Bittersweet Day

We got a phone call this morning that Uncle Rod had taken Aunt Sheila to the hospital. She woke up short of breath and having chest pain and her back pain was very bad. They admitted her into Mercy Fairfield immediately. We got things together and went up to see her. Right now they are just working on pain management, and they found out on her chest xray that she does have pneumonia on top of everything else. They consulted Dr. Richards so he will be coming to see her. Please pray for her. We visited for awhile and headed to Dad and Anne's when she seemed to be settled.

Today was the Gabbard family Christmas. We had a wonderful time celebrating. Ethan sat up and ate ham with all the trimmings and absolutely loved every bite. Anne told me how to make twice baked potatoes, so we will have to add that to our rotation :) We had such a fun, relaxing afternoon with Dad and Anne, Grandma, and we finally got to see Brad, Lindsay, and Shawn! Shawn was really sick last week and had to be home on Christmas. Ethan had lots of fun opening his gifts and loved everything - he got a cute pair of shoes, a monkey hat, his first Miami U tee shirt, some very cool puzzles, and some fun cars. Grandma's gift is going to go towards a baby gate for the steps which we really, really need, so we appreciate it very much!! We also got to share the last 'installment' of our special gifts that we have been working on. So now that everyone has them, I can share here :) We created a digital scrapbook of Ethan's first year, with dvd's of favorite family videos and a slideshow set to special songs of photos as well. We were very excited to make them and to share them with the grandparents!!

We went back up to the hospital to see Sheila and to take Uncle Rod some dinner. She seems to be resting a bit better and they're increasing the frequency of her pain medicine to keep her more comfortable.

After we got home tonight, Ethan was going around and playing with some of his new things. He discovered the Playskool Stack 'n Nest Barrels that Mammaw and Papaw got him. Well, this is the simplest little toy, and Ethan is enthralled with them! He sat and played with them a good 15 minutes, and then I grabbed the video camera and he proceeded to play with them even longer. He LOVES them! There are a set of 4 barrels that snap together and pull apart. You can nest them inside eachother and can stack them to make a tower. Ethan has been loving placing items in cups. In the bath, he puts his little ducks and boats into a cup. He loves putting his binkie in your hand. So, he was loving taking his binkie out and putting it into the little barrel, and trying to close the other half of the barrel around it. It was so cute! Ryan and I were loving it!!