the neverending sickness saga...

Well - if you recall, the beginning of June was filled with ear infections, antibiotics, and secondary viruses. We all managed to get better, for a whole week. Unfortunately, the 3 weeks of sickness left me in a depressed slump and a chaos breeding house. I was feeling so down and frustrated and behind and just depressed and over whelmed in general; that i just couldn't seem to make any headway with the mess. Tim did his best to help at night (which I felt bad about, since he was working all day, then coming home to my undone work...but I sure needed the help.) I was starting to feel a little better and was beginning to feel like there was hope of digging out, when WHAMMO! Bryan is sick again. I just want to cry!

Last week I started noticing Bryan acting fussier than normal, (downright cranky to be honest) but I just blew it off. Then Friday he had a temp of 101. Later that day (after we spent the afternoon at Payson lakes, which should be showing up as it's own post here soon) I discovered some little white blistery looking bumps on his tongue. I was 99% certain that it was just a virus and not worth making the trip to the Dr, but I called and talked to the on call nurse just to make sure. She confirmed that he (most likely) has hand, foot, and mouth disease. Now luckily for me, Brillig blogged a while back about one of her kids having this disease, and when she did I immediately thought of "hoof and mouth" disease that cattle and sheep get. The one I was sure wipes out entire ranches. Where they put down animals for miles around and everyone and everything is quarantined for eons... I do realize that I'm combining hoof and mouth disease and mad cow and who knows what else all together - but that really was the reaction I had when Brillig said her little boy had hand foot and mouth disease. I was waiting for them to put her whole family into eternal quarantine and call in the CDC to evacuate the city... (okay, maybe not THAT bad, but close!) ANYWAY... as is fairly typical for me, once I panic over something and plan out what I will do when we are evacuated from the city for who knows how long, I looked up the disease on the internet and learned that while the two names are very similar, but they are not even remotely related. PHEW! Happy day. And lucky for me, I had already learned all this before the on call nurse gave me her over the phone diagnosis. (Can't you just see the panic I would have had if I were still in my state of ignorance and I believed it was MY child and MY family going into permanent quarantine???)
Any which way - life is not fun for me right now. Bryan is miserable. He has sores on his hands, feet, and especially his mouth (probably where the name comes from EH?) and he cries pretty much non stop. He is so hungry and thirsty, because is just hurts too bad to eat or drink anything.
I am totally exhausted. Last night I went to bed right around midnight (I just had to get the kitchen floor mopped before I went to bed because I knew I wouldn't be able to get to it during the day, and I couldn't stand sticking to it any more.) and between 12am and 6:15am (when I got up to go walking) Bryan woke me up 4 times screaming. Throw in a couple time wakingup to feed Caleb, and you get the general idea. Tim siad this morning, "I think last night might win the award for our worst night's sleep ever." I think he might be right!

So now you are probably wondering why I am sitting here blogging at 10:30 at night instead of being in bed sound asleep. I can answer that in one word: BRYAN. He took enough naps during the day - and he hurts enough, that he is having trouble sleeping. I've been trying to get him to sleep since 9. No luck yet. I finally decided to blog for a few minutes, then try again.

Yesterday Katrina had a fever of 102, and this morning Aaron said his throat hurt when he woke up, so I'm just hoping that they get milder versions and not the full blown deal, and I'm especially hoping and praying that that by some miracle we can manage to keep Caleb from getting it. I just keep wondering when this will end! I'm not sure I can take much more.

Now you have a better idea of why my blogging has been pretty sparse. That's enough of the saga for now, and hopefully the final chapter. I'm off to try to get my little angel in devils clothing (jammies) to go sleep. Wish me luck - I have the feeling I'm going to need it.

100 push up challenge

Ali is doing the 100 push up challenge and has invited any and all of us to join her. (the whole strength in numbers thing...) Since I have WIMPY WIMPY arms, I decided to take the challenge. (even though it is virtually impossible for me to imagine being able to do 100 consecutive push-ups...) Today was day 1, and I think I must have been crazy to agree to this. (Shhh, listen - I think I can hear Tim laughing at me clear from Salt Lake)
Wish me luck, I'll keep you posted, and feel free to join in!

reunion photos

so much to do - so little time (and energy)

I feel like I am so far behind in everything - blogging too... I have had tons of things I wanted to blog about, but never seem to find the time to sit down and do it. My goal for the next few days is to make several shorter posts. (Hoping to spare you the agony of reading my typical long winded meandering dribble...) I'll begin by posting this -

Several weeks back Tim's brother Richard and and his family came from California for a visit. We arranged to rent a cabin up near Heber City for a couple nights and we had a fun time. Here are the pictures I took while we were up there. I don't know how to add it to the slide show post - but since I only have intelligent readers - I'm sure you'll be able to figure it out. One side note - the picture of everyone... really isn't everyone. Most of Chris and Gordon's kids couldn't make it, so we were missing 3 of their kids, the 3 spouses, and 3 children, plus we realized after the fact the 3 of the older kids who were at the cabin, were down in the hot tub so they missed out on the photo op. oh well - maybe next year

now THAT was COOL!!!

I had the coolest thing happen to me this morning. I got home from my morning walk, and since Caleb was still asleep when I got home, I decided to get out and water the garden (and flowers on the hill) before Tim had to leave for work. I was up near the top of our yard, when all of the sudden this deer appears, walking right in front of me. Then another and another and another!!! (young males I think, since it looked like they were all in the velvet stage with about 4-6 inches of antler growth - but since I'm no expert, I could be wrong about that... I obviously didn't take this photo since I was busy holding perfectly still - not running for the house to get a camera, but this is pretty much what the nubs looked like.)


Anyway, 4 deer walked right in front of me - 20 feet away max! I could take my tape measure up there and measure it for real, since I am so bad with distances, but rest assured - they were CLOSE!!! It was SO totally cool. I just stood real still and watched them walk by. Each one would stop and look at me, trying to decide if it needed to run away, then it would decide I was fine and it would continue on; then the next one would do the same thing. I TOTALLY LOVED IT!!!
Here's a glimpse into my nature loving brain - my immediate reaction was that I wanted to run out and get a watering trough for them and a salt lick...

my momma told me there'd be days like this...

YESTERDAY:

the plan:

* go walking at 6:20
* be home by 7:30 and spend the morning working really hard to clean my house (Having sick kids for the past couple weeks has thrown my house into a complete state of chaos that I have been struggling to pull out of... I have two good friends from my high school days that were planning to stop in and visit - both of whom had never seen my house. I was not about to let them see it in the horrible state is was in.)
* go visiting teaching at 1:00 (my friends were going to lunch, but I couldn't go since I already had this appt. set up.)
* 3:00 (or some time in that general vicinity) open the door to my mostly clean house and welcome my friends in for a nice relaxing visit

THAT - was the plan -

What really happened:

* 6:00 - after being awakened who know how many time during the night - I got up and got ready to go walking. Since it wasn't time to go yet, I started cleaning out the dishwasher - to get a jump on the day's cleaning. Heard Bryan start crying...
* 6:15 - called my walking partner and explained that I couldn't go walking because Bryan and Katrina had both woken up crying and I was trying to get them back to sleep
* 8:30 - I woke up again, in Bryan's bed. (apparently I was tired or something...)
*9:30 - walked into the TV room to see Bryan holding his ear again, saying it hurt. (GREAT!!! this is NOT what I needed!) Made an appt to see the dr at 10:20.
* 10:10 - racing around the house looking for my keys that were lost AGAIN in the chaos of my house
* 10:30 - arrive at the Dr's office 10 minutes late, having found the missing keys (I knew they were in my jacket pocket - I just couldn't find the jacket! It was hiding under the open dishwasher door (remember that dishwasher that I started cleaning out but never quite got back to???)
*12:20 - heading back home after the dr found ears that had fluid buildup but no infection, and white spots on the throat but the strep test came back negative. "If he's not better in about 10 days, or if he gets worse, bring him back in." I wanted to strangle the poor man when he said that. this has been going on for 3 weeks! just give me the magic cure and give it to me NOW!!!
* 12:45 - after stopping at a FEDEX shipping location to ship something - only to be told that my shipping label had expired and that I need a new one (arrgghhhh) I stopped to pick up Aaron from my friend Holly's. (She had graciously agreed to keep him while I was gone, since he has a tendency to stir the others up and create sheer pandemonium. She could see that I was frazzled, and she offered to keep the kids while I went visiting teaching and throughout the afternoon so that I could have a few hours of peace and quiet to get some cleaning done. I was torn between not wanted to totally take advantage of her - and the delightful sound of an afternoon with only Caleb. I took her up on the offer and left the 3 older kids there.
* 1:00 - went visiting teaching without my companion, since she was home throwing up. I had a wonderful visit with one of my sisters. (Take note - this is the one thing that actually corresponded with the original plan! That us cause for celebration.)
* 1:40 - went to the home of the 2nd sister I was going to visit. She wasn't there. Went home, put a sleeping Caleb in his bed (perfect timing), and took a deep breath in preparation for a super speed crisis cleaning session.
* 1:45 - noticed phone message light was blinking. It was Holly. "Everything is fine, the kids are fine and you don't need to come get them, I just wanted to let you know that Katrina threw up." I grabbed my keys to go over and get her, when the phone rang. I picked it up. It was the sister that hadn't been home. She was just getting back from her Dr appt up in SLC and she'd really like a visit. Now normally, I would explain what was going on and skip the visit. HOWEVER, this particular sister is really struggling right now. She is facing really serious medical issues, has no family in the area, and feels that everyone in the ward hates her and they want to move their records to another ward because they feel that this ward is so "unfriendly." In truth, it really is a very difficult ward, but that's another post altogether. The fact that she had called me and wanted me to visit, indicated that I really needed to go. So I left a note on the door for my friends explaining my absence, got Caleb out of bed, and off we went.
* 3:50 - finished visiting (She really just needed someone to listen and the visit certainly could have gone longer but Caleb was poopie and he was DONE sitting there!)
* 3:55 - picked up the kids from Holly and apologized for being so long and leaving a throwing up kid with her. (She'll think twice before she volunteers anything like that again!) As I left, I told her, "At least by now my friends are long gone back home and I don't have to worry about them seeing my filth-pit of a house!"
* 4:00 pulled into my driveway to see my dear friends on the porch waiting for me. (Actually, they were leaving me a note (their second))
What could I do?? I apologized to them, made a half hearted attempt at an apology for my house, then invited them into my CHAOS.
* 6:00 my friends were driving away and I went in the house. A few minutes later the phone rang. It was a neighbor from down the street." I just thought you'd want to know that your little boy is sitting the in the middle of the road - with no clothes on." WILL IT NEVER END???

In the end - I am so thanksful for good friends. Holly is still my friend, even after I bail on walking, leaving 3 kids there for hours on end, while one of them is throwing up, and I'm thankful for Cheri and Michelle, who are still my friends, even after seeing my chaos - and today I got up with the determination to make a dent in the mess. So far, not a lot of progress, but a little... I guess I should get off the computer and get to work.

can only go up from here... (i hope)

here it is, 6:30 am - and I should be out on my morning walk. Instead I am sitting here at my computer - totally exhausted and wanting to go back to bed! Not exactly the best way to start off a brand new week!

Last Friday I took Bryan into the Dr. He had ear infections in both ears, and the dr told me that the left ear drum looked ready to burst, so that I shouldn't be surprised at all if it ruptured within the next 24 hours. FUN FOR ME! He's been on steady doses of ibuprofen and antibiotics since then, and he is a little less crabby now.

Needless to say, I haven't been sleeping really well for a while, but I was hoping last night would start a new trend. Didn't happen. First off, I had trouble falling asleep, (I just haven't learned how to shut my brain off at night...) then between Caleb, Bryan, and Katrina - I got less sleep than ever!

I usually try to handle all of the middle of the night stuff so that Tim can get sleep. (If figure it's more fair that way since he has to get up and go to work, and I can technically take it easy - try to squeeze in a nap- at home. But last night when I heard yet another crying child upstairs, (Katrina crying this time because HER ear hurt) I woke Tim up and sent him to get her some Motrin. That worked for only about 2 hours before she was screaming again. SO - I've been up since just after 5 (which I know is normal for some of you out there, but I'm not a morning person and I've been really pushing myself to get up at 6:10 to go walking...)

So - here I sit, my eyes (and brain) so tired that I'm having trouble keeping my eyes open. Aaron, Katrina, and Caleb are also awake. (Tim and Bryan still sleeping) I am waiting until the dr's office opens up at 8:30. (or maybe the Instacare at 8:00) My house is a total wreck and with my current level of energy (pretty non-existent) I don't have much hope that it will see marked progress throughout the day:(

Here's hoping that things go up from here -