Schools Out

Monday.  May 23.
We did grocery swap that day.  And when I picked the big girls up from school I realized Brooke was feverish and she was complaining about a sore throat.  So between Dan and I we got her to the minute clinic around 4 pm while Candy and Megan did swim practice.  She didn't have strep, but she did have a possible ear infection. We had the missionaries over for dinner that night and it was great to get to know them better. 
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So Brooke stayed home from school Tuesday.  It was my day to teach joy school, so Brooke hid out in her room and watched Netflix on the kindle while we had our lesson.  I got to ask the kids questions for these books they are making and their answers were so funny.  I asked Candy, "What does your Mom always say?"  Her answer:  "If you don't get a toy then you don't cry about it!".  Then I asked, "What does your Dad always say?"  Her answer:  "Get in your bed!".  Haha, you can tell she's been getting into trouble lately!  I went to my book club that night which was fun since I hadn't been in a while.

Wednesday I did a second swim lesson for the twins I'd taught the week before.  They both were terrified to start but were happy little fish by the end of the 30 minutes.  Brooke was home from school again that day.  Since I couldn't take her to playgroup, Ashley picked up Jack and Candy for me and took them to Discovery Green.  As you can see they had a blast. 

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While those two were at playgroup, I worked on assembling the all about me books for the joy school kids.  Brooke and Emily cooperated nicely and they both napped while I worked.

Candy's profile

I sent Brooke back to school Thursday (May 26).  I taught the last joy school lesson of the year.  And then right in the middle of nap time (around 2:30), the nurse called--Brooke was running a fever and not feeling well.  I picked up Megan then too so I wouldnt' have to run back.  We ran to the store to buy more ibuprofen and Megan mentioned how she'd been freezing all day--great (not!).  Sure enough, she had a fever too. 

Since you can't return to school when you got sent home with a fever for at least 24 hours, I had all 5 kids home on Friday (May 27).  Brooke woke up that day completely recovered.  Megan was fevering but did ok when her ibuprofen was working.  We had to pick up some flyers for stake conference from the print place and it is right by costco, so we walked around costco a bit and had hot dogs for lunch there.  We all needed the outing!  Having everyone home made me a little nervous for summer--but we'll find a routine :)  Our sickness cancelled babysit swap that night since we were supposed to host.  So we put our kids to bed early and Dan and I watched a movie.  It rained like crazy Friday night all night.

Look--all 5 kids fit just fine in the giant cart!

Megan was still fevering on Saturday, but it was Chloe's baptism day, so we gave her meds and got on our way.   We left our house at 8:45 am and drove to Shad's church.  It was a great baptism service for Chloe and another little girl.  Dad spoke and did a great job.  He mentioned that it had been 11 years to the day since your baptism.  Pretty cool!  Here's Shad's kids and mine minus Emily.  Jamie and her crew came too, they just got there a little later.
 

The 8 year old cousins in their white dresses.

After some refreshments, we all loaded up and headed to Shad's new house on Lake Conroe.  Dan and I hadn't been there before and it's awesome!  Traffic was nuts getting there because after all the rain on Friday the feeder road on part of 45 was flooded (right where we needed to go).  But eventually we all made it safe and sound.  The lake was halfway up Shad's back lawn, his dock and everything were totally underwater, we could just see the tops of some lights on the end of the dock.  Because of the high water the lake was closed to motorized boats, but that didn't matter--we still had a blast.  My kids played in the hammocks set up outside, they jumped off the submerged dock into the lake itself and we all went out and swam in the water some too.  We played cards and had lunch and dinner and talked and laughed.  My family headed back home around bedtime.  Within minutes all 5 kids had passed out.

Megan had played hard despite not feeling great on Saturday, but by Sunday morning she was not doing great.  So with Dan at a ward conference, I sent Brooke and Candy to church with cousins and took Megan to the Minute Clinic.  She had double ear infections and a bad sore throat, but again, no strep.  Our Sunday was quiet after the doctor visit and we talked with the kids about what they wanted to do on the holiday.

Emily getting her Sunday morning bath (May 29)

Our kids list for Memorial day went like this:  pancakes for breakfast, bowling, swimming, make home made ice cream, eat hot dogs and watermelon, hang up the hammocks Aunt Jamie gave us, and have joy school graduation.

We hit most of them!  After our pancakes, we took the whole crew to the grocery store.  We got what we needed for ice cream along with our groceries for the rest of the week.  Megan was still feverish, but the antibiotics seemed to be helping a little.  We went bowling at a brand new place near our house and it was a blast.  All the kids loved it and you should have seen Jack's ear to ear grin when he knocked the pins down.  It was so fun. 

 

Bowling is pretty exhausting...

Hammocks hung!  That's Brooke on top (Megan's in it too but was hiding) and Candy under them.

We came home for lunch and started our ice cream and hung the hammocks.   We had a hamburger and hot dog dinner with the Tracy's and the Ashcraft's (our Bishop and his fam) at the Tracy's house.  As soon as dinner was done, we all headed back to our house for joy school graduation at 6:30.  It was adorable and crazy (10 adults and 21 kids among the 5 families)
 

A few of the 21 kids that were with us for joy school graduation--the hammocks were a big hit!

Candy getting her diploma (which is what Tyler was doing one year ago on May 30)...

Our class of kids and mom-teachers

Megan was STILL running a fever Tuesday morning (good grief!), so she was home with me again but Brooke was back at school.  I watched 2 extra kids all morning this day (a girl Candy's age and boy Jack's age) and they put on swim suits to splash and play in the baby pool and sprinkler outside.  Megan was tortured by me all day (meaning I told her she wasn't allowed to do anything but sit and rest and she glared at me all day), but her fever finally broke (see, Mom is right!).  Candy and Brooke did swim team til thunder cancelled practice.  After dinner, Brooke came up to me and complained about these itchy mosquito bites on her chin.  As I looked closer I thought WOW!  She got eaten alive!  She has bites EVERYWHERE!  It took about 2 minutes for us to realize she didn't have 150 mosquito bites, what she had were hives!  Poor kid.  So benadryl for her and bed. 

Emily is still cute--this is her on Tuesday (May 31)

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So on Wednesday, Megan was finally 100% and back at school.   Dan worked from home because they had their end of year awards in their classrooms in the morning.   Brooke was not feeling great and didn't want anyone to see her hive-covered face.  We told her she could just come to Megan's awards with us and go to her awards after and we'd take her home. 

Candy and Emily in their matching dresses on wednesday (jun 1)

Megan's classroom award was the "Honey Bunch" award for being so sweet to everyone in class all year.

Megan and Mrs. Renfrow

Our whole fam (poor Brookie's swollen blotchy face!)

Brooke's teacher Ms. Eakin and the 3 kids awarded the "fantastic friend" award for always being friendly and kind to everyone. 

It was a fun morning for the big girls.  After their awards I took Brooke home to rest (since Dan was working from home) and I took my 3 younger kids plus 2 of Ashley's kids plus cousin Luke to a splashpad for playgroup.  It was threatening rain, but it held off and the kids had so much fun.  Megan had piano after school and swim team got cancelled again for rain. 

Thursday morning Brooke was feeling a bit better and asked to go to school for the last day.  Dan worked from home again because of heavy rain.  I dropped off the big girls and I took the little ones to say hi to cousins around 10 am.  At 11:20 the school nurse called--Brooke was miserable and had a fever.  So I came and picked up both girls.  I talked with the nurse a bit because Brooke's hives were so bad now that her feet and hands were swollen and she wasn't wanting to walk.  She recommended that I take her to see the doctor.  So I got an appointment for 1 pm and dropped Candy and Megan for an end of school party at the Tracy's and put Jack down for a nap at home (yay, Dan was home again).  Emily and Brooke and I headed to the doctor.  My regular pediatrician wasn't there, but the on-call ped was Dr. Bergman--she was on the Willow pool board and her kids grew up with all of us lifeguarding and doing swim team and stuff.  So I was glad to know her a little.  At this point Brooke was making me really worried.  She had a fever, the rash was just worse, and she could hardly walk down the hall to the exam room.  Dr. Bergman spent a while talking with us to try to figure out what she was reacting to.  We realized that she didn't have hives, what she had was called "erythema multiforme" which is an allergic reaction that is much worse than hives and can have some pretty serious consequences if it continues for very long.  She sent us downstairs to have some labs drawn (we had to have a wheelchair for Brooke) and we came back upstairs to wait for the results.  The results were not conclusive, but in the time we'd been there it seemed that Brooke was responding a little more the zyrtec I'd tried, so she recommended we continue with  zyrtec, benadryl, and ibuprofen/tylenol for the fever.  It was a long, sad afternoon for Brooke.  The only thing that felt good was for me to rub her swollen feet and legs so I did that as much as I could and we kept going with the meds.  I had her take an oatmeal bath to help soothe her burning skin and it did help some.

Brooke slept soundly last night (yay!).  And this morning she was able to put a little more weight on her feet.  I gave her more zyrtec after breakfast (you can only give this once a day) and she asked to take a nap.  After an almost 3 hour nap this morning, she came out walking easily, ate a normal lunch (after not eating much since Tuesday), and has been playing happily since then.  I'm so relieved.  The welts on her face are fading and her limbs aren't as swollen.  So I think we're through the worst of it.
 

So it's been a pretty quiet (boring if you ask Megan) first day of summer.  We've let Brooke rest (and Jack too, he started running a fever last night!).  The other kids have played and although we didn't get rain overnight or most of the morning, it's raining now--we may cancel swim team again!

This is Emily napping this morning.  I need to get more pics of her smiles--she LOVES to be talked to these days and has the cutest happy grin.