The Road Best Traveled

For a second weekend in row we headed down to the Kenai Peninsula for a much needed life break, from work and the busy, everyday life we lead in Anchorage. It’s been a solid year since I took a week off from my day job; unsuspecting the tough events at work last year were right around the corner of that trip.

With no gil net fishing allowed this year by Fish and Game, we decided getting out of town remained worth it for some much needed family fun. I still revel at the ease of traveling now compared to last year, and with Grandma Sue in tow, it’s about as close to a vacation as you can get (with kids!). The first two nights spent at the same place as last week meant the girls were already comfortable and familiar and very excited to show Craig around. Everyone slept both nights in their temporary bedroom, which is a feat in itself, and did a great job staying at our other house.

With no daily plan or planned places to be, we adventured and explored as we felt like it. We dilly dallied in the mornings and the kids played, much less structured mornings than when we are at home and getting things done. We popped into the Kenai jump park to burn some energy and strolled the farmers market in Soldotna, playing at the playground behind it and trying out a couple tasty treats. The girls fearlessly slid down the extremely old, metal slide- probably installed when Craig and I were kids and now seen as more dangerous- and checked out the old-school monkey bars. At the market one vendor displayed a beautiful wooden bench with a fishing pole sealed into it; the girls all checked that out with interest at how it would come out for use. So funny!

We walked along the boardwalk of the Kenai River, the opposite direction we explored last year after the car broke down. The chanting of kids don’t float! followed our brigade, since life jackets weren’t on and the adults were carefully paying attention. Dandelions, well really any type of flower, were collected into kid bouquets and carried in hands and pockets for the entire excursion. Little did we know this direction took us right to an warm, open (Alaskan standards) beach area with lots of climbing rocks along the riverbank. The girls tossed rocks and sticks into the water with enthusiasm and explored. With the sun finally showing its face, it became surprisingly warm out and almost like summer was upon us! The girls asked to climb out to the farthest rock and in true grandma style, Sue removed her socks and shoes and walked out barefoot to assist them to it.

At one point a random lady and her toddler approached us, asking if we had seen misplaced keys. Craig and I helped her look around and eventually I luckily saw their reflection underwater, just enough to notice them. So random and glad we could help out a fellow mom that wasn’t having as good of a day as us!

At this point the girls’ “pollen coughs,” as I now call them, were in full swing from the warmer temperatures and our time outside, so after an amazing Thai noodle lunch and a lot of ice water to cool down, we drove around a bit so everyone could settle. This followed our plan to be unplanned, and we drove in a few circles trying to find a random flower shop that potentially sold poppies for Sue.

The one planned event toward the beginning of the trip was to barbecue at cousin Jamie’s house and hangout with almost all the cousins on that side of the family. Even with the mosquito club meeting that swarmed around the yard, the evening was wonderful. Savaya, Jaren and Chatum stopped in for a while and it was nice to see everyone. The girls were all on decent behavior, especially after a busy day of adventuring around a new place, at least until Hayden came home from work. Then like they do with Uncle Will…let the torturous games begin! Maddie shared a stuffed animal from her collection with each kiddo, Harper selecting a pink bunny, Emerie a Stitch, and Reagan a cheetah (or tiger?). Since returning home, all three get snuggles each night at bedtime. The pony coloring books from cousins were also a hit and colored while at the barbecue and for the rest of our trip.

After some delicious grilling by Steve, out came the marshmallows. The girls have tried this activity only a couple of times, so it was interesting to see their response to it for the first time this summer. In the past we just made a point to avoid fire situations, since three tiny running toddlers are hard to keep track of to avoid injury! Ultimately they all just wanted to eat the chocolate bars, which they did, and Emerie gave us a hilarious display of slow cooking hers, flipping it over and rubbing it into the fire pit grossness, and making everybody laugh at the ridiculousness of it. Jaren tried to show her a better method and she was not about to listen. By the end of the day they were all exhausted and immediately crashed after we made it home for the night.

The second half of the trip was spent in one of our favorite spots, Homer. We only spent about six hours in the town last year and I have been looking forward to a longer visit to spend more time exploring and hanging out at the beach. The weather took a turn toward beautiful for two of the three days, so even with the blustering wind, the beach adventures each day were fun. After the drive down that morning we headed straight to Bishop’s Beach. The wind made the girls instantly cold in their light sundresses, coats and shorts, asking right away to go back to the car. But by the time we walked to the water’s edge and looked for shells, they were more excited to find things than complain about the temperature. Well, I should say Harper and Reagan; it took Emerie a bit more convincing but she got there! By the end of that first afternoon, Harper and Reagan were down to bare feet and no coats and creating forts and “kitchens” out of the driftwood; Emerie kept hilariously laying on the ground underneath her coat, trying to take a nap, and wouldn’t take her socks off but abandoned her boots.

The second day the beach was just as gorgeous but the wind was blowing harder. The tide was pretty far out and we were able to walk a good distance and see some larger shells that weren’t visible the first day. Grandma Sue explained other small sea creatures and goodies as she found them, even finding two (dead) crabs at one point, that the girls glanced at and then refused to carry around with them. Buckets filled up pretty quickly with treasures and we rinsed them off in a shallow pool closer to the shoreline, that Harper ended up falling backwards into. This was after her walloping trek across the water a few moments earlier, which filled her boots with water and soaked her lower half, not that it bothered her (that time!)! While I wish we could have spent more time out there, the wind was so strong it was making my ears ache, and eventually we headed off to explore other spots in town.

This rental was a beautiful three bedroom house, so the girls took turns sharing beds. The first night Emerie won the lottery to sleep next to Grandma Sue and the second night it was Harper’s turn. I may have snapped a couple of nighttime photos of them unknowingly snuggling with one another as they lightly snored. When asleep and wearing the same pajamas, they look SO alike! All three did quite well entertaining themselves while we briefly got to relax, or cook, or enjoy the beautiful view of the water and the spit. Everyone spent a good amount of time playing on the front porch and creating forts with the furniture cover and, you know, fighting over it.

While of course we visited some of the touristy spots, which are boring to elaborate on here, one cute adventure was spent out on the Homer Spit, walking around the pier and looking at the boats. Personally I enjoy reading all the creative boat names, but since the girls can’t read yet, they enjoyed looking at the colors, fish in the water, and activity happening before them. When asked one thing they remember from the trip, it is pretty likely to be seeing the rainbow boat out in the water. It caused quite the stir of excitement and we HAD to walk over and see it up close and personal. Grandma convinced them the “dock police” would come and haul them away if they weren’t on good behavior, which included no running and goofing off because kids don’t float! A few passerby’s joined in on that humor and acted like they might be those enforcers. It was great. We also witnessed a random boat tour loading up and asked Captain Bob twenty questions about his boat. Bob was good sport and joined in on the fun.

As we rounded the turn back to the car we spotted several fishermen filleting catches from the day, one a good sized halibut and the other was cleaning salmon heads for a restaurant here in Anchorage that makes soup. The intrigue intensified and all three asked a lot of questions, wanting to get back in there and check it all out. The salmon fisherman was also a good sport, in general everyone we spoke to was so friendly, and brought one head around to show the girls. All three touched the eyeballs, because why not, and Reagan might have licked her fingers after and then wiped them on her dress. Gross! This picture accurately depicts the reactions; I trend toward the same feeling as Reagan when it comes to fish eyeballs. You could definitely tell they were bummed we didn’t get to do gil netting and we received a few questions why we didn’t go.

I am sure I’m forgetting some other cute and memorable things, but I didn’t write them down in the moment and don’t remember now. It was a nice trip, with tired kids each night, lots of treats and candy from different stores and restaurants, lots of coloring and driving and cute kiddo moments. The coveted candy rings from Grandma inspired Reagan to explain to her all knowingly, well you said we could have the candy rings tomorrow and today is tomorrow so we can have them! Such wisdom for first thing in the morning. The drive home was solid fog for the first hour and everyone snuggled in their blankets, ate their full lunches and snacks and finally watched a movie until we made it home.

❤

Jun 15

First Trip of Summer

Summer in Anchorage is slowly rolling in, or at least I will continue to whisper that to myself until actual sunny days and seventy degree temperatures appear. With this season continuing the cold snap and dreary, rainy weather, the girls are still asking when summer will get here. And it’s a fair question.

The weather confirms my decision to not pursue kid soccer this summer and opting to wait until they are older with better participation. It also means we don’t have to sit outside and be cold and wet while watching! Instead we opted to do parkour gymnastics once a week for summer session with all three in class together. Two weeks in and so far so good on behavior. The teachers have everything handled by splitting them out into separate subgroups for each activity and while they push limits a bit, overall they are doing much better than a year ago. One difference between the weeknight and Saturday morning class is the level of kid whining from the group in general. You can easily tell everyone is far more tired into their day than when it’s the first thing on the weekend. So far we seem fine and are home by about seven for a quick dinner. Harper will also say she’s sad that Miss Jess, her dance teacher, doesn’t work on Tuesday nights, and is already asking for dance to start again.

Even without sunshine yet, we kicked off our first weekend of June with a birthday party in the valley, random face painting and shaved ice treats, and a multiples barbecue with a ton of twin sets and us! By the time we made it to the final event of the day the girls were in rarer form, grumpy and disobedient, but we survived! A year ago that much activity in a single day would have ended in disaster, and we have to remember how much easier it continues to be each day. It’s not only a relief, but also a little sad, knowing the girls are growing up into bigger, more independent kiddos.

It was a nice change to attend an event and the girls found ways to entertain themselves, something that never used to happen without adult containment and constant attention. When they were smaller I always felt like I missed socializing at every event, because they needed constant attention to stay out of the disaster stage while we were out and about. So for a solid hour my tiny humans climbed and played in the mayday tree next to the birthday party, and it was amazing. By the time we loaded up to the next event, probably more than half of the tree’s flowers were either discarded on the ground or in massive bouquets intended for soup and other child creations once at home.

I believe that instigated the next stage of our non-summer weather, with a straight kick of pollen to the face. The handfuls of mayday flowers, which smell amazing to those of us that don’t have allergies, likely spurred the coughing that we are still seeing a week later. Surprisingly enough, Emerie is the least affected so far, and not the one with a runny nose or coughing fits. This year seems worse than prior ones- even with all three on daily kid-Clariton medicine- and Reagan and Harper are stuck in the midst of it, with continuous coughing fits for the last several days but no fevers.

So much coloring with Mom’s fancy markers and new coloring books!

Grandma Sue arrived middle of last week and together we trekked with the girls down to the Kenai Peninsula for my work trip. We left midday on Friday while Craig was still at work and spent two nights enjoying life outside of our hometown after a long winter without much travel. At one point on the drive down all three girls and Grandma were snoozing and I enjoyed the quiet drive listening to music and seeing the beautiful Alaskan landscape. Everyone snuggled in the new blankets Grandma brought up from Juneau and Emerie slept a solid hour with the blanket completely encompassing her head. At one point I tried to smoothly pull it off so she wouldn’t suffocate and she fought back in her sleep with an angry groan and wouldn’t release it.

The rental outside of town had two bedrooms and a main living area. Upon arrival the girls immediately chose their own twin bed and proceeded to spread out their blankets and stuffed animals until they were set up for bed. It was the cutest thing and completely inspired by them. Grandma and I brought in the gear and then we headed back to the car to more adventure.

Looking out at the river for a brief moment

The first night we walked around the Kenai River festival in Soldotna and the girls played at the amazing playground. The sun vanished and turned to rain and wind as soon as we went to the first booth- sidetracked by mermaid themed goodies and a mermaid treasure chest full of treasures the girls HAD to have- and it turned very cold for the next hour. We managed to hide under merchandise tents and order some food truck food for dinner, the girls sharing a big hotdog and the adults enjoying gyros on white rice (super delicious by the way!) under the overhang. We met up with Cousin Jamie, Steve and Maddie and walked around and caught up a bit. The girls did great and settled pretty easily for the night at the rental. At one point they danced to the live music and caused some chuckles from folks sitting nearby.

The next morning I headed off to the Kenai Municipal Airport for the annual air fair. It was my first time attending the event or having a booth at it, and the girls adventured around town with Grandma Sue and Cousin Jamie. Everyone stopped by about halfway through the afternoon and I took a break to walk through the planes out on the apron, something the girls really wanted to do last year at the aviation festival in Palmer. The sun returned and momentarily eased up the rain long enough for us to enjoy the helicopters and fixed wing aircraft, especially the old Everts cargo plane. We had to pry the girls out of that plane; they quite enjoyed sitting in the cockpit and asking Hayden twenty questions he couldn’t answer because he’s not a pilot and doesn’t fly the skies of bush Alaska.

We might have a pilot in the making, in addition to my painter/artsy girl, because Reagan asked a million questions at both helicopters, one LifeMed and one Guardian. The poor flight medic tried to answer all her inquiries on the buttons and how to make the plane go forward and fly, and it took some convincing to move on so others in line could have a turn. Everyone took a turn getting strapped into the critical patient spot and laying down on the stretcher. Everyone also asked a ton of questions on the gear, pointing to the ventilator, the oxygen mask, the blood pressure cuff, and excitedly wanting an answer so they could point at something else.

At one point a plane did some tricks in the air above us- the funny thing being I couldn’t get the girls to look up for the life of me, as they were all focused on the beautiful color of the hanging pilot’s helmet in the helicopter, and the fact it was an hombre teal color. Priorities folks.

The first trip of the summer was definitely a success and simpler than last year. I am proud to say that no one asked for any screen time on the drive down or back, everyone went to bed pretty easily at night and in their own designated bed, no specific schedule needed following, and no massive destruction occurred at the rental (well no kid destruction- sometimes you can’t take Grandma Sue anywhere without a little destruction and she will kill me for writing this!). We are dancing on the edge of a major growth spurt, with everyone hungry and filling a big appetite. For example, Emerie ate three half sandwiches, two servings of fresh peaches, a cucumber, and half of Grandma’s potato chip bag on the drive down. The remainder of snacks were devoured on the way back by all three! We also collected massive kid allergies for Harper and Reagan, who both still have a dry, unproductive cough, and could see the layer of pollen on the car each morning. They were both good sports about it for the most part and it was nice to see Emerie escape the crud and go about her day, business as usual.

One brief stop to the beach equaled a massive amount of “pretty” rocks in the back of the car, fancy rocks that are now a part of the family and sitting on the back deck. Hopefully our next beach adventure will be slightly warmer temperatures and seashells, at the girls’ request. We also enjoyed a pancake breakfast with cousins and the girls lasted a solid two hours at the cafe, coloring at least five pictures each and staying chill longer than they do at most our food outings.

The mosquitoes weren’t too bad for all our time spent outside, likely because of the level of wind; but at the end of the weekend, Reagan woke up with one eye swollen shut, from a bite right underneath her eyebrow. Funny enough she told me a story, claiming a mosquito followed her into the house that night, waited until she fell asleep, and then BIT her on the eyeball. It was very descriptive and told ever-so seriously.

I also noticed the girls are now referring to themselves in third person. So when one answers an adult question or comment and we respond asking who said that, because we aren’t looking that direction in the moment, they’ve taken that to heart and now simply answer with Reagan said that or Harper wants milk or no, I’m Emerie. Apparently us adults need to pay better attention now so that we don’t spend our lives hearing third person responses!

I look forward to next weekend’s adventure, which should be fishing but with counts so low and gil netting canceled, we are still determined to simply get out of town and enjoy this summer, however that will look and however cold it may be!

❤

Aug 15

Allergies and Veggies

The past several weeks have tested the parent patience levels like no other. While I won’t completely speak for Craig on that, by I personally feel incredibly burned out from the fighting, sickness, and overall day to day, more so than other times of hardship with the kiddos.

The girls are still allergy ridden and not sleeping well overnight, after probably six months of decent sleeping in their room. We believe Reagan might be having some form of night terror or bad dream, as she will wake up fully screaming for us and then not remotely let us settle her back in her bed. Once in our room, she’s asleep in seconds, indicating maybe she wasn’t entirely awake for the episode. She also has no desire to go to sleep in her bed and has hour long meltdowns as we try to convince her to lay down and fall asleep, especially in days she is so overtired and her sisters are already asleep.

The allergies continue to plague our household, with a number of different nights resulting in a kiddo coughing so hard they throw up all over their bed, or our bed. After numerous doctor visits for a variety of different ailments, we continue to try new methods to help the girls feel better. The two, double ear infections for Harper and Reagan are insistent and want to stick around, with Harper on her second round of medicine and Reagan on her third!! We’ve also tried a steroid for all three to help with the throat cough, that all doctors visits have assured us is not remotely sitting in their lungs, and while it didn’t seem to make a difference right away; it appears to help a little on day two.

We’ve rotated ailments between kiddos enough that each one has been home without sisters at least a time or two this summer. I have to say it: one toddler at a time is WAY EASIER…even a sick one!! I tried to do something special with each when sisters are not around to disrupt, whether that’s playing with a fun toy and not having to guard it, getting a yummy lunch, or just having one-on-one time. If I am being honest, I find a little hardship in knowing that one three-year-old at a time would be so much more fun and enjoyable, allowing me to better appreciate moments and handle the fits and maturing, than daily trying to do so with all three, which is often less than enjoyable and stressful.

Harper was greatly enthused to go to the doctor by herself the first time, since 90% of our one-kid doctor visits over the past three years were for Reagan or Emerie. Reagan seems to be the toughest patient of the three, likely because she despises her ears getting cleaned out (I mean no one enjoys that…). Emerie is always excited to see Doctor Winkle for her eye and enjoyed seeing Doctor Magnesun for her broken nail in the door. Enjoyed might be a tad strong of a word for that visit, but she chatted throughout her appointment and didn’t shed a tear for the clean out. She did give lots of smiles for the stickers and paper bag with her name on it full of gauze and sterile water.

Another beautiful thing about kiddos close in age, or ones that have the same birthday: insurance! When more than one kiddo requires a medication but receives them a day or two apart, insurance responds in the “mind blown” shock that no, we cannot pick up two of the same medicine and the prescription is already filled. Craig has argued several times now that the second prescription is for a DIFFERENT kid and I’m guessing this denial will continue in the years to come. Just another thing to deal with…

While nights over the past month are long, with upset littles and tired parents, we do have shiny, daytime moments worth documenting!

For example, we’ve greatly improved on the please and thank you responses this summer. Occasionally we even hear a please may I, although that is rarely between the I wants and I need demands that normally transpire.

The toddler discussions are turning into fun banter. I really enjoy picking them up from daycare and chatting with everyone on the 10 minute drive home. Here’s a sample of some of the toddler thoughts:

Me: so where do you guys work? Can you tell me?

Emerie (without missing a beat): I work at Costco!

Me: Oh yeah? What do you do at Costco? Drive a forklift?

Emerie: No, I have a cart and I take things off the shelf and put them in it.

Me: Oh, like a personal shopper!

Reagan: I work at Daddy’s work. I work there. I throw things in the trash can.

Harper: I work at Daddy’s work too. I color on paper.

Another drive home centered around dinner options:

Harper, “I want vanilla pasta with blue and raspberries for dinner!”

Emerie and Reagan: “and chocolate for taste!”

I still don’t know what “blue” tastes like but apparently it’s delicious. We have other chuckling moments at home, such as Reagan randomly exclaiming from the living room, “Guys, are you kidding me? Are you KIDDING ME!?” and turns to look at me with a “they took ALL the blankets. Those guys.” So dramatic!

There are other typical kid moments, Emerie is especially good at their delivery. One evening she had a good sized booger gravitating down her top lip; she looks up and says, “I picking it. I don’t need a tissue; I wipe it on my pants.”

The girls now fight over boogers and throw total fits when a sister wipes that mess on another. This seems to happen mostly during car rides and occasionally at home. Thanks to this summer’s allergies, everyone has excelled at blowing their noses and demanding tissues throughout the days.

One night while watching Snow White- the part with the mean queen and the impending poison apple- Harper comments “she not very nice! Daddy needs to lock her in the closet.” Can you tell we’ve watch Tangled recently, when Rapunzel locks Flynn in the closet in the beginning? Other “ass-whipping” comments occur on a number of less than nice Disney villains as well. Harper still reminds us when a fellow sister needs one.

Not all drives from daycare have the happy chats- some days we get reports of naughtiness that result in no beloved lollipop. Harper learned this detriment one day after a note she bit her sister for the second or third day in a row! (No idea wtf was going on with her that week!). The brutality of it all, that mom wouldn’t give her a celebratory lollipop to enjoy on the way home like both her sisters. The screaming, throw-your-hands-in-the-air attitude was definitely over the top on her part, but you know what? She hasn’t had a bad report since that day so it made a decent impact.

The daycare was closed for three days this past week to prepare for the coming school year and get a deep clean. Grandma Sue came up to save us from the long, five day weekend with minimal napping, allergy ridden, grumpy toddlers.

The first day we took advantage of the break in rain and ventured out to the valley to the “you pick” farm for some veggies. It was two years ago since we last came out, and what a difference! Toting one year olds around last time meant the wagon, which was also full of picked vegetables and goodies, and resulted in the littles running all directions whenever released. This time around, with our three and two bonus friends, everyone mostly explored the place and ran around, following directions pretty well for the most part and helping pull peas off the vines and potatoes from the dirt.

Some battles occurred over the big zucchini’s and every HAD to have a picture with their own. In their defense, they are half a batch of zucchini bread I made the next day, so it was worth it.

The wind picked up after a while but luckily no rain. The kids stayed warm by continuously running across the fields and they really enjoyed playing with the farm animals . The goats and pigs were very friendly and more than happy to give kisses and run in circles. It was a good trip, minus the triple fighting on the drive both directions!

The second day off was spent with friends, running errands and visiting the trash man and much of day three at home playing with a new tea set, kinetic sand and a lot of Duplo block construction. No naps for all three days and we somehow managed to survive!

Next adventure is berry picking, which we put off from this past week because of torrential downpours. We hope to get at least one afternoon in before fall arrives.

❤

Jul 26

Outnumbered

One of my main mental night anxieties is how to handle the kiddos in the middle of the night when all three need something at once. No granted this has been an anxiety for the past three years, the response to when it actually happens just changes as the kids grow. When they were smaller this usually related to putting a lost binkie back into a wailing mouth or hurriedly comforting an upset little before the other two woke up, probably a handful of times every night. For a while this constant worry sort of sat on my chest each night after everyone was in bed, the anxiety of how to handle comforting everyone when there are three of them and only two of you.

Now that we are in the toddler stage, nights with triple upsets usually result in an adult snoozing in the nursery armchair, whispering comforts and reassurance to whoever keeps waking up while attempting to get some of your own shuteye. Not ideal but very manageable compared to years past and the girls are now much better at laying back down in their own beds.

Matching masks! It’s very hard to keep 3 wearing a mask while you walk across the hospital!

Then there are nights like one last week. We guessed it was going to be a long night, but had the kid wrong. Over the last two weeks Reagan and Harper have been fighting double ear infections and on meds to clear it; as of day seven, Reagan all of a sudden was complaining about her ear again and running a high fever. Knowing a follow up doctor visit was necessary the next morning, we prepped for a long night with an upset toddler.

On queue at about 10 pm she woke up unsettled and we plopped her into our bed, knowing her ear hurts and she would wake up the other two at some point during the night. Within an hour or so, and after finally dozing off with her, Emerie continued a throaty cough that resulted in a puke covered bed and conversation between her and Craig about a possible bead she swallowed in her tummy (or lodged somewhere making her cough).

This prompts and unplanned ER visit to ensure nothing is lodged in the ever important airway. Don’t worry, she wasn’t having any difficulty breathing (thank goodness!), BUT was coughing so hard and throwing up and continuously, leading us to believe she might need more intervention to rule out the possibility.

The ER wait was extremely long, with a lot of folks frustrated in the waiting room at midnight. Craig ended up bringing her home and we managed to get all three kiddos into the pediatrician’s office the next afternoon after an unsuccessful attempt at a walk in clinic with all three in tow. Good news was nothing was obstructing the airway, bad news is allergies and long lasting ear infections are a thing. We left that appointment with a new medicine for Reagan’s double ear infection (since the Amoxicillin wasn’t working), a note to continue Harper’s Amoxicillin that was working, and instructions to keep an eye on any changes in Emerie’s cough that might indicate the bead was obstructing. We also left with the knowledge that all three had crystal clear lung sounds, indicating seasonal allergies. In fact, the flemmy cough all three have is presumably from the cottonwood shedding their “summer snow.”

While bedtime boasts the worst of the flem time, we did have one day where all three coughed for HOURS. I had an epiphany the following day that additional allergies might exist with tiger lilies, since a beautiful flower bouquet was sitting on the kitchen table. There’s a reason hospitals don’t allow tiger lilies in their flower deliveries, and after removing it from the house, the extreme kid coughing lessened a lot. So chalk one point up for mom figuring that out! Who knew!

So combine all these fun issues with a full moon and BAM, it equals out to a very long week. Thank goodness the cottonwood should be less soon! All this also slightly terrifies me…since July is not usually a month of sickness. What will winter this year look like?!

❤

Mar 12

Reaction

Yesterday evening was an interesting night. Craig got home about 8 o’clock from taking Emerie to the pediatrician at Providence.

It was a typical day, the kiddos a bit fussy but manageable from teething, with Harper still holding on to her terrible cold cough. We did a good amount of table time, full of snacks, vegetable melts, a beef and vegetable purée (NOT well liked), and some yummy peanut butter.

After the peanut butter we decided on bath time, because well, it was everywhere. Reagan managed to rub it all over her head, Emerie had it absolutely everywhere, and Harper all over her arms and face and binkie!

Everyone enjoys playing in the bath together!

After bath time Craig noticed Emerie had a bunch of little bumps all over her back, arms and legs. I thought it was goosebumps, but it didn’t go away with pajamas. We’ve done peanut butter before, so I didn’t think it was a reaction to that, but wasn’t sure what it was.

After going back and forth with the pediatrician call line about four times, they told us to bring her into verify she wasn’t reacting to peanut butter. At no point was her breathing labored or we obviously would have immediately drove her to the hospital. I’m not aware of any family peanut allergies, but better to be safe than sorry. I definitely don’t enjoy allergic reactions that need Benadryl!

Bedtime routine became a little out of whack without Craig and Emerie, but we survived. Harper went to sleep relatively easily and Reagan fought it to the death, falling asleepu about the time they got back home.

Thankfully, the doctor doesn’t think it is a peanut allergy or reaction. Thank goodness!! She just did a ten day stint of Cefdinir for her latest ear infection and that is probably the culprit. Apparently the reaction takes time to build up while in one’s system, which is why she didn’t breakout until the end of the dosing. She was on this med because she kept fighting and puking up the Amoxicillan, so the next ear infection might get pretty interesting. Or maybe we will not see any for a while, or a cold for that matter. Is it summer yet??

Luckily she doesn’t seem super itchy, which is a definite blessing. I’m very hopeful Emerie will be feeling better and not itchy from all this soon, and that Harper’s cough will subside. It would be nice to enjoy the birthday party and not simply have a grumpy, snot fest. I guess we will see!

The Douglets

Triplets in Alaska

allergies