Test Results

Caroline got the results of her blood tests today - she tested positive for Celiac disease, which is a disease where the immune system reacts to gluten and causes intestinal damage which then causes the body to be unable to absorb the proper nutrients from food. The inability to absorb these nutrients causes gas to build up in the tummy, bulky yucky smelling stools and/or diarrhea, stomach pain, loss of appetite, weight loss, failure to thrive, developmental delays, etc... which explains why Caroline has not gained any weight or grown in height in the last 3 months, has a distended belly, intermittent irritability, is prone to diarrhea, etc. The good news is that with the elimination of gluten from her diet, her intestines will eventually return to normal and she will start absorbing nutrients properly again.

The bad news is we have to eliminate gluten from her diet, completely, 100%, forever. So I am racking my brain trying to figure out what I can feed her for dinner tonight since we just got this news this afternoon and I haven't been able to do any shopping -- so far I have come up with rice chex and fruit. Even the chicken nuggets she eats are breaded, so no good...

We have an appointment tomorrow afternoon with her GI doctor and with a dietician. Will blog some more then about what we find out.

New York Weekend

This weekend was our much-anticipated trip to NYC to celebrate Joel's 40th birthday - a trip that I planned back in March and managed to keep as a surprise for all of about 24 hours ;)

 We arrived Friday night and immediately began trying to eat our way through New York City in 48 hours, beginning at Sparks Steakhouse which is a famous and longstanding establishment and the place where (Joel did not tell me this until after we were seated) the Gambino family crime boss was killed in a mob hit ordered by John Gotti in 1985. While the ambience was great, we didn't think the food lived up to expectations and, also the food put Joel in the bathroom all night long so it earned a resounding thumbs down from him ;)

Saturday morning we took a 3 mile walk from our hotel near Times Square to the Upper East Side, ending up at William Greenburg's Desserts where we got some black and white cookies, hamentaschen, etc, and then took a cab ride back to the hotel and got ready to see the 2pm show of The Book of Mormon, which tickets cost an arm and a leg, but were SO WORTH IT! Best show ever! Awesome, awesome, awesome. Very excited also that The Book of Mormon is coming here to Charlotte next year, and we will very most definitely see it again then. (Hopefully the tickets will be cheaper, LOL... the tickets to the NY show cost more than our flight. It was a cheap flight but still).

After the show we headed to Tribeca for dinner to Nobu, a Japanese restaurant Joel wanted to go to because it is Howard Stern's favorite restaurant and he always talks about it on his show. We did not see Howard there. But, we had an AWESOME three hour dinner, where you order a bunch of small plates off the menu and they bring them to you one at a time so you have time to relax and enjoy each thing before they bring you the next. We were not terrifically adventurous (did not order the live octopus), but the food we did have was all totally delicious, and so were the martinis, especially the pink grapefruit one. Dinner at Nobu, also, coincidentally, more expensive than our flight. But again, SO WORTH IT! I am still salivating over the food in my head.

Sunday morning we found Magnolia bakery and bought half a dozen cupcakes, most of which made it home to the kids ;) Then we met one of Joel's high school friends, Brian, and his wife and daughter for breakfast at the Brooklyn Diner, where I had wonderfully delicious strawberry pancakes. After that we headed to Citi Field where the Mets, happily, were playing the Phillies, and the Phillies, happily, won ;) We had great seats and it was a beautiful afternoon for a baseball game!

We did have to leave early to get back to our hotel, collect our bags, and head to the airport. Having misjudged how much time that would take (I hate NY traffic) there were a few moments there where we really thought we might miss our flight home. Happily we got our boarding passes in the nick of time, scooted to the front of the security line, and made it to our gate with 10 minutes to spare before boarding even started. Phew.

We got home a little after 9:30 last night. The kids, by the way, had an awesome weekend of their own with awesome babysitter Sharon, who took them out to dinner, to Discovery Place, to the Nature Museum, to the pet store, etc. They had loads more fun than they usually have with mom and dad on a weekend ;)

And now... a rainy Monday morning in Charlotte ;)

Caroline's Ordeal

Here is Caroline after her little ordeal at the GI doctor yesterday. The doctor ordered some labs to check her nutrient absorption function, and the nurses at the lab tried twice to stick her and couldn't get any blood out :( So we had to drive over to the uptown office, coincidentally in the same building as Daddy's office, where the nurse there was MUCH better/quicker at finding Caroline's blood ;) Daddy came downstairs to witness the screamfest (Mommy had heard enough screaming for one day already by that point). We also provided a stool sample, which Daddy took to work with him this morning ;) We should know test results early next week.

Mid-Week Update

Caroline has seem improved over the last few days, at least she is less cranky and has been sleeping a lot better. But she has been eating very little... seeming to subsist for the last few days on milk and small amounts of applesauce and cheerios. Pretty much everything else offered to her receives a wail of "Noooooo.....!" and gets promptly chucked on the floor if you ignore the "no" and try to give it to her anyway. (Clara is always on standby floor cleanup duty). Tomorrow morning she has an appointment with a pediatric gastroenterologist to discuss her apparent digestive issues.

Friday Joel and I leave for New York for the weekend to celebrate Joel's birthday, leaving the kids in Sharon's capable hands until our return on Sunday night. So I am going to be running around over the next couple of days trying to get everything ready for our trip as well as get the house stocked and everything in order... Wish me luck :)

Looks Can Be Deceiving

Very cute but a major crank monster today!

Good Riddance!

Today I bid farewell to two things I don't like - spiders and the chore of scooping dog poop.

Yes we still have Clara. But the other day as I was driving the kids to preschool I noticed a pickup truck advertising a dog poop scooping business. I immediately looked it up online when I got home and begged Joel to let me sign up. For $12 a week they come every Friday to scoop the yard and they take the poop away with them ;) I figure this is perfect because the kids don't really use the back yard during the week, and it will be poop-free for the weekend. I do so hate scooping poop. And honestly I wasn't doing it as often as once a week myself :P So looking forward to my poop-scooping free life.

And the spiders! The exterminator came this morning and sprayed inside and out, and stepped on the spiders  he could find for good measure, LOL.

Not a Happy Camper

Caroline stayed home from day care on Wednesday and went back on Thursday, but today we ended up at the doctor's office in a quest to find out what had made her night last night and her morning today so miserable... she has been a VERY cranky baby! No ear infection, no strep infection, nothing but her usual big gassy belly. (For which we've now gotten a referral to see GI). I took her back to day care which probably improved her mood all by itself - she HATES the doctor's office now!

Maybe if I hide in the corner and stay very still no one will notice me....

Tires, Spiders, Fevers... Oh My ;)

First let me start off by saying that today is Joel's 40th birthday -- happy birthday Joel! We are going away for the weekend later this month to celebrate the occasion in proper style, but for today we did go out for dinner and Pinkberry!

Now, for the rest of my day:

1. Took my car in for the annual state inspection only to be told it wouldn't pass without four new tires. $517 later I have a clean inspection report and shiny new tires. I feel as though when you spend $517 on something, it should be something a little more exciting than tires. Sigh.

2. Had a termite inspection which did not turn up any termites, but turned up a whole family of black widow spiders living in my garage. Mommy spiders, baby spiders, cute little black widow egg sacs.... We actually came across a couple of them while cleaning out the garage the other week and had this conversation:
JOEL: Are you sure that's not a black widow?
ME: Do you want to flip it over to look at it's stomach? Because I don't.
JOEL: Uh, no.
So now we are having an exterminator come out on Friday. (Joel wanted to know why I did not have the termite inspector take care of it right then and I said, because I wanted to make sure I didn't get ripped off! So I got two quotes... I thought Joel would be proud of me. Turns out he prefers immediate black widow riddance - who knew?) Now the kids (and Joel) are afraid to go into the garage and are making me park my car on the driveway. Double sigh.

3. As if my day hadn't been complicated by enough unforeseen problems, I got a call from Caroline's day care at 4pm that she had a 102 degree fever and I needed to come get her. Triple sigh :(

Springtime!

After getting a late start this year, I'd say springtime has officially arrived! The flowers are blooming, my kids are wearing shorts more often than not, and everything is covered with an obnoxious layer of neon green pollen.

Weekend Update

We had a busy weekend with the usual kind of activities - flag football, hebrew school, and soccer - with a few extras thrown in: a play date at a friend's house for Ben, an early birthday dinner with Papa and Mary for Joel who turns 40 tomorrow, and a grown-ups only dinner on Friday night with our friends Quimby and Sue at Upstream. Below are a few pictures from the weekend...


Caroline saying "cheese" for the camera (or "deeeeeee...." as she says but clearly she is trying to say cheese)...

Becca taking a water break at her soccer game yesterday....

Daddy and the girls at dinner on Saturday night....

Beginner's Night

Tonight was Rebecca's Beginner's Night at her future (Ben's current) elementary school. Rebecca was very excited to go, but I had to remind her about 50 times that no, kindergarten does not start "after bed" (her way of saying "tomorrow"), but rather she has two months of preschool left and then summer camp and THEN kindergarten.

She separated from me very easily and was led off to a classroom by a parent volunteer, while I sat through the hour-long what-to-expect-in-kindergarten lecture which I am sure I paid far less attention to this second time around, except for the part where they reviewed the first week of school, because that is different now- now the kindergarteners attend for either Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday of the first week, during which time they are given bunches of assessments, before teacher assignments are made. This is to ensure that each classroom is as heterogenous as possible (apparently the year before last all the kids with behavior problems accidentally ended up in the same classroom). So we will not find out who her teacher is until Thursday of the first week of school, and then Friday we come in for a "meet and greet" with the kids at 8am and then leave them there for the rest of the day.

When I picked Rebecca up at the classroom I observed her spacily wandering around, apparently having finished the craft project early but giving the teacher a blank look when asked if she'd put her project outside in the hallway by the door, or if she still had it in the classroom. Then on the way out she informed me that the teacher was nice, "and doesn't even get mad when we fight."

"Who fought?" I asked, not liking the sound of this.

"I did. Me and a boy."

Oh great. "What? No fighting, fighting's against the rules in kindergarten."

"No, no" she insisted. "It's okay. We didn't get in trouble. The teacher just said how 'bout we walk away from each other."

Greeaaaat. Then on the way to the car she threw a tantrum because I said we didn't have time to visit the playground because we needed to get home to take a bath and get ready for bed. I tried, "Kindergartener's don't throw tantrums." But, she responded through howls with, "I am not in kindergarten yet! I am still a preschooler!" Sigh.

Going, Going, Gone...

Apparently there is a real market for free 6 year old lawn mowers that haven't been used in 2 years ;) I posted ours on craigslist this morning and within 30 minutes not only had someone emailed me about it, they had even shown up to get it. Must be one of the fastest turn around times in craiglist history ;) Also I had to reply to 3 other inquiries that it was already gone, before I got a chance to take down the posting. We've had a lawn service for two or three years now and my endless complaining to Joel about why we have to keep the lawnmower cluttering up the garage finally paid off.

Garage Purge

Lets just hope the trash men cometh.... This is the first time we have been able to fit both cars in the garage ;) History teaches us this will be short lived.

She scored a goal!!!

It was a hard-fought victory for Nazareth United, fraught with potty emergencies and tantrums.

And Then She Spilled It

Enjoying some afternoon sun!

Future NBA Star?

But not, as he claims, Michael Jordan's grandson ;) Ben made all 3 of these shots within about a minute of each other, surprising even Mom's unwavering faith in his athletic skills ;)

New Shoes

15 Month Checkup

Caroline had her 15 month checkup this morning. Normally I am all over the height and weight stats, but this time, they're a bit muddled. You see the nurse measured her this time at 31 inches, whereas last time the doctor measured her at 32 inches, and when I pointed out that last time she was 32 inches the nurse said that in the computer for last time it said 30 inches, and I didn't feel like arguing that 30 inches was the height taken by the nurse and that later the doctor had taken it again as 32 inches... oh well. By the 31 inch measure she's only somewhere around the 50th percentile for height but I am not believing that. She was screaming bloody murder though so I didn't really feel like putting her or the nurses through a re-check. Her weight is 25 pounds 10 oz, which is only up  a couple ounces from last time, and surprised me because to me she feels like a ton of bricks ;)

The doctor and I discussed her tummy issues (gas, ginormous poops) and decided to switch her to lactose free milk and stop the cheese and yogurt altogether for a couple weeks to see if that helps. Besides that we discussed her language development (her language repertoire now includes mama, dada, hi, bye-bye, more, yes, no, uh-oh, yay, thank you and puppy). I was all set to complain that she's not walking, but in the last 2 weeks she's started walking all over the place, though still pretty unsteady. She got a couple of vaccines and her hemoglobin checked (normal) and then I dropped her off at day care. Today is the first day in a week and a half that someone hasn't been sick! Of course that means that we are due for another illness sometime in the next 2 days ;)

Shoe Shopping

Now Rebecca, I've come to expect, could try on shoes all day before she makes up her mind about what she wants. But with Ben I'm having kind of the opposite problem. He only wants a very particular pair of shoes, in a very particular color. Exactly the same pair of shoes in the exact same color as are currently being worn on his feet. The problem with the ones on his feet is that a) the toes are worn out, b) the dog took a bite out of the heel of one of them, c) the treads are worn out , d) I can poke my finger clean through the side of one of them... okay you get the idea. He needs new sneakers.

Anyway these shoes are called Nike Free Runs and they aren't the most durable shoe I've ever come across (see points a through d above). But Ben refuses to wear anything else. Apparently they are quite popular at school, and although he and Joel visited 3 shoe stores after dinner tonight they could not find the color he wanted. I gave up and ordered them online just now (Should have done that in the first place). Joel came home and announced that if this is how difficult shoe shopping is with an 8 year old boy, he is washing his hands right now of shoe shopping with our daughters.

Happy Birthday Ulysses!

We are so happy that Ulysses came home in time to celebrate his 11th birthday!

Somebody's Taken Over the Dog Bed!

Poor Clara, LOL