Sunday Hike

Since today was going to be our last day of nice weather for a week or so we decided to go for a hike at Henryville State Forestry. Lucas was VERY excited.

We found a goose egg in the water. My pack-rat son would normally want to cart it around with us, but thankfully there was too much else to do!

The hikers! We went over lots of little bridges with Lucas, of course, as the leader! We'll definetly have to do this again!

Spring Saturday

We had great weather yesterday! We began our day by walking down to Cole and Nate's house to watch the Little League Parade! Nothing like a bunch of teams warming up their arms by throwing candy before their first game! Yikes! We MADE OUT! My kids will be so happy to see new candy in my candy box at school! Then we walked on to Easter Egg Hunt #2 at the American Legion, which started at 12, but for some reason they decided to start at 11:50. There were NO eggs left by the time we got there but the boys had fun playing on the playset and didn't seem too upset! The rest of the afternoon we played outside, took naps, and went for ice cream! These are the kinds of days I've been waiting for! Kate is doing much better. She still has a cough and lots of mucas after sleeping, but I think the worst is behind us! We DID have to go back to the Kosair ER last Sunday for the same problem. Her oxygen level was okay once they deep-suctioned her so we got to come home, thankfully! I am ready for warm weather to stick around and for my kids to be well! :)

Lucas likes to live dangerously....messing with my flowers.

We've had to discuss which ones are okay to pick and which ones aren't. So far so good....

Kate thinks Lucas hung the moon! Everything he does is funny! I love watching her watch him. He's such a good big brother!

Easter Egg Hunt #1

Well, maybe Easter will be like Christmas...by the end my son won't be terrified of the Easter Bunny. If you remember at Christmas it took about 4 exposures for Lucas not to panic around Santa. I've tried to explain that they are friends and they play golf together in the summers...we went to the park, in the rain, with Cole and Nate and he almost chickened out because the Easter Bunny came onto the field. He only got about 6 eggs because he was worried about where Mr. Bunny was. Oh well, that's an easy record to break for next weekends hunt!

Can you see the green fading bruises on both sides of his forehead? One from bumping heads with another child on the playground and the other from hitting the bathtub. The cut on his face is from road-rash from not putting his feet down at the end of the slide. The picture doesn't illustrate his burnt fingers (stove) or his appendage that was zipped up (by Dad!) It's been a rough Spring Break!

Spring Break is here!

Spring Break is here and we have ABSOLUTELY no plans and I love it! We are just going to hang out, play, and go with the flow! Kate is doing MUCH better. She's only getting up about once a night, coughing, but then goes right back to sleep. We had a super-busy week beginning with St. Baldricks last Sunday. This is the second year Joe has participated and this year he organized a team in honor of one of our friend's son. It was awesome to see! I'm so proud of him.

I had conferences this week so aside from playing catch-up from being out with Kate I had to do report cards and get everything ready to meet with parents. Water under the bridge though. Joe also left for OR to watch the NCAA games in Portland with two of his best friends, his brothers, and his dad. He was very excited to go! I, on the other hand, was a little nervous about getting both the kids ready and out the door on my own...we did great though! I am definetly ready for him to come home on Sunday though. Lucas keeps asking me when Daddy is coming home.

What a week!

A week ago Saturday Kate started coughing and had a bit of a runny nose. We kept her home on Monday and Joe took her to the dr., who said it was just a viral cold. Wednesday, my babysitter called and said that Kate was running a fever and was breathing a little fast. Another girl there had been diagnosed with RSV the week before so I asked Jeannine to watch her closely. I took her back to the dr. and they diagnosed her with broncholitis. Nothing new to our household! I was thinking, boy, we''ll really get our money's worth with that nebulizer. They said to do treatments every 4 hrs. Right before bed I did a treatment and she seemed to get worse. I called the dr. and they said to give her another one right away and if her respirations didn't slow to take her to the E.R. After her second treatment I called Beth to bring her stethoscope and she timed her respirations at over 100 a minute. I called my mom and we headed to Kosair (Joe stayed home to put Lucas to bed.) When we walked in I couldn't believe how many kids were there with seemingly the same symptoms. After assessing her, they put Kate on the high-priority list because of her need to be deep-suctioned. We were back and had seen a dr. by 10:15 p.m. and she was deep-suctioned at 11:15. Around 12:30 they decided to admit her based on her oxygen level and her respirations. Then they put her on oxygen My mom headed home and Kate and I finally got to a room at about 2:15 a.m. where they deep-suctioned her again. Her mucus was so thick that she couldn't breathe through it or get it out on her own. They would put a long, thin, rubber tube up her nose and down her throat to get all the gunk out. They did that 12-15 times during our stay. In order to come home she had to go all night without oxygen and without needing to be suctioned. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night she had to be put back on oxygen and needed suctioning. Due to her "impressive cough" that lasted 2 minutes at a time they tested her for whooping cough. Thankfully that came back negative, but they were pretty convinced for awhile! Finally she made it Sunday night and we came home Monday! Yeah! She is much better. She has a cough that just won't quit and is not eating or sleeping very well, but we're home! I'm planning to go back to work on Thursday since I'm OUT OF DAYS! YIKES! I home April and May are healthy months! Thanks for all the prayers. Being there reminded me of how many great friends I have and how much we are loved. I am so appreciative of our overall health because there are so many that aren't as fortunate who do what I did for 5 days for a much longer time! We're so blessed!

4 month well-visit

We went for Kate's 4 month well-visit on Monday and everything was great! Kate weighed in at a whopping 13lbs. and 1 oz. She is really beginning to show us her personality. She's such a happy baby. She thinks everyone around is solely there to entertain her! She smiles non-stop! She just started reaching and grabbing things! We brought down the exersaucer today and she loved it! I can't believe that she's already big enough for it.

We're ba-ack!

Our computer has been out of commission for the past 3 weeks, but it is back virus-free. It wasn't the only one fighting virus' these past 3 weeks. Lucas finally got over the fever, but then got croup. The following week we were just driving along to school when he said, "Mommy, I just spit up" which was followed by heaving....thank goodness for leather seats! I pulled into the parking lot at school, and then thought, "Now what?" so I called the school secretary who got Joe out of basketball practice and came to my aid. I had stripped Lucas naked because he was soaked through to his underwear. I, then, remembered that I had some clothes in Lucas' size that someone at daycare had given me for Kate....so...I dressed him in a Halloween shirt that said "Who needs a costume when I am already a princess" and pink leopard stretch pants. Too bad I don't have a picture of that :) He was upset that he had to put them on, but Joe and I made such a big deal that they were "cool" that he wouldn't take the pants off for the rest of the day!! Ah, the joys of parenthood. Just when I thought all was clear, I got a call on Wednesday that Kate had it! Yikes! Once I picked her up she was alright, she got it all out there! Lucky for me!

Kate has had 2 new gal pals born in the last 10 days! Sara had Addison (7lbs. 9oz.) and Danielle had Isabelle (7lbs. 9oz.) today! Poor Danielle, her water broke yesterday at 7a.m. and they ended up doing a c-section at 7a.m. this morning! Sara elected for a repeat C-section-smart girl! Our girls are going to have so much fun together! I'll get a trio picture soon!