A long and emotional day...

Today we had to take Zachary into the Children's Hospital for a day surgery.  It was discovered in January (and confirmed in May) that he had what appeared to be a hernia.  The only way to know for sure is exploratory surgery.  Since that needed to be done in order to know exactly what we were dealing with, they would obviously fix whatever the issue was while they were in there.

So, we went in for 9:00 this morning.  The surgery was scheduled for 11:00.  He was taken about 30 minutes late but all went well.  They called as soon as he was starting to wake and I doubt that he even remembered coming to and us now being there.  Zachary was extremely brave.  He was a trooper up until the nurse came and took him to the OR.  At that point he was terrified (even though we had explained as much to him as possible) and would not let go of Steve.  The nurse had to peel him off of him and when he did, he spotted me.  He reached out and cried for me and that's when the nurse whisked him off.  We then turned and started our way to the waiting room.  Obviously this was extremely difficult on me and Steve.  We were crushed but knew he was in amazing hands.

The surgeon (Dr. Shaw) and his team were amazing.  They were so wonderful with Zachary even though he never made eye contact with any of them.  They explained everything to us and did all they could to make us feel comfortable.  I was so impressed with the hospital.  It is very reassuring to know that we have such an amazing facility at our disposal but hope to never have to use it again.  I am also so happy that we have been donating to them for the last few years.  It's money well spent...

He is now happily sleeping in his bed.  He is so brave and recovering very well.  He was wanting to play golf after getting some food in his system.  I think we're going to have a hard time keeping him calm and resting tomorrow.  I guess it's better than the alternative.

Great Papa's 90th birthday party

Today we went and celebrated my grandfather's 90th birthday.  He was so happy to have his entire family there with him.  He got emotional while I was talking to him, saying how he couldn't believe that we were all there.  I told him that if I could be guaranteed to live the quality of life he has had thus far, I would sign right now to live past 90.  He told me that he worked hard all his life and went dancing when he could.  That is why he believes he is still around and full of life!

Here are a few pictures from our special day...

The 4 generations:

The entire Houle family:

 Our branch of the family tree:

Me and my Papa:

 

Great Papa dancing with his girlfriend Sandra:

 

Outside fun!

We are enjoying another gorgeous weekend.  We pulled out the climbing castle toy that we had when the big boys were little.  Charlie had a blast trying to climb up it and playing with the wheel.

Zachary and Nicolas spend quite a bit of time running through the sprinklers.  How they weren't frozen to the core, I'll never know.  But they had a ball and that's all that really matters...

 

Going from crying to laughing in a few seconds...

Charlie loves taking baths.  He sure is my water baby.  He was happily playing in the tub and talking away to himself.  I started to take a few videos and for some reason he got very upset and started to cry.  here's what happened next...

A Run in with a Nutrigrain Bar

Charlie enjoyed his snack after his nap today.  I gave him a strawberry Nutrigrain bar.  He loved it and ate it all up... all except for the parts he decided to wear instead.

I snapped a few pictures simply because it was too funny...

The Great Outdoors

Thankfully the boys LOVE being outside!  We enjoyed this beautiful, long weekend and spent most of it outside.  On Saturday night we had a BBQ at our neighbors house.  The boys were so well behaved and ate like champs.  They ran around with the other kids and headed home to go to bed as soon as we told them it was time to go.

On Sunday some of the boys' cousins came to visit.  They spent the afternoon running through the sprinklers with Laulau, Katie and Sabrina.  They have so much fun with those girls.  We enjoyed a nice big breakfast withe them this morning and also had "take-out Friday" (ordering pizza) with them tonight.

Tomorrow we get back into our regular routine.  It`s great to have a long weekend but it seems to back the start of the upcoming week that much harder.  Here are a few fun pictures from our weekend...

How we love our Daddy

Here are just some very cute pictures of the boys with Daddy...