Please Help!

Y'all might recall hearing me talk about a good friend of mine whose baby daughter was diagnosed with leukemia last year (was it really just last year?!!). Well, the baby, who is now 2, is hanging tough and doing much better, but the family still needs our help.

My close friend Melissa had to quit her job to care for her little girl throughout all her hospital stays last year and this year. Meanwhile, Dad hasn't had much luck finding work as a contractor. I guess it might be because of the current economic situation around here, where the zip code that abuts ours was recently reported to have the highest rate of defaults and foreclosures IN THE COUNTRY! Anyway, the family has been struggling to keep their heads above water, but unfortunately, their situation has not improved much since all this began, and they are now in danger of losing their home. They need all the help they can get. Please take a look at the slideshow below and give what you can. They have been through so much already.

To see the full screen, click on the little square within a square below the video.


To read more about Avery, click here to visit her Caring Bridge site.

Update: Click here to read a related article on the Denver Egotist, where their tagline is "Helping Denver Suck Less, Daily." Well said. :)

Another way to help!
Click here to visit the C.O.L.E.S. Foundation website and cast your vote for Avery in the Christmas Cash giveaway! Families must qualify to enter the contest, and the winner receives a monetary prize to help them out for the holidays.

Birthdays Galore

This month, Pumpkin and I took Giggles sledding for the first time. Getting there proved to be a bit of a logistical challenge because the sidewalks were dry, but the park was covered with snow so I couldn't pull them there in their sleds, but I also couldn't pull them all the way in the wagon because it wouldn't make it. I ended up having to load both kids in the wagon, carry 1 of the sleds, and have Pumpkin pull the other sled behind him. By the time we arrived at the park entrance (1 block away), I was beginning to think it might have been a bad idea to try this on my own, but I persevered.


I parked (read: abandoned) our wagon at the park entrance, and we proceeded from there via sled. The park entrance is shady, and thus very icy and slippery, and I nearly fell once or twice, but we finally made it to the hill. Giggles was very excited to be out in the snow, but unfortunately, her cute little snowsuit didn't quite stand up to the elements as well as I'd expected. Before I realized what was happening, the feet on her little suit had gotten soaked, and Giggles' own feet were very, very cold. Thankfully, a friend had brought her kids over to sled with us so I was able to leave Pumpkin with her while I rushed Giggles back home to change her into some warm, dry clothes. And yes, I had to pull her back to the park entrance in the sled, then transfer her over to the wagon, then walk home as quickly as possible without slipping, then shuck our wet clothes and boots at the door, then dry and warm her up, then rush upstairs to find new clothes, then dress her, then pull our coats back on, then load her back up in the wagon....well, I'm sure you get the picture. Needless to say, I was a fried and sweaty mess by the time our sledding adventure was over that day, haha. But it was fun!

November was also a busy month for us birthday-wise. We celebrated mine in the usual style (as per QT's incredible planning), and we celebrated friends' birthdays at the usual spots (Chuck E Cheese, kid gyms, Chuck E Cheese, etc), and we ate lots of cake.




Updated Video of Downtown Laredo

The picture quality wasn't coming out that great so I fixed the video up a bit. Consequently, the link in the previous post no longer works. Here's the new one.



Ajua! Viva Laredo!

Costume Parties, Downtown Laredo, and More!

Last year, I decided that, rather than go home for Thanksgiving, we'd go for Halloween instead from now on. By the time Halloween rolled around this year, though, I'd changed my mind and had decided to stay and enjoy all the cool goings-on around here instead.

Fortunately, Pumpkin and my family prevailed, and off to Texas I went with my kiddos. Unfortunately, Pumpkin came down with croup again shortly after we arrived, but he healed rapidly this time and a good time was had by all. (BTW, thanks again, Lulu, for helping him get better. Love ya!!)

I took the kids' warm weather costumes with us to Texas, and Pumpkin got to use his more than once, which was neat. To start with, we had a costume party at my parents' house the day after we arrived in Texas. It was really, really last minute, but it worked out great! Everyone wore a costume, we all pitched in with fun Halloween food, and the kids had a blast goofing off together! Here are some pics from that night. Pumpkin was a soldier, and Giggles was a ballerina (thanks again for the duds, Oz!).

Joining us were a princess, a corpse bride, some sort of death, a ghost, a dog, Dona Florinda, a medieval knight, a pig, a jockey, a ketchup bottle, a camper from Camp Rock, and a transformer. Oh, and my brother, the red grinch who stole Halloween. ;)

























Pumpkin spent most of the party on the trampoline at the house next door. ;)

A couple of days later, my sisters and I (and mom, and Coach Vic, and the boys) went on a Haunted Historic House tour that was being presented via trolley by the Webb County Heritage Foundation (pictured above). I think the boys were expecting something slightly scarier, but we all agreed it was a fascinating tour nonetheless. Below are pictures taken before the trolley arrived for us.



Wednesday, Grandma Toni took the kids to Peter Piper Pizza while I enjoyed lunch with a girlfriend at La India Packing Company. Yummy mole! Mmmm.

On Thursday, I took Pumpkin and his cousin D downtown to ride the free trolley just for kicks. We hung around the plaza for an hour, but the trolley never materialized! While we waited, we walked over to QT's grandparents' old house, which was sold about a year ago to a development company that's hoping to revitalize the San Agustin Plaza area downtown. I believe the house was never officially designated an historic property; however, repairs could still not be undertaken without approval from the Historic Building department. Their backyard had a stone wall that is supposedly the last remaining structure from a Presidio that stood here back when Laredo was still under Spanish rule circa 1700's. It looked to me like whoever bought the house was doing a nice job of fixing it up. Seeing it anew made me wish we could've done that ourselves, which is what QT had wanted to do.

After that, we headed back to the plaza, where I finally found out from the doorman at La Posada Hotel that the trolley had stopped running some months before, probably due to lack of funds. Well, pfffttt! Rather than call it quits and go home, the boys and I took off on a short shopping spree in the downtown shops. They picked up some nice loot then we headed out to visit the Lamar Bruni Vergara Environmental Science Center at LCC, site of the former Fort McIntosh and home to many an historic building of its own. There, we saw alligators, bobcats, foxes, raccoons, turtles, fish, and a javalin (um...I think that's wild boar in English, but I'd have to verify). They also had some interesting displays on the Rio Grande River watershed that Pumpkin and I enjoyed...though D perhaps not so much. ;)



Later that day, Pumpkin accompanied his cousins Van and Cass to a trunk-or-treating event at their school. They attend a private school, and I've gotta say, those private school parents hand out good loot because Pumpkin came home with a big bagful of all his favorite candy!

In between our running around, we ate most of our meals at my parents' restaurant and the afternoons and evenings hanging out with my sibs and their kids. Friday afternoon, my brother, his wife, and little D drove us back to San Antonio to catch our flight back to Denver. The boys played their Nintendo DS's all the way there, and I'm glad Pumpkin got to spend his last couple of hours in Texas playing with D, who's become a really good friend to him this year.

The Price of Negligence

We found out today that Pumpkin has 9 cavities! I think they said 9..maybe it was 7. I can really only remember 5 of them, but either way, it was a lot! At least 5 or 7 or 9 more than I would've expected. Four of them are where his molars touch, which boils down to 2 for the price of 1 since those 2 cavities end up affecting 4 teeth,

Because there are so many cavities to repair, Pumpkin will need to be sedated for the procedure. Because he has a history of RAD, the procedure can only be done in a hospital setting instead of at the dentist's office. So, the cost of our negligent parenting is whatever the cost will be for the hospital room, the anesthesiologist or whoever does the sedation, plus of course, the dentist herself. I'm still paying off the hospital bill from when Giggles was born, and now this. Damn.