Ponytails, Stride Rite, Playgroup, & Bright Ideas

I used to do my hair. I vaguely remember a day that I did my hair....I think. It seems like a good day lately that I take a shower and actually blow dry it, but even then its swept up into a ponytail the minute its dry! And some days...it doesn't even get dry. I don't know when babies stop pulling hair but my kiddo has a knack for pulling mine OUT! I asked the question on my facebook this weekend, when do they stop pulling so I'll stop wearing a ponytail and a friend mentioned this point. When do I think I have the time to actually STYLE hair?! She's right...ponytail it is. I actually went in today and cut nearly four inches off...my biggest criteria to her haircut. I MUST still go up. Has to...no if...no kind of...it absolutely MUST go up. And thankfully she listened and it does. Its nice and light and I'm hoping that with less of it to do I just might be able to wear it down once in a while. I'm laughing at myself because I had a big victory today. My big victory of the day??? Getting Stride Rite to replace shoes they sold us that didn't fit my child! We went in a few weeks ago and purchased two pairs of shoes. They fit her and tried them on her while she was in our arms or sitting on the ground, they never asked her to stand in the shoe, much less walk. So when she'd only worn them a handful of times and they were too small and physically hurting her toes I was NOT a happy camper. I asked around and all our little friends wear Stride Rites too, there just isn't another great option for early walkers but a friend told me to call them that they were great about working with you. Incredibly they had me come back in, re-fit her, let her walk and run in the shoes and then EXCHANGED them for us!!! I was shocked! Of course they didn't have the ones we'd picked last time in her current size so I had to pick new ones and they are a little more fall/winter looking than I'd planned but it is September so they'll be great. She said she should be able to wear these until Spring so I really hope she's right. Nevertheless...I definitely recommend Stride Rite. They are awesome. Just make sure to do your part and know that they need to stand/walk/run and that if the shoe Velcros...the entire Velcro needs to attach, otherwise they don't fit. Tomorrow's our busy morning. Kindermusik and then playgroup at the park and picnic. Emilie will be exhausted by the time we get home for her nap but our little group is SO much fun to play with. She'll love it! One of the big reasons I joined Kindermusik (other than the educational reasons for Emilie of course) is that I needed to meet other Moms with kids Em's age. I felt like it was important to have a network of Moms and kiddos. I was honestly frustrated because for our first several classes there weren't Moms my age and when a few joined they were uninterested in getting together outside of class. Thankfully I'd gone to one makeup class with the early group and ended up running into one of those Mom's in the toy aisle at Walmart! She added me to their playgroup list and I was AMAZED at this group of Moms that found time to get together routinely. When Emilie's nap changed I did a happy dance that we could switch into their class permanently and we now have an amazing group of wonderful friends to play with. We meet up at least once a week, sometimes several times a week to play and eat and just enjoy each other. It's been such a blessing to me and I'm incredibly thankful for it. On a totally random note, I read a friends blog today. She wrote "Lately, I feel like I'm not doing enough. And by that, I don't mean having enough on my day-to-day agenda. Because I do. What I mean is that I feel like I am not doing enough that is significant. I have this passion to serve, to help others, to make a real difference and most times, I feel like I fall flat of my potential." Wow...Its like she stole the words right out of my heart. I feel the exact same way. I have so many passions about helping others, specifically kiddos, and so many ideas, but I fall flat on the doing part. On finding ways to get involved and reaching out. I find myself talking the good talk, or thinking it, but not on doing it. So I'm giving myself a challenge. By the end of the year (just over 3 months) I need to find a way to serve, even if its a small start I need to do something until I find what I'm supposed to be doing to serve. I feel deeply within myself that there is something I'm supposed to be doing, something that will make a difference (even if its only in the life of one person), and I'm going to work harder to be proactive in finding that something. Thank you friend for reminding me not to allow myself to fall flat. Ok...I'm in a million places tonight but that's how my minds working these days! Night ya'll! P.S.--No one commented to tell me you were reading when I asked last time, but Blogger has this wonderful new stat that shows me that post had at least twenty views...so please let me know your there and if there are questions or topics you'd like opened to discussion :) And since I know you love them...here's a cute pic of my crazy bunch for your viewing pleasure :) Em was requesting a pony ride (fitting since we talked about ponytails, lol) and the dogs decided to line up for their turn too!

Nursing melt down...yup...still going...

This week we dropped the morning nurse, leaving only the near bedtime nurse. It wasn't planned on my part, in fact, I probably would have given her another week after recovering from being sick, but I was worn out and her Daddy thought letting me sleep was a good idea so he kept the monitor low and let me sleep in. Without waking me he got her up and gave her a sippy of milk and that was that. Once we start it there is no going back, so there went the morning nurse and man she is ticked. I mean TICKED!!! The first morning it went well; it was ten before I woke up on my own (OMG...it had been over 14 months since I've slept that long) and she'd had an entire sippy of milk (WOW...too bad it was a one time thing), had eaten breakfast and was playing nicely. The second morning I stayed in bed so that she wouldn't see me and I could hear her protesting. She wasn't happy at all, but eventually got on with her routine--no milk though. Unfortunately when I did get up Braden made the mistake of bringing her into our room and plopping her on the bed, so when I didn't nurse her...well lets just say she lots her mind. Complete meltdown. This morning I heard her protesting again but it didn't last as long and she did drink an ounce or two (I guess I should be glad she took SOME milk right?!). The problem is by the end of the day she is just freaking out to nurse. Like begging at my legs when its time. Then she nurses like she's afraid its the last time, doesn't let go until she gets the last drop. Then smiles at me like I made her day! Its heartbreaking. I feel awful taking away something she's known her entire life when she obviously doesn't want to give it up. And I'll be honest. I love nursing her. I love the connection we have, love that I'm the only person in the entire world that can do this for her. But I also realize that it's time. Since she's having such a hard time with this session I know I'm going to have to give her a little time before cutting the last one (Oh darn!). We have several things coming up that will disrupt her routine as it is, so throwing that on top of it is only asking for trouble. She earned herself a few more weeks. But in all reality we should be done nursing at the end of the month. So maybe in October I should go buy myself some fancy bra's because I'll have my boobs back! LOL On a different note. Here are a couple of things I made this week. The first is a rag quilt I made of Emilie's old infant receiving blankets. They were too worn to save for a possible future baby and for some reason I just couldn't throw them away. When Em was little the receiving blankets were practically a part of her daily outfits. We'd pick an outfit and a blanket for the day. They mean something to me. So I cut them up and re-purposed them into a blanket she can use now and for a little while to come. The second picture is a bib. A friends Mom made two like this when Em was born and we've loved them. But they are getting a little small so I had to replace them. I made a pattern out of her old one and made a new one for her. I got some other fabric so I hope to make a few more soon.

Poop to Virus to Dehydration...Our Hospital Journey

Well a few weeks ago we were talking about poop, I was laughing at the time...I'm not laughing anymore. Poop can actually become a very serious thing. Emilie's poor little tummy was pretty torn up from the constant diarrhea and then we think she got a virus, the two together were too much on her little system and it caused her little bowel to basically shut down a little. The parastolic movement stopped and it was basically sleeping, without the bowel doing its job she began to vomit and not long after she was becoming pretty dehydrated...it was awful. Here's our story: After nearly two weeks of extreme diarrhea from the Omnicef Emilie was taking to help with her sinus infection (and yes we did probiotics and yogurt) her little system was tired. Then as kids do she must have picked up a stomach bug. I had noticed that Emilie wasn't eating breakfast well and within a few days she'd started to boycott food altogether. I thought that it was because of the antibiotic and once she finished it we would start to see her appetite return. But she finished her meds on a Thursday and by the weekend her appetite had only further decreased, even when offering her favorite foods. I was really starting to worry but on Sunday night she ate nearly everything on her tray, I thought...WHEW! We're ok!! Monday-- But we were woken up early Monday morning with a vomiting baby. I assumed that she'd just picked up a bug from the playdate we'd had over the weekend, but since she hadn't been eating well and then got sick after her first real meal I went ahead and called the Dr. We went in and she said that it looked like it was just a bug or that she was having trouble due to the antibiotic, she said she really thought the vomiting was a one time deal and home we went. Well...within five minutes of getting home...VOMIT CITY!!! There goes our one time deal!! She continued to refuse food other than small snacks here and there but the night went pretty well. She went to bed fine but was sick again in the night. Tuesday-- Tuesday she woke up and nursed well but refused her sippy cup...NOT GOOD! This kid LOVES juice and water, loves her cup! As we went through the day she continued to refuse to eat and drink and I could see that things weren't going in the right direction because she also hadn't had a wet diaper. After she went a confirmed 6 hours without a wet diaper (I say confirmed because she woke up wet, but the next diaper was more liquid poo so I can't say whether or not she'd peed, so we waited a bit) I knew we were in trouble and made a call back to the Dr. They recommended syringe feeding her Gatorade G2 every five minutes for three straight hours. I could not miss a dose. If she hadn't peed an hour or so after that I was to call the Dr back. Have I mentioned in previous posts that my child is stubborn and independent?! She can't even stand to be spoon fed, so imagine trying to get a syringe in her mouth every five minutes. I had to literally pin her down and force it every five minutes and honestly...we lost a lot of the Gatorade. I did my best and was told by the Dr that it was ok and that's part of why we were doing it every five minutes. But let me tell you...it was a nightmare! Doing it alone was probably even worse, but we made it through. I did have to step away once and allow myself a good cry, I think it was with only thirty minutes left and her diaper was bone dry...I just broke down. I didn't let her see me upset, I put on my happy face and came back into the room to finish the job we'd started. Now we just wait....wait on pee....But guess what...It's 8pm and her diaper is...BONE DRY STILL!!!! I seriously wanted to cry but instead I picked up my phone and called the Dr. back. We spent some time on the phone and since Emilie wasn't showing any signs of dehydration other than a lack of urine output she didn't feel like there was much we could do at the moment. I could try taking her to the Acute Kids but since she was still happy and playful they wouldn't likely give her fluids. I did call them for a second opinion and they said the same...they wouldn't stick an active happy kid. I felt really frustrated that because I have a resilient happy go lucky baby we couldn't get help, and felt confident that we needed it, but all I could do was keep a close watch and do as the Dr. recommended which in this case was to nurse her and let her go to bed. Wake her up at 3am and if she wasn't wet start another round of syringe feeding. So that's what we did. And at 3am....SHE WAS DRY!!! At this point I'm tried and frustrated and don't want to fight my baby through the night so I scooped her up and nursed her. I don't know how much she got, because we don't typically nurse at night, but I had to do something. And within 20 minutes of our night nurse....WE HAD PEE!!! Can you say huge sigh of relief?! It would have been had I not noticed that even though we had pee...she was looking awfully clumsy. I was hoping she was just tired, so we all went back to bed hoping morning would show that we'd turned the corner. Oh how wrong was I... Wednesday-- We woke up Wednesday morning exhausted but hoping Emilie would be feeling better. She nursed, but not as well as I'd have liked, but she did take her her sippy and drink several ounces of juice, that's a huge improvement. I told myself the lack of nursing was because of her night nurse and tried to ignore the worry in my mind, that is until I watched her try to play. She would try to stand up and it took several attempts, then she would take a step or two and stumble. I know these sound like typical toddler behaviors, but Emilie has been steadily walking for several weeks now, this was atypical behavior and again...I called the Dr. I played it off as just wanting to update them on our night and then added the weakness and clumsiness. We were asked to get dressed and bring her in. Yea....I figured those weren't good signs. We left Emilie in her pjs and headed to the Dr office...again. We got the office around 9:30 and took a seat in the lobby, Emilie started to act whiney and wanted out of her Daddy's arms and then BLEH! Vomit city. YUCK! Amazingly it didn't get us seen any quicker, we waited longer than normal but probably because we were fit in. Once they'd had a chance to see Emilie it was clear that she was moderately dehydrated and it was time for a direct admittance to the hospital. By eleven we were admitted and in our room waiting on labs and an IV. As soon as we got settled in our room Emilie started screaming and curling herself up then stretching out, we had no idea what was going on and just thought she was tired and didn't like what we were doing, until she let out some of the loudest toots I've ever heard and then promptly filled her diaper. We laid her across the bed to change her and she fell asleep mid diaper change, no my baby. My baby doesn't stop moving...or fall asleep out of her crib...but there she was passed out cold on the bed. Of course no sooner had she settled down and gone to sleep that they came in to do her belly xrays. When they were done I scooped her up and she fell back asleep against my chest. But don't worry...they don't let you sleep in hospitals, lol...soon they came in to do her IV. They had to wait until an RN freed up that was comfortable trying on an already hard to stick baby that is now dehydrated. It took lots of looking and two sticks but they did get the IV in. Unfortunately she was too dehydrated to get a stick for her labs so they decided to wait for some fluids to run and see if they would have better luck. She'd been looking awfully pitiful but they promised that once they hung the second bag with all the good stuff she'd start to perk up. They hung the bag and we laid her down for a nap. She slept for a while and woke up asking for "ju" aka juice. GOOD SIGN! She did seem to have a bit more spunk and I felt like I could finally breathe since we were admitted. They still couldn't find a vein when they came back later so we ended up having to do a finger prick. At that point, I didn't care how they got it as long as they got what they needed. The stool samples came back negative for everything except for the few that needed several days to run and were much less likely. The xray showed large amounts of gas around the bowel indicating gastroenteritus aka...stomach virus. Nothing too serious as long as we could get the bowel to wake back up and as of lunch we weren't hearing much in the way of bowel sounds. But luckily by the time the Dr. came back at six, we had bowel sounds and she was perking up a bit. The night was a lot less painful in the hospital than we expected, we had a fabulous nurse who was great about checking on Emilie routinely. She was starting to pee the fluids so much that she peed through her diaper, clothes, and bed around 3am. We got her cleaned up, had the nurse help us weave the IV bag through her clothes so we could change them and did a thorough check of her vitals before laying her back down. She slept pretty well until they came in at seven to wake up for changing of the guards. Luckily we were graced with another wonderful nurse and our Thursday was looking up. Thursday-- Emilie is acting like she feels pretty well and is wanting her juice. They wouldn't allow her to eat and she was starting to get frustrated with that so we asked the nurse to call our Dr. Around 10am we were released onto a BRAT diet and I can't tell you how excited that baby was about her applesauce, lol. I went ahead and ran home to shower not knowing how long we'd be up there and updated our family and friends while home. Shortly after returning our Dr came to visit and said her bloodwork was looking better and like it was going in the right direction, so as long as she continued to eat and drink and keep it down we might could go home that afternoon. Getting a nap out of Emilie there the second day was much harder, but her Grandma was able to rub her back until she fell asleep and she had about an hour nap. She definitely would have slept longer but a tech came in to take her temperature and woke her up. She woke up soooo grumpy. I think we were all done with being there at that point. She wasn't really showing a lot of interest in her sippy but she was eating like a champ and had still kept everything down so around four we were finally given the ok...we could take our baby home!!!! The rest has been just taking it slow and getting her back to normal. She's now eating and drinking close to normal. She gets full a little faster and tired a little earlier but I know she'll be at 100% before we know it. That's just how she is. We did gain something out of this...a more snuggly baby! She's been incredibly huggy with me ever since the hospital and I'm loving it. We had an amazing support system through the entire illness and knew that many people were praying for us. I think that helped a lot, I'm incredibly grateful for our friends and family...They are amazing! I've attached a few pictures of Em during her hospital stay, the top was her laying in bed with her new animals, she didn't do much but lay there for the first part of Wednesday. The first at the bottom is later that afternoon when she was starting to come around and had just finished a purple popsicle. The last one is Thursday morning when she was even more perky watching her cartoon. PS- If your reading these...leave me a note. I'm pretty sure only one person actually reads these things and although half of the reason I write them is just as an outlet, I'd still love to know. (Especially since tonight I'm tired and didn't proofread...sorry in advance) Thanks!