Callias Dream

Callia told me about a dream that she had last night. I was sitting here at the computer as she told me about it so I opened this window and typed it as she spoke:

"I had a nice dream in the middle of the night. There were people and snow and and I had gloves and they were gray with pink and I had my jacket that had pink and gray on it too and there was snow and I was having fun in the snow in my dream! And then next to the snow there was a cornfield and I was in a wagon. Pretty neat, uh? I rided a wagon through the cornfield. And there were these crazy bouncy seats that had seat belts and I even rided them, and it started all by itself."

Still Sick

Poor Callia is still sick. The past few days she has been begging for food and then throwing it up when I give it to her. Yesterday she would throw up and immediately ask for something, suggesting things like McDonalds. Its hard to tell her no when I know she is bound to feel like she is literally starving. I was spending the whole day fixing her food just for her to throw it up, trying things like applesauce, crackers, vitamin water, banana, oatmeal (that was one she specifically asked for) and other stuff I thought would be easy to keep down.

Today, at the advice of the nurse I have taken and different strategy and have not been allowing Callia to eat even though she is asking for food. Every thirty minutes to an hour I'll give her something to eat or drink, about a quarter cup. The nurse said even a teaspoon of water every thirty minutes would be good but I'm pushing it because she is so hungry. Thank God she hasn't been throwing anything up that way. I was starting to get very worried about her. I am hopeful that she will begin to feel less hungry over time if I keep giving her little bits of stuff. Before I was giving her a little more at a time because she was asking for it, but these little bits are staying down better. She cried this morning when I wouldn't give her more kix. She asked for sausage this afternoon. I've been setting the timer so she can hear it go off when it is time for her to have something else to eat, and that comforts her, probably because she is otherwise afraid I'm going to forget to feed her, and she knows it is coming.

Thaddeus has been fairly miserable as well, but he has been keeping down breast milk. I have not been feeding him anything else for fear he would throw it up and the milk would come up with it. I have also been feeding him more frequently so he gets smaller amounts. Last night he would not sleep in his own bed. We fed him a little rice cereal mixed with milk and he gobbled that up but started pushing it away long before he ate a full meal. It was maybe a quarter of the size of his normal meal. Then when he refused to let me lay him down in his crib we allowed him to stay up later, and he was pretty cheery in his swing playing with toys. I tried putting him to bed again and once again he would not sleep. Nathan tried feeding him some applesauce but he was so upset when we put him in the chair we didn't even try. He just wanted to be held and nurse. So we just turned off our movie and went to bed with him in bed with us, but I could not sleep because Thad was kicking and whining and would not stop nursing on and on and on. We'd drift off and he'd wake up again very soon after. This went on until about 3am when I tried again to put him in his bed and when he woke up again I actually allowed him to cry himself to sleep which didn't take more than a minute because he was so tired. But he woke up again a couple minutes later. So Nathan went and slept on the couch (I'm sure he slept much better there, I was beginning to think it would be nice if I could but it wouldn't have helped since Thad needed to be with me). I did sleep a little better with a little extra room. Thad kicked for about an hour and then slept reasonably well after that. What a miserable night. Then in the morning Callia woke up throwing up once again.

Fortunately I haven't gotten sick yet, and hopefully I can escape without getting this. I don't see how it could be possible, but maybe God is planning on being nice to me.

Two Sickies

Well, both of my kids are sick throwing up. Callia has been sick since Sunday and Thaddeus since yesterday, although both of them waited until the second day to start throwing up. So today both of them are throwing up. Thad has had reflux up until recently so I'm used to him spitting up some milk here and there but this is nothing like that. This morning when I went to get him out of his crib he was laying in last night's baby food meal of rice cereal and squash. It was all over his clothes, down his arms, in his hair, spread out all over the sheet, and covering half of his lamby stuffed animal. And it smelled terrible. Once I cleaned him up from that, I allowed him to breast feed and in the middle of that he threw it all back up onto both of us and my bed. Then thirty minutes after that Callia woke up and threw up immediately. Fortunately she does a good job getting it into the bucket I have given to her, although she did inform me she threw up on her sheets last night and just rolled over and slept on a different part of the bed. "Its dry now", she said. So that is three sets of sheets that I had to wash this morning. Not the best start. She was supposed to go to preschool today and get her vaccinations this afternoon but that is not going to happen.

Four year old Firsts

Putting all these "firsts" in here for Thaddeus makes me think about the fact that Callia still does things for the first time all the time, too. Yesterday afternoon we were coming into the house and she asked if she could unlock the door. I couldn't think of a good reason not to teach her how to, so I did, and she unlocked it and opened it herself and put the keys up on the hook inside the door. Its really a gift to be able to go through everything for the first time again with my kids. I mean, how much do I take for granted being able to unlock my front door? But for her it was something new and challenging.

First Words

Thaddeus is saying "mama" and "dada" now! He has been babbling mama for about a week and twice earlier this week he said it while he was upset and wanting me to pick him up and I thought "Did he just say mama?" but this morning I was sure of it. He was happily laying on his back on the bed while I was getting dressed and he looked at me smiling but not making any noise, and out of nowhere he said "mama". Two syllables very clear and purposeful! I was so proud. Nathan heard it, too. We have also heard him babbling "dada", also and he was saying it this morning while he was looking at Nathan and smacking him in the face in bed. Its wasn't as clear, just dadadabuhdadabuhda, but I'm pretty sure that's what he was meaning to say. I told Callia about it and it seemed like she could barely believe it. She was like "Thaddeus said Mama?" and I said yeah and she was gasping like it was wonderful. Cute.

Pictures

I had Thad and Callia's pictures taken this afternoon at The Picture People in Spotsylvania mall. I spent $135 even though I wasn't overly impressed, but a few of the pictures turned out good. The quality of the prints is a little lower than I would like, and the atmosphere in the studio was frustratingly distracting for the kids. There was a little girl that repeatedly threw a fit in view of Callia and Thaddeus and some kids in the next room over, and none of the employees did anything about it. I felt they should have asked her mother to take her out. She did take her out after things got completely out of hand, kicking and screaming the whole way, and we could still hear her screaming from way out in the mall for a while. Of course that gave Callia a long face. I was sad that none of the shots of the two of them together turned out but there were some good individual ones. I don't feel like it is overall the best value but I'm still glad I have the pictures. They will be very treasured.

Cough

I took Thad to the doctor yesterday afternoon because he has had a cough the past few days and it kept waking him up at night. He hadn't been able to sleep during the day, either, and he was exhausted. I called the nurse and she said he should be seen to make sure he doesn't have an ear infection. So he was seen by the nurse practitioner, Sue, but it turns out he just has a cough. She said to have him sleep upright by putting his car seat or something in his bed and strapping him into that, and to run a cool mist humidifier in his room. So last night when I put him to bed I put his bouncy seat in the crib and layed him in that once he fell asleep on me in the rocking chair. He made a little happy sigh in his sleep as I layed him down in it and he snuggled in. It sure did the trick. I was sure he'd be awake in 30 minutes, but he didn't wake up until morning!