November 2016

November was a bit of a rough month. Kara came down with croup the second week of November and missed the whole week of school. Fortunately, she started feeling better just in time for her birthday party. Unfortunately, Emily started feeling sick just as soon as Kara started feeling better. We were supposed to travel to Mimi and Papa's house to visit for Thanksgiving, but Emily was a miserable mess. She had croup, a stuffed nose, and just generally felt terrible. The worst part was the lack of sleep (for everyone). She would wake up crying at least 2-3 times a night, and nothing Mom and Dad could do could really help her. She consoled herself by going through about a box of tissues every couple of days (we went through a lot of tissues). It would have been miserable trying to travel with such a sick little girl, so we we decided to cancel our travel plans at the last minute and reschedule for Spring Break. We took advantage of being home the long Thanksgiving weekend and got the house all decked out for Christmas. Dad even got out and hung up lights outside!

Link to pictures

Rough Start to Summer

We've had a pretty rough start to summer.  Kara had a make up T-ball game the first week of June.  About halfway through the game, she started complaining to Dad that she was feeling hot.  He thought she was just a little warm because it was hot outside and told her to drink more water.  When we got home, she still said she was hot.  Come to find out, she had a fever of 103°F!  She was supposed to have another game that Saturday, but her fever was just not going down and she developed a pretty rough cough.  We took her to the doctor's office after about 5 days of 100+°F fever where she was finally diagnosed with pneumonia.  Once we got Kara on some medication, her fever went down after a couple of days, and she started feeling much better.  She was supposed to go to music camp the second week of June.  Camp Oonie Koonie Cha is a music-centric camp for kids.  The theme this year was the Old West, and Kara really didn't want to miss it!  Fortunately, they had some openings the next week, and Kara was able to change weeks when she felt better.  Kara had a great time at the camp and intends to do it again next year (the camp next year will be jungle-themed).  She also attended a rock-themed birthday later in the month where the kids could get on stage and sing Karaoke.  Kara had a blast getting up and singing songs (there were a lot of Taylor Swift songs and other singers Dad has never heard of).

Emily's also had a rough start to summer.  Early in June, Dad took Mom out for a nice dinner for her birthday and left the girls with Grandma and Grandpa S for the evening.  Soon after Grandma had put her down, Emily got her foot stuck in one of the slats on her toddler bed.  Apparently, she got it really stuck, and it took quite the effort for Grandpa to get her foot out.  After that, she refused to get back into her toddler bed, so Dad had to take the bed apart that evening, and Emily just slept on the mattress.  Compounding Emily's issues with her bed, she simply hasn't been sleeping very well recently (even before the bed incident).  At least twice a week, she'll wake up crying hysterically in the middle of the night, and no matter what Mom and Dad do, she won't calm down.  We're thinking this is just a phase, but we'll see...

The weather, in general, was quite warm for the month of June, but not too hot.  We got out the sprinklers a couple of times.  By the end of the month, things were looking up, so let's hope we continue to have a fun summer into July!

Link to pictures

Disney World Hangover

Emily picked up a little bug our last day in Disney, which made the travel day home quite unpleasant.  Unfortunately, she continued to have a snotty nose and a cough after we got home.  Dad came down with the flu a few days later, Mom came down with a cold a few days after that, and Kara finally developed a barking cough a few days after that.
Emily seems to be fine now, but the rest of us are still fighting the cold.  Good fun!

Emily's birthday was the weekend after we got back from Disney.  It was a little subdued since we were all a little sick, but we still got a cake, of course!  It's kind of hard to believe Emily is 3 years old already!

We got 2 separate heavy snow storms later in the month.  We got about a foot on March 18th, which happened to coincide with Kara coming down with the cold.  She wasn't too sick to go out and play, though.  The weather warmed up right after that and all the snow had melted by the time the second storm came in on March 23rd.  The second storm came in fast and furious, and we had 21" of snow on the ground by that afternoon.  It was Kara's spring break, so she didn't get a snow day, but that would have been her third one this year.  Crazy!

Unfortunately, the second snow didn't melt quite as quickly as the first snow, so we had to do our Easter egg dyeing and Easter egg hunt inside.  It's not quite as fun as outside, but the girls still enjoyed it!  Emily knew what was going on and jumped right in searching for the eggs (stopping to open up each one as soon as she found it).  Later in the day, we headed over to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Easter dinner.

Emily is starting to develop into an annoying younger sibling (Tyler's words).  She routinely does things these days purely to bother Kara.  She's also developing a bit of a rebellious steak.  She enjoys running away and slamming doors when Mom and Dad are trying to get her to do something (like get dressed).  She's landed herself in time out a few times.  Fortunately, she continues to loves hugs and cuddles and is still very empathetic and sweet.....80% of the time!

Kara is loving school and all the learning and friendships that go along with it.  In fact, when we got back from WDW, Kara said she enjoyed the trip but wished she hadn't missed a week of school! :O  Her written stories are getting more nuanced these days, and she's started story-boarding a motion picture involving unicorn superheros.  There are also 3-D paper mock-ups involved.  She has requested a videocamera, so stay tuned.  She's a hoot!

Link to pictures

Emily's 1st Birthday!

Emily had her first birthday, and we celebrated by all getting sick.  When we say sick, we don't mean a little sniffle, we mean a nasty stomach bug that will take you down!  Emily got the party started by waking up on Friday covered in vomit.  Mommy and Daddy thought maybe Emily had just eaten something that hadn't agreed with her.  We were wrong. On Saturday, Emily's birthday, Mom started to feel sick around noon, and Kara started throwing up shortly thereafter. Daddy was able to hold it together through Saturday, doing load after load of laundry to keep everyone with clean clothes and bedsheets.  Daddy couldn't hold out forever, though, and fell victim Sunday.  Fortunately, Mommy was starting to feel a little better by that time and was able to keep everything together.  Fun times, huh?

The following weekend, we did a re-do on Emily's birthday.  Grandma and Grandpa came up, and we called Mimi and Papa on the iPad.  Emily really enjoyed her cake.  She didn't know quite what to do with her wrapped presents, but she eventually figured out how to tear the paper (not quite fast enough for Kara, though).

Emily has now mastered walking.  She can move pretty quick these days.  She has also been working on her communication.  She can usually convey what she wants through grunting and pointing, and we think she might be close to saying her first words.  She's said something that sounds a lot like "baby" (while looking at her Baby Beluga CD case) and "here you go" (when sharing her toys).  It's amazing how fast they grow up!

Link to pictures

Halloween 2013

Halloween was a blast this year. We got the festivities started by attending a pumpkin-carving party at a neighbor's house, which was a lot of fun. We tried to go to a pumpkin patch, but we didn't get there until late in the month. By that time, the pumpkin patch was very picked over, so we had to get our pumpkin at the grocery store. Trick-or-treating was a lot of fun this year. Kara dressed up as Spiderman, and Daddy took her out with some kids on our street. Emily was a little too young to enjoy the trick-or-treating, but maybe next year!

October, in general, was a busy month for us. We spent the first couple of weeks just getting ourselves settled after spending almost five months living in Florida. Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how you looked at it), Daddy spent the entire month of October working from home since his office flooded in September, so he was around to help out a bit. Unfortunately, Mommy, Kara, and Emily were sick most of the month.  Kara got sick with croup after only 4 classes of preschool. She was down for the count for an entire week and even lost her voice (which was very odd from Kara who usually almost never stops talking). She still has a pretty nasty cough, but she feels fine.  Emily and Mommy both got pretty rough colds (but not as bad as Kara's croup). Daddy, however, was able to avoid the plague, so there was at least one person functioning.

Emily is making progress on crawling. She now army crawls pretty much anywhere she wants to go and can pull herself up to a standing position, but she hasn't quite figured out how to propel herself with her torso off the ground. There's a lot of coordination that goes into crawling! Emily is also developing quite a taste for solid foods. She really enjoys green beans and peaches, but her favorite is pears and apple cinnamon oatmeal.

Link to pictures

The Miserable Patient

Kara does not like being sick. I mean, nobody likes being sick, but Kara particularly dislikes being sick. She has been absolutely miserable for the last week, though it didn't help that she's getting 3 molars at the same time!

Kara starting coughing and sounding pretty rough last Friday. She didn't nap too well that day and just cried when we tried to put her down to sleep that night. We hoped that she would eventually calm down and go to sleep, but after about 15 minutes, Mommy and Daddy went back into Kara's room to try and soothe her. Kara greeted each of us with a hug (and a couple more each for good measure), which was great; however, the unpleasantness was just about to begin. Mommy had talked to a nurse earlier in the day, and the nurse recommended that we put saline solution in Kara's nostrils to help with drainage. It seemed like a good idea, but Kara didn't agree. She started screaming and crying uncontrollably. The nurse had also mentioned that Kara might be able to sleep better in an inclined position (as in sleeping on someone sitting in a chair), so Mommy ended up "sleeping" with Kara in a recliner for half the night and Daddy took the other half.

Kara didn't sleep very well all weekend and just got crankier and crankier.  She refused to sleep without Mommy or Daddy holding her, which means they took shifts rocking her in a recliner for the whole night and naptimes. It was pretty miserable for everyone.

We took Kara to the doctor's office on Monday, thinking that she might have something more serious than just a cold (like croup or maybe an ear infection). There much be something going around because there were several kids at the doctor's office with the same cough as Kara. Fortunately, the doctor didn't see anything wrong with her ears or lungs and said it was just a nasty cold. Unfortunately, Kara didn't get any better in the next couple of days. In fact, she woke up on Tuesday and Wednesday with a temperature over 103! She also wasn't eating or drinking much and got pretty dehydrated.

We were supposed to go to Alabama to visit Grandma and Grandpa H. and Great Grandma B. (GiGi) on Wednesday, but we decided to reschedule for April. We figured it was much better to suffer at home than to share our misery with a plane full of innocent travelers. Hopefully Kara feels better by April!

Kara finally started to feel better on Wednesday.  She took two two-hour naps and slept by herself in her crib that night, but she was still pretty dehydrated. Mommy and Daddy started clapping and cheering (Yay Kara!) every time Kara took a sip of water to encourage her to drink more.  So now whenever Kara drinks, she claps for herself.  It's pretty funny.  Also, Mommy found that Kara likes popsicles. Yes, we know they're full of sugar, but we figured it was better than nothing.

Our little girl's fever was much lower this morning, so we think she's getting better. She's still super-cranky, but she's napping, sleeping through the night (more or less), and drinking lots of fluids. I think the worst is behind us.

No pictures this week. Hopefully we can get some good pictures of our healthy girl for the next post! Since we don't have any pictures of Kara, here's a link (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scu9zzC5U3g&feature=feedf) to one of Mommy and Daddy's favorite clips from Sesame Street. This kid is hilarious!