Our Lil Pumpkin

I'm not sure that I'll have time to update towards the end of the week so thought I'd get this blog done now. Denver will be 11 months on Friday! Where has the time gone? We've had so much fun with him and watching him learn new things, but at the same time I'm sad to see my little boy get so big! We'll see how that BIG birthday goes in a month. I will just savor all my time with him now as I know it will just go faster as he gets older. There isn't much new to update on Denver. His butt had been all clear, but now it's been acting up a little bit again and I'm at a loss of what to do. We'll see what it does in the next couple of days and see if we need to go back in for it or not, but please pray that it just heals and we're done with it. I hope to have some more fall pictures later, but maybe those will be his 1 year pictures, but for now here is Denver with his pumpkin that Grandma Verni thought he needed! :) We had wanted to go to the Pumpkin Patch with him as well, but on our way out there on Saturday it started raining so we never went and I work the next 2 weekends so I'm not sure that we'll make it this year.

Sleepless Nights?

I thought once you got through the sleepless nights stage it was basically over other than an occasional night here or there. Well, boy was I wrong! The occasional night here and there is several nights in a row here and there (which recently seems to be quite often)! When Denver's butt was so owie he started getting up during the night...we're guessing because he was itchy and in pain. Now he's been doing it again. First, we thought it was because he kicks all of his covers off and rolls all around in his bed so we went and bought new jammies yesterday so he wouldn't freeze (they are fleece WITH feet so he should stay warm, right?), well once again a little before 1a.m. we hear a "waaa, waaaa" coming from Denver's room. Daddy went and saw he was still wrapped up so at least last night it wasn't out of being cold...and then told him it was still "na-nigh time", but he continued to scream frantically. I went and got some Motrin, gave it to him, wrapped him up (because now he did have the covers off), and immediately silence! Now we think it's those silly teeth. When you look at his gums you can see white all over so I'm guessing it won't be long and this kiddo will have a mouth full of teeth! I'm pretty sure the other top front tooth is really close to popping through. Then again at 5a.m. came more crying. We gave in and let him eat, he ate and went right back to sleep. That's such a dilemma....when you're tired and just want that last little bit of sleep and you know if you feed the guy he'll go back to sleep that's all you want to do, but then you wonder if we feed him is he going to keep on getting up this early in the morning and wanting to eat? We've also been trying to cut back on the nursing and switch to the sippy cup. We've struggled here as well. Denver will drink some milk out of his sippy cup, but he won't consume the amount of milk in a day that he's supposed to unless he nurses! Anyone with any advice or suggestions we'd gladly take them. (You can even leave a quick comment at the bottom of this "Sleepless Nights?" blog by clicking on comment! Hint, hint....are people scared to leave comments...seems only people who have a blog ever leave comments on anyones blog.)

Denver showing off a pair of his new warm jammies!

It was my birthday yesterday and Evan invited a couple friends over for supper. It was nice to hang out at home, but do something with some of our friends. We're at the time in our lives where almost all of our friends are either pregnant or have a child or too. Denver loved being able to play with some of his friends at his house. It was so cute watching them play together. At one point all 3 of the little ones were back in a little corner. I didn't get to my camera fast enough so I didn't get a picture of it, but it was pretty funny. Denver is always finding the tiniest places to crawl into. He likes to trap himself behind his jumperoo (which we found out can be dangerous...Daddy was napping one day while Mommy was at work and woke up to Denver crying because his head was stuck in the railing!! Don't worry Daddy got it right out, but it sure scared Dad and I don't know that he'll fall asleep while Denver's roaming around anymore!), he also loves to crawl under his high chair and to play under there...the problem is figuring out how to get back out of all these places.

Here are some more pictures of our little man:

Denver loves to crawl in the closet and play in there. Typically he gets himself into trouble in there because he always pulls the little scrubber off the swiffer and chews on it (GROSS!). He'd play in there for hours if you let him.

Here's Denver walking to Mom. He still won't take more than 6 steps and then decides its faster to get down on the floor and crawl. Evan thinks he'd win a crawling contest for speed. If you open the fridge door you can bet he'll be there in a couple seconds no matter where he was in the house before you opened the fridge!

New Things

Denver keeps on learning and doing new things. He also had his first cold, which I forgot to include in his 10 month blog. The day Denver turned 10 months he came down with his first cold. He had a runny nose and a cough and his lungs sounded terrible. I bulb syringed his nose tons during that week which he absolutely hated. It was finally better and now he's working on his top left front tooth and this in turn has caused a runny nose too! The poor guy. He hasn't been to fussy with this tooth coming in, but the other night when I had to go to work I think it was bothering him and he just wanted me to sit and hold him...it was very hard for me to walk out the door! Here are some pictures I took of Denver the other day. If you notice his pants are a little big, it's because we moved up a size. His jeans that are 6-12 months are too short, but these 12-18 month are pretty big yet too! I wish they didn't put such a big span between sizes; oh well at least he can wear these for a LONG time. Evan was shaving the other night when he gave Denver a bath and when he was done he put his face in the tub to wash off his face and blew bubbles. Denver immediately picked up on this and started doing it too. Here's a video of him, it's too cute!

Here's a video of Denver when I walked into his room to get him out of his crib after his afternoon nap. He typically wakes up happy and loves to play around in his crib before he starts hollering for someone to come and get him.

This is an older video of Denver playing in the tub. He loves to make "noises" in cups.

Denver is 10 Months Old!

Believe it or not Denver was 10 months old last week Wednesday. He continues to be a busy little boy. He crawls all over, loves to push his little "walker" all around the house, he crawls up the stairs (and has caused a couple of scares!), learning how to feed himself with a spoon, learning animal sounds (has been making tractor sounds for quite some time), and who knows what else! Denver has also taken up to 5 steps on his own. He's scared to do it by himself and if you don't have him preoccupied with seeing Mom or Dad a couple feet away from him he'll plop his little butt down on the floor instead of walk, but that's okay with me! When he takes off I'm afraid it will take a day or 2 and he'll be running! We were too busy to take pictures the day Denver turned 10 months, but I took some 2 weeks prior that I never got posted and I attempted for some more yesterday, but he didn't really cooperate.

An update on Denver's butt is....that it is ALL BETTER!!!!! We couldn't be happier and I've learned to absolutely love dermatology! They took such good care of us, I couldn't be happier. I never had to sit on hold when calling the clinic, they returned phone calls within 5 minutes, and they even called to check on Denver this week and to let us know that his culture did come back showing some staph so they were indeed correct that his little butt was infected through fungus and bacteria. Denver will finish his oral antibiotics tomorrow which he has done wonderful with...he gets excited when he sees me come with a syringe of "pink stuff" and we're done to his special cream of once a day and then next week we'll go to once every other day and then we will also have a follow up appointment that week as well.

Other things going on in the Kindt household are finally winding down. We finally had a Sunday with NO plans; it was absolutely amazing to be able to do our own thing and spend the day as a family. Evan went on a fishing trip last Saturday with his Grandpa Pootsie. He couldn't bare ending his summer of fishing with catching nothing. They actually limited out on walleyes so Evan is semi-content in the fishing department now.

Here's Denver feeding himself his breakfast (yogurt....he LOVES yogurt!)

A friend from work had suggested taking pictures of Denver going crazy with a box of Cheerios. Denver loves Cheerios, but he really didn't go crazy with the box and it took a little for him to figure out he could actually get them out of the box!

The Butt Update

I wanted to update everyone on Denver's poor little butt. After seeing the dermatologist who gave us a special cream that we had to go get from a special pharmacy it started to fade away and we thought we were finally going to have a happy little boy again. Well, we were proven wrong. I worked nights this past weekend and got a phone call from Daddy at 5a.m. Denver had been up since 3a.m. screaming and frantically pulling at his diaper and Daddy couldn't get him to stop crying. Finally around 5:30a.m. Denver calmed down and went back to sleep so Daddy got a couple hours of sleep before he had to go to work. Today we returned to the dermatologist and she put Denver on a different cream and an antibiotic. They think that the fungus has cleared up some (which I agree) and that it looks more bacterial now and are hopefully that the antibotic and new cream along with Aveeno baths will do the trick for us. As long as all goes well we won't return back to the dermatologist for 3 weeks. Thank you for all the prayers you've said for Denver and us and please continue to say them. I'll try to keep you posted.

Drinking Water

Just the other day I decided it was probably time to let Denver drink from a cup by himself. Here's a video of him. Now his meals are all about the cup. He wants it the whole time.

The Power of Prayer

Just wanted to update everyone and tell them how powerful your prayers have been for our family today. As I said earlier today I called our peds clinic and asked for a referral to the dermatologist. After another phone call and waiting about 4 hours our pediatrician's nurse finally returned my phone call. She said she would make the appointment for Denver with a dermatologist and would get back to me with the date and time. I then asked if she thought we'd be able to get in today yet and she kind of laughed at me and said "No, no, you won't get in until the end of October. It's hard to get into a derm.". I responded "Then we need to see McKercher or we need him to come up with another plan as we need something more than what we're doing now." She told me she'd get back to me of what our pediatrician wanted to do and we'd go from there. After hanging up with her I was very disappointed and just didn't know what to do for my little boy. Then I reassured myself it was okay and that we have lots of people praying for Denver and put my trust in God to take care of it. After waiting another hour or so she called us back and said she had derm on the other line and that they had a cancellation and could see us at 1:30p.m. (it was currently 1p.m.!). I said we'll jump in the car and be there. We got to Denver's appointment and waited a long time to be seen, but it was so worth it (or at least I think so as of now). She walked in and took one look at his little bottom and said "Oh, that's a fungus. I know how I'll treat it, but we need to get a slide of it first just to make sure." She was very impressed when I responded with "THANK YOU, I knew it wasn't yeast and that it had to be a fungus". The slide confirmed that Denver has a fungus and she gave us a new cream to try that we actually had to go get from a special pharmacy. God is good! Thank you everyone for your prayers and keep on praying that this cream does that job and Denver gets over this fast. We have a follow-up appointment in 2 weeks unless it doesn't start improving in a couple days then we'll go back sooner.

Denver's First Trip to the Black Hills

Denver had his first experience of a LONG road trip which was to the Black Hills. We went with the Waltner/Schmeichel family. During our time there we went to my cousin Ethan's 2 soccer games and hung out with the family and relaxed the rest of the time (Evan did go fishing....but unfortunately he had no luck AGAIN! I'm beginning to think fish can smell him and say don't go close to him...just kidding honey!). Denver did very well with the long drive. He did have one screaming/crying fit on the way out there, but the rest of the time he was perfect! We did take our portable DVD player along and let him watch Baby Einstein towards the end of the trip on the way out there and on the way back as we were running out of ways to entertain him (sorry for those who disapprove of a 9 month old watching videos, but we all had to stay sane and he loves them!). Here are some pictures from Ethan's first soccer game the night we got there. The first 2 pictures are courtesy of my sister (Yea! Finally some pictures of Mommy and Denver!). These days it seems my hands are a little tied up that I don't get many pictures taken anymore when we are out and about so I don't have many pictures from our trip.

Our whole family stayed in a cabin while we were in the hills. My cousin Paula brought her dog Max along who Denver absolutely LOVES. Where ever Max was is where Denver wanted to be or he had to at least be able to see him. Here's a video of them together.

Denver playing with Max

Before ending this post I have a little prayer request for my little boy. Denver has had a rash in his diaper area for a little over 3 weeks. We've been to the doctor twice for it and today I called back to our peds clinic and asked for a referral to a dermatologist because it's still not better and it's now starting to hurt him. Please pray for the doctors to know what it is, for it to heal, and to quit hurting Denver fast as it just breaks my heart to change his pants because he just cries and cries.

Labor Day Weekend

Labor Day weekend Evan's first cousin Jordan got married to Ann (Congratulations Jordan and Ann!). This was a big day for our family. Evan was a groomsmen and I was one of Ann's personal attendants. It was a beautiful day and overall Denver was very well behaved and loved watching all of the action going on. Unfortunately, we never thought about who would be Denver's entertainer during the ceremony so I had to stand out in the narthex area and let Denver play and talk as when I tried sitting in the sanctuary with him, Denver would start talking and tried to warn Ann of the "crazy" Kindt family that she was marrying into! :) (Please don't take that personal Kindt's as we love you dearly and love spending time with you, but you have to wonder when you can find a carrot in a silverware drawer or a hammer in the freezer! Hee, hee!) Denver's Great Grandpa Pootsie thought he needed to give Denver a sucker. Denver loved the sucker and made a mess out of it and was very upset when Mommy said "No!" and took it away.

Later that night Great Grandpa Pootsie along with Great Uncle Bryce thought that Denver also needed some Pepsi!!!! (And they wonder why Denver doesn't come to the farm by himself!) :) Mommy and Daddy were dancing and Mommy saw them letting Denver drink out of a cup and Mommy said right away "What are they giving my baby now?!". Daddy thought it was funny at the moment. We got home late and Denver was tired, but never fell asleep as he did not want to miss out on any of the action. Everyone kept saying "Oh he is going to sleep so good tonight!". Well.....we wish everyone would have been correct, but instead they were wrong. We were up with Denver 2-3 times that night (Daddy no longer thought that drink of Pepsi and the sucker were cute as he was now tired like Mom!).

Here's our immediate family picture from the wedding. For those of you who do not know, Evan's Dad, Keith, is next to me and Evan's younger brother Aaron is next to their Dad.

Playing in the lawn with Dad at the reception.

More Camping Trips

Now that I finally have a little bit of time to update the blog here are our last 2 camping trips. The first of these 2 camping trips was to Yankton with Evan's family. It was so nice to kick back and relax that I kind of forgot about taking pictures so these 2 pictures will have to do. I've put in a request from the other cameras there, but have not gotten them so this is what everyone gets to see.

Our other camping trip was to Roy Lake (for those who don't know and care it is in northern South Dakota...almost to the North Dakota border). We chose Roy Lake for the 3 of us to go and celebrate our 5th Wedding Anniversary. (Crazy that 5 years has gone by, huh?) Daddy would have been okay with leaving Denver at home, but Mommy couldn't leave him just yet! We stayed at Roy Lake Resort where we rented a cabin that had a kitchen where we could make our meals and it was just 15 ft from the lake. We also picked Roy Lake because there is supposed to be good fishing and Evan wanted to do some "good fishing". Unfortunately, 2 weeks before we went they had a big storm and a lot of fish washed up on shore and the fishing hasn't been good since, so needless to say Evan caught NOTHING. This was a disappointment, but we enjoyed the time away as a family where we could all sit back and relax and not have to be constantly running (like we do when we're home...but by the middle of September it WILL be better). Here are some pictures of our time at Roy Lake.

Daddy and Denver fishing off our personal dock!

Denver loved spending so much time outside. He pushed his little walker toy all over the deck and had lots of fun. It was during this trip he started figuring out how to crawl. Also, during this trip Denver thought he needed to break Mommy and Daddy back into being new parents. The first night he was up twice and the second night he was up most of the night wanting to play!

Our 9 Month Old Squirt!

Denver continues to be our little squirt! He weighed in at 17 lbs. 5 oz. and measured 27.5 inches long for his 9 month check up. That puts him in the 10% for weight and the 25% for height. Once again Daddy had to be reassured that Denver's Mommy and Daddy are little so he's going to be to and it doesn't mean that he's not getting enough to eat. He's doing just fine. Towards the end of our check up they looked through our "Ages and Stages" (a questionnaire that I have to fill out about different things that Denver is or isn't doing...this used to be called the "Denver Assessment" but the name has changed). Then our practitioner said "Well if it makes you feel any better about his size, he scores 100% in smartness!". I was able to mark yes for every question it asked. Denver is starting to crawl. He does a funny crawl though...he puts one knee down like he's supposed to and keeps the other one up and uses his foot. Evan thinks he does this to be able to keep his options open. If he wants to go back to a sitting position he can easily where as if he had both knees down he might be on his tummy with no energy to get himself back up to a sitting position; although he can do this if he wants to. Denver also took his first STEPS (all by himself) last Sunday. I set him down on his 2 little feet to throw some stuff in the diaper bag and off he went 3 steps all by himself. He obviously didn't realize my hands weren't there and he won't do this again. That's okay though a little fear is good and it's nice that he's not TOO mobile yet. Our time is coming though as he continues to push his little "walker" around and is cruising pretty fast with it. He went up and down the sidewalk with it the other evening. Denver likes to show off to the neighbors. His new thing is to scream all the time and it's driving us crazy. Evan complained to me today about how vocal he is and I looked at him and said "Could you expect anything else? I think we were pretty vocal and we still are!". Here are some pictures of Denver to "mark" his "9 Months". I attempted to get some in a "nice" outfit, but haven't succeeded. He's too interested in his environment and doesn't want to sit and pose for me anymore. Not quite sure how I got him to cooperate for these pictures.

As most of you know Denver is a grandson to a dairy farmer. Grandpa Rodney and Grandma Verni got Denver 2 "Got Milk" onesies at Christmas time and the bigger one fits now. The "milk moustache" is yogurt, which Denver loves to eat!

We've been on 2 camping trips since my last post, but we've been so busy I haven't had time to post them; 1 trip was to Yankton with Grandma Kim and Grandpa David (and family) and the other we just got home from today which was to Roy Lake for our 5th wedding anniversary. I hope to get them posted, but for now this is what you get. It's been a busy 2 weeks and we have 2 more weeks (or so) of craziness and then I THINK it will slow down. Posts that will be coming after all our running around will include our camping trips, cousin Jordan and Ann's wedding, and a trip to the Black Hills with the Schmeichel family so stay tuned! :)

Promised Video

Here's the video of Denver walking with his little "walker" that I promised everyone a while back. He's so proud of himself walking around! I'm also thinking we might not skip the crawling afterall. He has started getting up on all 4 and rocking back and forth. Last night he attempted to moved forward about 2 hand movements, but he was by his highchair and of course had to hit his head on it so then he was done!