Unfortunately Wesley’s bike is just a little too big and even with the seat all the way down he couldn’t get his feet flat on the ground.  So he pushed himself around for a few minutes, but had trouble balancing because he had to lean side to side to reach the ground. We put the pedals back on and after just a few minutes he was riding around for short distances all by himself.

Here we are celebrating his first real ride on a two-wheeler:

And here we are shortly thereafter being attacked by crocodiles (They live in the rain gutter on the inner edge of the track. What you didn’t know?):

After that Wesley rode all the way around the track:

He was really, really pleased with himself.

He still has a few kinks to work out. This crash gave him a nice mark on his armpit that you can still see. He isn’t perfectly stable, but he is on his well on his way to being training wheel free!

After riding we spent some time playing baseball, running around and of course, picking flowers.

The head and the rock.

On Friday Amber was pushing Wesley on the makeshift swing (actually a tether-ball hooked to a tree branch) in our backyard and it came apart sending him, to quote Wesley, “like a bow and arrow” onto a large rock in the flower bed. He ended up with a gash on the back of his head. It wasn’t too large and Amber was able to control the bleeding in a few minutes, but it was deep enough to see the fat layer, so stitches were called for.

The Rock!

After a bunch of calls we ended up at the doctor’s office. The urgent care clinics around here wouldn’t take him because of his age and the emergency room was probably going to be both slow and expensive given our current insurance. The doctor managed to fit us in and get Wesley taken care of, but it took two hours all told. Wesley did great. For a kid terrified of getting shots he is the bravest thing you’ve ever seen when it comes to getting stitches. He’s terrified of it, but when it comes down to it he holds perfectly still.

As you can see he is doing fine now.  He really liked the green wrap and the way it made his hair look.

Back in full slug collecting mode.

For those of you keeping score at home, that makes 7 stitches in all for Wesley. Jillian is going to have to step up her game if she is going to regain her crown for the most stitches/staples. I guess whoever breaks a bone first, wins.

Aerial view of the park

The hike is on a wide gravel trail that leads down from the rather busy parking lot to a small playfield/picnic area and usually beach access. You drop about 400 feet over 1.25 miles as you descend into the gulch. Most of the trail is pretty moderate with a few steep sections, some of which have stairs. The kids managed to walk the whole way down, but rode pretty much the whole way up. Luckily they were fully rested when we got to the top (more than I can say for Amber and I) so they found the energy to swing and climb on the play structure.

Running down the hill. Lots of energy at the start.

Wesley and Jillian in front of a Douglas Fir on the trail.

Stairs on the steepest portion of the trail.

Amber looking beautiful as usual.

Wesley climbing what he named the "Monkey tree".

The trail is shaded most of the way and follows, more or less, the path of the creek. This time of year there are lots of different plants growing along the trail. We had to have a talk about stinging nettles. I’m sure it won’t be our last.

Bleeding Heart. These were everywhere.

A new fern.

Horse Tails. The trail was mostly dry but surrounding areas were damp.

Holding hands to keep them moving.

Almost at the bottom, Jillian decides she will go no more.

The face of passive resistance.

At the bottom, just past the ranger’s residence, we took a little break at one of several picnic tables and ate some granola bars and cooled off with some water. Jillian picked flowers and Wesley and I played Frisbee.

Even though the beach access is currently closed it didn’t stop a lot of people from climbing under, over or around the fence and heading down there anyway. We decided not to since it was closed to protect the salmon in the stream. What amazed me most is the number of people who got to the bottom and seemed surprised that it was closed. This despite the fact that it has been closed for months and the dozen or so signs at the trail head. It should open in June as they are able to dredge some of the creek without hurting the salmon. Upstream development has caused it to silt up to the point that they had to remove the trail under the train tracks that leads to the beach.

On the way back up the trail Jillian rode in the Ergo on Amber’s back. I carried the backpack and Wesley on my shoulders. We still passed a bunch of people, but boy was I sweaty. The kids were well rested and enjoyed swinging and climbing on this cool toy.

Hanging out in the "spider's web".

Hi Dad!!!!!

In the Urgent Care, Avery Ranch, Austin, TX

Medically speaking, the last week has been kind of traumatic for Wesley. We started out last Saturday with Wesley taking a tumble and cracking his head on the door jamb. There was a lot of blood (but we managed to get it out of all the clothes!)  and we just couldn’t get it to stay closed even with butterfly bandages.  We weren’t sure if he’d need them, but we took Wesley to an urgent care and sure enough he ended up with three stitches. Amber was babysitting for a friend so Wesley and I drove out to the nearest place open (about 25 minutes away) and actually had a pretty good time. We talked and goofed off, looked at fish at the Chinese restaurant next door, drove around looking at Christmas lights and of course had ice cream when we got home. He did really well, by which I mean he screamed bloody murder when he was getting the stitches and anesthetic (two shots), but didn’t struggle.

Looking at his stitches the next day.

On top of the stitches we also had Wesley’s four year checkup scheduled. Wesley hates going to the doctor’s office because he hates getting “pokes”. At four years there are a bunch.  In all he ended up getting 5 shots and two flu spray mists up his nose.

Wesley’s checkup went fine. He is growing well and aside there were no concerns.

• Weight: 38.75 lbs (75th centile)
• Height: 41.25 in (75th centile)
• BMI: 16.0 (65th centile)

We were surprised to learn that at 4 they also do urine and blood work.  If you think getting a shot is terrifying, getting blood drawn is much, much worse.  At first Amber tried to hold Wesley in her lap, but he was struggling too much so I had to hold him. He is getting so strong!  I was a little afraid he’d snap a bone the way he was struggling. Imagine the shots for that. Again he screamed like you wouldn’t believe, but once it was started he actually watched the blood being drawn and had lots of good questions.  And it wasn’t all bad. He got to pee in a cup!

We made a "Not at home" rule for peeing in cups.

On Friday we had to go back and get the stitches removed. By this time Wesley was terrified of going to the doctor. He even started begging me to take out his stitches at home, which I probably would have done had Amber been home to help hold him still.  Plus one of his vaccines (DPT we think) had caused his leg to swell up so I wanted to have it looked at. His poor left thigh is about 1.5 inches bigger around than the other. It is stiff and quite warm. The doctor looked at it and said it occurs in about one in thirty vaccinations (though it is getting less frequent since they have changed the composition of the shot). I had the same reaction in my arm to the same shot a few years ago (a booster I got while working at the UW) so I guess it’s genetic.

So for those of you keeping track:

• Shots: 7 (5 vaccines, 2 anesthetic)
• Sprays up the nose: 2 ( 1 per nostril)
• Blood draws: 1
• Stitches: 3 (six pokes in all: in one side, out the other)
• Unusual and painful reaction to a vaccine: 1
• Pees in a cup: 1

At first we just trudged through some mud and didn’t get too wet or dirty.

Check out the mud caked to her shoes.

What is Jillian pointing at? Vultures. Lots of vultures.

We saw at least 50 vultures on two towers.

We were staying pretty dry until we crossed the creek. Because of the rainfall the creek was running higher than usual.  The only thing to do? Fall in of course.

Wes fell in a hole and got really wet.

Once you get wet you might as well get muddy.  Really, really, really muddy.

This was just the start.

Time lapse of the kids in the big mud puddle.

We had a fabulous time. We stripped the kids naked before they got in the car and had to tie Redmond in the back of the wagon to keep his muddy self off the seats.  I hope it is muddy next time we go.  A lot better than the trips in the 100F+ temp this Summer.

Well, we’ve finished the fourth week of our HundredPushups workout plan.  So far I can say we are both feeling the difference, but I doubt that either of us will be able to do 100 consecutive pushups after we finish the last two weeks.  Maybe I’m wrong, but it doesn’t seem possible.

That isn’t to say we aren’t making progress.  We certainly are.  Last week alone Amber did a minimum of 231 pushups and I did 449.  Will we make it to 100 in a row?  I’ll let you know in two weeks.

The site, hundredpushups.com, has a simple concept.  It provides a plan for training just about anyone to go from being able to do just a few to being able to do 100 consecutive pushups.  The site uses a well known method of increasing and decreasing numbers of repetitions in a set.  You do pushups three days a week, some days doing more and some days doing a few less, but on average for the week you increase total numbers of pushups.  For example I do at least 152 total the first week and at least 740 the last week (not counting the final 100 pushup test).

Amber and I started the program this week as a way to mix up our usual workouts.  It provides an attainable goal and a little bit of a push without having to do any planning or thinking at all.  It is easy really.  You just start with the test, then use the results to figure out which of three plans you should follow.  Now do the exact number of pushup repetitions and sets the site says.  At the end of six weeks you go for it to see if you can reach 100 pushups without stopping.  I’ll let you know how it turns out in the end.

Other sites with similar, single fitness purpose:

Situps: twohundredsitups.com

Squats: twohundredsquats.com

Running: Couch-to-5K

Mat recommended we head up to Mount Bonnell.  A peak that is commonly believed to be the highest point inside the Austin City limits.  At 785 feet above see level it is actually much lower than the Jolleyville Plateau (1100ft).  The difference is that Jollyville doesn’t feel high.  It’s just a large flat area coverd in houses and strip malls.  Bonnell on the otherhand has a 200 foot cliff overlooking Lake Austin.  It gives the impression of being up high mostly because it is dramatically higher than the lake below.

We parked near the top and “hiked” up several flights of rock steps that lead to the top.

From the top you can see the lake, the relatively well known bridge over Loop 360 and the skyscrapers of downtown.  All along the lake are crazy expensive houses like this one:

It was windy on top and more hazy than usual.  Wesley led us around the many trails in the woods surrounding the peak.  He was sure he had found a shortcut.  In the end we were just walking in circles, but still had fun.

After working up an appetite hiking we went to dinner with the Godfreys.  We went to the Tokyo Steak House in Round Rock.  Chris and Tiah had been there before and thought it was lots of fun.  My understanding is that it is a lot like Benihana.  It is teppanyaki style where you are seated around a grill and the chef prepares your meal while making a great deal of noise and show.  It is kind of spendy, $70 for the two of us (the kids shared our food) and we don’t drink alcohol, but fun.  All the kids had a good time and were pretty enthralled by the cooking.

I wouldn’t say that I’d go on a regular basis, it was too loud and too spread out to have much of a conversation, but it was definitely entertaining. The food all kind of tasted the same (which I guess makes sense since it is all cooked together), but it was still pretty tasty.  We were also a mellow group.  I think this is the kind of experience that is improved by a rowdy crowd that’s been drinking a bit.

Here is a video of Wesley’s reaction to the chef lighting a bit of oil on fire.  He also really got into the onion volcano turned steam train.

– “That made me laugh!”" –

Does she look malnourished to you?

Last Thursday we had our visit with the pediatric dietician.  We drove all the way out to the new Dell Children’s hospital (which by the way is in not very subtly shaped like a church with a tall steeple) on the recommendation of our pediatrician.

The dietician, Megan, was friendly, but wondered why we were there.  She actually asked us “Why is she here?” and said “When I walked in I thought I had the wrong room.  Because she doesn’t look the kids I usually see.”

When all was said and done she agreed that Jillian is fine.  She is small (3% for weight, 5% for height, 15% for head circumference), but growing.  She is clearly doing fine and is getting enough food.  Megan reviewed the food journal Amber has been keeping for the last few weeks and was impressed by the number of and variety of foods that Jillian happily eats (like peas and bell peppers for instance).

She had two recommendations for us:

1. Give her a little more healthy fat (this morning I sprinkled a little olive oil in her oatmeal)
2. Find a new pediatrician.  (Sort of the same feeling we got from the cardiologist)

At this point we’ve had two specialists tell us that Jillian is fine.  She is small, but fine.  And that our pediatrician should not have sent us for a visit, especially since Amber and I weren’t worried.  They’ve have also hinted (cardiologist) and told us outright (dietician) that we might consider a new doctor.  So we are.  The new doctor will be number four since we’ve moved to Austin.  If you have a good recommendation on a pediatrician in Austin I’d be glad to hear it.  We had a fabulous one in Seattle I’d happily refer you to if you need it.

Jillian has an innocent murmur.  Basically that means it is small, harmless, and actually pretty common.  Our doctor recommended we see a specialist mostly because of her size.  The murmur (basically a leak between parts of the heart) won’t affect her in any way.

Here she is getting an EKG.  She did pretty well except she wanted to pull off one of the tabs:

Here she is getting her blood pressure taken with the world’s tiniest sphygmomanometer:

:

What we don’t have any photos of is the 30-40 minute long ultrasound session.  She had to sit very, very still for a very long time.  It went better than I would have expected.  Wesley would have jumped off the table, run down the hall, and hopped in the elevator after 5 minutes.

All told we were there for about 90 minutes.  The result:  You have a beautiful, active, baby with a common innocent murmur.  It isn’t affecting her size.  Next, we are off the to nutritionist. Who will probably say the same thing when we tell them she eats as much food as Wesley and often more.