june 3

we had a nice, slow day at home today.  this moment cracked me up.  brooke and gavin were both pretending to be cats drinking milk out of their bowls.  this is totally something hanna would do, so i texted the picture to anastasia :)

june 2

brooke played such a great game today!  she ran up and down the field the entire game and scored tons of goals!  i loved to see how aggressive she was in going after the ball.  her soccer skills have really improved in the last couple months!  we are so proud of her.  today was brooke's last game of the spring season.  we expected to be in chicago celebrating pierce & london's birthdays, but we ended up being in town due to gavin's injury.  we treated brooke to graeter's after the game to celebrate her great soccer season.  we continued the celebration into the evening with a nice outdoor fire and some s'mores.  i'm feeling grateful for so many things today - that gavin is ok, that brooke is excelling at a sport that she enjoys, that we have each other, that we have simple days like these that are filled with so much love and joy.  we are blessed.

june 1

tonight kevin and i unwound from our week with this pretty bottle of champagne.  we are more than ready for this week to be over!

may 31

thankfully when we awakened in the hospital this morning, gavin was feeling much better and able to keep food down.  we met with a team of doctors and nurses who told us that neurology disagreed that there was any blood on the membrane.  but blood or no blood, it was clear gavin had a concussion.  they reviewed after-hospital care and restricted activities and then discharged us from the hospital.  gavin rode on kevin's lap in a wheelchair as they were pushed out of the hospital.  i was so happy to see gavin smiling.  i am so grateful that he is going to be okay.

we were all so happy to leave the hospital, and we went straight to get brooke from heather's house.  brooke and stella had had a great time together, and stella did not want brooke to leave :)  but, we had important things to do so off we went!

the most important thing for gavin right now is to rest, so we made sure that we got him home for a good nap.  meanwhile, i got brooke ready for her dance recital while kevin made an early dinner.  kaye arrived, and we all quickly ate and then brooke, kaye and i were out the door and headed back to uc clermont.  kevin stayed home with gavin so he could get as much sleep as possible.

i was so happy to be able to be with brooke on this important day and know that gavin was going to be ok.  so much has happened in the past 36 hours!  but we put all that aside and made sure brooke had a special night.  it was a very nice evening, and we took a lot of pictures before the recital.  gram vicki, aunt heather, uncle danny, stella and ba kaye all came to see brooke dance.  kevin and gavin arrived just before the recital started.

it was a wonderful recital, and brooke danced her heart out!  it made me so proud to see her up there on that big stage doing every single dance move, this time from memory!  it felt good to sit in that audience surrounded by family, especially after all that we'd been through.  

may 30

today was the scariest day of my entire life.

this morning the kids and i met two girls from my book club (emily & ali) and their kids at woodland mound to go the the water park.  we got there a few minutes early, so brooke and gavin began playing on the playground outside the water park.  emily, tom and sarah were there, too.  emily and i were chatting when gavin asked me to come down and push him on the swing.  i made my way down to the bottom of the playground where brooke and gavin were both on swings.  i was swinging both of them as i've done so many times before.  brooke asked me to swing her higher so i gave her two hard pushes and then switched and gavin gavin a big push.  their swings were side by side so i could alternate my arms almost without looking.  as my hand left gavin's back, i saw that he was not holding on.  his arms were extended straight out, and i heard him saying "superman!" as my heart hit the floor.  i yelled to him to hold on!!!! but it was too late.  an instant later he fell straight back off the swing onto this head/back.  just a few moments before i had been admiring the super soft synthetic bark that lined the playground, so i honestly thought that gavin would be just fine.  i thought he would shake off the fall just like he always does.  but he didn't.  i ran the few paces to him, and he was screaming.  i held him tight and tried to calm him, but he wouldn't stop crying.  that's when i knew something was really wrong.  i wanted so badly for my boy to be ok, but i knew he was hurt.  he never cries for more than a few seconds.  when i asked him where it hurt, he pointed to the back of his head.  my heart dropped even further.  not his head...!  i asked him to try to stand, and he couldn't.  he was dizzy.  he immediately put his head on my shoulder and tried going to sleep.  i wanted to keep him awake, so i carried him out of the sun and back up to the top of the playground under a big tree.  emily was by my side, and i was doing my best to stay calm.  i had gavin drink a juice box to see if some hydration would help.  it didn't.  i started to panic a little inside.  i called gavin's pediatrician, and they told me to bring him right in.  my friend ali had just arrived, and she offered to take brooke to the water park while i took gavin to the doctor.  surprisingly, brooke chose to stay with my friends whom she barely knew!

i drove gavin to the doctor as safely as i could while also trying to keep him awake.  i've always heard that you should not let someone with a head injury go to sleep.  i was so scared and worried, and i was alone.  i wasted no time.  i didn't call anyone.  i just drove and talked the entire way.  i asked gavin what his name was and what my name was.  thankfully, he answered all of my questions correctly.  we quickly arrived at the doctor's, and as soon as we walked in gavin threw up all over the floor.  then i really panicked.  they rushed us right back to see the first doctor they could find.  i still don't even know her name.  gavin was really not doing well at this point.  he was so pale, and he couldn't keep his eyes open.  he was laying on the examining table, and i was praying silently for help.  the doctor told me his reflexes were good, his pupils were dilating and there was no blood in his ears.  thank you, God.  i was frantically asking if he could go to sleep because i literally could not keep him awake.  she said he could sleep, and that calmed me ever so slightly.  she told me he likely had a concussion, and she wanted me to take him to Children's immediately for a CT Scan.  i carried my sleeping baby out of the doctors office and started crying so hard.  i was so overcome with emotion.  i truly felt like there was a black cloud hanging over my head.  like everything that could go wrong was going wrong.  very, very wrong.  i called kevin who thankfully was working from home that morning.  i quickly told him what was happening, and i swung by the house to pick him up.  i called my sister sobbing and told her what was happening as well.

when kevin and i pulled into Cincinnati Children's Gavin awakened and seemed a little bit more himself.  we had to wait a little while for the CT Scan, and then they sent us home to wait on the results.  we had been home maybe 30 minutes when the pediatrician called with the results.  the radiologist thought there might be a very small amount of blood on the membrane adjacent to gavin's brain.  as a precaution, they wanted us to take gavin to the ER and be admitted.  so we did.  i called ali & emily and made arrangements for heather to pick brooke up and take her for the night.  we packed a bag and left for the hospital.  we talked to many different doctors and nurses in the ER, and we were finally taken to a room much later than i had hoped.  the doctors were optimistic that everything would be fine, but they wanted to make sure that gavin didn't have any more vomiting.  once settled in our room, we fed gavin some juice and some jello.  within ten minutes i could tell he was not doing so well.  gavin was cuddled up with kevin in the hospital bed and looked too pale.  a few minutes later he vomited.  our optimism deflated.  kevin and i were scared.  so. very. scared.

the nurses decided to put in an IV so gavin did not get dehydrated.  this was gavin's first time in the hospital and his first IV, and i wanted to wish it all away.  i did not want any of this to be happening.  but gavin was so brave.  he didn't even cry as they poked around to find his vein.  my poor boy.  how had i let this happen to him?  how did i not protect him?  it is my job to keep him safe, and i failed.

i slept in the hospital bed with gavin, and kevin slept on the pull out chair.  i held gavin close and prayed that he would be ok.

may 29

tonight family joined us for brooke's dance rehearsal at uc clermont.  since they limit tickets to the actual recital, the rehearsal is open to everyone.  brooke was so happy to see her cousins, aunts, uncle and grandparents!  it's special for all of us since no one was able to see brooke's first 2 dance recitals because we were in seattle.  brooke sat with her dance class through the entire rehearsal and did a great job practicing her routine and grand finale.  she loved every minute of it!  unfortunately, kevin was on his way to the rehearsal when his car unexpectedly broke down in mariemont :(  so far, this isn't shaping up to be our week!!!  i had to wait until the rehearsal was over so i could take brooke with us to pick up kevin in mariemont.  we were able to salvage the night with dinner at the dilly deli, while the towing company took kevin's car in to be fixed.  what a night!

may 28

after a fun-filled, busy holiday weekend, we took it easy today.  lingered in our pjs, relaxed at home and had a healthy lunch... well, gavin did anyway :)

may 27

we are kicking off summer the right way!  on friday after brooke's last day of school we went out to mt. orab to go swimming at bar bar & gigi's, and today we headed north to dayton to go swimming with ba kaye & bob bob.  the weather has been so hot, and we're anxious to make the most of our summer in cincinnati.  we have lots of swimming on the agenda!  i'm hoping that brooke and gavin will be swimming on their own by the end of summer :)  today we had a great time in the pool, and we had another seafood boil - this time lobsters!  what a treat!  this is what i call a great memorial day weekend!

may 26

i was so happy to be in town this year for randall & antje's annual crawfish boil!  it's been three years since we attended - the last time being when gavin was just several weeks old and we were on our way to seattle!  it was a hot & sticky night filled with friends and kids and yummy food.  my book club was strong in attendance this year, and we had a good time catching up with everyone.  brooke and gavin played with reese and evan most of the night.  gavin and evan were making "bad guy soup" in the bird bath in the backyard, and brooke and reese were running around trying to determine if the stories randall was telling them were true.  it was wonderful to see the kids having so much fun together.  no one wanted to leave when the party was over :)

may 25

brooke's last day of preschool... EVER!  wow.  brooke has been in daycare/preschool since she was 18 months old.  i remember how hard it was to send her to daycare.  i also remember how much we all ended up loving it and feeling like miss kimmy and miss becky were part of the family.  brooke went to the "zebra room" at CFC for one year.  then we moved to seattle and i got to stay at home, but we still wanted brooke to have an outlet outside of the home where she could develop socially and emotionally.  we were lucky enough to have SRELC right in the middle of our community, and we sent brooke there 2 full days/week for 2 years.  the school connected us to the community and a wonderful group of families who became some of our closest friends.  we all loved miss april & miss maxine who brooke was lucky enough to have as teachers for 2 years in a row.  it was hard leaving that school, too, but i had already learned to look at it as a new beginning.  so, we moved into our new house on friday, september 9th, and brooke started pre-k at mt. washington presbyterian on monday, september 12th.  i remember dropping her off on the playground that first day and watching from the car as she ran around the playground.  she literally did not skip a beat.  brooke had a wonderful year and made great friends.  mrs. lees and mrs. beck were great teachers and encouraged brooke not to be afraid to fail... to attempt everything and solve her own problems.  brooke has grown so much this school year.  i'm so proud of her, and i know she is most definitely ready for kindergarten!