Being home with the girls is....

Actually turning out to be quite fun and entertaining.  Today's escape took us to Walmart in the pouring rain.  POURING...as in - I got soaked just going to get the car to bring it closer to the house so the girls wouldn't get as soaked.  Rather than let them all walk and get soaking wet - I took them one by one under the umbrella.  Smart right?  But being the genius that I am - I didn't think about how I would get them from the car to the store though!  It was still pouring.  I had choices of course.  I could have turned around and gone home.  But then we wouldn't have gotten the things we needed/wanted.  I actually parked the car, climbed into the back seat (so I didn't have to get out and get wet again) and said out loud (but more to myself) "How am I gonna get you guys in the store...."  Emily doesn't skip a beat and says "Mommy - bring one at a time!"  Oh...duh - why didn't I consider that.  I can just leave you at the front door, come back, get Hailey, leave her with you (if you're still there) at the front door, come back, get Hannah and then we can all go about our merry shopping trip.  Right.  Plan C: wait out the rain.  That's not happening - so move to Plan D! 

Lucky for me - the guy parked next to me just showed up with an empty cart and left it next to the van :)  It was soaked so I couldn't just put the girls in there.  I grabbed a blanket from under the wagon the way back of the van (that took some strength since the wagon was on top of it lol).  Unbuckled the kids and got them all scrunched up in a bunch on the floor.  Opened the door, jumped out, threw the blanket in the cart, threw the kids on the blanket, threw the umbrella over the kids and VOILA!  We had a cart tent - 3 kids inside and they were ALL dry!  We did have to scratch a few things off our list since I didn't consider not being able to utilize the entire cart lol.  But the girls were more than willing to hold the following items:  marshmallows, goldfish, blueberry muffin mix and paint.  The rest went under the cart.  Oh - and the one item we desperately needed that brought us out in such a storm to begin with?  Lactaid...and they didn't have any.  Ahhhhh well.  It was well worth the trip.

Tomorrow - Pete is off to VT for the whole weekend.  Looks like the girls and I are gonna have to have a slumber party!

Happy Birthday

To me! I am taking the day off from blogging :)

Stick a fork in me

I'm sick.  Head cold, sinus infection...whatever it is - it's kicking my royal ass.  I also had some dental work done last week - and today my mouth is throbbing like crazy.  Add to that a trip to the girls doctor to get the flu MIST only to arrive and be told the girls have to have the injection.  And only 1/2 dose.  So we have to go back next month for the other 1/2.  That wasn't fun.  And now they're in bed crying that their 'boo boo still hurts'. 

The doctor also filled out my paperwork for work - and I'll have to be out 4 - 6 weeks.  That's IF the antibiotics work the 1st time and the 2nd round of testing comes back negative.  (The CDC requires 3 negative tests to consider the child negative of the c-diff and no longer contagious). 

With that said - the girls were (and really have been) very good.  Their attitudes are completely different lately.  They seem to be using their words more and more and whining less and less. 

They're doing better with going potty ON the potty and letting me know when they have to go.  They are wearing diapers though because with the diarrhea I don't want them to feel discouraged or upset about having an accident in their big girl underwear. 

The best part of today was later tonight we decided to ditch baths and go for a walk instead.  LB and I took the girls a different way than we usually go and we just ventured further than we anticipated.  What we also didn't anticipate was the torrential downpour that we got caught in!  We all ran (the girls were literally walking with us...no wagon!) to a big tree and hung out there for a minute before we decided to just head back home in the rain.  We didn't get far before Pete showed up with the van to rescue us.  We all jumped in the back, I threw Hannah & Emily in a car seat...no straps - and had Hailey on my lap while LB was sitting on the back of the seat that was folded down.  (We were in the complex...no worries).  But what's REALLY funny is just as Pete started to pull away - the CD player started playing a song that starts with "We all buckle up real tight...."  HAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!    It's a song about going for a car ride and making sure you have your seat belts on!  Irony at it's best.   The girls won't remember our walk tonight.  But I will :) 

Mid day post to vent!

So I spent MANY hours getting stool samples from the girls.  MANY.  I had to collect 4 tubes for each child...3 times.  That's a total of 36 tubes of sh*t.  Guess what we found out today?  The lab - Quest Diagnostics - labeled all but 2 with Emily's name!  I labeled each one individually - how the *f* did they mess it up?  I work at a hospital...I know better than to make those kinds of mistakes.  I made their job easy by labeling each one with their name and date of birth.  I had 3 lab slips - one for each child.  I guess the only mistake I made was putting it all in the same bag.  But what the hell am I suppose to do?  I have so much crap to carry that putting things in one bag just makes sense.  I assume that people will do their job and check things MORE THAN ONCE to get it right.  GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR   So now - I have to collect more shit because they're not sure they even labeled Hannah's & Hailey's right!  (What we're thinking is they labeled all of them with Emily's name, then found the names on them - and realized there were 3 different kids so they just put Hannah's and Hailey's name on whatever one to make it look good).  Lovely huh? 

We brought Pete lunch today and hung out with him for a few.  The girls are still running low grade fevers (hovering around 100).  They're sleeping now - when they wake up we'll be baking orange, pumpkin sugar cookies. 

Durham Fair

Was much fun!  The girls were really good even though they didn't take a nap.  They LOVE riding the school bus.  :)

Pete stayed home today - sometimes we have to split up to get things done and since my mom & LB were willing to hang out with us today it just made sense for Pete to stay behind.  He got a lot done while we were out of the house.  The girls went on rides for the 1st time today too!  They loved the cars...just sat in the car and the ride went around and around and around and around and........lol.  They went on the teacup ride - Emily will tell you she didn't like it.  She won't be lying.  They also went down the slide.  Emily loves slides but she'll say she didn't like this one.  She won't be lying again.  (I think she hurt her arm somehow). 

On the 'sick' front...we'll be back at the doctor tomorrow.  Emily's rash isn't better.  And when I tried to give them their meds this morning - Hailey & Emily threw them up again.  It's so weird because it's instant...the meds don't have time to do anything.  So we'll need to get some new meds for them.

They slept all night last night 6 - 6.  Hoping we get the same tonight since they went to bed at 6 again.  I'm headed to bed shortly because I'm sleepy myself!

Reaction

Emily was throwing up most of the night last night.  This morning she threw up before taking her meds and Hailey threw up after taking her meds.  They both have rashes on their faces (not bad...but red, raised bumps).  I called the doc on call and he suggested not giving the 2 of them their antibiotic for today.  He also said to give them some Benedryl and another medication for the nausea. 

The rest of the day went smooth. 

I'll be honest - I'm exhausted just thinking that I'm going to be home with them for a few weeks.  They need more structure than I feel I can give them.  When I'm home - I'm so focused on getting 'things' done...and as we know - things are never done.  So it's always a juggling act.  Today for instance - Pete went to take a shower.  I was in the kitchen cleaning up all the vomit off the table, chairs and floor and the girls were in the living room playing.  I'm not sure how much time went by when I realized it was QUIET.  Panic struck in me instantly.  Quiet might be good in another household - but NOT this one.  Sure enough - I peek in the living room and my 3 toddlers had vanished.  Where might they be?  Oh...said 3 toddler thought they were adults and ventured out onto the porch - with their Tinkerbell chairs and they decided to 'look for turkey's!'  Ugh.  It was a matter of a minute maybe between the 'panic' and when I actually set eyes on them.  But hold your breath for a minute and you'll realize just how long it can be.   Luckily they were all sitting quietly in their chairs watching through the railing for a turkey to go by.  Turkey's.  That's what they were looking for.  I swear the only thing missing was a cup of coffee in each of their hands. 

So rather than be mad at them (they didn't do anything wrong...if I didn't want them out I should have locked the door), I grabbed my own chair, my cup of coffee, threw down my rag and went to chill with my babies.  We spent a good hour out there before coming in. 

Being home with them worries me because I'm not sure I can teach them what they need to be taught!  How do you teach colors and numbers and names and animals and and and and and..........I'm not a teacher!  What if they go to pre-k and can't write their names?  I know I'm taking it to the extreme but you get my point. 

meds

Getting the girls to take their meds is becoming a project.  Up to this point - we have had very few problems getting them to take any kind of medication.  Occasionally one of them might put up a fuss but for the most part - it's been a fight over who's gonna get it 1st!  This new med their taking tastes awful so they're not so easy to be 1st in line anymore.  So far I've had to give 6 doses (x3) + 2 rounds of double doses due to throwing it right back up.  So 24 rounds all together.  This is day 2.  We have 19 more days ahead of us.  I have tried giving the meds 1st followed with an M&M (this is usually the way we get them to take 'yucky' medicine).  They threw this round up.  So we tried the meds followed by yogurt.  It worked but they didn't like it any more.  I've put food coloring in the meds to make it 'fun'.  I have put the meds IN applesauce and also IN yogurt.  I have tried giving them a 'chaser' of M&M's, candy corn and again - yogurt and applesauce.  Tonight it was green meds (it's fun and they are more into taking their meds when they can choose what color they are) followed by chocolate milk in shot glasses.  Yes - actual shot glasses.  Again...it's fun.  They also had straws cut to size these shot glasses thanks to LB.  They took their med, drank the milk and chased it all down with a mini snickers.  Nothing came back up.  But I can only assume this will work once and probably won't work again so I'm already trying to think of new ways to get them to take their medicine.  How on earth do you get kids to take medicine?!?! 

I talked to the doctor today and the girls will considered contagious until they finish their antibiotics and the symptoms don't come back.  No school and no play dates.  POOP (literally).  I'll be home with them.