A Friday afternoon...

Hello, all! It's been a crazy week, and I'm glad to be coming to the weekend. Seth, thankfully, seems to have turned a corner. I think, though, that what started as teething has now turned into a cold. The color of the snot has now turned from clear to yellowy ick, and though his coughing is better, he still coughs a little. His mood has improved a good bit, though he's still a little on the cranky side.

I'm wondering if I need to cancel next Friday's doctor's appointment because of his cold? I think I read somewhere that you're not supposed to give your children any vaccines at all when their immune systems are down. I think I may reschedule just to be on the safe side. And... I have a request in at the library for "The Vaccine Book" by Dr. Sears, and that might give me some time to have it come in. =) It looked to me, from the Amazon reviews, like this book is an easy to read, relatively unbiased, book that lists each vaccine and tells a little about the diseases being vaccinated against, what's in the vaccine, etc. I think at this point, my m.o. might be to figure out which vaccines have to be given as boosters and which can stand alone, and then make decisions for the future accordingly, postponing vaccines that stand alone until later on. Brandy told me about wild chicken pox parties, so that is something to consider as an alternative to the vaccine. Thanks, girl!

I'm keeping my parent's dog while they are visiting my brother's family in Minnesota. I really like Albert when he's on his own turf. He's a little harder to handle at my own house, more likely to bark at nothing and play too rough with Seth. I have to lock him up in another room in the house if I don't want Seth to feed him all of his lunch. I know, it's sooo much fun to feed the dog. We don't have one, so I don't want to make a hard and fast rule that he can't ever feed the dog, so I'm dealing with a bit more hassle for the sake his fun and nutrition. I don't think we'll be getting a dog until all of our children are much older.

In other news, Seth is starting to pull up! He hasn't figured out how to pull all the way up, but he will pull himself up on his knees and grab onto the edge of the sofa, a chair, anything sort of steady, really. He's finally ok with me standing him up and holding onto something while I cheer like a lunatic. I feel like we're starting to turn a corner to toddlerness this week. I'm having to watch him a lot more carefully than I used to to keep him from hurting himself. I'm glad he's so inquisitive, but I think my days of reading while he plays are numbered. Maybe I can finish my biography of Anne Bradstreet before he decides to start climbing the kitchen chairs...

After a cranky baby week, it's nice to have something fun to look forward to! I got snookered into being a small group leader for MOPs next year. =) Hold your applause. No, really, I'm pleased about it. And that means that I've been invited to the leader's retreat! We're staying at a local hotel tonight and tomorrow. We're going to eat too much food, lounge in the hotel hot tub, and hang around in our PJs. Oh yeah, we're also supposed to be planning MOPs for next year somewhere in there with all the more important stuff like eating M&Ms and doing pedicures. Please pray that its a relaxing and good time for all of us. I don't know most of these women, and being around a bunch of women, even Christian women, can go many, many different ways, some great and some not so good.

David gets to have a man night with his friend, Tony. They're going to be watching the kids while Kristi and I are off having girly fun at the retreat. These are our go to babysitters on short notice, for doctor's appts., whatever. Since we live only 5 minutes from them, we trade back and forth quite a bit. It's nice to have that childcare net. =)

And tomorrow night I'll be trying out a new chicken marsala recipe for some friends who are coming over. I'll may share the recipe later...

Oh yeah, our Netflix queue is empty. Anybody got any good movie suggestions to fill it up? Have a lovely weekend!