Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes

Sunday afternoon we had a surprise visit from Julie and little Bennett! Steve was off in Jacksonville for the football game, so they decided to drop in and say hello! We all hung out for awhile and got to see how much Bennett is growing! She still looks just like her daddy...sorry Julie I know you hate that, but I hear it everyday too with Christian! However, she does have Julie's big blue eyes and I believe they are going to stay that way. Christian was very interested in his cousin and wanted to play with her! He has not learned all his manners yet so he does not know how to keep his hands to himself! People do not particularly like fingers in their nose, mouth and eyes! I like to think that he was teaching her one of his favorite tunes, but just got stuck on the eyes and ears and mouth and nose section of the song! Brian was holding both of them in his lap and he kept poking her in the nose, eyes and ears! We tried to get him to give her a kiss, but he only kisses mommy right now! I am ever so lucky because I know that will not last forever! I have got to stock up on the kisses while I can!

Later after Christian had lunch Julie, Bennett, Christian and I all went through the houses on the Parade of Homes in our neighborhood. It is always fun to see how other homes are decorated and get some ideas for your own!

First Haircut and First Bribe

I know that I am not the best at updating my blog on a regular basis, but I spend most of my time chasing after Christian! A few days before his 1st birthday Christian went in the barber shop for a little trim. His hair had gotten quite long and was hanging over his ears and past his neck! I did not want him to have a mullet... so he went in for the cut! Christian enjoyed going for the ride like always and when we got there he flirted with all the women and of course went for a few spins in the chair! They put a cartoon drape on him and cut all his adorable hair off! I certainly saved some locks for his baby book! He did really good until they had to trim the back. We could not get him to look down so we bribed him with his very first lollipop! He loved it and we were able to trim the back very easily! After his haircut he looked like a little man! I can not believe how he has grown! I think it is time for another!!!!!

Birthday Boy Pictures

Alright, so I might not be the best mom to roam the earth! Christian has not had another party to make up for his 1st birthday! Life is so hectic and it is hard to get things together especially occaisons that have come and gone! Labor day weekend at my moms house we did have cupcakes, which my sister made for Christian and we sang him Happy Birthday! There were even candles however, I did not have my camera! Christian was still a little shy about digging in to the cupcakes, but I have no doubt that that will not be an issue next year! I am going to post some pictures of his Birthday Party where you can see how cute his cake was and all his presents! Christian was not feeling well that day, but he sure was a trooper! He was not so sure about the cake eating, but he did stick his fingers in it and almost his mouth! He had his own separate cake that was a monkey, just like him!

The cake that the guest ate was just as cute as Christian's! Angels in Crestline does a great job for any child's birthday! I highly recommend them to all mother's! The cakes also taste fabulous, which makes it even better! Unfortunately, I threw the leftovers away because mom does not need her behind growing any bigger than it already is!!

Christian got some great gifts and a few of his favorites are; the chair that mommy and daddy got him to sit in. He likes to climb in the chair and just hang out! It is adorable! He also loves the learning table from his Nene and Poppy and the big red wagon from Grandma and Grandpa! When he was sick, this wagon was one of the only things that would make him smile! Hence, the picture of him sleeping in it! We would pull him around and he would smile, which was few and far between during that week!

While Christian was sleeping some of the children played the Nintendo Wii upstairs and some played with all his new toys! I think everyone had a good time that afternoon! We were so glad that all of are family and friends came out to celebrate such a monumental occasion! When Christian woke up that afternoon he played with some of his toys, but became obsessed with this monkey balloon I bought for the party! I think a good time was had by all! I never new a birthday party could be so much work! Whoever invented the idea to give away gifts to all children that come to the party, must have had a lot of time on their hands! I think that was the most time consuming thing on the birthday to do list! However, everybody has called to tell me how much they loved the gifts! Christian gave all his friends C.D.'s that had eighteen nursery rhymes on them, new and old! I was afraid that some of the older kids would not like them, but they loved them too! I was so glad I did it! The front of the C.D. had Christian's picture and a sticker telling them thank you for coming to my birthday party! He also gave away cookies that had monkey's on them and his name! My sister had these made as a gift to him! Heather's neighbor is a caterer and she made them! They were delicious!

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It was a great birthday and I only hope that next year Christian will enjoy it more than ever! Happy Birthday to our little monkey, we are so glad you are feeling better! We love you!

Horrible 1st Birthday...

I know many of you that view Julie's blog probably think I am a horrible mom because she posted birthday pictures of Christian's party before I got a chance too. However, after I write the saga of what went down the day of his birthday party and actual birthday; I think I should be written up in the book of best mommies ever to exist!!!! Alright let me start with the facts: Our nanny Melissa has a son T.J. who came down with the virus Herpengina (spelling???) this terrible virus causes blisters in the back of your throat. Apparently very common in little ones and very contagious! Adults are usually immune because at some point in our lives we had this virus or something related to it. This virus is a part of the strain of Hand and Foot viruses that causes blisters on the hands and feet and can be dangerous to other children and pregnant women. Needless to say, when Christian got this virus I was very concerned for all the children that attended his party especially little Bennett. Christian was not feeling well the morning of his party and was running a low grade temperature. I had thought we had gotten away with him not getting sick since days had gone by from when he had been exposed to the virus! His temperature went away after a dose of Motrin and he seemed fine, so we went forward with the party! He was very cranky and I thought it was because he had lacked his morning nap. We immediately did the cake and singing once everyone had arrived because of his behavior. I wanted to get him down for a nap so he could play with his sleuth of toys when he woke up! I should of known that something else was going on because he was not interested in his cake! Christian is just like momma when it comes to chocolate! We LOVE it!!! After a little enticing he did try a little, but the crying soon came and he went down for a nap! He slept for over three hours and the party went on without him...The theme was monkey because he is exactly that, a monkey! We had cake and banana splits for the kids and banana daiquiris for the adults! All the children that came to the party enjoyed playing with Christian's new toys, unfortunately it would be awhile before our little monkey would be playing with anything!

Late Sunday afternoon he woke up and just was not himself. He was not really interested in his toys and that pesky fever had returned! I now became concerned that he was definitely getting sick, but with what was the question? That night was not that different from any other after bath time he went straight to bed! Now at around 11:00p.m. all bets were off with the normalcy of my household! Screaming like I have never heard was my little baby! It was terrible! I think anybody who is a mommy will understand the helplessness that one feels when their child is hurting and there is nothing you can do to help them! You can not ask them what hurts and you can not tell them you are trying to make it better! This screaming went on all night and maybe the two of us got about a hour or two of sleep! As soon as the doctor opened I had Christian there to be seen by his pediatrician ASAP!!! The doctor confirmed what I was afraid of and that was he had that Herpangina virus and he showed me all the blisters in the back of his little throat! Now it gets worse because there is NOTHING you can do for this virus, but let it run its course! Well that just was not doing it for me!!! I am just supposed to sit around and let my baby be in constant pain because it hurts to swallow, eat and anything else!!! I loaded him up with Motrin and Tylenol every three hours! This seemed to dull the pain, but my angel was still hurting and not to mention barely eating!!! For the next two nights neither one of us got much sleep and holding him and rocking him seemed about all I could do to soothe him! Being the mommy that I am, I was happy to do anything to make it better! We slept in the rocking chair most of the time and I did what I could to make him comfortable!

O.K. so now it has been three days and his actual birthday is upon us! I was excited because he slept thirteen hours and I thought we were near the end of the virus that was causing him so much pain! I thought now I can pull out the birthday cake and we can try this again! We can celebrate his birthday and maybe if he felt up to it...go to the zoo or something special! After thirteen hours of sleep he woke up and seemed to be still a little cranky. Maybe still a little pain from the blisters, but much better since he was finally able to sleep! He also was able to eat and took an 8oz. bottle! Yeah....we are on our way to recovery! Still a little cranky, so I took him on a golf cart ride because that always cheers him up and makes him happy! My mother and sister were on the way over because we were all going to out and eat for his birthday! Thank God for that because what happened next would make any mans stomach turn! I believe God made mommies able to withstand just about anything when it comes to our children. Christian and I walked in the house and before I new what was happening he was vomiting all over me and the floor! When I say vomiting, I mean projectile and I mean a lot! I was covered from head to toe in vomit! Christian was crying and I was just standing there trying to figure out how do I start attempting to clean this up! I had to clean him up and then I had to stop our dogs from cleaning it up off the floors before I could get to it! I had it in my hair, on my face, in my shirt, my bra, my pants and my shoes! I do not think he missed anywhere on me when he decided to get sick! At this point my mom and sister walk in the door and I was just standing there, helpless trying to comfort him the best I could! My mom took Christian and cleaned him up while I cleaned the floors and then myself! What in the world had just happened? I thought he was getting better??? Well turns out that there is a G.I. bug going around and guess what daddy had it while he was out of town! With Christian's little immune system down, it seems that he now had picked up this 2nd virus on top of the one he already had!!! It only continues to go down hill from this point and just when you think it can not get any worse, it can! That day Christian continued to throw up and was really not interested in eating a thing! His fever spiked again and it was now running consistently around 102.4. I called the doctor and they said to watch him and try to make sure he continues to take in fluids! Sounds easy enough....it is just another virus and we need to let it run its course! What is the deal with viruses running there course? I do not like this answer when my baby is sick! So all day on Christian's birthday he was miserably sick and not eating! Keep in mind daddy is on the road and I am all by myself! Now I am going on pure adrenaline because we are working on our fourth night of no sleep! Christian is miserable and does not understand what is wrong with him! The only thing he knows is that mommy can comfort him and is trying to make it better! Nobody else could get near him, he just felt terrible! That night he continued to vomit and I could not keep any Motrin down him to help with the fever he had! I was so scared and did not know if the Children's E.R was calling our name at this point! It was 3:30 a.m. and I called my mom! I did not know what to do and I was seriously worried! My mom came over and helped me with Christian until the doctors office opened! We went immediately and the doctor was not concerned about his fever, which now had reached 103.6, he was like a little firecracker! The pediatrician told me that the fever fights the virus and that he was only concerned with his lack of fluid intake. He still had blisters in his throat and was not interested in eating because he could not keep it down. We stayed at the doctor's office for over an hour and used a syringe to put a 1cc of fluid in his mouth every 15-20 minutes! Talk about a tedious chore to get a child to drink! My mom and I did this all day long and Christian was keeping down the fluids, but he was not doing that much better. The doctors told me that he needed to have a least two wet diapers a day and this told them he was not getting dehydrated! This task is a little hard when they have diarrhea constantly! I was worried that the hospital was where we were going to end up and eventually we did! At this point Brian decided to cancel his Friday appointments and come home to help me with Christian because I was exhausted! However, it is not like any mom could sleep through their child crying! I will get sleep when he is better!!! O.K. Thursday night he took about 40z of milk and seemed to be on the upswing of recovering from this virus! He held down the milk and even woke for some pedialyte in the middle of the night! Friday morning he had some more milk and kept it down! Doing good, maybe the hospital would have to wait for another day! Then around 2:00p.m. up came the milk and anything else Christian had drank that day! He look horrible and the lack of eating for the past five days had definitley taken a toll on his physique! I called the doctor and off to the E.R. we went!

I have to say that I was not looking forward to the children's E.R. because I have heard horrible stories of waiting and waiting and waiting! I must say, our experience was wonderful other than Christian being so sick and going through what he did! We got there and checked right in. We got back immediately and were seen by a doctor within 30 minutes! Unfortunately what happened next I would never wish upon any mother to have to go through! My baby needed I.V. fluids because he was severely dehydrated from the past week of virus after virus! Since nothing had been working even the syringe of fluids every 15-20 minutes we really had no choice! I had to help hold him down so the nurse, who by the way was fabulous, found a vein. This is were it gets difficult. Because he was so dehydrated, his little veins kept blowing out! They had to stick him five times before they were able to get a vein! I do not know who was crying harder him or me? I was trying to sing to him in hopes that it would help take his mind off of what was happening, but it did not! He was so tired that he used his last bit of energy fighting us and just passed out asleep! I held him for the next two hours while the fluids entered his frail little body! I knew that he would feel so much better after they were in him. Christian got double the fluids for someone his size on top a bag of electrolytes and sugars! He lost 4lbs. during this terrible week! The one thing that I think I learned during this time is that I will never ever wait this long to get my child to the hospital again! I know we tried everything and did all of what the doctors asked, but sometimes you should just follow your instincts! I am glad I took him to the hospital when I did because God only knows what could of happened if we had waited! Children can be tricky and you think they are getting better, when they actually are not!
It is now Sunday afternoon and my little monkey is sound asleep in his bed! On Saturday, after all his fluids he has been able to keep liquids down and has taken 32oz of milk! I am giving him whatever he wants and how much of it he wants! He slept mostly all day yesterday, waking up only to eat! His little body is just trying to get better! Slowly, but surely he is getting back to his normal happy self! I thank all of you who knew and kept him in your prayers! I will post some pictures later of his birthday! We are going to have a redo and celebrate with a cake again, once he is 100%!