Austin's 4th Birthday

2 days after Austin's accident, he celebrated his birthday! 

He was so excited to open his presents after Matt got home from seminary.

 Austin got a monster truck, ice cream squishy (both things he had seen at the grocery store and wanted SO badly), fizzy bath color tablets, Paw Patrol bath puppets, and a bubblegum machine. The latter was actually to replace the one he got from Christmas and accidentally broke. He was so sad about it, and when I saw the gum ball machine was half what I paid at Christmas, we decided to get him another one.

We had a lot going on that night with baseball practices, so I decided to do Austin's cake during preschool as a special treat to share with his preschool friends.

Grandma also came and made his day by taking him out for a milkshake after preschool and giving him his present--a Paw Patrol helmet!

On Friday, I took Austin out for his birthday lunch, Chick Fil A, after his 4-year-old shots. He tried to be so brave for those but dissolved into tears after the first shot. :(

Austin's Accident

This entry hurts my heart to write. This is one of those moments that I wish I could rewind time. With that said, I know in the grand scheme of things this isn't a big deal and there are so many worse trials, but this still hurts my momma heart a lot. No parent wants to watch their child in pain.

2 Sundays ago, Austin and Bryson were taking a bath together upstairs. They typically only bathe downstairs in the large tub in our bathroom because there is more space. I'm not sure why they went upstairs to bathe, and I can't recall that they've ever taken a bath together upstairs. Our master bathroom gets the most use in the house, which I don't mind because then I don't have to do as detailed of a cleaning. The upstairs bathtub is pretty slippery though. I remembered after the accident happened that we bought a bath mat when we first moved into the house since we would bathe our babies in there, and we wanted it to be more safe. We have since thrown that bath mat out and that bathtub doesn't get used hardly at all.

I was downstairs playing a game with Caleb and Carter. Matt was up in the media room, checking in on the boys semi-often to make sure they were not splashing too much. Austin and Bryson love to take a bath together and usually spend about 30 minutes because they love to play together. Matt had asked them to get out of the bath numerous times as it was approaching bedtime. Finally they were obeying, and as Austin was getting out of the tub, he slipped and hit his mouth on the edge. There was a lot of blood, and it was difficult to ascertain the seriousness of the impact. Once Matt could finally look, he noticed a tooth was missing. The tooth fairy made an emergency visit and dropped off some money for Austin losing his first tooth. That helped a ton!

Just like Bryson, Austin was born with an extra front tooth so he and Bryson have 3 front teeth. Austin has an extra permanent front tooth in addition, while Bryson only has the extra baby tooth. The tooth that Austin knocked out was his extra baby tooth. Our next worry was if the tooth was actually knocked out or if it had been pushed up in his gum. (Bryson's best friend had that happen with his two front teeth due to a similar bathtub story.) Another worry was if the tooth broke and the root was still stuck up in his gum.

Austin calmed down pretty well. Though his mouth hurt, he said he didn't want any medicine. We thought he would wake up in the night in pain, but he slept all night. Matt got up 3 different times to check on him and make sure he was sleeping okay.

The next morning, Labor day, we called the emergency dental line. The on-call dentist took a look at the bottom picture and told us to wait a few days for the swelling to go down and then go in, so I scheduled an appointment for Wednesday. 

After looking at an x-ray, the pediatric dentist said that the tooth was completely gone (yay!) but also that his extra permanent tooth had cracked the root of the baby tooth next to it. She said to give it a week and see how it heals. She said it was possible to keep the baby tooth even though the root was cracked.

I prayed and prayed all week that it would heal well and that the gum would be strong enough to hold and keep that tooth. That may be silly to some, but I didn't want my baby to go around for the next 3 years with an even larger gap, not to mention the trauma of pulling out the tooth.

Unfortunately when we had our follow-up visit the next week, our dentist said that the crack had spread, the tooth was too wiggly, and it was starting to turn gray. It will be necessary to pull out the tooth. We are now waiting to hear back from a pediatric oral surgeon whether he will be willing to pull out the baby tooth plus the extra permanent tooth now. (We were planning on pulling out the extra permanent tooth at 6 years old.) The response will likely be that the permanent tooth is too fragile. Plan B is the dentist will pull out the baby tooth in the office with an oral sedative and laughing gas.

So more to come on this. To be continued...

About an hour after it happened--still managing a smile.

The next morning

x-ray showing the cracked root

(This is the 2nd x-ray showing how the crack had spread.)

Caleb's 12th Birthday

The last time I threw a birthday party for Caleb was when he turned 5 or 6, so when he asked for a big birthday party this year, I conceded. (He has seen how much money his other friends get at their birthday parties as gifts, which was the main motivation.) He enjoyed celebrating turning 12 with his friends a few days before his birthday at a trampoline park. He did get lots of money from his friends, which he has spent on buying new board games that we've enjoyed playing when we have a free night.

Singing "Happy Birthday"

The only gift he got from us this year is a new phone, a decision we debated over heavily. He is proving responsible so far, and we set up several rules together (discussing the why) as well as putting a timer on his phone of when it's available for his use during the day. He sure loves it, and it's nice to be able to communicate with him during the day--mostly just sending him a text to wish him luck on a test!

The Start of School

1st day picture: Bryson starting 1st grade and Carter starting 4th

Caleb starting 7th grade at a junior high school

Austin starting preschool

The start of school has been a breeze for Bryson and Carter. Bryson has his best friend, Dax, in his class, plus a handful of friends from his class last year, including Camdyn who is enamored with him and vice versa. I can't tell you how many entries in his writing journal were about Camdyn at the end of last year. "Who is your favorite person and why? Camdyn because she gives me hugs." Bryson is doing well in school so far. He also has matured since last year and hasn't had the meltdowns right before school about refusing to go when something sets him off in the morning like last year. (i.e. Me telling him to hurry too many times, Carter saying something that upsets him, Austin looking at him the wrong way...)

Carter has the same homeroom teacher as Caleb did when he was in 4th grade. They have simplified some things since Caleb was in 4th grade including less homework. I'm so grateful for that! One less thing to keep on top of.

Caleb has had a tougher adjustment this year. There is a stupid rule that in order to be in Athletics instead of P.E., you have to play football. We have heard that if you are in Athletics, the coaches know you better and your chances increase of making the other sports teams. Caleb plans to try out for soccer, basketball, and tennis and wanted to increase the odds of making the teams so he is doing football for the first time this year. Caleb is athletic and fast so we knew Caleb would be able to hold his own, but the experience so far has been more than Caleb bargained for. He wakes up every morning at 6:15, eats a light breakfast, and leaves for school at 6:45. I run him to school because he has a few busier intersections to go through. He changes into his football gear and has to be on the field at 7:20. They practice football for almost 2 hours and then they have 20 minutes for 150 boys to shower and change for the rest of the school day. Caleb also uses a portion of those 20 minutes to eat more breakfast that I pack him.

The first 3 days of practice were extra hard. I can only assume that the coaches were trying to weed out the weak, and Caleb was ready to throw in the towel. It's very hot and humid still, and when the sun comes out, it is not fun to be outside exercising. (I feel bad for the 8th graders who practice after school!) The workouts were so intense that kids were throwing up their breakfast each morning. Caleb absolutely hates the mouth guard, which is too large for his mouth (and most of the boys' mouths). You can choose to have it pushed all the way in and having the ends irritate the back of your mouth or leave a portion hanging out the front of your mouth. Caleb is a germaphobe--he took all lessons about germs from school to heart. So it drives him crazy to have sweat and snot dripping into his mouth guard while he works out, not to mention the grass and dirt that get on it from the up downs. Because the morning workouts are so intense, he said he would have a headache the rest of the day and sometimes have difficulty concentrating in class. (Water is provided only by the football coaches in big huge jugs, but I'm sure a reason for the headaches is not being hydrated enough. He says the water tastes nasty so I bet he doesn't drink enough water like he should.) He definitely has not been on his game this year in terms of schoolwork. He's in all pre-AP classes this year for the core classes, and I've really had to stay on top of making sure he is keeping up with his classes. So after the first week, he didn't verbally say it, but I knew he wanted to quit. We had to talk about how 1) being labeled a quitter would do nothing to help him make the other sports teams, 2) the difficult conditioning he was doing each morning would help him be a better athlete and get in better shape, and 3) how this was an opportunity to rely on Heavenly Father to help him. 

Now that the boys are divided into 4 teams, Caleb says the practices aren't as hard as the beginning of the year. This year was a learning experience. I didn't want Caleb playing football but also wasn't strongly opposed to it if he wanted to try it out. I don't see him choosing to play again next year! He made the C team--we were warned that anyone who is a smaller 7th grade would likely make the C or D team, which I'm fine with. I don't want him going up against or getting tackled by bigger boys!

Starting preschool with Austin was a lot more difficult than I wanted to be. Austin is an angel and very smart for his age, but there are some challenges with some other students in the class. 8 days in and things are improving. Day 5 of teaching though was the hardest day of any of the 6 years I've taught preschool! A combination of one child absolutely refusing to participate in activities, having a meltdown 1st thing in the morning when she didn't get her way about something and another major meltdown for the last 20 minutes of preschool with hysterical crying, and another child throwing up all over my carpet right at the end of preschool. It was a doozy, but then it can only get better from there...I hope.