New cool stuff

Okay, haven't posted in over a year. This is mostly due to the the fact that Sarah and I now have Facebook accounts and do most of our online posting there, but those posts are transient, and don't have much depth to them.

So Both kids are now a year older and a year wiser. Kyler is talking now and just won't stop. In fact, it's almost like the two kids have completely reversed roles. Now Brayden will eat almost anything we put in front of him and Kyler is a super picky eater. This was completely opposite last year. On car trips, Brayden is now the quiet reserved one and Kyler is a jabber mouth. Oh what a difference a year makes.

Brayden is now in Kindergarten at a charter school called The Intergenerational School, or TIS. It derives it's name from the fact that the school is in the same building as a retirement community and the kids interact with the retirees on a regular basis. It's a very cool concept. Brayden had a hard time adjusting at first and had some discipline issues for awhile, but now he is doing very well.

Kyler is still attending Daycare and everyone that works there claims that they are "Kyler's favorite". He is super curious and super adventurous and if we take our eyes off of him for a second, he is gone and missing. It's lots of work, but he smiles with those big eyes and you just have to forgive him.

Sarah is continuing to be a top system's analyst at State Farm and continues to balance a full time job, a husband (me) who works crazy hours and two small kids with overactive imaginations. I still don't know how she does it and keeps her sanity. She's my hero. She is really excited (probably more than me) for my residency to be over next summer. Hopefully moving back to Michigan and being closer to family will help relieve some stress.

As for me, I'm just counting down the days till my residency is over. Don't get me wrong, I thing the training is top notch, but I am so tired of being a slave to many masters and feeling like just a cog in the wheel that is the Cleveland Clinic. I've had some interviews but no definite job yet. We'll see.

Random notes:

Today when I got Kyler up from his nap I detected an all too familiar oder from his back side... I asked him "Kyler... did you just make a stinky?" and he replied "No Daddy... I made a GIANT stinky."

We spent the weekend at Kalahari indoor water park/resort to celebrate Sarah's Birthday. It was LOTS of fun. While there, on two separate occasions I witnessed Brayden going out of his way to help a younger child that he didn't know in the kiddie pool. Once he helped a little girl climb up a slide so she could have fun, and on another occasion he asked the kids around him to not slide down the slide until a little boy had gotten out of the way of everyone. That kid impresses me.

Well, will update soon (I hope).

Bye

Wow, it has been a long time since we updated this blog.  So much has happened!  Here is a rundown of some of the fun things we have done over the past 6 or so months!

May 3rd Brayden turned 4 years old.  I can't believe he is already 4.  It seems like just yesterday we brought his home from the hospital.  Time sure does fly by!  

May 3rd - May 10th - Steve and I decided to surprise Brayden and take him on a Disney Cruise for his 4th Birthday.  We started planning it about 6 months in advance and kept it a secret until Friday, May 2nd after we picked him up for daycare.  He was so excited when we told him about it that he was literally bouncing up and down.  He was even more excited once we showed him the DVD that explained what the next 8 days and 7 nights would include.  We flew out at 7am on Saturday, May 3rd.  This was Brayden's first airplane ride, be he handled it really well.  Once we got on the ship he was all smiles and had a great time.  Our ship, the Disney Magic) went to Key West, Grand Cayman, Cozumel, and Castaway Cay.   When the cruise was over he didn't want to go home (do you blame him???).  We had a great time, just the three of us (Kyler spent the week with Grandma and Grandpa Grubaugh).  We are already planning our next cruise for when Kyler is older.

June 20th - June 25th - We headed up to Interlochen, MI to camp for a long weekend and attend the wedding of Matt and Abbie Ansorge.   The wedding was beautiful and it was a lot of fun catching up with friends.  Camping was a lot of fun also.  My (Sarah) parents brought up their 5th Wheel to the camp ground and we rented a cabin for the week.  Steve's parents lived in the area, so they came over every morning and spent the day with us.  It was so much fun and the kids really enjoyed themselves.

July 1st - Steve entered his 3rd year of his residency.  Only 2 more years.  I am so excited that we are 1/2 way through the residency.  It has been a tough 2 years, but very rewarding for Steve.  I am in awe of how much knowledge he has gained over the past 2 years.  I am sooooo proud of him.

We've done a lot more than what I have mentioned, but just can't remember everything.  We apologize for not updating more frequently.  We will try harder!!!!

One last note.  I haven't mentioned much about Kyler.  He is doing great and is getting REALLY big.  He is starting to look more like a little man and less like a toddler.  The chubby cheeks are disappearing...but his chubby legs are still there  ;)  He is 19 months old and keeping us very busy.  He is starting to talk more and running everywhere.  He brings a lot of joy to our lives!

Take Care!

Sarah

From the mouths of babes

Two quick things that Brayden told us this morning that we wanted to share with everyone. Last night I started reading "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" by C.S. Lewis to him and he really liked it. So much so that this morning, the first thing he asked me was if I could read more to him. So once I found where I left off, I asked him if he remembered what was happening when we stopped reading yesterday. He replied "Yes... I was going to bed!"

About 30 seconds after I stopped laughing, I clarified my question and he recapped the story for me. He was eating some oatmeal for breakfast and asked if he could have some crackers with it. I told him he needed to eat two bites of oatmeal first, but he said "Daddy, I already ate two bites!" Then I said "Oh, I changed my mind then, just eat one MORE bite and you can have some crackers." To which he replied, "Daddy, you shouldn't change your MIND! You should always keep you own mind!".

That kid cracks me up.

Adorable TidBits

Okay, next Dillon Family Update. First off, the picture above is Brayden sleeping on the couch (very cute). The next picture is Kyler just after his first Birthday with spaghetti sauce all over his face, and the picture below that is Brayden at the same age with spaghetti sauce all over his face. You can really tell that they are brothers.

Sarah is now working out of her new office in Warrensville Heights. It's just about as far away as her old office, but now it's all city streets, whereas before it was all freeway, so she's getting a lot less gas mileage. She is also doing a GREAT job of hitting the gym on a regular basis and she's finding that she has a lot more energy now.

I (Steve) has been on a relatively lighter rotation this past month which does not have any weekend or overnight call responsibilities. It's nice and there is a lot more free time, but I feel like I'm getting spoiled and I'm starting to dread going back into the main OR's in a few months.

Brayden and Kyler continue to do things almost every day that make us go "Awwwe". Just a few days ago, Sarah was picking up Brayden from day care and the report from day care was that he took a very good nap, so Sarah told him "Brayden, I'm so proud of you for taking a nap today!" Then Brayden replied, "Mommy, I'm so proud of you for letting me know that!" And then just this morning, Sarah wanted Brayden to try on some new pants that she bought for him and told Brayden that she had bought him something "special" for him and wanted him to come see. He responded with a very grouchy "It's just pants!"

Kyler is starting to get really fun as he is learning more and more communication skills. He gets so excited whenever I get home and he just sprints over to see me. He usually is holding some toy (or the TV remote control) in his hand and when he sprints over to see me, he usually offers it to me! He is starting to give kisses to me and Sarah and he absolutely LOVES to wrestle around with his big brother. We could spend hours just watching those to kids chase each other around the house and tackle each other. We have to remind Brayden not be too rough sometimes, but overall they play great together.

We recently had to have some major work done on the car which was not fun. It started off as just the "check engine soon" light came on even though the car was running fine. It turned out that there was about $1600.00 worth of work that needs to be done. Ouch.

Living in Cleveland, it's hard to be Detroit sports fans, so we went out last weekend and bought the whole family Detroit Tigers baseball caps. We plan on wearing them whenever we watch the Tigers on TV or hopefully we can make it to some Tigers/Indians games this year at "Progressive Field" (Formerly Jacobs Field) when they play there.

Kyler is ONE!!!!!

Wow, the year sure has flown by fast.  It just feels like yesterday that I (Sarah) was in the hospital giving birth to Kyler and now he is One year old.  

We celebrated his birthday on Saturday, his true birthday.   Grandma and Grandpa Grubaugh were here to help us celebrate.  We gave him his presents then did the traditional "first bite of cake" where he enjoyed making a mess.  All was fun.

Kyler is really getting big.  I took him in for his 1 year well child visit and he weighs almost 24 pounds and is about 2 1/2 feet tall.  He has been walking since Christmas so he is really bow legged, but the Dr. said that was ok.  He has had a tough few months health wise.  He seems to be following in his mommy's footsteps with non-stop ear infections.   I am just praying that he won't need tubes in his ears like had.  The Dr. has put him on a low dose antibiotic for the next 6 weeks in hopes that it will keep the ear infections away!!!!

Other than Kyler's birthday, there isn't much more to update everyone on.  Steve is finishing his 2nd year of his residency and is loving it.  Brayden will be 4 soon (May 3rd) and is loving asking "Why..." about EVERYTHING.  Rumor has it his daddy did the same as a little boy.  I just laugh when Steve gets frustrated.

I hope all is well with everyone else!  Take care!

- Sarah

Xmas Chaos, First steps and Resolutions.

Well, it's been a few months but here we are with another update on the Dillon Family.

Christmas was a lot of fun, but also a lot of stress as we had to coordinate traveling up to Michigan to see both sides of the family. This is not easy to do with two energetic boys! But in the end, it was fun for all. About two weeks before Christmas, Brayden told us that the thing he wanted more than anything else for Christmas was a "Transformers Helmet". He was referring to a toy helmet that looks like "Optimus Prime" the leader of the good transformers, that talks and changes your voice. Well we decided that we'd get it for him, but BOY was it hard to find. Since the transformers movie has been out of the theaters for so long now, the toys are not much in demand. We searched and searched and then we finally saw the helmet in a Toys R Us ad one Sunday morning. Well I called the store early in the morning and they told me they only had two left! I felt like a crazy person as I sped across town just to get my kid the one thing he wanted for Christmas, but the mission was successful and Brayden still loves his helmet.

Once we were up in Michigan, little Kyler did some pretty amazing things... most notably, he took his first steps! It was so much fun to watch him waddle across the room and the see the excited look on his face when he reached his goal! The only problem is, now he walks EVERYWHERE and tries to get into EVERYTHING. Including things that used to be out of his reach. So today, I went around the house and installed child safety locks on all the cabinets, and boy you should have seen the look of confusion on little Kyler's face the first time he went back to the Kitchen after the locks were on! It was priceless to see him try to open the cabinet and then look at me as if to say "Daddy, the door is broken!"

Brayden continues to amaze us with his ever growing intellect and powers of observation. He is also VERY protective of his little brother. So much so, that once when Kyler was crawling toward the stairway (mind you he was still about 12 feet away), Brayden sprinted across the room and tackled him so that he wouldn't hurt himself on the stairs. It was funny.

Sarah and I have made some new year's resolutions to live healthier so we both joined a gym. The biggest problem is that between work, getting the kids to daycare, keeping up with the chores at home and studying, we barely have time to go to the gym at all. Hopefully we find a way to get there regularly.

One last Braydenism for today. We asked him where he would like to go on vacation if he could go anywhere in the world. His response? "Grandpa Dillon's House!"

Niagara Falls

This past weekend we went on a mini family vacation to Niagara Falls.  This was the first time that we were to take the kids out of the United States, so there was a little added anxiety in packing to get ready to go.  I couldn't remember if we had ordered Kyler's birth certificate, but I was happy to find we had when I was looking in our safe.  We ended up not needing the kid's information, which was good.

Going into Canada was so easy.  We had to pay $3 and tell them where we were going, then were sent on our way.  Getting into the United States was a little tougher.  The border patrol guy had a gun on his side and asked us our citizenship, then asked if we had brought any food back from Canada, to which we both answered "No".  Then he asked Steve to unlock the doors and he opened the drivers' side rear door where Brayden was sitting with a Pizza Hut box on his lap!!!!!  We both quickly said, "Oh Yes, we just came from eating lunch", both sweating, wondering what trouble we'd be in.  Thankfully he didn't care and sent us on our way.

Niagara Falls was great.  We stayed in the Sheraton on the Falls, but had a city-view room instead of a Falls-view room.  We were ok with that, as we were only there for a night.  The Canadian, aka Horseshoe Falls, were VERY impressive...as were the American Falls.  The only complaint that we had was that it was bitter cold while we were there.  We remembered the boys' hats, but forgot gloves.  Kyler's little hands were very cold and red after just a few minutes outside.

We are planning another trip back when the weather gets warmer.  It is only 3.5 hours away, so it is a great, short vacation destination for us.

Take Care!