Lilypie Fourth Birthday tickers

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Lilypie Second Birthday tickers

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Thursday, January 31, 2013

Hospital Visits

Well, both of my girls started out January with fevers.  Kyri's was pretty high and lasted for about four or five days.  She had flu-like symptoms and was miserable, and I was freaking out because she was scheduled for tonsil surgery the next week, but I knew they wouldn't do it if she wasn't feeling well.  Luckily, Dr. Lin gave her a prescription for Tamaflu, and that got rid of the fever and nasty cough pretty quickly. (More on her surgery later in the post).

Two days after Kyri's fever started, Tessa spiked one, too.  She got a nasty, croupy cough with her fever and was having a hard time breathing.  She and I visited the emergency room one of the nights because the steamy shower and blast of fresh air outside wasn't doing the trick.  When we got there, Tessa's fever was 103.5 and she was putting on a coughing/barking show.  I called her my little seal while she was being examined, and she lifted her head up, pointed at her chest and said, "No, I Tessie B!".  I cracked up.  Even when she was feeling miserable, she still had to set the record straight.  The doctor kept her there for about 3 hours to monitor her breathing.

She got a heavy dose of ibuprofen, a steroid, and in the breathing treatment there was a medicine to treat the croup.  They also gave her a huge glass of straight apple juice... By the time we left (around 1:00 in the morning), she was wired and wanted to walk all by herself!  I was so happy to see her perk up from the lump that she was when we went in.  After a few days, she was back to her normal crazy self!


So, the next week, we visited the hospital again for Kyri's tonsil and adenoid surgery.  (She had been battling sinus infections this past year, and she was on 5 different antibiotics since October.  We were referred to an ENT, and after looking at Kyri's throat for about 10 seconds, the Dr. said her tonsils and adenoids needed to come out.)  Aunt Kay found Kyri a book about the surgery, and it was perfect to prepare her for what to expect.  K.J. was soooo brave!

Before Surgery - Waiting patiently
 (for almost 2 hours... good thing cartoons were on!)
When the anesthesiologist came in to explain to Kyri what would happen, she stopped him and TOLD HIM all about the "magic mask" that he was going to put on her.  He cracked up and looked at us in disbelief.  We told him we read a book about it, and he was impressed.  The nurse was surprised how much K.J. knew about the surgery, too.  She asked us for the title of the book so they could get one for future patients.  : )

The whole surgery lasted only about 15 minutes!  We met with the Dr. afterwards, and he told us her tonsils were huge, infected, and had way more scarring than he has seen in a kid so young.  So, it made us feel better about the decision to have them removed.

After about a half an hour, we were able to go back into the recovery room.  While Kyri was really excited about the popsicle part after the surgery, it didn't turn out to be so fun at first.  : )  The nurses kept trying to get her to suck on a freeze pop, but Kyri was crying and coughing a lot.  They gave her something to make her more comfortable, and it put her to sleep for a while longer.  Eventually, the nurses gave us the okay to go home, but K.J. was still pretty tired and uncomfortable.

I got to ride in the wheelchair with her on the way out. 
 Poor thing...she didn't enjoy getting jostled around.

She was pretty nauseous for the first couple of hours after we got home and got sick a little bit, too.  But  by late afternoon, she was perking up a bit.  She enjoyed getting to eat ice cream for dinner!  (Thanks to Auntie Chrissy for giving her a gift card for ice cream - along with a dinosaur book to keep her busy!)


She definitely felt loved after the surgery with so many people sending her well wishes.  She is one lucky girl to have so many wonderful people in her life!

Grandma B stopped by with a big bag of books and DVDs to keep her occupied for the next few days while lying on the couch.

Uncle O and Auntie Donna (and the kids) sent her a special delivery.

Uncle B and Aunt Kay (and the kids) sent her this "Make your Own Popsicles" kit.

 Uncle Steve and Aunt Sandy sent these cute flowers.

And Grandma Nancy sent her this fairy friend to play with.

K.J felt so special to get so many deliveries, along with cards and phone calls to check on her. Thank you, everyone, for helping lift her spirits!!

Her recovery went pretty well for the next couple of days, but around the 7th day after surgery, her pain spiked up again pretty badly.  The paperwork that we got said that would happen, and at her follow up appointment, the Dr. said that was a normal part of the healing process.  The poor thing felt worse the second week than she did right after the surgery.  We felt so bad for her.  Now that we're onto week three, she seems to be doing much better.  She still complains of a sore throat occasionally, but she is back to eating all of her normal foods.  Hopefully this surgery will help her feel better in the long run!

Looking back on all of the sickness and recovery that went through this house, I have to say I didn't mind having an excuse to sit around and snuggle my girls for a few weeks.  I just wish they didn't feel so miserable throughout all of this!

Friday, January 25, 2013

Grizzly Jack's

This post is out of order...  The weekend before New Year's, we went down to Utica to an indoor water park called Grizzly Jack's by Starved Rock.  We stayed in a two bedroom Villa with Owen, Donna, and the girls.  Along with the water park, the place also had an indoor amusement park with small rides that were perfect for the ages of all the little ones.  The weekend was short, but it was nice to get away for a couple of days.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any swimming pictures, but here are a few from the trip.

Snack break

Charlie

 Gwyneth



Tess and Charlie at the bar... uh oh

 Horrible picture, but the only one I got of all five cousins.

It was a COLD weekend, which made it even more fun to be able to swim indoors!

And, I can't forget this picture.  We just happened to stumble upon this baby lion while walking through the lobby.  Ha!  So, of course we had to feed her and get our picture taken with her!
I know K.J. looks scared in this shot, but she was just really listening to all the facts the owner was telling us about how big this little fur ball will get.  Both girls loved this lion!  Anytime we were in the lobby, Tess asked about her.  And when the lion wasn't there, Tess would say, "Linon nigh nigh?"

Sunday, January 6, 2013

Happy New Year!

For New Year's Eve we had my brother and my niece, Aubry over and The Coulters joined us, too (Dan, Gina, Cooper, and Brady).  Kyle deep fried a turkey and we had some other goodies for dinner.  Then, we counted down using Greenland's time zone on our laptop (which was really 8:00 our time).  

Since Cooper only has boy toys at his house, he wanted to be like Tess and dress up.  
Dan loved it!  Haha!

And poor Brady had to drink out of a princess sippy cup at our house!

 Kyle and Dan set off poppers and noise makers for the kids.

Happy New Year, Aubs!

Kyri went around giving everyone kisses to say Happy New Year.

Coop seemed to like his New Year's smooch!

 Tessa and Cooper spent most of the night wrestling, so Tess was left with some battle wounds.  She loved having a boy around to rough house with.  She's a tough cookie!




The next morning, we went for our New Year's Day pajama party at my parents' house again.  We all bring a dish to share for brunch and pig out!  This isn't the best picture, but I had to post it to show that even Pop comes in PJs!

 The kids had a fun time arranging all the chairs into a train.  I never did capture a shot with all of them sitting on the train, though.  They're too quick!

Happy 2013!

Friday, January 4, 2013

Four Christmases

Here's a Christmas card picture that I forgot to post from the previous photo shoot post...




Two weekends before Christmas, we started our partying at my parents' annual Christmas open house.  About 90 of their friends and family stopped in for a chance to catch up from the past year.  It's always a pretty extravagant event.

Kyri at the Chocolate Fountain
(...where she spent most of the night!)

Aubry and Aunt Sherry having fun

Us with Kyle's parents (and the giant Santa)

Cutie Tessa showing off her "parkly" red shoes

Pretty Morgyn and all her fans

We finally rounded up the kids for a family shot!

Grandpa and Kyle introducing Tessa to some chocolate fountain treats

Kyri and Pop putting on a dance show

Smooches from Aunt Sherry

And a very sleepy Tessa with her Daddy



The next weekend, we got together with Kyle's family at Owen and Donna's for an early Christmas celebration.

We had a tasty dinner.

The girls played a lot of Ring Around the Rosie.




Then we tried to get a photo, but someone was mad that we made her stop playing "Rosie".

So our little defiant one refused to sit with the rest of the group, but once we let her down, she posed with a big cheesy smile.  Ughh!

Lillian and Gwyneth with Grandma and Grandpa

Present time... G and L with their new puppies

Dr. Charlie fixing up this puppy

We were safe with these emergency workers at the party.

Construction Worker Lillian

Construction Worker Gwyneth




Christmas Eve:  We always celebrate Christmas Eve with Laurel's side of the family.  This year Kyle's cousin, Jessica, and her husband hosted.

An attempt to get a nice group shot of all five little ones...


 We can count on the two biggest cousins for a smile!


 Jessica and Carl's piano was a big hit!


Present time!

Kyri and Charlie got matching fairy princess dresses and flew around the living room for a while.

 Kyri enjoyed our white elephant gift!

And Bobbi enjoyed her white elephant gifts, too!  

Tessa helped Grandma warm up for Christmas carols.

Kyri talked about singing carols all day, and she even had Rudolph memorized for the tradition....but she didn't quite make it...  : (  We sang without her!



Christmas Day:  We started with presents from Santa, had a tasty quiche and then headed to church.

She was so excited to look in her stocking to see what Santa left her!

Tess was excited that Santa brought her a princess pillow so she had to try it out right away!

Around lunchtime, we headed out to my parents' house for the Knutson Christmas celebration.

As soon as we got there, Tessa found this guy waiting for her!


She also got a new baby, which she immediately began to care for.

 The girls opening their gifts

Morgyn and Grady got their own chairs.  Grady prefers to climb on it!

Here's Kyri showing off her her new Disney lanyard with pins from all the times she's gone there.  We'll keep adding to it!

They love these animals that they can bounce on.

After dinner, we got all the supplies out to make our own gingerbread houses.

These two worked really well together on their house.

Although, I think Tess ate more than she decorated!

Kailey made a cool log cabin.

And Aubry took her time to make a very detailed roof for Kailey.


So proud of their work!

Even Morgyn got in on the action!


We had such a fun couple of days this Christmas season with all of our families!