A BIG Day for Our Family

Yesterday was a big day for our family in so many different ways.  The boys and I left the house at 8:30 am and drove into the garage at 5:40 pm.  Traffic was horrendous everywhere we went yesterday so that made for a big day of driving for me and we hit some pretty major milestones yesterday. 

But first, our park day was yesterday.  Both boys had appointments at Children's Hospital in the early afternoon, but they wanted all the paperwork from Swedish so we had to chase that down in the morning.  I had called a couple days ahead so Swedish had it all ready to go and I just had to sign for it, but the downtown traffic in Seattle was so crazy that we ended up waiting two or three traffic lights per light on most of the lights and with all the construction and go-slows on I-5 there were a lot of people taking "alternate" routes through the city. 

After finishing up at Swedish I called Bryan and asked if there was a way around going on I-5 to get to the park we wanted to go to, since I-5 was stop and go for several miles south of the bridge and we wouldn't have had any time at the park.  He gave me a great route around, but it went right through the University of Washington and let me tell you, those roads are CONFUSING!!  There are so many "Y's" in the road that it takes a bit to figure out which road you're really supposed to be on--especially when everyone seems to be using those roads as an alternate to I-5.  But we got there and had 45 minutes to eat lunch and play for a couple minutes before needing to be at Children's.  (To give you an idea, I had planned for an hour and half for lunch/playtime.)

We went to the Warren G. Magnuson Park, only about five minutes from Children's Hospital.  It is the second largest park in Seattle and used to be an active military base, but is now just a park, though it looked like there were still people living in the barracks.  It is a huge park and we didn't have nearly enough time to do it justice.  The playground was lots of fun, and one of the bigger playgrounds we've been to and the quick drive we did down to the beach looked like it would be a great walking place.  Some of the things I read about that we didn't have a chance to discover were the sculptures and the old military equipment.  Someday I'd love to go back and spend at least half a day exploring and playing around there.

It felt sooooo good to have a picnic lunch in the sunshine--one of my favorite things to do during the summer that we just haven't had much of a chance to do yet.

Because I have a picture of Micah in a swing at every playground we've been to.

Brandon was so proud of himself for being able to go down the fire pole by himself.

Brandon is starting to really enjoy "helping" Micah play--Micah still needs some convincing at times.

This is the biggest teeter-totter I've seen around here.  When we arrived there were probably close to 20 kids on it.

Being goofy and adventurous and trying to ride it backwards.  He does this with every teeter-totter.

Micah thought it was the best ride ever when I made them both go air-born a little bit.

This one just cracks me up!

 When we got home, since the boys had done so much sitting, we played outside for a while.  Another BIG accomplishment for Micah was that he got himself into a sitting position from laying on his tummy for the first time.  He wasn't quite sure what he had done at first, but was convinced it was a good thing with all the praising I gave him.

And the BIGGEST news of the day was for Brandon.

...DRUM ROLL PLEASE...



Brandon has officially graduated from wearing braces!!  I was completely astounded, shocked, and VERY trepidatious (is that a word?) when she told me.  I looked at her and said, "You know this is terrifying me right now, right?"  Bryan and I have our serious doubts, but are willing to give it a try.  Brandon needed some convincing at first.  Night-time for him means braces and teddy, so at first he correlated the two and was very worried that he wasn't allowed to sleep with teddy any more either.  Once we got through to him that he may still sleep with teddy, just his braces were going away, he calmed down considerably.  He was pretty excited about it last night, but still asked when he was going to get to wear them again.  I think it's going to be quite the transition for him. 

The doctor was very convinced that his feet are doing extremely well.  She watched him walk, run, played with his feet and said he could be finished with the braces and she didn't want to see him for a whole year!  In my mind, with someone who has already had to be recasted, this is jumping the gun a bit and then not to see him for a whole year after taking the braces away doesn't seem very prudent, but she said if we see anything we're not happy about then we should bring him back in.  She also said (NOT to be repeated to Brandon because of his obsessive nature these days) that if this doesn't work it is tendon surgery because we've already tried the recasting and braces won't do a whole lot at this point any more.

And that brings us to the end of our very busy, very exciting, and very emotional week.  We are exhausted.  I had a whole list of errands to run and things to get done today, but since both boys have colds, and between the two of them I was up most of the night (I lost count after 6 times by 1am) it might just turn into a stay at home and decompress kind of day.

Whatever our day turns into, may your day be sunny and blessed.