Getting in the Spirit

Last weekend we got our tree up and started getting into the Christmas spirit! Good thing too before Corbin got so sick. He is on the mend but still coughing a lot and keeping us up at night trying to help him sleep. Eliza now has a runny nose and cough. Hopefully it doesn't turn into Croup too.

Here we are at the Christmas Tree farm.

Corbin liked the giant snowmen at the farm!

Some egg nogg while decorating the tree.

Corbin made his first ornament at our Two's Class.

Corbin is allowed to take off any of the sleds, the wheelbarrow, and a monkey. He is not allowed to take more than one off at a time. So far he is doing a great job. I even was able to keep a couple of glass balls down low that he has been so great with!

We then had some of Corbin's buddies over to make gingerbread houses (with graham crackers). Corbin ate more candy than he has ever in his life! Wow, what a sugar high he had!

This was Corbin's!

And what says "Christmas Spirit" better than a naked cute little baby butt!

sickness

We had our first ER visit the other night with Corbin. It's weird because I have been thinking about what I would do if we had to go to the ER after our doctor's office after hours closes. One of the great things about the kids pediatrician office is that they are open till 9pm at night and on the weekends, therefore hopefully limiting the amount of time that we might need to visit the ER. But Corbin woke up at 10pm the other night with a definite Croup cough. He has developed a regular cough that day and had coughed a couple of times that I heard on the monitor while Adam and I were downstairs watching TV. I headed to bed and was in our room puttering when I thought I heard him coughing. Our upstairs has been turned into a wind tunnel with the sound machine and huge fan going full blast for a noise buffer for Eliza while she sleeps in our "hallway". So needless to say, it's hard to hear what is going on unless the fan is off and doors are open.

I went into his room to check on him. He was shaking in his bed, standing, having trouble breathing, throwing up, gasping for air, and trying to cry. I wisked him out of his bed and ran down the stairs to go outside. As I went by Adam, I cried, he has croup, call Daylen right away. My friend Daylen's little boy, Luca, had a scary case of croup one night too that landed him in the ER too, so I knew she would know what to do. As I stood outside with him, he was having such a hard time breathing. His chest was retracting so badly, I could feel it on my body. He was throwing up and gagging on the air he was trying to take in. I was in total panic mode. Daylen said that being outside for 10 minutes or more should help but I didn't know if I could wait that long. I decided we needed to go the ER, even if he got better on the way there, I wanted them to check him out and give him the steroid for his lungs. I told Adam to go and wake Eliza up and meet us in the car. As I was putting Corbin in the car, he started to get better. He was able to talk and was trying to tell me he was all better. But he was still coughing and his whole body was just shaking. As we were driving we saw a deer in the road and Corbin said "watch out for the deer, Daddy!", so I knew he was feeling a little better. We kept the windows open in the car to let the cool air in while we drove. It helped him a lot.

By the time we got the hospital he was breathing almost normally with just the seal bark cough that comes with croup. But he wouldn't let go of me. He was still shaking and obviously a little freaked out by what we were doing and where we were. He wouldn't let the nurse put on a bracelet or get his heart rate with the finger monitor. The first nurse who came and checked in on us once we were in our room made him a chicken balloon out of the hospital glove. That seemed to make him relax a little. Adam and I were doing our best to try to talk about all the things around us and help him relax. Eliza just sat in her car seat quietly for almost an hour! Emergency Rooms are funny. We saw about 3 different nurses, one doctor, then other staff taking our paperwork etc. One person would come in and do something and then another person would come in to do something else. I guess in ER standards, we were there for only a short time but it seemed to take forever. About half way through, Corbin started to really relax. He let me let go of him and he sat on the bed by himself. By the end, he was playing soccer with Adam and his balloon and jumping all over the place! They gave him the steroid for his lungs and told us about what we could do if it came back. Going into the bathroom and turning on the hot water as hot as it will get and sitting in the steam is their first suggestion. Then outside, then driving around with the windows open, then the hospital.

We finally got home and everyone in bed by midnight. Corbin ended up sleeping till almost 9:45 am! But then he didn't want to take a nap. It was a long day!

Then last night he was up at 11:15 coughing and wanting to come into our bed. He was almost asleep again when he had another coughing spell. Then he decided he wanted to be awake. He started tapping me on the head, talking, asking to go downstairs. Finally I had to take him back to his room and rock him and put him in his own bed. By that time it was 12:30. He woke up again at 4:45 am with the strider breathing again. It was not nearly as bad this time, so we went down to the bathroom and sat with the shower going in the steam for 30 minutes. He was wide awake! He was being so funny once he could breath again. It was amazing how fast the steam worked. Then we went outside and sat with a blanket wrapped around us for a while. He was just talking up a storm and asking such funny questions. At 5:30, I decided to take him back upstairs. I had to lay with him (in his toddler bed) for a while before he would go to sleep. Then he was up again at 7 am coughing and wanting to be up and in bed with me. I sent him with Melissa to Brody's house just so I could get some rest while Eliza took her morning nap. Melissa brought him back here and he is finally sleeping.

It was so scary. Even though I know what croup is and Corbin has even had a mild case of it. There is nothing like holding your child who is having trouble breathing. I was so scared and yet trying to relax him at the same time. The "middle" of the night also throws a different aspect into it, as opposed to during the day and daylight hours. I am glad we all made it through and now have that first ER visit behind me. Now we just have to cross our fingers that Eliza doesn't get it.

Random Thoughts

Here are some random thoughts...

• We went to get our Christmas Tree today!
  
• Corbin is VERY excited for Christmas. He thinks Santa is coming tomorrow. So we had to make a paper chain to let him know how many days are still left. I felt a little relieved to see so many chains, I felt like it was all coming too fast but there are a lot of loops there.
• Corbin keeps saying "Santa is working on my presents!" It's too cute!
• Adam told Corbin about the ornaments he used to take off the tree and play with. Then Corbin went around saying "This is the one I always take off to play with" as if he has always been doing this (for his last 2 Christmas's)! Ha!
  
• Our house smells so nice with the tree inside!
• Does anyone ever figure out their Christmas lights before they try to put them on the tree? Does everyone always have to run to the store for more lights? Or is it just us?
• Corbin had his first mug of Egg Nogg tonight. "MMMmmmm good!"
  
• We will put pictures up soon of our tree...
• But our computer is about to run out of room so we are slowly going through our 10,000 photos to transfer them over to an external hard drive.
• We don't even have enough room to put any more videos or anything on the computer. Yeesh!
• We had a great Thanksgiving with Adam's parents and brothers and sister-in-law.
  
• We are VERY thankful for so much!
  
• We had almost no pictures of the four of us as a family.
  
• Corbin is not too keen on getting his picture taken lately.
• Eliza is rolling. Corbin did not roll until he was 5 1/2 months. She rolled at 4 1/2 months
• She has rolled over in her crib twice now and not been able to go to sleep on her tummy.
• Sleep training is going well. It's such a relief to just put her down and know she will go to sleep on her own.
  
• We are going to make ginger bread houses tomorrow with friends.

'now!

Here we are, snowy around Thanksgiving again. The first thing I did when I got to school on Friday was close the blinds. Got to keep fourth grade eyes away from those floaty, fantastic flakes.

It didn't really start snowing until Friday night. We woke up to a lot of white. I guess there was about 3 inches.

When Corbin woke up I sent him straight to the window to see what was out there. It took him a bit to process what he was seeing. Then he got pretty excited.

He was ready to head out with his pajamas on. Get those boots and go! As we got downstairs it was clear that he was ready to do a little playing before breakfast, so I insisted he get dressed and went up to get some clothes for him. When I returned, he had pushed a chair up to the dishwasher, climbed on top, and was perched somewhat precariously on Ellie's bumbo chair, looking out the window.

Never mind that there are plenty of easier windows to look out of.

"Daddy! 'Now on our garbage can, Daddy!" Corbin sometimes leaves the 's' off of some words.

"Yep."

"And, 'now on the new car, too!"

"Yep it is."

"And on Lynn's pile of dirt!"

"There's snow all over, huh?"

"Yeah!"

So we got bundled up and headed out.

 

It was a day of in and out of the snow for us. Unfortunately, I somehow tweaked my back while bending over during snowman production, so I didn't participate in much of it. Back tweak hasn't happened to me for a long time, probably since my back surgery, so it was frustrating.

Anyway, Corbin and Erin and Ellie and Brindzi all went on a walk and ended up at Alden's house, where Corbin got to try skis for the first time. It's been our plan to get him on cross country skis this winter. It seems that he will be quite open to the possibility.

Also, Erin relays the following conversation, which occurred during their walk:

"Mommy, you are a banana!"

"Oh, really?"

"I am a zucchini!"

Giggles and grandparents

Corbin and Eliza have pretty awesome and active grandparents on both sides. His Grammie Susand and Grandpa Mark just got back from an Italian Adventure. And his Grammie Dani has just taken up Cyclo-cross racing at the age of 61! Cyclo-cross is...Races typically take place in the autumn and winter (the international or "World Cup" season is September–January), and consists of many laps of a short (2.5–3.5 km or 1.5–2 mile) course featuring pavement, wooded trails, grass, steep hills and obstacles requiring the rider to quickly dismount, carry the bike whilst navigating the obstruction and remount.^[1][2] Races for senior categories are generally between 30 minutes and an hour long, with the distance varying depending on the ground conditions. The sport is strongest in the traditional road cycling countries such as Belgium (and Flanders in particular), the Netherlands and the Czech Republic .
My parents came up this weekend and there just happened to be a Cyclo-cross race in Sedro-Woolley. So we headed down to watch her race in the cold fog. It was so fun to see her doing something fun and new! And muddy! We cheered "Go Grammie go!" I don't think there was anyone else there cheering on their Grammie :-)

This morning I left Eliza with my parents while Corbin and I went to our BTC Two's class. I felt naked without Eliza in the Ergo! It was the longest time I have left her while she is not asleep. She did great! They had to keep her quite entertained and be constantly changing her environment but she was not crying or hysterical when I came home. She even was slightly interested in the bottle. Corbin and I even got to eat some lunch before I nursed and put her down. While we were eating she had some of her first real giggles that lasted more than just a second!

Eliza 4 months

Eliza is 4 months! We celebrated her 4 month mark with a start of sleep training. With Corbin we didn't start till 5 1/2 months to let him cry it out. Eliza has been a similarly great sleeper from about 2-3 1/2 months. She was still sleeping pretty well once she went to sleep but she was having lots of trouble getting to sleep and lately going from only one wake up to two. She would go down and then wake up after one sleep cycle, 40 minutes, and then continue to wake up and need to be nursed 3 more times or want to be awake till 10 or 11 at night. This process ended up taking an hour and half sometimes. Sometimes she would get so over tired that she would get really fussy and not even want to nurse. We would end up walking/pacing the floors with her until she fell asleep. She would also try to nurse till there was no more milk and just want to suck. She won't take the pacifier no matter how hard I try to force it or introduce it at different times. I was getting sick of being a human pacifier. I thought that I would try to transition her out the miracle blanket, a straight jacket like swaddle blanket, before we started to do "cry it out". She was starting to bust out of the swaddle and I wasn't quite sure I was ready to let her cry. I tried the one arm swaddle, I tried a new sleep sack with Velcro that is supposed to help them transition. She would struggle and fuss and then jerk herself awake before even setting her down. I realized that I might not be able to transition her without her crying. She loved her swaddle but at the same time needed to learn how to sleep without it. She is getting close to rolling over. It was going to be just as hard. I went back and looked at what I did with Corbin. Adam and I were going to talk about what our strategy was going to be and then get prepared. Then last weekend she was really bad at going down. All week was bad. My nights became really unpredictable. Would she wake up, would she not? Then on Thurs. night she went to bed and then woke up after only 30 minutes. She seemed wide awake. She didn't want to nurse, she didn't want to lie down. I was tired. So I brought her downstairs with me and said, "Adam, I think I am ready. I think she is ready."

I did't think she was going to transition out of the swaddle without some crying or a lot of up and down, nursing, rocking, walking, etc. So I called Aimee and talked to her, I called Becky and talked to her. I just decided to go for it. I went back upstairs, nursed her, and then layed her down. I went and took a shower so I wouldn't have to hear her cry. Adam said she cried for 16 minutes, was quiet for about 2-3 minutes, then cried again for about 3 min then was asleep. We went upstairs to go to bed, turned off the fan, set the sound machine to go off in 15 minutes, and then she woke up as soon as we got in bed. We had to lie in bed and listen to her cry. She cried for 40 minutes. Then Adam snuck back in and turned on the sound machine. She fell instantly asleep. Then she woke up at 2:00 am and I went in and nursed her. She woke up again at 6 am and had trouble going back down even though she was still really tired. She finally went down at 6:45 and slept for another hour.

Night 2, I went out with my girl friends for dessert and drinks. Adam said she cried for about 20 minutes. Then she slept till 11:30 and woke up when we were in bed again. She cried for 30 minutes and then slept till 4 am. After talking with the girls, I decided to not swaddle her for naps either, I was hoping to not have her cry for her naps but not swaddling her meant crying. I tried to set her down ever so softly after nursing but she just wakes up. So she is now crying for naps too. But by today it's been less than 10 minutes each time.

Night 3, Adam and I went out to dinner while my parents stayed home. She cried for 20 minutes and then woke up at 2:30 am, I nursed her, and then she woke up at 5:30 am. I nursed her again. I think I am going to work on getting her to sleep till at least 1 am without nursing her and then work on cutting out the 2nd wake up in the early morning later.

Night 4. Tonight, she cried for about 15 minutes. We are making progress. She has her little lovey bear and has been also sucking her fingers. So she is learning. She is learning to fall asleep on her own. She gives me the biggest smiles when I come and get her in the morning which makes me feel so good. I know it's not hurting her but making her a better sleeper.

I think it's easier this time around because she is younger. I thought it would be harder because she cries harder than Corbin ever did. She seems fussier than Corbin. She can get really worked up. But so far she has done really well. It was also a really good idea to go out and not be home for a couple of nights. I will keep you posted on how it is going. It's a nice relief to know that when I put her down she will be down for good at night. It frees up my evening, allows me to go out and do something and let Adam or someone else be at home. And soon it will make naps easier too.