Catching up

I'm much better; thank you for all of the well-wishes. I haven't felt that bad in quite a while.

On Wednesday I took Emily to the pediatrician. I couldn't figure out where else I would have gotten strep so I assumed it was her. After all, she has had an ear infection and a cough recently. :) Her strep screen came back negative, so I was once again in the dark as to where the strep had come from.

On Thursday, I returned to work to try to cram everything into one day that needed to get done before I was out for the rest of the year. I didn't really have that much energy and didn't feel very good (my throat still hurt a lot) but I did get things wrapped up.

Friday was great. The kids and I made butter from the cream from our raw milk and meringue cookies for a tea I was going to that night. But Friday morning I got a call from the pediatrician--Emily's strep culture came back positive! We started her on amoxicillin that evening. She never seemed to be feeling bad and hadn't had any troubles eating or drinking, so I don't know if it wasn't a bad case or if she was just starting to come down with my strep.

The weekend was pretty calm and we spent time at home. Mark put in a new window and Saturday night I made his birthday dinner. It was a few days late but still delicious (I made a cake on his birthday) and we had it after the kids were in bed, just the two of us.

Today I sent Emily to preschool so I could take the three big kids to my work holiday party at a bowling alley. They had a blast (as did I!) thanks to one of my wonderful co-workers who helped me help the kids bowl. While I would have loved to bring Emily, she would not have enjoyed it nearly as much as the other kids and she had a great time at preschool today. She made a super-cute angel ornament for the tree that she is very proud of. :)

Sick mama

Sorry for the dearth of posts. I actually have one that's about ready to post but I just haven't been able to finish it up.

Saturday I started feeling achy and had a slight sore throat. The aches got worse over the weekend and I assumed I was coming down with the flu. I had miserable nights Saturday and Sunday even with Nyquil, so when I got up on Monday I took my temperature. I had a low-grade fever but still felt awful. I went into work for a few hours and then went home and slept until I picked the kids up from school.

Today I stayed home from work and went to the doctor. I have to feel really bad to go to the doctor, but I just couldn't take it anymore. The aches were doing better but my throat was killing me. I had looked at it in the mirror and it wasn't a pretty sight.

The doctor's office was able to get me in this morning. My best guess was either flu or strep but I didn't think it was flu since I hadn't had a high fever. The CNP said it's unusual for adults to get strep--they have to have pretty significant exposure.

The test came back positive for strep. I start antibiotics today. Hopefully I'll be feeling better within the next 24 hours. I'm certainly not sure I can feel much worse. Right now I'm just hoping none of the kids come down with it, although if they do at least it will be Christmas break and we'll all be at home together!

A 10-minute fever?

Yesterday I got a call from the preschool that Emily was running a 100.4 degree fever. She also had some drainage from her ear. Her ear has been draining for several days (a result of the tubes in her ears which apparently work very well!) from a mild ear infection but is finally almost done. The infection hasn't seemed to bother her at all and she hasn't been feverish so we've been letting it run its course.

Preschool policy is that with a fever of 100 degrees or above the child must go home so I went and picked Emily up. She was not happy to be leaving school as she wanted to stay and play. :) As soon as we got home I took her temp again with an oral digital thermometer so I'd know if I needed to give her any medicine--98.0. I put her down for a nap since it was preschool nap time too and then took her temp again after the nap--98.2.

She played and laughed and ate and had a great day (we had lots of fun together at home! :)) and I took her temp again at bedtime--98.6.

We haven't given her any medication but I can't understand why the thermometer (a forehead scanner) at school would register over 100 if she's not running a fever.

After talking to the preschool, they agreed to let us send her back today. Normal policy is that they must be fever-free for 24 hours but none of us are convinced that she was actually running a fever. We'll see how she does today!

Little white lies

Yesterday Alex told me he only had one paper to bring home. It was a phonics paper that he had done pretty well on, so we corrected a couple of things (he's still struggling with rhyming so we go over those when he misses them) and then he was off to play. When we had finished his paper he went to get his backpack. I assumed he was going to put the finished paper in his backpack since that's what we do on papers that need to be redone and sent back to school. But this one didn't need to go back which he knew.

"Where are you going?"
"To get my folder..."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"Do you have any other papers in your folder?"
"No."

So he went off to play and I put the finished paper on the kids' stack of school work (I take pictures of it and then it goes in the recycle bin).

Later that night, after all of the kids were in bed, I was putting their bake sale money** in their backpacks. Tim wasn't getting to participate since he has had a couple of miserable days at school behavior-wise and we consider bake sale to be a special treat. As I pulled Alex's folder out, I realized that there were TWO more papers in his backpack--both papers that needed to be completed or redone. He knew the papers were there as he got the other paper (the one that didn't need to be redone) out of the same folder. So he deliberately hid the other papers from me and then lied about it.

I was not happy. And he is not getting bake sale today. We will also be having a discussion after school about his choices yesterday and why he will now be bringing his backpack to me after school each day until he shows me I can trust him again.

**Each class at the school can host bake sale days to raise money for their class or for something else, like a child they are sponsoring through missions. The kids can bring a quarter and buy something at the bake sale--usually a cookie or a Little Debbie or Hostess treat.

Living large

Sunday afternoon was our fall band concert. Mark and I both play for the Meramec Symphonic Band through Meramec Community College. The wonderful friends of ours who came to sit with the kids asked us how we have time to do this.

We don't.

The original plan was for one of us to play this semester, but then they were desperate for another euphonium so Mark ended up playing too. It's too hard to get babysitters every Thursday night, so we alternate rehearsal nights and then beg people to come sit with the kids at the concert. :) The kids love the music and usually do really well...plus they get bribed with cookies after the concert if they behave. ;)

After the concert all of the kids got their cookies (they all picked M&M cookies--M&Ms are a current favorite among the kids...I think they just like saying "MmMs" which is how it is pronounced by all of them) and they also got some "juice". I didn't realize until I tried mine that it was juice plus some kind of clear soda. I warned the kids that they might not like it because it was "spicy" (their word for carbonated) and that if they didn't like it they could have water. Alex and Emily both tried it and although Alex said he liked it they both asked for water instead. Tim and Danielle both drank it and seemed to like it.

The expression on Tim's face was priceless when I had told him what was in it. He took a sip, got a big grin on his face and said, "There's SODA in here??" I love that it's a super special treat when they get soda. They know it doesn't happen often so it makes it that much more of a treat!

"Boys"-e State

At dinner tonight we were talking about football. Tim said he would like to see some people play football. Mark asked him if he'd like to fly down to Florida and see TCU (go Frogs!) play Boise State.

Tim replied with "What kind of boys are they?"

To which I got the giggles so bad I almost had to leave the table. It was even funnier because Tim knew we were laughing at him and that he'd said something funny (which he likes because he's a ham) but he couldn't figure out why the question was so funny.

Upgrades

Mark recently replaced the thermostat upstairs with a digital one. After making sure it would work with the radiators and that we still had heat, we decided to swap out the downstairs one too. After getting it all hooked up, we needed two AA batteries to run the thermostat. Since our extra batteries were upstairs and the kids were all sleeping, I asked Mark what I could take batteries out of to use until we could put new ones in.

"Why don't you take them out of the TV remote?"

Yeah, that was the first place he thought to take them out of. Can you tell we don't use the TV much?

Unfortunately, the new thermostat is not working and we have no heat downstairs. Good thing we have therapy, dinner, and bed tonight and not much time to play downstairs!

Edited to add: We came home to heat! Mark was able to fix the thermostat before the kids and I got home from therapy. :)

Alex-isms

In first grade, they are working on addition and subtraction. Only they don't call it subtraction. They call it "taking away." Unfortunately for my English-challenged son, what he learns in one area always carries over to another.

"Mama, I got an A take-away on my math paper. That's not good, is it?"

MRI results

We received the MRI results a while back but I hadn't posted because, well, there's not much to report. Here's the official info I was given:

"Sequelae of global ischemic injury in the ventricular area; not classic for prematurity but that is a possibility"

That's it.

But what does it mean???

Well, it means at some point, probably during childbirth, Danielle's brain experienced decreased blood flow and thus oxygen. This is possibly the cause of her balance and coordination issues. Or not. We still don't know. So we'll keep doing what we're doing and watch her improve every day! :)