Sikorski Saga

Tim got the ultimate guide to outdoor grilling from Uncle Phil! Luella loves her new art easel. Luella wearing all her presents she can - Tinkerbell pj's, princess dress-up, Bob the Builder belt, and swimming back pack. Luella snuggling with her daddy and singing teddy bear from Great Grammy. Katja awake for a little bit of Christmas morning. First one to fall asleep had to wear the head band. Good thing she's cute enough for it! Santa gave Luella moon sand to build sand castles. It was all she wanted and she played for hours! Honestly - a two-year-old playing with one toy for multiple hours!

Luella and Katja after the family service. Luella and best girl friend, Sigrid Evers , smelling the poinsettias . Our traditional Scandinavian Christmas Eve dinner! We shared the night with Uncle Phil and church friend Doug. Kyla with her girls! Luella opened her early present from Grammy and Granddaddy. She got Tinker Bell jammies and fuzzy crocs ! The Christmas tree!

Luella entertained herself for 45 minutes by playing with her new friends. We all love a good game of ring around the rosy.

Yes, Katja is the result of Mommy kissing Santa, but not the Santa in the following photos! After waiting in line nearly 45 minutes (which I hear wasn't bad), we got this photo with Santa. We are so amused. They let parents take two shots with their own camera, after they took three with their cameras. Of course I don't have the fancy flash that takes out the mall skylight shadows.

Katja now screams as a form of communication. Luella alternates between shushing her and putting her hands over her ears. (Yes, Kirsten, this one's for you!)

I think we need a big red cross on our house. Tim's lung turned out to be 20% collapsed and it was too much for just forced oxygen to fix. So Wednesday afternoon we went to the ER and the doctors put in a chest tube and admitted Tim. We visited him Thursday morning and he was really out of it, but had a miraculous recovery about the time he got a CAT scan and he was discharged Thursday afternoon. He can't lift more than 25 pounds or fly for 2 weeks. I guess it's a good thing we decided to stay here for Christmas. Friday morning we woke up to Luella vomiting. She got the viral bug going around. We took her to the clinic and said she was on the brink of a trip to the ER for an IV, or getting better. Luckily she only vomited once more after that and really picked up. She had 10 hours of being really sick. Crazily, Luella gained an inch in height in three months since her two-year check up. She's now 37" tall! So Saturday night Kyla got Luella's bug. She got it ...

Katja is 24.5" long and 15 lbs 11oz, which makes her 50% for height and 90% for weight. She's developing just fine...just like Luella. We have to go to the County Health Dept for her HIB vaccine. There is a nation-wide shortage of the HIB and our clinic only gets 5 vaccines a month. Two months ago we were 135 on the wait list and never got called. Go figure. Tim, on the other hand, isn't doing so well. Tuesday morning his company played 22 nd Tec Escort (the unit he just left) in a "friendly" game of flag football. The refs were there to make sure no fights broke out, and apparently tackling was allowed. Tim got hit hard and saw the medics. Yesterday they thought he strained a muscle but had him get chest x-rays today to see if there was anything else going on. There was - Tim has a partial pneumothorax . If you remember back to Luella's birth, she did too. So we're going to the hospital today for him to get on bed rest and forced oxygen to reinfl...