The Fujis are ready!!!!

At least, Eckert's announced that the Fujis were ready. We have been waiting ages for this day!!!!  A lot of others must have been too, because it was packed when we went.  Sam and Maggie had to get on a different tractor to us, no one was willing to move over to make room!!!!

It's a good job Sam went with us this time, a lot of the prime apples were at the top of the trees.  This kids love him to lift them up so they can get the apples

The apples are fantastic this year.  I told Sam it will be a very sad day when they run out!!!!

(yet another) wrist update

We had another full day of doctors/hospitals last week.  I took Ben to get the MRI done on his wrist on Wednesday morning.  It was pretty straight forward.  After that, we went over to Wash U to see Jan as she had her knee replaced on Tuesday.  Finally, we went to the endocrinology clinic to see about Ben's growth.  He is now 5 ft 5 in and weighs 122 lbs.  He's officially taller than me!!!!  They don't think he is going to grow much taller and he won't have to do growth hormone for too much longer either.  I think he's pretty happy with how tall he is now.

Dr G called me on Friday about Ben's MRI and said that the ganglionic cyst has come back and that one of the options is to do surgery again and remove it.  Ben has decided that's what he wants to do because he is tired of being in pain all the time.  I guess I need to schedule another surgery....

Random pictures

It seems like blog posts arise as I clear out the photos from my phone these days. Been very busy and not able to update much at all. Anyway, here they are.....
Maggie is still doing horse riding once a week.  Last week she had the sweetest, most gentle house ever, I would have been happy to just stay and pet him for an hour!!!!

Maggie wanted to buy these pants a couple of weeks ago, because "I like candy".  I thought that she would never wear them, but she had them on the other day "because there are absolutely no shorts in my drawer".  She looked great in them

Ben, Maggie and I went to the Strange Folk Festival at Union Station last weekend.  I realized that if Ben has ever been at Union Station, it was when he was a baby.  He was interested in looking around and seeing the trains.

Maggie's "horse of the week"  Shiloh

Work on the house continues.  I haven't taken many pictures recently, but the tear-out of the half bathroom is worthy of a couple

The house is covered in dust.....

A proud parent moment....

When I took Ben back to school yesterday, I met the school principal in the hallway.  He stopped me to tell me how well Ben was doing in school.  He also told me that there was an incident at the school in the first week that involved bullying.  Ben stepped in and helped the child out.  He was very impressed with Ben's choices and told me that not many others would do that.  He told me it showed strength of character and that he was impressed with Ben. 

DEFINITELY a proud parent moment......

A trip to the doctor.....

I took Ben back to the doctor again yesterday.  His wrist is still not right and they are going to do another MRI to see if they can find out what is going on.  He was on top form and we laughed the whole time.  As we were driving out to the appointment, he was telling me that he was driving with Sam and pointing out all the hospitals he has been to.  He said "they open a new hospital, we get an invite".  Funny, but scary to think it's not far off the mark.  I think he is pretty healthy overall, but we have seen a lot of doctors.....
When we were in the office, the nurse called "Benjamin Skyler"  How many times has his name been changed to that?  He just looked at me and said "we should just ignore them when they say that.  Next time, we should totally do that....."
In the patient room, the sharps container on the wall indicated you could put scalpels in it.  Ben said "why would they bring scalpels in here?", I said "oh, you know, so they could do some minor digging around".  I'm such a reassuring parent......
The last funny conversation was:
Me:  Why does his wrist sound like that?
Dr. G:  Oh it's because of his gymnastics
Me (to Ben):  I bet orthopedic doctors really hate sports
Ben:  Blame it on the Greeks......

Summer is officially over......

We went to Little Rock to see Milly and Rich over Labor Day. We were going right before school started, but Ben had to register for classes for school, so we could not go at the last minute.  This was the next opportunity we had to travel.  We left on Friday and stayed for a couple of days before coming back on Monday.  The kids had fun playing games with Milly.  We played Mousetrap on Friday night and Ben's Monopoly on Saturday night.  The kids weren't too successful at winning since MIL won Mousetrap and I won Monopoly!!  Still, they were very happy to play

We went to US Pizza for lunch on Sunday.  Sam and I used to go there for lunch on a regular basis before we got married, in fact Sam gave me my engagement ring in one of them!!!  Unfortunately, my tastes appear to have changed and it's not as good as I remember it.  We'll have to try one of our other many favourite haunts next time we go back.

Back at home, we had the house number engraved in the stone over the front door.  We haven't had anything else done to the house this week, been pretty quiet!!!!

We did have the stove repaired and found this unlit firework under there.  Do you see the warning label???!!!!!

Milly had a hummingbird feeder that had loads of birds come to it every day, so I thought I would try again.  We bought one in Little Rock and I put it up when we got home.  I thought it was probably too late in the season to attract any, but we got this little visitor the same day!!!!  It is outside the kitchen window, so we can watch the birds easily!!!  Things like this make me very happy....

More light.......

Our dining room light arrived!!!! It is as spectacular as I thought it would be....

Now we can have dinner guests