My Jacob's in 1st grade

I know, I know, parents say this all the time, but I really can't believe Jacob is old enough to be in first grade. He is officially a big kid now going to school all day. He really likes it though, and so far he hasn't seemed too tired when I pick him up from school. His first day was good he said. He did get lost once on his way out of the lunchroom. He couldn't find anyone from his class. I guess they all went outside straight to recess. He was able to ask a yard duty, and she told him they were at recess. He also had to eat lunch without any friends. He said they tell you where to sit and you can't pick a spot, or else there was no room by any of his friends. One of those. He sat by a girl in his class named Brooke, but he didn't talk to her because she wasn't his friend, he said. He also said he played by himself during recess. I asked why he didn't play with anyone else and he said he couldn't find his friends. But he did play with one friend at the second recess. So I told him to make it a goal to play with other friends at recess and to find someone he knows to sit by at lunch. After school today he said he accomplished one goal, he got to play with friends during both recesses, but he still had to eat lunch alone. I'm sure that will change once he gets to know the kids in his class better. There's only one other boy in our primary in his class. His good friend Joseph has a different teacher.

So all in all Jacob is very happy about school. He likes his teacher and she seems very friendly. It's nice for me to have Jacob starting school early because I've been getting up earlier and going to bed earlier. I was getting in the habit of staying up late and sleeping in. So this just prepares me for when the baby is born and I'm always getting up early.

Kera as Barbie Mariposa

Kera's aunt Carrie came up last night to buy Jacob a backpack for his first day of school. (I'll post pics of Jacob on his first day later. He starts 1st grade on Monday.) So while we were at the store she told Kera she could pick out one thing. This is what she chose, a Barbie Mariposa dress up outfit. Then this morning she wanted me to take a video clip of her in her new dress. Here's Kera, the magical butterfly fairy.

Final Update on Kera

I want to finalize the Kera sickness thing by saying that she is feeling much better now. I think she got used to waking up feeling sick each morning though because this morning she woke up and said her tummy hurt and she tried to go throw up, although nothing came out. Then she said "can I watch cartoons like I do when I'm sick?" So I think that was her way of getting to just sit and watch TV without having to get dressed or do anything else.
It dawned on me last Friday that she probably had the swimming pool virus, that cryptosporidium infection. She went swimming at the Orem Athletic club the Saturday before she got sick, and most likely swallowed some of the pool water. So that must have been what was making her sick. After researching about the crypto thing, the symptoms fit what she was dealing with: vomiting, diarrhea, loss of appetite, and fatigue. So I took her in last friday to get tested for it. They gave me a test kit to take home (stool sample). By this time her diarrhea had lessened, and then it was to late to use the test kit because it has to be liquidy(gross, I know). Anyway, we never tested her for it, but I'm pretty sure that's what she had. So just a warning to all of you moms who take their kids to the public pools, be aware and don't let your kids drink the pool water! And make sure there's nobody swimming who have had diarrhea for the past two weeks. I think it will be awhile before I let my kids swim in a public pool!

Update

Well, I did take Kera to the doctor yesterday. The doctor did a throat culture and gave her an exam. She said that it doesn't seem like a stomach virus, due to the fact that she only feels sick early in the mornings and is fine throughout the day. She has had a significant appetite loss, although she didn't eat too much before this problem. The doc had the idea that she may have some type of reflux and that's why she wakes up in the night with the need to vomit. So last night I gave her some prescribed Previcid and she didn't wake up this morning feeling sick. She also slept down in Jacob's room with him, so if it was something in her room making her sick, it could still be that. I'm gonna try another Previcid tonight and have her sleep in her room. Maybe it will rule out the room being the problem. This afternoon though she did start to say her tummy hurt as we were out running errands. Maybe this has something to do with the heat? She gets too hot and then feels nausious? Who knows! Hopefully she'll start feeling better now and there will be no more bouts of vomiting. Thank you everyone for your advice. I am glad to hear your opinions and your concerns. If there are any new developments I'll let everyone know.

I'm puzzled...

For the past week almost Kera has been exhibiting some strange illness/vomiting issues. It started last Tuesday. In the middle of the night Kera threw up in her bed. In the morning she came into my room and said there was "red stuff" on her bed. I go in there to see a very unpleasant site. She had thrown up all over her bed and it had all dried up. (Sorry for the graphic image). I found it a little odd that she had done that. But she seemed just fine that morning. So after washing all of her bedding, I kept a close eye on her throughout the day. No strange behavior from her. She was fine for another whole day, so I think it's just a fluke. But sure enough, she wakes me up Thursday morning and says her tummy hurts. It's about 5 a.m. at this time. So I take her into the bathroom where she throws up. I put her back in bed, and she's still saying her tummy hurts, and then she has to go potty(diarrhea). Okay, so finally I get her to go back to sleep. Later when she wakes up she's fine. By fine I mean bouncing around acting as if she had never felt sick at all. So the rest of the day goes smoothly (although a few more loose stool episodes.) Then Friday morning she's fine and is doing well again until she wakes up Saturday morning saying her tummy hurts once again. She proceeds to throw up again (it's about 5 a.m. this time too). She throws up again a few minutes later. Then she goes back to sleep and when she wakes up around 10 a.m., fine. No problems. The whole day she's great, and Sunday is fine all day. Monday goes smoothly, no real problems, just some mild diarrhea. Then this morning she comes into my room about 6 a.m. and says her tummy hurts again. I'm thinking no way can she be doing this again. It seemed like this was over with. But nope, she goes to the bathroom and throws up. I go put her back in bed and when she woke up later that morning, guess what? Just fine. She's been fine all day long. So I'm just waiting to see what tomorrow morning brings, or doesn't bring. I don't know. I'm really stumped on this one. Nobody else in our family has gotten sick. I can't figure out what could be wrong. If any of you out there may have any ideas or have ever experienced this before, let me know! I'm taking her to the doctor tomorrow to see if they can figure it out. I'll post an update after she sees the doctor, if there's anything they can tell me.

Martina McBride

Dave and I had a fun weekend together. We were wanting to spend some time together before the baby comes next month (can't believe it's so soon), and we thought about going to Park City and staying overnight somewhere, but instead we decided a concert would be fun. So after looking at the concert schedules, we decided (okay I decided and Dave agreed) that this would be a good concert to go to. There were a few others he would've liked to see more, but this was one of the few concerts on the weekend. Once we got there, however, we saw that one of Dave's favorite singers, and I really like him too, Robert Earl Keane, is coming on the 27th with Dave Matthews Band. So we might be going to another one here soon.
This concert was a lot of fun. They started with a country singer named Chris Young. I'd never heard of him, but I guess he has a couple top 40 songs. Then Jack Ingram, also a bigger named country singer and who I believe won an award this year for one of his songs, played. Then of course the reason everyone came, Martina came out and put on a great show. The concert was at the USANA amphitheater in West Valley. This was my first time seeing a concert there. I really liked it because it was outside and the seats were all pretty close to the stage. We were able to score really good seats at the last minute too. Fourth row! All these pictures are taken from my seat. We had a fun time rockin out to Martina, and I even got Dave listening to her CD in the car the next day! Dave's sister Carrie and her husband watched the kids overnight for us, so we were able to go to Leatherby's afterwards, and we slept in the next day. It was nice being lazy all day and having the place to ourselves. So we could've stayed at a fancy hotel, but this was even better! At the bottom are a few of the songs she sang at the concert.

Up close shot of Martina

No this isn't me doing bunny ears to Dave. The person behind us thought they'd be funny and tried to mess up the picture. You can see the lady smiling about it behind us.



This is Jack Ingram getting deep with the lyrics

Woo hoo, girl power
Showing off her amazing vocal range

"Blessed"


"My Baby Loves Me"


"This one's For the Girls"

"Strangers"

Pioneer Day at Bear Lake

On the 24th we went with our friends Jeremy and Heidi to Bear Lake. It was our first time visiting Bear Lake. I've heard from other people that this is a beautiful place, but being there and seeing it was better than I imagined. This is one of Utah's hidden treasures! I love this place. It reminded me of being at the beach. There were even small waves that came onto shore from the boats and jet skis riding around. And the sand was fun for the kids to play in. I recommend this place to anyone who lives in Utah and wants to feel like they're at the beach, without having to drive to a coastal state to get there. Our kids had a blast and spent the whole day playing in the water. They loved this little water hole that they're in where the water was warmer and the sand was extra messy. The only misshap that day was when we lost Kera! A good trip is not complete without losing one of your kids, right? :) We were all sitting and relaxing on the beach talking when I looked up and couldn't see Kera. Jacob was playing in the water, but I didn't see Kera. Then I tried to think of the last time I saw her, and then I started to panic because I hadn't noticed she was gone, but it had been about 10-15 minutes when I saw her last. She was right behind our spot chasing the sea gulls. Dave had dozed off in his chair and after remarking to Jeremy and Heidi that I couldn't find Kera, he suddenly opened his eyes and we all started looking for her. A few minutes before this I had taken her life jacket off because she wasn't playing in the water, she was just running around on the sand. Of course this had me worried even more that she'd gotten back in the water and drowned or something. So we ran around calling her name, and soon others around us noticed we had lost a child and they started to help us look for her. Some people close by us said they saw her about 10 minutes ago. So we all spread out and were looking for her. Jeremy and Heidi got on the 4 wheeler and were driving around. I didn't think she would go too far away, but I started walking down along the water asking people if they'd seen her. After about 5 minutes of panic and searching, one of the ladies helping us look said, "is that her?" She was about 50 feet from me and a woman was holding her. I ran to her and thanked the kind woman profusely. I grabbed Kera and asked her and couldn't believe she'd gone so far away from us. (Probably about a half mile away from our chairs). She was drinking a Capri Sun that the lady gave her and didn't look too worried. I thought for sure she'd be in tears, but no, she was just fine sipping her drink. The lady said she was wandering around and since she wasn't with an adult, she had Kera stay there with her and wait for someone to get her. When I asked Kera why she had gone so far away she said because she wanted to find a place where the kids weren't mean to her. Earlier that day there was a girl by us who came and dumped water on Kera and told her this was her lake, and she couldn't be there. This really had upset Kera, and she had cried about it. So this is why she went away from us, to get away from the mean girl apparently. Well, despite this scary experience, we had a great day at the "beach"/lake. We went to a little drive in place there on the beach that had great raspberry shakes (what Bear Lake is known for) and good burgers. The onion rings were delicious too! It's called LaBeau's (sp?) Anyway, a it was a good way to spend the Pioneer Holiday. Thanks for the invite Jeremy and Heidi!

I have to explain about the one of Dave and his friend Jeremy on the 4 wheeler. They had to ride on this one together back to the RV park where Heidi's dad had the other 4 wheeler. Heidi and I were laughing at the two of them together on one 4 wheeler. I also don't know why some of these pictures are on here twice. That's the way the grid came out and I didn't know how to fix it. Also, don't look too closely at my big belly or Dave with his shirt off. :)