Halloween 2017

Halloween is one of Rhett's favorite holidays, which has made it one of mine too. This year we got in as much celebrating as we can (which means so. much. candy), and we had the best time.

 Making/finding Halloween costumes for Rhett has been so much fun (the UPS man of 2015 will always take the cake). This year I wanted him to get involved, so we settled on a robot a while ago and made the costume together. Putting those old diaper boxes and recycling to good use! His favorite part was the turbo boosters, which he showed off to everyone while we were trick or treating.  He was very specific that he was a worker robot, the RhettBot 4. If you pushed a special sequence of buttons on the front, it would initiate the "dance" sequence or the "invisible" ability. 

 For some reason, we have never carved pumpkins in 6 years of marriage. Blasphemy, I know. I think we tried a few years ago but gave up because it was too gooey. We finally did it this year, and it was so much fun. Rhett loved it, of course, and was so proud of the happy pumpkin he had been planning for weeks. 

 Tessa was a pineapple because she is adorable. 

Andre's mom had the idea to dress up the baby cousins like grandmas when Maura was in town the weekend before Halloween. It was a process trying to photograph two tired babies, but look at them! I still can't look at the pictures without laughing. 

 Are you kidding me??

rhett's surgery

(this post is for posterity, not to garner sympathy. and who knows, maybe someone googling "one-year-old dermoid cyst surgery" will find this helpful).

Our one-year-old is a plastic surgery champ! Rhett was born with a dermoid cyst in his right eyebrow. It grew but wasn't painful or really dangerous to him, but there was a risk it could get inflamed if he hit his head (which is basically inevitable for a toddler boy). Plus, strangers everywhere liked to comment on how he must have bumped his head, poor baby.

See? a cyst on his eyebrow

After months of meeting with doctors and specialists and our favorite Dr. John (it sure comes in handy to have a brother-in-law who is a pediatric ophthalmologist and first pointed our Rhett's cyst), Rhett finally had surgery on Tuesday. It was a pretty simple out-patient procedure and only took about two hours in the OR, but Rhett still had to get full anesthesia. He did great and the nurses said he was her favorite patient. The doctor showed me pictures of the cyst afterwards, and it was way bigger than anyone thought it would be, about 1x2 centimeters.

Pre-surgery with his stuffed animal friends. Rhett was a model patient!

A five-hour nap after we came home and he was good to go. His eye--not so much. The day after surgery his eye was swollen almost all the way closed, so he was a little wobbly in his walking. We went to story time and ran some errands and got lots of stares, but no one asked what happened. People of Colorado: my baby had surgery. I'm not a bad mom who pushed him down the stairs.

Evening of surgery day. Isn't this just the saddest face you've ever seen?

The morning after, when all he had to look through in his right was a little slit or nothing at all.

Now, five days later, the swelling has gone down a lot, but the bruising has picked up and the stitches are still there. I would post a picture, every picture I've taken in the last few days ends up as the back of Rhett's head. But trust me when I say that the doctor has everything is progressing nicely and he should be back to his adorable self in no time!

it's spring! let's be glad!

I should be working, because you know...deadlines. But it's a sunny Friday afternoon and I'm stuck inside listening to my baby refuse to take a nap and André has a long day at school. So instead I blog.

First, listen to this as you read. And then listen to all of their songs.

We've finally hit spring, and people, I am loving it! It's about time the weather got nice because this whole staying home with the baby thing + winter has given me a serious case of cabin fever. So Rhett and I are enjoying the weather and going adventures. Look!

Rhett went on the swings for the first time. He loved it, obvs. Total exuberance.

Just trying to play catch in the backyard. We're working on it.

Rhett sits in his stroller now instead of in his carseat in the stroller and he thinks he is just the biggest boy on the block.

A little stroll to watch the geese. Terrifying.

A selfie sesh after getting creeped at by old men fishermen at the lake.

So there you have it. And apparently Rhett only wears stripes.
(also, 10 points if you get the post title reference)