one of these kids spent most of the day in the ER...

I thought he was entitled to ice cream for dinner.





(the sister just gets it for being the sister, lucky girl!)
(and okay, I told them they could have ice cream for dinner, but did end up following up with making them eat offering them cheese/taco meat quesadillas -cinco de mayo!- and applesauce. so no turning me into the parent police.)

So... anyone else think it's ironic that I found that ultrasound picture yesterday and showed it to Sawyer and we had a very drawn out talk about not only how cool it is that that's what he (or any baby) looks like before they're born, but also a lot about how ultrasound works and how cool is it that they can see and take pictures of the inside of your body...
and then we turn around today and Sawyer is in the ER getting an ultrasound of his own abdomen??!?

Yesterday Sawyer was complaining about pain under his belly when he moved. It was just a casual mention starting off the day, that it hurt there (showing me way down low under his belly button) when he sat down or bent over or sneezed. I didn't think much of it... until, as the morning went on, he stopped being his normal active self and basically wouldn't get off the couch because it was bothering him. Fast forward to lunchtime and he had grown more lethargic and eventually, additionally, spiked a fever of 102.5°. Hmmm.
Now, I am not one to run my kids into the dr's office for a simple fever. I don't worry about the usual ailments of childhood... it takes either a lot or a long time of sick for me to call the doc. My kids are pretty healthy and pretty good at kicking illness in the butt themselves, given time. But this time? With the strange pain first (and not a tummy ache or sick stomach, but pain way down low) and then a fever... I was a little concerned.
So I took him in and after ruling out a bladder infection, the dr wasn't sure what was wrong... possibly the beginning of appendicitis? She checked all the usuals as to rule out any other possibilities... ears, throat, chest all looked good... and ran a strep culture just in case... which came out just on the slightest side of positive. She showed me the strip and I couldn't even really make out the blue line but she said she'd treat it as positive -maybe we just caught it super early so it wasn't showing up real well- and gave us antibiotics for that. Still kind of puzzled though as to the abdominal pain -again, that it was not belly pain, but rather so low and radiating- so said to keep an eye on it getting worse, moving to just the right side, etc, just in case it was coincidentally appendicitis.

Well, last evening it got worse. His fever was stubborn in coming down, he'd moved on to no appetite, frequent bathroom trips, and more pain; by bedtime he'd hardly let us touch him. I felt like more than anything it was the fever making him so miserable and breathed half a sigh of relief when we did get it down enough to feel at least halfway comfortable letting him go to bed. To then sit around all night and debate on whether we should take him in.
His fever and pain stayed at an even keel overnight, but in the morning I decided enough was enough and finally took him in to the ER as soon as Savannah was off to school.














They scoped him out for appendicitis right away... I was surprised at how relatively quickly they got us in they had him in the ultrasound room and then has his urine and bloodwork underway.














Vanderbilt Children's was great! But then of course the waiting for results. What seemed like hours later...















Turned out no appendicitis. Yay! But definitely the strep and actually the strep had caused lots of swelling and inflamation in the lymph nodes in his bowel area; hence the pain and tenderness. I had no idea there were lymph nodes in your lower abdomen and even less of an idea that they would flare up with strep throat!! Seriously... no sore throat, but fever and appendicitis type pain?!? Crazy.

They gave him an all-in-one dose of antibiotic shot in the butt... so we don't even have to worry about meds here at home and supposedly he'll feel better faster than the traditional 10 day dose. Hopefully.

We made it home just in time for me to dose him up with more Motrin, tuck him in bed for a much-needed nap, and welcome Savannah home off the bus. So yeah, basically spent our whole day at the hospital, just to confirm he had strep like our dr told us the day before. :)

He's doing better this afternoon... but of course been still doped up on Motrin.
Oh, and now he says his throat is hurting. Of course, now.

I think we'll be home from school tomorrow. He's been on antibiotics for over 24 hrs already, so he's not contagious, but I'm thinking he won't be up to it.
And that's saying a lot if you know Sawyer, poor kid...

Get well soon buddy!

sick or treat

Here were my treats for this Happy Halloween:





















Tylenol, ibuprofen, amoxicillin, hot tea, hot cider, soup, applesauce, tylenol, ibuprofen, chloreseptic spray, throat lozenges, frozen lemonade, a DQ blizzard (thanks hon!), ibuprofen, tylenol pm, and repeat.
For three days in a row.
And lets do it again today.
This is seriously THE worst sore throat EVER. My dr even confirmed that... he shook his head at me three or four separate times during my appt. saying, 'man, that must really hurt. That's about the worst looking throat I've ever seen.'
Um, thanks for making me feel better.
And speaking of feeling better, I don't. Fever/sickwise, I'm good now, but this throat thing is really trying to do me in. I can't eat, can't talk, can't even move, my neck is so swollen and tender. It hurts to even breath my throat is so raw. Seriously, bad shape.

I haven't been sick in a loooong time. Honestly, other than a little two-day cold here and there I cannot remember the last time I was sick like knocked off my feet, not functional.
Not fun.
And of course it was the best timing... the only full weekend we had before Halloween involving the kids each attending a party, a certain little boy's birthday tomorrow and our own big fat birthday party at the end of the week. Plus had wanted to squeeze a couple more house projects in before visitors next week.
Obviously, I got a whole lotta nothin' done.
Birthday shopping will have to be finished tonight, party supplies scrounged up all week and painting done every evening. Sigh. Moms really can't afford to get sick.

On the bright side, I realized this was the first time we've ever had to use our new insurance cards since Ryan switched jobs in March... no illness in almost 8 months! And I went and broke the streak...

Anyway, I do have a few pics of the kids this weekend. We did manage to eek out some costumes (so thankful I kept that part low key this year!) and they candied it up last night. Of course I snapped those pics with my big camera and still haven't found my card reader, so those will have to wait for later tonight.

Till then, Happy November! Hope it's better than how October ended around here!!

on to the spring cleaning

This past weekend I had designated this week as a week of Spring Cleaning.
Cleaning, sorting, purging, reorganizing, repurposing; the works.
Monday started out okay... I got some work done in the kitchen and--

Well, and then I got a migraine.
A migraine that lasted a good 30 hours. Yuck.
I haven't had one that bad in a long time.

Somehow -and I honestly hardly remember doing any of this- yesterday I still managed to make three batches of pumpkin scones early in the morning and take them to our last MOPs meeting of the year, since my group was on schedule for breakfast. And I managed to stay and make it through most of the morning there. I'm not sure how... I was so shaky and foggy. I did leave early thinking I was going to lose it and throw up at one point.
I got Sawyer home and layed down for about an hour before Savannah got home and then after I got her off the bus I -again, don't know or remember quite how I did this- made dinner and dessert for a couple with a new baby from our church. When that was finally done I collapsed on the couch and didn't move until Ryan got home.
The kids were actually very good for me, not complaining at all about no tv or no outside time. They just played games together all afternoon. Pretty quietly too, I might add.

It was so bad I honestly couldn't remember if I had redosed my drugs or not. I remember thinking it was time, and I remember getting up and pouring myself some water, and the water glass was on the counter next to the bottle of pain reliever, but later I could not for the life of me remember if I actually took them or got distracted.

Thankfully I woke up this morning feeling refreshed and like my head will actually stay in tact for the day.
Anyway, so it's now day three of this week and I've made no dents in my Spring Cleaning list. In fact my list has seemingly quadrupled since basically being out of commission for the past two days. My kitchen, which was clean on Monday afternoon, is scary. Three batches of pumpkin scones, one pound of cut veggies, two pounds of cut meat, a pan from browning meat, all that mess thrown into the crock pot, one batch of rice in the rice cooker, one batch of beer bread, and one batch of brownies (with a cream cheese/pineapple whipped topping and the mess of slicing fruit) later, with everything left exactly where it was last used, my kitchen looks like a war zone. Seriously. Oh, and throw in scraping something together for breakfast and lunch for the kids in there.
Thankfully Ryan let the kids escape the avalanche danger at dinnertime last night and, after delivering the dinner I had made, had McDonalds.

So today the kitchen is my first plan of attack.
The other rooms around here aren't much better I'm afraid.



Savannah's been busy doing her own Spring Decorating/Organizing around here... she's been labeling everything in sight. She's made signs for all the doors in the house and labeling other random things.
Here's the guest bedroom door: She's listed grammas- both BG and DS (but no grampas??)
and all her aunts (again, what about their counterparts??)
and then friends who use this room:
Mike, Evan (planning ahead for when he arrives I guess)
KC,
Robersins,
Yuri,
Mike and
Arein :)

(I love kindergartner spelling !!)

And my bed:


I found this on my headboard.
Complete with side assignments.

(and Ryan's wondering why she labeled it -in his words- our 'love bed' haha)













Apparently, everything everybody has it's place around here!

scatterbrained

I feel like I've been so scatterbrained lately. So random.
It doesn't help that I barely slept last night. I was in bed by 10:30, but I doubt I slept at all until almost 2. And slept fitfully after that. I just could not quiet my thoughts. And it spilled over into my dreams when I did actually drift off.
Ryan and I got some news yesterday that just sent my mind spinning... so try as I might to sleep, I spent most of the night excitedly, apprehensively, nervously, tentatively imagining, wondering, hypothesizing, planning and praying.
Hehe... I know that's cryptic; there's just no way I can begin to talk about it at this point.
Yet it's all I'm thinking about.

In other (scattered) news...

I'm feeling much better today. Past the worst, I'm at the point I think where I sound worse than I feel! HA!

*****
It's sunny and "warm" today. Warm is relative, of course, but it's supposed to be in the mid 40's today. Almost 60 tomorrow. Can't wait to get the kids outside to play for a bit!! And our garage has been suffering in this cold weather. Stuff just gets thrown out there or when we have to go out and grab something it's just dig, grab it and run back in, so it's getting a little disheveled. I finally sold my old dining room table, so it's out of there, I have a load to take to Goodwill, we have to pull out tractor and clean it up for our "trade" with the Laughlins, and all around put the garage back together and give our cars some room to breathe again.

*****
We (finally) have our appointment for Sawyer with a Pediatric Dermatology Specialist at the Children's Hospital in St Louis tomorrow. I know I haven't gone into detail on that stuff on the blog yet, but I'm hoping after seeing the dr's tomorrow there won't even be any reason to. Or at least a concrete diagnosis instead of more of the past three months of wondering. I know. Cryptic again. I'm not meaning to here, I'm just too tired to get into it.

*****
I, for some random reason, really liked this post over at Dooce yesterday. Really liked it.

*****
I picked up my produce basket this morning from my neighbor. And I weighed it today. Sometimes I think I should back my car up into her driveway to pick up my stuff... it's not always easy to carry that big full awkward basket kitty corner across the street. It's heavy! So I was curious and weighed it today. Just over 40lbs of produce for $20. That's good, isn't it? And supposedly prices are at the peak right now. Today's basket included lettuce, potatoes, sweet potatoes, onions, green beans, tomatoes, green peppers, acorn squash, mushrooms, limes, grapefruit, oranges, nectarines, apples, bananas and a big pineapple.
I'm hungry.

*****
I'm not a Facebook-er. I have pages on MySpace and on Facebook, not because I'm ever over there posting messages or "writing on walls" or whatever it is that people do over there (do I sound like I'm old and out of the loop or what?!), but just for a place marker of sorts... so once in a blue moon I can meander through and find some long lost friend or, more often, some long lost friend stumbles over my page and finds me.
Lately, however, it seems I'm over on Facebook almost every day. There seems to be this sudden influx of people from my past either jumping on the Facebook train, or just finally getting connected with people I've already found on there. I've been getting message after message of requests or updates and yesterday (hold on to your hats!) I actually sought out a few old classmates and sent friend requests of my own (and found an old friend's blog -yay!!). It really is fun to see where people are and what they are doing and look like some 15-20 years later. Yikes. 15 years since high school. How did that happen?!?
Anyway. All that to say, as much as I'm starting to like it, I don't like it! I don't have time for this, people!! And yes, I know I'm way behind on this bandwagon, but I've been avoiding it for a reason. I don't want to get sucked in.
I wish everyone just had blogs. I could peek more into their lives, get updates in my reader, and communicate via commenting and good old fashioned email. Forget this "writing on someone's wall" stuff.
I'm going to stop rambling now, as this could turn into what should be a post in itself.

*****
I've lost 7lbs in two weeks. Kinda happy about that.

*****
Sawyer just pulled a string cheese stick out of the fridge and came over to ask me if he could have it... with a "pretty pretty pretty pleeeeease?!?" and -get this- a complete head tilt and full on batting of the eyelashes.
Who's kid is this??

*****
Well, I should think that is enough scatterbrainedness for you for one day!
You're welcome.

guess what?

Now I'm the one who's sick.
Apparently a week of helping the kids stave off their colds (combined with more colds that came to visit with our friends this weekend?!) wore me down. I woke up Saturday and Sunday with a sore throat and then by yesterday (Monday) I was full blown sick. I felt like I barely left the couch. Between my stuffed up head, my sore throat, my voice coming and going, and my cough, I was great company let me tell ya.
Really, it wasn't that bad... I haven't been sick in a long time and it was kind of nice to just lay around and take it easy. It was good timing too, considering Ryan had Monday off work, there was no school, and we all had a complete hunker down and veg out, never leave the house kind of day.

The real bummer part is that Heather had her baby this past weekend and because of this sick house, we obviously haven't been able to get up to the hospital to see them. I'm actually feeling much better today (except for a killer headache) so I'm hoping I can get over there as soon as they get home midweek. I'm dying to meet that tiny baby girl!!

Let's see... what else can I fill you in on about the weekend?
We had a great time as usual with the Robertsons. We all kept saying over and over how fun it is now that the boys are older and everyone can just go play! Ben and Sawyer are less than 8 weeks apart in age and so we've of course always been hoping they'd be fast friends. In actuality, they've spent the first three years of their lives pretty much just tolerating each other. In typical toddler fashion, they've butted heads quite a bit, but mostly it seemed they kind of just tolerated each other. This time, now that they're both big three year olds (how did that happen??) they are finally playing with each other, having conversations, making up games together and having dance offs. It actually warmed up just enough to bundle up and get some fresh air for a bit:













Sawyer loved having Benny come stay with us. He was bummed when they left.
J was great fun too... he's such a sweet little guy and absolutely cracked me up!











And of course we got to meet the bay-bee... who's not such a little baby anymore. I can't believe Solomon is already 5 months old! Man, I'm afraid to blink anymore these days; these kids are going to be teenagers the next time I look!






















(see previous years' stair shots -it's become a tradition of ours- here and here)

Anyway, we had a great weekend (aside from all of us nursing these stupid colds) eating a ton of good food, including a night of chinese take out, playing games, and catching up.

To see them off we all went to The St Louis Mills Mall Sunday morning to catch a little of the Blues hockey practice and to let the boys run off some energy on the indoor playground before their long drive home. After the Robertsons left we hit up a couple of the outlet stores and then had lunch before we headed home as well.

It's been snowing off and on this morning. I wish it would just really snow. It's been so freaking cold this winter, but we've had absolutely no snow worth mentioning around here. I'd like at least one good snowfall before spring arrives!

yup, it's cold

I'm really glad I don't live anywhere where a negative 20 degree windchill is normal. Cuz I'm not a fan.

There was talk last evening of school being called off today because of the 0* temperatures and the minus 15 to 20 degree windchill. Many districts in our area did call because of the dangerous cold, but we were still on here. It was notable though, considering that the norm for our block has kids outside 20 minutes early for the bus, even in the winter; playing foursquare or throwing footballs around or sliding around on any ice puddles. Even when it's freezing out, the kids still gather early to enjoy a little hang out time (even kids who aren't getting on the bus- preschoolers, homeschoolers, private schoolers, etc) and half the parents are out there visiting as well. This morning however, everyone waited inside their front doors and as the bus pulled up kid by kid quickly emerged from each of their houses all bundled up to basically run right on to the bus.
Twenty degrees below zero just isn't right.
There's a reason we don't live up north, thankyouverymuch.

Sawyer and I ventured out to the church this morning bible study. It was funny to see him take such notice of the cold. Normally it doesn't phase him in the least. He's not a complainer like the other little person around here and it always seems he really could care less what the weather is. This morning however, he was in awe of the chill. Even bundled up with barely half of his face showing, he kept saying over and over, "yep, it's a super freezing day today!"

Along with this cold weather we're trying to fight off our first colds of the season as well. Except for Savannah's rendezvous with strep throat the first week of school, we have been lucky enough to stay cold and flu free so far this year. Then this Tuesday Savannah came home from school losing her voice and coughing (and that's been off and on since) and yesterday Sawyer woke up looking just miserable. You can hear his head is all stuffed up and he just has those tired, almost fever eyes. No fever as of yet, but he took a four hour nap yesterday, so you know he's fighting something!
So I feel like they're both right on the edge, and I'm trying to keep them well-rested, fed and watered right so as to just kick this cold stuff right out the door.

Especially because we gots stuff to do this weekend!
The Robertsons are coming for the long weekend and we're very much looking forward to spending some fun time with them, not to mention finally meeting baby Solomon. I'm sure they'd appreciate a germ free house to stay in.

So I'm off to put together a good stave-off-a-cold lunch for the kids, get them down for naps (sleep today Savannah, please!!) and wash sheets, change toothbrushes, and all around disinfect this house!

is it Friday yet?

I didn't get as much done yesterday as I wanted to. It was the first day with the house to myself again, the first day in awhile of being truly back in the routine without houseguests. I got (most of) my laundry done and some leaves raked and dishes done. And lots of just hang out with my baby boy time. But now today I'm wishing I would have done more because it's pressing in around me. It's just one of those days where we're all stuck inside and it's overwhelming. How does this house end up in chaos so easily???

All four of us were gone all morning; Savannah to school, Sawyer and I to bible study, and Ryan to the plastic surgeon. He had five cysts removed from his face today and is home now recuperating. We are all, in fact, home now. Which normally is a very nice thing. Not so nice today. Ryan's tired and sore and grumpy and the kids are loud and bouncy and fly back and forth between being too happy and then grumpy themselves. Let's pray nap time happens well today. For all of our sakes.

If I can just get through today, I'm looking forward to tomorrow when both kids are out of the house for a bit. Savannah's even got a date to play elsewhere all afternoon, so it's not just the morning I have "off", but practically the whole day! Woohoo! Whatever will I do with myself?!?

I have excitement planned, let me tell you! I'm going to run some errands, reorganize my linen closet, research regrouting a shower, list some stuff on Craigslist, clean out my fridge, and then hopefully get started on a few Christmas projects.

And just a warning, there will probably be a few lists showing up around here one of these days soon. I have a dozen of them floating around the house and a million of them in my head so you know there going to end up here sooner or later. Lists of ideas for all the holidays, lists of gifts, lists of things to do for school, lists of things to get out in the mail, lists of calls to make, lists of regular meals and groceries, lists of supplies I need for homemade gifts... lists of lists of lists.

As a matter of fact, here's today's list:

1. make get Sawyer to nap
2. keep husband fed and warm and drugged up
3. snuggle on the comfy couch and watch Wall*E with the kids
4. figure out dinner

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go put some effort into #1.

What's on your list today?

this is definitely an "ugh" kind of friday...

Of course.
After bragging yesterday about how healthy we all usually are, guess who woke up feeling horrible, stuffed up, sick and crabby? Me? Savannah? Sawyer? All three of us???!!! That would be correct. Oh it's been a lovely morning. And it's not even 7am....

Combine our morning today with yesterday consisting of concerning news at Sawyer's dr appointment, my several burned fingertips after a battle with the hot glue gun, a botched trial run attempt at Savannah's halloween hair, and as o f now the dishes still in my sink from Wednesday night... I'm really trying to keep myself from just crawling back in bed on this cold and rainy morning.

So to balance out this beast of a day, I'm trying to think of the positives.
Or at least things that make me smile.
Here's a little list of the better things to come out of the last 24 hours:

• peppermint ice cream
• a friendly, funny, doctor-impressing, little almost-three-year-old who charms everyone in our pediatricians office
  
• got gas for $2.33/gallon!!! last night
• my husband bought me my new favorite cd
• I'm declaring Sawyer officially completely potty trained
• Savannah being so proud of herself presenting her little personal pan pizza coupon at Pizza Hut. She earned it from school by reading so many books this month.
• pumpkin muffins
  
• The Office
• it's Friday

What is the best thing that happened to you this week?

the verdict

He does have an ear infection. And a doozy at that. So we now have antibiotics as well as a steriod for him to take for the next three days because she was concerned at how bad his cough and swelling in there sounded. His lungs are good, no croup or anything, it's all just drainage and irritation from his ears and sinuses I guess. The dr ordered strict "bedrest" for the little guy (as strict as bedrest can get for a two year old) to keep calm and quiet and keep the coughing at a minimum. Even though it's gorgeous outside today and even though I had a whole afternoon planned of letting the kids run around outside while I tackled more of the garage and even though it's all but impossible to get this kid to sit quietly for more than five minutes, not to mention adding steriods into the mix... we're consequently taking it easy.

I did set him up in front of Little Bear on the tv so I could at least get thirty minutes of garage work done outside while waiting for Savannah's bus. Now he's finally napping (which between the coughing and the steriods took quite awhile to happen) and I don't really want to be in the garage where I can't hear him. So I guess I'll spend the afternoon baking (we have small group here tonight so I might as well get some homemade goodies ready) and folding laundry. Mmmm... Fall baking!

We started our neighborhood Halloween "Boo" the other night. I was actually way ahead of the game and have had everything ready to go for a couple of weeks now, and Savannah has been impatiently waiting until it was far enough into October... she wanted to be sure and be the first ones to do it! So we "made the drop" Monday night. Ryan took both the kids sneaking around to the two houses we chose. They were thrilled with the stealth of it; tiptoeing up with the bags in hand, ringing the doorbells and running, hiding behind bushes and cars to make sure the surprise package was recieved. I watched from the front window. It was fun.



And oh my, have you all tried those new Candy Corn Hershey's Kisses?? Oh. Yum. And I don't even like candy corn!
I'm glad I gave 90% of that bag away, or I'd be in trouble!!





We were also suprised to recieve our own "Boo" on our doorstep last night so quickly!
We waited until this morning to dig into the bucket we found since the kids were already on their way to bed, but sure enough, first thing today it was once again like opening stockings on Christmas morn! They were so excited. Candy and treats, Sawyer claimed a yucky squishy giant spider and Savannah of course claimed the snowglobe. Maybe our secret "booer" knows she collects snowglobes?

Fun stuff!!

is it really only wednesday??

It so seems like it should already be Thursday --or even Friday.

I think my brain has simply done enough thinking, planning and running around in circles for the whole week already and it's ready for a weekend. :)
Lots going on today and in between all of it I'm trying to use every free minute to make sure I have everything ready and organized for the garage sale on time. We have so much stuff!!

On top of that, I think I'm going to take Sawyer in to the dr today. He's had a cough for the past week, nothing big at all, but yesterday it seemed to get suddenly worse and he had a hard time napping because of it as well as a miserable night. Normally, I'm not one to run the kids to the dr with cold symptoms or simply a cough (he's had no fever) except that the last two times Sawyer's had a cough like this it's been because he's had an ear infection. He never shows up with a fever or complains about his ears at all, it just manifests into this yucky cough. Fluid draining I think??
So I think we may be making a trip out there this morning.
Cuz I didn't already have enough to do!!

sick day

So Savannah was home sick today.
And we had a fabulous day. Honestly. She was feeling a million times better than yesterday, we had the dr. visit and the drugs and were home by 9 this morning, and had the whole rest of the day to hang out just she and me :)
We did a little coloring. We did a lot of reading (I got her a new book for us to read outloud together while the boys are gone). We spent two hours napping. We talked to our boys on the phone. We took a walk after dinner in the summer rain. We washed her hair in the kitchen sink (which is an odd favorite treat for her... she loves to lay on the counter, with the warm sprayer water and my hands running through her hair in the sink. Gee, I wonder who's daughter she is? She also was telling me as I sudsed her up I really can't wait to see my friends tomorrow! Why? So they can smell my yummy hair! Apparently a wash in the sink smells yummier.)

It was a great day to just be together.
We need to get back in the habit of our one on one "dates" or have more special days like this once in awhile...






















Also, I couldn't help but snap pictures of this tree we spied on our walk this evening...This thing only had a trunk that was seriously like two-and-a-half feet tall, but the poor thing was propped and tied up all around because the branches were growing out forever. And it had just hundreds and hundreds of apples on it. I could not get over how many apples this tiny trunk produced. It looked so odd. Like some sort of apple bush rather than an upstanding tree...

diagnosis

Savannah and I have been to the airport and back, to the pediatricians and to the pharmacy, all before 9 this morning. We are ambitious in the morning, what can I say?

My hunches about SJ were correct... she spent the afternoon not really moving from the couch, with a low fever, complaining of a headache and that her neck was stiff and hurting her. She made us a little nervous and on the lookout for meningitis there for awhile because her neck/head pain and tenderness was a big deal. We called good old Dr Dave (one of Ryan's best buds from college who just so happens to be a neurologist) and he ran down a list of things to watch for and to otherwise keep her as comfy as possible and get her to rest, checking on her throughout the night. She also popped up with a nasty rash by the time we were going to bed.
She woke this morning with her temp pretty much back to normal and feeling almost good as new... but covered in the bright red itchy rash all over her torso, up her neck and creeping onto her cheeks.
So after our 5 am airport run seeing our two boys off, we called her school to say she wouldn't be in today (she was crushed... so upset she had to miss only her third day of Kindergarten) and got an early appointment with her pediatrician.
Diagnosis: Strep throat with Scarlet Fever. Fun.
Since we caught it so early and got her on antibiotics already this morning and she really is feeling pretty good, she should be able to be back to school tomorrow.
For now she's curled up watching a movie and I think we may just take a nap together after lunch. Then I'm putting her to work :) I had big plans for my childless mornings this week with Sawyer gone and SJ in school, and since that was put on hold this morning, Savannah agreed she would help me with some boxes and garage sale stuff this afternoon. I'm hoping she'll be feeling as good as new and it'll be a fun time spent with my little girl!

the sick house, the new neighbors and the gradulation

So Hi, I'm sick again. Not the cough and sore throat I've had for the past week. Oh no. I decided to go ahead and explore all realms of sick. After Sawyer's puke fest overnight Saturday/Sunday (and being fine all day Sunday afterall), Ryan woke up in the wee hours of the morning on Monday sick as a dog. He was home in bed all day yesterday. And then guess who's turn it was today?...
Thankfully, Ryan knew what I was going through and stayed home again today to take care of the kids for me. I slept most of the day. When I wasn't in the bathroom that is.

So now it's four o'clock in the afternoon and I'm thankfully feeling much better, sitting out in the sunshine on our front porch watching Ryan with the kids riding their bikes up and down the street. And I have the laptop. :)
And I'm checking out our new neighbors across the street. Yes, there's finally buyers for our dear neighbor who's been waiting to move since November. The new folks are here with the inspectors, termite guy, plumber, etc., I'm assuming checking out the house for the big inspection. We waved to the family as they came in. And now we're kind of hanging around out here waiting for them to come out so we can say hi. It looks like they have three little girls; maybe about 7 years, 3 years and an infant. Not our ideal ages/sexes for new kids to move in, but we'll take what we can get. It's better than a bunch of obnoxious teenagers who run over mailboxes!

We're going to have to think about dinner soon (not me with my stomach, but at least for the kids). Savannah's preschool graduation program is this evening. She's excited.
Is it wrong that I don't correct her pronunciation? For weeks, she's been calling it her Gradulation. And I just think it's so stinkin' cute. Like a combination of graduation and congratulations. My mom sent her a little surprise in the mail to celebrate and Savannah was excited to show me what she got for her Gradulation gift! It makes me smile every time!
I just know we're getting down to some of her last few mis-enunciations and I have to hold on to some of these before they're all gone!!



Happy Gradulation Savannah Joy!
























preschool graduation pics, April, 2008

chalk another one up to the tired column...

Why does it work so that kids are always up puking in the middle of the night, rather than the middle of the day?

Sawyer was absolutely fine yesterday and went to bed great. We were awakened about 1am by his crying (screaming) and throwing up in his bed.
He threw up three times between 1 and 3:30. AM.
After cleaning him up the first time, I had taken him and slept in the guest bed with him, meaning I was awake from approximately 1 to 4:30. AM. And then he was awake and raring to go at 6:30. AM. And was perfectly fine all day. Acting normal, running around as normal, eating as normal. And hardly blinked an eye at the lack of sleep.
Me however?
I was teaching in kid's church this morning so I had to get up and be there, and then had some baking I had to do this afternoon, followed by a barbecue get together this evening.
I could have really used that 5 hours of sleep I missed.

I'm glad it was just a flukey bug or whatever it was and that he's feeling fine, I really am. I'm just puzzled as to why it always seems to happen in the night, rather than the middle of the day when we're all awake and able to function a little easier... after a full night of sleep.

I'm off early to try and get one of those tonight...
Wish me luck!!

cuz three posts in one day wasn't enough

I'm just feeling chatty. And I keep trying to talk to my husband and he gets mad if I don't wait for the commercials in between Scrubs...

So here I am. Welcome to random thoughts version 4/10

>>I was beginning to think I'd forgotten how to cook dinner. I mean a real dinner. I honestly can't remember the last time I made dinner. Like more than a box of mac and cheese or throwing chicken on a salad. I was actually chopping vegetables today... and sauteeing on the stove!! We had this tonight and it was yummy! Hopefully I'll be more motivated to make real and yummy meals next week with my family in town.

>>Oh, did I mention my family is coming into town? My parents are arriving on Saturday and they're bringing my little sister for a week. She hasn't been here yet, so that'll be fun!

>>My eye has healed up nicely. Thanks everyone for all your well wishes. I still don't really know what happened. I had a huge tear on my cornea, but no idea how it got there. The dr said maybe I did it in my sleep? I just woke up in horrible pain... couldn't even open my eye. The dr. numbed it up, cleaned it up (removed a flap of torn surface), and patched it up giving me painkillers and antibiotic drops for the next few days. It was much better yesterday and today I was actually able to wear my contacts for a few hours to go to bible study and take Savannah to school. It's good to feel normal again. Do you know how hard it is to not be able to see? I only had one eye patched, but really I needed to keep the other one closed as well because your eyes move simultaneously and when I would use my good eye and look around, my injured eye also moved even though it was closed, and the raw cornea rubbing against my eyelid was quite painful. I wasn't quite tired enough to sleep much that day, so I was quite bored not being able to watch tv or read or be on the computer... even talking with Ryan or the kids it was hard to just keep my eyes closed. I was so bored and restless. It's good to have my eyes back.

>>This has been an odd week. It seems to have flown by, like I can't believe tomorrow's already Friday, but at the same time it seemed to drag on sooooo sloooowly. I'm also dreadfully behind on so many things this week. Having basically two days wiped out of a busy week due to "blindness" doesn't help the fact. I'm still trying to get laundry put away from my "laundry day" and my whole house is basically a disaster. We were gone for most of the day today, including the evening and I have to buckle down and get some stuff done tomorrow. We're babysitting the neighbor girls tomorrow morning and then we're getting to work around here!

>>Yucky weather today. We've been in this lovely pattern of a nice warm sunny day and then a yucky rainy stormy day, back and forth, back and forth. Today was warm and muggy... 70 degrees but rainy, windy, haily (I know that's not really a word) and stormy. Sawyer and I spent some time outside in between showers while he wasn't napping today. He was a total boy playing in the mud puddles, splashing up a storm, picking the muddiest spots, digging for worms and squishing up the mud with his fingers...
I have a post coming on this boy and his spring sports obsession. We are going to have a blast outside all spring and summer!

ouchie

As a follow up to our great peaceful evening last night,
of course we would have to spend our evening tonight like this...

(that's a Pooh ice pack
for owies)












We were out running errands tonight and decided to stop in for a quick dinner at Wendy's. We have no Wendy's near us (they apparently are rare in this neck of the woods) and both Ryan and I have been craving it lately, so when we were "conveniently" driving by, we made the stop.
Sawyer finished up his dinner and we were all sitting around waiting for Slow Poke Savannah to finish her nuggets. Sawyer was restless so we let him stroll the restaurant a bit. He ran over and watched the guy refill the ice machine (he's mildly obsessed with ice cubes at the moment, so this was the highlight of his day, I'm sure!). And he ran back to tell us excitedly about it.
Only he never told us because as he came upon our table, he tripped and smacked right into the base of his own chair. These were nice solid wood dining chairs and he hit the leg or the rung at the legs HARD. As soon as he looked up at me, before he had even had a chance to start crying, he already had a blue/green lump popping up on his head. By the time I scooped him up (and by then he was crying at full volume) it looked like a huge vein was going to literally pop out of his forehead. Oh it looked bad. And it was starting to bleed. Luckily it wasn't actually cracked open, just kind of scraped raw in a couple of spots, so it wasn't gushing. But it was swelling by the second. We tried to ice him, but he would have nothing to do with it. So we made our way out to the car, cleaned him up a bit, scrounged a ziplock bag out of the diaper bag and he played with a couple of ice cubes in it all the way home, although I don't think they ever made it up to his head.

Once home, and after wrestling him down to give him Tylenol, he finally let me ice it for a bit with his "boo-boo Pooh" while he watched a couple episodes of Little Bear.








And luckily it didn't phase him for long...





















he did stare at himself quite shocked in the mirror at bathtime...















and I'm sure it'll be pretty in the morning.





















From the time we left the restaurant until we got home, the swelling spread nicely to take up the whole side of his forehead evenly, kind of even pushing his eyebrow down. Before it was sticking out in one confined spot like a huge swollen vein in between the two cuts.
It always amazes me how pictures never seem to do injuries justice.





















I honeslty winced a little everytime I looked at him...
even now... it just makes my stomach hurt!

Uck.

knock knock

So of course after I wrote about how lucky we've been with our sparse dr. visits and my kids who usually steer clear of childhood ailments left and right, guess where we went yesterday?
Sawyer has had an annoying cough for the past three or four weeks. Nothing big; really only noticeable at night and if he got real wound up running around and such. But instead of going away, it had gotten worse toward the end of this past week, leaving him in some not so pretty coughing fits all throughout the day. No cold, no fever, just this annoying cough that was drawing more and more concern. So since our ped. was open this Saturday I decided to take him in.
Turns out his lungs sound good... throat is fine... everything looks fine... except.
He does have a pretty significant ear infection. Go figure.
The np just barely looked in his right ear and was exclaiming, "woah, here we go... this looks like it hurts, poor kid!" Thing is, my tough little boy hasn't made a peep about his ears. He's been perfectly normal aside from the cough. The np said the drainage from his ear may be the culprit for stepping up his cough... otherwise if for some reason it is the start of something else then at least the antibiotic for his ear should clear up whatever else it might be.
So we came home with this big honkin' bottle of amoxicillin and Sawyer loves the stuff! Which was a nice surprise since he normally detests consuming any medication in any way shape or form. He actually comes running when I say it's time for his ear medicine now (I'll go ahead and knock on wood here this time) and knowing he gets one and a half syringes full, he actually asks for more while I'm filling the second half. Such a nice change from the bribing and eventual pinning down...

*****
So we're at the start of another gorgeous day around here. It's supposed to be 75* today! Love it!! I guess I don't need to tell you that we'll be spending the day outside...

But I'll be back tomorrow with the start of two days of 35* weather and freezing rain and snow. Hopefully the last we'll see of the white stuff till next winter...

good morning

I think I need to start my day over.

I was just doing laundry; I took a load from the dryer and transferred it to a basket. I then proceeded to take the wet clothes from the washer, which should have obviously been transferred to the dryer, and I absentmindedly put those in the basket too (on top of the dry clothes) and took it all all the way upstairs before I realized what I was doing.

Want to hear about the rest of my lovely morning?
Sawyer was up at 5am. I don't really need to say anything else here, do I?
Then I had an 8 o'clock dentist appointment, which I was actually looking forward to. I love our new dentist and everyone there is so great and yes, I was going in for a filling, but I had just been in for a root canal and it was quicker and more painless than almost any dentist visit I've ever had, so I was just looking forward to getting it done and overwith. So I get all situated in the chair, the dentist and I are chatting away, and she gives me the numbing shot...
and then my whole face explodes.
Seriously, I've never felt pain like that in my life (and keep in mind I've had two babies, wisdom teeth pulled, and kidney stones)... I thought my whole head was exploding. A huge sharp blinding explosion followed eerily by the tingly strange numbness... all over the right side of my face. I was freaking out; not only did it HURT and scare me, but then I couldn't see and couldn't swallow and felt like I was suffocating. The dentist sat me up real quick (I was really freaking out!) and tried to keep me calm, telling me that it was okay, she knew what was wrong, and just sat there holding my hand until I stopped crying and could breathe normally to explain what happened. I told you I was freaking out.
So she finally explained to me that where she was "shooting" there is a cluster of nerves that branch out, one branch for the lower jaw, one for the top and up to the eye and one for further up... and of course if you get to where before they branch out, you get all three...
She thought she was plenty low to just get the bottom branch, but apparently my nerves are not where they should be... and she hit my whole face. Oh, and did I mention you have to break through the bone with the needle to get to the nerve? I was prepared for and felt that first ouch to get to the nerve... what I wasn't prepared for next was the whole entire right side of my face to explode and then fall off. She wasn't prepared for it either, and she felt so bad. Plus I think I scared her, I freaked so bad! I was fine after a minute -after all, everything was numb- but the whole thing was just so surprising for both of us! She sat with me and wiped my watery numb eye and made sure I was okay for about 30 minutes.
I couldn't see anything and it was the weirdest feeling... everything was blurry, but if I covered either eye, then things were clear. It was just that my eyes weren't focusing together. Freaky. Plus the fact that my right eyelid wouldn't stay up. haha!
My nose felt like it was four times too big and dripping off my face.
And I could hardly talk as my cheek and mouth had that huge numb feeling too.
The dentist decided to not do any work on me after that... she said I'd been through enough. Once I got control of my swallowing and my breathing and my blinking, she sat with me and chatted (mostly a one sided conversation, as my mouth wasn't exactly working) for another 20 minutes until my eye got mostly back to normal and I told her I could drive home.
And then drove home to tell Ryan he had missed a morning of work for nothing.
Fun stuff.

So that wiped out most of my morning. My face is just getting back to normal, and I do have some errands I want to run; I actually legitimately need to go to Target, but I'm just not in the mood. I really should, as it's supposed to snow quite a bit the next couple of days and who knows when I'll get out again. But really, I just want to curl up on the couch and take a long nap and then start the day over.

Now Ryan will be working late, and then he has two soccer games tonight, so he won't be around to tagteam the kids' bedtime. Ugh.

Sorry for all the complaining. It's actually a beautiful sunny (albeit COLD) day and the kids are getting along well and we're having a reasonably good morning here now that I'm home.
Still, It'd be nice to hit the reset button today.

And how's your Wednesday?

sick in the snow

This was Saturday...





























this was after the first round of snow, at 8AM. It then continued to snow all day and all night. We got at least 7 inches in 24 hours.

Sadly I didn't take many pictures of the kids outside... I was inside feeling miserable with a cold and figured I'd take plenty more on Sunday with more snow.

Well, this was Sunday...










































and we weren't outside because Savannah had "the throw-ups"...





















Now replace Savannah in this picture with me, and that's today.
Happy Monday!

tgif

Well, we're almost there anyway. It has been a rough bad horrible looong week.

Sorry about the last post. Turned into a lonely feeling sorry for myself kind of rambling. That's what I get for starting a Thoughts for Thursday without any thinking ahead. And while PMSing. And at the end of a week like this one.

I think I have to take Savannah back to the doctor tomorrow. We were in Monday morning and she got meds for strep. She's been on antibiotics for three days and had no fever, but she still has no voice and her throat is still hurting badly.
This girl is a mean patient. You've heard of a mean drunk right? Yeah well, that's Savannah only instead of alcohol bringing that out it's simply her pain and discomfort and confinement to the house. She is seriously grumpy! Well, with me it's more of a clingy personality (seriously, I don't think I've held her as much in the past three years as I have in the past week), but with anyone else --namely her little brother-- she will bite their head off. It is not pretty.

So as we're wrapping up this long week, we decided to venture out to Creve Coeur Lake this afternoon for a picnic with Ryan's department at work. We had had quite the day, and as many hurdles we overcame to get out of the house, I was somewhat looking forward to getting to the park. It was beautiful out, but Savannah and I were not feeling all that "beautiful". I'm getting quite the cold too; all stuffy and headachey and thinking my sinuses are definitely not happy. And Savannah? Well let's just say she did enough crying and whining today to last me six months. And while she seemed to be feeling well, and said she was happy to be at the picnic, she fell apart at every. little. thing. Crying and whining and basically acting like a spoiled rotten brat of a two year old. I was honestly embarrassed. I wanted to announce to the whole park that she had been sick for the past week and was tired and didn't normally behave this way. I left early because I couldn't take it any more. I myself was in no mood to be happy and chatty meeting all these new people. That situation is never my cup of tea... big groups... especially when all of these new people I'm meeting already mostly know each other. I'm too shy. And tack onto that my being sick and dealing with Savannah's attitude... I'm afraid I didn't make the best of impressions either. I packed the kids up in the car, said goodbye to Ryan and headed home as fast as I could. And proceeded to cry most of the way.
To top it off?
So I get home and manage to get the kids bathed and in bed without much trouble, and then start running a nice big bubble bath. (By the way, I got this amazing Bubble Bath from Target... have you seen the new line they're carrying?... Calm One Calm All Bubble Bath= AMAZING!!)
So I'm running the bath and before I can even get in, Ryan (who got home shortly after us) heads in there to, um, shall we say overpower the lovely scent of my new bubbles. Seriously, it was bad. But, here I had a full tub of beautiful bubbles. Can I plug this stuff one more time?? The bubbles looked like soft foam... it looked like a silky carpet of bubbles... so inviting. Only not so much with the smell in the room. I only stayed in the tub for about 10 minutes before I could stand the burning in my nostrils no longer. So much for unwinding.
And then? We are out of Twix Magic Shell.

Is it Friday yet??

Happier things to come, I promise :)