Merry Christmas to you!

Merry Christmas! Well, I hope this post finds everyone enjoying a wonderful Christmas morning/afternoon. We enjoyed our first Christmas in our own home by ourselves. I must say, it was very sweet, relaxed, and happy. It was a little different, but it was nice to just go with the flow, especially since we had a rough night!

Sydney has decided that she should not have to go to bed before midnight. Yes folks, you heard me correctly. This child is nuts! We tried the "let them cry themselves to sleep" method again last night. Screaming was heard for over an hour, and like the snow on Christmas in a popular Christmas song..."SHOWED NO SIGNS OF STOPPING." In which case, I went and got her eventually. Sydney likes to watch movies and PLAY like crazy when it is actually time for bed. So, if anyone has any remedies please share. (We are very close to bopping her on the head! j/k)...but seriously. Anyway, so Sydney went to bed late, which means I went to bed late, and Brennan has been feeling pretty lousy, so he went to bed REALLY late!

Brennan has been feeling pretty yucky lately. He is in full swing of his side effects. He has a horrible sore throat which has made it very difficult to talk and especially difficult to eat. He can't eat anything with spices, (no Mexican food-which is killing him) nothing hot or cold, (so no shakes or warm drinks to make his throat feel better) nothing like spaghetti sauce/tomato, nothing with citrus, and nothing with chunks. Guess who is having a BLAST trying to cook for this guy...not me! Anyway, meat is out of the question unless I puree it. He has been having to eat a lot of mashed potatoes, soup, instant breakfasts, beans, etc. OH YEAH...and he can't have anything with chocolate. Chocolate really irritates his throat, (we were warned about this) so that has been hard for him. Especially since he LOVES Reeces Peanut Butter Cups. I feel bad because I know we have 6-10 more weeks of this and it is already driving him crazy. It is driving me crazy too, because Sydney and I have been eating essentially the same things.

Back to Christmas morning...Brennan's dad gave us money for a play kitchen set. It was the cutest thing this morning! She went crazy when she saw it set up in the living room. She immediately started pulling all of the pieces out, opening every drawer, talking on the toy phone, etc. It took us awhile to get her to stop playing with it and open her other gifts. She had a good time though. She would run from one toy to the other and tell us about it, and show us how excited she was. Hopefully, she doesn't expect this every morning! -Not happening kid! I really wanted to make a yummy treat for breakfast this morning, but breads are out of the question for Brennan, and so are pretty much every Christmas treat. So, I settled for making him a blended fruit smoothie--heated up a little so it wasn't too cold. (boring)

Hope everyone has a great Christmas! Love you!

December is going so quickly

So, Christmas is only 8 days away. I can't believe it. We are actually going to be at our own home this year for Christmas. We plan on going for the weekends to visit family, but I am really excited to have it just be our family in our own home and not having to travel. I am very glad that Brennan is getting through his treatments. He had number 10 today. He is starting to have his yucky side effects though. He is starting to get a very sore throat and you can see a rectangle of a sunburn on his poor neck. His voice is starting to get quieter too. He has been in pretty good spirits, but I know he isn't feeling very good. I just got over a sore throat last week, so the thought of having one more severe than that---and for such a long period of time makes me sad. Anyway, he is doing good and we are ALMOST half way through it.

Day 5 of Radiation

So today was Brennan's fifth radiation treatment. So far he has not started having the bad reactions yet. Our doctors assure us that soon he will start having difficulties swallowing and certain foods will definitely be a "no-no" so he doesn't irritate his throat. Also, a few other side effects he can expect soon are: a very sore throat and the "sun burned" neck. Other than that...Brennan has been doing really good. His treatments are very quick and painless though. We are just so glad that Chemotherapy was not the answer and that since it is such a small area, that radiation has been the best answer.