August in Review

(It's a REALLY LONG one.... :) )

August was a whirl! Where did it go?? It was like a blink in time. It was a great month. We celebrated Allie's second birthday, and that's where my last post left off.  Here are a few pictures to tell the story of the rest of the month.

Allie and Gracie are best friends... :) It is so cute to watch them play together. Allie loves to crawl on Gracie, give her treats, chase her, tease her and play ball, balloon, and frisbee with her.

Our little girl is looking more like a little girl.  She's loosing her baby look almost completely!! She is so pretty! :) (I'm allowed to say that cause I'm her mommy! :) )

We went to the pool and met with one of mommy's friend and her little girl. :) It was lots of fun! Although I do believe it was here that landed us in the situation below that WASN"T fun.......

You see, this little girl of mine... LOVES to put things in her mouth. She loves to drink bath water and pool water and no matter how many times I pull the cup or toy that she is drinking from, out of her hands and try to distract her and tell her and teach her not to drink it, she still insists. I'm fairly certain that she picked up a nasty hand-foot-mouth virus here that day. BUT... it was still a fun day (until the blisters started a few days later!)

I learned quite quickly that when you take toys to the pool to play with, for your daughter... they quickly  become property of anyone who wants to pick them up. No matter how many times I tried to keep them reigned in, they still managed to grow legs and find a new set of hands to belong to for a bit. Allie was playing with other kid's toys too, at times, even though I tried to explain that we brought our own, and this wasn't hers.... I don't know why this surprised me or bothered me like it did... I know... get over it mom! :) Ha!

Allie's little friend! :) Isn't she so beautiful?!!! 

Lunch break! :) Picnic style! :) Allie ate a big girl sandwich, grapes and cucumber! :) It was fun! :)

Then of course, it was back to relaxing and taking in the sun! :) The lazy days of summer for sure!!!!! I love this picture! :) She stayed like this for a good 10-15 minutes just relaxing and being nosey! :)

There were a few days that I took Allie girl to work with me to get my room ready.  Here are a couple shots. I moved to a new room this year... across the hall from last year's room. I have the biggest class I've ever had, but so far it is going SO well! :) It is an amazing group of kids!!!! :)

The room still isn't quite the way I'd like to have it- as far as being "done", but it is a constant work in progress as the kids and I make it our "HOME" for the next 9 months! :)

We of course had to play on the play ground at mommy's school! :) This was usually the highlight of the work time! :) We had to bring daddy one evening to show him  how cool the playground was! 

We've also spent the evenings playing outside on her "noisy bike" as she calls it, and playing in her sand box.  We have a neighbor who we have grown pretty fond of. He gets the biggest kick out of watching Allie play. :)

He is the neighborhood watch man! He knows what everyone is doing and what is going on! :) We always know if anyone stops at our house- he always tells us! :) Ha! He loves to sit in his garage and chat with everyone who is out! :)

I think we were eating left over birthday cupcakes! :) Yum! :) She loved them!!! :) 

On her actual birthday, we went to the park. She played on all the playgrounds and rode the train a few times! :) She had a blast! We got ice cream and just enjoyed her birthday! :)

The next day started a two week long state of misery! :(  Poor girl! We went to her two year check up and she was doing great. She had taken a morning nap which was unusual for her, but I figured it was because she had a big day the day before, and was just tired... plus she was up at like six am! She woke up from her nap and felt a little warm. I thought it was just because she was sleeping and it was a little warm in the room. We went to her appointment and she checked out just fine. 29 pounds, 34 inches tall, ahead of schedule developmentally and the doctor was pleased. She wanted her to have a Flu Mist Vaccine, but that was the only vaccine on the plate for the day. I was hesitant, because it was a live virus, and it seems like she doesn't tolerate stuff like that well. I questioned the doctor, and she seemed very confident in her reasons. She said this was more of a natural vaccine, and it was a better coverage for the different strands of flu including H1n1. She said it is rare (um.... yeah!) to have a reaction to it, and she should be just fine.  I agreed to have it done, and have regretted it ever since! She had the vaccine and did well with it...for about an hour....  We walked out of the doctors office hand in hand. We came straight home to eat a late lunch. I tried to put her down when we came in the house, and she was really fussy. I figured it was because she was hungry and it was about nap time. I took her up to change her and thought she felt warm still. I took her temperature and it was 102.4. I thought that seemed high, and a little strange, since she seemed fine before. I brought her down to give her some lunch and she still was fussy. I convinced her to eat a little, and then, she threw up twice. I started to really get concerned at this point. I called mom who is a nurse, and she suggested I contact the doctor. I was doing this and I rechecked her temp... 103. I gave her tylenol and we flew back to her doctor's office. They put us in a room and we were "next" to see the doctor. While I was sitting there waiting with Allie, I was having a hard time keeping her awake and talking to me. Usually, she is so nosey and curious that she won't sleep anywhere but in a familiar place. I opened the door and told them that I thought she was getting worse. They immediately brought two people in to help me. They stripped her down to her diaper and gave her a cold sponge bath, and hooked up the pulse-socks (not sure if that is how it is spelled- that's how it sounded to me).  They ended up giving her a benadryl shot.  They had us wait in the office so they could keep monitoring her. They kept checking her temperature and her pulse/oxygen level. They couldn't get her temperature to come down. About three hours later, they got it to come down with Motrin.  She perked up and they let us go. They told us we shouldn't need any more medicine and the worst was probably past.  

That night, she still had a bit of fever, so we continued tylenol/motrin. The next day was the same but she was much perkier.  Sunday, she started with flu like symptoms... diarrhea and the poor girl insisted on using her pink big girl potty every time! She was miserable! There was NOTHING left in her by the end of the day! :( She started acting like her mouth was really sore as well. She didn't want to eat and when she did, she would hold her hands to her mouth and cry.   Enter Hand-Foot-Mouth- in addition to the reaction from the vaccine!  

Pretty much similar things Monday and Tuesday. She showed signs of Dehydration by Tuesday and still had her fever, so we took her to the ER. They told us to keep doing the tylenol/motrin thing... and maybe her fever would go away and she would start eating if she felt better. Um yeah... that's what we've been trying to do for the last five days... it isn't working. Mom and I  remembered that she  had similar symptoms when we were in Hilton Head at the beginning of summer, and an antibiotic seemed to help her. So we mentioned that. They gave her one, and sent her home.  The fever was gone by Wednesday, but she still had sores in her mouth and wouldn't eat/drink. She seemed to be getting better, but by Thursday around mid-night, we couldn't get her to stop crying (after about an hour and half of screaming non-stop, we knew something was going on). We went and this time they admitted her. They tried FOUR times to sitck this precious little girl for an IV, and on the fourth time it finally took. She was so dehydrated, they couldn't get a vein!  She was screaming, and I was bawling! :( NOT FUN AT ALL! IT took daddy, mommy, and a nurse to hold her down- while another nurse was trying to get the IV going.  Once they finally got it in, I was concerened because she was so agitated, I knew she'd pull it out. She was annoyed with her hospital name band that they put on her ankle... she'd see it and yell, '"Pelp!!!!!!!!! Pelp!!!! Pretty offf! P-E-L-P!!!!!!!! (that's her call for help!)

They ended up wrapping it really good when we got to the Pediactric unit!

They admitted us around 5AM Friday morning and we didn't get discharged until around 10 on Saturday. She had the IV fluids and IV antibiotic.  She was a pretty sick little girl. She didn't do much but lay in our arms. The IV fluids really helped though, and by Saturday, she was much perkier and much more playful!

We didn't get much sleep- so we took naps when we could. Mommy and daddy went about 36 hours with out much more sleep than a little half hour nap here and there. Surprisingly, she didn't sleep much Thursday night/Friday morning either. Between being poked and prodded and x-rayed and all that stuff, she just couldn't settle down. When she did sleep, it was on one of us.

When she did start perking up, she wanted to watch her favorite shows. The pediatric unit had a DVD player and so we watched B@rney and Str@awberry Sh0rtc@ke. :) We also read some books and visited with people who came to see her. 

She had her hand all bandaged up and at one point wanted to read a book. I handed it to her and was going to let her look at it. She tried to turn the pages, and couldn't do it very well because her hand was all bandaged... she said her first sentence.... 

"I can't do it!" It was so pitiful sounding. It broke my heart! Since then, she's been using that same sentence when she can't do something... sometimes she'll say, "I can't draw, or I can't sleep!"  She is so precious!

She finally started perking up and wanted to eat! :) Yay!!!! Milkshakes and yogart and bread with butter!!! Even some noodles! It was great to see her eating again!!!!

When we came home, she was testing the waters big time!!! She knew she was feeling better and she knew she had been spoiled while she wasn't feeling well... she got pretty testy! She threw a lot of fits, and sat in time out quite a bit, but she is back to her ornery self again! And we are so thankful!

Nana and Papa and Auntie D helping Allie with her new tennis shoes! Princesses and Strawberry Shortcake.... they light up and she thinks they are SO cool! :)

At the end of the month, we met Cousin K and L at the park and played on the playground for a couple hours. It was lots of fun! We are back to normal...enjoying life again! :) Yay!!!!

Who knows what September holds... it is already interesting, as we had to switch to a toddler bed.... SOMEONE kept climbing out of her crib! :) But that's a whole new post! :)