My Love Bug Gets a Tummy Bug

Poor Dex. He woke up last Friday as I was headed up to school for a study session and said, "I don't feel good, Mommy." "Poor child, I'll get Daddy," said I. After the study session I called home and learned that Dex had been throwing up all morning.  He had a doctor's appointment scheduled for his 5-year old check up and, after throwing up in the waiting room, they turned it into a "sick visit", told Ben how to care for him and sent him home with a little throw up bucket (which has since been named "Pinky"). When I got home in the early afternoon, Dexter was asleep in bed (he hasn't napped for years!) and Ben showed me a picture of My Bologna watching over a sleeping Dexter (he never does that!).

"Pinky" is on the table next to the bed.

A Benefit of Being Bold About His Birthday

A full week after his birthday, Dex was still telling everyone that he just turned 5 years old. When he told the manager at the grocery store, he went and got Dexter a special happy birthday cupcake.

Dex couldn't wait to eat that cupcake but he wanted to share it with both Mommy and Daddy so they waited until I got home from school to dig into it.

Dex enjoyed every crumb!

Executing a Vision

As an assignment for school, Dexter had to decorate a "train car" to be part of the classroom's holiday decorations. When Ben initiated the project with Dex, he asked how he would like to decorate it - markers, stickers, colored paper? Dex has his own idea - he wanted to cover it in candies left over from Halloween.


Dex picked out all the candies of the same type and when Daddy suggested that they glue them on, Dex insisted that he should tape them on. And so he did. We were really impressed with Dexy's ability to come up with an idea, figure out how it could be implemented, and then actually execute it all by himself. Maybe it was just a vehicle for using a lot of tape - he does love to tape. Either way...

Designing Mazes

Ian, Elissa, and Jason gave Dexter a maze workbook and a hidden pictures workbook (he loves them both) and both workbooks came with a CD for loading puzzle designing software onto the computer. Dex gets very engrossed in designing his own mazes and I love seeing him use technology and begin to master the fingerpad on the laptop.

Helping (?) with Outdoor Chores

Ben and Dex took care of the leaf raking just before the temperatures plummeted. It started out promising with Dex ready to actually rake. But he quickly tired of the job.

Raking up the leaves was definitely not as much fun as playing in the leaves!

Not sure how much fun Daddy had getting them all raked up and put in bags but Dex had a blast "helping" with the outdoor chores.

Chug-a-Chug-a-Choo-Choo!

We took Dex out for a special birthday lunch but we kept the destination a surprise - he was so excited when he spotted the Choo-Choo Restaurant! 

Each year, we fill out a card with Dexter's name, birthday, and address and each year they send out the card as a coupon for a free birthday lunch. This year, Dexter wrote his own name on the card.

Cheeseburgers and fries were delivered by train and wolfed down by us all.

The train also delivered a special birthday cupcake while everyone sang the happy birthday song. Dex covered his ears because they also blow the train whistle ("too loud").






But the noise (and the burger and fries) didn't dampen Dex's enthusiastic consumption of that cupcake. And the train whistle that comes on top of the cupcake (that Dexter blew the whole car ride home) wasn't too loud for Dex (but Mommy and Daddy kept saying, "too loud!").

My Bologna's 9th Anniversary

This year, My Bologna's anniversary fell on Dexter's birthday. My Bologna also enjoyed opening his anniversary gift!Nine years ago, on the day after Thanksgiving, Ben and I went to meet this crazy-looking fuzzy dog that we found on the internet.

My Bologna (called "Rex" at the time) was outside in the yard with a bunch of other dogs that his foster mom was caring for and I spotted him right away. "That's him!" I exclaimed.

He was a nervous, skinny puppy of about one year old, scared of people in general and men in particular (probably some sort of abuse history). But he came to me immediately. Once we got him home, it took a while for him to warm up to Ben but now they are best friends. And My Bologna and Dexter also love playing together.