2nd Half of March

2nd Half of March

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  We always try to celebrate this holiday in some little way, maybe because it is my Dad's birthday and I like to remember him on that day, or because it's fun to turn things green.  We had green pancakes, and surprise, a leprechaun turned our milk green in the middle of the night!

Our pantry door for the month of February decorated by the girls.

Emilyn has made it through all the letters in both her preschools now.  She can pretty much write her name, but still needs a little reminder now and then.  She is at least a little more interested now in her letters.  I was proud of her for writing all of her letters above.

Matisyn made herself a birthday sign.  :)

Lucas and Emilyn getting some snuggles

Matisyn goes through withdrawals without brother all day at school, so sometimes she comes home and all she wants to do is hold him.

Note from Matisyn:  0 all the way to 100, Mom, this is how much you measure to my heart.  Precious!

Lucas getting the hang of this food thing.  He doesn't seem to mind whether it is just rice cereal or oatmeal.  He'll take it with milk, water, warm or cold.  It can get a little messy if he doesn't have a head rest.

We had a babysitter for the girls so Matt and I could get a night out.  We went to dinner and a movie and went to look for Emilyn's birthday present.  I found this from Matisyn on my pillow when I got home.  It was wrapped up so cute, and had one of her favorite stuffed animal dogs inside.  Matt had to get a picture with me on the couch because I had just fallen down the stairs and hurt my ankle.  :(  Our stairs are pretty steep, and it seems anyone who stays with us takes a fall sometime.  I guess it was my turn.  I had a huge bruise and hobbled around for a couple of days.  I'm so glad it wasn't worse.

Pneumonia/Pulmonary Embolism Scare!
The Monday after this happened I ended up feeling pretty sick.  We were at the Barrett's for dinner with friends (the Helquist's came into town) and I just started feeling achy.  By the time I got home I could barely move.  I couldn't even get Lucas's car seat out of the car.  The next morning I felt so much better, I thought it was just a quick flu or something.  By that night the same thing happened.  I felt bad each day, but the nights were horrible.  I was so achy and miserable, and it hurt to breathe.  The next day I decided I would go to the doctor just in case.  My heart sounded a little funny so the PA did an EKG, but that was normal.  My symptoms were enough that she decided to have me do some blood work and go get an x-ray.  I ended up having a spot on my lung, but my blood work didn't match it being pneumonia.  My white blood cells weren't up and didn't appear to be fighting an infection like that.  The doctor wanted me to go in and get a CT scan to follow up.  When I called to make an appointment they couldn't get me in until the following Monday.  Matt was starting to worry by this point so he went and got my test results from the doctor's office, and since everyone was gone for the day he took them over to his mom at the hospital to talk through them with her.  A doctor friend happened to walk by so they talked to him about it.  He said he assumed it was pneumonia by what he saw, but the radiologist also mentioned a pulmonary embolism and a neoplasm (tumor, unlikely), but still scary.  Matt had me call the next day and find out what I should be doing.  If it was a blood clot in my lung I probably shouldn't wait the weekend.  I still wasn't too worried, Dr. Kristin, as I like to call myself, had already diagnosed pneumonia to Matt days before even though it didn't fit exactly.  That next day when the PA called me back, I did start to panic a little.  Dr. Kristin had given herself an antibiotic just in case that happened to be what it was, I happened to have a z-pack in the medicine cabinet, and it seemed to be helping.  She said if it were walking pneumonia then it was more likely viral and an antibiotic wouldn't be helping.  It was possible the blood clot had just moved through so I was feeling better.  Definitely started panicking after that!  She wanted to know where my CT results were, and when I said I hadn't had the test yet, she asked if I had gotten a cough or if my symptoms had changed at all.  When I said no, she basically changed gears to do you have someone to watch your kids, I need you to go get the test right now, I'll schedule it for you.  I think she was nervous because I didn't have cold symptoms, or a cough, and my white blood cells weren't up, so even though I hadn't had a surgery lately or been on a trip to have an obvious reason for the pulmonary embolism, my symptoms weren't fitting either one exactly, and she wanted to make sure.  Luckily I was with Alison at the time, we were trying to make the best of her being in town, even though I was feeling miserable and worried.  We picked up the girls from school and I left her with them and the baby at our house.  I feel especially grateful that she happened to be here at the time, and I could at least not worry about them.  I had Matt meet me from work and I went to get the CT scan.  (The worst part ended up being that they injected iodine as part of the test and so I wasn't able to nurse for 48 hours afterwards.  Lucas does take a bottle, and we were so lucky that we had a stash of milk in the freezer, but emotionally I didn't like it, plus I was worried he would get more used to the bottle and not want to nurse anymore.  We ended up surviving that fine, but I was not happy when they told me.  It seems silly now that I was even worried about that when I could be going to the hospital to deal with blood clots in my lungs!)  It was funny to be cheering for pneumonia, but that's pretty much what we were doing.  That was by far the best option of possibilities.  After the CT scan, pneumonia was confirmed, and our fears were put to rest.  After a few days on an antibiotic (more nursing complications because it made Lucas's tummy sick) I was finally feeling better.  It gave us quite the scare because it didn't add up to normal pneumonia.  It's a good reminder about priorities and what's important though when you all of a sudden think something serious could happen to you.  I'm so grateful to Matt for putting up with me feeling miserable, worrying about me for the week, and helping extra since I'm still not feeling like myself, my friend Amy for saving the day and cleaning my kitchen for me when you couldn't see the bottom of it, my other friends' well wishes and concern, my friend Alison for putting up with our less than stellar girl time and watching the kids so I could go take the test, my mom for driving herself crazy with worry and being ready to jump on a plane if I needed her, and for knowing I have so many people that care about our family! Yay pneumonia!

Matisyn was SO excited to take her Daddy to the Daddy/Daughter ball at her school.  They danced the night away!

March 25, 5 1/2 months old

On that Tuesday Alison and I managed to get the kids together to play and after we got Matisyn from school we took them all to the Dinosaur Museum.  I didn't know what was going on yet, but I wasn't feeling very good.  I'm glad we made it for an outing before I got worse.  The kids had a great time, and the museum never disappoints for them!

 Jens and Matisyn worked hard building a dinosaur.

 Emilyn spent a long time playing in the sand this time.  She loves building sand mounds for the dinosaurs.  While the girls played in the sand, Matisyn and Jens played on the computer.

They all liked digging for fossils.  They would have stayed longer if we didn't need to get home for dinner.

Emilyn's little neighborhood preschool class on the last school day before Easter.  They had an egg hunt.  Such cute kids!

Emilyn Quotes:

"That is agragious."  She says that often, and my best guess is that it means outrageous and hilarious together.

"I have plenty of snuggles in my body.  I can share with anyone who needs them."

"Boom, boom" and then she poses.  She says this when she really likes an outfit she is wearing and thinks she is extra cute.

"I think your tummy is going to get big again and you will have a sister, and baby sister and baby brother will be friends.  I wish that would happen."

Matisyn Quotes:

"I wish I lived in olden times when they used chalkboards.  They're really cool and easier to write on than whiteboards."

Said with disbelief and her typical over the top drama, "I can't believe that Daddy lived when the phones were still connected to the WALL.  It's weird.  That is SUCH a long time ago."  I agreed with her and acted like I didn't know how that was possible, Daddy is so old, I have never seen phones connected to walls!