stomach flu

One thing I am truly grateful for in our day of modern conveniences is a washing machine. How in the world could I survive the stomach flu going through a family of 5 (David is the only one who has been spared--thus far) without a washing machine. With that being said, why is it when you are your most careful to grab the part of the sheet that was not puked on, the puke part always seems to be the one part that brushes against your arm. YUCK!

Well Kylie is currently the ill one and babies just rip your heart out when they are sick, but especially babies that have had surgery to prevent them from throwing up. She can of course, throw up, the fundo didn't hold, but it still much harder for her to get anything up. It's awful!!!

With all that being said there are a lot of other things to catch up on so here we go:

Emily turned 6 last Saturday and we celebrated by taking 9 little 5 and 6 year-olds to the movies (can we say I'm in need of a sanity check?) We had breakfast at her birthday party and plopped some candles in a donut, which she thought was hilarious! After her party we went to the Incredible Pizza Company to party some more and then we came home and ended the day with a friend's kids to come play while the parents went out to celebrate the mom's birthday. Busy, busy busy! However, our little princess had a blast and we could not possibly be more proud of the young lady she is turning into. On Sunday we went to my parent's house to celebrate Emily's birthday and that is where the castle cake is from--not me--I don't have that kind of time. :) But of course she loved it.

Emily also had her dance recital two weeks back. She loved the hip hop number the most. She was completely adorable and I am loving the fact that she still wants to be a ballerina when she grows up!

The same day as the dance recital Emily also had her Thanksgiving feast at school. I was able to go and even got a friend to watch the younger two, which was nice--thanks Amy C! Anyway, I ended up leaving my camera in the car, so I am stealing this picture from Sally's blog. They also

made these great Turkey hand shirts that you can't really see in the picture, but super cute!

We also headed to the zoo last week. It was nice to be able to spend some time with Emily, I feel like I miss so much of her little life now that she is in school. I really look forward to the breaks when she is home with us. Anyway, we went to the zoo with a group of friends and all enjoyed the day.

Kylie: that poor child has been through a ton the past few weeks. She has been measured and molded for braces for her lower legs--she was tortured just through that process so I have no idea how she'll handle something on her all the time. She has gone into the hospital twice in the last few weeks to get a Renal DMSA done. It's to check for scar tissue on her kidney from all of her UTI's. Twice I have gone to the hospital. Twice they have attempted to get an IV in her to do the test. Twice I have cried in frustration and at her pain and twice have I left without the test being done. I don't have the answer folks, I just don't know.

To top it off her G-tube button started having serious issues. It would break and fall out on an average of every 6 or so days. This is really not good. They only will give us one spare at a time and they have to UPS them over night. It's not like we can run to a 24 hour Walgreens and say, "hey, yea, I need a 14FR 1.2cm G-tube mickey button. Oh, yea aisle 9, great thanks!"

The worst time it fell out was when I was waiting to pick up Emily at school, standing on the black top talking to another mom. I glanced down, saw it picked it up and kept right on with my conversation as if I had dropped my keys. She didn't notice and for that I am grateful. That's a little hard to explain. The good news is (knock on wood) I finally got her into the surgeon's office and they gave her a shorter one. It has lasted a total of 9 days, so we'll see how long it makes it. She lost 5 in about a month.

As a side note, my girl who loves lights, loves all these Christmas decorations. If she is ever going to crawl I think it might be to get a hold of the tree.

Last but not least our little Dallin. He started off all this flu business on Thanksgiving morning. While Daddy was off playing in the local Turkey Bowl, we had our own bowls filling up at home. Needless to say not a relaxing Thanksgiving, but I did get the pie and fruit salad made. We did eventually make it to grandma's house, David's sprained ankle and all. Me and my boys... However today, David took off from work and while the girls (me and Emily) were in bed moaning the boys had an excellent time going on a bike ride, playing street hockey in the driveway and starting work on the train table they are making together. We'll post pictures when they are done.