b

More on the other blog!

a list

I've had every intention of posting stuff in the past few days but haven't gotten around to it. Here's a few things that have been going on and I'll get back to post a "real" post later.

1. Sunday, we woke up to SNOW, so we didn't go see Bryell. :( We really wanted to, but figured the interstate would close so we couldn't get home, and we both needed to be at work on Monday. We'll try again this weekend.

2. Prom was Saturday night and it was a blast! Brecken could only stay awake until 9:30 so that's when he and I came home, but while he was there he had the time of his life.

3. I was selected for a jury yesterday. Spent a long day in Rawlins and go back today- and probably tomorrow, and hopefully not on Friday!

4. Brecken woke up at 2 am yesterday with a barking cough. Woke up at 6 am with a 102.7 fever. AGAIN. Josh stayed home with him yeseterday and then took him to the Laramie clinic yesterday around noon. Diagnosis? THE CROUP. The poor kid can't catch a break. Got a dose of steroids yesterday and has another one today. Poor baby.

5. Don't want to be late for jury duty, so I'll be back for a "real" post later!

said to me this morning...

(by Brecken of course.)

"I need to brush my teeth. My teeth all dirty. I feed the dogs, that why my teeth all dirty".

B: Mommy, what's this guy's name? (question of the month)
Mommy: I don't know, buddy- what should we name him?
B: (squinting and looking at him closely) ummm.... SANTA CLAUS!!
Mommy: Perfect! Looks like a Santa Claus to me!

in love

Brecken is in love with his new baby cousin and he hasn't even met her yet. Yesterday morning before school is when I found out Beth was in the hospital. Josh was in the shower while I talked to her, but Brecken was up so I told him. Josh came upstairs and B exclaimed, "Daddy! I have a new baby sister today!!" :) He also said, "She has a polka dot shirt." Last week while in Laramie, we found some little tiny dresses, and he picked out one for Bryell that had polka dots all over it. He remembered, a week later, that he was going to give it to her!

Just this afternoon, I was showing B a picture of Bryell. He knew exactly who it was. You should hear him say her whole name... "By-ell ewwabab0-beth." It's dang cute. Anyway, this afternoon after seeing the picture, he said, "I need to go see my baby cousin." I told him we would go on Sunday. He furrowed his forehead and exclaimed, very sternly, "No WANT to Sunday! Go 'morrow!!"

I think we need a new baby doll for him to play with- he has two right now and their names (given to them by Brecken himself) are Baby Hailey and Baby Brooke. Now we need one for him to name Baby Bryell!!

bryell

I want to welcome into the world my new neice, Bryell Elizabeth! She was born at 10:54 a.m. this morning weighing in at 6 pounds and was 19 1/2 inches long. She's a beauty!! I have another beautiful neice to add to my collection of beautiful neices and nephews!!

Welcome to the world, Bryell!! We can't wait to meet you!

the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

OK, it wasn't actually that terrible. :) Could've been lots worse, that's for sure! We made it though the night fine- his fever broke and he slept peacefully. I had him in bed with us, just in case it spiked suddenly again, so I could feel it. But we made it through the night, waking up every two hours to give the next round of medicine. It was weird- the alarm never went off, I always woke up exactly two minutes before it was supposed to. Mommy-intuition is a powerful thing sometimes!

We got up early this morning and left for Laramie at 7:00. The clinic opens at 8:30 so as we pulled into town, we called right away to get the first appointment available. It wasn't until 10:30, with a FABULOUS nurse practitioner who after today I will DEFINITELY see again. So we went to Wal-mart and got a birthday present for Amy's son for his birthday party on Tuesday. Brecken really, really, really wanted to keep what we bought Dylan (a set of little water guns), so I promised if he did a good job at the doctor, we'd come back and get him some. ALL HE TALKED ABOUT for the next three hours was "I need water guns to shoot Mommy with water!!!" :) Then we went to breakfast at Perkins- haven't gotten to do that in a long time so that was fun.

Unfortunately, before our appointment, Josh had to leave us. He is in Laramie today and tomorrow for a coach's clinic with UW. So he didn't get to have "fun" with us at the doctor's office.

We got an exam room with a little electronic keyboard in it! Brecken had so much fun playing it. Until the nurse came in and had to take his temperature and stuff. He now dislikes that nurse. Then the NP, Paula, came in. She was so fabulous! She let Brecken look in her ears first, to see if there were monkeys in there. Then she looked in his ears and he screamed. And no wonder. The right ear is totally infected, and the other one is a little bit. Then she grabbed a quick peek in his throat and said how disgusting that looked, too. So she ordered a strep test. She also ordered an influenza test because he was telling me the other night his legs hurt bad. She left, and the nurse came in with a popcicle and some swabs. Swabbed the boogers in his nose for influenza and swabbed his throat. That was the "fun" part I was talking about. I'm glad the little guy only weighs 23 pounds because it was hard enough to hold him down while they did that! He cried and cried and cried. But then enjoyed the popcicle while we waited for the results. :) Both were NEGATIVE, thank goodness! So we left with a double ear infection and a throat infection. Fabulous.

So, we went back to Wal-mart to get his antibiotic filled and he got to pick out his water guns finally. He was in 7th heaven, I think. :) Then we got lunch to go, and he ate a great lunch and then slept the rest of the way home. He's feeling pretty good this evening- we blew bubbles and played and watched some cartoons. He even took a bath so he could play with his water guns- I wouldn't let him go outside to do it because it is snowing once again. So the bath was a good substitute. :)

Yay for feeling better!

i'm not cut out for illnesses

I'm not cut out to have a sick child. It scares me to death. I always assume the worst. That's terrible, I know, but I can't help it. I know I should stay calm because I'm the mommy, but it's so hard. Even tonight, while talking to the pediatrician on the phone, I was shaking so bad and had to try hard to not cry on the phone.

Brecken woke up in an absolute panic about 10:30 last night. We could not get him to calm down. I had a feeling he was getting sick AGAIN, because this weekend he was rapid belly breathing again. And Amy said he hadn't been himself at daycare Monday and Tuesday. I slept with him last night and every time I moved, he would panic. It was a LONG night. He woke up this morning with a 101 fever. I was right- he was getting sick. So I stayed home with him today, and after mid morning, he perked up a bit. His fever stuck around and would creep back up as the medicine wore off, but he was in a better mood.

Well, after an OK day, we almost went to the ER again tonight. Brecken's temp was 101 at 7:45 and even after Tylenol and ibuprofen, it kept climbing. I called the pediatrician on call in Laramie (Kristen told me to) and it was Dr. DeHart, the doctor who was at B's delivery. While on the phone to her it got to 104.7. His rapid breathing was back again tonight too. He had told me his ear hurt, and I told Dr. DeHart that, and she's pretty sure he has an ear infection. But she said the rapid breathing concerned her, given his full history of breathing problems. She said to watch the fever and if it didn't go down, and if his breathing stayed rapid, we needed to get him to the ER. She said if I couldn't convince myself that he was OK, we should bring him to the ER. And if we don't go to the ER tonight, she definitely wants him brought in to the clinic tomorrow. So, a sub again tomorrow... Josh has a coach's clinic in Laramie, so we'll go over together and then leave Josh there with the other coaches. We have bags packed for a trip in the middle of the night though, just in case. But the fever has come down some.

I'm quite tired of illnesses. I feel totally guilty of him being born premature, because I'm very convinced his immune system is so low because of that. I know it wasn't my fault, I didn't make my body go into labor, but I still feel guilty. And I'm QUITE glad I don't have two kids. I couldn't deal well with having Brecken so sick all the time and having another baby, too!!!

So. Until the next update...

new blog

I'm very excited that I have had the opportunity lately to photograph a lot more people. I want to be able to share some of the photos I've taken, but I don't want to really have them on THIS blog because when I print this blog off in book format for Brecken when he's older, I don't want a lot of random people's photos in his book. :) Because of that, I've created a new blog just for the photos I've taken for people. Feel free to drop by!

hailey

Another beautiful neice...

nuggets

Josh won tickets in an auction that was a fundraiser for his football team to put lights on their field, so he and Jeffrey headed to Denver this afternoon to watch the Nuggets play the Sacramento Kings. THIS is where they sat- holy moly, what great seats! And a trip to the concession stand is worth it, because you burn a million calories climbing the stairs to get there. :)

uno, dos..

So Josh and I were totally amazed yesterday when Brecken had three balls, and while throwing each one said, "cuatro, cinco , seis..." Yes, he counted 4, 5, 6 instead of 1, 2, 3, but where did he learn the Spanish numbers well enough to say some in order? I'm telling you, the kid is a genius. :)

getting caught up

I realized there were quite a few movies on my little camera that I haven't gotten posted! So here they are.

This one is from December! (Actually, the next few are!) This is a house in Marco Island that had it set up for you to pull up in front of the house, tune your radio in to a certain station, and the music matched the light show. I know it's a bit hard to see, but pretty cool anyway.

This next one is from Disney World. There is an AMAZING light show called the "Osbourne Family Spectacle of Lights". It's the best Christmas light display I've ever seen. It was started by this dad that wanted to give his little girl all the lights he could at Christmastime, and then the neighbors started complaining about the light and traffic. (It was set up a bit like the one in Marco Island from the previous video.) He had to take the display down. Disney caught wind of it and brought it to Disney World. AMAZING to see. If you ever have the chance to see it, DO IT!

Here's a quick 360 degree view of the one section of street I was standing in at the time:

Brecken reading books with his Papa:

another beauty

I got to shoot another beauty yesterday. I'm 3 for 3 on good looking seniors! It was SOOO cold and SOOO windy so we didn't get to do everything we wanted to, but we got some good ones, none-the-less. Here's just a few of my favorites. I LOVED the color ones, because with such a dreary, dead-looking day, her bright colors totally popped. I think she liked the black and white ones best though. But since it's my blog, I posted my faves. :)

This fence was one she and her brother and cousins always played on when they were kids, so she wanted some pictures with it now that she's all grown up. Click on it to make it bigger if you want:

"whoa! big movie!"

We took Brecken to his very first movie theater last night. He keeps seeing the commercials for Monsters vs. Aliens and saying, "That's my favorite one!" so last night we decided to give it a go. He was so excited. He got his own little bag of popcorn and a little 7-Up and he was tickled to death. We sat down and the previews came on and he kept staring at the screen and squealing, "Whoa! BIG movie!!" The 3-D glasses were a bit big, so he didn't want to keep them on, and the beginning scared him a bit. But after hiding his face in my arm, the scary part was over and he watched the rest of it. I was impressed- I was figuring we'd have to leave halfway though because he got bored of sitting still! But he did great! We didn't get back from Rawlins until almost 10:00, but he fell asleep in the car and then slept hard all night. I was hoping that would be the case, instead of him waking up afraid of monsters! :)

hiccups

This morning we were watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. In this particular episode, Donald had the hiccups and therefore couldn't sing in the singing contest unless they went away. They did several home remedies to get rid of them, and Brecken did everything with them. Jumped, turned around, counted to 3, and when Donald said, "My hiccups are gone!" Brecken turned to us and said,

"My hiccups are gone! They're in my bum now!"

I had tears, I was laughing so hard.

my new senior

I went out with this beauty yesterday to get some senior pictures for her. Isn't she gorgeous? And even though the wind was blowing SO. HARD., we managed to get some great ones. I had so much fun! I can't wait to go out again after this storm blows through and the wind dies down so we can venture out farther than the wall. :)

brecken's camera

One of the very first pictures he took the night he opened his camera:

The TV in our hotel room before we flew to Florda- TVs are important!:

Papa in the airport:

Grandma in the airport:

TV in front of his seat on the airplane:

The elephant in the living room of the house we stayed at in Marco Island:

We thought this Santa and flamingo-reindeer blow up was fun:

The boats in Marco Island:

The Christmas tree at Disney World:

Taking a picture of his mommy taking pictures of the middle school basketball team:

One of Daddy's games:

Daddy:

Grandma Lennie:

Papa Craig:


Regional Basketball:

Taking a picture of Papa taking a picture of Brecken:

Grandma Lou's kitchen:


Not bad for a two-year old with a Fisher-Price digital camera!

Brecken to his mommy tonight:

"I love my wife. I love my MOMMY wife."

I love that kid.

in the potty!

I asked Brecken this morning if he wanted to go sit on the big potty. He said yes, so off we went. This is a regular occurance in our house. He will sit on it for what seems like hours but nothing happens. This morning was a different story though! He went potty!! He actually missed the toilet because things were aimed different ways (it's rough to be a boy) and it went all over the stool in front of the toilet, but he DID it! For the first time ever!! I made a huge old party out of it and then he cried because his stool was wet. :)

We had a couple fever-free days, and it's back again this morning. Low fever 100.0- but still a fever. And a cough. Have I mentioned how much I can't stand this dang virus?!

oinkies

Preface: Oinkie= pig in Brecken's world.

Mommy: What does an Oinkie say?
Brecken: Little pig, little pig, let me come in!!

taco body

I do Dance Dance Revolution in my elementary music classes once or twice a month. It's a really fun way to work on steady beats, since the closer to being exactly on the beat means you get more points. I keep track of all the points and give awards to the high point winner from each class at the awards ceremony at the end of the year. The kids LOVE it.

Today was a DDR day. We did the song "Funkytown". We got to the "talk about it, talk about it, talk about it, talk about it" part. One of my 1st graders said, "Mrs. Sandlian, what is a taco body?"

I love it.

flying an airplane

On the way home from picking up Brecken from daycare today, we saw a big airplane at the airport. Brecken LOVES LOVES LOVES airplanes. He got all excited and said,

"I want to fly the airplane!"
Me: "You do? But I don't think you're big enough yet."
Brecken: "I'll bring my car seat!"

What a smart child to figure that out. :)

Brecken got sent home from daycare yesterday with a 103 fever. I'm so sick and tired of this virus he has. By the time I got home, his eyes were completely red and streaming water out them, and his nose was super runny too. He was totally and completely miserable. He had a fever at 1:00 this morning when he woke up, but then when he woke up at 6:45, the fever was gone! He made it through the whole day at Amy's house today. His eyes right now are a tiny bit watery, but NOTHING like yesterday. Hooray! I still hate this virus and I hope it turns to Spring soon so it will go away.

state basketball

Josh and I took Thursday and Friday off to enjoy one last weekend of basketball. Our first stop was in Casper to watch the Encampment boys and Saratoga boys play back to back games in the first round of State Basketball. Good games, but both teams came out on the losing end. Saratoga did go on to win 5th place though.

After the games, we went up to Worland so we could watch my cousin Cody play in the 3A West Regional Tournament. Josh's brother Jeffrey was also up there with his girls team from Lyman. We had a good time- my grandma lives there so we stayed with her, and my mom and dad came over too. Again, both of our teams came up on the losing end. :( Neither one made it to State, so we'll get to enjoy a weekend home this coming weekend. That will be nice! Brecken will be sad though- the boys lives for basketball and popcorn these days.

macey

For the first time ever tonight, we had a high schooler over to babysit Brecken for us. We've never had to do that before because 1) there is not a lot of places to go here in Saratoga, and 2) we've always had adult friends invite Brecken to their house when we go out on the very rare occasion. But tonight, two couple friends of ours invited us out to the Saratoga Resort to watch the Cowboys play on TV. So we asked one of Josh's players, Macey, to come babysit. She and her boyfriend had come over to watch the Superbowl at our house for a little while and B fell in love with Macey. He cuddled right up to her and brought her book after book to read. For him, that's strange. Great, but strange- he's NOT a stranger lover! She was awesome with him. And so was her boyfriend- I wouldn't mind both of them coming over to babysit, but Hayden left tonight for Casper for state basketball, as he is one of the stars on the team.

Anyway, Brecken was so excited to have Macey come play with him. She had barely gotten in the door when he grabbed her hand and dragged her downstairs where all his toys are. Josh and I were left in the dust looking like a couple of rejects. :) We went downstairs to tell her the pizza was on the counter and where to find our phone numbers and found Brecken taking anything he could find and saying, "Look at this, Macey!" It was quite hilarious. So we took the opportunity to sneak out.

When we got home a couple hours later, he was still playing hard! Macey told us the great news- he never cried! We had expected him to freak when he realized we were gone, since this was the first time anyone's ever come to babysit him! But I guess they went upstairs to eat dinner and he said, "Where my mommy and daddy went?" and she told him we'd be back and he said OK and continued eating. YAY!!! I'm so glad. And when Macey got her shoes on so Josh could take her home, Brecken cried and said, "Macey no go home! No go home!!" I'm super glad he liked her. I told Josh we'll have to go out again next week. :)

The best part? She's a freshman. Three more years of fabulous babysitting! :)

"get the bike from the garbage."

It was SOOO nice outside today! It was the first day in months we've been able to go outside to play without being blown away or freezing to death. So, out we went. We only needed sweatshirts, even- that's how nice it was. On our way out, Brecken told me "Get the bike from the garbage." Garbage and Garage are easy words to get mixed up. :)

So, the boy with his bike was able to ride again.

in the pink

What a fun weekend we had with the Pink games! No official number yet, but we think somewhere between $4000 and $5000 was raised. Awesome! And to add to the awesome-ness, Josh's girls WON both games!! The one against Hanna was a nailbiter, but we pulled out the win- by ONE. Phew. Yesterday afternoon his girls beat Encampment by 11. We're on a two win streak going into Regionals this weekend! :)

The Hanna girls were wearing the same pink t-shirts that were handed out at the UW pink game last weekend. They wore them as their warm-ups and the coaches were wearing them with dress pants. The Hanna boys wore pink sweat bands around their arms. The Encampment girls wore pink hairbows in their hair and pink socks, too. The pink socks looked fabulous with the red shoes. :) The girls' coaches wore pink dress clothes. And ALL the players, boys AND girls, showed up in pink dress clothes- pink dresses, pink shirts and ties, etc. The Encampment crowd showed up in a lot of pink, too. How awesome.


Both nights had a 50/50 raffle, in which over $800 was raised. Friday night, one of Josh's girls won it. And she gave it back to be donated to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. What a good girl. Yesterday's winner did the same thing.

The head ref from yesterday donated his proceeds for reffing back to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. That was classy.


A ref that they've had throughout the season, but didn't ref this weekend, had bought 12 t-shirts for the ladies in his office. He also gave $50 to the 50/50 raffle but didn't want tickets. This past Wednesday, he came to practice and told the girls what they need to do to draw the fouls in their favor instead of against them. He told them they were ALMOST there and if they did these things the fouls would work for them. He was right- it worked this weekend. He did one other amazing thing this weekend, which I'll get to.

The woman who donated the jerseys got presented with a framed, signed one of her own. She was shocked and amazed. That was fun to watch.

They also had a framed, signed jersey to auction off yesterday. They did it yesterday because Encampment people have money and they love giving it away. (Encampment School has a cake auction each year and last year made a new record for total funds raised in an hour and a half of selling cakes- $14,200.) They figured the Encampment people would get in on the bidding, and sure enough, they did. The jersey was not auctioned off once, not twice, but THREE times. I was in awe. The ref I talked about earlier won it first. He donated it back to be auctioned off again. The second time, it was won by an Encampment couple. They also donated it back to be auctioned off again. The THIRD time, it was won by another Encampment couple, who then donated it to Saratoga High School to be hung. I had some serious goosebumps going on by the end of all this. :) I think the final total for the jersey was somewhere around $1400. Wow.


All in all, it was a great weekend. I'm excited for this to become an annual thing. The Encampment girls' coach said she's thinking of getting white jerseys with pink trim, so they can wear tem when they play Saratoga again this weekend next year. Fun!

Some more pictures of the fun:

"You called WHAT, ref?!" :

pink panthers

This weekend's basketball games will be a little different- the Saratoga Lady Panthers have teamed up with the Women's Basketball Coach's Association and are doing a "Think Pink" weekend.

The "Think Pink" weekend raises money for breast cancer research and all money raised this weekend will go to the Wyoming Chapter of the Susan G. Komen Foundation. A framed jersey will be auctioned off at the game on Saturday, and a 50/50 raffle will be done. A generous grant from the Gretchen Swanson Family Foundation made it possible for the team to buy pink uniforms for this weekend, which will be worn each year during the "Think Pink" weekend.

We're pretty excited about this- Josh has been working since last fall to make this happen. The school made t-shirts that say "Pink Panthers" on them and they have sold like hotcakes. Even Encampment is getting into this, since they come to play Saratoga on Saturday. The Lady Tigers are rumored to be showing up with pink socks and pink hairbows, and the Encampment crowd is planning on wearing pink to the game. The Saratoga boys are even getting in on the action, by wearing "Pink Panther" t-shirts as their warm-ups. I think that's fantastic!

no, my child is not dramatic.

OK, so maybe he is.

Note to self- do not eat another one of Brecken's chips without asking. Dinner tonight was a Mexican-type dish that tastes fantastic when scooped up with tortilla chips. I took one of Brecken's and ate it with gusto, because that usually makes him laugh and then take one himself and eat it. Anything to get the kid to EAT, right? Apparently it wasn't funny tonight. He BURST into tears. Huge ol' crocodile tears. "My chip! I want it!" he kept wailing. It got to the point where he had to go sit with Daddy in his chair and snuggle and calm down. "My chip! I want it!" Josh kept telling him, "Buddy, Mommy didn't know you wanted that one so she ate it. It's in her belly, so we can't get it back." Man, if looks could kill.... Brecken made me feel incredibly guilty!! TEN MINUTES of crying. It was quite something. We had a whole bag full of chips, I gave him some of mine, he had a million on his plate, but he wanted that ONE. The one that was in my belly.

Nope, not dramatic at all. :)

the name game

The newest development in Brecken-World: Full names. He will now tell you that his name is Brecken Sandlian. In fact, he just saw a picture of himself and said, "That's Brecken Sandlian!" And I am now "Mommy Kara" and Josh is now "Daddy Josh".

What a smart kid we have. :)

Happy Valentine's Day!

i'm sick of sickness

We had to take Brecken to Laramie today, to see a "real" pediatrician since we don't have any in Saratoga. He just hasn't been able to kick the illness that put him in the hospital, even though it's been almost a month. Last night, he was breathing SUPER fast (76 breaths a minute!) and could hardly catch his breath. And Amy said at her house yesterday, he was saying his chest hurt and she could feel his heart POUNDING. So Josh called the Laramie Children's Clinic as soon as they opened and got an appointment for this afternoon. We both went.

Dr. Horst, the pediatrician, is almost positive Brecken has the virus that is identical to RSV, called the Human something-something Virus, but there isn't a test for it yet. But he's almost positive that's what B has. He thinks he got it a while ago, before the hospital stay. With this virus, it hangs on for a long time, and magnifies all other small germs, which totally makes sense because I keep wondering why my kid has the worst colds ever!! He's never been 100% since the hospital stay. Dr. Horst also thinks, based on our reports about the hospital stay, that B might have had a bit of pneumonia, but since he wasn't there, he can't say for sure. Anyway, since B has had this human something-something Virus for a while, the only treatment he is going to do for it is continue the nebulizer treatments 2-3 times a day and as needed. After a few days, we can cut back to just as needed. And if he doesn't have a healthy day by the end of February, we can come back and we'll talk about a steroid inhaler. Brecken has a bit of a wheeze in his lungs, but Dr. Horst doesn't want to classify it as asthma yet. I asked how he knows WHEN to say it's asthma (because I've always wondered if B has it...) and he said after a 3rd round of nebulizer treatments, he is "safe" to call it asthma. This doesn't count as a "round" though, since it's treating the virus. We told him he's been on nebulizer treatments before, and he said then sometime down the line, asthma might be discussed.

Anyway, he sent us to the Lincare place with a prescription to buy our own nebulizer machine since we seem to need it so much and I anticipate needing it more in the future. :) Cost us $150, but we can submit it to insurance. Plus, it will pay off because we won't have to pay a rental fee each time we need it now! We borrowed Amy's that she owns, last night, but now we can send that back to her house and have albuterol in the diaper bag so if she needs to give B a treatment at her house (like if a heart thing happens again like what happened yesterday), she can.

About the heart thing- Dr. Horst said in this age of kids, chest pain is always breathing related and not cardiac related. That makes me feel better!

We really liked Dr. Horst. He spent a long time listening to the lungs and doing a VERY good history. Asked a ton of questions. He was awesome with Brecken while looking in his ears (he was looking for french fries!) and nose (he said, "I want to look at your boogers!") and stuff. We have decided that we can go to the clinic here for shots, but anything more than that, we will be taking B to Laramie. Bummer that it takes so long to get there, but worth it for the care. The clinic has not been impressive to us lately. Today if we had gone there, they would've spent 2 minutes with B and not done anything.

We think he gained a half a pound since the hospital stay. He wouldn't stand on the scale but we weighed me holding him, and then just me. It read 23 pounds. He was 22 lbs, 8 oz. in the hospital. Yay for a good weight gain! But 23 pounds for a 2 1/2 year old makes me giggle. :)

While waiting for Josh to check out, B was playing in the kid area. There was a little guy playing there too, and it turns out his name was Brecken, too! Crazy!

So there's the update. Maybe soon this thing will go away and my boy can be healthy again!

full of love

Brecken has this thing now where he'll say "I love you more", to which we reply, "No, I love YOU more!" and he says, "No, I love YOU more!" and so on and so forth. I think that's what he meant this afternoon when he looked at me and said,

"Mommy, I love you too much!"

I laughed so hard I cried. :)

some pictures

I went to send out my January pictures, but realized I only took a few of Brecken last month! I took lots of photos- for middle school basketball teams, homecoming, basketball, but I guess I didn't get much of my little guy. So I'll just post them on here.


Here is Brecken after he decided to ditch the spoon and eat the yogurt with his hands:

He really has gotten interested in my iPod lately. He has a playlist of his songs on there, and he listens to them over and over. He dances and sings along.

It looks like he is in pain on here, but he isn't. He is totally digging the song "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes", and is doing the "head" part in this picture. He gets into his songs. :)

a boy and his buddy

It sure is fun to watch my child grow into a boy. Makes me sad because the baby stuff is gone, but at the same time, this stage is a blast. Amy (our daycare lady) has a little boy about 5 months older than Brecken and they get along fabulously. Dylan told Brecken when we left the other day, "Bye, Brecken! I love you!" Today she told me that Cooper, her 1-year-old, was trying to get Brecken's milk today and Dylan told his little brother, "NO, Cooper! That's my best friend!" Awww....

We had a good weekend. Saturday morning, I did photos for the middle school basketball team and then B and I stayed home while Josh's team went to Hanna to play. They lost by one, and should've won pretty easily, so it wasn't a good day for them. Sunday, we had some people over to watch the Superbowl and had a good time. Brecken is very much into piggyback rides, which he calls "Tigger-back" rides. It's quite cute. He can't get enough Tiggerback rides.

finally! a win!

Josh's team finally got a win last night! First one of the season. It was a big win, too- it was against Encampment, in Encampment, at Encampment's homecoming! It was very exciting. They won by 4. Phew! His JV was close- they lost by 1. Encampment boys won by 1.

They are in Hanna today. Brecken and I didn't go. Hopefully Josh's team will come home with another win!

my friend

Totally out of the blue tonight, Brecken gave me a HUGE squeeze around my neck, and said, "Best Friend."

I swear, I didn't know my heart had anything else to melt!

oh, no.

Here's what started last night:

"Why, Mommy?"

I was dreading this stage. And here it is.

Wish us luck.

:)

welcome home

I beat Josh and Brecken home today. I was standing in the dining room when the door opened, and in comes Brecken, shouting, "MOMMY! MISSED YOU!!!!" before he even saw me. What a nice way to be welcomed home. :)

what an historic day

I'm here in Casper for the All-State Conference. I have been since Sunday, but we get to go home today! I'm glad, because I miss my two boys at home.

I was afraid I was going to miss one of the biggest days in history, because we were in clinics and the kids were in rehearsals, all day long. But the guest choir conductor, from the University of New Hamshire, had a great idea. He stopped rehearsals for his choir at about 9:30 yesterday morning and had the inauguration projected on a HUGE screen in the auditorium so the kids could witness the event. So I skipped one of the clinics and joined them. I wasn't the only teacher with that idea- there were several rows of us in the back of the auditorium. :) And WOW. What an amazing event. Not only did they have one of the most beautiful arrangements of "Simple Gifts" that I've ever heard... (Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Pearlman, and two of their friends, playing the arrangement done by John Williams!!!!!!!!! Could it get any better?!?! It brought tears to my eyes!) but just the historical significance of swearing in Barack Obama was incredible. No matter who you wanted to win the election, you have to admit- this is a HUGE day in history. One that will be written down in our history books. And a day that shows that we as Americans, have moved in a direction that shows that everybody is EQUAL. And that's a wonderful direction to be going.

a visit to the rawlins hospital

I finally got to ride in a wheelchair with my baby- I never got to when he was born since he left in an airplane- but I got to on Tuesday morning!

Brecken has had a fever since Friday. We thought it was another molar coming in- he had a fever over Christmas and when it went away, we found a molar. So we kept alternating Tylenol and Ibuprofen and trying to keep the fever down. Monday we decided we better get him to the clinic to get checked out, so I stayed home with him. Dr. Jake thought his ears were pretty red, but not infected, and that his throat looked terrible. Brecken had a good cough too, so Jake thought it was the same crud that has been going around. He prescribed us antibiotics and we went home. Brecken had some energy back that evening and we went to bed as normal.

At midnight, I heard him wimpering in his sleep. So I went in his room and felt his head and almost burned my hand off. Brecken was BURNING. I got out the temporal thermometer and totally freaked out when it said 106. I tried several more times and got readings between 104 and 105. Josh tried the under-arm thermometer and go 102.9. He called the doctor on call, who thought we could probably give Brecken a half dose of ibuprofen since it wasn't time for a full dose yet. After Josh hung up, Brecken threw up all over me. That's when we decided it was time to head to the ER in Rawlins.

When we got admitted to the ER, they took his temp rectally, and got 105.1. It's so much more scary to get a reading like that from professionals. I was terrified. My first thought was "Oh my God, he's got meningitis." His heart rate was over 200, and his oxygen level was only about 72%. They started him on an IV, which was TERRIBLE. They only had to stick him once, thank goodness, but the look of terror on his little face is something I'll likely never forget. They drew blood, did a nasal wash to check for RSV (negative), and then we had to do two chest x-rays. Let me tell you how fun that was. It wasn't. He had to sit on a stool by himself. Josh held his head and I held his hips. At 3:10 am, when you are two years old and not feeling good AT ALL, it was a miserable experience. They said his upper right lung looked a little off. They asked if Brecken had ever had problems with his lungs that had hospitalized him before. Why, yes, he has! (click on "why yes he has" if you don't know the story!) By this time, Brecken had had a bag of antibiotics through his IV and was started on his second bag of fluids. They decided we better be admitted into the hospital. FINALLY at 5:30 am, we were given a room. (this is when I got to hold him and be wheeled up to our room!) Then they poked and prodded him and we got no sleep. (I forgot to mention that the hospital is under reconstruction, and at the dot of 7:00, the construction started. RIGHT OUTSIDE OUR ROOM, IN THE HALLWAY.)

So we got to hang out in the hospital bed all day yesterday. Couldn't go anywhere since Brecken was hooked up to the IV, and we had to keep an oxygen tube near him at all times to keep his oxygen up. Plus, Brecken didn't feel like going anywhere- he felt pretty terrible. He would cry every time a nurse would come in because he knew they were either going to mess with his IV in his hand, put a "sticker" on his foot or finger to check oxygen levels, take his temp, make him do a nebulizer treatment, or something else he wasn't interested in doing. Poor kid.

Early this morning, around 3:00 am, his fever broke. And you could tell- he was up and hyper! He was pushing the buttons on the bed I was sharing with him (Josh slept in the other bed in the room), making it go up and down and up and down. He channel surfed on the TV, watched movies on his DVD player, we walked the hallways, he put a million stickers that the nurse had given him on to his hospital mug, and the best thing- he asked for food! He hadn't had an appetite in 4 days so that was a wonderful sign! Finally, he went back to sleep about 6:00 this morning. Just in time for construction to start at 7:00. :) The doctor came in around 8:15 and said we could go home. Hooray! His final conclusion was that he thought Brecken had an upper respiratory infection, even though his white blood cell counts were in the normal range when we came into the ER. And he didn't know why exactly Brecken's temp was as high as it was. But he sent us home with a decongestant, the nebulizer machine, antibiotics, and tylenol.

So, we got home around 11:00 and after lunch, Brecken and I took LONG naps. :) Now we're hanging out and taking it easy. It's so nice to be home! I have to go to work tomorrow morning to work with my all-state kids before we leave on Sunday, so I will go and Josh will stay home with Brecken. Then we'll switch at lunch and I'll come home and Josh will go to work for the afternoon, since he has a home game that starts at 3:00. Josh doesn't have school on Friday so he can stay home with Brecken. Next week we'll get back to normal!

Thanks for everyone that threw prayers our way- they worked and Brecken's on the mend! I can't believe how brave our little boy was. We are very grateful that we have such an awesome kid. Throughout this whole thing, HE was kissing OUR owies. What a trooper.

chicken and nanny

Every single day since August, when Brecken started daycare, we ask him what we have for lunch.  And every single day since August, the answer has always been "chicken and nanny!"  (nanny means candy.)  Every day.  I KNOW that's not the answer because Amy always tells us what he has for lunch.  And it's never chicken and nanny. :)

I thought after 2 weeks off at Christmas, he might forget about that answer.  But Jan. 5, first day back, I asked what he had for lunch.  "Chicken and nanny!" was his answer.  Nope, he didn't forget!

You should hear him say "candy cane".  It's so funny.  "Mommy, I want a nanny cane!"  :)

he wants to go!

Josh and I were talking with each other tonight about how much we loved Marco Island and we wanted to go back.  The word Florida was mentioned and all of a sudden Brecken exclaimed, "SEE MICKEY MOUSE FLORIDA!" 

How in the world does he know Mickey lives in Florida???

He kept telling us he wanted to go see Mickey in Florida though!  Our arms might be able to be twisted.... :)

i love the age of two.

It's interesting, that's for sure.  B thought I was his slave today.  Everything was "Mommy get it." and if that didn't work, he'd shout it at me.  It was a long morning.  For both of us- for myself because I was being yelled at and for him because nothing he ordered me to do got done!  :)  The classic was when he tossed something off the couch and then said, 

"Mommy get it!!!"  

Me: "YOU get it.  You're the one who threw it and you have two legs."

B (in a snotty tone, I might add...): "Where?" 

Oh, my child.  Thank you for keeping me on my toes.

The afternoon was much better and by the time Josh got home from his poker run, B was hysterical.  He's really into pretending he is a horse right now.  He gets on his hands and knees and rares up saying, "Neigh, neigh!"  Tonight he found his stuffed toy horse and was "riding" it, neighing.  Yesterday while doing this, I said, "Daddy, we have a horse in the house!"  B goes, "WHERE???" (again, his favorite question.)  I said, "Right there!" and pointed to him.  He looks over his shoulder and exclaims again, "Where????"  Poor kid probably got very excited thinking we really had a horse in the house. :)