Lucy lately

Last Thursday was warm and gorgeous so I surprised my girl after school by walking up there with the wagon to fetch her.  She was pretty excited to see the packed wagon when we walked outside:

We walked across the street, through the nature trail and to the little pond near Kroger.  I'd brought some bread for us to feed to the ducks and she had a good time with that.

I also packed us a picnic dinner so she was loving life...I asked her to pick out the perfect spot and she asked me to help her spread out the blanket.

Next we walked back through the nature / garden trail before heading back to our street to play at the park.

Once there, she had a big accomplishment!  She's attempted the yellow curved climber many a time but has gotten too nervous about half way up each time, even with help.  She'd had yet to make it to the top...until last Thursday!  And she was very proud of herself!  She also performed a little tight rope-like act along the gardening stones and needed me to cheer for her once finished...

Playing outside can wear a girl out...soon it was time to relax!

We had more girl time on Saturday while Daddy was "with his running girls."

We started the day with a trip to Busken (aka "the cookie store") for breakfast and then ran some errands.  We also went to the city building for the Easter egg hunt (though my baby brain did it's best to ruin the day, she still ended up with treats and got to see her cousins Alli and P).


Sunday brought more fun - Big Sister class at St. E!
But first we had to get dance pictures taken...here's a sneak peek!

She was pretty excited about the big sister class:

When we walked in, we had to sign in and she and her baby doll had to get a name tag.  The teacher introduced herself and asked Lucy if she was getting a baby brother or a baby sister and my girl was very matter-of-fact.  "A brother!"  The lady asked what his name will be but she said she didn't know...I guess she wasn't in the mood to come up with a silly name.  I've asked her, "What if the baby turns out to be a girl?  Would that be okay?" and she says, "No!  I only want a brother!"

We were pretty impressed when she headed to the middle of the room to participate with the other kids.

Excited to learn how to diaper and swaddle a baby...
though she was pretty sure she already knew all she needed to know

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Baby #2 update:

My most recent appointment was last Friday, April 11.  I saw Dr. Willett because Dr. Lea is out of town.  I asked Dr. Lea quite awhile ago if he had any vacations planned in May and he told me no, but that he'd be out of town for several weeks in April.  Neither of us seemed to think this would be an issue, particularly since Lucy came out the day after her due date (after I went into labor on her actual due date).

Dr. Willett announces that I am already 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced!  He asked repeatedly if I've had any contractions.  I told him no, besides the one day when I had myself pretty worked up and he agreed, "Yeah, stress can do that."

He proceeds to tell me the baby is in position and once I hit 36 weeks (which I hit two days later!), they wouldn't do anything to stop labor!  As soon as the appointment was over, I rushed out to the receptionist and asked, "When is Dr. Lea back?!" and she told me what I already knew...April 30...

I cannot have this baby in April!  I told the gal at the desk, "I'm putting myself on bed rest!"

But so far I am still pregnant and Dr. Lea will be back in 15 days...and my next appointment is this Friday afternoon.

My weight had dipped thanks to the return of morning sickness (plus the last time I was wearing my boots and this time I wasn't) so I've gained 3 pounds total at this point and I've been feeling pretty good.  I've been feeling worn out but no pain or anything.  I had a lot of back pain in my last pregnancy so it's nice not to have to huddle up to my heating pad every night!

Besides being nervous about having this babe so early and potentially having another doctor delivery him or her, I didn't feel prepared!  But Lucy and I went to BRU on Saturday and bought a few things and we got the car seat and bases out of storage and I'll have the base installed in my car this week...and Dave is working on clearing some space in the living room for the swing...so we're getting there and I'm feeling a little better - but I still want the baby to wait until MAY!

The bugs came

Over the past 3 years of loving life with Lucy, we've had many crazy moments.
But I'm going to have to say that what happened overnight last Thursday was the craziest moment yet.

She went to school Thursday and was fine.  She came home and was fine...played, ate dinner, got ready for bed...fine.  Everything was normal.  She went to bed fine.  By around 1am, she was not fine.  Nothing was normal.

She woke up screaming crying and Dave rushed up there.  I listened to the monitor because she sounded hurt...but we hadn't heard any sounds like her falling out of bed...I hear him get up there and she's inconsolable.  She's talking about...bugs?  Within a couple of minutes he brings her down.

"Dani, she's being really weird.  She said there are bugs in her bed, under her babies.  But I checked and there are no bugs!"  Turns to Lucy, "Did you see bugs or did you feel them?"

I figured she was dreaming and told him to stop talking about it in front of her so hopefully she'd forget.  Of course he was freaking out and probably wondering about bed bugs so he went back upstairs to do a more thorough investigation while I calmed the girl.  I got her to stop crying and trembling but she was burning up!  And she would not close her eyes...they remained open, wider than ever.  We gave her some Children's Advil and I took her back up to her bed and laid with her.  She finally started drifting off only to shoot up seconds later, screaming that there were bugs in her room!  On the pillows, under her dolls, on her walls!  It was the creepiest thing ever!  Obviously she was not dreaming...she was hallucinating!  And though I knew there were no bugs, I was starting to freak out, too, looking everywhere for bugs. 

We kept giving her water and calming her down but every time she was almost asleep, the bugs would come.  Her fever was around 102 and we realized that we had to get the fever to come down before the hallucinations would stop and she could get some sleep.

Luckily Dave was on Spring Break and didn't even have track practice the next day so he offered to stay up with her and let me get some sleep so I could go to work on Friday.  But...they decided to have a late night (early morning, actually) showing of Frozen and I started to get sucked in...Dave said he'd be happy to go to bed if I wanted to stay up and watch, ha!
 

This picture was taken at about 3am

Once her fever seemed to break, Dave tried to put her to bed but she wasn't having it...she wouldn't even try to sleep on the couch or in the chair with him and she surely wasn't going up to her bed...so he brought her in to me.  But then she wanted him in bed, too.  So for the very first time, she slept in bed with us.  And we're okay with that.  But this tricky girl thought she'd give it one more try and sat up and said, "There's bugs..."

But there was no crying or screaming or panicking - she just thought she'd see if she could have another tv party.  Nice try, little friend!

She finally fell asleep and before Dave could fall out of bed because of his two bed-hogging ladies, he carried her upstairs to her bed and she slept fairly well the rest of the night.  By morning her fever was back but wasn't quite as high and no more bugs came.  And the fever went away pretty quickly.  She had a pretty good day at home with Daddy and seemed to be acting like herself...

Silly at lunch...Dave asked, "Are you sleeping?"
and she said, "No, I'm just having a sleepy face."


By the time I got home from work, she seemed regular, though a little clingy (she missed me!).  I'd called the doctor's office earlier in the day and they didn't seem concerned in the slightest about the hallucinations (??!).  She said they can be common (hopefully we don't ever experience them again!) and the fact that she sat up and was fairly easily comforted and perked up and watched tv was reassuring to her.  She just told us to push fluids and to watch for more symptoms.  She said it was possible the fever would be all we'd see but that she wouldn't be surprised if more symptoms popped up.

We were bad and went up to her school late that afternoon - even though she was under the weather, we couldn't miss our last chance to hang with Ms. Megan and say our goodbyes and give her the gifts we'd made and purchased for her (I was good and didn't cry in front of her!).

On the way to her school, I asked, "Did anything weird happen when you were trying to sleep last night?" and she said, "Yeah!  The bugs came!"  I would have preferred that she have no memory of it, but she seemed very matter-of-fact about it and Dave said she went to her bed for nap just fine on Friday...

Megan gave Lucy some cookies to take home:

Overnight Friday she woke around 4am with another fever and she needed her mama...but again, there were no more bugs.  Still, we decided to head to the doctor's office in the morning because by then I was pretty sure she had strep throat.  She'd started saying, "My mouth hurts" and we figured she meant her throat...and on Saturday morning she had a rash on her chest.  Sure enough, the diagnosis was confirmed.  We met Dr. Voet for the first time and we both loved her.  Lucy was much more cooperative and talkative with her than she had been with Dr. D. at her checkup Monday which was kind of weird since she was sick and still very cuddly with mama...

We had a prescription to fill so we went to Kroger and loaded up on medicine and Popsicles.  After she finished her second Popsicle that day she was trying hard to get another one.  "Do you know the rules, mommy?  You get me a Popsicle and I lick it!"

We spent most of the day watching movies - and eating Popsicles! - but she perked up a bit that evening and we played a lively game of Disney Princess Yahtzee and she got all decked out in her new Doc McStuffins gear and performed several check-ups, reenacting her visit with Dr. Voet that morning!

Dr. Voet said she'd be fine to go back to school on Monday (today) so off she went.  She wakes up very cranky, though, and her throat probably hurts a lot more in the mornings...as we were getting ready, Dave said, "Where's Ms. Megan when you need her?" meaning she'd hold and love on Lucy until she was comfortable this morning...we miss her already! 
But I called to check on the Lucygirl this afternoon and she's in good hands with Ms. Florence who said she needed a little extra attention this morning but was back to her regular self in no time.

Silly girl in pretty new pjs from Grandma and Grandpa last night before bed

Party time!

We celebrated our big three year old last Sunday!


Lucy and I found a cake on Pinterest and she asked her GranJan to make it
and she did an amazing job!



The party was at GranJan and Grandpa's house (due to space issues at our house...along with all of Lucy's stuff, we can barely fit the 3 of us in there sometimes!) and started at 2pm.  We'd hoped Lucygirl would nap early and be good to go but she resisted sleep and arrived at the party nap-free.  She got there by 1:30 and I'd hoped she could complete her warm-up phase during those 30 minutes but no such luck...so the birthday girl was a bit of a wiener at the beginning of her bash but once she finally warmed up, she was loving life.

She had so much fun playing with Sam and Alli and Luke and Baby P!

Our family was ridiculously generous to our birthday princess and she got some amazing gifts.

Dave and I even lost our minds and bought her this new castle for all of her Disney princess Barbies...

As much as she loved opening her gifts and playing with her new things, she also really likes being sung "Happy Birthday" to!

She's had a really great, never-ending birthday!

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We visited Dr. D. on Monday for Lucy's 3 year check-up...and there are no shots at 3!  Woohoo!  She was still a little shy at the appointment and wouldn't interact with the doc much but she cooperated for the most part...the only exception was, she would not open up and let him look in her mouth. 
Later that evening:
Me - Why didn't you let Dr. D look in your mouth?
Lucy - Uh...because I'm crazy?
Totally!
Now she weighs 35 pounds which puts her at 85% and she is 37.5 inches tall / 54%.

That afternoon we also got to pick up the masterpieces she'd painted on her actual birthday:

She was very proud of them and, as planned, ate Goldfish off of the plate right away!

We enjoyed the gorgeous day on Monday, too.  We took a long walk in the wagon and then had a picnic dinner in the backyard.  She was looking especially pretty so I tried to get a couple of pics but anymore, when she sees the camera, she gets a little wacky!

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Baby #2 update:

I had my 34 week appointment with Dr. Lea last Thursday.  I’ve gained 7 pounds and baby is still measuring right on track for my May 11 due date. 

I mentioned to Dr. Lea that I am a little more uncomfortable this time than I remember being last time and he laughed at me!  He said first of all, we tend to forget lots of the discomfort / pain…otherwise no one would ever have more than one baby!  I know this is true but this time around, bending over has become much more of an issue than last time – just tying my shoes has become a bit of a task!

He also said second (or more) pregnancies often bring more discomfort…and that we tend to carry lower…so there went the theory that this little babe is a boy since I’m carrying lower!!  Seems like most people continue to guess boy, though…we shall see!

Last Friday I got some sad news.  Lucy’s teacher, Ms. Megan will be leaving Abby’s Child Enrichment Center.  We all adore Megan and I took the news especially hard.  Driving home from work, soon after getting the email from the director, I could not stop crying.  And I’m not talking about a little misty eye – I could barely see because my eyes were swelling shut and I was sobbing.  I was a hot mess.  I love Megan!  She has made sending Lucy to school so much easier on all three of us and Lucy loves her very much.  I knew my girl would only be in her class for a couple more months before moving on to the 3 year old classroom but at least we’d still see her!  I was on my way to my parents’ house to start getting things in place for Lucy’s birthday party on Sunday and by the time I got there, I wasn’t doing so well…

I also seemed to have come down with a little virus that afternoon – I’d thrown up at work a few times before finally leaving and it didn’t feel quite like good old fashioned morning sickness.  Once at my parents’ house, I felt worse – ill, dizzy, worn out…and my belly was repeatedly tightening and I was feeling frequent pressure.  I said, “I feel like I’m about to have a baby!” and (half jokingly) told them I’d call them if the baby came as I was leaving a bit later.

Luckily / obviously, I did NOT have the baby 6 weeks early and have had no more contracting episodes.  Ema said she often had Braxton-Hicks contractions, especially after really long days at work, but I hadn’t had any with my Lucy pregnancy.  I’d gotten myself quite worked up, though, so I attribute it to that.  My next appointment is next Friday but we’re definitely nearing the home stretch!  Not much longer until we’ll be loving life as a family of four!