Scratch that...

...fever's back...

Do I dare say I see some light?

After sleeping 16 hours yesterday, Ainsley took a nap at 4:00pm. I actually didn't figure she'd take a nap since she slept until 12:15pm, but she laid right down and didn't complain at all! I have no idea how long she would have slept. The girl's had a jewelry party at Leah's and her husband was out of town, so Clint picked Will up and brought him home about 5:30. As soon as Will walked in he grabbed my hand and started saying, "Come own...Ainseeey!" So, we went to wake Ainsley up. She was in a very deep sleep so I bet she would have slept quite a while! She was SO excited to see Will, though. When Caleb got into town, he came over and hung out with Clint and the kids. From the little bit I've heard, they had a pretty eventful night! I think it had just been too long since the kids had played with each other and they were extra hyper! :)

Anyway, the good news is that she had no more fever after the low grade she woke up with yesterday morning. (Yes, I'm knocking on wood!) She also slept almost 12 hours last night too, so I think she's catching back up. She has a terrible cough, but it sounds like it's breaking up and her poor little voice is starting to come back too.

I'm just so excited that we may be able to go somewhere with her this weekend. We were wanting to take a small trip somewhere, but with her being sick and not knowing if she'd get better, we didn't plan anything. So, we'll probably just find some fun activities around here or something....if she stays feeling well. And many of you may be impressed to know that with all of the sickness, it's been 10 days since I've been to Wal-Mart! I've been up to Harp's once just for milk, but I have been super resourceful with the groceries in my pantry! (And for those who don't know, I cook every night so my pantry is about empty!) I can't believe it, but I'm actually ready to go grocery shopping!

I have a few pictures that I'll try to post later.

Hibernation?

Ainsley fell asleep at 8:30pm last night and slept until 12:15pm today! (Yes, that's noon!) 16 hours!!! As soon as I walked in her room she said, "I want chips!" She still has a fever, though. I'm waiting for the on-call nurse to call me back. She's had a high fever non-stop since Monday. I don't think this is normal, even for a virus, so I'm thinking about taking her to a different doctor. We'll see what the nurse says, though...

Too much fever!

Isn't it funny to think that you can get sick while you're sick? Ainsley has started coughing now. Her doctor said with all of the fluid that she may develop a sinus infection too, so I guess it has made it's friendly arrival! If only it could have waited a few hours, though. After hearing her cough off and on all night, I woke up at 2:30 to a coughing spell in the monitor. Clint went to the guest room and I brought Ainsley in bed with me. I was already prepared with 5 different bottles of medicine (cough syrup, acetaminophen, ibuprofen, allergy medicine, and the antibiotics) a thermometer, extra sippie cup of water, wet washcloth, and paper towels in case she spit the medicine out! So, I started working on trying to get her fever down from 104. I had the wet washcloths on her legs and forehead, giving her ice cold water, and both a dose of each fever reducer. Finally about 4:45 she fell asleep....for 3 hours. Her fever came back mid-morning and took forever to break again! She was so wound up from lack of sleep and all the medicine that I just couldn't get her to calm down enough to take a nap. So, I started rocking her and spanking her when she'd start squirming. It took almost 2 hours and I almost lost it, but she's sleeping good now!

We missed dance class, but Clint stayed home yesterday morning so I could at least go to bible study. Now we're going to miss activities at church tonight too, but since there's no school Friday so I guess we have all week to recover! I'm just SO tired! If I could just get her fever to go away I could get through it, but with a fever she just won't sleep. (Especially not one that high) Well, I think my quiet time is up....I'm hearing noises.... :)

Not Again!!!

Yes, Ainsley is sick....again! She was doing fine this morning; just happily playing with her toys. I had no reason to suspect anything until right before lunch. I thought she might feel a little warm, but nothing registered. Then I took it again before her nap and it was 103.4 - under her arm! We went to the doctor this afternoon and she has another ear infection. This is the 3rd since mid-July. I'm just so discouraged! Why my child? The one who's favorite food is broccoli and chicken, drinks more milk than any kid I know, takes vitamins, Pediasure, etc.? She's sick every other week and it's so draining! I asked the doctor today about her immune system and why she gets such a high fever with any little bug or infection. I was ready to check her white blood cell count today, but she just told me (again) that I had nothing to worry about. Nothing? She has a fever over 103 every 2 weeks and I shouldn't worry? When she started talking about tubes, though, I did stand my ground and insist that we get her allergies under control first. The Claritin doesn't seem to be working anymore (nor does the honey) so I have her on Zyrtec now. Maybe if we can get her allergies under control the ear infections will disappear and maybe give her immune system a little boost? One can only hope!

Ok, now that I got that out of my system, we had a good time with "Mimi" and "Bapa" this weekend. They stayed at my sister's house the first night and came over here about 5:00pm on Saturday evening. Clint was mowing when they got here so we went to Sonic and picked up some burgers and ice cream. When we got back, Clint told us there was a huge turtle in the backyard. Thinking that we had a cute, little turtle I said, "Let's go look at it!" Ok, we do have 2 ponds close to our home, but each is across the street. PLUS our yard is fenced in AND Clint had just finished mowing. So, I'm already wondering how a turtle made it into our yard, but never in a million years would I have expected the huge dinosaur I was greeted by in our back yard!
Oh, and did I mention that my dad is crazy? This is a little leaf in his hand. This was a massive snapping turtle that almost bit his hand off....4 times! You should have seen the tail on this thing! Now, if this doesn't prove that evolution doesn't exist, I don't know what does. This animal was definitely prehistoric....look at the horns on its tail! Anyway, it was very aggressive so Clint and my dad had to scoop it into the garden cart and dump it into the empty lot across the street. We're hoping it will make it back to the pond behind Seth and Kelsy's house. (Sorry, guys!)


On a completely different note, Clint loved the Lincoln Logs that I bought at the garage sale so much that he took Ainsley to Wal-Mart Saturday morning and bought another set. He said one set wasn't enough to build anything really cool, so he had to get some more! (He paid 10 times as much, though!) They have been building forts together every night. Ainsley loves it SO much when they're finished and she gets to "Ready, go!" and knock it over. :)

An Exciting Friday

I thought I'd better blog today in case my friend Rachel checks! (Ha!)

So, my secret is out...my 2 year old plays with makeup! This picture was taken a couple of days ago. If Ainsley is awake while I'm trying to get ready in the mornings, she sits up on the vanity with me and does "her" makeup. Now, usually this consists of her little makeup bag full of brushes and chapstick, but I guess I wasn't paying attention this day because she found my marathon water proof mascara! She was putting it on SO carefully and actually had a fairly even coat on her lashes...aside from everything on her forehead!


Ainsley had "school" this morning and I thought this was pretty cute. She was just walking around eating her breakfast bar, but she just looked so cute!

So, since Ainsley was at school, I stopped at a few garage sales on the way home. I got some really great stuff! And since Ainsley has been such a good girl lately, sleeping in her big girl bed and all, I picked up a few cheap toys too. One of Ainsley's favorite things was this backpack thing full of little stuffed medieval dolls. Half of them were from Rugrats, and the other half were teddy bears, but they were all dressed up like princesses and knights. It was only $2 for about 8 or 9 dolls, so I thought it would be fun even if she only played with the dolls.

Well, I was wrong! Her favorite part of the set was the backpack that looks like a castle. The little drawbridge is a zipper and it has places for all of the dolls to "sleep" inside. She had all kinds of babies in that thing and refused to take it off! She wore it all afternoon....















I also got this big set of Lincoln Logs for $2. I was so happy when I got to school and Ainsley's teacher said she had been playing with the blocks all day! So, we got them out as soon as we got home and they were a big hit! (Even with Daddy!) Here's the fort we built...complete with windows and a ladder.







I am SO excited! I enrolled Ainsley in dance lessons today! So, since she was super good at school (even napped for the first time this school year) we went into town and bought her uniform....the standard black leotard, pink tights, and little pink Capezio ballet shoes.
She was super excited to put her "dancing" shoes on and she looked adorable!

I just can't wait for her to go to her first class on Tuesday! It's going to be expensive, especially around recital time, but it's a LOT cheaper than the only other place that accepts 2 year olds. And the biggest plus? It's only a mile from our house! Check out those teeny little ballet shoes!

In addition to this being our first Connection Group meeting and expecting a very large crowd of close to 20 adults, my parents are coming into town this weekend. They're staying with my sister tonight, but I think they'll be staying with us tomorrow. I'm already stressed about Sunday. Clint's on praise team so it will be late when he gets home and I'm cooking all of the food and getting the games and such ready. At least with Mom's Day Out this morning I had time to do the floors! I'm sure I'll update with pictures from the weekend later.

A Big Girl!

Well, we're almost over all of these little viruses. Ainsley still has a runny nose, but no fever in a 8 days now! Thank goodness she's feeling better because otherwise I'm not sure that the toddler bed would be working out as well. On a normal night, she has been sleeping 10-11 hours and a 2-3 hour nap. I'm not complaining! The funny thing is, she climbs in and out of it during the day, but she won't even think about getting out of bed when she's supposed to be sleeping. I can put her down and it might take her an hour to fall asleep, but she never leaves the bed. That's not the funniest part, though! She will also wait for me in the mornings/after nap before getting out of bed. But she won't let me pick her up. She says "No, I get down!" Today she took a really short nap so I decided to see if she'd go back to sleep. Nope! She laid in bed singing for almost AN HOUR and didn't get up until I opened the door! All I was hoping for was that she'd get used to sleeping with a pillow and blanket before the real furniture gets here, but she's definitely exceeded my expectations! (Here's a picture of her reading before bed)

I have been SO busy lately! Does anybody else feel this way? Seriously, we've had something to go to every single day for the last 3 weeks. (Weekends and all) So, finally, I have nothing planned tomorrow. I can't wait to have 1 day at home to get some things done! And I know Ainsley will enjoy it. Every time she gets started playing with something, we have to leave. I don't think she has stepped foot in her toy room all week! I need to work on the "stay-at-home" part of being a mom! :) Now I just have to figure out what I want to do with my day while Ainsley's at school on Friday!

One last thing, if you haven't seen the pictures from the day Ainsley got to babysit her baby cousin Hailey, you should check them out! She had a great time!

Can she really be sick again?

So, it's summer. I thought there was an unwritten rule that kids don't get sick as much in the summer, but apparently all sick rules are null and void in the Bean household! When I went to pick Ainsley up from the nursery at church Sunday morning, I noticed one of the workers in the hall holding a little boy that had been in Ainsley's room earlier that morning. She told me that the parents had brought him in with a fever! Granted, the parent's may not have known that he had a fever, but that still doesn't erase the fact that the kid was spreading his feverish germs all over my child! So, I left that morning thinking that we actually might have a chance. After all, Ainsley is still on antibiotics from her ear infection and she just had the stomach bug a few days earlier. We should be good, right?

WRONG! About 11:00 Monday morning, after playing with her friend Michael for 2 hours, we were getting ready to go meet some friends at the pool when I felt of her burning forehead. It wasn't bad yet...around 101.5 or so. (If you know Ainsley, that's pretty low for her) So, I gave her some medicine and put her down for her nap. She slept over 3 hours and woke up with a temp of 104.5. Ugh! All I can think about is that kid in the nursery! My poor baby is shaking like she tends to do when her fever gets over 104 and I have to leave in an hour for a training class at work. I gave her a cool bath, loaded her up on medicine, and Daddy came home early with some ice cream to cool her little body down. We always have to be careful when her fever gets that high so she won't have a seizure. I couldn't break it, but I got it to 103 or so before I left. This was at least low enough that she didn't scream when I left her with Daddy. Later that night it dropped to 102, but we still didn't get it to break before bedtime. I had the guest room prepared with a flashlight, medicine, water, cool washcloth, etc. expecting to be up with her all night, but she slept for 13.5 hours!

Since then things have been better. I'm sad that there's no school for Ainsley on Friday, but I had to work yesterday so at least she got to go with me and play 1 day at school this week. Because I won't have my shopping day tomorrow, I took Ainsley shopping with me today. I've been trying to find her big girl bedding, but I think I'm being way too picky. I did get a great deal on some Stride Rites at Dillard's though! We had a fun morning together and Ainsley loved to help find her new shoes.

We converted Ainsley's bed to a toddler bed tonight! I'm SO nervous about it. She's been sleeping in until 8:30 or 9:00am every morning and I'm so scared that she's going to be up at 6:00am tomorrow! She did really well tonight. I sat by her bed and read her a book. Then I sat next to her and patted her back for quite a while until she was good and still. I listened closely in the monitor to make sure she wasn't crawling out, but I just heard her singing. It was a little later than usual when she finally fell asleep, but so far so good! Wish me luck!

Another trip to OK

My mom and dad were in Tulsa last week for a convention. Since Clint was also gone on a praise team retreat, Ainsley and I decided to go do some shopping in Tulsa on Thursday. We found some GREAT deals on clothes! And since my little angel seems to be trying to break some kind of 2-year-old height record, clothes were much needed! After shopping, my mom rode back to Ada with us and we (of course) went swimming and had a picnic by the pool!

My mom had to work on Friday, so we decided to go surprise Ainsley's aunt (Clint's sister) who she calls "Nawnaw" at her office. As we were getting ready that morning I noticed that Ainsley seemed a little warm, but nothing registered when I took her temp. We went on up to Laura's office anyway and left there about 10:45am to go surprise my mom at her office too! But, on the way, Ainsley started falling asleep in the car. At this point, I knew she was getting sick. We were almost there, though, so I called my mom and said we'd only come in for about 10 minutes or so and let Ainsley meet some of the teachers. She did great and I was even able to keep her awake on the way back to my parent's house, but not for long! She had a quick snack and took a 3.5 hour nap. (Which gave me a chance to nap too!)

Since my child gets sick every other week, I always travel with medicine, so I began alternating Tylenol and Motrin. This did pretty good until I got on the last turnpike on the way home. I just couldn't pull over to give her the medicine like I had been at the beginning of the trip, so her fever spiked again. It was 104 when we got home that evening so we left immediately for WellQuest. She had a really bad ear infection and I felt so bad for blowing it off the last two days. (I had thought it was maybe just teething) You wouldn't know she didn't feel well, though. Here's a picture of her taking a picture of the turtle at Mimi and Bapa's house before we left that morning....


Ainsley had to take a picture of the turtle too!
Originally uploaded by Clint & Mandy

So, her fever continued all day Sunday and broke Monday morning. Luckily I had a chance to go to Wal-Mart on Monday because she woke up Tuesday morning with a stomach bug! We literally laid on the bed ALL day and just lined it with towels. I lost track of how many times she threw up somewhere mid-morning. But, knock on wood, she just woke up and seems to be fine this morning!

So, I've had some eventful few days! I have to brag, though, on how well Ainsley has been doing lately! We took the paci away several weeks ago and she hasn't been sleeping very soundly since then. Plus, she stands up and cries for quite a while after we put her to bed. BUT the last couple of days she's taken good naps (at least 2 hours) and slept about 11 hours at night! It may be the medicine she's on, but even if it only lasts another week I'll be happy! I just need her to stop fighting it so we can go to a big girl bed soon!

Lastly, Mom's Day Out starts back this week and I'm SO excited! Ainsley will be in the toddler room this year and she's even eating in the cafeteria. I think she'll have so much more fun this year and her teacher from last year (Ms Christy) has moved to the toddler room! I've already made a hair appointment to pamper myself a little on this day! I think after laying in vomit all day yesterday, I deserve it! :)