Poor Baby

Yesterday, I chaperoned Emily's class field trip to the Victory Ship. (If you've never heard of it, it's an old WWII warship that is docked behind the Florida Aquarium.) My Aunt Kathie kept Katie for me while I was out with Emily for the day. When I returned to pick Katie up, my aunt informed me that Katie had hardly eaten anything all day. Not such a terrible thing - maybe she just hadn't been hungry.

After Sarah got home from school, I took the girls (including one of Sarah's friends) to the Olive Garden for dinner. Katie usually loves it there because she is crazy about their breadsticks. I figured that since she hadn't eaten much all day that she would be pretty hungry, too. I figured WRONG! Not only did Katie not want to eat - even her beloved breadsticks - but she was miserable and yelling the entire time we were there. All I could do was beg the older girls to please hurry and finish their food so we could get out of there.

Once we got home, I took Katie's temperature and it was 102.7. No wonder she hadn't been eating or acting right all day! She was sick, duh! So, I gave her some Tylenol and rushed her up to the After Hours Pediatrics office, because I was afraid to wait until this morning to see her regular pediatrician. THAT was a HUGE WASTE of TIME and MONEY!

The "doctor" there said that Katie looked just fine to her. She could see no signs of infection, so her fever must be being caused by a virus, and we should just keep treating her fever with Tylenol and Motrin and wait for her to get over it. Something about her diagnosis just didn't sit right with me, and when Katie was still running such a high fever this morning (up to 103 by then) I called her pediatrician and asked if I should go with what the other "doctor" had said or bring her in to be checked out. He said to bring her right in.

Since I had to get Sarah to a friend's house for a ride to volunteer with our church youth group at Metropolitan Ministries, and get Emily to her soccer game, too, I had Phil take Katie to the doctor. As it turns out, Katie is NOT infection-free as I was told last night. Her throat is bright red and her glands are swollen. Luckily, it's not Strep, but it was still pretty bad. Since we had already wasted $30 on the After Hours co-pay, Dr. Bob gave Phil some samples of the antibiotic so we wouldn't have to pay for them. Hopefully, she'll be feeling better very soon.

So Very Tired

So, about three weeks ago, my doctor diagnosed me with anemia. I was a bit shocked, but it totally made sense to me since I had been so very tired. She prescribed me some iron pills, that my insurance won't cover by the way, so I thought I would start feeling better soon. Of course, I never thought I'd feel great, seeing as my asthma is a constant issue, too, but I thought I'd at least feel a little better.
Alas, I feel no change at all. I did feel okay for a few hours on Wednesday morning, because I had gotten to go to bed at 7:30 the night before, but that feeling didn't last long. By the end of the day I was worn out again. I don't know how I'm going to make it through the holidays feeling like this. I have all of this stuff that I want to get done, like shopping for Christmas, but I just don't have the energy to do much, if any, of it.

Doctor, Doctor

Katie turned fifteen months old today, so off to the doctor we went for her check-up. Katie weighed in at 20 pounds 4 ounces, and is 31 1/2 inches tall. She's tall and skinny, and well on her way to being a supermodel.

Katie also got a few shots today. Ouch! She got her MMR, her pneumoccochal vaccine, her chicken pox vaccine, and her flu shot. Gotta keep my baby healthy! Thankfully, Katie took her shots like a champ and has been in a good mood all afternoon. She even put up with me dragging her to the mall for a while after her appointment.

Hug-N-Farm

Tuesday morning, our playgroup went on a field trip to Granma's Hug-n-Farm. Katie got to see and pet lots of farm animals. We also got to go on a hayride. Katie had a blast.

Out of all of the farm animals, Katie's favorite one was this dog. So, of course, she had to give him a kiss!

Here Katie is showing me the donkey that she and Julianna were looking at.

Katie loved petting the soft little bunny in this picture. She also enjoyed chasing the bunnies around with the rest of the kids.

Look, Ma! No hands! Katie did so well on the "phony pony" that she thinks she's ready for the real thing.

Congratulations, Emily!

Congratulations to Emily for getting her first ever report card with straight A's on it. Emily is very proud of herself and I am very proud of her, too. This is especially exciting because at conference time I was told that she was borderline between A's and B's in four of her subjects and that her grades could go either way. And then she got sick and missed a few days right before the end of the quarter. Apparently, working so hard on the make-up work really paid off for her.

Another congratulations to Emily's soccer team, the Fireballs, on their first win of the season today. Emily missed the game last weekend, but from what I've been told, they played a team of Amazons and lost 7-3. Today, they were much more evenly matched with the team they played, at least size-wise, and won 5-0. Way to go, girls!

Here We Go Again...

This is what my dear eldest daughter looked like four years ago:


And this is what she looks like now:

She barely looks like the same kid. She definitely has lost all of her babyness, if that's even a word. She really becoming her own person, and very independent.