Sweet Sick Baby

RSV is taking its toll on my sweet baby girl. After spending 3 nights in a row sleeping in the rocker in her room rocking the pitiful little thing to sleep and then staying in there all night long because in my arms was the only place she would sleep, Sunday night I decided it was time to pay another visit to the doctor. Monday morning rolled around and we made our way to the doctor, sure enough sweet baby has double ear infections and is wheezing which required breathing treatments at the doctor's office and at home, so we now own our very own nebulizer machine Yaaaaaaay (hopefully you can sense the sarcasm there). As you can imagine she isn't a huge fan of the breathing treatments, but we get them done as quickly as we can because she needs to have it done. My heart breaks watching her cry and wiggle in pain while trying yo get comfortable because of her ear pain and then to listen to her raspy, wheezy, "junky sounding" breathing is just pitiful and makes me want to stand in her place. She is such a trooper though and will still flash her beautiful gummy smiles and grab at her toys in her baby gym (a new skill), but naturally we can tell she is simply not herself, which is to be expected. We are praying that the antibiotic starts working quickly, that the Tylenol eases her pain, and that the breathing treatments help to open and clear her lungs, please pray with us. 

 

Sleeping in my arms.

Waiting to be seen at the doctor's office.

 Still a pretty happy baby.

 

This is where she slept last night and for her nap this morning, upright in her baby rocker.

Its Been A While (this is a long one)

Clearly we have been busy around here since I haven't posted anything since DECEMBER! Holy cow time flies when you can't remember what you did the day before!

We have literally just been trying to survive. It appears that since Maisie's birth back at the end of October at least one of us has been battling some sort of ailment. Three days after Maisie's birth Sophie and Jonah had horrible colds of which Jonah's ended being croup that scared us half to death. Then a week after we were over that Sophie came home from school with lice, LICE! I don't do bugs, ESPECIALLY bugs in
my child's hair! Thank goodness for my mom, even though I am pretty sure she was as skeeved out as I was, she came and vacuumed, washed bed sheets, and bagged up anything that couldn't be washed. Seriously y'all I felt like I should have had a HAZMAT suit on! Not long after that we discovered Maisie and I had thrush......Yaaaaaay. Anyhow that was a really fun ride that took a bit to time to clear up. Somewhere in between I think Jonah may have had an rad infection.....not sure things are still fuzzy. Then at the children's well visit, yes I said children our doctor is that awesome and that brave that he willingly put himself in an incredibly tight space with Neal and I and our 3 children, at this visit it was discovered that Maisie's left hip was a bit looser than the right. This warranted a referral to the Pediatric Orthopedist to have an ultrasound to rule out hip dislocation just like her mama who had to be in a harness for 4 months as a baby due to a dislocated left hip from birth. So naturally my mind there to all the negative possibilities my baby would have to endure. Luckily, two ortho visits later and a very hefty bill, all is well in that department and she goes back for a recheck and X-ray in a couple of months. Pretty sure there were a few runny noses and coughs in between there, nothing chart topping just normal annoying winter sickness. Through all of this Jonah just hadn't been the same since his battle with croup and therefore still had this nagging, lingering cough that just wouldn't clear and got progressively worse. At his well visit the doc gave us some super duper cough medicine that worked for a while, but not long enough, soon my baby boy was up several times a night crying and having coughing fits, hats off to my fabulous husband who got up with him EVERY TIME! Two more doctors visits for Jonah and both times we were told allergies, well it got so bad, with him coughing so hard he would gag and we were worried he was going to damage his vocal cords his cough was so violent. So Neal and I figured there was no way this was allergies alone so back we went to the doctor. Which brings us to our current battle of sickness; Monday night Sophie woke up throwing up while I was in nursing Maisie so poor Neal had to field that one, I walked into our bathroom to find Neal holding her hair back while she was covered in puke along with a nice pile of it on our bedroom carpet. Jonah was up and down all night coughing,
gagging, crying and now sweet Maisie started coughing.....not good. Sophie was on the mend by Tuesday night, but Maisie and Jonah weren't looking or sound so great. Back to the doctor Wednesday, again not sure what I would do without my mom she came to keep Sophie so I didn't have to take all 3 kiddos. After a full exam and two really invasive and really painful nose swabs (one for each kid in each nostril) it was determined that Maisie has RSV a lung infection with no course of treatment other than watch and wait. Jonah has an ear infection and the root of his 6 week long violent cough is still undetermined the hope is
though that the antibiotic for his ear will clear his cough. And Maisie, well she is a trooper, but oh so pitiful, she will still smile every now and again but she is obviously not her normal "Princess Happy Pants" as we like to call her. And that is where we stand as of today, still two sick little ones, but at least we have some answers. Through all of this we have prayed really hard I have talked to God on a daily basis and asked for clarity in the situation and for Him to reveal what He is trying to teach me. Patience? Strength? Gratitude? Thankfully the Lord always provides and He did so for me through my amazing husband who took time off work to help and suffered many sleepless nights caring for Jonah and just being there to listen to me vent, and through my best friend Heather who just listened and provided me with Scripture and support and reminded me that He is in control, and of course my mom who helps in any capacity she can. So I guess in the end this whole roller coaster of sickness isn't all negative since my Faith was strengthened and I was once again taught to be grateful for the people in my life who love me and my children and grateful that my children's illness are short lived and curable. However, once we are well I think we are just going to stay in the house until summer!

On a fun happy note Neal and I got iPhones! We scored a really awesome deal through his work, they had new ones in the box never issued to the big execs so we were able to buy them for $25 each! Couldn't pass that up! So I have a bunch of awesome pictures to upload and share that I took with the iPhone that are awesome quality, I always knew Neal had an affinity for Apple products and now I know why!

Now for the fun part....PICTURES!

Always the helpful hubby!

Sophie made herself at school, can you guess which one is hers?

 

Clean diapers in a pile yet to be folded....as usual!

Sick girl, but happy.

RSV is no fun.

Lunch Love for my loves.

She was calling herself "Chef Sophie"

The state of my living room one day amidst all the sickness!

What a bunch of cuties!

Sweet bedtime smiles.

Playing Angry Birds on the iPad.

To Santa or Not to Santa?

I have been seeing a lot of these posts around the blog world lately and for obvious reasons....it is Christmas time. Nonetheless, this is something that has been on our minds and a recent post by a friend of mine on her blog sparked me to write my own post.

We are choosing not to "do" Santa in our home. We "did" Santa for the first two years of Sophie's life, not that she will really remember that, but once Neal and I started to root ourselves deeper in our faith we began to realize that maybe this was not the route we wanted to take with her and any other children we may have. Since then we haven't really had to field many questions about Santa Claus, until recently. Sophie is a very smart girl, constantly asking questions and almost always remembering the answers. She pays attention, very close attention in Sunday school and preschool where she learns Bible verses, sings songs about God and attends chapel with her class. All in all the girl is surrounded by the word of God and can tell you about several people and their stories in the Bible. This is definitely not something I was able to do as a child. Sometimes I am convinced that she might know more about the Bible than me! Anyhow, the question came up in October sometime (she had been rehearsing Christmas songs in school since September for her Christmas program so the topic was fresh in her mind) "Mommy, what does Santa have to do with baby Jesus?" I was silent for a minute thinking carefully about my response, but I could tell that the wheels were already turning in her head about the truth and reality of the fat man in the red suit who magically brings presents. I proceeded with my answer, "Well nothing really, he is more like a symbol reminding us to show kindness and love to one another just like Jesus shows all of us". That answer was enough for her at the time and she remembered it when we had our more recent conversation where I went into more detail about how Santa Claus is a character based on the real Saint Nicholas, who she knows about from the VeggieTales movie, but I refreshed her memory with the story anyway. We talked more about Jesus for a while, giving to others in need and she proceeded to tell me how Jesus is real and not a character, but Santa is a character like Dora or Mickey Mouse. I ended the conversation by telling her that Santa Claus gives us gifts and it reminds us of the gift that Jesus gave us which was.......and she finished my sentence by smiling and saying, "HIM!!!!" Siiiiiigh my mommy heart jumped for joy, she gets it and she is joyful about it!

Now, we are most certainly not banning Santa. I would be quite the hypocrite if I did, telling my children that he is a make believe character who needs to be banished and forgotten and then hauling my whole family off to Disney World (which we do, often), a theme park built around a fictional little mouse! We simply want our children to focus on the real reason of the Christmas season, the birth of Jesus Christ. Focus on the true joy that comes from giving and not simply get excited about the prospect of receiving presents. To give not only material gifts to those we love and those in need, but gifts of the heart.