This And That...

The sickies have FINALLY cleared out (mostly anyway) of our house. HOORAY! I've also been a TOTAL slacker when it comes to working out and other goals that I have for myself. Oh well.

Yesterday was James's birthday, HAPPY B-DAY BUDDY!!! (you can see him blowing out candles and his cake that he thought was really cool...yes I made it...first attempt at anything but "stars") He is now 4 years old and just is overjoyed with the fact that he's now old enough to go to school just like his big sister! Now, our only problem is convincing him that he has to wait until summer is over! We should have come up with something else to tell him other than "you can't go to school until after you're 4!" He keeps coming up to us and telling us that he's now 4 years old and he can go to school now! We have to keep telling him that after summer is over, THEN he can go....sadly, it's Spring Break this week for our school and he has it in his mind that when Terra goes back to school from THIS break, he'll be able to go too! That's gonna be a fun week. Poor kid's gonna feel jipped!

He also keeps asking how old Terra is and when we tell him that she's 5, he gets SO excited and says, HEY LOOK! 4 AND 5!!!!! (pointing to himself and Terra)

We also took him to the doctor today for his well-child check up. That was interesting. I'm not really impressed with the nurse that helped Chris out (he just took James in while I stayed home with the other 3 kiddos). First she made a big ol' stink about his immunization records and how they weren't "stamped off" on that card and how she could get in BIG trouble for signing them. Chris explained this to me over the phone and I was livid. We weren't given a card for his records at the hospital, so, when we moved out here and started going to the public health nurse, I just brought a copy of the paper from his medical records (which I SHOULD have sent with Chris today but had a total brain-cramp), and they (the public health nurses) copied them onto a card for us. We thought that was fine. Well, after making this HUGE stink about it, she finally signed it. When he got home, I realized that it was the seperate card that was for his pre-school registration...which I can just shred and get a new one, or just COPY the yellow card that I have and send that instead. They accepted that for Terra's registration!! They also took a sample from James to test because of some of his health issues (I'll just keep that part private...to save him from embarassment) and said they'd call us with the results. After doing that, they told Chris that James was in the 75% for height and everything else was average (so he's tall and skinny....just like his daddy). Then they came in and went over the shots he would be getting today. They were like, 'since you're self-pay, these are rather expensive shots, do you still want him to get them?' Chris said yes and they came in and gave him shots. Now...to MY understanding in taking all the other kids there, it's standard procedure to give the Public Health Department's shots to self-pay patients so that they can either get them at WAY discounted or free "pricing". They said that they'd bill us later for it and we wouldn't have to take care of it today. I'm LIVID about this, and yes, they WILL be getting a call from me tomorrow (since the dr. didn't call about the analasys results this evening).

We found a camper shell for our trailer that my dad made for us for Christmas (totally random, but we're way excited about it!)!!!

Also, Tyler is getting VERY cultured. I LOVE to listen to Josh Groban while I get ready in the mornings. This morning, he came in and just stared at the CD player with a BIG smile on his face. He also tried to sing along a couple of times. LOL, way too cute!

Yet Another Update

Tyler is improving by leaps and bounds....he now just has the cough and if he gets too active, coughs so much he tosses something (usually mucus, still). Celeste is getting worse, starting to get raspy when she breaths deeply and coughs quite a bit. James is still coughing some but is getting a lot better and Terra isn't really sick at all. We still stayed home today from Church because we knew that there'd be some angry glanses if we'd tried to endure the whole block of time there. Oh well, we both had subs for our responsibilities anyway since we were SUPPOSED to be gone this weekend.

Since we stayed home, we decided to be REALLY big roughians and clean the house a bit. We got the kitchen most of the way done and the living room and entryway all the way done and were working on catching up on laundry when we discovered that the clothing coming out of the dryer was still a bit damp. We just kept on truckin' and eventually.....NONE of the clothing was dry.....AT ALL!!! The heating element went out on the dryer so we've been cruisin' the net trying to find another one for free or dirt cheap (since we're saving up for a deposit/1st month's rent on another place to live at the moment). We found up up in Longmont for $40 and Chris will be going out to check on it in another hour. I'm hoping it's something that'll limp us through until we get enough saved up to buy a matching one to my new washer (wishful thinking.....maybe) or just limp us through until the next heating element goes out! *Sigh* And people wonder why I'm so tired all the time! GRRRR!!!!

How's your day shaping up?

I Guess We're Having 8!

I took a quiz on Facebook (copied the results below) and found out that I'm supposed to have 8 or more kids, which is funny because each time Chris and I start discussing the number of kids we should have, that's one of the numbers that keeps popping up! LOL ROFL


"Sandi took How many kids should you have? quiz and the result is EIGHT AND UPYou must not like to be alone! Well, if you have 8 or more kids...you won't be for many many years. Along with many children comes many laughs and many tears...and broken pieces of furniture and many many diapers! Good Luck with your overflowing home!"

Would anyone care to comment on this "find"?!

Update on Sickies...

Well, after yesterday, I'm thinking that Tyler is over the worst and can only get better from here on out. He got meds twice yesterday, and both times threw up, but kept them down long enough to absorb the majority of them. His fever is gone and he's up running around and asking for food and sippies and eating/drinking them on his own. It is SUCH a relief to see him like this. I was realy worried about him before. But I did have a scare with Celeste yesterday. She got a fever of 102.2, so I was worried that she was going to end up like TyTy, but she never did and the fever is gone today and she hasn't really been spitty either. James isn't getting any worse and Terra doesn't seem phased by any of this (thankfully).

An update on Erin....

She's out of surgery and recovering at home now. They did the endoscopy and didn't find the stones, so just went ahead and scheduled the surgery to get the gallbladder out. When they got it out, they were glad they DID get it out....it was SO much worse than they had expected it to be. We're VERY glad that she's on the mend and wish her all the best (Love you Grandma/Mom).

Another update from the family.....

Back in my post about Celeste being 4 months I mentioned that my sister-in-law was rushed into surgery, but then I never did give an update on that. She's home and doing well, too. THe surgery went great!

We're glad that all this trauma is over and done with and hope that its a LONG time (if EVER) before the next one hits! LOL Now I must catch up on all the house stuff that got pushed aside to care and worry about all that's happened! Great fun for ME!

I LOATHE Sickies :(

We have the sickies at our house....yet again. We've been told that kids can get over it and be in the clear and catch it again immediately....which could be what happened in this case, but I still stand my ground on it being a reaction to a shot that was given and then turned horribly wrong when he got an ear infection. Poor TyTy is NOT feeling well at all. We had to cancel our trip home that I was SOOOO looking forward to, but along those same lines, how much fun would it have been for ANY of us if we'd had sickies in tow. I'll back up to last week and tell you ALL about it.

On Tuesday of last week, you'll recall, Tyler had his well-child check-up and received a shot. We got the information of possible side effects and went home, blissfully happy that this would be just like all the other times....slight fever, ornery for a couple days, and then we're over it. Well, on Thursday night, as we were putting him in bed, he coughed and coughed so much that he threw up, we didn't think anything of it. Vomitting was one of the side effects and he was still getting over his "slight" cold (that he's had for over a month). Friday, he kept vomitting off and on, but could keep fluids down, so again, I didn't worry. Saturday, however, he took a major turn for the worse and I started to get worried. I called the after-hours answering service for our pediatric office and got in an arguement with the receptionist and she said, rather shortly, "I'll transfer your info up to the Children's Hospital and have a nurse call you back." We waited for a couple of hours and finally got a call back and the nurse didn't really help much, didn't ask too many questions, just read what I had told the receptionist and said that he had a cold and would get over it in a couple of weeks. She told us to humidify the house and suction out his nose and that should do the trick. So, we complied, we turned on ALL the humidifiers we own, suctioned out his nose a couple of times, after which, he vomitted, yet again, and then immediately fell asleep. He started to get really lethargic and on Sunday, took a 2 hour nap, then a 4 hour nap, fell asleep for the night at 7:30 and slept till 5:30 when he got up and crawled into bed with us and fell asleep again until 8 am or so Monday morning. Sunday also brought on the dehydration. He wouldn't drink much but when he did, it'd come right back up. I started to almost go into histerics when I was caring for him, really worried and just KNEW that it wasn't "just a cold" that would go away. I told Chris so, and he said that if he didn't improve by Monday, then we would call and go in to the office. He actually ate a banana and kept it down Sunday evening and Chris also gave him a Priesthood Blessing that he would be comforted and that we would be calm enough to care for him. He seemed to relax a bit, but still was a little too sick than I was comfortable with (lol, don't laugh, I KNOW you can't ever be comfy with the sickies). So, he slept peacefully through the night, and we fed him applesauce for breakfast and decided he was well enough to wait it out another day. So, Chris took Terra and left, and as soon as he pulled out of the driveway, Tyler threw up again. So, I didn't even wait for approval or discussion from ANYONE, I just called the office and demanded to talk to the nurse or one of the doctors there. In the back of my mind, I just knew something HAD to be done or this kid was going to be in BIG trouble. Little did I know how right I was.

The nurse called me back and immediately didn't like what she heard, so scheduled us to be there by 11:30. I made arrangements with my neighbor to watch the girls for me and I took both boys in (both of them were barking and hacking up a lung). When the doctor walked in, James was the one coughing, so he goes to check out James and I'm like, uh....no, it's this one you want to look at. He looked at me pretty stunned and was like, are they BOTH like this?! I answered yes and he set to work checking TyTy out. His oxygen levels were pretty low and he has a bad ear infection, a sinus infection and all that compounded with his cough/cold is making him nausiated. They wrote out a perscription for us to give him and we left, thinking all would be well again in the land of Nelson. We filled the perscription, and came home. I gave a dose to him soon after getting here and he kept it down for an hour and then......yup, you guessed it! And, to top it off, he was just getting more and more lethargic as the day wore on. I put him in the tub, because his fever had spiked again. He was so out-of-it that he was almost falling over in the tub. So I propped him up on my arm and dumped water over him to cool him down. I got him out of the tub and into some jammies and laid him back down on the couch. He then proceeded to wake up just long enough to throw up mucus, and then close his eyes and be out-cold. He was so weak that he could (or would) barely slurp up anything through a straw or his sippie. We were finally able to get him to wake up to eat something (although that something isn't all that great and probably has little to no nutritional value to it....but I'm grasping at straws here). I'm LOVING Cheetos today! He ate about a quarter cup of them and has kept them down. We also gave him grape gatorade through a syringe (about 6 tablespoons) about a half hour ago. So, I'm really hoping and praying that tomorrow goes better. Chris has a long driving trip ahead of him, but will be home later afternoon to evening, but having to deal with all of that for even a couple of hours....is rather wearing and stressful.

Another thing that has happened in our family.....we got a text message this morning stating that Erin (my mother-in-law) was in the hospital awaiting surgery. Her gallbladder is causing some major problems and needs to be removed.....but they have to find the gall-stones first. Somehow they worked their way out of there and into the intestines (from what I understand anyway). They're hoping to have all the procedures and surgeries done by noon tomorrow. We're so FULL of excitement in this family! Bet you can't wait to see what happens next...right?!

Funny...

I feel like this some days....LOLOL

Forgotten or Failed?

My New Year's Resolutions haven't been.....what's the phrase.....paid much attention? I didn't think that I needed to write them down....I'd just remember them!! HA! Anyone who knows me KNOWS that I don't remember things well. So, here's a list of my resolutions and a blurp about how I'm doing on them!

1 - Lose 35 lbs (baby fat plus some).
* I've lost 10 lbs, which isn't bad, but none (and I mean NONE) of my jeans are fitting me still and I STILL have that "baby pooch" up front!

2 - Exercise everyday except Sunday
* I have done terrible at this until just recently. My sister and I decided that we'd get up at 7 am every morning and exercise together (even though we live a few hundred miles away from each other). I did great that first week, the second week, it wasn't at 7 am, but I still got the workout done. Week 3 is where I'm at now and between kids being sick, me being sick and a baby that decided not to sleep through the night a few times, I'm still doing ok (gonna hit the grind-stone hard tomorrow though).

3 - Read the scriptures for personal study everyday (we already do family scriptures, but I've been lacking in the personal department over the years).
* Ummm.....I've been waiting until I have time to myself to read, and anyone that has more than two kids KNOWS that when you wait for that to happen, it never does. I have studied once a week the past 2 weeks, which is an improvement, but could be better.

4 - Start and upkeep a blog and post on both blog AND family website at LEAST once a week, if not more.
*Obviously I've been doing ok in here, but sometimes forget to copy and paste into my family's site, so, when I remember, I post an epistle length post to catch everyone up (sorry guys)!

5 - Get my house clean and maintain it...every night put away toys, shoes, coats, dishes in the dishwasher everynight and unload it in the morning so I can have a clean sink all day (dishes would just go directly into the dishwasher).
* HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! *Sigh* wishful thinking, I guess

6 - Meditate more so my memory and mind can be more clear.
* I need to do this still. I don't think I've done this ONCE since I thought of it at the beginning of the year!

7 - Create a new budget for the year and put some money in savings as a starter and be debt-free by Christmas.
* Budget has been created, recreated and re-vamped to fit our needs. Our minimum savings is in the bank and we're working on the debt. We probably won't be debt-free by Christmas, BUT we will be by this time next year!

8 - Start doing Once-A-Month-Cooking.
* We did this for the first time this month and let me tell you....IT HAS BEEN FABULOUS!!! I just pop something out of the freezer and throw it in the oven. It's saved my life when Chris has gone on his business trips. However, we haven't cooked it all on one day, but rather 2 Saturdays, we spent cooking most of it and we still have about a week and a half of meals left to cook, but we figured that it was a good start. We also doubled the recipes, so we have extra meals for when we need them!

9 - Eat healthier
* This could be better, but we have improved on this a bit so far.

10 - Get daily routines down for the kids to make bedtime, mornings and just over-all life a little bit easier (I'm all about simplifying).
* So far, no set routines, but the kids are getting used to what is expected of them....they don't always follow those expectations, but which one of us was ever the perfect child growing up, right?!

(I also threw in an extra couple of items, just because)

11 - Become more self-sufficient (sewing our own clothing, garden, raise chickens for the eggs, etc).
* We have the chickens (which haven't started laying yet), we have geese (which HAVE started laying), I have made one complete dress for Terra and am working on a couple other projects to be done before Easter. As for the garden, we aren't doing much with that right at the moment. We're going to be moving again in April/May, so we'll worry about that when we get settled into another place.

12 - Build our food storage back up.
* Our storage got depleted over the last couple of years due to some money issues we were going through. I'm so very glad that we had it available to us to use and I'm forever grateful to our families for helping us out with this area too! We are now in a position that we can start stocking up again! (a sub resolution that goes with this one is to cook more with wheat and learn how to use it more)

So, how's your resolution(s) doing?