Sometimes Life Gets Hard

It's been a rough winter.  I think we've all been hit to some degree or other either physically or emotionally or both.  And then there's the weather.  I'd never heard of a polar vortex before this year.  Now we all know what that is and we've seen a couple of them.  Brrr.....

Anyway, I'll let the pictures guide the storytelling to try to fill in some holes here.

Grocery shopping with three kids on a snow day!  This
is hands-down everyone's favorite grocery cart.  Wal-Mart only has two.
We've had melt downs over not finding this cart.  We've waited our turn for this cart.
Finn cheers with joy when we get the cart!

This is my view of the cart.  And man is it a monster to drive!

Polar Vortex take 3 maybe?  I was proud of us being out and about in the frigid air.
School was closed again this day because it was so cold they couldn't get the buses to start.
The car actually dropped down to -9 while we were driving, but well, we were driving!

The day after that, Finn got sick.  Very sick.  At first I thought it was one of his typical GI episodes.  And he had been seeming to be a bit backed up going into this day, so that made sense to me.  But after throwing up three times in a half an hour I realized this was different.  He wasn't keeping anything down and he had no energy at all.  He spent the entire day on the couch.  He didn't move.  He didn't talk.  And he couldn't eat.  Because kids with CF can dehydrate much more quickly than regular kids, I was getting worried.  I could only get a teaspoon of liquid in him at a time that would stay down.  Anymore than that and he would lose it.  So he got one teaspoon with a medical syringe ever fifteen minutes.  By mid-afternoon his temperature started to creep up.  And he was still not holding anything down.  I finally got some Milk of Magnesia to stay down around dinner time and by bedtime he demonstrated that he wasn't obstructed (another big issue that kids with CF are prone to and that I was really worried about) and he also stopped throwing up at the same time.  He spent that night sleeping on his mattress in the living room and I was on the couch next to him.  He got hungry and started to keep food down around 2am.  It was a long night (or a short one depending on how you look at it).  Between him and Bree I'm not sure I really slept.  And the next night wasn't any better either.  I am pretty sure that I saw every hour on the clock both nights and both days.  I can't remember being that tired in a very long time.  Finn's fever continued off and on for four days and the vomiting was replaced with upper airway congestion.  On day four he started antibiotics.  It has been his third round of antibiotics in as many months.  And if you go back to September, he's had five rounds since then.  I did say it's been a rough winter didn't I?

The next week was Valentine's Day.  Because Kai is into rocks and gems right now, this is what we came up with.  The bags are filled with Chocorocks.  They look so real, though!  The class party was held the day before Valentine's as
they actually had Valentine's Day off of school.  That was nice.  For Valentine's Day, Reid took off of work and the boys all went to see the Lego Movie in the theatre.  I got some nice quiet time at home with me and Bree (who napped for a good chunk of it).

I had been wanting to learn how to make cake pops for a while, so I started experimenting in October.  Now I actually make them and feel comfortable giving some away.  Not all of them are nice enough to give away, but some are.  I gave some of these to Kai's teachers at school and my visiting teacher.

And as if I wasn't tired enough from the weekend, this little one decided to get up at 5am one day that week.  Yeah, that was fun.

It warmed up a bit on President's Day and so we ventured to the zoo.

Outside the new lion exhibit

This picture cracks me up.  There was an adult man and his older children (think much larger) that laid in this cement circle and took a picture.  They filled it up and it made a nice picture.  Finn saw them do it and insisted on having his  picture done the same way.  I think he's just a tad smaller, though!

The kids had a great time with the otter.  I got a great video of the otter swimming just inches away from their faces.  It was fun!

The next day while Kai was at school we headed to the park.  It was in the 60's again but the wind made it a bit colder.

She insisted on being put down and allowed to play in the grass.  She even crawled over to the mulch and loved playing in it.  She is really into feeling new textures.  She just loves to touch and feel whatever she can get her hands on.

This week--what happens when Finn finds Bree's bow

Bree's sad face when I take away the iPhone.  Yep, mean mom right here.

And this is how Finn has been sleeping lately.  Socks on his hands, cap on his head.  In fact, he's upstairs snoozing like this right now.

From School

I got the following short email from the librarian at Kai's school.  She is currently teaching an extraciricular class about the Amazon Rainforest.  It meets for an hour once a week for 6 weeks.  We decided to let Kai take her class because he has been super enthusiastic about the rainforest lately, and because she was the teacher.  She has been telling me for nearly two years now (since early on in Kindergarten) how much she loves Kai.  Everytime I see her she makes sure to tell me that she loves him.  So, because she was the teacher of this class it only made sense to let Kai take it.  There are only 6 kids in the class and they meet at 7:45 on Thursday mornings (yeah, that's not so great!) and Kai loves it.  He'll even actually hurry out the door that morning.  That means something!  Anyway, I just wanted to share this email from her (her name is Angie Waldron :P).  Oh, as a side note, my mom sent Kai some poison dart frogs that used to belong to my brother Robert which explains his particular interest in those.

Mrs. Jones,

I get such a kick out of Kai.  He is so precious and full of so many interesting facts, especially about Poison Dart Frogs.  If I teach this class again he may have to come and be my assistant J  He said he is going to live in the trees of the rain forest when he is older and that I can come and visit.  Too cute!!  He has a couple of fun things to show you tonight.  Enjoy the long weekend,  Angie

Injuries

With boys it's inevitable I suppose.  But Finn has had some real dozies lately.

This was Finn's second injury to the exact same eye within just a few days of each other.  Both were caused by a certain older brother.  I think it looked worse that this picture reflects.

Finn busted his lip real good goofing around.  I've never seen a lip go black and blue before.  It did.  See that welt on the inside?  And then just a few days later his whole lip peeled off.  I thought it was due to the injury but when it happened again just days later I realized that it was because he was mouth breathing at night.  So, now he gets A&D on his lips before bed every night or he wakes up with cracked and bleeding lips.  Poor kiddo!

Winter Time Fun

It's been a brutal winter.  Seriously, between the cold and the occasional snow dump, it's been brutal.  There was a stretch of time in December, January, and now where the highs have been in the negative numbers.  And that's without the wind chill.  Kai's school district has already extended the school day by 5 minutes just to make up for all of the time lost to cold days before winter break.  I have NO idea what they are going to do to make up for the time that we have lost/are losing now.  And our winters continue until April.  I sure do hope Kai isn't in school until June.  That would be sad!

Anyway, with all of the indoor time, we have had some fun around here.  Here's my winter time fun photo dump.  Enjoy.

Bree loves riding on Reid's shoulders.  She pulls his hair and hits him (love pats!) on the head.  She has also starting leaning down to look at him and smile.  This almost always makes her giggle and smile.

One morning they took a ride together

While they were riding they picked up toys to put in the basket with them.  Then it was play time in the basket.

Finn worked on writing his letters in flour.

I didn't imagine how much of a mess it would turn into!

Yep, that was fun to clean up!

Bree pulled herself up to a stand for the first time on the music table in the waiting room at OT.

Bree's first time with playdough.  Thumbs up!

The boys like playdough and this game of "playing stickers".  We have gotten fun stickers (Angry Birds, Doc McStuffins, Jake and the Neverland Pirates) and they create scenes out of them and tell stories.  They really like it!  Yay for a chep game!

Don't mind Finn's runny nose.  We have had a LOT of that this winter.

building castles

another thumbs up for Bree

Finally trying a puff for the first time.  It's hard work but every once in a while she will put one in her mouth.

She is thinking hard about cruising.  Just not there quite yet.

my little helper

9 Months

*Weighs 15 pounds 3 ounces
*26 inches long/tall
*Crawls and pulls herself  up to a stand
*Lights up when we play Patty Cake with her or sing "If you're happy and you know it"
*Nurses 5 times a day and once at night--FINALLY!
*Takes two longs nap per day (one around 9 am) and the other around (1pm)
*Goes to bed around 7:30pm, nurses around 1:30 or 2am and then gets up for the day around 6:30 or 7am
*Continues to love her brothers, although she does have a favorite (but I'm not naming names)
*Is very much a mama's girl--she is content to just have me hold her and do all of my chores with her in my arms most of the time.  If she's tired or hungry I can just pick her up and carry her around and she's content
*I continue to pump two times a day to keep supply up for her.  And then I use the pumped milk to give back to her in a sippy cup or her cereal.
*Speaking of cereal, she does not eat well at all.  We made some progress toward the end of the month with eating solids, but not a lot.  She does not consistently eat even her baby food (an ounce every few days or so) and completely refuses all actual solid foods (puffs, meats, cheeses, peas, etc.)
*She coos and squeals with the best of them but has not started babbling.
*Because of these last two items, the pediatrician has written a referral for her for speech and feeding therapy.  Ugghhhh.....I seriously need to write a post about therapy.  You'd be surprised what has been going on over here with all of that.  Let's just say she's the 3rd child to have a referral for therapy.  I have one child currently in OT and speech therapy.  Another child is beginning the OT process.  And now this.  Clearly, there's a lot more to our story.

*She's a doll and we just love her!

Dinner Quotes

The last two nights the boys have provided some much needed comic relief at the dinner table.

Last night we had taco soup for dinner.  Kai adamantly dislikes both onions and tomatoes--this soup had both.  While picking through his soup to try to avoid the tomatoes, Kai discovers a piece of onion.  Unsure of what he had found he asked me if it was water chestnut.  I told him it was not, but rather an onion.  Straight-faced Kai deadpanned, "No wonder I'm crying."  He wasn't crying, but he sure wasn't happy at his dinner.  I burst into laughter at the sarcasm that he had no idea he was using.  He is growing up too fast!

Tonight at dinner Reid asked Finn to give the prayer.  Finn responded that he was too tired to pray.  Reid explained that a prayer did not involve any energy and so he should be just fine to offer the dinner prayer.  At that point Finn got creative, "But I'm too tired to fold my arms!"  Well, needless to say after I chuckled Finn said the prayer instead of choosing to go to bed.

Love my boys!