November 11

Just another crazy month in our household!  The weather may finally be starting to cool down, which would be great!  But this is Texas, so who knows what tomorrow will bring!

We spend a good chunk of our time this month running!  Another race down for the kids and we even got to cheer Daddy on in his 5K.

     

Go Daddy, go!

Now it's Little Buddy's turn.  Race face on!

     

Both the kids (and Daddy!) did really well in their races, so we decided to go for pancakes afterward to celebrate.  Unfortunately, Little Buddy was so enamored by the idea of pancakes that he wouldn't look at the camera for a picture!

"Daddy, enough of this!  Pancakes are that way!"

     

We also had a lot of fun at the costume run at Run Club.  Here come the airplane pilot and Daddy Bones!

Our Minnesota visits went as scheduled, but with one minor change...Daddy went on one with Little Buddy!  It was so nice for Momma to have a week off.  

Hanging in the hotel with Momma, just eating quesadilla.

His favorite Paul Bunyan picture in the airport!

     

Handing with Daddy WILLPower and waiting for the new Chick-Fil-A to open at the airport.

Let's see, what else did we do this month?  One of our friend's had a birthday party for her son and both Little Buddy and Little Sweetie got to go.  It always means a lot when Little Buddy gets to go to a party.  He had such a fun time bouncing at Pump-It-Up!

     

     

He loved the slide!

We also had some big stuff going on in the Sanfilippo world...

Watching our friends from Carter's Challenge on The Doctors!  Way to spread National Awareness!

     

Checking out his new giraffe buddy from our friends at the Sanfilippo Children's Foundation in AUSTRALIA!  Little Buddy has some pretty cool friends in some pretty cool places!

Height and Weight

Still coming at about 50 1/2 inches and close to 63 pounds.

Personality

Unfortunately we are hitting some emotional times.  He just seems tired all the time.  School is wearing him out.  We are going to try to add naps back in on the weekends to help him rest.

Developmental Changes

Still stable but as we head into November, it's been hard.  It's been hard because we remember how great he was doing this time last year.  He's lost quite a bit in terms of attention and verbal ability and that is hard.  But we remind ourselves that the fact he still has any verbal ability is huge.  As long as we are helping him live a life a joy and dignity, that is all that matters.

It's hard for him to sit still, but if we put his knee immobilizers on, he can sit and focus and play for awhile.

Every once in awhile, he will sit.  Here they are, just two siblings in Batman pajamas watching TV together.  Sometimes it is the semi-normal moments like this that I cherish the most.

Fun Tidbits

We finished the month with a lot of Americana!  First we took our usual walk down to the polling place to exercise our right to vote, then we told people to "Be Brave" after the election, and then we thanked our Veteran's for their service!  Lots of USA pride and flags around...Little Buddy was in heaven!

     

We are blessed to live in the USA and proud of it, even during trying times!

Have a good night, 

LBM

Little Buddy's Momma

O-H!

I-O!

After Little Buddy's diagnosis, we sat and made a list of things we wanted to do with him or that we wanted him to experience.  Being big Ohio State fans, we wanted him to experience a game in the Shoe.  He loved watching the Buckeye on TV and was always excited for Brutus Buckeye to make an appearance.  We knew this one was a long shot, but we were hopeful.  What dad doesn't want to take his son to see their favorite team in action?

Well, this weekend, we got to make that dream come true thanks to some amazing supporters!

Hanging out at the airport... not to go to Minnesota for once!

Kisses for daddy from Little Sweetie before we fly!

She may not be as experienced a flyer as her brother, but Little Sweetie did great on the flight!

Because of flight prices and schedules, we actually flew into Cincinnati instead of Columbus.  That meant we got to spend the night with Aunt D, Uncle C, and J!  It was wonderful to see them!

      

Enjoying some basketball fun at Aunt D and Uncle C's!

     

     

More backyard shenanigans.  Such beautiful Ohio weather!

Daddy having fun with Little Sweetie and J!

Unfortunately, after a day of play, Little Buddy had a rough night.  We decided to rest in Cincinnati for the day to see if he felt up for the game that night.  The bright side was that Little Sweetie got to go to J's birthday party while the rest of us rested.

This moment captures about all of the sleep Little Buddy managed to get that night.  :(

This girl did sleep great, so she got to have lots of fun at J's party!

Thankfully, by 2 PM we were all feeling more energized so we headed up to Columbus and checked into our hotel.  We got to have dinner with Mimi and Pop-Pop and picked up our tickets from our dear friend and supporter, Ms. K, and her family.   

Hanging with Pop-Pop before leaving the hotel.

Tickets secured!  Here we go!  (Little Sweetie wasn't feeling the group picture, lol.)

And then it was time to go to the game!  Originally, when we had looked at this date as a game option, it was supposed to be an afternoon game.  It then got switched to a night game.  After Little Buddy's rough evening the night before, we weren't sure how much of the game we would make it through, but we were up for seeing what we could!

He was very excited and proud to walk with Daddy to get to the game!

Here we are!

Love that we got to see so many of our friends and WILLPower supporters!

Walking up to our seats.  I admit, I got pretty misty-eyed at this point.  It's such a natural thing for a father to want to enjoy a football game with his son as they cheer their favorite team, but this is a father-son moment we weren't sure that we would get to see.

He was entranced from the moment we arrived!  He loved watching the band, the players enter, and Brutus Buckeye!  Poor thing even cried each time that Brutus left the field!

Just a beautiful night!

     

Love these two!  (and Brutus too!)

We didn't stay the entire game, it was getting too late for the kids, but he loved every moment he was there.  We are so grateful for these memories together.

Actually fell asleep in his carseat on the way back to the hotel!  This never happens anymore, so you know he was SUPER tired!

 

Giving his new Brutus a hug before bedtime.  Good night, Columbus!

As we flew out this morning, the airpot had a board where you could leave a message about from where you were traveling.  I had to leave a little #WILLPower for people to find!

That's all for now, 

LBM

Little Buddy's Momma