Friday, December 14, 2007

She lives

Not much time at the moment, but I figured I should post in here before December was over. Seems like the time is flying by!!

I did indeed forget to take the camera to Tennessee, so I have to finish the roll of disposable camera film before we get to see how those pics came out. ;)

And I now have a yellow and orange dining room. Soon to have a green living room.

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Pictures

Random pictures from the last few days.



First, we have Francesca making the face we get if I ask if she wants to nurse. She runs at me like that full speed.

Next is Adia and Francesca at the mall. :) They're sitting in one of the cool kid-size arm chairs.

Adia wearing the most stylish hat this season. (Big girl panties, of course.)

"Driving" the firetruck at the mall. (No quarters required, because it's terrifying if it's not sitting still.)

Francesca "eats" yogurt. Mmmm! Want some?

She saw an Adia-sized girl riding on this (with quarters) and demanded to be put up there. Still wasn't turning it on. She had already been traumatized enough by my carrying her up to Santa. (Not sitting on his lap - just looking at him was enough!)

Hopefully I'll get some good pictures at Thanksgiving. That reminds me, I need to dump the camera so I'll have space to save them! :)

Oh, and we were at the mall yesterday after Adia's checkup. She got the all-clear, so we were free to get my sunglasses fixed before the big drive. She's still on the Pulmicort for three weeks, but we're weaning her off of the Xopenex. Fingers crossed that she stays healthy!

All Aboard!

So, I think my thyroid is taking the express train to hell. In the last 24 hours, my milk has come in again (seriously -- Francesca is pooping like a newborn too.) I've gotten jittery again. Insomnia has kicked in. I cannot stop eating. If I do, I get nauseated. My brain is flying at a million miles an hour. I get randomly paranoid. I'm irritable as all heck.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Thanksgiving is going to be so fun!

Monday, November 19, 2007

D'oh

I guess I fell behind in checking the recalls, because I found a toy we have on it:

Both the little caterpillar trowel and garden rake

Luckily, I don't think the kids have really chewed on them. I'll take them back to Target anyway.

Updating on the sick kiddos, Adia seems to be feeling a lot better. She goes back to the doctor tomorrow. Francesca spent Saturday night puking on me (did I mention that already?) and she is a bit snotty today. She's also been doing the constant pooping thing again. (Although just now it was newbornish... I'm not sure she's had more than a few bites of solid food over the last few days.)

Lunchtime and she's up from nap!

Thursday, November 15, 2007

2 steps forward, 1 step back

I may have spoken too soon about Adia feeling better. By dinnertime, she was getting pretty winded playing. Now she's in bed and coughing. :( Poor girl.

Ugghhhhhh

The child illness law of proportion states that as the sick child starts to regain their health and energy, the parents will get sick with whatever made the child sick in the first place.

Mmmm.. headache, exhaustion, cough, and runny nose. And a snotty Francesca. And an Adia who feels better enough to fuss and fight sleep, but still snotty and coughing (well, she was before she got her AM treatment.)

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Poor sick girl :(

Today involved a surprise trip to Fredericksburg! And now we won't be going to the local LLL meeting tomorrow or Fredericksburg's LLL meeting Thursday.

Last month we all had a nasty cold. All four of us were miserable, snotty, coughing, and exhausted. Three of us have gotten over the miserable, snotty, and coughing parts. Adia hadn't really gotten over more than the snotty and some of the miserable. She has been exhausted, pale, and coughing since then, although the coughing has mostly been at night and first thing in the morning. She's been getting winded fairly easily too.

Yeah, the obviousness of what was happening went right by me. We started giving her vitamins over the weekend assuming it was her iron. Duh. Not so much. I realized last night after a 20min coughing fit that she was having an asthma flare-up. Charles and I dragged out the nebulizer and steroids at 10:30 last night and gave her a quick treatment, and she coughed exactly twice after that. (I stayed awake until after midnight. Coffee at 3pm is a bad plan.) I called the pediatrician's office at 9 this morning (note: although the message says they open at 8:45, that really means 9:15) and eventually got her an appointment at 10:15. Which I was late for. Which was okay, because they lost our chart temporarily. I was biting my nails, because I was afraid they were going to think we were neglectful for waiting so long. (She wasn't doing any wheezing that could be heard without a stethoscope, though, and that's our usual clue.)

I described what had been going on to the NP (who was amused to note the history of seeing us for the same thing every Nov/Dec) and she agreed with me. Adia had the beginnings of bronchitis. We did a Xopenex treatment in the office so she could double-check it wasn't pneumonia. Luckily, it wasn't. We're home with an official diagnosis of seasonal asthma and:

Azithromycin (1x day, 5 days)
Claritin (1x day)
Xopenex (every 6hrs while awake)
Pulmicort (1x day, at bedtime, 4 weeks)

I'm glad she'll be off the antibiotics for Thanksgiving, although I'm not thrilled by the idea of travelling with the nebby (again.)

I'm doubly glad we caught it early this time, so she's not completely and utterly miserable. Or hospitalized. Her mood has already improved after three nebby treatments and one dose of antibiotics. She even fought bedtime, and it's been awhile since she did that. ;)

She did fantastically at the doctor's office, by the way. No tears, and she inhaled and exhaled just like the NP asked. :) Maybe all of those visits to the ER and various doctors this summer set her a good example? :P

Sunday, November 11, 2007

More college

And in the land of "I'm into punishment", I added Pre-Calc to my classes next semester. Isn't it funny that I've done a 20cr semester in the past, and now I'm thinking the 10cr one may kill me? :P

I have more credits to take than I thought I would, but in different areas than I thought I would. I'll also be doing a summer semester now too. Joy.

No updates, what?


I'm so good at blogging. At least I must be, because other bloggers make these "sorry I haven't posted" update posts all the time.

Last weekend's excitement was working the LLL booth at the baby fair at the mall on Saturday. It was a lot of fun meeting breastfeeding moms and moms wanting to breastfeed. The time slot I picked wound up being the busiest too!

During the week we stayed busy with appointments. Training meeting on Monday and dentist on Wednesday. Where we figured out my "treatment plan." All $10k+ of it. *sigh* And it begins with re-doing a root canal at an office in the west end of Richmond (so, a longer drive.) Then a root canal or extraction of the tooth beside what was my wisdom teeth.

When we weren't out running around, I worked on decluttering the guest (read: junk!) room. It still looks like a tornado hit it, but the tornado carried some things away. I've tossed like 4 trashbags of stuff out.

Friday morning I had a coffee-mergency when I woke up out of coffee. So we bundled up and went to the coffee shop at 7:30am and then to the grocery store. We were home by 8:30, which was kinda nice. I didn't really feel like being social, and there aren't too many people to be social with that early in the morning.

Yesterday I got up and did my coffee shop breakfast thang, then hit up the rescue squad auxillary's yard sale. After that, I grabbed a pregnancy test at the drug store (not a chance in hell, but I've felt kinda crappy lately and I know that would be the first thing the doctor suggested if I called. I'm not, BTW.) I also got an Office Space calendar for us for next year. I'm pretty excited about that. (And a dork, apparently.) Then I started my grocery shopping, which I remembered my Zune for for a change. I listened to the Rent soundtrack, which is a bad plan because it leads to things like dancing in the aisles. Whatever, I know I'm the town freak anyway, what with my crazy babywearing devices and cloth shopping bags.

I came home and got ready to make homemade curry (this is the awesome book I used!) and realized I was short on onions, so back to grocery store #2 for those. (When I realized "I go to the grocery store a lot." I get to go back again today!)

The curry turned out fantastic! I need to get to an international grocery (heh) for proper chilli powder and fenugreek, but it was really good. My interpretation of the nan recipe leaves a bit to be desired. I have no problem using the frozen variety of that, though. :P

Last night, Adia woke up around 2:30 coughing. She then puked all over the bed. (Fortunately?, she sleeps in the full size bed with Charles now. Fortunately for me, I guess anyway. ;) She woke up for the day at 6:30 and she's full of energy. That's apparently the course for this virus, since Francesca had it for a couple of days this week, just out of the other end instead. She was still wild girl throughout it, just with a sore bum.

We had contemplated a trip to Fredericksburg today for the aforementioned international grocery run, but we decided it was ill-advised with the viral fun. Now to decide what to do with our day...... (And I got a different kind of coffee the other day, as they were out of my usual. I think I'm twice as wired as normal. Wheeeeeee!) So far we've moved the router into the kitchen next to the phone jack. Yesterday my computer finally went wireless, so we just have a 6' phone cord from the jack to the router instead of a 25' one, plus the looooong cat-5 to my computer.

Monday, November 5, 2007

College, pt. 2

I'm registered for classes! BIO101 and SOC200 :D


I'll update later with the events of the last two days (Fredericksburg and decluttering, oh my.)

Friday, November 2, 2007

One doctor down

Today was another followup with the allergist. He said that since my rash is gone and I'm off all of the meds, I don't have to come back unless I have another problem.

While we were out, I picked up a few more paint samples, although I may wind up going with the one I already have had hanging up for almost a week. I'm looking for a good orange color to go with the light yellowish gold in my kitchen.

And that's it for today, because a certain little someone is disturbed by my typing while she sleeps. (Which she's done for 70% of the time we've been home today. Both girls are SO worn out from not getting enough sleep the last three nights. :( )

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Halloween

Last night went well, I think. :)

I got the house clean enough. (Although I just now saw the pile of candy wrappers on my desk from "lunch" yesterday. Ha! Good thing my desk is messy enough that a pile of candy wrappers is pretty much camouflaged.) We ran late with dinner and pumpkins, so the safe trick-or-treating was a no-go. Instead, we had dinner and then sent the daddies and 3yos out to bring us candy. :P

(Funnily enough, Adia's having her first Tootsie Roll pop and she just got to the chocolate part. So cute! And shaddup... she ate breakfast.)





















I had fixed up 20 goodie bags with candy, goldfish, and a colored pencil or bubble wand. I gave away three to trick-or-treaters. And three handfuls of candy to the four 15yos. I sent four more bags home with the R's. What I'm going to do with the other 13, I'm not sure?









Francesca was not the most cooperative with pictures, but she was one of the only two not getting candy out of the deal, so it's not surprising. ;) Adia actually said "Trick or Treat" at all of the houses, which surprised me. She's usually so incredibly shy that it takes her awhile to warm up to people she sees fairly often. (Also, please note her awesome bag. The pictures here don't quite do it justice, but trust me when I say it's very glittery. My floors can attest to it, even.)









Adia's ghost, Francesca's face, my international breastfeeding symbol, and Charles' spider.

Wednesday, October 31, 2007

A New Start

I'm not sure whether or not it's appropriate to be making a new start on Halloween or not, but I'm going to throw caution to the wind and do so anyway!

I figured I'd start a blog that would be family-friendly enough to share with our family, but make no mistake -- I titled it the way I did because it's still all about me. ;)

Right now I'm just waiting for Charles to get home so we can finish cleaning before tonight. It seems to be becoming a tradition that we have an impromptu Halloween get-together with friends. Two years ago we had Beth over (I think James may have been out of town?) and this year it's the R family. I told them about our subdivision's community center holding a "safe" trick or treat event, so they're coming over for dinner and then safe trick-or-treating. To be followed by the dads taking the 3yo's out for unsafe (read: traditional knocking on doors of neighbours who we may or may not know) trick-or-treating. We have a ton of retirees in the neighbourhood and they like to give full-size bars. Wouldn't want the kids (yeah, right) missing out on those!

Speaking of ToT, both kids have actually scored on that front already today. We went to CB this afternoon, and the movie store was giving out candy bags that had coupons in them for kids in costume. Francesca wasn't really in costume, but she got one anyway. Adia got complimented on her bat costume, and EVERYBODY loved her bag. (I do too! It's a black background with white skulls on it. Said skulls have red glittering eyes. She picked out the fabric herself!) For her free movie, Adia chose "Dora Saves the Mermaids." The first two episodes on it seemed to work okay, but I think it crapped out on the third.

Also in my scattered thoughts here, I saw that the blood pressure cuff for the Fisher Price doctor's kits tested high for lead. I know that a lot of cheapie dollar store, etc. things have been recalled over the years, because I've been on the CPSC children's recall list for a year or two. But the name-brand stuff scares me quite a bit more. I've already declared this year to be a non-made-in-China Christmas. We'll see how that goes. So far I'm looking at a lot of things in the Magic Cabin catalog. I'll need to make the girls' list earlier if that's the case though, so that things have the chance to get here before Christmas. (As a side note: we have a FP doctor's kit, but fortunately? it's only the red ones that are bad. Adia's is a black cuff.)

Okay, I need to get off my bum and clean, so I'll try and come back to this blog thing later. :)