Happy Birthday, Cassidy!

I can't believe my sweet Cassie is 3 now. Wow! She woke up this morning and we told her "Happy Birthday!" She got the biggest grin and informed us "Yes, it's MY day" in her soft little voice. LOL

Happy Birthday, Cassie!

Party report and pics

Well, the party was a success. Everyone appeared to have had a nice time. We grilled hot dogs and hamburgers, had chips, broiled potatoes, and cake and animal cookies. There was no real set theme since it is increasingly difficult to have Jacob and Cassie have the same theme. So we had green napkins and plates and pink napkins and plates...each of their favorite colors. :)

After lunch, the kids opened their gifts. I may have mentioned this before, but in case I didn't, let me explain - every birthday is like Christmas around here. Nobody wants the other kids to feel left out, so all of the kids get gift bags packed with little gifts and the birthday kid(s) get extra. They love it! {they aren't spoiled or anything!} So, the fun began. I missed a lot of what they got since I was being called every 5 seconds to look at what someone had opened. It was so cute seeing them all so excited about their new treasures.

Jacob got a couple of Transformers, including "Starscream" that I have been hearing about for months. Little did Jacob know, I bought it for him back in January and it had been sitting in my closet ever since. LOL We also bought him a Pixter, which he had a blast with. There were also coloring books, a Doodle Monster, stickers, clothes, legos, and some other things that are not coming to this tired mind.

Cassidy made out like a bandit as well. Lots of princess and My Little Pony toys. She got the cutest book - Picture Me Sparkle Princess - which has her photo in it and each page has "Cassie" wearing a different dress. Oh boy, did she ever love that tonight! And she also got clothes, books, a princess game, Barbie Rapunzel movie, a couple of necklaces, hair items, and the list goes on.

Here are some pics:

The cakes:




Blowing out the candles: (check out Elena trying to help LOL)




Opening gifts:
















Josh and Elena partying:

Seven Years

I can't believe seven years have passed since my sweet Jacob took his first breath. In some ways it seems to have flown by and in other ways it is as if it happened yesterday. He and Cassie will be having their birthday party later today. He requested a chocolate blue Lego cake, but when we headed to the store to get the decorations for Cassie's, he decided that he really liked the Spiderman Candy cake decorations, and he really wanted chocolate icing. LOL So we are compromising a little. We are having a chocolate Spiderman Lego cake with chocolate icing. He also requested a number 7 candle. I think he is really excited about this turning seven years old thing. :)

Here is a scrap layout I made for Jacob this year:


Happy Birthday, my handsome boy!

Digital Scrapbooking

I have been posting some on RAK Scraps (link in the right sidebar). It is such a wonderful and helpful group there, and I love it! I decided I would join the newbie chat on 5/13 to hopefully get a few tutorials and get to know a few of the people in there. I had no idea we would get a HUGE assignment for a newbie. LOL Kim/vkimmycat gave us several tutorials and then the assignment - make a kit with 4 papers (2 plain and 2 patterned) and 4 elements. We then had to make a layout using our newly created kit. We could either do a scraplift or use a sketch that she created for us. I chose the sketch, and this is how it turned out:



Kit by me. Sketch by vkimmycat at RAK Scraps.

Here is the kit. If you would like to download it, the link is below the pic. Feel free to share, but please do not give the link to the download. Instead, send them to my blog to click on the link themselves. Thanks!



Download Summer Picnic Kit: http://www.sendspace.com/file/786zpd

Everyone loved it, especially the ribbons. I had no idea if I did it right or what, but from the feedback I received, I am guessing I did good. :) Anyway, I was so excited when I received a private message from someone saying how good the kit turned out. She wanted to know if I am a designer anywhere and if not I should consider it. Wow! Did that ever make me feel good! She also said she has a site and is currently looking for new a fresh designers and wanted to know if I would like to apply. I told her I would really love to do that in the future, but this was my first kit and I still have so much to learn. I was so excited about it though. So, who knows, maybe one day in the future my kits will be out there for everyone to see. :D
If you do download, please be nice and leave a comment. Just a hello would be nice. :)

In addition to that, Katrina at RAK Scraps decided to post an impromptu challenge for us. She gave us a color swatch and her part of a kit and asked that we do our own add-on kits. So I went to work and got mine done. Here it is:



Papers and elements by me. Font: Scriptina.

Everyone that participates in the challenge will get all of the add-ons and original kit. Fun stuff!

Hopefully on the mend

Cassidy is so much better today! I am relieved. No fever at all so far...her temp was 97. Yay! So far so good. She even ate 3 crackers and drank without having us ask her to do so. And she has been off of the couch and playing for the majority of the morning.

Medical update (on me and Cassidy)

Ok, this will be long and I hope it makes sense. I am tired.

Cassidy was not running a fever by the time we got to the peds, which is great, but her lips were dry and she looks horribly ill. The ped said her ear doesn't look near as bad as the chart indicated it was on Tuesday, so she thinks the antibiotic is starting to work. They tested her blood sugar because of how bad she is shaking and it is fine. The urine looked fine and did not seem to indicate that she was dehydrated as of yesterday. She is starting to not urinate as much though so we have to now start watching for the dehydration.

If she has a fever tomorrow then we have lab orders for blood work and a chest x-ray and then we will go in on Saturday to the peds. She will likely have her antibiotic changed if that is the case, but we may have to hydrate her with IVs if she is getting worse...so she is still ok hydration wise for right now. Whew!

We had my appointment to go over all of my results from bloodwork I had drawn and my thyroid ultrasound since my appointment last month. I will tell you about those results in a minute. Once we got home (well after 5pm), Cassie's fever went up. It reached 103.7, so I have a feeling we will definitely be heading out tomorrow morning for those labs. :(

My appointment wasn't too great, but we have a plan somewhat in place. I am pre-diabetic, my cholesterol is really high (total and LDL) and my blood pressure was up, so I am on a strict diet for now. Fresh and frozen only still and then in a month I will go back to be retested and have an even stricter diet given to me. If my cholesterol isn't improved a bit they will likely put me on meds for it.

My thyroid tests all came back fine, but my thyroid ultrasound came back showing that I have 2 nodules and a goiter (knew about the goiter but not the nodules). He thinks I likely have Hashimoto's Disease, which my mother has. They recommend I have the ultrasound repeated in 6 months. Yikes! I'm still a little confused about how you have a goiter with nodules and yet have your multiple thyroid tests come back ok. Unless his theory is correct (see below).

He ordered another test, but my lovely lab decided to do some totally different test. It came back with abnormal results and he has no idea what the test even looks for. That kind of scares me. He was thinking I have a thyroid autoimmune problem, but he isn't real sure. I don't like the fact that something came back in an abnormal range and we don't know what it is. I mentioned about being tested for scleroderma as a kid and that the results came back as inconclusive and he said it may very well have something to do with that but again he isn't sure.

If anyone knows what a weak positive for the "Actin (smooth muscle) Antibody" test might mean, please feel free to let me know so I don't have to sit here pondering what the heck is going on. ;)

Anyway, it all boils down to the fact that I have multiple problems so he is sending me to see my mother's endocrinologist. She said he used to do internal medicine as well as endocrinology, so I think he is bound to get me fixed up.

It seems like there was something else, but I am blanking now. Hopefully Cassie will wake up fever free tomorrow. She is feeling pretty warm right now, so I guess we will see. Thanks for thinking of us. I'll keep you posted. I have a feeling it will be another long day of testing tomorrow. I hate that she is sick like this. :(

Cassidy update

Well, she is still running a fever (101), so I have an appointment for her this afternoon with my regular ped (thank goodness!). I'm not sure what they will do. She vomitted the meds this morning and had a (TMI) very large bowel movement. That could very well be what she meant when she said "the down" was hurting. Maybe she was constipated? I don't know. I know when we lift her up to change her pull-up she is VERY shaky, so I am wondering if they will just put her in overnight for some IVs.

Then at 3:45 I have my doctor's appointment to go over all of my lab results. I know my pressure will be sky high because of the rushing around I will be doing, the worrying about Cassie, lack of sleep and not staying on my diet at all this week. I am hoping he won't jump to meds as the answer after only seeing me twice, especially since my pressure was fine at the GYN office. Maybe my pressure will actually cooperate for me and be surprisingly low.

Wish us luck! Hopefully we will get to come home and I can update. :)

Cassie is sick

I brought her to the peds and spent 4 hours there. The last time I saw this particular doctor, she treated Jacob. He was so sick she felt he needed to be hospitalized, but yet she had us sit in her office for 5 hours before she did a darn thing. So, I knew we were going in to a long appointment.

She apparently hasn't changed any. I was ticked. Cassie has been running a 102-103 fever since Sunday WITH Motrin round the clock. She also keeps saying "the down" hurts. I asked her where she is hurting, could she show me, etc, and she points to just above her belly button. I pushed a little all over her belly and she never winced or anything and when I asked her again if that was "the down", she pointed to her privates. So, I thought maybe she has a UTI and I brought her in....the ped thought it was a good possibility as well.

The initial check-up went quickly. We were first after lunch, had a throat culture that came back negative, and her left ear is severely infected. I mean, the ped hardly even had to look before she said it looked really bad. :( Poor baby. She never said a word about her ear hurting until we were pulling into the parking lot, so I had no idea.

Anyway, since the throat culture came back negative and Cassie had mentioned that she hurt a little, the ped decided we should do a urine sample. I brought Cassie to the bathroom and she didn't want to go in the cup. She wasn't feeling like sitting up at all for the past two days, so she certainly wasn't going to be cooperative on something like this. So I told the ped we should probably try the bag method. We sat there for 3 hours and Cassie would not go. They put us in a tiny room with no magazines or anything and one chair. So for three hours I stood there waiting for her to pee in the bag. This doctor also has a habit of jumping to conclusions a good bit. After two hours she assumed Cassie is dehydrated. She's not, she just never potties when we leave the house. She didn't have any signs of dehydration, and she also had been pottying with no trouble until this point. Plus she had been drinking quite a bit, so there was no reason to believe that we needed to give her an IV at the hospital.

So, when the 4th hour came, the ped just happened to come out of one of the other rooms, so I went out and told her Cassie was feeling pretty hot again and I needed to know if I could give her some more Motrin or not. She felt her head and told someone to come and take her temp. It was only 101.6, but she felt like she was on fire and was looking pretty bad again. I told the ped again that Cassie hasn't been having an odd or strong smell to her urine. Suddenly the ped decided that she would just go ahead and treat the ear infection and let us go. Nice, huh? Except that she was going to give her the Rocephin shots and I had to remind her about Jacob's severe allergy in the hospital when she treated him several years ago. According to her, none of my other kids should chance that particular medication. So, we now have Augmentin and I have to bring in a urine sample tomorrow morning.

So, that was my fun day. I am beat.

All Tuckered Out

Poor Elena. She put on Josh's old tennis shoes which are about 4 sizes too big for her feet. She walked around the house for a while, then stopped at the couch, put her head down, and didn't budge for a good 15 minutes. She was apparently tuckered out and needed an extra nap. A couple of minutes after I took these pics, she fell flat on her tush and woke up. LOL Little nut.

Yes, she is sleeping standing up. LOL

Happy Mother's Day

I have watched this video about 20 times in the past two days, and it cracks me up every single time. LOL I have two younger brothers and I can totally see them in this. (From YouTube)

Grey's Anatomy

Who else is completely excited about next week? The season finale of Grey's Anatomy is next week. One hour on Sunday and two hours on Monday! I am so excited! I LOVE this show! 2 nights and three hours next week. I can hardly wait!!!

Oh! And the Season 2 DVD is coming out September 12th. A 6 DVD set. Woohoo!

Did I mention that I really love this show? I really, really do. Seriously!

Baby Madison made the news

Baby Madison had a news station come and do a story on her. She is so sweet and beautiful, and Shelli is so strong. You can see the video at the following link:

Baby Madison video

Kidnapped Doughboy

Our local news station did a report yesterday that had me cracking up. Apparently there is a grocery store closing in New Hampshire and someone isn't happy about it. So, they kidnapped the 4 ft. doughboy mascot and send daily ransom notes. Here is a link to the story: kutv.com
And this link shows photos from the ransom notes:
cbs4boston.com


I've scrapping some more. :)



She was just too cute wearing this hat that she has practically outgrown. :)

Credits: Papers - Bold and Chalky Kit by Traci Reed - www.scrapmommies.com
Elements - "Allure Special Embelishment" by Diane Miller, Font - Shelley

An Update on Baby Madison

They do think the liver failure was due to medicines she was taking. They took her off some of them, including her seizure medicine. So far she has not had any since being off, and we are all praying it stays this way. Each time she has had one, it has caused more damage to her brain and major setbacks. Madison had just reached the newborn type stage since starting therapies about 2 months ago. Her eyes were reactive again, she could hold her head up a little. It would be heartbreaking to see her go backwards again at this point.

They are hoping her liver function continues to improve and she will be able to go home next week, so keep praying!

Stay at home moms

I was reading Kim's blog, Reality Check, this morning. She posted a link to an interesting article about one person's take on SAHMs. I shared it with some of my mommy friends. Some of them are SAHMs and others are working mothers. The reaction was the same despite what their current employment status is. Not a single person agreed with the take in the article, other than the last paragraphs.

Later, on my June '03 mom's board, someone posted a link to an article on how much a SAHM is worth monetarily. Funny about the timing on this. LOL Here is the link:
SAHM monetary worth

In the article, you will see a link to the Mom Salary Wizard. I bit and tried it out. How much should I be earning for what I do as a SAHM that is "letting down the team" by not working outside of the home? Well, according to the Mom Salary Wizard, my salary should be $176,367. Not shabby, eh?

Baby Madison - in need of urgent prayers and thoughts

Baby Madison is the daughter of a sweet friend, Shelli. We met on a due date board during my pregnancy with Elena and have posted together ever since. Madison was born with mitochondrial disease. There is no known cure for this, but she has been showing great progress with the help of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT).

Madison is currently in the hospital because she is in liver failure. Shelli posted that this may be because of the medications she os on. They have taken her off of the meds in hopes that she will have her liver begin to function. If not, Shelli said she will not be bringing Madison home.

Please say some extra prayers tonight for Baby Madison and her mama, Shelli. They could really use it. Thanks!