A Christmas to Remember?

It's been a whirlwind week. An exhausting week. Surprisingly, Christmas isn't completely the reason I'm wiped out.

Leading up to Christmas Kathryn and I ran errands,

I did a ton of baking (here are 1 of the 8 tins of cinnamon rolls I made to go with people's gifts),

wrapped gifts, and got the house in pretty good shape, if I do say so myself.

Things were good! Kathryn was happy, I was happy enjoying my time off with my little one, and we were ready for Christmas.

And then Christmas Eve hit. Suddenly, Kathryn wasn't in a good mood and was getting fever to really top things off. We were lucky to get a few decent pictures in before heading out.

The day before she got a small pimple type thing on her tush - nothing to really be concerned about, especially being in a diaper all the time she, like other kids, are prone to them.

The pimple got bigger and turned into an infection, hence the fever. I'm not sure if there's such thing as a "cute cold/virus", but K's "sick" is far from cute. Gross, really.

Temporarily putting on a happy face while we were celebrating Christmas Eve

Reading The Night Before Christmas

Resting before Santa arrives

Christmas morning wasn't the magical picture I had painted in my head. I already knew that she wouldn't understand too much about what was going on, but the addition of a fever left K down in the dumps.

She wasn't into unwrapping gifts, but she sure was very lucky this year.

After unwrapping gifts at home, we went to my MIL's house so she could see her big gifts waiting for her there. (They'll stay at her house since she spends so much time down there while we're at work).

Lucky girl. My play kitchen certainly wasn't this advanced when I was growing up! It makes "sizzling" and "bubbling" boiling water noises when you put something pots and pans on the stove. So fancy.

Of course, every little girl needs her very own F150. It even has a working radio in it, making it just about as advanced as my 2001 Honda Civic.

Playing at home with one of her new favorite toys - an Elmo guitar

Checking out her new cowgirl boots

Christmas aftermath

The day after Christmas, we headed to the urgent care clinic since our doctor's office was closed for the holiday. After the doctor looked at her infection, they determined that the best thing to do would be to lance the infection.

Kathryn is a smart cookie and knew exactly what was coming and she wasn't happy about it. To say the least, it was so sad having to pin her down while they cut the infection open.

As soon as they finished cutting her, Kathryn firmly said in her whimpering little voice, "ALL DONE!!!". She continues to say this every time I have to even touch her bottom :(.

The only good thing this infection has done is turned my non-cuddler little girl turned into a needy, cuddly toddler. You can bet I'm taking full advantage of that.

Since then, she's been on antibiotics (which by the way, she willingly takes. Crazy! I ask her "are you ready to take your medicine to make you feel better" and she says "yup" and opens her mouth!).

I give her a few warm baths a day to soak with some antibacterial soak and then some cream. They have been doing the trick because I've been the lucky one to be around all day to get that gross junk out. And no, it's no easy task when you have a strong little girl fighting me.

I don't blame her in the least because it surely looks painful, but she's been a trooper. And really, if this had to happen, it's best that it happened now while I'm off work and can be there all day for her.

Over the past few days, I've been thrown up on twice, cleaned up lots of blood and puss (gross, but just keepin' it real, folks), and last night Kathryn took her diaper off in her crib and left us a disgusting surprise...all. over.

I've lost track of how many loads of laundry I've done to sanitize the many messes that have been made by the aforementioned disasters.

K still isn't completely back to her normal self, although we're making progress. She's still super sensitive (as seen below - she'll barely even put any pressure on her right side to avoid pain). Breaks my heart.

My solid sleeper has woken up once each night crying. I can't tell if she's in pain or it's a bad dream, but she's been enjoying some extra time in our bed, morning and night.

Cuddled with a Christmas present - her new stuffed animal and her usual entourage of 2 kitties, an owl, and her blanket.

As I was folding laundry one night, she found a pair of my cozy socks and made them her own.

Oh yeah, and you see the bottle as a reoccurring theme in a lot of these pictures. During my two weeks off, I was going to do an intervention to ween her off the bottle, but with her feeling so miserable, there was no sense in trying to make her feel even worse.

It truly hasn't been the worst week. I've so enjoyed staying at home, I just wish Kathryn was feeling more like her playful-self. Christmas 2011 was certainly a memorable one. I think next year will be a different story, especially if K isn't sick.

We're lucky that this infection was the worst problem we had on Christmas. I hope you and your family enjoyed a wonderful holiday together! Merry Christmas!