A Boy and His Dog

As you know, we got a dog. Her name is Daisy and we have been very blessed by her. She was a great dog from the start, catching on quickly to the crate training and potty training thing. She is also quickly becoming JP's best pal. They play together constantly. She follows him every where with a toy in her mouth begging him to get down and wrestle with her. It really is something so cute to watch.....

And in other news....we have been having a great time doing all kinds of things and enjoying every minute of life. Pratt had shoulder surgery right before Thanksgiving and then Thanksgiving night Shelby, JP and I all came down with strep throat. For a family that is rarely sick or injured, we hit the big whammie!!! But, thankfully we all survived and Pratt's shoulder is getting better and better with each passing moment. He has full range of motion and about 7 weeks left with a strict order of no lifting from the doctor.

We decided to take it easy on Thanksgiving this year. In years passed we have tried to cram in all of our families and we end up running around like chickens with our heads cut off. It was a great relaxing day. I ran the Turkey Chase first thing and then we just chilled with our neighbors for the rest of the day until it was time to go to Papa and Grammie's for dinner.

Shelby is doing great. Next week is her last week of gymnastics and she is really getting so good. Her handstands and cartwheels have come along nicely and she always has so much fun. So naturally I assumed that she would want to sign up for another session, but she has decided that she wants to take tennis. We will see how this goes. She is growing so much and is learning like mad at school. This week she was able to bring home books from school to practice reading at home. This is huge and she loves to read to us while we are sitting on the couch. She is also moving along in her math work. She finished the pink cabinet which is the addition cabinet. She learned how to add all numbers and also did binomials; which is to help her get ready for algebra. Now she is in the blue cabinet which is the take aways. I still can't get over how big she is getting and how much she is growing up!!!

JP is doing great in school too. He is learning his letters and numbers and all sorts of other things. He really enjoyed learning about the solar system and space and would come home every day with some sort of fact about the planets, sun, etc. He is my talker and tells me everything that is going on and I love it. We did have a dental issue this fall. He had two cavities in is front top teeth. The first attempt to fill one was a huge failure. He did great with the little mickey mouse nose and was totally chill, but as soon as the dentist tried to work in his mouth he went ballistic!! So the dentist decided that we should try again and this time give him a Valium before the procedure. It was so funny to watch this drug slowly take effect and listen to all he had to say. When it was his turn he went back without a fuss, laid back in the chair, put the nitrous oxide nose on, crossed his legs and was one chillen dude. I thought that this would be a piece of cake, but once again when they tried to work in his mouth he went nuts; so, we ended up having to strap him down and then myself and the receptionist had to lay on him while the dental assistant held his head and the dentist worked in his mouth. For some reason I got totally tickled by the fact that it took 4 of us to hold him down....I mean, he is really strong and used every ounce of his energy to fight getting that filling. We were only able to get one cavity filled and for the time being the other one is being watched.