My little girl is growing up, and suddenly she wants to wear dresses

I registered Zoe for kindergarten yesterday. Sniff. I didn’t think I would be emotional about it, since I just registered Noah for kindergarten last year, but I was. It’s weird to think that we will be sending our SECOND child to elementary school in the fall.

(Maybe the problem is that it is not FREE kindergarten, even though it’s public school. Maybe it would have been a little easier to swallow that my little girl was growing up if we were getting the benefit of dumping a monthly school bill at the same time. It will be cheaper than her preschool bill, but full-day kindergarten costs $2,300 in our district, so there’s not much comfort in that. But I digress…)

After registration we took a school tour. We got to see Noah in his kindergarten class, which she thought was pretty cool. We saw the music and art rooms, the library, the gymnasium, the stage, the cafeteria, etc. I think she would have been happy to just stay there then instead of waiting for August.

Noah and Colin both had school yesterday, but Zoe’s school was closed for conferences. I had the day off, so it was just the girls after registration.

She’s always excited to “go to a restaurant.” If given the choice, we would always eat at the local hibachi place. If that’s not an option, because Mommy says it is too expen$ive, she really has no preference. She just wants to go out to eat. Zoe’s preschool has more days off than Noah or Colin’s school, so she gets to go to restaurants for lunch more often than the boys. This has caused a little bit of friction, so I told her not to brag about it when Noah got home. She didn’t, but I almost think she intentionally left her kid’s cup of pink lemonade in the fridge so he would find it. He saw it immediately after he got home from school and said, “Hey! Where did you guys go this time?!” in his best “that’s-not-fair” voice.

After lunch we ran a few errands. We went to Babies R Us to buy her some of the 2T-3T socks she likes. (Yes, she is five, and she wears 2T-3T socks from the baby store!)She is VERY particular about her socks. They have to fit a certain way or she complains about them incessantly (unless they have Hello Kitty on them, and then she doesn’t really care how they fit. It’s too bad Hello Kitty socks don’t come in a larger variety of colors.).

Then we went to the mall so she could pick out a birthday gift for Noah that will be from Colin and her. We also visited the hair kiosk to have her feathers moved up a little and to look at headbands. The woman working at the kiosk was from China, as was the man at the cell phone accessory kiosk right next to her. They both talked about how Zoe looks Chinese and not Vietnamese. She said, “Chinese people tell me that all the time.” (It’s true. They do.)

Did anyone catch that I just said my little darling wanted to look at headbands? Yes, it is true. She is starting to become more interested in girly accessories. And dresses. She’s always liked to wear dresses in the summer (with shorts or bloomers on underneath at my insistence!), but in the winter she’s been a t-shirt and jeans kind of girl, and that was just fine with me. It was so easy! I bought her five pairs of ruffle flair jeans from the Children’s Place (with the waists adjusted in ALL the way, of course) and some cute shirts every year, and she was good to go. Then a couple of weeks ago she said, “Mommy, Kelley wears skirts and dresses to school every day. Can I wear skirts and dresses?”

Le sigh. I’ve had a major education in little girls’ fashion over the last two weeks. Matching a shirt, leggings, skirt, socks, boots, etc is much more complicated than t-shirts and jeans! At least she picked a good time of year to make this decision. I found lots of cute stuff on clearance at Target, including skirts for $2.50! And, since she grows so slowly, this stuff will probably fit her for the next two years (even though the skirts I had to buy to fit her are 24 Months or 3T)!

Still, I was not entirely convinced she was really going to do this. Remember, this is the girl who routinely sucks her thumb and picks her nose at the same time. A girly girl she is not. I only took the tags off of two outfits so she could give it a trial run. She made it through though, and has asked to wear a dress or skirt every day since. She usually takes the leggings and/or skirt off when she gets home from school, especially the fluffy tutu skirts, but she usually took her jeans off when she got home from school before, too.

She looks adorable, but she has not been feeling very photogenic. I have tried several times to take pictures of her in her new attire with no luck. I got this one this morning. With the expression on her face, it looks more like a mug shot than a photo of my darling little princess.

At least I can always count on Colin for a good photo (or at least a crappy cell phone pic (I REALLY REALLY REALLY need a new cell phone. Mine takes exceptionally crappy pics)). Colin saw me trying to get Zoe to smile and said, “Take my picture, Mommy!”

Noah’s awesome report card and strep (again)

Noah brought home his second report card Wednesday. The “grades” are M (meets expectations), P (progressing), or I (needs improvement). On his first report card, he got about 60% Ms and 40% Ps. This time he brought home 37 Ms and only five Ps! We are so proud of him, both because he did so well and because he improved so much!

The things he got Ps for are basically handwriting, writing his first and last name, and participating in class. He still tends to write his name in all capital letters, so she couldn’t give him total credit for that. His handwriting could use some improvement, so I’m not shocked about that one. Plus, if sometimes all of the lines in a letter don’t connect or if he occasionally writes a letter backwards, he can’t get full credit.

When we had our first conference, we knew the participation thing was a bit of an issue. I had seen it myself when I volunteered in his class. When the teacher says, “Raise your hand if you can tell me…,” half of the kids in the class have their hands up before she even finishes the request. Noah does not. She says that she has noticed that Noah could use a little more confidence. He never wants to give an incorrect answer, so he is a bit timid about sharing in class. She added that when he does answer, he gives a thoughtful or correct response.

The bad news is that kindergarten has been a bit rough on his health. He has had strep four times, plus a viral sore throat twice. He went to preschool since just before he was two, so I’m kind of surprised that’s he’s been sick so much. It’s not like he hasn’t been exposed to other kids and their germs.

Usually when Noah gets strep (or the viral sore throat), he is suddenly whiney or weepy. I feel his head and he is burning up. He usually has a 101 or 102 fever. Then he cries because his throat hurts.

This time the symptoms were different. He came in our room at 2am Thursday saying his throat hurt. He didn’t have a fever. And then he started throwing up… from 2am to 6am. Good times.

I stayed home with him Thursday, thinking we would both be able to nap, but that didn’t happen. He was happy and playing, and not in the mood to sleep. Around 3:20pm I happened to scratch his back and realized he had a fever. We called the doctor and were able to get in at 3:45pm, when he tested positive for strep.

We asked his doctor about tonsils, and she said that they usually don’t talk about that until a kid has had strep six times. They also consider the size of the child’s tonsils, and his are not large enough for her to be concerned. She thinks this is just something he is going to have to get through, and eventually “grow out of.” 

He’s already missed nine days of school this year, so I’m hoping he “grows out of” this soon. At least his grades haven’t suffered… (If you can’t tell, I’m a little proud of my boy.)

Chloe’s wild birthday party

Last weekend we went to Chloe’s birthday party. Zoe and Chloe are from the same province in Vietnam.
 
 
The Phu Tho girls:

 
 
But this wasn’t just any birthday party. Angel hired a guy who brought several different animals that the kids could “pet.” I don’t think Angel knew what she was getting into when she booked this party. I’m thinking she might have reconsidered if she’d realized she would end up with a giant cockroach on her face:


 
 
Noah touched several of the animals, including the hedgehog:


 
 
Zoe touched a few, including the cute little frog (my fave):


 
 
I’m not sure that Colin touched any. He would get really impatient and yell, “I want to pet it!” but then chickened out by the time his turn came. He still had a good time though:


 
 
Kelli and Aiden were there, too. I wonder what these two are talking about:


 
 
Noah and the birthday girl (doesn’t Noah look way too old in this picture?):

Racism exists – even for Asians

Minhee Cho, an Asian-American woman in New York City, ordered a pizza at a Papa John’s Friday night. Instead of asking for her name, the clerk who took her order decided to make up his own name for her.

Minhee Cho was not pleased. She tweeted: “Hey @PapaJohns just FYI my name isn’t ‘lady chinky eyes,’” along with this photo of the receipt:

Not only was this employee racist, but he was stupid, too. (I guess that’s kind of the same thing though, right?) Did he not remember when, less than a month ago, a Chick-fil-A employee was fired for calling two Asian customers “Ching” and “Chong”?:

As an adoptive mom to an Asian daughter and a Hispanic son, I take racism very seriously. Unfortunately, even though they are only five and three, we have already had to deal with it. And it is NOT OK.

We talk about race in our family. We try to make sure our children are exposed to people of all races and cultures. We purposefully chose an African-American doctor and a Hispanic dentist so that our kids would have positive, professional role models of color. We even MOVED so that our kids would be in a more diverse school district.

I have been told more than a handful of times that we shouldn’t really worry about it. It’s not like they’re *Black.* They’re Hispanic and Asian. I mean, if they were African-American, people might see why I would worried. (SERIOUSLY – I have been told that. I wish I was kidding.)

Colin is half Caucasian and doesn’t *really* look Hispanic, right? *Probably* no one will pull him over some day just to see if he has his immigration paperwork, or because he’s “driving while Latino.” 

And so what if Zoe is Asian? “All” Asian stereotypes are positive, so why worry?  What’s the big deal if people assume she’s good at math?  Forget that whole “all Asian women and submissive and slutty” thing. She’ll *probably* never have to worry that the guy she’s dating just has a fetish.

Racism exists! Look at the two photos above. LOOK! It is a very REAL thing. It can be overt, or it can be subtle. It doesn’t matter. It is there, and I need to help my kids understand it and have a plan to deal with it.

I just don’t know what else to say right now. I guess I’ll just go bang my head against the wall some more.

Cocoa and Carols

Zoe had her school’s Cocoa and Carols program just before Christmas. It’s a rite of passage. Noah was in Cocoa and Carols last year and wore a very similar elf hat.

Zoe is in two classes (a MTW class and a ThF class) so we got to see her do Cocoa and Carols twice. I was very proud of my girl. She can be a bit moody, so I wasn’t sure if she would actually participate in either program, but she did both – choreography and everything!

I cropped out the other kids, but it is funny to see how much smaller Zoe is than everyone else in her class. (She has one other friend who is a peanut like her, but she’s also almost ten months younger.)

2011 didn’t suck (or blow)

Christian and I have been together for ten years, and something BIG has happened in each of those ten years.

2001  – Christian and I started dating. He moved two hours away shortly afterward, and we continued in a long-distance relationship. I knew he was moving away when we started dating, so I figured we would just go out a couple of times, and that would be that. Little did I know that he would only be gone for 50 weeks, and that one of us would make the two-hour drive 48 of those 50 weekends.

2002 – Christian moved back, and we moved in together. Neither one of us had ever lived with a significant other, so it was a bit of an adjustment. He proposed a few months later, and we started planning our wedding.

2003 – We had our dream wedding, complete with 300 guests. Later that year we bought our first house and I started working on my Master’s. I also started a new job.

2004 – We tried, unsuccessfully, to get pregnant, and learned that we had fertility “issues.” We started fertility treatments and battled with our insurance company to get them to cover some of it.

2005 – We continued fertility treatments and got pregnant, but miscarried. Two months later we finally got pregnant with Noah. I finished my Master’s and Christian went back to school.

2006 – We had Noah! Several months later we began the paperwork to adopt from Vietnam.

2007 – We adopted Zoe! Later we started the paperwork to adopt from Vietnam again.

2008 – We learned that we would not be able to adopt from Vietnam again, and started the paperwork for domestic adoption. Though we expected to wait 12-18 months, we brought Colin home just seven short weeks later! Also, Christian started a new job and graduated with his Bachelor’s.

2009 – We sold and bought a house (very quickly).

Then there was 2010. Oh, 2010. What a horrible, horrible year. I wrote about it a year ago, but to recap: a herniated disk and pinched nerve caused me awful, ongoing back pain; we hired a searcher to try to find Zoe’s birthfamily, but it was not successful; Colin was diagnosed with FAS; Colin’s new school did not work out; Noah was in the hospital with Kawasaki Disease; things were going really well with Colin’s birthmom and then it all went to sh*t; and we spent $17,000 in medical bills. Yuck. Blech. Ugh. It’s horrible just thinking about it all. I still cannot believe how stressful that

2011 wasn’t so bad. We did have to spend a lot of money on our house – the sewer pipe from the house to the street, the landscaping and grass in the front yard (from the sewer pipe being dug up), our water heater, some leaky gas lines inside the house, the heat/AC and duct work, and some scary electrical wiring – and that kind of sucked. We knew the heat and AC needed to be replaced when we moved there in 2009, but the rest of the stuff was a surprise.

Other than expensive home repairs, the rest of the year was pretty good.

January – Noah celebrated his fifth birthday and told us he had his SECOND girlfriend. (His cousin Michael has since told him that it means your are “in love” if you have a girlfriend, so now he says neither girl was his girlfriend.) We also got a new dog. It was a questionable decision to get a THIRD dog, but we did it and I guess now we are stuck with her. The kids love her, despite the fact that one of the first things she did upon becoming our pet was to eat Strawberry Shortcake’s face off.

February – Colin started his new school and things have been great.

March – I took this awesome picture of Colin. Zoe started asking more questions about her birthfamily and Vietnam and I don’t think I screwed up the conversations too badly. 

April – I took my favorite pictures of Zoe.  We had a good visit with Colin’s birthfamily. I found some FAS videos that made a lot of my feelings seem normal.

May – Noah had his last official day of preschool.  We figured out how we would manage three kids in three different schools. We went to the Asian Festival in Columbus. I got Botox shots in my feet.

June – Zoe had her first trip to the ER. We took our annual trip to see Thomas the Train.

July – We celebrated Colin’s third birthday and my mom’s XXth birthday.

August – Noah started kindergarten and Colin’s (bio) brother and sister came to stay with us for a few days.  Colin was potty trained! I took this awesome picture of Noah.

September – Zoe and Colin had their first day of preschool for the year. Zoe started ballet and liked it! We celebrated Tet Trung Thu (Mid-Autumn Moon Festival).

October – We went to the pumpkin patch, and celebrated Halloween and El Dia de Los Muertos (Day of the Dead).

November – We celebrated Zoe’s fifth birthday. Zoe started asking more questions about race, and I hope I didn’t screw them up too badly. We took a trip to the waterpark and the kids were wonderfully behaved and full of love for each other. Zoe had a rough time with her CT scan, but the results came back normal.

December – Noah showed off his mad new reading and writing skills when he shared his first letter with Santa and we had a great Christmas. Jason and Hailey came to stay with us again.

Here’s to a normal 2012!

2011 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 31,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 11 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

The visit so far

Yesterday we drove to SB to visit with Colin’s extended birthfamily and to pick up his brother and sister, Jason and Hailey. Jason and Hailey’s grandma was at work, we picked them up and went to the mall playground to meet the rest of the family. Colin’s aunt (Amber), his maternal grandma (Trudy), and his cousins (Camren, Kiley, Kiara, and Michaela) were all there. (I have some pictures to post, but I’ll do that later.)

We stayed for a couple of hours and the kids all played together while the adults had a chance to talk. I’m glad that I can really mean it when I say, “The kids *all* played together,” including Noah and Zoe. It’s not like these visits are all about Colin. It’s about our whole family. While we haven’t quite figured out what Noah and Zoe should call Jason and Hailey, we call Amber their aunt, we call the cousins their cousins, and we call Trudy “Grandma Trudy.” Jason and Hailey and their grandma had Christmas presents for Noah, Zoe, and Colin, as did Grandma Trudy. It’s awesome that they included Noah and Zoe, too.

We went back to Jason and Hailey’s house once their grandma was home so we could see her for a while. Then we all drove home. My minivan is a little packed with seven people, especially with two car seats and one booster seat, but we managed. Zoe fell asleep on the way home, but Colin stayed awake. He almost never stays awake on long car trips, but he was pretty excited and he fought it. He was a tired guy by bedtime.

We made a quick dinner once we got home, and it went smoothly. The last time they were here, we ordered pizza. Jason grabbed a slice and ate it standing up in the kitchen before I even had plates made for everyone else. This time we made plates and everyone took them into the dining room. It’s possible that they don’t sit down together at home and have meals, but they remembered that we did and it wasn’t an issue. Colin was the first one to say he was finished and I said, “OK, you can be finished, but you have to sit at the table until everyone else is done.” It was perfect that Colin said it so that I could address it to him while Jason and Hailey heard “the rule.”

I addressed the shower issue by saying, “Noah, Zoe, and Colin are going to take baths right after dinner. Do you want to shower now, while I finish dinner, or do you want to shower when they are done?” (the classic “choices” trick – where the kid has a choice, but either choice is a desired outcome for the adult). Jason decided to shower then, and Hailey said she would shower after the little kids. (She ended up not showering, but said she would shower in the morning instead, so no big deal.)

We have a finished basement where we have the playroom, but we also have an area that’s a bedroom with a queen-sized bed and dresser, etc. The last time they were here, they slept there until the last night, when Jason slept on the couch in the family room and Hailey and Zoe slept on the futon in Noah’s room.

Jason decided he wanted to sleep on the couch again (so he could watch TV) and Hailey ended up sleeping in Zoe’s room. We just told them that if they wanted to stay up late, they had to sleep in the basement or the family room. If they wanted to sleep in Noah or Zoe’s room, they had to go to bed when they went to bed. (We didn’t offer Colin’s room as an option because he NEEDS his sleep and I didn’t want to mess with that.)

Hailey slept in Zoe’s room, and Noah ended up being jealous. There’s only room for two to sleep in Zoe’s room. Noah has room for three, so we’ll move Hailey and Zoe in there with him tonight. Noah was pretty tired last night anyway, so it was probably best he got some rest, since Hailey and Zoe stayed up talking and laughing. We didn’t say anything for a while because they were having fun and it was cute (and again, because we are glad that Noah and Zoe are included in all of this, too), but we put the brakes on it a little after 10pm.

We mapped out the next few days with them. The last time they were here, we packed things in. Last time we did two or three things a day. We’re still doing a lot – at least one thing each day – but it’s not as scheduled as last time.

Friday we are taking them shopping so they can pick out their Christmas gifts from us. We’re also taking Jason for a haircut and letting Hailey get some hair feathers. (We got their grandma’s permission when we saw her.)

Saturday we are going to Chuck E. Cheese’s (their choice).

Sunday we are going roller skating.

Christian is driving them home Monday. (I have to work again.)

The only exception is today. We’re doing quite a bit today. I had to work, so Christian took them all to Monkey Joe’s to bounce. Colin and Zoe are napping now, and we’re going to go to the zoo tonight to see the Christmas lights, and then we’re going out for dinner.

Something tells me I’m going to need a nap by Tuesday.

Jason and Hailey are coming tomorrow

Colin has two biological half-siblings named Jason and Hailey. They are 11 and 13. They have the same mom as Colin, but Jason and Hailey have a different dad. They live with their dad’s mom.

They live about 2.5 hours away from us. Tomorrow, we are going to drive up there to visit with Colin’s aunt, cousins, and maternal grandma, and then bring Jason and Hailey home with us. They will stay Wednesday through Monday.

They came to stay with us for a few days this summer. I’m not as anxious this time as I was then, but I am still a bit nervous. It was a little strange “disciplining” them the last time they were here. They were both very good, but we still have to enforce things like what time they get up (if we’re going somewhere), that Jason has to take a shower at least every other day, we eat dinner together at the table, etc. Then there are little things: Our kids aren’t supposed to burp unnecessarily, and when they do, they should say, “Excuse me.” Jason is 13 and thinks burping is funny, and it makes my kids laugh. Do we say something, or just let it go? Also, our kids have to stay at the dinner table until everyone is finished, and then they take their plates to the sink. Do we announce that before dinner? Address it if they get up from the table? Just let it go? It’s strange because they don’t know the rules of our house, and we don’t know the rules of theirs. It’s strange because we are just getting to know them and they are just getting to know us. It’s not like a niece and nephew we’ve known since they were little. We haven’t had all  that time to figure it out.

We had things pretty scheduled the last time they were here, but decided we would have a little more free time this trip. Hailey likes to roller skate, so I did buy a Groupon for $50 that included admission and skate rental for ten, two pizzas, and ten soft drinks. The zoo has a Christmas light display that I think is up through New Year’s, and they really liked some of the indoor stuff there, like the shark-petting tank. They told us last time that they like Chuck E. Cheese’s, so we will probably oblige and go to the Mouse House of Hell.  Other than that, I guess we’ll kind of wing it.

Any other great ideas for things that will keep five kids (aged 3, 5, 5, 11, and 13) entertained?

Oh, and wish Christian luck. I have to work Thursday, so he’s on his own with five kids. (Ha!)

Happy Holidays!

I think photos in front of the fireplace are going to be a new Christmas tradition. The fireplace pics from 2010 are here. (Maybe by next year I will figure out how to get the lighting right, or at least learn Photoshop so I can make it look like I can get the lighting right. Oh well. At least the cute kids distract everyone from my terrible photography skills.)

(Oh, and a couple of people have asked me how I get pictures of all three kids smiling at the same time. Here’s my secret: Christian stands behind me and acts like an idiot to make them laugh. Honestly, I don’t know what he does back there, but he’s definitely taking one for the team.) 
 

Santa

Colin’s school had a Holiday party for the students and their families. They had a reindeer (which smelled dis.gust.ing, by the way) and Santa Claus. Noah had written a letter to Santa in his kindergarten class. When he hard that Santa was going to be at this party, he said, “Oh! I have to bring my letter!”

When it was Noah’s turn, he read the letter to Santa, letting him know he wanted a Lego Racer. (Santa had already done his shopping, and a Lego Racer was not among the things he intended to leave at our house on Christmas morning, so he had to make a stealth run to Toys R Us after the party.)

 

Santa was very nice. Since he didn’t have any pockets, he folded Noah’s letter up and put it in his boot for safe-keeping.

 

When it was Colin’s turn with Santa, Colin just told him he wanted “presents.” Santa was hoping that Colin had a more specific answer than that since Colin already has all the trains and cars a boy could want, but I’m sure Santa will come up with something.

 

Zoe wanted nothing to do with Santa. She is afraid of him, as she made clear in this photo. (She said she wasn’t going to be afraid of Santa, the Easter Bunny, Chuck E. Cheese, etc once she turned five. Now that that day has come and gone, however, she says it’s going to have to be a “bigger number.”) She came in the room, but she wouldn’t get anywhere near him. Santa even asked if Noah could sit on his lap and then Zoe could sit on Noah’s lap, but no deal. Zoe didn’t even want to stand next to him for a picture.

Noah, being the good big brother that he is, took Zoe aside. He said, “Zoe, tell me what you want from Santa and I’ll tell him for you.”

Zoe whispered to Noah that she wanted a fairy set, and Noah relayed her message for her. He’s such a sweet big bro.

CT Scan

Zoe fell unconscious in our driveway in June. We went to the ER that afternoon and followed up with her pediatrician afterward, and the consensus was that it was just a fluke. She has not fallen since, but she did complain of headaches for a couple of months, so her doctor ordered a CT scan at the end of November.

I called the nurse ahead of time to try to figure out what to expect. Zoe can’t even hold still long enough for me to put a pony tail in her hair, so I was pretty sure she was not going to be able to get the CT scan without sedation. We told Zoe what was going to happen and explained that she would need to hold still or they would have to give her medicine. She said she could do it. I was still skeptical, but she seemed very sure of herself.

As soon as we walked into the room with the CT machine, she said, “Uh uh,” and started backing out of the room. I grabbed her hand to bring her back in and she tried to pull me out of the room with her.

We tried everything. Christian got up on the table and showed her what would happen. It seemed like we were starting to convince her, but she freaked again as soon as they showed her how the table would move.

We tried to reason with her. We tried to ask her nicely. We tried to tell her how brave we knew she was. We tried to be stern and tell her she had to do it. We tried to bribe her. We said we would go to the toy store as soon as we were done. Christian even told her he would give her a car for her 16th birthday, but she was not to be convinced.

They led us to a room and they put some numbing cream on her hand to prepare for an IV. Another nurse brought in an iPad and distracted her with a Tinkerbell game while two nurses worked on the IV. When they finally stuck her, she gave them the death look and screamed her head off.

We had to take her earrings out and the feathers out of her hair so there wouldn’t be a shadow on the scan. She was p*ssed. She screamed and screamed. I promised the nurse that she is usually a sweet little girl, but at that moment I certainly wouldn’t have blamed them if they didn’t believe me.

I’ve mentioned that my girl is stubborn, so she FOUGHT that sedation. I’ve also mentioned that she is strong. She may only weigh 32 pounds, but it was a fight to keep her down. She cried and thrashed and tried to pull on the IV tubes. She kept turning over, getting the tubes tangled.

Once she was FINALLY out, they took her for the CT scan, which took about two whole minutes. Then they took us back to her room and said they would try to wake her up in 15 minutes.

 

When they came back, she looked like this:

 

They said they would give her another 15 minutes, but when they came back, she looked like this:

 

After 15 more minutes, she was still like this:

 

We tried picking her up and moving her around, and she was like this:

 

Finally, we got her to swallow some Sprite and they said we could take her home. Christian carried her to the car and she rode home like this:

 

Christian carried her to our bed, and for the next seven hours, she looked like this:

 

When she finally did wake up, eight hours after having been sedated, she started throwing up. She was still sleepy, so she could barely hold her head up. Imagine me trying to hold her limp little head over the puke bucket, while holding her hair back at the same time. Yeah. It was not fun.

After a while, we started to get concerned. She couldn’t hold anything down. She had not had anything to eat or drink in 24 hours except a few ounces of apple juice and a sip of Sprite. She hadn’t peed in more than 14 hours. I called the on-call pediatrician, and she recommended that we go to the ER for IV fluids. I REALLY did not want her to have to have two IVs in one day. It was 10:30pm. I told her if she was still getting sick at 11pm, we had to go.

Miraculously, about 10:45pm, she turned a corner. She was finally able to keep some Sprite down and she got up to pee.

She was so hungry, and she kept asking for potato chips. I had to tell her that wasn’t a good idea, but promised her she could have some chips the next day.

She finally fell back to sleep around midnight, and she slept until 7am, when she opened her eyes, looked at me, and said, “CHIPS!”

She was still a little groggy for part of the day, but was obviously feeling much better.

Of course, the CT scan came back normal, and I don’t think she’s complained of a headache since. I feel bad that we put her through all of that and it was nothing, but I know I would have felt a lot worse if something was wrong and we did’t catch it.

 

Zoe at five years

I promise that our boys get plenty of attention, but it seems like a lot of my blog posts have been about Zoe lately! Since she just had her fifth birthday and I don’t think I ever did a four-year-update for her, I owe her one. Then I have to write a post about the CT scan she had a couple of weeks ago. Once that’s done, I assure everyone I have some stuff to say about Noah and Colin, too!

Ah, Zoe at five… What can I say except, “If she’s this way when she is five, what the HELL are we going to do when she is 15.” Christian and I are so screwed.

She is stubborn. She is ridiculously stubborn. When Noah gets in trouble, I can tell him to go to his room until he is ready to apologize. He goes to his room for three minutes, and sincerely says, “I’m really sorry, Mommy.” Zoe, on the other hand, could stay in there all day. We were at my Grandma’s house and Zoe was not being very nice to a cousin. I told her she needed to sit down until she could go up and say hello to him. She sat there for 35 minutes. She would have sat longer, but we finally made her get up and say hello. That girl does not break.

Of course, she is gorgeous. Christian and I have never believed in owning guns, but I wondering if he’s going to change his mind when she starts dating. :)   (She’s said she’s going to marry Noah, and seemed disappointed that we told her she couldn’t.)

She is an absolute peanut. She weighs 32 pounds and is almost 41 inches tall. She’s in the 5th percentile for weight and the 15th percentile for height. I mentioned recently that she just wore two different 18-24 month sized bathing suits when we went to a water park. They were tankinis, and the bottoms still looked like they were going to fall off of her. She is in the same size underwear as she was when she potty trained before she was three. He waist is just so small! I just bought her her first pairs of 5T jeans this week. They are OK in the length (a touch long), but the waists are huge, even when they are adjusted ALLLLLLLLL the way in.

She is incredibly strong. She just finished up her ballet class, and I think she’s doing gymnastics next. She taken preschool gymnastics classes, but I think it’s time to start her in the beginners classes with the school age kids. She’s also pretty tough. She plays rough with Colin. Colin tends to go overboard when wrestling, so we try to get him to lay off a little, but she usually says, “It’s OK! Come on, Colin!”

She still sucks her thumb and is afraid of costumed characters (Chuck E.Cheese, etc). She originally said she would stop both of these things when she turned five, but now says it will have to be a “bigger number.”

We recently bought her a full-sized day bed, which she loves. She looked really small in it at first, but she’s filled it up with throw pillows, Strawberry Shortcake, Ariel, Woody, Jessie, Bullseye, Buzz Lightyear, three pink puppies, a Hello Kitty, and some other things I can’t remember right now.

Her plan at the moment is to be a writer, an artist, and a dentist. She also wants to work at the “polish store” owned by a Vietnamese family we met. I guess we’ll see!

New blog header (again)

I’ve figured out some basic CSS code and how to work with digital scrapbooking kits, so I think I’ve entered some dangerous territory. I changed the blog header again, and I’ll probably end up changing it AGAIN now that I know how to do some of this stuff and found out it’s kind of fun!

I wanted a bigger blog header so I could do more with the kids’ pictures in it, but Christian thinks the current blog header is too big. Is it? Does it take too long to load?

Zoe’s 5th birthday

Zoe turned five on Thanksgiving. We waited until the following weekend to have her party, and it was a BIG one. With our kids, their cousins, and our friends’ kids, we already had 12. Zoe, of course, wanted to invite her friends, too, so we ended up with 25 kids. I know they say that for a five-year-old’s birthday, you should invite five kids, but there is just no way that is ever going to work. Zoe is friends with EVERYONE. She’s my little social butterfly.

She is in her last year of preschool. On Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays she is in the “Explorers” class. On Thursdays and Fridays, she is in the Fours class. She has friends in both classes. On top of that, she is still friends who kids who were in her class last year. I immediately told her we were only going to invite the girls from her class – no boys. It’s not that I have anything against the boys, but I just had to cut it off somewhere. (She’s just as good of friends with the boys as she is the girls. In fact, she’s been asking to have playdates with a couple of them.)

When I say that Zoe is friends with EVERYONE, I really mean that. Even before she was three, she could tell me about all of the kids in her class, who their mommies were, and who their siblings were. She has four friends with whom she is closest, but she really plays with everyone. Almost every mom has said, “Oh, you’re Zoe’s mom! [Insert name] talks about Zoe all the time!” Her Thursday-Friday class goes outside first thing in the morning. I dropped Zoe off and as I passed the playground on the way to my car, I saw the teacher with a little girl who was on the swings alone. The teacher said, “Oh, Zoe’s here. Why don’t you ask her to swing with you. I bet she’ll do it.” Apparently Zoe is the go-to-girl when someone is feeling left out. Another teacher told me that Zoe left what she was doing with two of her “besties” to play with another girl who was alone the other day.

I’m a little sad for her because none of her four “besties” are going to be in kindergarten with her next year. Three are in different school districts and one will go to private school. Something tells me she’ll be OK though. :)

I have photos from her brithday party (we had a gymnastics party) but I am going to password protect them since there are lots of other people’s kids in it.

Polar Express

Colin’s school took a field trip to ride on the Polar Express. Again, I think it’s so awesome that they go out on trips like this.

This is the picture they sent. So sweet… Man he’s one stinkin’ cute kid.