Sophie's been learning how to use our camera, so I thought we'd share some of her photos. It must be true that suffering brings out the artist in everyone, I think these look pretty sharp!
Here are some more:
Finger Detail 1
Finger Detail 2
April 2007 Archives
I'm happy to report Josie had a very nice day visiting with her Grammy Barbara (in visiting from Montana), Grandpa George & Grandma Sue: thankfully she seems to have fully recovered from her bout with RSV and the flu just in time for her birthday!
We scaled back party plans due to all the medical issues we've been having, but still had a very nice time with a smaller crowd. Brandie baked a fantastic lemon cream cheese poundcake with candied ginger, and had made a special trip "down da Valley" to get decorations from a party supply store.
Josie had her own little cake to work on, and Sophie helped her open presents after the rest of us enjoyed the other layer. She got a whole new wardrobe of summer clothes from her grandparents, and a stacking ring toy from Mom & Dad. She also got a monogrammed pink armchair to match her sister's red one.
Thanks to the grandparents for the presents and company, and to Brandie for organizing the day and being a fantastic mommy! She definitely deserves a medal after this week.
More birthday pics here.
End Note: I forgot to mention, after we put the girls to bed we could hear Sophie talking softly over the monitor: she was singing "Happy Birthday" to Josie, who was already asleep in her crib. Definitely one of those moments that makes you forget how tired you are, and remember how lucky we are to have these two.
Sophie's surgery has been postponed due to the fact that she has the stomach flu and it's risky to put someone under anesthesia while they are vomiting. (Hard to imagine, I know). Also, (and this was our feeling) they don't want her trying to recover from surgery while she has the flu and a staph infection. I never thought I would hope that she was sick but I was relieved when she was still throwing up the night before the scheduled surgery. I just knew she wouldn't be up for it. This poor kid needs to catch her breath.
She seems to be on the mend today. Fingers crossed. My mom is coming in from Montana today and I can't wait. I need my mommy!
Thanks to everyone for your concern and we will update as to when the surgery is, most likely next week or the following week.
Our kids are sick. They keep getting sick. We are tired. Here's a chronicle of the string of illness in our house over the past month.
March 23rd: Sophie is diagnosed with staph infection in her leg. Starts on amoxicillin.
March 28th : Sophie goes for a check up on her infection. They decide they need to lance, drain and culture the infection on her leg.
March 30th: Sophie gets a new diagnosis of methicilin-resistant staph infection. Starts new antibiotic.
April 1st: Sophie starts having terrible diarrhea from her antibiotic.
April 3rd-ish: Sophie develops a yeast infection from the diarrhea. Take her to the doctor and get a perscription cream for it.
April 5th: Sophie develops a cough that starts keeping her up at night.
April 8th-ish: Josie picks up the cough/cold that Sophie has.
April 12th: After finishing her antibiotics, Sophie becomes constipated. During a bowel movement she tears her bottom and bleeds. We head to the doctor where she perscribes a stool softener.
April 15th: Josie has a fever induced seizure (fibral seizure). We head to the ER where we spend four hours. She is diagnosed with an ear infection and starts antibiotics.
April 17th: Josie returns to the doctor for a follow up exam where they determine both ears are infected and she has RSV (Respiratory Syncytial Virus). The doctor perscribes Albuterol and we purchase a nebulizer. Josie needs breathing treatments every four hours for 45 minutes each treatment.
April 20th: Josie goes in for a follow up appointment. The doctor says her ears look better but her breathing is still not 100%. Advises us that Josie may have asthma.
April 21st: Sophie goes to the walk in clinic with a 103 degree fever. After extensive exam and xrays, it is decided that she most likely has a virus. Doctor checks a small pimple on her tailbone that has been bothering us and says it is nothing.
April 22nd: Josie wakes up with the stomach flu. Diarrhea and vomit all over her crib. She is limp and feverish.
April 23rd: Sophie develops what we think is another yeast infection. Also, when wiping the "pimple" on her tailbone it releases lots of green pus. We call the on call doctor and she informs us to go to the office first thing in the morning.
April 24th: Sophie is diagnosed with a pilonidal cyst that has abscessed. She is also diagnosed with another round of staph infection. The doctor perscribes antibiotics and refers us to a surgeon for the cyst. We visit the surgeon who schedules a time for surgery on Thursday but hopes we don't actually have to do the surgery due to the fact that the abscess is healing. Later that evening, Sophie develops the stomach flu and pukes like Regan from the Exorcist.
I really need an updated picture of my little brother. He turned 24 today. So hard to believe. I still remember when he came home from the hospital. I hope you had a great one even though you had to work.
Love you lots!
Our little Juice has been trying desperately to chase after her sister for this last year and last night she took some significant, independent steps in that direction. She passed between Jake and I with about 3 steps and then later took 5 more steps on her own.
Here they go! I'm sure it will always be in opposite directions!
I have completely fallen off schedule with this updating once per month business. I guess it's because I am too busy actually interacting with the kids. Well, I guess that makes it sound like I wasn't interacting with them before. Hm, oh well. Here's an update! :)
Sophie has officially moved into a twin bed. When we first moved we converted her crib into a toddler bed. She was having a hard time adjusting to sleeping in a noisy room with her sister so we decided that it probably wasn't the right time to transition her and slapped that crib side back up. Just recently she started asking us to take the side off again. We gave in after three days of requests and she did great. No getting out of bed and very little falling out of bed. All was well until I had to change the girls sheets and took a glance at the state of Sophie's crib/mattress. They were well worn with a noticeable sag in the middle. A quick trip to Sam's club (actually two, the mattress and box spring wouldn't both fit in the mini van) and Sophie had a brand new bed. We took her to Target to pick out some new sheets (we ended up picking them out) and had Grandpa and Grandma bring over the bed rail from their house. The bedding we picked out has a monkey on them doing various beach things. We asked Sophie to name her and she decided on Cowgirl the Monkey. Pretty cute. She is one snuggly bug.
Sophie has been enjoying a little more social interaction as well. We head to a weekly playgroup at the Vestal Library where she gets to play with a bunch of kids all up to age 4 or so. We take a ball and some snacks and she gets to run around the room playing with the other kids. She really enjoys herself and never wants to leave.
Unfortunately, her socialization has been limited recently due to the fact that she has been sick. She developed a staph infection in her leg which turned out to be a more resiliant strain of staph called MSRA (methicillin-resistant Staph). She had to have her leg lanced and drained which was a terrible experience for all of us. The poor girl! The nurse practitioner thought she did such a great job and gave her two lollipops at the end. So she has been on antibiotics for almost 14 days now. She also has a terrible chest cold that has been waking her up at night with coughing fits. She seems to be feeling better but it has taken a long time for her to get over all of this stuff.
She never stops talking! Some of the things she loves to say are...
how 'bout again? (usually after being thrown in the air)
hm, what else? (when detailing a list)
I want some moak (milk)
cockawhile (crocodile)
fider (spider)
woaf (wolf, from animated Peter & The Wolf)
a fider / the woaf / Josie is comin' to get me!
I'm Li-Keen (Lightning McQueen)
palada (no idea what this means, but it's funny)
I want to paint finguns (finger paint)
would you like some ... (offering her food)
I want to be cold buns! (diaper-less)
I'm so sad. (after being told "no")
are you sad?
I want to watch a show!
Don't touch my poopoos [name]
I'm still goin' poopoos
I'm taking my time goin' poopoos
It's Josie's turn [to have her diaper changed]
I don't like that!
I love you so much...
You're so cu-u-u-te...
Have you ever seen my friend [name]? (usually applies an absent half of a couple, as in "Trina, have you ever seen my friend Danny?")
Sunday night, just as the Nor'easter was arriving Josie went into a fever-induced seizure (limp, pupils dilated, eyes in the back of her head, inconsistent breathing, splotchy rash on her chest) so we rushed her to the ER at Wilson Memorial. Dad & Sue met us at the off-ramp and took Sophie to their house, and we waited four hours with Josie while the hospital started to deal with people coming in from weather-inspired road accidents.
During that time Josie managed to charm just about everyone we met, and proved she had her mother's veins as 15 minutes of poking and prodding (and crying) failed to reveal a viable one for blood-tests. Thankfully the doctor let us off the hook and said we could go without another try: she had a bad ear infection that caused the fever, and they wanted us to bring her back in to see her doctor within a few days. We retrieved Sophie from my dad's and made it home just as the roads were getting really bad, and just in time for the power to go out.
The hospital only gave us one dose of amoxicillin to get started, so the next morning after breakfast I suited up and took the Forester to Reddon's in Hallstead. Snow was still falling and on the way there, four trees were down across the road but people had cut away branches (some with just hand-saws) enough for a car pass beneath or pulled them to clear a lane as we waited.
In Hallstead, the pharmacy hadn't opened yet because people couldn't make it to work. I grabbed some coffee from the Dunkin Donuts drive-thru (no hot water at home) and waited for a bit longer for them to arrive. It took a few more minutes to mix up the antibiotics, then I was on my way to the register when the power went out. I didn't have cash, but being the nice people they are, they let me go with a promise to come back and pay later. Thank you, Reddon's!
On the way home, more trees had fallen. Just past the state line I helped a big-rig driver hook up a chain to his tractor trailer and drag some enormous trunks to one side of the road. While we were clearing it more fell behind us, blocking our retreat. Past Brookdale I cleared a few big trunks myself (after each one thinking "this is it, I'm almost there!") before finally getting stopped at a wall of trunks and branches twenty feet high. We were right by Zahora's farm, less than a mile from home but there was no getting through. A crew of county workers (led by a man with a blue baseball cap that read "BOSS" in huge letters) was clearing branches on the other side with chainsaws, but the main trunk was 10 feet in the air, running from the high bank across the power line and nobody dared to cut it without heavier equipment.
While I was standing there anxiously listening to the trees crack and eyeing where I'd dive over the guardrail if one fell, I recognized the husband of someone who used to work with my dad. He had driven his wife to work, and on his way home a tree fell on his windshield, shattering it. He called for a rollback to come pick him up, and then they had both gotten stuck. More trees were falling every minute, so it seemed likely that either his truck or the rollback were going to get more damaged. Someone from the Hallstead side started to climb through the tangle of branches to help cut away, and another tree fell on top of the pile while he was in it. He didn't seem to notice. Eventually a phone company bucket truck showed up and they used it to clamp the wires down while they cut away the tree, then used the bucket again to drag away the huge sections of trunk.
While they were doing that, I started walking home with Josie's antibiotics and caught a ride from someone whose car was stuck on the Montrose side of the tree. He gave me a lift back to the car after the medicine was delivered, and we helped clear more branches out of the way until the road was finally cleared again. I drove home and got the car in the garage: all told it took four hours to get to Hallstead and back again (total mileage less than 20 miles). We all ate a cold lunch and took a nap; when we got up the power was still out, and high winds were expected to bring more lines down. We decided to make a run for it to my dad's, so Sophie & I went outside and cleared enough snow to safely exit the driveway.
This morning Josie had another doctor's appointment (another motivation for spending the night up in town), and it turns out she has RSV (a respiratory virus that's apparently tough on infants and the elderly). Thankfully she's been in good spirits through it all. We drove home this afternoon and are unpacking now, the power's back on!
End Note: I just wanted to say thanks to all the people in our community here who helped us: from my dad & stepmom to the hospital staff to the volunteers who were clearing the road to the pharmacy employees to the highway workers and telephone crew to the guy who gave me a ride back to the house, everyone really showed what this area is all about!
Ok so only 5 years but we still feel like we fell in love yesterday. Only now we have two kids. Funny how that works.
We had a fun night out thanks to Grandma Sue and Grandpa George coming over to watch the girls. We headed out on the town for a charity wine tasting event. Coming from Sonoma County, I have to say that I was very disappointed in the wines but we still had fun with our friends Dave and Karen. There was quite a turn out and the ballroom was packed wall to wall with all types of people. We bailed early and walked around the block to get something to eat. It was nice to get dressed up and head out together.
\KAY-EFF-SEE MO-muh-nt\, noun:
1. The point at which the experience of parenting (particularly fatherhood, especially of teething infants) becomes too overwhelming, causing said parent to rave madly to their friends (particularly expecting parents, especially of twins). Pairs especially well with cross-country moves and take-out fried chicken:
Jake was definitely having a KFC Moment.
I'm happy to report we finally got some decent sleep last night, after almost a month of being up every hour (sometimes half-hour) with the girls. What a difference some uninterrupted sleep makes on your outlook!
Sophie's had a really tough few weeks, starting with a resistant staph infection on her leg that required some heavy-duty antibiotics, which gave her stomach trouble and a diaper rash which required another prescription, then a cold that was on the verge of being croopy, and finally some more stomach trouble that required another visit to the doctor's yesterday.
The Juice has been teething, which is arguably worse than all that combined (at least as far as the sleep impact goes!) She's also learning to walk and wants to try out her news skills as soon as she's awake.
You tell us: is he faking, or really asleep?
You may notice the light dusting of snow outside: thankfully the cold weather didn't keep the Easter Bunny away! Hope you all have a nice holiday with your families.
Love,
Jake, Brandie, Sophie & Josie
PS. I also posted some egg-painting and Easter ham pics: enjoy!
