Not Quite Like the Spring Breaks in College

I think I've mentioned before that my family lives all over the country.  We are in Los Angeles, both of our parents are in Florida, Andy's brother is in Rhode Island, my sister Beth lives in Virgina and Megan in Wisconsin.  As you can imagine this makes it pretty difficult to get together for family dinners.  That's why last year when we went on the cruise it was so great because my sisters and I got to hang out with each others families.  I love that our kids got to play together for a week.  I wish we could do it more often, but it's so expensive to travel with five people and my girls have only recently gotten to the point where I don't mind traveling with them.  They are easier now.  They can be entertained by an iPad for two hours, and I can actually read a book without being in the bathroom.    

I decided a few months ago that we needed to go visit Megan in Wisconsin, because I haven't been to see her longer than anyone else.  She's been here to Los Angeles for one reason or another, so we have seen each other, but it was our turn to visit her and her family.  We decided the girls' spring break would be a good time.  You know, because as the rest of the country is taking their spring break to escape the cold, why not be the people going right to the heart of it!  And oh my sweet baby Jesus was it effing cold!  Or as I liked to refer to it- real life "Frozen".

Let me start by saying, I do not like the cold.  Nope, never have.  I don't mind it for a day or two, but winters in Boston during college may have kept me from getting to a class or two.  Who the hell wanted to go out when it  was 10 below and so windy that I could walk at a 45 degree angle?  I liked the snow, when it was snowing or right after, but the grey black shit it turned into in the city was not so pretty.  When we would finally get a slightly warm sunny day in March, I was that person in shorts and a tank top running around yelling "what a GORGEOUS DAY!"  In fact I believe I used to call those sort of days, "orgasmic".   That's why living in Los Angeles is perfect for me.  Our coldest winter day is 50 degrees.  Perhaps it gets colder at night, but I'm inside with the heat on under a blanket.

 My sister Megan is the opposite.  When she looked for places to go to college she sought out every good college in the tundra.  She eventually chose Marquette in Milwaukee, WI.  Since then her family has moved to the middle of Wisconsin to a little, and I stress the word little, town called Stevens Point.  That is were we went for spring/still winter there break.

How hot and dry our winter has been here in L.A. is just how cold and wet the winter has been there in Stevens Point.  Her girls didn't go to school for three days because it was TOO COLD TO GO OUTSIDE!  W..T..F?  I will admit I was looking forward to a little cold and some snow for a few days though, since it had been so hot here.  Plus she had heat and hot chocolate so we were all good.

We had to fly into Minnesota, because there is not close airport to my sister.  Well, not one that doesn't charge an extra $300 per ticket to get to it.  That was fine though because Minneapolis has something that I would never make a trip to go see.  Since we were there though, the Mall of America was a sight worth  seeing.

We got in on Monday night and drove the three and a half hours to my sisters house, arrived around 1am and unloaded the sleeping children from the car.  That's when it started.  Lana complained about a sore throat.  Crap.  I just brushed it off to traveling and it being late and her being tired.  The next morning she was still saying her throat hurt and she didn't feel well.  I gave her some Motrin and we went about our day.  The kids played outside in the snow and came in for some hot chocolate.  All seemed fine. It wasn't until we were sitting in the movie theater that afternoon enjoying the new Muppet movie that I noticed Lana totally spacing out.  It only took me one swipe of her forehead to know she had a raging fever.  Crap, crap, crap.

When we got back to Megan's I gave her more Motrin and she rested for a bit.  I had hopes that perhaps this would be a quick fever.  She would get over it by the morning.  I should have known better considering that Georgia had a fever two weeks before that lasted four and a half days.  The good news was we were at a family members house and not a hotel in Hawaii.  (So help me, if one of them ends up with a fever at the hotel in Hawaii next month.)

For most of the week we layed low and the kids played.  My sister has a gorgeous house with a gigantic playroom.  Not to mention a workout room where Andy and I could escape to get our exercising in and finish the first season of Orange is the New Black. (OMG! That show!!) It was fabulous in that aspect.  It was not so fabulous that Lana's fever continued the ENTIRE TIME WE WERE THERE.  We didn't let it stop us to much.  When we wanted to do something we would give her some Motrin and the fever would go away enough for her to enjoy the outing to the cheese factory, or the half an hour I spend with them building Baby Buttons the snowman. 

The Cheese Factory

Time to make the cheddar!

"Do you want to build a snowman?"-you know you were all thinking it.

So maybe there wasn't A LOT of snow to make a big one.

But this is one bad ass selfie I took!

 The only symptom she seemed to have was the fever.  And no, I didn't take her to the doctor for a number of reasons.  Georgia had the same fever and it went away, so I assumed this would do the same.  Plus every time I've gone to the pediatrician for a fever he's said, "it's a virus.  It will be gone within a week.  $25 copay please." So I figured what was the point? Plus Megan is a nurse and she didn't seem to be alarmed so I didn't feel I should be either.

The end of the week is when we went to The Mall of America.  Unfortunately, Lana STILL had the fever, but the mall has an American Girl store (not to mention the amusement park and mini golf course inside).  Aunty Megan had promised Lana she would buy her a birthday present there and dammit, no stupid fever was keeping that girl from American Girl.  So we dosed her with more Motrin for her to feel better and off we went.  Oh!  I forgot about the aquarium that's inside the mall too.  You guys this mall is CA-RAZY.  I've never seen anything like it.  Like I said, I would have never made a special trip, but I'm glad we got to go and see it.

An amusement park INSIDE a mall.  Similar to a chicken cooked inside a duck inside a Turkey.

Poor Lana!  She looks so terrible here.

So we did the aquarium, and American Girl.  We rode some rides at the amusement park, had lunch and then Lana started to go way downhill.  She was tired, cranky and obviously getting the fever back.  We were going home the next day thankfully, at which point I would take her to the doctor because it had just gone on for so long.

Andy and I were dreading the flight home the next day, because Lana had started complaining of ear pain.  I was positive it was an ear infection.  However, the problem these days is that they don't treat ear infections all the time like they used to when we were kids.  So even if that is what she had, I wasn't sure she was going to get anything anyway.  Still getting on a plane with a kid with an ear infection was not top of my bucket list.  However, short of renting a car and driving for three days, there was no way else to get back to Burbank.

I did give her benadryl for the first flight, which resulted in her falling asleep the entire flight. Phew!  The second flight I didn't give her anything but the Motrin and she fell asleep anyway and didn't complain of ear pain the entire time, which I found odd.  Maybe she didn't have an ear infection after all.

First thing Monday morning I took her to see the pediatrician.  I told him all the symptoms and said I was waiting hoping the fever would just go on it's own.  He assured me I did the right thing.  Then he took one look in her ears and described them as "miserable".  Oh.  Well, then. My mother of the year award should be arriving soon.

Did I still do the right thing?  And how come she didn't have terrible pain  on the plane?  Well here's a little tidbit for all you flying with kids.  Their ears bother them less with an ear infection on the plane.  When they have an infection their ears fill with puss where there would otherwise be pockets of air.  When we fly that air builds pressure until it pops.  If there is something filling that space, like the puss, there's no pressure and it doesn't hurt.  Who knew?! Still he said I was in the right to wait out the fever, but he was prescribing an antibiotic and suggesting I give her double doses that day. This is a doctor who is usually conservative about giving out the antibiotics, so I knew this was bad.

By the next day Lana's fever had gone down, and then came back for a bit.  I panicked and called the Dr again.  They assured me that I needed to give it a couple days to work properly.  By Wednesday night she seemed to be completely better even though low on energy.  Either way I was sending her to school on Thursday.  I half expected to get a call from the school nurse at some point, but fortunately I did not.  She managed to make it through the day and even to Girl Scouts.  She was exhausted by bed time and it took her through the weekend to get back to "normal".  She was spacing out and seemed to not hear us from time to time, although I'm not entirely sure that wasn't selective.  I'm just thankful she's better.  

I'm not usually the mom that freaks out just because her kid has a fever, because I have three kids who have had many fevers.  However, they have never had one that lasted so long and if I'm being honest I may have started to freak out by Tuesday just a bit.  She's completely better now, but slightly cranky and sensitive.  I guess being catered to for that long and not having to do chores will make going back to real life sucky.  And because I'm such a nice sister and was taught to share, we shared our germs with my nieces and both of them got the fever as well.  Fortunately, they never got quite as sick and were better within a couple days.  Still don't say I never shared anything with you Megan!  

Thanks so much for the hospitality!  We had a fantastic time despite the sick kid, and the cold wasn't THAT bad.  In fact it was quite a bit of fun, but only because I got to come back to the warm sunshine.  

For My Little Sister

This particular blog post is dedicated to my sister, Megan, and her family.  A couple of days ago they had to put their beloved, almost ten year old dog to sleep.  It was very unexpected.  One day he was fine, the next he wasn't.  They had him at the vet where they discovered his kidneys were failing and within two days he was gone.  Having gone through putting Jazzy to sleep last year, I know how hard this is for everyone in their family.  Megan has two little girls who I've mentioned on here before when they came to visit last Thanksgiving.  Lucy is five days older than Georgia and Vivian is two and a half.  For the most part Vivian doesn't really get it.  They don't understand at that age.  Lucy, however, was beside herself about losing little Frankie.

I was on the phone with Megan on Tuesday.  I kept checking in with her to see how he was doing, because the vet was trying to flush out his kidneys to see if they could get him better.  Unfortunately, he was to far gone and things were looking bleak. They made plans to take him in on Wednesday morning to help him get to doggie heaven.  While I was on the phone with Megan, I heard Lucy in the background sobbing.  Now, keep in mind, hearing each others kids crying on the phone is a daily normal occurrence.  It's one of the only reasons I can really only talk to my sisters during the day.  There have been times where we are on the phone not talking to each other, but disciplining our kids at the same time.  It's actually kind of funny, and makes me thankful for my sisters and the fact that we can share our parenting experiences.

After hearing the crying in the background, I asked my sister what she was crying about.  Because, believe me, most of the time it's trivial, with any of our kids.  This time was different.   Megan informed me she had been upset on and off all day about Frankie dying.  For a moment Megan started to try and console Lucy as I listen on the phone near tears myself.  Lucy doesn't understand why Frankie has to die and Megan tries to explain to her that he's a dog and dogs don't live as long as humans do.

"But why?" Lucy wants to know.

"Because that's just how it is," Megan tells her.  "Humans live a lot longer than dogs.  We were hoping Frankie had more time with us, but he doesn't.  I know it's sad."

Lucy starts to cry again, but after about a minute she stops long enough to ask my sister a question,

"Is Vivian a human?"

Awwwwww!!!  She was worried about losing her little sister!  Or maybe she was hoping for it.  I can't be sure of which, but when Megan assured her that her sister was indeed human she seemed to be relieved.

It's so hard for our little ones to process losing something they love so much.  We had a difficult time with Sonya and then Lana last year after Jazz died.  The good thing about kids though, is they bounce back from it quicker than we do and in no time are asking for a new pet.

For Megan and her family that might take a while.  I should mention that losing their dog was just icing on a stress filled cake for them.  Megan's husband got a job transfer and even though it's only a couple hours from where they are now, they still have to sell their house, pack up and move within the next couple months.  This is something they were aware would happen, but Matt is already at his new job two hours away leaving my sister to play the role of single mother.  She also has to  ready the house to put on the market.  So losing the dog right now was the suckiest timing possible.  Life likes to do that though.  Make bad situations worse.  Kick us when we're down.   I only wish I lived near her so I could help her out with the kids, or the house or whatever.  I guess that was the point of this post.  She always reads my blog which I appreciate so much.  This is just my way to empathize with her and let her know, I am always her for her, even in shitty times.

I might not be able to be with you physically to help, but a good bitch session via phone with  a glass of wine will always do wonders! I love you little sissy.  Chin up!  Things will always get better.   

Family Reunion

I thought I should let you know that posting might be light for the next week, in case you come here looking for your daily fix and find nothing new. I like to try and write at least three times a week, but on Wednesday half my family will be in town, and some staying with us. So it's going to be ten times the crazy around here. More stories, I'm sure, but less time to write. Or less quiet. Probably both.

The reason for the pseudo family reunion is due to the recent passing of my paternal grandmother. Now before any of you become extremely sad or sorry for me, believe me when I tell you this was for the best. Grandma had Alzheimer's for the past ten years. She's been in a home for the last three, and hasn't really been with us for at least that amount of time. A few weeks ago she suffered a stroke and it was down hill from there. It was a blessing when she passed away last Saturday morning, for her and for my Grandfather who has been in limbo ever since he put her in the home three years ago. He was never really able to mourn her and move on since she was still here physically, but mentally it's been a long time. So when she passed away it was not a surprise and somewhat of a relief, I think for my Grandfather especially. Since my Grandparents lived near me, well my Grandpa still does, the memorial will be here this coming Saturday. This means my parents, my youngest sister, and her family are coming to visit. I bought six bottles of wine on Saturday.

I'm kidding! Sort of. I really did buy that much wine, but I'm actually very excited for them to come visit, and we like to drink wine when we get together. My parents try to come a few times a year, but I don't ever really get to see my sisters, especially now that we all have kids. I am sad that Beth won't be able to make it, because she has a belly full of baby ready to pop in about 4 weeks. Megan will be here with my nieces and her husband though. Since Vivian is still new to this life, I have yet to meet her. Lucy I've only met once when we all went to Florida last year. She and Georgia are just 5 day apart, so it should be quite a circus when everyone is here. Megan and her family are staying with us, but my parents are smart and staying in a hotel. Well also because my house is not big enough for everyone, but I'm thinking I may steal their hotel key one night and head over there myself. Then again, I do have my six bottles of wine to keep me sane.

So, while my Grandmother's passing is a bit sad, it's also happy because I get to see my family for a little while. Her death also made Sonya ask a few questions, which I had to field. This is the first time we've ever had to deal with any kind of death. Luckily, she didn't ask too much. She didn't really know my Grandma at all, because she was about three when she went into the home. Lana was just a baby and I don't think G ever met her. Sonya has faint memories of her though, because she did ask me once, a few months back, why Great Grandma never came to visit us with Great Grandpa anymore. I explained a little about the nursing home at the time. When I told her about everyone coming to visit this week, she was curious as to why they were all coming at the same time. I told her that Great Grandma died and went to heaven.

"What does that mean?"

"It means, Great Grandma died. She's not here with us anymore," I told her.

"And now she's in Heaven?" she asked.

"Yes."

She thought about this for a minute then said, "Poor Great Grandpa. He doesn't have a mom anymore."

HA! I'm sure Grandma would have loved that. "No, no Sonya," I said. "Great Grandma was Great Grandpa's wife, not his mom."

"Oh," she said. "Then where is his mom?"

Like I said, we haven't really had to deal with death at all. Just for the record, I'm not complaining about that.

Well, I do have a great story to share with you all when I get a moment, but for the next couple of days I have to prepare for everyone to get here. Then once they're here, who knows when I'll have a moments peace. It'll be a fun, crazy good time, with a tinge of sadness on Saturday when we reflect on the passing of Grandma. I really am looking forward to it. The hanging out with my family part, I mean. Why else would I buy six bottles of wine?