Saturday

Saturday is finally here. It has been a challenging week at the Rutledge house as the boys have experienced their first real colds. With congestion and stuffy noses out comes the baby aspirator which both boys despise. At first when you put it up to their face they laugh as they try to eat it. Then when they realize that it is going up their noses, they go berzerk. Fun stuff. But they are troopers and are hanging in there. Amy has it the worst of the four of us. I tell her I think it's actually the bird flu.

Amy & I put up Christmas decorations this week. It is a bit different now with two little ones -- what used to be an afternoon of putting up the tree & Christmas village is now spread over days as we decorate when we can steal a few minutes here and there. We finally put our $2 artificial tree to rest this year. It had gotten pretty ridiculous trying to keep the tree from falling over as we had to find the right combination of phone books to prop it up -- the tree only had three of the necessary four legs. This thing made the Charlie Brown Christmas tree look like a champion Redwood. But seeing how we paid $2 for it at a yard sale five years ago, I think it had a full life. We figure this is a year of new traditions so we kicked it off with a real Fraser fir, a tremendous upgrade over the phone book tree. The boys aren't quite as captivated with the lights as we thought they would be. Still, they do enjoy rolling around on the floor in front of it. I suppose we should just be happy that they're not crashing into the tree as they chase each other around -- yet. ;-)

This week brought a mix of good and bad news. Amy's cousin Tyler was in a bad car accident back in Kentucky as his car slid across lanes of traffic on the WK parkway. Thankfully he is recovering ok in the hospital despite being banged up a bit. And our friends Debbie & Chad in Savannah received a much-anticipated phone call this week. They have been matched with a little girl in China that they have been trying to adopt for a while. Aidan and Abby are about to have a little sister, and Debbie and Chad are brave souls now with three little ones two and under! Here is a picture of little Anmei.

So with Amy's bird flu and some basketball on the tube later this afternoon, our day is going to be a low key one with some relaxation and recuperation. Hope everyone stays warm -- cheers!