A few days ago we tried giving the twins some diced apples...they were completely unimpressed!

A collective, "Meh."


Evie gives Gavin a backrub:


Evie is turning into our little dancing queen:

Photo Shoot, Part 2

We had part two of our photo session on Saturday morning. This time Evie was "all about Mommy" and did not want much to do with our photographer friend Dusty. Gavin, however was one little ball of charm! This time he was the one who climbed into Dusty's lap and triedto push the buttons on her camera.

Dusty captured some great pictures of Gavin - the first one available to preview is here.

She also brought along a new backdrop - the twins wreaked havoc on her other one! (Well, they knocked it over and sat on it, anyway.) When we were all done, she laid it on our floor and the twins went crazy crawling all over it:


They were fascinated by the material...


...and the fact that they could feel their toys underneath it!


I think this may have been the first time Dusty used this backdrop - our darling Evie christened it by barfing on it shortly after I took this picture! (Luckily it wiped off.)

"Ok, we've figured this out. Time to go back to chewing on our toys!"

"Aww, Mom, no more pictures until after our nap!"

Fun With Nana & Grandpa

On Saturday, we did another photo shoot with our photographer friend Dusty. (More on that in a future post!) Then Nana and Grandpa Cermak came over for a visit. Gavin completely refused to take his nap and tried to cover up by being sweet and cute. Here he is telling Grandpa a secret:

Then he actually sat still and listened as Nana read him a story (lately the twins prefer to sit on their books):

Evie took a nice, long nap and woke up in a great mood. Here she is wearing a College of DuPage sweatshirt that Nana bought about 10 years ago! With that and her baseball cap, she looks ready to head off to school! (sniff, sniff - Sharon)

Evie loves having a helping set of hands to walk her around our house. Grandpa was happy to oblige:

Dancing With Uncle David

Hop-A-Long Cermak

Gavin seems to be doing a little better every day. We think he still has a little pain when he pees, because he still cries suddenly while he is playing contentedly. All we can do is keep giving him Tylenol and TLC. (The crying really was minimal yesterday, though.) We will follow up with his urologist in a month.

Evie has a new method of getting around, which we think looks a lot like hopping! That is, if a person could hop before she could walk!

Before she started hopping, she decided that the best place to put the magnetic fridge letters was in Dad's slipper:


Here she goes:

Road to Recovery

Hi everyone, it's Francis blogging as Sharon is a bit under the weather. Gavin was feeling much better on Tuesday, the day after his procedure, although he still has a little pain now and then. He did wake up the following night and was very unhappy, but that is apparently common for children following anesthesia. Overall though, he was in a much better mood.

Thank you to everyone who sent in thoughts and prayers!

On Tuesday, Sharon woke up with laryngitis, of all things, but no other real "cold" symptoms. Luckily, Uncle David was able to stop by in the afternoon and help out.








Just chillin' while Mom feeds Gavin. Could he look more relaxed? Next he'll be expecting grapes and a fan made from palm fronds.



Evie seems to almost be over her cold. She's starting to cough up phlegm, which is a good sign (I caught two batches in my hands before I left for work on Tuesday morning: good times!). Needless to say, she is spending most of her play time on the hardwood floor, rather than the rug.

At Church With Grandpa & Grandma

On Sunday, Grandma & Grandpa Cordes renewed their wedding vows during Mass. They have been married 40 years and we are so lucky to have them as parents and role models! (In case you think this post looks familiar, their actual anniversary was September 28 and we all went to church that day with them also.)

Gavin was totally attached to Grandpa. He fell asleep on Grandpa's shoulder for a good 35 - 40 minutes! Here is the happy couple bringing up the gifts, with Gavin sound asleep (he didn't wake up during Communion either)!

Gavin getting sleepy on Grandpa's lap:

Evie and Daddy. Evie was very interested in gnawing on the songbooks:


After Mass, the kids played around on the alter. I think this was their favorite part of the day!


The alter has one step, which they found fascinating:

Evie was content to sit on the step with her "Hungry Caterpillar" toy:

Gavin Update #2 - We're Home!

We are back home and the twins are sleeping. Gavin came out of the procedure after about 45 minutes, which is the time frame we had been given.

His recovery was nothing like Evie's. When she was brought out of surgery, she was heavily sedated for several hours. She would flutter her eyes, but she was still totally out of it. With Gavin, the staff brought us into the room first, then brought him in and put him in my lap as he was waking up. The nurse told us he would be disoriented and very upset for 5 - 10 minutes. Boy, was she right! He was so unhappy, all red-faced, blotchy, teary, and squirming around in my arms.

He didn't want a bottle at all, but we knew he was hungry and tired. We came back home, and when we were in the nursery with his familiar music and rocking chair, he was totally calm and drank some milk. Then he played with Evie for a while before naptime.

Here are some more pictures from our morning:

Gavin explores our day-surgery waiting room when we first arrived:

Then he checked out the computer in the room:

He got to wear a little band around his toe to measure his pulse-ox, which Evie is totally used to because she gets hers checked every month. It has a little red light. He didn't like it very much!


Here he is trying to rip it off...he was successful in about 30 seconds!

Here we are in recovery. He was kicking off his blankets and wriggling out of his gown:

Finally, a little quiet time:

Grandpa Cermak came over to watch Evie while we were gone. He did a great job of giving her a bottle, medicine, yogurt, and changed her diapers and outfit. They had a great time and he said she was a perfect angel!

Here is Gavin exploring the hallway at the hospital:

And here he is trying to get into the nurses' station:

Gavin's Procedure Update #1

Gavin is in the surgery room right now and we are in the waiting room. He did pretty well this morning, considering he couldn't eat anything. He was very interested in his new surroundings and wanted to explore the hospital beds, computer, floors, and everything else. He still hung onto an old stand-by for comfort, though: a water bottle.

We told the nurse that he would become upset when it was time to take him away from us, so she gave him some Versed, which will make him sleepy. But about 15 minutes later, instead of being sleepy, he was smacking Francis' head and trying to bite his nose! Then another nurse
told us that sometimes Versed can make kids hyper. Hmmm.

Francis changes Gavin into his hospital gown

Here's Francis trying to keep Gavin occupied while we are in the pre-surgery waiting room. He was in a real "biting" mood and was slapping and nipping at Daddy's face.

Gavin should be out in about 45 minutes, so we'll keep you updated later today!

Gavin's Medical Procedure

As you may remember, Gavin was diagnosed with vesicoureteral reflux, grade 4, when he was a few months old. He has been on antibiotics ever since to prevent more urinary tract infections.

Today at 7:30 am, he is scheduled to have a proceudre to correct his reflux. The procedure is called deflux, and it is an outpatient procedure. He will be under general anesthesia. The procedure should take 45 minutes, then he will be in recovery for 45 minutes to an hour, and then we can go home. We really hope and pray that things will go as scheduled!

We are bringing the laptop to the hospital (it will be at Edward Hospital, nice and close) and we will post updates during the day.

Friday Cuteness

Things have been very busy around here lately! Evie is getting over a cold, and it looks like Gavin may be coming down with it too. She is doing a lot better than earlier in the week though! Unfortunately, Francis caught her cold and it seems like he has it worse than she did.

The kids, thankfully, took long naps today and yesterday. I know that they need a lot of sleep, but they just fight it so much. It is so nice when they take the naps that they need and we don't have two whiny overtired babies all afternoon.

Gavin is still waking up early, like 5:30ish. Hey, that's better than 4:30, but it will be even nicer when he gets back to 6- 6:30. Evie is pretty much back on schedule and adjusted from the time change.

Evie and Gavin play with their new "Hoops and Yoyo" toy:




We think Gavin looks like he just stepped out of a Levi's ad (but then, we are totally biased):

The kids tackle Dad:

Dad sleeps, Evie plays with his drawstring (what is it with drawstrings and shoelaces that they both love so much?):

Thursday Cuteness

Here are some random shots from last weekend:

Evie and Uncle David sang a song:

Then she got really mellow with her Auntie Di:

Daddy pulled a bin full of stuffed animals out of the basement, and the twins were fascinated:

Evie was so interested that she had to climb in:

Evie can still walk under the kitchen table with no problems!

The twins help me empty the dishwasher:

Just playing around and learning some Spanish:

Fun With the Vertical Blinds

Last week, the twins decided that the vertical blinds were more fun than ever before! They couldn't get enough of giggling and scampering up and down the length of the blinds:



Anything is a toy when you're 13 months old!