Hurricane Gustav

I can't believe how similar this all is to Labor Day weekend 3 years ago with Hurricane Katrina but then again it's all completely different. When Hurricane Katrina hit Mike's parents were visiting Ricky in Washington D.C. and my parents were living in Lafayette. Evacuating was a foreign concept to many people living in New Orleans and so many of our friends and family either didn't evacuate or waited until the last possible minute to do so. Mike's parents house was virtually destroyed as were so many of the other things that I grew to know and love about New Orleans.

This time around it's impossible not to remember the uncertainty of Hurricane Katrina but at the same time things are completely different. Mike's parents have already evacuated and are safe in Georgia. My sister and her family evacuated to Arkansas. We don't know where so many other friends and family members are but this time I'm sure they've left the city. This time it seems like people are really preparing for the worst and expecting it whereas with Katrina they prepared for the best and expected the best. Who is to know what will happen but we're definitely glued to The Weather Channel around here!

TGIF!!!

I don't know about the rest of you but this has definately been one of those "Thank GOD It's Friday" weeks. I haven't been able to post much this week because it's been such a crazy week. Here's a quick recap so you know what we've been up to:

Monday

• Work all day
• Deliver dinner to a friend who recently had an adorable baby boy (we're both seeing the same OBGYN so I had to get the inside scoop)
• Conference call for Gamma Phi Beta - RE: Sacramento Alumnae Chapter
• Monday was an exhausting day, I got some very sad news about an extended family member (I'll share more later but it's just too painful to deal with now)

Tuesday

• At a retreat all day for work
• Pick up Mike from work (he rode his bike to work in the morning but I didn't want him to ride home in the rain so I went to pick him up)
• Got to go with Mike to pick Olivia up from school (a rare treat since we almost never get to pick her up together)
• Start watching the weather in New Olreans with Hurricane Gustav nearing the Gulf of Mexico we're concerned about all our friends and family in Louisiana

Wednesday

• A long day at work
• Get home to make dinner with Mike (he's been very helpful with the cooking now that I'm pregnant)
• Realize I'd made an appointment last week for Dream Dinners last week and I'm already 15 minutes late, good thing it's only 10 minutes away
• Spend a hour and a half making 12 dinners to keep in the freezer for quick meals, arrived home again by 9pm

Thursday

• Spend half the day at a retreat and the rest of the day working in the office
• Attended a Faculty/Staff Reception
• Spend an hour in terrible traffic (it's the start of labor day weekend traffic) to get home
• Go with Mike and Olivia to a Hail and Farewell at a minor league baseball game (unfortunately the traffic was still just as bad on the way to the game so we were 40 minutes late)

Friday

• Spend a very long day at work while Mike was at home enjoying the first day of his 4 day weekend
• Rush to an obgyn appointment during my lunch break

I am so glad it's Friday! It's been a long week. I am really looking forward to the long weekend!

The Healing Process

Olivia's stitches have been taken out and she's begun the healing process. Here are a few pictures of Olivia's eye as it's started to heal.

A little maternal bragging

You can tell that Mike is in the field, I've posted quite a lot this week but I just couldn't resist the opportunity to brag a little about Olivia's speech progress. Granted these are subtle changes, but for us they're huge reasons to celebrate. This week Olivia has added several new words and phrases to her growing vocabulary. New words this week include: elbow, boo boo, out, buddy bear, block, cracker, cheese, and juice. New phrases include: go bye, more snack please, hi pam (Olivia's speech teacher is named pam). I think that Olivia has also started to learn a new song/dance at school. I have no idea what she is saying but she babbles constantly while marching in a circle and then after two circle rotations she promptly stops and waves. Then the entire performance begins again. I've been trying all week to get this on video and have been unsuccessful so far, maybe I'll have better luck this weekend! I've got to remember to ask her teacher what song and dance they've been learning!

The Rest of the Story

So now that Olivia is officially recovering and I've been able to get some sleep I'll fill you in on the rest of our Two Days = Two Trips to the Hospital Trip. I'll warn you now this post is a little graphic!

On Tuesday I woke Olivia up after just 6 short hours of sleep to take her to a previously scheduled doctor's appointment. Olivia was due to have a second skin biopsy. They took a skin biopsy back in June and they attempted to grow cells from the little tiny skin sample and they weren't able to grow anything so they had to schedule a second biopsy in hopes that this time the would be able to grow some cells. That part of the appointment was relatively painless, Olivia knows the doctors that were performing the procedure so she happily went with them while I waited outside the room. They gave Olivia a local anesthetic to numb the area and then they held her down and took the sample. I was thrilled that I got to wait outside the room and "rescue" her when everything was over as opposed to the night before when I had to hold her down during the stitches. I thought our visit was over and was excited to head home for a well deserved nap when the doctor said they also needed a urine sample.

As some of you may know Olivia has had to have several urine samples taken over the last couple of months and she has a "history" with the sample collection. Without getting too graphic the basically tape a bag onto Olivia to collect the urine and then cut a hole in her diaper and thread the bag through the diaper so that she can run around with a diaper on and we can easily see when the urine has been collected. During a previous appointment the urine went into the bag but the bag was not removed immediately so Olivia riped the bag off and started flinging it around. That's right folks, urine showers for everyone! This time the bag was attached and I took Olivia to the quiet more private waiting room and started pumping her full of juice and water in hopes that we could collect the sample and be on our way. We waited, we washed our hands, we played in the bathroom sink, we watched mommy potty, we gave her more juice and water and still no urine. After an hour I decided that it was too much pressure I would just let Olivia play in the normal waiting room with the big playhouse. Olivia was thrilled to be allowed to play in the playhouse even though the other parents were a little hesitant to let their child play with Olivia. I understand their hesitation, she had a massive black eye with stitches and she was running around in an unsnapped onesie with a bag dangling out of her diaper. Fortunately the plan was working and we were starting to finally collect some urine! Just as I decide that it's time to go have the sample collected I see my child toddle by and right in front of the playhouse (in full view of all other parents and kids) a giant turd falls out of the hole in Olivia's diaper. This turd was enormous, I still can't even believe that it came from my child, it was easily twice the size of her fist. I scoop up Olivia and the poop and head straight to the nurse to have the urine sample collected and to get a real diaper onto my child. Lets hope this is the last urine sample they need to collect until after Olivia is potty trained. I don't think I could handle another one!

Two Days = Two Trips to the Hospital

Monday afternoon I got a call from Olivia's school which is never good. Olivia had fallen down and they thought that she might need stitches. I got to Olivia's school to find her playing in the office with the center directors. She was her typical happy self but one quick look at her upper eyelid and I agreed, she'd probably need the stitches. We went straight to the ER and got there a little before 4pm. It wasn't too crowded so I was optimistic that it would be a quick trip and we'd be home soon. The triage nurse recommended that we see a PA instead of a doctor because we would have a shorter wait time. I asked if PA's could do stitches and the nurse assured me that not only did they do stitches they probably were more experienced in doing stitches than one of the ER residents would be. We settled in for a wait and Olivia started to get a little more fussy. She wanted to be playing but an ER waiting room isn't a good place for a toddler to play and coming from work I wasn't very prepared with my usual supply of toys and books. Finally we saw the PA who took one look at Olivia's eye and said yes, she'll definitely need stitches and one of the ER residents really should take a look and stitch it up since it's on her eyelid. That meant we went to the bottom of the waiting list to see an ER doc. Finally we saw an ER resident and after consultation with the senior resident and the head doctor in the ER they decided that not only did Olivia need some stitches but they really should give her some anesthesia so that they could properly clean out the cut and make sure to stitch it up carefully to minimize the scaring. Unfortunately during our long wait to see the initial PA I had given Olivia some ritz crackers. In order for the doctors to give Olivia the anesthesia it was important that she hadn't had anything to eat for at least 4 hours. That meant we'd have to wait at least another 2 hours in the ER. They moved us into a private room and we settled in for a wait. It almost broke my heart to hear Olivia asking for food "pease" and I couldn't give her anything. Finally they moved us into another room so that they could administer the anesthesia and stitch her up. On the fourth try they were finally able to get the IV in so that they could give her the anesthesia and they stitched up her cut. Five stitches and some paperwork later we were finally on our way home at 11:50 pm!

Olivia went right to bed only for me to wake her up at 8am this morning for another trip to the doctor. On the agenda for today, a skin biopsy and a urine sample. Today's visit was relatively quick (in and out in under 3 hours)! Unfortunately her eye looks worse today than it did last night. It's more swollen but in typical Olivia fashion she seems to be handling it well.

Here are the before and after pictures. Before as we were waiting in the ER room and the after picture was taken this afternoon during lunch.

Cell Phone Pics (part V)

These are the very last of the random cell phone pictures. Ironically I haven't taken a single picture with my new cell phone since I got it. These are from when we were looking for some backyard toys for Olivia. She loved the little playhouse but they were a little expensive so we went with the tent instead (and it's much easier to store in the rainy Washington weather). I don't think that Olivia notices the difference. In fact we think that she enjoys the tent even more. Olivia likes to go into the tent and run/push forward so that the tent rolls across the backyard like a hamster in a wheel. I think it's absolutely hilarious when she does this and I diligently tried to capture the phenomenon on video until Mike got home and thought it wasn't so funny. In fact I got a pretty serious lecture from him about how it was really dangerous and I shouldn't encourage that sort of behavior. It's funny how he seems to be getting more protective of her as she gets older. I'm already worried about those teenage years!

A Typical Weekend

Due to Mike's training schedule and my work schedule we haven't spent the last several weekends together so it was really nice to have a weekend to ourselves. Our weekend began with a doctor's appointment for Olivia on Friday afternoon. Olivia was starting to get an ear infection but it seems that we caught it pretty early and she's already feeling much better. Saturday was a pretty low key day, Olivia took two long naps (partially the result of her antibiotics). We made a quick trip to the mall to pick up some items for the new baby as well as a birthday present for a friend and Olivia got to pick out a new puzzle. We spent some time outside in the back yard on Saturday evening. Olivia really enjoyed helping Mike water the plants. Olivia woke up feeling much better on Sunday morning and our day began with church and then a trip to the grocery store. The entire family enjoyed a nice afternoon nap and then we headed over to a friend's 3rd birthday party. In the evening Mike had to pack again for another week in the field and Olivia and I spent some quality time together playing with her new puzzle. Olivia did decide that it was bath time and proceeded to climb into the tub fully clothed and turn on the water. It looks like we'll be needing another baby-gate, who knew she could do that! All and all it was a nice, relaxing weekend. I hope everyone had such an enjoyable weekend. I am definitely dreading having to go back to work tomorrow!

Cell Phone Pictures (part IV)

After a very long day of traveling yesterday we're very happy to be home! Here's the weekly post of cell phone pictures for you to enjoy! Olivia and her Daddy who she loves dearly. These pictures were taken the first time Olivia saw Mike after a month long stay in the field. I don't know a single military spouse who doesn't worry about how their child will bond with their daddy, especially since Daddy was gone the entire time I was pregnant and until Olivia was about 6 months old. He leaves often to go to the field and I constantly worry about how things will go during the next deployment now that she's older and understands more about what's going on. I truly believe that God somehow watches over these families and I remind myself daily that I shouldn't stress out about the things I can't control.

My husband, whom I love dearly. I've been so lucky to have him around during this pregnancy. He's constantly getting me glasses of water (which I drink half of and leave all over the house) and reminding me to try and relax, to put my feet up, to take a break. He's helping with the cooking, the cleaning, and the laundry. It's been hard to see him do some of these things. I know that they're just chores to him but I've always looked at them as the little ways to express my love and appreciation for all that he does for us. My husband had a terrific surprise for me last night when Olivia and I got home from Austin. He'd put together all the baby furniture, he'd decorated the room, he'd even washed some of the baby clothes and put them away, he had even separated the clothes by age range. It was such a wonderful surprise!

Austin Trip

I found out a couple weeks ago that I would have to go to Austin for a conference for work. The conference was Monday-Wednesday so Olivia and I took advantage of the opportunity and decided to spend the weekend with my parents in Bellville at LexStone Ranch. On Friday afternoon Olivia and I flew to Austin where my mom and Amy picked us up from the airport. We spent the weekend with them and then I headed to Austin for the conference while Olivia is enjoying some extra time with her grandparents and Aunt Amy. I know that Olivia is having a great time and I'm really glad that she's getting the opportunity to spend more time alone with them. I'm enjoying the conference but it is definitely weird being all alone. I can't remember the last time I really was all alone, it must have been before Olivia was born while Mike was deployed.

This evening I sat with one of my colleagues from work and we watched Austin's famous Congress Street Bats. I'm staying at the Hyatt which is featured in the picture below.

I can't believe I did that!

I feel so incredibly lame, I can't believe I caught myself doing this. At this point we have our morning routine down to a fine science. I wake up and get ready for work while Olivia is still asleep. Once I'm all ready I wake Olivia up and get her dressed for school. When we go downstairs Olivia gets her coat (yes, you need a coat year around here in Washington) and her cup and we head to the car. Olivia loves it when we listen to music on the way to school. Even though it's only a 2 minute car ride she likes to clap and dance and the happier she is in the morning the easier it is to drop her off at school. The more obnoxious the music the better and Olivia loves "The Wiggles". This morning went as usual, I dropped Olivia off and got in the car to drive to work. I get more than half way into work, at least a full 15 minutes into my drive when I realize that I am still listening to the wiggles, in fact I'm doing more than listening, I'm full on jamming out, dancing and singing to the wiggles. By myself, in the car, no toddler in sight. When did I become so lame! Who doesn't love a little "Toot toot, chugga chugga, big red car" (to hear this moving song you can click on the wiggles link above).

Cell Phone Pictures (part III)

A new week means a new post with pictures from my old cell phone.

First we have a face only a mother could love. Olivia decided to fully immerse herself in the discovery of her new sandbox by tasting the dirt. She decided that it did not taste good and in trying to spit the dirt out of her mouth she ended up smearing it all over her face. As a mother I have definitely come to appreciate the dirt and the messes that come with having a child. It means she played hard, she had a good time, and hopefully she learned something. In this case Olivia learned that dirt does not taste good and since this day this past spring I have never seen her try to eat dirt again.

The second picture is of the above mentioned sandbox/water play table. I found this on clearance a Target and Olivia loves it!

It's finally happened...

I knew it was inevitable, I knew it would happen, well tonight was the night--my child has pooped in the tub. What's funny about the entire ordeal is that Olivia totally told me that it was about to happen, I just wasn't listening. First of all Olivia kept trying to stand up. She knows that she's not allowed to stand in the tub. She knows it so well that by this point the only time she ever stands up is when she's ready to climb out of the tub. Well tonight she kept trying to stand up and when I told her to sit down she would shake her head and say "boo boo." At this point Olivia is making new sounds every day so I didn't think anything of it when she said "boo boo". I thought she was just babbling. Then she did it again but this time it was very clearly "poo boo". I still didn't get it. I asked her if she was talking about "poo boo" her new book and I told her we'd read it when she got out of the tub. Finally she just shook her head again then she squatted in the tub and went "poo boo". Well that's certainly one way to tell me what she was trying to say. I responded with oh, you were saying poo poo to which Olivia very clearly replied, "ess" her word for yes.
How could you possibly be mad about that. The child told me she was going to go! Don't worry, I did not take pictures of this precious event but I just had to share.