Life chugs on

Can't. Quite. Reach.

All in all, not much to say. Life is good. John and Joan are over their flus now. The stomach part didn't last more than a day each, but they each had a few days of coughs and runny noses. Both Mike and I escaped, with no more than a tickle in my throat for half a day. Jer and his boyfriend both got colds, but nothing major. It may not even have been the same thing.

Joan's day of throwing up left her noticeably skinnier, but she's filling back out again. She's getting really vocal these days. She's in that cute gurgly "ga ga ga ba ba ba" stage. She still doesn't have the strength that John had at this age. She still can't sit completely unaided. She can't pull herself up like he could, and she's not creeping. But to be fair, she doesn't get the practice in. It's not safe to put her down on the floor- she'd get trampled by John.

John is doing great. He's such a good kid. He's really embraced the concept of "sharing". Except when it's sharing books with his sister. Books are sacred. But if he has a food item, he'll usually split it in half and give one of us half, saying "you want to share with me? One for me, and one for you!" It's not going to work well with our new "diet," but it's the thought that counts.

And talk about vocal! He's getting so articulate lately. I can have a whole conversation with him and understand almost every word now. There are times he still makes no sense, but those times are getting fewer, and usually happen when he's upset, because he's trying to talk and cry at the same time. He plays lots of fun games, too. He loves hide and seek. It's really funny playing with him, because when you finish counting to 10, and say "ready or not, here I come!" He'll giggle and say "Okay!" from his hiding spot - usually in the closet. He also loved charades, which is a non-stop game in our house now. He'll come up and ask "what's my name?" and you have to guess from the actions he does, what piece of heavy machinery he is at the moment. My favourite is digger (backhoe). He has the backwards scoop action down pat. He's frequently a crane. Sometimes a drill (auger). Sometimes a bulldozer. He's starting to venture into animals. Sometimes he's a baby jaguar (Diego reference), other times a snake or a butterfly or a "goldie fish". My favourite is a snail. He gets down on his knees, and shuffles forward, inch by inch, pulling with his arms. We went to staples the other day, and did it all the way through the store. By the time we got to the check-out his hands were so black, the store manager appeared with a bottle of Purel and a wad of paper towels to clean them off. As soon as he was clean, down he went, back to being a snail. He inched out the front door and all the way across the parking lot.

He's picked up these funny sayings. If he wants to do something, and you hesitate, he says "come on, mom! You gotta try it!" often followed by "you're gonna love it!"

Other favourites of mine:

"I can't believe it! I gotta drive it!" (when seeing any piece of heavy machinery.)

"Come on, guys! Follow me!" (whenever we're out anywhere)

"No Baby! You're not a lobster!" (to Joan, when she pinches him)

He loves to sing, and has his own unique versions of songs, like, "row row row your boat, gently down the street." A lot of times, he'll get them mixed up, so we wind up with black sheep or baker men rowing down the street. He's lots of fun. Hopefully, we'll get up there soon, so you can see it for yourself. If not this summer, maybe closer to Christmas, or maybe Mike's reading week. We'll see how it all goes!

Joan's first trip to emergency

It was bound to happen. I figured I'd grown past all the frantic calls to the doc and unnecessary trips to emergency. But I guess I'm still a worrier the second time around.

The kids have a stomach flu right now. Joan's just getting over it. John's just starting to get it. He's still sleeping, so I'm not sure how bad it will be for him, but he was throwing up last night, so I'm expecting more of the same today.

With Joan, it just started as sniffles, but by the next day (Saturday) it was a fever, and a full-blown stomach flu. The fever was 38.3 all day - the point where they say to start trying to bring it back down. I gave her Tylenol, it did nothing. A cool sponge bath helped a little, but not much, or for long. Her only meal of the day was at 11 a.m. everything after that, she threw up, and by suppertime, she'd lost all interest in food entirely. She just sat there, drifting in and out of sleep, glazing over, staring off into space. That alone was a little alarming, and then her temperature spiked up to 39.5. She wasn't crying, but she had this really sad look on her face. She hadn't peed at all. She had the same diaper on all day, and it was dry. I was too scared to put her to bed like that, so at 11:30 p.m., I called the doc's on-call service. The doc told me she sounded dehydrated, and may need an IV, so to get her to emergency right away. Way to freak out an already freaked out mom.

So, we all piled in the car, and headed to Mac. The triage nurse looked her over, took her temperature, and gave her more Tylenol. Then he put a little bag over her nether regions to catch any pee that she made, commented on how pale she was, and sent us to the waiting room. We thought we'd be in for a long night, but not two minutes later we were in, being examined by a nurse.

The doctor came in about 15 minutes later, and diagnosed her as having a stomach flu. (duh). He said she didn't look dehydrated at all - she had tears and drool, and looked hydrated, but the test for dehydration was a urine test, so we needed to waited until she peed. That would all be well and good, except by this time, the Tylenol they'd given her had kicked in, and unlike every dose I'd given her at home, this one was actually working. She was smiling and wiggling, and hungry. I was feeding her when the doctor arrived, and she managed to keep in all down. Her temperature was way down. I felt so incredibly stupid, sitting there in emergency, with a seemingly perfectly happy, healthy child.

And to make me feel even worse, it was a crazy night in the emergency. Across the hall, about eight doctors were crowded around this poor little baby, who was having seizures. Shortly after, a baby with brain and neck injuries was rushed in (the mom in the next room over overheard the police say he was an abuse victim. It never actually occurred to me until then that people actually do shake their babies.) Then there were a few bloodied car accident victims. Then they had a guy right outside our room in the hallway, who'd broken his leg, and was sobbing and screaming obscenities at the top of his lungs from the pain. A almost went out there and offered him our room. I felt so stupid being there. Three hours later, Joan still hadn't peed, but I looked out, and across the hall, surgeons were prepping the seizure boy for emergency surgery, while nurses wrapped their parents in heated blankets, and all I could hear was this poor guy screaming in pain while he waited for the morphine to arrive. I looked down and Joan, and she flashed me a big smile, and I thought, 'why on earth are we here?' So Mike convinced me to ask the nurse if we could go. She looked at our grinning, wiggly, alert and healthy baby, said we could probably take her home, but she'd have to get the doc's approval first.

It took him a while to get there - car accident victims and shaken babies and all. Kind of a busy guy. But I felt a bit validated when he finally did come, because as he walked in the door, Joan threw up violently, splattering vomit all over herself, me, the bed, and making a puddle on the floor, easily a foot and a half wide. He gave us a bit of a shocked look, and took off to find a nurse for clean-up. Mike was worried he'd force us to stay, but he did let us go, with the suggestion that perhaps I should keep her meals small for the next day or so.

And wouldn't you know it, she peed as soon as we got home. Typical.

She woke up on Sunday looking much better. She had her colour back, and was eating just fine, though I'm still limiting her to smaller meals more often, because she's still a bit gaggy. The doc wasn't worried that she hadn't peed in the three hours she was there - he said it's not an indication of dehydration. It's just proof that she hadn't been eating. She still looked hydrated, so he wasn't too worried about her. We asked him what the nurse had given her to make her perk up so suddenly, because we'd been giving her Tylenol, and it hadn't done anything. They give her one dose, and she was almost good as new. Turns out, it takes three doses for Tylenol to reach peak effectiveness.Who knew? Never heard that one before.

All in all, it was an exciting night. John had a blast. He transformed the bed into a pirate ship, and I made dad into a whale, who wanted to come and sink our ship. He has a pretty good imagination. We had a treasure, and had to protect it from the evil whale. The game kept him entertained for hours.

In other news, we have yet to get John to open his birthday presents. I know, I know. It always seems to late by the time we can do it, and then he's crabby. But in the next few days, it will happen, I promise!

He's learning his numbers and letters now. He can count to 10 very easily, and is starting to venture into the teens. He knows T when he sees it, and knows A-D, but can't match the letter name to the written letter. Like, he'll call C, A, and D, B. But it's coming. I think he even did some rudimentary math the other day. He counts everything. In the bath, he pointed to a leg, and said "one leg" then pointed to the other and said "one leg" then, he pointed to both, and said "two legs!"

On the Joan front, other than having a stomach flu, we think she's a lefty. Nothing wrong with being a lefty. But we're pretty sure she is one. She uses her left hand for everything! Her right plays a very minor supporting role. She'll actually twist her body around into uncomfortable positions to avoid using her right hand for grabbing things. It was harder to tell with John - he used both hands equally for a long, long time. But he's very much a righty now. It's strange to see such a strong preference so young with Joan.

Anyway, both of my sickies are awake now, so I'd better go.

sitting pretty

Yay! She can sit! I love this stage. Soon, she'll be able to let go of the floor and tinker with stuff. With John, things moved pretty fast after that.

Just a quick update - sorry. Things here have been hectic. We've got association stuff out the wazoo, and Mike just finished his philosophy course. Phew! He has all his marks but his final exam, and figures he wound up with a 90 in the course overall. (He got 100 per cent on the mid-term, by the way.) Work has picked up, so he wasn't able to get his final essay in on time (he went two weeks without a single day off) but because he works and has a family - two stresses few of the other students had - the TA took pity on him, and gave him a five-day extension. So that's what we spent our weekend doing. He got his mark back already - he got a 90. His lowest mark the whole term was an 82, for his first essay. His arguements were fine, but I'm not exactly trained in academic writing, and Jer was too busy to help, so he lost marks for style. But we learned, and did much better the second time around. We made a good team. I think this year, he'll do even better.

We did something crazy yesterday. We joined a gym. We'll have to tighten up in other areas to fit it in, but it's gotten to the point where we can't afford not to. Sitting at a computer for school has really helped Mike pack on the pounds. He feels really tired all the time. We've been getting out more, but he finds it isn't helping enough. So we shopped around, and because it's July, when no-one goes to the gym, we got a pretty amazing deal. We looked into the Y, but the babysittibg hours were terrible, and the cost was rediculous. So we went private. He not only gets a discount through work, but they paired it with the July promotion. They wiped out the sign-up fees, and cut the membership almost in half. The real clincher was the councelling. As part of the promotion, you get nutrition councelling for free - it's usually a separate program that you pay extra for. It's eight weeks of sessions with a dietition. She goes over what foods we eat, and tailors a meal plan using those foods. She talks about portion control, healthy choices, all that stuff. It sounds like something we could use. It only gets done for one of us, so the trainer guy signed Mike up for it, because he has a much bigger goal, but because I do the cooking and shopping, I go too, and just adjust the portion sizes to myself, so it's like 2 for 1. They have daycare included, too, and John loved it! They have an assessment centre, too. They do a big fitness assessment, and tell you what you should be doing and what you should avoid and let you know if what you're doing is working. We can do that four times each year for free. All in all, pretty amazing for the cost, and they really seem to care about overall health. The meal plan looks pretty sensible. It doesn't look restrictive or out of balance. The other private gym has all the same stuff, but it was all as hidden fees. The membership for their summer sale was about the same, but they put you through mandatory fitness testing every 12 weeks at $100 per person per test! THAT's not happening! The nutrition councelling was optional, but cost extra as well. And they were very high pressure. The place we went with was much smaller and not nearly as fancy, but the price was right and they were very low key. And we have use of all four centres, including a 24-hour one, which will come in handy for Mike, with his crazy summer hours. The other place made you pay a premium for that. So all in all, I think we went with the right place for our needs. Mike's looking forward to the nutrition councelling. We have our first meeting with the dietician tonight. I wish we didn't need to do this, but it was a good move under the circumstances, I think. As Mike says, he's got a family, he quit smoking, and is close to a career he's going to enjoy. But it will have all been a big waste of time if he keels over from a heart attack at 35. His dad was an inspiration, too - especially that he has back pain, even though he lost all his weight. Mike figures if he gets his off now, maybe he can avoid long-term damage. Hopefully, it will work!

Anyway, John is here! Better go!

Happy birthday to John!!!

Since we're going to the beach so much, we decided to get Joan a bathing suit, so other parents don't giggle at her swollen diaper. Isn't she cute? I love the cabbage patch doll face.

John's favourite pastime - digging at the beach

John, running away from us, when we announced it was time to head home.

These photos were taken Saturday, at Valens, the ickyist beach we've ever been to. It was crazy hot yesterday, so Mike wanted to cool off in the lake. We didn't want to drive to Long Point, so we tried one of the Lake Ontario beaches. The water was c-c-c-c-c-c-c-cold!!!!!! Too cold for swimming, anyway. So we headed to one of the conservation areas that rents canoes to check out the scenery while we cooled off in the water. Well, it was a bigger lake, so we're going to go canoeing there next time, but never again for swimming! Blech! It's actually a swamp, so they have a walled-off section for swimming, with a man-made beach. Inside the wall is apparently chlorinated. But the place was teeming with...something. I don't even want to think about what was scuttling across my feet and nipping my legs. And I couldn't even say anything, because John is finally getting over his fear of crabs. Mike thinks it was fish, because they were bumping him, too. But fish don't scuttle along feet. Or do they?

Regardless, John had a blast, and that's all that counts. We had gotten him a little inflatable boat last year, where he can stick his legs out the bottom, to help him overcome his fear of the water. He wound up developing a fear of the boat as well. We brought it out again recently for Joan, but she's too small for it. But John thinks it's awesome to have his own little boat, so we let him use it yesterday. I wish I had a picture, but I didn't want to bring out a camera, then leave it unattended in the bag while I swam, and once I'm out, John will follow me in if I head back to shore, and never go out again. He was having way too much fun, so I stayed out until Joan turned blue. He managed to figure out how to steer and drive the boat by kicking, and could really boot it, when he wanted to. Dad pretended he was a swamp creature, grabbing his legs from underneath, and John squealed with delight every time.

He's getting pretty good with the water. We went to Long point a while ago, where the waves are huge. If you go in chest deep and stand still, they'll go right over your head and sweep you off your feet. But there are lots of sandbars, where the water is only waist deep, and the waves crash against them. Mike put John on his shoulders, and kneeled down on a sandbar, so the waves were crashing against John, and he laughed like a loon every time. He's still talking about playing in the big waves with dad.

Oh, and the splash pad! I didn't tell you about that. I took both kids to the park one day, and the splash pad was running. I didn't bother dressing John in trunks, because traditionally, he doesn't like water, or getting wet, or being splashed. But as we were leaving, he stopped by the edge of the splash pad to watch the other kids. Next think I know he's stripping! I managed to convince him to keep his diaper on (no, he's not potty trained yet), and he tore off into the sprinklers! I haven't heard him laugh so much in ages! He kept runing back and forth, sqealing "I wet! I wet!" I just wish Mike was there to see it, because it was hillarious (he was at work.)

Today is John's birthday! He's 3! But he doesn't know it yet. We're actually postponing the actual celebration by a week, to next Saturday or Sunday, so we can make it really special for him. Today, Mike is working, and he has his second essay due on Wednesday, and his final on Friday night, so it's a big, stressful week for him. But after 10 Friday night, he can relax, and has two days off. We were planning to go camping, but there's not enough time - we'd only be there one night. It's too much work for one night. Mike's talked about following Vic to Ohio, but I can't tell how serious he's being. If we stay here, we'll do the canoeing thing, which John enjoys. We'll go swimming, Maybe take him to a movie, if Rattatoullie is still at the drive-in. (Jer and his boyfriend went this weekend, and gave it good reviews.) we'll do the cake and candles and balloons, too, which he's been talking about for weeks. Two parcels have arrived for him, but they're still at the post office. He saw the mail truck arrive, and was running around all excited, because "mail truck bring me big box of toys!!!" I didn't want to deal with the tempation and tantrums, so I'll pick them up discreetly closer to the day.

Anyway, better go!

this and that

Sorry - this is going to have to be a quickie.

Joan had her 6-month check-up last week. All's well! She's 70 cm long, and just under 19 pounds. At this age, John was 71 cm, and just over 19 pounds, so he's actually surpassed her in size, just barely.

Doc said she looks great, and commented that she's got very good head control. The murmer is almost gone. He said it's so soft, he'd class it as an innocent murmer. If he'd heard it that soft when she was born, he wouldn't have sent her to the specialist. He gave her a bunch of shots, and sent us on our way.

We've kind of started solids with her. She's finally stopped pushing everything out with her toungue, and is swollowing most of what we give her. Her favourite food so far is mint chocolate chip ice cream. I know, I know. Bad mom. But she seems to have this instinctive pull towards ice cream. Whenever we eat it, she gets all excited, grabs my spoon, and pulls it with all her might towards her mouth. If I don't give her any, she gets all sad. She does the same with mashed potato and banana, though, so there's hope for a healthy diet yet. She's had sweet potato, too. Didn't like it at first, but after a few spoonfulls, was opening for more. Though, that might have just been peer pressure - John thought it looked pretty good too, so he'd grabbed a spoon and was shovelling it down right in front of her.

John's doing OK. We took him to the steam museum on Canada Day - they have train rides with miniature steam trains. He thought that was awesome. He announced that it was his favourite train. Then we took him to Chapters for a couple of new Dr. Seuss books. When we got home, he raced for the bag, dumped them all on the floor and said, with wonder, "Look! It's amazing!" We saw fireworks after that, and he liked them. He kept talking to them, tellling then to "stay over there. Don't burn mom!" He's become very protective of me lately. It's very cute. He races to my defence, which I think is great. Mike jokingly told me I was a bad mom one day - I think it was for letting Joan get to much sun. And John piped in "No! Mom not bad! You a good mommy!" If he spills something, or if something is broken - even if it's broken in his mind, like the 23 flat tires we've had since going camping - he often says "don't worry, Mommy. I fix it." If he can't fix it, he still comes to me for repairs, but it's the attitude that counts, and hopefully that one will stick around well past toddlerhood. Like, until he's big enough to hang drywall and stuff.

Anyway, lots to do! I'd better get going.