broken boneS

Last Thursday Colin went to play football with some friends at a nearby neighborhood park.  There isn't a side walk he can ride his bike on and its a pretty narrow road (I've lost my side view mirror on that road hiting a mailbox when a truck was crossing the yellow line) So I dropped him off. Told him I would pick him up around 6 and if he wanted to stay later to call.  About 15 minutes later I get a call from Colin and all he said was "mom I slipped" I got in the car right away and his arm was hanging limp when he walked to the car.  So off we went immdediately to get it looked at.

Poor thing was in so much pain. They took us back right away and sprayed some medicine that starts with an F up his nose. They said it would make him a little loopy and he was out of it. Kept telling me about his little predicament. "What a predicament I'm in." "Mom I'm in quite a predicament" haha poor thing.

He definitely broke a bone.  So off we went to the main children's hospital where they had the orthopedic surgeon coming in just for Colin.

He got to watch the redskins lose while he got his cast on. They gave him the option of being put to sleep while they set the bone or they could give him this numbing block which would be just a small pinch and some pressure. He chose the numbing block but said if he were do choose again he'd definitely be put to sleep. Poor thing felt every bone.  I was standing in the hallway and heard them snap his bone back in place. I think that's why they have parents stand outside. 

He broke his wrist on a growth plate so we go weekly for xrays and hope that it heals right of they said they might have to break it again.  He will also not be able to try out for his schools basketball team this year.  He is really upset about that.  It took him a few days to start feeling better.  He broke it on a Thursday night and didn't go back to school until Wednesday.  He was so swollen and had sausage fingers and could barely move.

I gave him a bell to ring and Joel answers it every time.  I would've thought that would grow old but Joel jumps to help Colin.

Then on Monday this little princess decides to do a backbend in the yard and landed funny on her arm.  She has a buckle fracture.  She doesn't go to the orthopedic surgeon until Friday so she's been home with me until they decide to keep it splinted or cast it.  She really doesn't feel any pain unless she tries to move her arm palm up.

Colin says Norah has a fake break because he is still in so much pain and she's just as active as can be.

Joel will be wrapped in bubble wrap from now on because this mother cant handle any more broken bones.  Joel is actually living his best life because I told him he could just sit and play as many video games as he could this week.  No more going outside and breaking any bones!

Colin was walking to the bus stop his first day back and I heard one of the neighbor boys tell everyone "we must protect Joel" haha and yes please protect Joel.  Two kids with broken bones is more than I can handle.

camping

I sent that meme to my friend Amanda because she loves summer as much as I do.  And it meant perfect camping weather. We reserved two camp sites back during the summer and last weekend was our camping weekend. We went to First Landing State Park because we figured it was close enough if it was too cold that we could just drive home and leave all our stuff and then come back. We might be slightly scared from our 30 degree camping experience last year! ha!

  It was our first 2 night camping trip with the kids. I reminded Brent how we used to take college students in Colorado for 3 night backpacking trips and now we have a huge car loaded up with stuff.  Our fridge was leaking right before we left so I had forgotten in the midst of cleaning it up to bring brent a pillow and a blanket. So it was good that we were so close for him to go home Saturday morning and check the fridge and grab anything we had forgotten.

The weather was absolutely perfect.  Cool nights, but not too cold.   Warm days - warm enough that the kids went swimming in the water. We are getting more organized with camping.  We now have a big Tupperware bin in the attic with all our camping gear. Each time we realize what we need and don't need.  But the kids love it. And we all actually slept the second night - probably because we didn't sleep well the first night! The sunrises each morning were worth waking up and walking out to the beach.

We swim at this beach all summer so the kids were thrilled at all the tide pools that some storms had formed. We found some tropical fish and I think a sea slug? Still figuring out what that animal was. The tide pools were there the first day but the second day when we went out to the beach they were all dried up.

The kids loved our little hatchet we had gotten for Christmas.

Colin slept in the first sunrise but I talked him into coming the second day.  It wasn't as good as the first days sunrise.  And as he reminded me before  - he didn't miss the first sunrise because I showed him pictures.

A few minutes after this picture they were all soaking wet so we went back to the campsite and got their bathing suits on, packed lunches and spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach.  It doesn't get much better in October.

There was a dead pelican on the beach. It was cool seeing it up close.

Before we left we went around and marked on a map all the campsites that we could come back to. We had reserved two together but they were separated by trees. So we walked around to find a few options for our next camping adventure.  But that will have to wait until spring because we refuse to camp now when the temperatures are below 50.  Its still hard to believe that we camped in 30 degree weather last year.

And we picked the perfect weekend because fall weather has officially arrived and we've even turned the heat on in our house.  I think the reason we love camping so much is its nice to unplug from everything and just be outside. And having friends go with us makes it a lot more fun. 

Searching for pearls

On the last official day of summer we met Jeff and Sarah at Yorktown Beach for an afternoon of swimming and then a cookout dinner at Jeffs.

Colin took a nap on the beach, such a teenager.... or a tired from a sleepover boy.

Norah had collected oysters on the beach and said she was looking for pearls. We took them back to Jeffs to open.  Look at that sweet face. She was so excited.

With each open her face fell more and more.  Oysters are not only slimy and gross but none of them had any pearls in them.

She was crushed.  But we told her to keep looking and since then anytime we are at the beach she looks for oysters.  It also helped that Jeff told her he would eat tons of them at oyster roasts (which she thought was gross) but that none of them had any pearls either.

The perfect way to close out the end of summer!

Color me rad

About a month ago Colin asked to run the Color me Rad race with him. I looked it up and saw that they were coming to our area in September. So I signed us up.  Joel heard about it and wanted to sign up too.  So we began  training every night with Joel to get ready for the race.

The gave us these face masks which helped as we went through the color stations to not breath all the chalk dust.

This race is more for having fun. Its very laid back. At 8:45 they asked if we were ready to start. The official starting time was 9:00. Our wave was scheduled for 9:30 but we got in line because I figured why not since we were already there.  Joel had assured us he would run.  But from the start people were walking. So he walked. And then ran and walked and ran and walked. And why would anyone think that was fun?  He was dying. He hated it. It was not what he signed up for. It was a nightmare. I didn't prepare him for the race. And on and on. At some point colin  left us and ran ahead and Joel and I made our way to the finish line. Towards the end was this small little mound of ground (cant really call it a hill in va beach) but he saw the finish line, started yelling "I can see it! I can see it!" and took off to the cheering on of everyone around him.  

We were given packets of chalk dust to bring to the race but we kept ours so Norah could get us when we got home.  She loved it.  

The rest of the day Joel kept referring to the race as his marathon and I'm sure it felt like that to him.  He did run more than a lot of adults on this race.  

Colin is ready for a longer, more intense race with no walkers to dodge while he makes his way to the finish line. I'm going to need to train harder just to keep up with Colin's pace.