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Sunday, February 17, 2013

Valentine's Day

Last week was a bit of a whirlwind as I returned to work after being out with the flu for nearly a week. Work is always busy, but especially last week while I tried to play catch up. I had to work yesterday too for an event, so a one-day 'weekend' doesn't quite feel like enough and I'm already dreaming about 5 pm on Friday.

With Valentine's and a crazy work week, I wasn't really on my A-game in the mom department. I baked cherry chocolate chip cookies for Kathryn's class on Valentine's Eve, packaged them in a regular Zip Lock bag and wrote a Valentine's message with a Sharpie on each kiddo's and teacher's bag in her class. 

There was nothing cute about them, but Kathryn was the only one who handed out homemade Valentine's, so I should get some mom points for that one, right?
Valentine's Eve, in her favorite nightgown from Nana


 All ready for her Valentine's Tea Party at school
E. J. and I were really excited because we had the rare opportunity for a night out, which also fell on Valentine's Day. We went to a Lyle Lovett and Robert Earl Keen concert, which was great!

After work I picked up Kathryn, we made our way home and immediately dropped her off at my in-law's house. The concert started at 8, so we had to leave right away, eat a quick dinner out (I timed it, we ate in 11 minutes flat) and then made our way to the venue.
Speedy Valentine's dinner - can't go wrong with TexMex

The concert got out right after 11 and you would have thought it was four in the morning by the way I felt. We were home at midnight and sleeping by 12:30 am, but I'm so glad we were able to go!

My tired eyes tell the whole story - I'm not cut out for late, work night activities anymore that occur after a full day of work 
We left the concert right away, in fact the lights were still out and in true Barbara fashion, I missed two stairs and totally ate it in my heels. Thankfully no one could see my face, so I was completely anonymous after the embarrassing fall. But, I did get to take away a pretty awesome cankle and a nasty black and blue. This is the third or fourth time I've done this to my left ankle, so it's not exactly as strong as it used to be. (And after looking at that link, I realized I used "in true Barbara fashion" in 2010 too - see, it really is a thing. I'm terribly clumsy).

Despite the minor injury and lack of sleep, it was a great Valentine's Day spent with my loves. 

Sunday, February 10, 2013

Coming Back to Life

I can't believe it has been over three weeks since my last post. For the last two weeks, our house has been plagued with sickness (thus far, E. J. has been able to dodge all illnesses. Lucky dog.).

It started at the beginning of last week when I got a call from K's school that she was being sent home with a fever, which was on top of the cough that she already had. We were lucky to get into the doctor's office, despite it being really late in the day (4:30 appointment - we were finally out of there at 6:30).

Since Kathryn has been a regular at the doctor's office since August (coughs, fevers, ear infections) she's pretty well known. She received the VIP treatment that day. The nurses made a sign for her on the exam room door.
Luckily, she's been free of ear infections for the past two months and it turned out to just be a regular ole' cold. Lots of rest and three days at home after finally being fever free, she was back at school.
Next up, my turn. I ended up having the same cough last week and that escalated over the weekend. I had a sinus infection that made me feel like my head was going to explode every waking moment. Getting to sleep was a near miracle due to the intense pain.

I ended up going to the doctor at the beginning of the week only to find out I had the flu, bronchitis, a sinus infection and then later in the week, a stomach bug as well (which I think may have just been part of the flu).

Just a few days before I went to the doctor, E. J. and I realized we were mistaken that Kathryn hadn't received her flu shot. I had her at the doctor's office with me, so I asked if she could get her shot while we were there. Kathryn is very comfortable with our doctor and the entire time was asking him if he was going to look in my eyes, my nose, my mouth, listen to my heart - the works. He said he was going to leave the room while he was still the good guy and have the nurse come in to give her the flu shot.

Naturally, she cried a bit after her shot and was still a little weepy when we were on our way out. Our doctor saw her and offered a lolly pop for her bravery. Of course, she accepted the lolly pop and added in a "You got me Dr. 'insert our doctor's name here"...meaning "you really tricked me and caught me off guard with that shot". When did she turn 25?!
My world for a week
The flu is no joke (and no, after years of getting the flu shot, I never got around to getting it this year). I can't recall ever being this sick (there were some deep, dark moments), but I guess that's what the flu will do to you (every single, freakin' symptom of the flu!).  It wasn't until this afternoon (10 days after I started feeling sick) that I'm actually feeling like myself again.

I'm SO happy to be feeling like a functioning human and join the living once again. Now my next challenge...work. I haven't been in nearly a week and I'm a little scared to find out what this week will be like as I attempt to "catch up".

Kathryn's really into doing "cheers" lately with her glass at dinner, so I'm going to throw out a virtual cheers: Here's to a VERY healthy rest of 2013 and that Kathryn's mommy makes it out of this work week alive ;).