Pre-Easter Party

I knew Easter would be a little different this year because my family was out of commission.  My mother is still recovering from her radiation treatments for cancer, and my nephew had surgery to repair a deviated septum and reconstruction on his sinuses.  With my family being out of the picture, I was so grateful when Carol told me that she had planned a little Easter get-together for the kids.  I knew if Carol was able to pull things off the way she wanted, the event wouldn't disappoint.

Well, fate was on our sides and everything was wonderful.  We started off with a little lunch with sandwiches, salads, veggies, and sweets.  It was great to fill the kids' tummies before the Easter fun began.  It was so cute to see the kids all sitting together as they munched on their food.

Once the bellies were full, Grandma Bodily went into full force.  Amy and I, with our nephew Jonathon, hid and eventually scattered over 500 easter eggs.  I'll admit when we were trying to hide them all, I felt that it was too much, but I was wrong.  The kids ran out and looked for the eggs and because there were so many, the kids weren't fighting, they were casually walking to get them and enjyoing the moment, and even after as they looked inside the eggs, they weren't comparing the treasures with others.  Once all the surprises were opened, there really wasn't much more than a ziplock back per child and it was absolutely perfect.  Leave it to Grandma Carol to make the gradkids happy.

We took a few minutes to take some pictures of everyone as well.  I know I'm that obnoxious family member who wants to take a lot pictures and everyone is annoyed with me, but as I always say, "They may hate me in the moment, but they'll love me later."  I only wish I had thought to ask the kids to leave their bags of goodies out of the pictures.  Not only does it not look good in the picture, but they were very distracting for the kids.  Eventhough they weren't the nice photo shoot I'd like to have, I'm grateful we got a few pictures of the family.

The entire afternoon was wonderful and so great for the kids.  They played, they searched for eggs, and they had a blast.

Goodbye Spring

After the beautiful weekend we had, I have decided that Mother Nature was just toying with out emotions.  We had probably 5-6 inches of snow on the driveway and I don't know how much on the grass, and that was just over night.  I was truly looking forward to the beautiful weather and we got more snow.  Kris and I spent the morning shoveling our snow, and then I went out to get things done.  I hope this is the last storm we have.  I'm tired of cold right now.

Hello Spring

Mother Nature has decided to be exceptionally nice.  In the month of March we made it up to 70 degrees for a coupld of days, and we were fortunate enough to have the beautiful weather over a weekend.  Kris had been preparing the yard by picking up all the dog poop from the winter, and Kyson was nice enough to find the stragglers and clean them up for us. The snow finally melted and the kids were able to wear summer-like clothing becuase it's been so beautiful.  We had a nice break-in for summer by having the Holt girls over for the afternoon as well.  They drew with chalk, but Kodi got a little carried away.  I'm excited to spend more time outside.  I think the dogs liked it too.

Sickness Strikes

Three hours after returning home from Disney on Ice, Kyson started throwing up.  I wondered if it was food poisoning from the crappy food we ate at Disney on Ice, but when it didn't stop, I knew he was sick.  In the middle of the night on Friday is when it started, and like clockwork, he vomited every 20-30 minutes for two days.  We could never even make it through the 1 hour waiting period to try and get fluids in his body. 

On Saturday, his body started "cleaning out the basement" as well, which left him even more dehydrated.  He looked just awful.  Sunday he started getting really weak and on Monday he could barely walk and was turning gray.  When I got home from work on Monday, I gave Kyson a bath and he was so thin his bones were sticking out.  He looked like a concentration camp survivor and I was getting worried.  I decided to have him jump on the scale and he had lost 8 pounds.  I text my sister and asked, "When should I start getting worried?"  She responded with, "I would start getting worried now."  I decided to look online to detwemine when I should seek medical attention.  I found a website that has symptoms of when to seek medical attention and Kyson had 5 of the 8 symptoms on the list.  I got him out of bed and took him to the InstaCare immediately.

In the waiting room, Kyson was lying down with his head on my lap.  He looked at me and said, "I'm dying, Mom."  It broke my heart to look at my ashen-gray son who felt he was dying.  I was hoping the doctor would give him some IVs to jump start his body and let the healing process begin, but I feared they'd send me away and say, "Just give it more time."  When he saw the doctor, she was very nice.  She looked at him and ordered Ivs without me requesting them.  He was severely dehydrated and needed something fast.  My sister came down and stayed with us while they took care of him.  By the end of the IV, he was talking and his color was so much better.  The nurses said he took the needles like a champ, and even did better than some adults.  I was so proud.

When I arrived home, Kyson was doing much better, but I found Kris holding Kodi in his lap with a throw-up bucket.  While I was at the hospital with Kyson, Kodi started throwing up, and it continued through the night.  Unlike Kyson, she would go a couple of hours without vomiting, but every time we tried a sip of fluids, it would come back and we'd start over.  The next day, Tuesday, both Kris and I went downhill.  We both felt sick and we were trying to take care of the kids at the same time.  It wasn't pleasant.

 Wednesday both Kris and I missed work again, but I started feeling better...for a time.  The house was a mess and I tried to clean a little bit up, but it would wear me out and I'd feel sick again.  Wednesday afternoon I ended up taking Kodi to the doctor becuase she was still throwing up and not getting better.  They gave her a shot of Zofran to try and help her keep fluids down so she could start healing.  It worked.  Once she got the shot, she didn't throw up again.

By the weekend, we all were feeling better, except Kris was still feeling week.  It was a long week and we were so thankful to be feeling better.  I guess that's why there is opposition in all things.  When we feel that bad, it makes us grateful that we feel so good most of the time.

Disney on Ice

Disney on Ice comes every year to Salt Lake, and since Kodi has been so obsessed with princesses, I thought it would be something she'd really enjoy.  The tickets are pretty expensive though, and I didn't want to take that much out of the budget money.  I decided on a whim to use my allowance to buy the tickets.  I was so excited, that I decided to tell the family in a clever way.  I got a Disney Princess puzzle, put it together, and wrote a message on the back.  Then, I put it in an envelope addressed to Kris and the kids and had it sent to them.  When it came, Kris immediately called the kids over and they put the puzzle together.  It was a Saturday, so I was home to take some pictures of the event.  They put it together, Kris read it to them, and the kids got really excited.  Unfotunately, they don't understand the idea of patience, and they were really bummed when they had to wait 3 weeks before they'd be able to go.

When the night came, we were all so excited.  We had a hard time gettin ghte kids to get ready though, and we ended up not having time to eat before we got there.  That left us with food at the Energy Solutions Arena to eat for dinner - it's veyr pricy and pure junk.  We ended up spending $50 just on dinner becuase the kids changed their minds and we tried to go cheap and then needed more.  We just blew it off though, trying to enjoy the experience. 

Kodi was so excited to see all the different princesses.  All the little girls were dressed up and Kodi loved it.  There was a little girl next to us dressed as Aurora like her, and one dressed as Cinderella in front of us.  Kodi made friends with them and I thought it was so cute.

The show was pretty good, but not something I would pay money to see myself.  This definitely was an adventure for the kids.  There were three stories they told - Tianan, Cinderella, and Repunzal.  Repunzal's was by far the best.  It was pretty cute that they even had Maximus the horse.  It had to be two people.  Both kids really enjoyed the evening and their excitement made it worth it.

Safe Kids Fair

For years I've heard advertisements on the radio for the Safe Kids Fair, and every year I've thought about going.  This year we decided to put it on the calendar and take the kids.  I wasn't sure what to expect, I only knew that Spiderman was going to make an appearance, but I was pleasantly surprised.

The entire Expo Center was filled with booths from different companies.  Some were there just giving away free stuff and doing some advertising with it, while others were there to spread awareness of different things to keep people safe, like smoke detectors, radan awareness, and children identification kits complete with fingerprint kits and everything.  They had a karate demonstration and of course Spiderman came and talked to the kids about stranger safety.

The kids loved the balloon animals that two clowns were making, and the tattoo paintings that a radio station was doing.  They had prizes for making baskets with basketball, we won $10 in gift cards plus 4 free kids meals to Village Inn.  We also received coupons for 99cent kids meals from Carl's Junior and other wonderful prizes.  They even had arcade games from Planet Play where the kids could play for free.  The kids LOVED it.  The best part about it is that everything was free.  I think that we may need to go to this again in the future.