It’s been a fairly uneventful week around here other than for Lily’s recovery. She continues to do really well. It just takes time to care for her and take her out individually on a leash. But I’ve got a good routine down, especially in the morning when I get up and come downstairs. I’ve learned the trick to giving her all of her meds (of which she takes about 7 pills twice a day!) is to put them on top of wet/canned dog food. She pretty much will eat them like candy! Then I end by giving her a spoonful of just plain food (no pills) and give some to Brutus to for being a patient and calm observer. Lily and Brutus enjoy playing with each other (which is basically them growling and biting at each other over the baby fence) throughout the day. I really think that Lily enjoys the protection and peace and quiet of having her own room and playspace. She’s especially been loving laying on the dog bed and blanket that my mom made to go in her crate during her recovery. Isn’t it the cutest? It is cream-colored, which my mom picked on purpose to match her furry coat. Moms are just the best :). 
Griffin enjoys being in the playpen with Lily and keeping her company. He usually takes in a puzzle or quiet toy to play with while he lays down beside her. 
Our night time routine is obviously much different since Lily can’t navigate stairs for the next 2 months. So now it is just Brutus in Finn’s room during bedtime. He still is enjoying the cuddles. 
On April 1st we headed over to our neighbor Brian’s house to watch basketball and have dinner with some other neighbors. Being April Fools Day, Brian had a little joke to play on the kiddos. Here they were eating an “oreo” after playing together. Turns out the “cream” filling was toothpaste. Yucky! Finn, however, actually likes mint flavor so he wasn’t too grossed out until the other kids started acting all silly about it and thinking it was gross. He definitely didn’t like it, but also didn’t wig out over it. It was funny to watch each of their reactions. 
And here are a few others from our week. Griffin really loves painting and working on art projects with Debbie. He got in a trip to library story time, we went to Mellow Mushroom for pizza dinner and the balloon artist made Griffin a batman, and the last one is our sweet little boy all cozied up after he’d fallen back asleep in my bed after finding me early in the morning!
And this video showed up in my Google Photos app, courtesy of Google. I thought it was pretty good – so I included it here.
Vacation continues! Kevin was gone for the first few days of this week, but we continued our daily trips to the beach where Finn loved making holes in the sand to fill with water (and splash of course) and various sand sculptures with Grandpa and Grandma (who did most of the work!). The weather continues to be perfect – warm and sunny. 
Griffin snapped this pic during our walk for shells – I think it’s great!
Even though you’d think vacation is full of rest – this boy did not take many naps! He did crash pretty hard a couple of days, or he’d fall asleep within two minutes of getting in the car to go to dinner a couple times! He’s been a big snuggler for quite awhile now, especially at night time but at naps too. He just wants to “snuggle” for a bit before he gets into bed. Warms my heart :).
We continue to enjoy daily trips to the pool where Finn loves to float using the noodles and also jump in from the edge. I’ve included a few videos too. 
We ventured to Venice one afternoon for a bit of shopping and lunch. Afterwards we went to Casperson Beach, a beach that is known for being able to find Shark Teeth. While we didn’t find any ourselves (we didn’t have any real equipment that is best for shelling) a kind stranger gave us two she had found along with a piece that she said she’s read could be part of the jaw. Finn was super excited! 
After a yummy lunch it’s back to our regular shenanigans of the beach and pool. 
Finn has recently become very interested in coloring, and more specifically coloring within the lines! He just kind of slipped the switch and colors amazingly well for his age (I think!). He is so proud when he is done! He’s also gotten quite good at spelling Finn 🙂
Finn loved playing with his scuba diver and shark that he got at the children’s store in Venice. They were used as beach toys, shower toys, pool toys, they went everywhere with us!
Our last trip to Siesta Beach on Friday called for the biggest sand castle yet! Complete with a moat, multiple stories, sand castle drippings, and bird feather top!
On the last day of vacation Dad got his waterproof camera charged and working again so we were able to get some fun water pics. 
Cheers to our last dinner with Mom and Dad at Carrabba’s!
Saturday morning Mom and Dad headed home for Ohio bright and early at 5 am! We slept in a bit and then headed out ourselves, stopping first for breakfast at The Broken Egg. It was delish (I had Bananas Foster Pancakes!) and I bought the cute little mug as a keepsake too. 
We drove north to Orlando for our Disneyworld adventure. We had only told Finn about it a day or two before so he was pretty excited. Kevin found an awesome deal online for our hotel – the advantage of waiting until 3 days before arriving to book a place! It turned out to be a great hotel. We filled up on a good lunch in our room and then headed downstairs to the awesome pool area. At 5 pm the hotel opens up a complimentary happy hour with drinks and snacks. It even included cotton candy so Finn was super excited about that. 
The next morning we were up and at ’em early. We had a tasty breakfast at the hotel and then got in our car to head to Disney’s Magic Kingdom which was about a 15 minute drive. We had excellent parking and walked to the monorail to get to Magic Kingdom. Finn was taking it all in!
Our first ride at Magic Kingdom – It’s a Small World! Griffin loved it and throughout the day just kept asking if we could ride it again!
Though you can’t hardly tell, the sign says “Goodbye Kevin & Megan” and then “goodbye Finn”. We had used our Fast Passes for the ride so I assume that’s how our name was on the board. We almost missed it!
Griffin was able to meet Mickey Mouse! Here we are waiting in line and then he got his own private turn with Mickey! He was pretty bashful but I think he enjoyed it. And he loved talking about it afterward. 
We ended the evening with the fireworks show and then dinner. We nearly missed being able to buy Finn a keepsake as the Emporium was “closed” but fortunately Kevin found us a side door in and we were able to get Finn a toy. Of all the lovies he chose Lady, another dog, to take home!
We rode the ferry back to the parking lot and then hopped in our car and headed to the hotel. It was late – almost 10:30 pm – and we all were exhausted!
Well, we’ve had a busy week around here this week. Kevin has been working l-o-n-g days, often times leaving at 6:30 or 7 in the emorning and getting home after 7 or 8 at night. We’ve been up a lot at night here and there as we’ve been letting Brutus sleep on the floor in our room, not in his crate. He does awesome, but if one of us hears him up walking around we’ll take him out. So that’s occasionally been around 2 am. For the last couple of weeks Griffin has been waking up at 4 am and coming into our room to “snuggle”. He’s wide awake but after he lays with me for a minute I take him to his room, rock him, and he goes right back to sleep in his bed in a couple of minutes. We aren’t really sure why he’s waking – he’s not scared of anything and he can go right back to sleep. But I feel like I’ve been up multiple nights in a row at 12 am (to potty of course), 2, 4, 6, and finally getting up around 7 am. Sheesh!
Lately I have been feeling like getting some house projects done as when I look at the calendar after the next couple of weeks we will be gone for two weekends and when we return we’re busy with Finn’s party and then it is already the middle of March! Part of me is quite nervous to start Chestnut’s nursery but I’m doing my best to think good thoughts and move forward. We will soon be moving all kinds of beds around starting with getting Griffin a full-size bed for his room. His crib frame converts into a full size bed – so that is step one. Then the current queen bed in his room will go to our now one and only smaller guest room. And the full that is in that bed we will be giving away along with the king bed that is in Chestnut’s room currently. Lots of musical beds it seems! So this weekend we decided to do our painting project in Chestnut’s room. We already have all the supplies as we decided to go with plain white (bye bye almond), which we have leftover from our basement project. I cleaned the walls, patched the holes, and we were off! I must say it was a late night by the time I got two coats of trim work done throughout the room. Brutus was with me for part of it – literally napping on my leg! Kevin rolled the room on Sunday and Finn helped each of us with some brush work and rolling. He is so excited to be able to help and keeps talking about how he can tell Chestnut that he helped paint his room! Oh, and Kevin insisted I wear a respirator – which is a great idea – though I did got in my way at times I couldn’t smell a thing! First project, complete! I have found some cool ideas on Pinterest for converting the closet into a closet/changing table so Kevin plans to do that sometime before May!
Finn went on an excursion to Franklin Park Conservatory this week and had a blast running around and seeing all of the greenery and flowers! He’s also been working a lot on his letters and sounds – often sounding out a word when you talk to him. He is able to tell you what letter the word starts with. He’s always said Lily like “Yily” but now he is saying “la, la, la, Lily” and “la la la Liquid” for L words :). 
