Fall foods

A couple of videos of crazy Logan on the motorcycle. It's so funny to be doing something, look up and see him zooming by.  He almost always looks at us (instead of straight ahead) like "what, you see this?!"

I love Fall because it means Christmas is just around the corner. Today it was supposed to rain and storm all day after the gym I headed to the store to get groceries and the ingredients for a big roast and pumpkin banana bread. The roast is slow cooking away and the pumpkin banana bread turned out delicious. So good!

It hasn't been raining today, but it did rain a lot last night and we might get some more tonight. The grass sure needs it.

The aggies pulled out another big win! Now for more football tonight unless we get pulled into watching The Lorax again.

Isabel and Brian are getting the mail and trying to find puddles to jump in. She found some in the backyard too.

First jello!

Logan loving on his motorcycle

Banana pumpkin bread. Yum!

Let's go jump in puddles!

Puddles!

Woohoo!

 

 

 

 

Clean!

The house is 100% clean! It only took me working almost all of preschool time and all of nap time, but it's done and it feels great. The last load of laundry is drying and my mind is resting better.

I've had 3 buyers for my light fixture that was in the dining room flake out on me from Craig's list. Darn. I really thought the lady today was going to call me back. Oh well.

There is a 70% chance of rain on Saturday! Yay! I hope it cools down some. Perfect football and crock pot weather. Well, not really since its still in the 90s, but if it's raining I can pretend.

Everyone was pretty entertained by Brian's bubble blowing abilities last night.

Exhausted

This has been one of those really really really trying weeks for our family.  It has been physically and mentally exhausting.  I can't believe it's only just Wednesday.  Monday started off on the wrong foot. I skipped my early morning workout.  Gasp.  I know it shouldn't be a big deal, but it is to me and I always think about how I'm going to make it up until I do make it up. If I'm sick, it's no big deal, but I wasn't sick.  I wasn't even particularly sleep deprived.  I actually got about 6.5 hours of sleep, when my norm is 5.5 to 6.  I was just sooo unmotivated and the thought of lifting weights was dreadful.  So I beat myself up all day and got in an hour run while the kids napped.  Bad decision.  I was cranky the  rest of the afternoon.

Tuesday Isabel had a follow up with her PCP.  She is doing fine and he told us how he wants us to wean her off of her meds.  I have a feeling we won't get all the way off before she gets a cold and needs them again, but at least we have a goal and plan.  She also got a flu shot and was very brave.  But that cut into her preschool time so I had about an hour and a half to myself to workout on Tuesday.

Today we had to wake the kids up for Logan's big appointment at 8am up north.  I haven't decided how much I want to go into it on the blog since this is a public blog and I want to respect Logan's privacy.  Basically we're going to start occupational therapy weekly after his initial evaluation in a couple of weeks.  The thought of this is exhausting.  Mentally, emotionally, and frankly, financially.  If you know the company that Brian works for you know that obviously Brian won't be getting a raise  this year, or anytime soon, so making school, activities and all of these new medical expenses work is very challenging.

I'm hoping tomorrow both kids can go to school for the entire 4.5 hours and that I won't have to spend an hour at drop off.  I have so much stuff to do around the house.  Isabel has been in rare form this week.   Don't know what her problem is, but she has been a pill.  She is usually helpful and listens pretty well, but the last couple of days have been bad.  Really bad.  Reeeeaaaaallllly bad.

Here are a few pictures from our happier times this week.

Logan's first movie!

We hit up the early showing of Finding Nemo on Saturday. It was Logan's first movie theater experience. He lasted about 1/2 way through and then got restless. I took him out and he had fun 'playing' the arcade games. Isabel got a little bored too. I think seeing a movie in the theater that we've watched at home at least 5 times (including the night before) was not the smartest move. We were in the special 'sensory friendly' showing, so the lights were kept up and the sound wasn't as loud. There were quite a few kiddos with sensory issues and/or autism. I thought it was great! I was so much more relaxed with Logan and wasn't worried about him disrupting everyone else. He actually did really well but wanted to run around when he got bored. Even 45 minutes of sitting still was considered a great success for a 2 year old boy in my mind!

Finding Nemo here we come!

 

4 please!

Happy boy!

Somebody LOVES popcorn.  Had to cut her off!

So excited!

After the movie we came home and had lunch and naps before meeting up with friends for dinner. We were all decked out in our aggie gear and a sweet friend took some pictures for us.

This is her thrilled face.

That's better.

Mi familia.

Today we stayed in and played most of the morning. There have been ozone alerts the past couple of days and the allergy forecast for today was horrible so I didn't want Isabel outside much. The kids started getting super restless after lunch so I told izzy I would take her to look for a necklace for her Halloween costume. We walked around the mall for about an hour and a half. She took her necklace finding mission very seriously. She also found a ton of other things that she wanted. I was so proud of her though. Every time she asked for something I told her no and why we can't just buy everything we want. She actually acted like she understood and even told me that she was saving her money to go to Disneyworld. Proud mom right here! We saw the Hello Kitty kiosk and I knew it was trouble.

For some reason Isabel has a fascination with Hello Kitty. This kiosk was all Hello Kitty. We looked at some things and she saw a headband with a pink sparkly bow and a Hello Kitty in the middle. I talked to her about how it cost money, etc etc and she nodded like she understood, but then the silent tears came. Soooo sad.  :( She was trying so hard. I know that the lesson is such a greater gift than buying her what she wants, but how hard is it to say no to a brave girl trying to understand?!  It was all I could do not to buy the whole damn kiosk for her.  I told her that maybe she could put it on her Christmas list and ask santa. Meanwhile I secretly bought the $8 headband (what a ridiculous markup) and will keep it for Christmas.  I couldn't risk it not being there for Santa to buy later on!

So we went to Homegoods because I needed a pillowcase. While we were there she spotted the pink bag in my purse and grabbed it. I screamed 'NOOOO!!!!' Like a crazy person. She dropped the bag and didn't look inside, but holy crap, talk about a close call!

Hello Kitty kiosk.  I do not understand the fascination.

Can I get this?  One of the many headbands at The Children's Place

Very happy with her necklace for her costume.  She said "send a picture to Gramma please!"

Babysitter!

I completely forgot that we had a babysitter scheduled to come tonight for a couple of hours while Brian and I went to dinner. She emailed me about it this week and I was about to cancel, but decided to go ahead with it. We've been trying to schedule something with her for 6 weeks. Since we were just going to be about a mile away I figured it was ok. I have her the run down on izzy and she was super attentive and asked all the right questions. She's an elementary education major and works in the nursery at our old church in kingwood in the summer. She also came highly recommended. I was gone about an hour and when we got home izzy didn't want her to leave! Success! She said logan did fine too.

Brian and I had a little miscommunication and instead of him meeting me at the restaurant he came to the house after I had already left. Logan got upset again. Oops. She said he was ok after a little bit. I think school is really helping him with the separation anxiety.

Isabel continues to do well. We've had ozone alerts the past couple of days, so I've really tried to keep her inside. It's hard with the weather being nicer, but she was wheezing a little bit after being outside at preschool on Thursday, so I will be paying close attention to the watches on the future. We go back to see Dr. Frank on Tuesday.

We had playgroup over here today. Nothing like having 5 toddlers over! It was fun, but loud!

Here they are watching 'Finding Nemo' tonight. Logan is in his old man PJ's. We may try to go see Finding Nemo in the theater tomorrow. We'll see!

Peppermint mocha

Usually I hate flavored coffee creamers. Like really hate. I don't really like flavored coffee either. I like a nice bold blend with regular fat free coffemate. So I bought this creamer yesterday and love it. It's like christmas in a cup. Not what I want in the early morning, but perfect for my afternoon cups.

Don't you like the double picture? I kept with the self portraits and wanted to show off my newish shirt. I got so many compliments on it today at the gym. Especially the back. It's twisted with a bow. Really cute. It's from an Etsy store called 'ruffles with love'. They have one that says 'no coffee no workee' that I love.

And finally no post would be complete without some kid pictures. Here they are watching 'The Lorax.'. Again. Izzy is doing well. We're hosting playgroup tomorrow so need to finish cleaning.

Again, blogger is publishing he pictures in a seemingly random order. Since I usually post from my phone this isn't getting fixed anytime soon.

CPT Vest

Here's a video Grammy took of Isabel on her CPT vest.  She liked to sing songs and call people on her pretend phone!  She slept through 2 of the treatments if you can believe it!

Weaning Wednesday

Isabel had a good day today. Noticeable improvement in wheezing. I took her down to xopenex ever 6 hours and she seems to be doing well. She'll get her last oral steroid dose tonight. Still on inhaled steroid for at least the next 10 days. Probably more.

We went to ballet class today. She did great. Her little friend from school came over to give her a card and some bubbles and a glow stick. The house was a disaster, so I was a little embarrassed. This little boy is super adorable and was on her class last year too.

We played outside until an air quality alert was issued and then came in.

Here is a picture of Logan eating his oatmeal with a FORK!

I'm such a sucker for holiday clothes!

Why do they have to be SO cute!  I see all of these Facebook sales and some of the stuff is adorable.  I'm a sucker for Thanksgiving/Christmas stuff.  Add some smocking and I just about hit the 'buy' button.  To my delight Isabel's favorite clothes are her smocked bishop dresses and anything with a tutu.  She HAD to wear her Hello Kitty Halloween outfit today.  It was adorable.  She even found some (of my) Halloween socks to match.  She tells me every day that Halloween is 'tomorrow.'

But yes, I am a sucker for holiday/smocked stuff.  The smocked pumpkin pant set I saw today was so tempting.  But then I looked over at the counter where at least $300 worth of medication is sitting and come back to reality.  Even before our recent visit to the hospital I put myself on a no internet shopping rule.

Sometimes I wish I was a millionare, but then I look over at Isabel and think of how lucky I am that she's ok and that we have enough money to cover things like emergency care, doctor's visits, medicine and food and don't think twice when a certain medicine is 2x's as expensive, but has fewer cardiac side effects.  Our pediatrician's office takes medicaid patients and also caters to the well off Tarrytown folk, which I think is great.  I've heard from people who use medicaid (mostly foster parents who's foster kids are only covered through medicaid) who have said it is so hard to find quality doctors that will accept medicaid.  I wish all parents could take their kids into the doctor's office or ER and not have to worry about how they're going to buy food or diapers for the next week.

Edited to add:  FYI, we are NOT the well-off Tarrytown folk mentioned in this post.  :)  Just wanted to clarify.

So it looks like we'll be replacing the carpet in Isabel's room sooner rather than later.  We've been planning on doing it for a while, but now it needs to happen.  With cold/flu season coming up we just have to get the carpet out and some solid flooring in.  Anyone want to come help us?!  We'll pay you in food/beer/kid smiles/screams or all of the above.

What Happened?

As I posted on FB and have talked about with most of my family we had a stay at Camp Dell this weekend.  That would be Dell Children's Hospital.  Not fun.  Here's what happened.

Friday we drove over to Dell to see Isabel's allergist for her egg challenge.  We have been avoiding egg since she had reactions last year to some fried rice with egg.  Since then she has had negative blood and skin tests for egg and can eat things with eggs cooking in them fine.  We just avoid scrambled egg things.  Heat denatured the egg protein that causes the allergic reaction.  Heating scrambled eggs isn't enough to get the protein denatured enough, but baking is, so that's why she can eat baked goods with eggs.  We think that the reaction she had with the fried rice was most likely cross contamination from peanuts.  We were eating Chinese takeout.  This was pre-nut allergy diagnosis.

Anyway, we get to Dell for the egg challenge and Isabel coughs a few times.  Nothing alarming, just a couple of coughs.  She had done the same thing earlier in the morning.  The nurse wanted her allergist to come listen to her just in case she heard wheezing.  Sure enough, the allergist said she heard a tiny little bit of wheezing and that the egg challenge was canceled.  She sent us home with an albuterol inhaler (we had previously only been using albuterol with the nebulizer) and told us to do 2 puffs every 4 hours for the rest of the day and possibly Saturday.  So we went home and did as told.

Isabel seemed to be doing ok.  After waking up from her nap I noticed wheezing and decided to do the nebulizer with pulmicort.  Did that and she seemed to be doing ok.  She was playing with Logan, etc.  I tried to put on a movie and have a low key evening.  We did the albuterol nebulizer again right before bed.  Isabel was tired and asked to go to bed.  Brian and I went to see a movie while my Mom was watching the kids.  My mom texted us that Izzy was uncomfortable so we left the movie and I called the pediatrician's office on the way home (1 mile away).  As I was talking to the nurse Brian went to give Izzy another nebulizer treatment, but he just called down that we needed to head to the ER.  I told the nurse we were heading in and asked her if we should go to the ER closest to us or to Dell.  She told us Dell without actually telling us Dell.  Brian drove quickly to Dell.  He missed the sign for the ER and ended up in the ambulance bay.  Izzy meanwhile started puking.  A lot.  I ran her in to the ER and they immediately did a pulse ox reading that was low.  I think 84 or so and rushed us back to a room and started the albuterol.  The RT gave albuterol every hour and we saw the ER doctor who basically just called the IMU doctor (intermediate care).  The resident came down and talked to us about what they were doing and what the plan was.  His attending came down and talked to us some more a little while later.  I said to the doctors "Do you think she has pneumonia or a collapsed lung?"  They asked if Izzy had had a chest x-ray.  I said no and they said it wasn't needed and that it seemed like it was 'just' asthma.

Sick sick girl in the ER

So we got a room in the IMU.  We are there a few minutes when the doctors started paying attention to Izzy's blood pressure.  It was consistently very very low.  At one point it was something over 19, but it was almost always in the mid 20s.  So the IMU doctors said they were going to consult with the PICU doctors.  The PICU doctors were there in about 90 seconds and said she was going to the ICU.  So we headed up to the ICU.  Not a place you want to be.  Absolutely terrifying.  The doctors were debating on giving her blood pressure medication, but ultimately decided against it.  The first thing they did in the ICU was take a chest x-ray.  Sure enough, it showed a partially collapsed lung and one of the doctors said it was most likely due to viral pneumonia.  The first 6-8 hours in the ICU were indescribably terrifying for us.

Izzy was on continuous albuterol for the rest of Friday night and into Saturday.  She was weaned down to once and hour and then once every 2 hours and then 3 and then they started decreasing her dose and her blood pressure started to come up.  Saturday she was doing SO much better than Friday night.  None of us slept at all Friday night.  Isabel was up for 36 hours before taking a 1 hour nap.  Brain and I were at 43 or 44 hours before we got 4 hours of sleep.  Honestly I really didn't notice it except that my eyes kept literally burning and watering, but besides that the adrenaline kept me alert and going.  I couldn't eat anything until yesterday morning.  I just couldn't think about eating anything and keeping it down.

Not feeling so great.

Saturday Logan came to see her for about 2 minutes before we realized it was a bad idea.  She was happy to see his face though!  Thank goodness Grandma was in town to help out with the egg challenge!!!!  She took care of Logan until Grammy and Papaw came to help out Saturday afternoon. Taking care of Logan is a big job, so I'm thankful!

Tater tots for breakfast, lunch and dinner!

We had a couple of friends come and visit Isabel too.  I know Isabel appreciated the familiar faces.  Isabel was doing pretty well in the ICU on Saturday except that she just couldn't get off of the oxygen.  She was doing CPT therapy every 6 or 8 hours which was this vibrating vest that is designed to get the crap out of her lungs and get the collapsed part working again.  She would sing songs and 'call' people while being vibrated.  It was SO funny.

I saw this guy in the hallway that looked SO familiar, but I couldn't place him.  Turns out it was our very favorite doctor!  Dr. Finnegan, Isabel and Logan's cardiologist!  He is seriously the best doctor the kids or I have ever had.  He is phenomenal and doesn't take any crap.  One of Izzy's nurses (our not favorite one) was complaining about him.  Brian and I were both like 'oh no you di-in't!" (that was said with a sassy attitude).  Brian was like 'well, he probably expect nothing but perfection and you're not perfect' or something along those lines.  I really can't say enough good things about him.  He's also constantly asking about Grandpa and if he's gotten his AID yet.  He asked about him in the hospital too!  I wish Grandpa was there to get a lecture from him!  :)

Feeling better and getting out of the ICU in a few hours!

We graduated from the ICU to the regular floor Sunday afternoon.  A few minutes after we got there the resident came in and told us the plan.  We would continue with the albuterol and start titrating down to her home dose.  If she could tolerate the home dose twice in 8 hours and her didn't need oxygen we could go home.  Great!  So at 4:30pm it had been 4.5 hours since her last albuterol treatment.  She needs them every 4 hours.  The RT came in to do her CPT with the vest and I was like 'um, they usually do the albuterol with the vest.'  The RT goes 'they cancelled the albuterol order 15 minutes ago.'  Umm...what?!  Albuterol is what is keeping Isabel breathing, so I'm SURE they didn't cancel it.  She goes out and 'double checks' and comes back and says, yes, they just did it 15 minutes ago.  I said 'well, I would like to speak with the doctor because that isn't correct.' as I was trying not to take it out on the RT who was just following orders.  I was FURIOUS.

So the doctor gets paged and comes in and I explained that Isabel needs albuterol (DUH).  The doctor said this: 'before sending kids home we like to have them on the dose of medicine that they would be on at home.'  I said "right, so why isn't she on albuterol?'  and the doctor just kept nodding her head.  It was effing insane.  It was like she was on drugs or just kept agreeing with me because she didn't want to admit to a mistake?  It was SO strange.  By this time it was almost 5 and Isabel was (obviously) starting to have problems.  Brian and I were so focused on getting Izzy her damned medicine that we didn't realize how effed up the conversation was until about 30 minutes later.  I wonder how long it would have been until they realized that Izzy was in trouble?  Scary.  Scary.  Scary.  Note to parents (or anyone):  double check EVERYTHING while in the hospital a sick loved one.  Had I not been a complete bitch to the RT who knows what would have happened.  I complained to the next resident and the nurse and will be writing to Dell when they (hopefully) send me a comment card.

I really wanted our experience at Dell to be awesome.  It definitely fell short.  The ICU met and exceeded my expectations, but the regular cow pasture room sucked.  Might as well have been in a doctor's office waiting room.  Dell, I think you are maybe getting too big to provide complete, quality care.  :-(  I was treated and cared for so much better with my 3 c sections than on the regular floor at Dell.  Children should receive better (or at the very least the same) care than grown adults, IMO.

So we're back home now and Isabel is doing very well.  We're still on a lot of meds, but she is doing fine.  Running around (although we're trying to limit it) and very happy to be home.  We told her that we were going to be waking her up in the middle of the night to give her medicine and she asked if she could go home afterwards.  :(  She thought we meant we were going to be taking her back to the hospital.  We will see the good doctor Frank tomorrow morning.  He just happened to do his specialized pediatric training in pulmonary kids stuff (technical term I made up).  It was a billion years ago, but he's great and he cares about my kids a great deal.  I'm actually looking forward to seeing him.  The last couple of times the kids have been sick we've seen other doctors in the practice.

Today (Tuesday) I took Isabel in for a follow up with Dr. Frank.  He increased her flovent dosage and wrote a prescription for a xoponex inhaler (better side effects for Izzy than albuterol but it's like liquid gold and is very very $$$).  So now we'll be down another couple hundred bucks with the new meds, but I will gladly pay it.  Dr. Frank said all of Seton (Dell is part of the Seton network) has recently gone through a big cost-saving program that includes no xoponex in the pharmacies at the hospital, so that's why she didn't get it.  Thanks Dell.  We appreciate that Isabel's heart rate was in the 170s at times and her blood pressure was so low, but save $100 by not giving her xoponex, by all means.  I'm sure the stay in the ICU saved you money, right?!  I really don't know if xoponex would have been any better, but it still pisses me off.

So I talked to Isabel's preschool teacher today and explained what to do if there is a problem.  Basically give her the rescue inhaler and call me. If it's really bad give her the inhaler, call 911, and call me.  Her doctor said she could go back to school, but I wasn't feeling comfortable with it just yet.  When we got to school Isabel clearly was doing fine and wanted to stay and play so I told her I would be back in a couple of hours.  So she'll be there a total of 2 hours today.  I'm still tempted to go check on her.  I know her teacher will call me if anything changes, but still.  For just being released from the hospital it seems crazy that she's doing so well.  The doctor said it will be good for her to see friends and get back to her normal routine as quickly as possible, so we will try to do that.

*a side note for me (since this journal/blog is basically for me to remember things).  We took both Isabel and Logan in to the doctor this past month for persistent fevers.  Logan fist and then Isabel about 2 weeks later.  They did a CBC on Isabel and decided that it was a viral infection.  This was about 2 weeks ago.  She had no other symptoms besides the fever.

Not sure what's up with the captions, but I'm tired of trying to fix it.  Here are some pictures.

TV watching, but actually feeling better (even though it doens't look like it)

Possibly the worst food I've ever taken a bite of.

TV time. SO much TV

More candy bribery in the regular room.

Going home home home!

Maze at Dell

Butterfly wall before leaving

Thumbs up with the nose pinched. It smelled like puke.

Being silly with Logan

 

Dr. Frank's office today.