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The princesses are starting to feel better after another round of the rotavirus.  Thankfully Madeline seemed to miss it again but caught a bad cold or something.  Both Kayla and Madeline had temperatures of 104 on Madeline’s birthday.

Here are a couple pictures of the princesses in their new dress-up gear:

Princess Kayla spent the morning with Aaron for “Take Your Daughter to Work Day.”  Though I had two sick girls at home, it was pretty quiet around here and things certainly felt a touch easier than having all three.  But it was good to have Kayla back at lunchtime!  She is a blessing and a joy.

Princess Madeline and I baked “Masterpiece Muffins” during our special time together. 

The day was March 3, 2009—Aaron’s 31st birthday.  The previous night Aaron had taken Kayla to the ER for her first round of rehydration via IV.  She came home feeling much better and acting a little more like herself again.  She went to bed, only to awake in the night vomiting once again.  We feared that the vomiting would continue all day like it had the day before, and sure enough it did.  Around 2 p.m. we took Kayla back to the ER while Aaron’s mom stayed with the little girls.  Here’s a picture of the little sweetheart.

When the ER doctor came to check her, he suggested keeping her overnight.  We agreed completely—there was no way we wanted to take her home only to have the vomiting start again. 

After the doctor examined Kayla, the nurses came to draw her blood and insert the IV.  Unfortunately there was a problem.  Kayla was so dehydrated that they couldn’t get the IV in her little veins.  Finally, on the fourth and last try (they had already tried both arms and one hand), the nurse looked up to God and prayed.  I had been praying all along, but it was really neat to have the nurse pray, too.  And guess what?  After that she got it in!  Within minutes Kayla dozed off for a nice long sleep.  

Kayla slept well that night and barely woke when the nurses checked her vitals.  Aaron and I were able to stay with her; we shared a tiny little bed that wasn’t exactly cozy, but at least it was functional.  We slept relatively well given the circumstances!  

In the morning Kayla smiled again!  What a relief it was to see that smile!  She was still pretty worn out, but she felt up to a little reading and coloring.  Her she is with one of her favorite books.

Tests confirmed that Kayla had a rotavirus infection.  The doctor was really surprised that our almost-five-year-old was in the hospital but that our one-year-old and almost three-year-old were fine.  Usually it’s the younger ones who get hit hard with rotavirus.  

We spent most of the day of Wednesday, March 4 at the hospital, and it looked like we may even stay another night.  But by 6 p.m. when the doctor stopped by, Kayla was doing great.  Soon we were on our way home.

Kayla was very excited to ride in a wheelchair on the way out.  She was beaming the whole time.

We arrive home shortly after 8 p.m., just in time for Aaron to go to his surprise birthday party!  Before all of this happened, I had arranged for his seven closest friends to hang out with him at Buffalo Wild Wings.  I ended up having to break the surprise earlier in the day so I could ask his option about whether he would feel up to a party or not.  I was glad when he said yes, because we had already cancelled three birthday celebrations that week.  Aaron enjoy hanging out with the guys, and I was really thankful that all his friends could make it!  

Unfortunately the rotavirus is extremely contagious, and Savannah did end up getting it.  Her case, however, was extremely mild compared to Kayla’s.  We were grateful for that!

So that was our little adventure earlier this month.  The experience felt similar to having a baby—being in the hospital, only having one child to care for, getting to choose and order our own meals.  The nice thing for me was that I didn’t have a postpartum body this time around!  :)

What do you get when you combine a four-year-old girl and 25+ trips to the bathroom being sick?  You guessed it—one dehydrated child!  Kayla’s sickness started Friday evening.  The poor thing threw up 15 times in 9 hours.  Besides being a little weak and feverish on Saturday, she seemed like she was well on her way to recovery.  Sunday she felt great, but we kept her home from church just to be safe.  We were surprised to have Kayla wake at 2 a.m. today to start another round of sickness.  We lost count, but I’m pretty sure she threw up at least 25 times.  She couldn’t keep anything down—neither ice chips nor sips of Pedialyte—so around 4 p.m. Aaron took her to the ER.  She was a champ with her IV, and when she returned home around 7 p.m., she was doing much better!  Sorry I don’t have any pictures for this post, but I didn’t think to send the camera.

Here is a day in our life.

Madeline is proud of the picture she drew.

Here is Savannah using sign language to say she wants to nurse.

Savannah fell asleep on the way home from her 12-month check up.  She’s a big girl!  Almost 22 pounds and 30 inches long!  

Savannah received her first birthday card in the mail.  The big girls were excited about it too, and soon all the sisters were having fun together.

A couple weeks ago our good friend Erin invited Kayla to go on a special date with her to tonight’s gymnastics meet at CMU.  I knew Kayla would love it, and it was fun watching her excitement build as we waited for tonight.  Kayla enjoyed cheering for the “pretty girls,” having a special snack and getting to play on the gymnastics equipment once the meet was over.  We’re so thankful for friends like Erin!

If you know how much we love to play outside, then you know that we certainly took advantage of yesterday’s gorgeous weather.  Here’s how the day went:

We kept our usual Tuesday morning routine of going to Meijer.  I always see Meijer as a classroom and take advantage of the many teaching opportunities there—weighing bananas, counting lobsters, reading ingredient labels.  And the beauty of homeschooling is that we could take the rest of the day off “school” as we played outside in the sunshine!  (Since we do “school” five days a week, taking a day off here or there is no big deal.  It’s nice to have that flexibility.)  

Around 2:30 in the afternoon, after we had finished most of the indoor chores and started the pizza dough in the bread machine, we headed out to muddy backyard.  The girls had a blast playing on the swingset and digging around in the sandbox.  While they played, I organized the mud room.  Back in January we had spent some time getting the entire house organized (maybe I’ll write more about that another time).  However, it had been too cold to organize the mud room, so I told myself that I would tackle it on the first warm day.  So now our entire house and the mud room are neat, tidy and organized; the only thing left is the garage.  We’ll get to that later this spring.

While I worked, the girls made me treats from the sandbox.  Kayla said, “here’s a treat for you for working so hard!”  They made lots and lots of treats!  Meanwhile, Savannah took a 3+ hour nap.  I was sorry she couldn’t get out to play, but it sure was nice having such a long stretch of time to work.  

Here are some pictures of the girls making treats:

We came inside for a while to make and eat homemade pizza, and then we all (including Aaron and Savannah) took a walk to Dairy Queen for ice cream!  We’ve never done that in February before!  What a wonderful day.  :)

Last night Kayla and I finished Little House on the Prairie, our second Little House book.  My heart broke when the Ingalls Family found out they had to leave Indian Territory—and the very next day at that!  Pa and Ma were in the midst of planting their garden and dreaming about the bounty it would produce when they received the news.  To leave behind the little house and the land they loved would have been such a challenge.  They were disappointed to go, yet they chose to have good attitudes and focus on what really mattered—the fact that they were together and that they would face the next challenge together.  Tomorrow we start the next book.  We can’t wait!

When the new year comes, I usually like to set some sort of goal or two—though I prefer not to call them resolutions.  This year one of my goals was to spend more time playing with my kids!  With all the time that goes into feeding them, teaching them and caring for their basic needs, sometimes it’s hard to put all distractions aside and just play!  So last Monday, before the brutal cold weather came, Kayla, Madeline and I spent the afternoon goofing around outdoors.  The highlights (in my opinion) were playing tag and making snow angels.  Here are a couple pics:

Grandma and Grandpa Grage flew from Minneapolis, Minnesota to Grand Rapids, Michigan to spend the week with us.  Here’s Kayla with Great Grandma Grage.

We had a beautiful snow here today.  And it was the type of snow that was perfect for packing!  Not wanting to miss an opportunity, we bundled up to head into the winter—I mean, autumn—wonderland.  30 minutes later, we were ready.  

It’s a lot of work to get the girls outside in the winter, but it was so worth it!  We weren’t the least bit cold, and the snow kept falling on us as we played.  We built our traditional snowman, not once but three times.  I’m not sure if it was intentional or accidental, but every time I turned my back sweet little Madeline had knocked the snowman over.  Finally we finished, snapped a few pictures and decided on a name.  So here’s Fomkah, our Snowman.  He was named after Fomkah the sneaky bear from a Dora book the girls loved.