  It was fun seeing all four kids riding, but that was a short lived moment as they quickly moved on to something else.  Logan and Mckayla played well together; they were running around looking for “snakes” or sometimes monsters. Connor always wanted to follow the big kids copying what they were doing while Marcus only joined them occasionally.  They all ran around for a long time before we returned inside the house to play with toys.   We finally gathered to have the delicious dinner; we must have spent a long time eating as we were so stuffed afterward and we almost finished two full pots of cioppino.  Our boys had a decent amount of fish, pasta and veggies too.  It was an incredible dinner.  After a short break, we gathered to have some desserts.  The kids were so lucky to have an drumstick ice cream each; they were all so happy and quiet while eating.  Logan, Mckayla and Marcus all finished their shares and were excused from the table yet Connor was still savoring his cone of ice cream.  I eventually had to take the remaining half away as it was all melting, and Connor was very sad about that.  We finally had to say bye to the Kaos as it was after 8pm.  The drive home was nice as the kids enjoyed chasing and looking at the full moon that we had tonight.

     Connor was sweet and went to sleep easily.  But according to Stuart, Logan got sad after saying goodnight to me; he cried/sobbed while putting on his pajama.  He did calm down shortly after Stuart started reading to him.  Logan must have been tired from the long fun day.