Saturday, September 18, 2010

The Rest (and finally the end) of the Fever!

Lily's fever that had started on Thursday had still not let up by Tuesday morning. It had been a long 4 and a half days. She hardly ate anything, didn't sleep well and even skipped a few naps which blew my mind since she should have been SO tired! We watched a lot of Disney Channel, DVDs and my wedding video over and over. (She LOVES watching the wedding video).

I had been in contact with her doctor on Monday and he told me to just keep waiting it out, but by Tuesday afternoon, he said to come in again for another check up. Above are photos of her from Tuesday morning looking miserable and below, Tuesday around 11am. She LOVES going to the the doctor's office.



Doctor Chad did all the regular checks. Ears looked good. Throat looked good. Chest sounded great. Lymph nodes felt normal. No abdominal pain. No pain anywhere. Nothing. But he was as frustrated as I was with the ongoing fever. So instead of just sending us home and telling us to wait it out some more, he started running tests. He did a flu test -- negative. Strep test was negative. He took blood and ran a cell count test. Thankfully, all her cell counts were within normal range and looked good. It was kinda funny -- Lily did SO good when the nurse came in to take blood. It was a finger prick and he squeezed and squeeze her little finger and actually got out a lot of blood. I was so proud of her. She sat still and was unbelievably cooperative. But when he got all the blood he needed and went to put on a band-aid, she freaked out! She was screaming and crying over the band-aid. It was kinda funny since it was so ridiculous!

Snuggling up to Mommy after the bad nurse actually tried to put a band-aid on her finger. So traumatic.
The only other thing the doctor could think of was to have her get a chest x-ray. Lily wasn't really coughing, except a few times from post nasal drip. The cough didn't come from her chest and he said he chest sounded great. But Dr Chad said sometimes pneumonia can be tricky, so if we wanted to do a chest x-ray just to see, we could go next door to the hospital and get one done. I figured we were already there and just to have peace of mind, we'd run all the tests. So off to the hospital we went.
Showing off that infamous band-aid.

Posing with her hospital bracelet.
Again, Lily did SO well for the x-rays. She was perfectly still and such a good girl. The hospital was pretty quick and efficient and we heard back from the doctor shortly after we got home. Apparently, her lungs were clear of all the normal bad signs of pneumonia, but there some signs that may have been the beginning of atypical or walking pneumonia. The doctor wasn't 100% sure it was atypical pneumonia, but there was a chance. So he gave us the option of trying antibiotics which would help if this was the case, but would not make a difference if it was still just a nasty virus. Since I was beyond tired of waiting it out --we opted to start her on the antibiotics and headed to Wal Greens asap to pick up her prescription. . . .
... and we also picked up a Disney Princess lap table filled with markers, crayons and art supplies. :) Poor sick baby needed a treat. This was the perfect buy since it kept her occupied for days and kept her still and calm on the couch!
....................
Wednesday afternoon Lily was still the same. She was very sad to have missed a week of school already -- not to mention her first soccer game, soccer practice, dance class and we had to cancel our get together with Matthew, Carys, Ben and Rhiannon for dinner and the first Dallas Cowboys game. When I asked her how she felt about this she said, "I feel SO bad for all my friends. They are all SO sad and miss me SO much." The fever did not have any affect on her self esteem! But she was kinda right. Everyone was missing her a lot. Makayla felt so bad that Lily was still sick that she drew her a picture and dropped it off after school with balloons. It was so sweet.
Lily had a lot of fun with the balloons and apparently had a lot of pent up aggression since she was loving just punching them!


Finally Wednesday evening her fever seemed to break. But since it was so close to bedtime I still gave her fever reducers to get through the night since I didn't want her temps to spike back up while she was asleep. But I haven't had to give her anymore ibuprofen or Tylenol since Wednesday night! That is 2 and a half days fever free!!!! Of course, we'll never know if the antibiotics worked or if the virus finally ran its course. But whatever. It is done.

Thursday and Friday, we stayed home and rested just to make sure it was really all clear. More Disney Channel, Wedding videos and Candy Land.

We even took a trip to Disneyland! :) She loves playing with the map we got last time we were there. She has the whole park memorized. So we pretended the house was Disneyland and met the Princesses, Mickey Mouse, rode on Dumbo, Winnie the Pooh, "the pirate ride", the train and the boats. It was interesting to see what stood out to her after our trip there back in January.
By Friday afternoon. She was completely back to normal and very feisty. I think the week in the house was really getting to her. She decided to test her boundaries to see what she could get away with after being sick. Sadly, she learned that it was not that much. She had declared -- rather boldly -- that she was not going to nap and not going to listen to me anymore. Oh really? Of course she got in trouble and that made everything worse. It turned into total hysterics and I couldn't get a diaper on her or pajamas for a nap. So, I just had to toss her into her bed as she was . . . .

She is not asleep. She is still screaming. After about 35 minutes of this crap, I got her dressed and down for bed. At least after such an exhausting tantrum she fell right to sleep and finally took a decent nap! She woke up still in trouble -- no more TV and no goldfish crackers (which is like taking away oxygen for her) and was very very sorry. I should get at least one nice day from her before she decides to test me again. At least things are finally back to normal! :)
(PS -- I like the white little buns. Her tan lines are pretty bold. I took some photos this summer of her cute little tan lines, but never really felt they were appropriate to post on the blog) :)

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Lily is Hot Hot Hot!

So as I mentioned in my previous post, Lily played hard all day on Thursday and didn't nap. So around 6pm when she just wanted to watch TV in the playroom I didn't think anything of it. She was tired! But she couldn't get comfortable in the playroom and wanted to watch TV in my bed. So I let her while I worked on the laptop. The next thing I know, she crawled in behind me, lodged in between my back and my pillows . . . and fell sound asleep!


There she is right over my shoulder! It was pretty cute, but it was also 6:30 at night and I didn't want her to fall asleep yet. Plus, grandpa was on his way over with the turtle! So I tried to wake her, and she just didn't budge . . . .

I even carried her downstairs . . .

It was about this time that I realized she was burning up and running a fever! That was Thursday night. As I write this on Sunday evening, we are still waiting for her fever to break. The highest it got was 104. We have spent the last few days watching TV, resting and playing in the shower and bath to bring down her temperature.

Thursday night and Friday naptime she got to sleep with me in our bed. She loved that!

She is SO cute when she sleeps!
..............
Saturday morning I decided to take her into the doctors to make sure it was just a virus (as is going around school). We are lucky that her pediatrician is open Saturday mornings for sick visits. I grabbed some comfy play clothes for her to wear, but even though she has been running a high fever for a day and a half, hadn't eaten much more than 5 saltines and a pancake in that time and didn't get much sleep either, she still had the energy to veto my outfit choice, pick a much cuter one and ask for her hair in a ponytail!
My little diva at the doctors. She is very happy to be at the doctors. She loves going there.
The doctor confirmed what I suspected. No strep throat, no bronchitis, no pneumonia, her ears looks good, lungs sound great -- just a random virus.

The hardest part of this illness is keeping her cool. She has had constant fever chills and wants to wear pants, jackets, and constantly be covered in blankets. I have to tell her no and she gets so upset. She doesn't understand and cries that she is "freezing". It sucks. Here she is trying to cover up with the throw pillows from the couch.


Assuming the position.
We have a forehead scanning thermometer -- so she knows this move very well by now!

She randomly asked for pigtails today. My cute little sicky!

It has been 72 hours now since her fever first broke out and we are still getting temps as high as 104. I hope this passes soon!!!

Our Week in Review

Sorry my posts have turned into weekly round ups, rather than daily updates. But with Lily's school, dance and soccer schedule and my work schedule, I don't have a lot of time each day to blog.

This week was actually a little less hectic. No school or spin on Monday due to Labor Day and no soccer on Tuesday or spin on Wednesday due to weather.

Monday, while Chip and Lily were home we decided to stop by the outlets for some shopping before our weekly lunch date.

Lily loves to sit in the rides at the outlets. It is the cheapest past time since she she won't let me put a quarter in. She just likes to sit and play. (notice she has her Woody doll with her).


Tuesday she wanted her hair up in her Cinderella clip. It looks cute, but never stays in very long. The best part was when I was done and she said, "I look just like my Aunt Linda!" Since Linda often wears her hair this way.


Wednesday before school:

I love this new dress, so I had to get a photo!

..................
Wednesday was a wet and stormy day. What was left of Tropical Storm Hermine hit the metroplex and it poured most of the day! Wednesday night we thought it was all gone, but some random storms popped up and produced more than one tornado in Dallas that touched down! It was the first time since we've been here that we've gotten an actual tornado. They were small and no one got hurt, but there was some damage. While they were still 20 or more miles away from us, our tornado sirens went off, so into the closet we went.
Lily grabbed her laptop and her baby -- just like mommy! :)
.....................
Thursday we had playgroup here at our house. Lily was heaven having all her very best friends over at once -- Emily, Carys, Matthew, Elise, Trent and Makayla.
They all piled on the coffee table in the empty front room -- apparently it was their rocket ship!
They were having so much fun playing and us moms were having such a good time hanging out, that Matthew, Carys and Makayla ended up staying until 3:30 -- well into Lily's normal naptime. I started to put her down once they all left, but it was clear that she was still wound up and would take awhile to fall asleep. So instead of making her go to sleep, only to wake her an hour later I let her stay up. (My next post will detail more of what happened next . . . .)
Thursday night grandpa stopped by with a cute little turtle he found at the golf course. I think Lily would have appreciated it a lot more if she wasn't so tired. Plus, I was starting to think she might be coming down with something.
But she pet it and we all went over to the pond on the corner and let him go. He is now friends with the frog that we dropped off there last year!

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Mario Kart Addict

Every minute of free time in our hectic week has been spent playing Mario Kart. Lily is currently obsessed with that game. And you can tell since she is getting really really good. Last month when she first started playing she would drive backwards, off cliffs, into lava, etc and just time out at 20 minutes on each lap. But now, she is actually coming in 1st when playing against the game!!! She uses all the boosts and weapons; hardly ever goes backwards anymore and plays all levels -- even the hard ones! I am so proud of her. Sure, it would be nice if she was this obsessed with leaning how to read, write or learning a foreign language, but I am still proud of her. My three year old Nintendo Wii prodigy! :)


She came in first 2 times in a row -- hence the 30 points!


And placed 2nd over all after 4 races.
(she plays under Chip's name since he has pretty much completed the game and unlocked all the characters. She used to only want to be the Princesses, but now she is always Yoshi. She loves Yoshi!)

The Rest of Our Week

Wednesday, second day of school!
.................
Thursday we resumed our playgroup for the fall. It has changed some since last year. Lori and Hannah moved, Ashley and Heather are out since Ashley is in school full time and Meg, Travis and Allison are not going to be consistent participants. So it was just going to be us, Patti & Emily and Courtney, Elise & Trent which was fine by me since I really wanted to keep playgroup going to make sure we saw Patti and Emily regularly, since Emily is the only one attending a different preschool. But Patti suggested we invite Lily's school friends Matthew, Carys and Makayla to join us. I honestly didn't think they would since they also have school MWF, dance on Tuesdays and soccer. But they were both excited to join our little group! Lily is stoked since this means she gets to see Carys 5 days a week and I was excited since it brought all my favorite friends together. In the past I always had groups of friends -- friends from college, friends from work, etc that didn't all know each other. It still makes it hard to visit everyone when we go back to CA. So I am happy that all my friends from different groups here are mixing together. It is perfect!

This Thursday we all met at Matthew & Carys' neighborhood pool. It was a cooler day and even though the radar showed that the clouds were leaving the area, it rained on us most the time we were there! But we were in a pool anyway, so who cares! The kids loved it.

Emily, Matthew, Carys and Lily

Swimming in the rain.

Thursday night Rhiannon, Jennifer and I went out for our monthly night out which was fun as always!
......................

Friday before school.

After school we met Emily and Patti at the park. It was a gorgeous day. Mid 70s and perfect, so we couldn't pass up the opportunity to play outside, especially since it had been so hot the last month!

Lily and Daddy
...........................
Saturday evening we all went to Donna, Todd & Cole's house with Patti, Bryan & Emily for dinner and to watch the LSU game. Lily, Chip and I were the only ones not wearing our purple and gold. But as long as they are not playing USC, it is all good. When dinner was ready, Emily came downstairs wearing these awesome goggles and ate her whole meal with them on. It was so cute!

It was a fun and busy week! But today Lily and I are having a very lazy Sunday. We already watched Princess and the Frog and now we are spending the rest of the morning in the playroom until nap time.

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Ballerina Beckham

Yesterday we had ballet and soccer and Lily was a pretty tired little girl. As usual, we had dance in the morning, but soccer got switched from Thursday nights to Tuesday nights. Our coach and friend, Heather, is not able to coach this year so we got a new coach (the dad that took over last week) and due to his schedule, we all had to switch to Tuesdays. I really didn't think it would be an issue since she has a nap in between dance and soccer, but she was pretty exhausted last night. Maybe it was just this week with school starting too . . . . hopefully next Tuesday she'll have a little more energy.

Ready for dance.
Dance is just so much more fun when you have one of your best friends next to you. All the other kids are sitting a few feet apart, but Carys kept moving her carpet square so she could sit right next to Lily. Sweet.

..............................
As I mentioned above, Lily was pretty tired and not really into soccer so much tonight.
Christie, Lily, Caroline and Ashley

Charlie, Eva, Christie and Lily

Most of the time she just stood out there twirling her ponytail and asking for water and complaining that she was so tired.

But she did step it up to run one drill with Emily! I love these pictures with Emily -- she looks so determined and it looks like they are little soccer stars!

Now, I am off to get her dressed for preschool today . . . . Argh, I am pretty tired too from our fall schedule.