Drake's Goose Egg, Last Weeken and Pregnancy Woes

This is what happens when you trip and hit your head on the hard, back corner of the couch! Poor Drake...his head swelled up HUGE instantly after he hit his head. This picture was taken later in the night and after the swelling went down TREMENDOUSLY! I shed some tears over my baby being hurt and looking so painful. Nick took him to the doctor just to be safe. They just said to make sure he doesn't sleep longer than usual and to make sure he's not throwing it. Neither of which he did. I think I was more tramatized than he was. When he got home from the doctor he told me that the doctor looked in his ears and in his mouth. His weight is now at 38lbs. He tells everyone "I bump my head on the couch." In pregnancy news...not doing the greatest here. This past week has been very tough for me. Last weekend we had a good family weekend. Saturday we took the kids to the park and walked on the trails. Drake saw a boat on the river and said "I ride boat." Sunday we decided to go to Chicago and spend the day at Navy Pier. The weather was beautiful! We took a boat ride...which Drake's SO loved! The kids ran around on the pier and had a blast. They went on the carousal and Xandria was even brave enough to ride the huge ferris wheel with Daddy! Very surprised about that! We left there around 7:30pm. Monday I spent the day cleaning and cleaning. My cousin even came over later and helped cleaned and organize our closet area. Thank God for her and her help...it made a HUGE difference!! When tuesday rolled around, I was in pain! My upper back and shoulders hurt SO bad I couldn't do anything! Wednesday was the same thing. Thursday I didn't feel much better either.It would hurt so bad in the morning and at night. I could pretty much only sleep laying flat on my back. Friday was finally relief though my legs did hurt some. Yesterday morning started the itching. My whole body itched and itched and itched and itched more when I scratched it and hurt! Was able to get in touch with the on call ob who works with my doctor. She said it sounds like I have a condition that can be common in pregnancy. She told me to take benadryl every 4-6 and to use lotions and take Aveeno baths until I can get in on monday for a blood test. This has not been fun at all!! Today in the shower I itched so bad it was INSANE and I still have throunghout the day. It seems to be at the worst when I take my clothes off and when I'm trying to go to sleep. I was so exhausted today that I took a very long nap while Nick kept an eye on the kids and worked on the addition. I don't know what I would do without his support!! Well, that's all the update for now (which was plenty!), I'm just going to try to make it through the night and hope the doctor can offer some more relief tomorrow!! I will put pics up from last weekend next time hopefully.

Ear Doctor and Goose Egg

Last friday was Xandria's appointment for the ear, nose and throat doctor concerning her ears. Her left ear started hurting her two days before the appointment, perfect timing, right. We get in the room and the nurse practitioner (I think that's what she is) starts going through the process of checking out her, you guessed it...ears, nose and throat. Though she went nose, throat and ears. She did notice at first Xandria's little white bumps she has on her face (kinda like whiteheads), arms and legs. She informed me those are due to allergies...it's the top layer of skin being blocked. Oh, I never knew that and she's gotten those for years. Nose and throat looked good. On to the ears. Looked in right ear first...eardrum was still quite red. Left ear...she couldn't even see there was so much wax. She let me see the difference and it was amazing how you could see nothing in the left. So that meant SUCTION! She started with the right to get what was in there out. Wasn't much, so it didn't take long. On to the left. Ugh. Not good. Especially since that's the ear that just started hurting her. Not only is it loud in your ear, but the suction can't feel to great either! Xandria definetly did not want her to continue, but it had to be done. I held onto her hands and she would jump a few times and let out a little shriek, but she did VERY well. We had to take a few breaks though. It took quite awhile to get it to where we could see her eardrum! When that was completed we went into a special sound room where a machine can tell them if she has any fluid or holes in her ears or whatever else. She had no holes in her ears (she did before, that's why the right ear bled, but had healed up), but she had fluid in both ears. More in her right I think it was. Anyways, to wrap it up...she was put on a stronger antibiotic to hopefully heal her right ear and get rid of the fluid buildup in both ears. She was also put on Nasonex nasal spray. Both priced at $100 each! She also has to have ear drops in the ears 5 times a week to continue to get rid of wax and saline nasal spray, so her nose doesn't get dried out. We go back in 3 weeks and hopefully the fluid is gone, so we don't have to have tubes put in her ears!! *Keeping fingers crossed* Oh, I have to mention that she held up SO well tbrough all that, but when the doctor came in and went to look in her mouth (you know...open up and say aaahh), she didn't want to cooperate with that, so her mouth had to be opened wider with that stick and that was the one and only time she cried. Go figure. They were impressed with how mature she was for being five. It's funny because one of the first things the nurse said to Xandria was that she was going to be an actress when she grew up. I had to laugh and say she already is one at home!! Well, I was going to write about Drake's lovely doctor visit from monday, but this took forever and I need to get to bed. I'll post it tomorrow.

WE'RE HAVING A...

Yep, that's our newest boy! I was a little surprised because I thought it would be 2 boys and 2 girls, but I had a feeling from the beginning it was a boy. Wow, 3 boys and 1 girl. Guess Xandria will get to be the princess for awhile longer, ha ha. The ultrasound tech asked if we wanted to know the sex, I said "yes" and she asked what we thought first and we said "boy," since that's what they thought the baby might be at the last ultrasound. She confirmed and showed us his parts and said there's no doubt about it! When I got home I put all the ultrasound pics in an album and put that picture last to show the kids. I showed Xavier them first and he said "I'm so lucky!" when he read the "boy" part. Next I showed Xandria...she was so hoping for a sister. We got to the last picture and I asked her if she could read what that said, she said "no" and I told her it says "boy." She said "What?! I said I wanted a sister!" But, she got over it after a minute and is just excited we're having a baby...though she did ask if we could decorate the room with kitties. There's more ultrasound pictures below.

Ultrasound Photos @ 20 Weeks

These are ultrasound photos of the baby at 20 weeks. I love the one of his little legs crossed. The second one his arm is going up across his head. You can see his nose underneath it. I swear on the left side of the picture it looks like his other arm is up and he's flipping us off! I didn't notice it until later, so I didn't get to find out. Funny. The last picture is a 3D picture of his profile. She couldn't get many good pics because of how he was positioned, but you can see his eye socket, nose and mouth. We were told that everything looks good and all my bloodwork and everything came back fine. That's a HUGE relief. He weighed 10 oz and about 10 inches or so. He was moving alot while she was doing the ultrasound and I could feel it! I'm just amazed by how strong he is already and how much I feel him all the time!

Easter Pics

Here are Easter pictures from when we were at my parents house. We had a little egg hunt for the kids. Xavier was excited to find $5 in one in egg! Drake wasn't sure about it at first...he would find an egg, but not want to pick it up. Nick showed him to put it in his basket and then he was ready for more! His favorite part was eating the candy out of the eggs (there wasn't too much). In his Easter basket from my parents he got a basketball and hoop with suction cups, so I stuck that on their window and the kids had fun with that. The picture of him and Skylar next to each other makes me laugh...seeing how much bigger he is than her. She's eight months older than him! Gotta run...I plan on posting our ultrasound pictures later after I get them scanned in. I finally can breath out of my nose and feel so much better!

Bunny Ears

Wow, I can actually add pictures now! Here's a couple of Xandria and Drake. Drake had to put the bunny ears on himself and wouldn't let me help! Will add more pics later.

Sick, Doctor Follow-Up and The Weekend

Well...me and Nick officially have colds. Ugh. Yesterday my throat was K I L L I N G me and I just could not force myself to do much. Needless to say it was Pajama Day! Good thing was Xavier didn't have school, so I didn't even have to run to pickhim up. Throat has been alot better today, but now I have a crappy stuffy nose. Ugh. Sooooo tired of colds and coughs and aches and all that other stuff!! Nick woke up today with a sore throat and isn't feeling too hot since he got home from work. Took Xandria and Drake back to Doctor today for the follow up. Drake didn't cry once. I did mention to him before we went that we were going to the doctor and he said "no, I don't like doctor." But it was no problem. He even stood on the scale this time and was 36.5 pounds. Xandria was 56 pounds. Doctor looked at Drake first and said his throat has cleared right up and the only thing he has is a stuffy nose (wonder where he got that from?). So that was good news! Doctor looked at Xandria's ear and said the eardrum is still pretty red and that he wasn't expecting that since she's been on the meds for ten days. Also, she can't really hear out of that ear still, so he's sending her to a Ear, Nose and Throat Doctor. We'll see how that goes... In other news, we had a nice Easter weekend. Took the kids to have Spring pictures taken and to see the Easter Bunny on friday. Was at the mall for 3 HOURS to just do those TWO things!! Wasn't too happy about that. Then we went to my parents so the kids could dye eggs with my two nieces. That was fun. Saturday we went to Gurnee to do a lil shopping and go to Archivers (yay!). Sunday we went to my parents for turkey and all the fixins. Good good!! The kids did some egg hunting and then we went to see "Meet the Robinsons." I really liked the movie and I am not a kid movie liking person usually. We also took my niece Chelsey with us. Drake came along too. It was his first time going to see a movie. Wasn't too sure how he would do because he's not much into t.v. and many movies, but he did great. He sat there the whole time with his sprite and popcorn. It was funny...at the beginning of the movie they have a Mickey Mouse cartoon and he was yelling out "Mickey Mouse, Mickey Mouse!" He only did that a couple times though. I will try to post pics later (it won't let me now) and post about our ultrasound also!

Update on Sick Kids

Well, I ended up taking Drake and Xandria to the doctor on last friday. Drake's fever kept going up and down and he had been throwing up each time he ate. Right before we left for the doctor appointment, Xandria (who had been up the nght before crying her ear hurt) said that her ear had just "popped." So I told her to let me look at it. I pulled back her hair and there was blood coming out of her ear! Wow, that freaked me out! But I remained calm. But still SHOCKED! So, both kids off to the doctor. We wait only a few minutes and I tried to get Drake to take his coat off. Not happening! He was already crying now! Get Xandria weighed (55 lbs) and Drake wasn't down for getting on the scale. Nurse takes his temp and it was normal. Wait for the doctor. While I had to literally PRY his coat off and his shirt. That was tough!! Doctor comes in and starts to check him out while he is SCREAMING and trying to pull the doctor's fingers off of him! Not fun! Doctor looks in his throat and says it's extremely red. Listens to his breathing...he's still SCREAMING! The doctor is taking longer than usual listening to him breath which is kinda worrying me. Doctor finishes and says that he has a severe throat infection and he sounds wheezy, so he needs to have x-rays, because he could possibly have a spot pnuemonia. Wow... on to Xandria. Does the usual checking out, then looks at her ear. Doctor said it's hard for him to see very far down as there is alot of blood and some ear wax. He said she could have burst her eardrum. I told him she had told me she heard a pop...he said it's very likely then that is what has happened. He said fluid probably built up and caused that to happen. But he said 90 percent of time it will heal itself. That made me feel alot better. She was given medicine and has to go back in a week. After that off to x-ray. I didn't know what that would be like since I've never had to deal with x-rays before...I just knew it wasn't going to be easy with how freaked out he already was! Got in the room...had to remove his shirt and shoes. Then they show me the chair type thing he has to be strapped in! It looked like a torture device to me!! His legs dangle down and his arms are placed in to plastic things that stick straight up. The really tough part was that I couldn't be with him in that part because I'm pregnant. I had to listed to him SCREAMING and crying "MOM!" over and over while they took the x-rays. I couldn't stand it and was in the little room crying myself. Thankfully, it didn't take long and they got good pictures the first time. It was one of the toughest things for me though. We got the results and thak God there was nothing on them and he was fine. He was given medication and wasn't able to eat food for 24 hours...which was a little tough for the last half! So, he also has to go back in a week. Xandria has had some bloody drainage from her ear, but not much else. And Drake is back to his goofball self. Very thankful. I will post pics later from MY doctor appointment today later...