While the month may have started out great, it didn't end particularly well. The night before Thanksgiving Becky came down with the stomach flu and had to spend Turkey Day home alone while I took the kids to her Dad's in the afternoon and my Aunt's in the evening. On Saturday she started feeling better, but then both Kyla and Blake caught it. Kyla's recovery was swift for the most part, but Blake was pretty lethargic for days. I finally got it Sunday night.Fortunately my mom came to visit and helped us get through it. She ended up staying with us for five days and I'm not sure how we would have managed without her. For all of her generosity she was rewarded by coming down with the bug herself, though she only dealt with it for a day or so.
Kyla is now learning to write words. She started with "Mom" and "Dad" as well as her own name. Since then she's been able to write a number of short, phonetic words.
Blake's sleeping habits have shown some improvement, though it doesn't take much to cause him to have a bad night (teething, illness, etc). As with Kyla, these advances have tradeoffs in the form of being more difficult to get to sleep in the first place. Basically what Becky and I have gained in sanity we've lost in free time.
The holiday season has officially begun (to me the official start is Thanksgiving, which means that is the first day I will listen to Christmas music without cringing). Despite our being hit with sickness right off the bat, I think we're in pretty good shape. Becky has a big jump start on the shopping and I don't think we're too overloaded with commitments. Becky and I have been a little afraid of the holidays after last year was so difficult, but was when we had to deal with my grandmother's death, planning a big 30th birthday bash, and some very snowy weather during a time when a good night's sleep was impossible to come by.I have faith that this year will be better and I'm looking forward to enjoying the end-of-year festivities.
