Vernon Volumes text

Vernon Volumes text

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Choo Choo Train from the North Pole!



Connor has been dying to have a train table for a while now. When he was in his spica cast, Daddy took him to Toys 'R Us a few times and it was one of the first times Connor stood in his cast so he could play with the train tables on display. Every present he's opened this year, he's been convinced it would be the train that he's been waiting for. Grandma Anders got him a very nice travel train set that he keeps at her house, but he's still been waiting for the big one.

We told him that if he was a very good boy, Santa would bring him a train table of his own and sure enough when he woke up this morning there was a brand new table waiting for him!

He's been playing with it all day long and although he tore up the tracks once, he's done a great job pushing the trains around.

Coming down the steps to see the "Choo Choo Train" table.




Christmas with the Anders family



We celebrated Christmas with the Anders family this year in Odessa. We ended up with a VERY white Christmas, lots of snow with blizzard conditions. We ended up going a little more early than we originally planned to get ahead of the weather and we're glad we did.

Everyone exchanged gifts and we played games. We all got great stuff and Connor enjoyed playing with his cousins and with all the new toys.














Connor's Christmas Party at School



Connor's class had their Christmas party at school and Mommy and Daddy came in to celebrate with the kids. It was a pretty small affair, mostly just extra yummy snacks and some nice gifts. Connor made us some Christmas crafts and was very proud of them and excited to give them to us.

Connor was very excited about the cookies Mommy brought for the party.


Yummy cookie!!



Mommy and Connor.


Daddy with Connor


Our favorite picture of the day! Connor excited to give us the Christmas crafts he made!

Caroling with the neighbors


Connor and Mommy went caroling with the neighbors again this year. It wasn't quite so bitterly cold and there wasn't a ton of ice and snow on the ground so they went to quite a few more houses than last year.

Everyone seemed to enjoy it and it was a great way to get everyone into the Christmas spirit.

Our next door neighbor Mary Kate was awesome about carrying Connor around to the houses.



Mommy's getting pregnanter by the day and only likes to carry one child around at a time any more.

Connor loved the cookies and snacks that they had before going out in to the cold.


Merry Christmas!

Connor's school Christmas program



Connor's school does a Christmas program each year and this was Connor's first time participating. His class all dressed up as Christmas presents and sang a song about a Christmas tree.

We really didn't think there was any possible way that Connor would cooperate. The day of his program he was in a very cranky mood.

When we walked in to the auditorium, something about it rubbed Connor the wrong way. He didn't want to go near the seats and definitely didn't want to go up near the stage. We took him around to the stage entrance and he didn't want to wear his present costume and only wanted to be held. He only cooperated and wore his present after Miss Leah showed up and asked him to.

Connor looking very nervous beforehand.



Connor just wanted to be held the entire time.


Not happy, but posing with Mommy before the show.


Miss Leah (Connor's teacher) rounded up the kids right before the performance and Mommy and Daddy snuck back out to the auditorium. The kids were were led out on stage with the curtain closed and then it was pulled open.


Surprise! You're on stage kids!


Connor looked very surprised.


Connor didn't sing and spent the whole program with his hand in his mouth. Thankfully his classmate Jakie is not shy and super loud. The class did pretty well and all the kids actually stayed up on stage. Some of the older kids couldn't even manage that.


The video of the toddler performance. Enjoy!!


Grandma Genie, Grandpa Garry, Uncle Nate, Aunt Abby and cousins Drew and Allison came to watch the Christmas show with us. Afterwards we went to Chilis for some appetizers and snacks. We got one picture of the group and got a angry face from Connor in it. It's actually more representative of the mood he was in that night than any of the other pictures.


Thanks everyone for coming to watch Connor!

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Vernons come to KC for Christmas



The Vernons celebrated Christmas in KC this year. Grandpa Vernon, Grandma Alice, Uncle Alex and Alex's girlfriend Laura all came to KC to visit. Unfortunately Uncle Chris and (soon to be) Aunt Abby couldn't come.

We had a fun and relaxing weekend. We opened some presents, played some games, and ate a good deal of Italian style food (pasta at Buca and pizza from Papa John's).

Connor opening gifts.


Alex and Laura.


Grandma Alice and Grandpa Rick opening presents.



Connor opening presents with Mommy.


Opening gifts with Daddy.


After we opened presents, we went to the Plaza to eat at Buca De Bepo and then did a little shopping and looked at the Christmas lights and decorations. There were a lot of horse drawn carriages there and we thought about taking a ride on one, but Connor was absolutely terrified of the horses.





It was great fun, although there were quite a few pictures that everyone else took that we don't have yet, so more pics will probably be added later!

Tubes for Connor!

Connor had tubes put in both ears on Friday (12-18-2009). His speech has been a little unintelligible as he's been learning to talk, and thankfully since Andrea's a Speech Pathologist she knows a few things about speech/language development. We'd taken him to see the doctor about it and some early childhood educators, but none of them seemed too concerned and thought that while he may be a little delayed with his speech, it wasn't anything really worth messing with until he turned three years old.

Since we have spent so much on healthcare this year due to Connor's broken leg, we were close to our "out of pocket maximum" for healthcare and decided to get a hearing test done for Connor. We didn't really expect that they would find anything, but thought we'd rule it out, and if it was a problem we were hoping we could get it taken care of this year since it wouldn't cost us much out of pocket.

A couple weeks ago Connor took a hearing test and they found that he couldn't really hear anything under 35 decibels. The doctor found that there was a lot of mucus behind his ear drum and either because it was so viscous or because his Eustachian tubes were so narrow, it wasn't draining. After we got the results of the test, we would whisper to him, or talk quietly to see if he heard it and sure enough he didn't hear anything that was lower than a moderately loud conversational volume.

The doctor recommended tubes in both ears and we agreed that it needed to be done. We scheduled the appointment for ASAP and were able to get him in fairly quickly.

Early Friday morning we got Connor up and took him to the outpatient surgery center. We were pretty impressed that they were running on time and the procedure really didn't take very long.

Connor before the procedure.


Everything went well and the doctor talked with us after the tubes were in. Apparently Connor's ears were so gummed up with mucus that it clogged their suction device about a dozen times throughout the procedure. We had been second guessing whether it was really necessary, but after that conversation we realized that we'd done the best thing bringing him in.

We went back to the PACU, where Connor was waking up and he was not too happy.


We rocked him for a while and eventually he settled down. By the time we got him home, he was already feeling better and he's been a VERY good boy about letting us put his ear drops in. He's shown no major side effects from the procedure and the very first day he told Mommy and Daddy both that we were talking too loud. He can definitely hear better, although he's clearly not used to it yet.

Connor after we got home.


So far so good! The tubes are fairly low maintenance and after the first 3 days we really don't have to do anything special to take care of him or them. We're hoping this helps our little boy's hearing!