After dropping the boys at school and being at work barely an hour, I rushed back out to observe Connor’s school parade.  Unfortunately I made it there 10 minutes after the start time, and I missed the toddler’s parade.  The bigger kids were still making their parade, and I finally found my fireman Connor in the midst of the big crowd.  His class apparently just finished making their walk and now standing on the side watching the rest of the kids.  Connor did not notice me initially as he was paying attention to the activities.  Until the teacher told him about my arrival, he gave him a huge smile but he stayed in place with his class.  We watched the rest of the parade together, then he and I took a walk to visit the scarecrows.  He enjoyed walking around the school campus holding my hand.  We finally returned to his classroom.  Connor immediately took off his costume and returned all his belonging to the bag.  He was so excited to say goodbye to the teacher while holding my hand again.  I had to disappoint him by telling him that I would return to pick him up later instead.  Poor Connor, his eyes immediately filled with tears, his face turned red, and he sadly whispered “no, no”.  Then the big cry began as I left the room. 

     Connor still prefers me doing most things with him including bedtime reading, but Stuart and I try to switch off occasionally to spend time with the other kid.  Usually when Stuart asks Connor to go to him, Connor will say “No daddy, Mommy!”.  He actually cries too when he goes to Stuart, but of course it will stop within 30 seconds.  Last night when Stuart asked for Connor, his reaction was the same as usual, saying no.  Then Stuart pretended being sad, then Connor looked at him and felt bad.  I chimed in to say that he was making daddy sad and that I would read to him the next day instead, then Connor started tearing, frowned but nodded.  Within 10 seconds, he changed to a big smile and opened up his arms for Daddy.  It was so nice that we can negotiate with Connor now.

      At 9:30pm last night, we heard loud crying and screaming from Logan.  Apparently he was crying for awhile before we heard him over the TV sound.  Logan was having a very high temperature; he was so uncomfortable that he even threw up a little bit from the crying too.  He took the Tylenol willingly, and he finally calmed down when we put the ice pack on his head.  He tried going back to sleep a couple of times, but failed.  I finally laid down with him and after his temperature came back down, Logan eventually returned to sleep. 

     Logan stayed at home with Stuart this morning.  He watched TV while Stuart attended his teleconference, then they played Legos and soldiers/castle mostly by himself.  His appetite was not too good, but he managed to eat a little bit of rice.  He did not seem as warm during the day; the highest temperature was at 99.5 but Logan’s voice was raspy (ala Demi Moore).  In the afternoon when it was my turn with him, Logan and I played board games together.  We played four games in one hour; we played a match game, Chutes and Ladder, a race game and Busy Town.  This was probably the first time we spent so much time on board games.  Logan was not very good in counting the steps initially, messing up where the first step was.  He finally started counting with “zero” from the box where he was in, and it really helped him counting correctly from then on.  I was impressed that he figured out how to solve a problem on his own.  During the Chutes and Ladder, he was in the lead for a long time, then he fell down a long slide and I climbed up on a long ladder.  He was fine trailing for awhile, but suddenly he looked at me with a sweet smile, and said “Mommy, can we trade spots?”  I could not resist the cute request.

   Logan ate more at dinner and seemed to be better the rest of the night.  Hope he will have a good night sleep.

    Connor had school portraits taken a couple of weeks ago, and they are now available for purchase.  When I first saw the poses, I could not help but laugh. Connor looked so funny.  The photographer dressed all the kids up with the same four costumes, soccer player, skier, top hat & tail, and newspaper reporter.  Connor was smiling on all four poses, but the smile was so forced and uncomfortable.  Poor Connor, trying to cooperate!  Stuart and I are not big fan of these staged photographs, but we did just buy one sheet as a keepsake. 

    We took a day off together today to celebrate our anniversary.  The weather did not start out as nice as it was seven years ago, so we could not go golfing as we initially wished to, so we changed to plan B.  The day started late as Logan slept in until 7:07am, and as a result, we all did.  After dropping off the kids and doing some errands at home, we headed out to the Gilroy outlets for some shopping.  By lunch time, we took Michelle’s suggestion and drove to Phil’s Fish Market at Moss Landing to have their famous cioppino.  The food arrived quickly and was very delicious.  I enjoyed every bite of the cioppino, and Stuart enjoyed some fried halibut and chips too.  The experience totally worth the drive down there.  We then stopped by the state beach for a walk as I was so stuffed.  The beach was large, beautiful and quiet; there was only one other person there besides us.  The weather had become sunny and warmer by then, and walking on sand was definitely relaxing.  After that, we had to head home for an extra stop for the day as my eyeglasses suddenly broke last night. 

     Today was a great day, enjoyable and productive.  We can’t believe that it has been seven years.

     We made it to another practice this morning.  The weather was sunny and relatively warm; we definitely tried to enjoy as much as we could before the storm arrives.  We arrived early as usual and played at the playground until the rest of the families arrived.  Logan wanted me to accompany him for the practice, so Stuart and I switched kids.  Logan was a bit clingy initially but did follow instruction from the coach.  He did very well with his soccer kicks.  I peeked at Connor at times; he was content hanging on the sideline with Stuart.  He was watching the group sometimes, as well as kicking the ball back and forth with Stuart, or sitting on the ball for fun.  About half way through he looked up once and noticed that I was looking at him, so he immediately ran over to me; as a result, Stuart and I had to switch kids again.  I decided to take Connor running around the field to get some exercise until the end of the practice, then we all re-joined to have our picnic lunch.  Afterward, we played at the structures for awhile until Connor declared time to go home.