Back to the Cold

Jenn and I experienced a 50 degree swing, and we weren't too crazy about it. To get some of the dogs' wiggles out, we bundled up the kids and went to the Ledges. And we lasted about 20 minutes, but our mission was accomplished, so we felt good about it.Lydia is showing a real interest in talking now. She's reliably saying "da da" & "ma ma." Sometimes she says "bye bye," and once yesterday she said "Beh tee." It's also neat seeing her actively immitate Lincoln in some of his play.

Thanksgiving 2011

Happy Thanksgiving! We have so much for which to be thankful. Particularly, when Jenn and I think about what Henry is doing today, it's awfully humbling to think about our circumstances. This is the first Thanksgiving where Lincoln can start to understand just what Thanksgiving means. This has been a neat series of conversations with him.

Certainly a portion of our thoughts are with Auntie Em & Uncle Jeremy. They went to New York City for their anniversary trip to take in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Hopefully they'll see more balloons than OWS-Loonies.Yesterday was an odd Wednesday in that Jenn worked (she was off on Monday). Also, Kristen worked at CFVC, which is unusual. The reason why I lead with this is because the Myers have been into Christmas 2011 for some time now, and she had it set to Christmas music in the treatment room. I've been purposely avoiding all the Christmas stuff until after Thanksgiving because I don't want to be sick of it all by the time mid-December rolls around. But I started getting into the songs, and along the same lines, I was really getting into the Christmas spirit. This, combined with Lincoln's coming excitement about the season, is going to make for a fun Christmas.

And now Jenn's preparing some Thanksgiving Dinner food in the kitchen and listening to Christmas music. I glad I didn't hear Christmas music in the treatment room in October!Last evening I met up with my high school buddies at Fischer's. In attendance was Speas, Flaker, Jeff, Lyle, Bob & Bish. Blasts from the past, I tell you. It was good to catch up a little bit. Life has definitely pulled us in different directions, but our friendship is still there. We recalled some funny memories, and that made for a good time.

Henry's Birthday

It's been a period of busy-ness with lots of little things. Not lost in the mix, though, was our remembrance of Henry's birthday on the 9th. Between his birthday, and the upcoming holidays, it's a very different feeling that Jenn and I have. We certainly want to enjoy these times, but it's a bit hard knowing he's living one day to the next in his orphanage.Lincoln watched the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving DVD a couple of days ago. The following scene, Little Birdie, makes Lincoln laugh out loud.Lydia's been taking one step lately. She hasn't put two together, but when she's motivated enough, she'll take that step. She's been standing confidently for about a week now. It's only a matter of time.

Kendall Lake in the Evening

Jenn and I don't usually go to Kendall Lake in the evening, so we decided to make that our hike, seeing as I didn't have Edge tonight. We had a great walk. Lincoln did a lot of running, Lydia was more engaged in the walk than usual, the dogs completely wore themselves out, and we saw some cool wildlife.This is a Black and Yellow Argiope (Argiope aurantia). It looked disgusting, and almost made Jenn vomit, but we found out when we got home that she's completely harmless!The Mossy Log has become a point of reference on our hikes, particularly with Lincoln. We compare the plant and animal life we see around it to what we've seen previously. It's a cool way to mark the seasons and the passage of time. Here's today's photo of The Mossy Log.And this is what Lincoln will do not long after we get home from this hike.

Lydia Eats

We had a full Saturday yesterday. In the early morning we went to The Ledges to hike, and it was a foggy, buggy morning. Two hours and a shower after we got home, I found a tick crawling on my ankle. Ticks are in NE Ohio, and it's a no-doubter.

2010

2011

Last evening we went to the livestock auction at the Summit County Fair. I was completely ignorant of what to expect, but now that I've seen the process, we're planning on buying a pig next year. Nick, one of my middle schoolers, finished 4th in the hog division, 3rd in showmanship, and his hog fetched $2.40 per pound. This trailed only the Grand Champion ($6.00/lb.) and the Reserve Champion ($6.10/lb.)! It's clear that the champions fetch big money because the buyers get recognition over the next year, so it's good advertising. For instance, the Marhoffers of the Ron Marhoffer Auto Family bought the Grand Champion Hog.

I'm quite impressed with the 4-H kids and their families. Having seen both ends of the 4-H spectrum, the young kids with the chickens and lambs to the veterinary students who got their start as the young kids with the chickens and the lambs, it's a pretty cool organization.

I'll have some fair photos to post in a few days. Until then, feast on these...

Ledges on a Wednesday

This weekend is the annual Canada fishing trip, so I'm covering Saturday at the clinic. This allowed us all to go on a hike this morning! Lincoln's getting better about going at a good pace so we can all get good exercise. The dogs are wiped out, we had a fun morning outside, Lydia was a trooper, and we even saw something new on the trail: little frogs!When we got to the Ledges, I let Gretel off her leash and we told Lincoln that she needed to "get the wiggles out." Then Jenn said, "I know a boy who needs to get the wiggles out!" Lincoln knew exactly who she was talking about, so he started running around in the field. After a while, when we were back on the trail in the woods, he said, "I got the wiggles out. They're in the forest now."

Progress w/ Cereal

Grandma Laura and Auntie Haley are here for their visit and the grandkids are getting their Grandma time in. Auntie Haley was an all-star at keeping Lincoln busy on Tuesday... or was Lincoln keeping Auntie Haley busy... it was hard to tell.
Lydia began holding her own bottle this week!She also showed some progress eating her rice cereal. The video would be easier to watch if Auntie Haley wasn't laughing so hard while she was filming!

Now that's service!

Grandma Laura & Auntie Haley will be here later on today! Yea!
Jenn's birthday came and went and she received some very nice gifts from our parents. I was in Indianapolis two days before her birthday and brought back some Oliver wine as a surprise. Then last night we had a babysitter all lined up so we could go out with friends, but plans changed at the last minute, so we decided to go to the Melting Pot for a Big Night Out. It was fabulous.

Lincoln continues to amaze us. He's really been into Big Bird Discovers The Orchestra, and he even found a paper towel roll and an old Saran Wrap roll and put one inside the other so he could slide them and said, "Look! I'm playing the trombone!" He's also been brancing out from his John Deere movies to include the Life series. This started when we began calling them "Zoo Movies." So now he gets to learn about animals during lunch time. He loves it, and the stuff he remembers is crazy!

Lydia's a bit sick now. She's been running a fever off and on for the last several days, and been a bit more clingy than normal. She's sleeping well and eating well, so that's a good thing. She'll get past it soon.We started her on rice cereal earlier in the week. She hasn't yet figured out how to move the cereal from the front of her mouth to the back... it mostly runs out the front. Once she starts getting it, I'll post some before-and-after video.

Did you see the story about the Super Moon about a week ago? I read about it after the moon had risen off the horizon, so I couldn't do much with taking pictures, but this is what I got. Looks like typical moon shots to me, but I wasn't on a beach like the author of the story linked above.
I mentioned going to Indianapolis earlier this week. I received an invitation from a practice manager (the one who recently wrote the book on using social media in veterinary medicine) at a very progressive veterinary clinic to attend a workshop of the Veterinary Management Association of Indiana, and because I needed some extra CE, I made the drive over. It was really neat to talk business with clinics outside of the northeast Ohio area, and it was really cool to tour Broad Ripple Animal Clinic. They're doing some very cool things there, and they've given me some good ideas for Cuyahoga Falls Veterinary Clinic. The medicine and surgery that we practice is exactly the same, but the logistical things that they have in place are pretty clever.

We're looking forward to hosting our guests from the west!