All day yesterday I just felt off. And as the day progressed, it just seemed to go downhill. Halfway home from work I was pretty convinced that I had a fever. I picked up the kids and got home as quickly as I could. Thankfully my mother in law took the kids off of my hands until Tim could get home. When I checked my temp it was 101.5. Yup, definitely sick. Ugh.

Let me tell you, friends… It has been a long time since I have been that sick. I started getting crazy, crazy chills. I was dizzy, nauseous, my throat hurt, and I couldn’t stop shaking. Every time I tried to take something for the fever, I threw up. I couldn’t even sip on water without it coming back up. I couldn’t lay down because I got nauseous. I just sat in my chair, shaking for hours. I was convinced I had the flu. Finally in the middle of the night the fever broke and I was able to snack on a few crackers before getting a couple hours of sleep. This morning I woke up fever free. Tim got the kids to school, but as I laid in bed I felt the fever come back. Thankfully I was able to get some meds in me, and was able to get it under control.

I called the doctor to see if I could get in and they had an appointment in a half an hour so I booked it over there. Thankfully the meds had worked and I was feeling pretty good. The doctor didn’t think I had the flu because I didn’t have any coughing or upper respiratory things going on, so he ran a strep test. The rapid one came back negative, but they sent one out to the lab to make sure. Meanwhile he said that my symptoms were very ‘strep’ like and he started me on an antibiotic.

I came home and slept for a long time. When I picked the kids up from daycare, C was complaining of a sore throat. I figured we should get it checked out since it was highly possible that I have strep. So I took her to the walk in hours at her pediatrician. It almost seemed ridiculous being there because C wasn’t acting sick at all. We were surrounded by obviously unwell kids. I was starting to feel worse again and was ready to leave when they called her name. Man was I glad we stuck around because her strep test came back with an immediate positive. So thankfully we caught it super early in her and she has started antibiotics. She will stay home tomorrow and will be good to go back on Friday.

Despite me feeling awful, I really enjoyed my evening with my girl. She was so bubbly and talkative, and she made me so happy to just be with her.

So while our Valentine’s Day really wasn’t what we had hoped it would be, I’m thankful for easy access to doctors and medication. I’m grateful to my wonderful husband for carrying an extra load while I recover. And I am looking forward to my sick day with my girl! 🙂

I’m sick. That’s all I’ve got tonight. Prayers appreciated.

An introvert by nature, the thought of being in front of a large group of people is pretty overwhelming. The moments leading up to the experience are fraught with anxieties, and fears. I’m afraid I’ll say the wrong things. I worry people won’t laugh when they should. I’m scared of being made a fool.

I was asked to lead an ice breaker/game this evening at our MOPS event, which meant talking (and ad-libbing) in front of a large crowd for about a half an hour. Good bye, Comfort Zone!

I was talking in the car this afternoon with C, who was home on a sick day. I told her I was nervous about talking in front of everyone and if she had any advice and she gave me three tips.

1- Imagine everyone in the audience is wearing underwear on their heads.

2- Pretend there is no one in the audience.

3. Don’t be afraid to mess up.

While I’m not sure I’d subscribe to 1 & 2, but I think the 3rd option is some pretty solid advice. So once I got up there, that’s what I did. Of course, anticipation is usually the worst part of anxiety, so once on stage, it settled down pretty quick and it ended up being a pretty fun experience. I’m constantly surprised about the confidence I find at the other side of my comfort zone. 🙂

As for my girl, she was under the weather last night and ended up taking a sick day today. I was up most of the night, so after we dropped the boys off this morning, we came back to the house and I took a nice long nap while C watched TV and ate everything in sight. She was completely fine all day and this afternoon we went on a short date to Starbucks and Walmart before picking up the boys. I really enjoyed my time with her. We practiced math as I drank my coffee and she ate her cake pop. I don’t get a ton of one on one time with my kids, so I try to soak it up when I can!

And just like that, folks, Baby E is potty trained.

A few weeks ago he started to complain about his diaper, and his daycare thought he was definitely ready. So we decided on this past week for Potty Training Boot Camp and he took to it immediately. He now insists that he has “Potty Power” and only wears underwear unless it’s bedtime.

He was by far and away the easiest child to potty train (probably because we waited so long), but I am super excited that he has hit this milestone! Way to go, Baby E!!!

We decided to wake up early this morning and go to the new house. On the way we wanted to make a stop. I had researched yesterday if there might be anything interesting happening in the area near the new house that we could take the kids to. There were a few options- there was the chance to make Valentine’s cards at Michaels, there was a cooking class at Wegmans, but then I ran across something happening at a local park. About ten minutes from our house there is an arts center, and this morning they were featuring a marionette show. It started at 10am, and we pulled into the parking lot as it was about to begin.

Now I can’t remember if I have ever actually seen a real marionette show in person. I’ve seem them on tv, but never on the stage. The kids have never seen them. When we entered the theatre the room was incredibly dark, but the show hadn’t started yet. We found some seats and in a couple of minutes it began.

The moment the first puppet entered the stage, the kids were entranced. Even Baby E stayed engaged for the entire show! The story was a sweet little tale of a grandmother going on a journey to help bring the rains back to her country. She traversed desert and ocean to fulfill her mission. The highlight of the show was then the ‘Dragon King’ came out into the audience, ran around the theatre, and squirted water on all the kids. Baby E was especially excited about the dragon puppet.

The entire show ran about an hour, and the kids never got antsy or bored, they couldn’t keep their eyes off the magic. When the show was done, the puppeteers came out and answered questions, and then they invited the audience to come behind stage to look at the marionettes and props. We learned several awesome tidbits. Each human marionette had 13 strings. One of the puppets was a rod puppet, it used rods instead of strings to move. The dragon’s squirting powers came from a disassembled squirt gun. It takes 2 weeks to 2 months to make a marionette. And it took 2 years to produce the two-person show.

I loved that we were able to give the kids this awesome experience and I hope that they remember it for a long time!

There was an event at C’s school this evening that she had been asking to attend all week. The thought of taking all three kids by myself was very intimidating, but when Tim said he would be home early, I told her I would allow her to go. The boys weren’t interested anyways, so C and I made a date out of it. I don’t normally like to go to school activities, especially during the winter because all I can see are a group of excitable germ factories running around touching everything, but I swallowed my fears and decided to have fun. She was so excited to be there and I really enjoyed my time with my girl!

One of the things that I love about living at Tim’s parents’ house is the fireplace. There is nothing more peaceful than watching the flames flicker and dance and feel the warmth lick at my face. At night, with the fireplace running, the basement quickly becomes warm and cozy, and the bitter cold outside is forgotten. It is beside this fireplace that I am sitting this evening.

Today was pretty nondescript. This evening was relaxing. I enjoyed watching the kids pile on to Tim when they saw him walk in the door. He’s had the chance to be home a few more evenings this week and the kids are eating it up. They climb on him, hug him, and follow him around the minute he gets home. 🙂

Story time seemed extra special this evening!

Baby E was pretty excited about the Snapchat filter that made him look like ‘Creepy!’

The kids and I have a new game that we call “Armpit Caves.” In the game, I walk two fingers along the ground as I begin a tale about a very old man that decided to go on an adventure. First he visited the Foot Hills, I say as the fingers climb onto their feet. Then the man climbs the Shin Mountain, slides down the Thigh Slide, goes for a swim in the Belly Button Pond, climbs over Belly Ridge, and up to Shoulder Mountain. But the places the old man wants to visit the most, the places he can never seem to get to are “The Armpit Caves.”

While the children squirm and giggle throughout the story, the prospect of the man actually getting into the Armpit Caves is too much for them to handle. They shriek and laugh great big belly laughs that resound through the house. As they fight off the old man, he resigns himself to climbing over the Cheek Hills, onto the Nose Point, and finally to the top of Skull Island.

The kids now ask to play this game in the evenings, and I willingly oblige. You can never have too much laughter. 🙂

One day I might turn our little game into a book, and yes, I will call it “Armpit Caves!”

Baby E likes to swim at the library. Who am I to argue?

I can’t remember the last time that we woke up during the week to the sun already peaking above the horizon. No, we get up when it is dark, very dark. It’s difficult to get three sleepy kids moving in the morning without the promise of sunlight to convince them it is in fact morning. Every morning without fail, Baby E tries to convince me that it is still the middle of the night, and while my sleepy eyes and tired mind want nothing more than to crawl back into bed, the rest of me pushes through and gets us ready to go.

This morning, Baby E was talking to me on his bed in the dark corner of the basement. I could make out his figure, but it took a few minutes for my eyes to adjust to be able to see his face. Confused by what I saw, I walked to his bed and turned on the lights. All around his mouth, there was a dark, crumb-like substance. He looked at me, chatting away about it being dark, and the only thing I could do was stare at his mouth. What is going on? What happened?

It looked like he had gotten up in the middle of the night and found a chocolate cookie and proceeded to devour it, leaving the crumbs and slobber on his face. But that didn’t seem right because the cookies are out of his reach and it isn’t the type of thing he would ever do. I asked him if he had eaten anything and he insisted that he did not.

And that’s when I remembered that he had woken us up in the middle of the night. He had rolled off of his bed, and his subsequent screaming had brought both Tim and I to his bed to find him lying on the floor. We scooped him up, cuddled with him, and got him back into his bed. He cried for a little while, but quickly drifted back to sleep. What we hadn’t noticed was that he apparently hit his lip pretty good, and after he had fallen asleep and we had made our way back to our bed, his lip had bled all over his face and some on his pillow. The poor kid was a mess. When we realized what it was, we got a warm, wet towel and cleaned him off, only to find he did indeed have an impressively busted lip. I felt so guilty that I hadn’t noticed, but his bed is in a very dark corner, and he had calmed down rather quickly, so it never occurred to me to look for blood. He’s fine today. His lip is swollen and scraped, but it doesn’t seem to be bothering him at all, even when he is eating, so that’s good news.

Tonight I lined the floor with a very thick pile of blankets, so if he manages a repeat, at least there will be significant padding to cushion his fall!