Whew! November is finally over...

Whew! November was a whirlwind of a month to say the least. I don't think I had a single normal day all month long. I work on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and my MWFs were booked up with doctor appointments for the kids and myself. We've met our deductible for the year, so I wanted to get as many appointments as I could scheduled before 2013.

an outtake of our Christmas card photo shoot

So, here's the medical updates:

• Austin is officially smart. Ha! As if we didn't already know that, but the school system had reason to suspect a learning disability, so they gave him a whole battery of language tests. He passed with flying colors, which was no surprise to me since he is reading on a second grade level and sharp as a whip. That being said, he is a boy, he is a young first grader, he was a 29 week preemie, and he is not a people-pleaser, which means he has trouble staying on task and doing his work at school. It doesn't seem to be affecting his performance, other than the fact that teachers don't like it when kids don't do their work! I think he'll outgrow it, or he may just be one of those brilliant kids who doesn't care about doing busy work. At any rate, we had several appointments to discuss all this with the school system over the past month or so. Austin is definitely his own kid. 
• Austin also had an MRI to check his Chiari. We just found out this week that it has improved. This is great news and more than we could have hoped for! It seems that by releasing Austin's tethered cord a few years ago, his brain was able to fix itself. We go back in two years for a checkup, but hopefully everything will be normal!
• David had his speech evaluation with the school system last week. We will find out if he qualifies for free public preschool in about two weeks. He would be able to receive a great deal of speech therapy at school. I'm pretty confident that he will qualify, but the biggest issue is which location he would be placed at. They don't have a preschool at Field, so I will have to take the boys to separate schools every day. If all goes as planned, he will start mid-January when he turns 3. 
• The boys had flu shots this month, which was a nightmare. It took 3 people to hold Austin down while another person consoled David in the other room. I'm glad that's over... until next year.
• My thyroid is still working fine, thankfully. I go back to see my doctor late next year. 
• I had a funky infection in my finger nail this month. It was painful and nasty, and the doctor even mentioned the possibility of removing my nail. I opted for the wait and see method with antibiotics, and it seems to have cleared up on its own. There were a few weeks that the dishes got really piled up around here because I didn't want my fingers in nasty dish water!
• Austin had a stomach virus a few weeks ago, and Joseph and I got the stomach FLU last week. It was terrible. Throwing up is one thing, but when you have the chills, body aches, etc., it's just awful. So far, David has been spared. In fact, he's never thrown up once in his three years of life. Lucky dog!

Other things to mention about November:

• My oven went out one weekend. That was inconvenient. I was hoping management would give me a new one since ours is ancient, but maintenance was able to simple swap out a coil. Oh well, at least it works, and it got fixed before Thanksgiving. 
• Our downstairs neighbor complained to management about noise again. This is a chronic issue for us. Thankfully, we never received an official complaint, so I'm thinking management has our back this time. 
• We spent Thanksgiving lunch with our friends, the Bells. We never get to travel to TN for Thanksgiving because of Joseph's work schedule, so it is nice to have good friends in town. Larry and Joseph have similar personalities, as do Katie and I, and we both have rowdy boys who love to play together. It was fun. Another family that we know very well came over for dessert. Between the Embrys, the Bells and the Goulds, there were 9 kids! Lots of fun.
• Joseph made a turducken for Thanksgiving supper. Google it. Imagine a hen stuffed inside a duck stuffed inside a turkey with no bones. It was interesting to say the least. I realized that I'm not a big fan of duck. It tasted a bit like liver to me. I'll stick with turkey and gravy. 

Out with November. In with December. I am so behind this year. Didn't do black Friday. Haven't put up any Christmas decorations yet. Haven't bought any presents. I guess I've only got three weeks to get my act together!

I promise the next blog post will be a good one, full of glad tidings, good news and great joy.