Aloha!

Nicholas and I just returned from a fabulous and blissful week in Kona with Nana and Uncle Brendan and Uncle David.  It was a near perfect vacation; the only deficiency was Daddy's absence.  We swam, we ate, we relaxed....

Thank you so much to all who made this trip possible!  It was totally reinvigorating and so good for all of us.

(last year, same chair!)

we liked to start the day with milkshakes :)

then burn them off playing with uncles....

then take a snooze.

just one of the guys.

Nana is such an excellent photographer.

One day Nicholas got to tie die a t-shirt for himself, just like Teddy's!!

bff.

(so much meaning in this pic.  nicholas was uncle david's shadow during this vacation!)

thank you for finally agreeing to smile!!

Mommy time

Nicholas has been a little delayed in receiving some of his vaccines since I'm immunocompromised (and some vaccines contain a little of the live virus....= risky for me).  In preparation for preschool in September, and in an effort to be an upstanding member of society, he finally received his MMR vaccine just over a week ago.  To be cautious, I had to be away from him for a week.  So I went on vacation.

Nicholas was, understandably, a little upset that he couldn't go on vacation too (after all, we had just gone on one to AZ).  But he eventually seemed to accept that this was just a "mommy trip."  I went to my parents' place in Gig Harbor, WA, and was joined by my mom.  Here are some pics....

(breakfast of champions)

I'm the proud new owner of a set of.....

Punctal plugs!  These tiny silicone plugs were placed into my tear ducts yesterday in hopes of relieving some of my dry eye symptoms (a common side-effect of stem cell transplants).  It took less than a minute, and was painless (no needles!), yet nevertheless made me woozy :)  Anyway, I'm still waiting to fully evaluate them.

Nicholas and I went to Arizona last week to visit Nanny, Grandy, and Aunt Whitney.  We also drove down to Tucson one day to visit Auntie Susan and Uncle Don!  Other than that, our days were filled with lunches out, swimming, splashing, cooking and playing!

And we made these Almond Blueberry Scones....OMG so delish!

Trick or Treat!

Nicholas was his favorite superhero for Halloween, a fireman!  I crafted a fire truck out of a cardboard box which he gladly wore (and even added his own siren for effect!).  In the morning, we went trick or treating on Chestnut Street, where the local merchants line the sidewalks with bowls of candy and hundreds of toddlers march along gathering their goodies.  While the morning activity was certainly enough to fulfill any Halloween needs of a 2 year old, I wanted Nicholas to get the nighttime experience too.  So we went to nearby Sea Cliff and went to a dozen or so houses....most of which were on hills and had quite a few stairs, which is hard enough for a little kid, let alone one wearing a box!

Nicholas had the opportunity to show some real fireman his costume and he got scared!

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What We've Been Up To.....

Open House at Fire Station 34!

Visiting Nanny and Grandy's train park in AZ

Checking out Grandy's Mini Cooper.  "Why are there no doors back here?!"

Before....

After!