Mom's Birthday

Guest post by Mom:

So I turned 32 years old this year. It was pretty anticlimactic as most birthdays go for adults. I gave myself a present though! I gave myself shingles.

For real.

It started out on Friday, the 15th of April. I had noticed for the last couple of days that I thought I had burned myself on my arm. That is the best way to describe it. There were just some sensitive spots on my right arm and down on to the side of my hand. That Friday we had our spring carnival at school and I was quite busy all afternoon. I came home that night and noticed I had a couple of spot that went down my arm. I even took a picture for my sister. It almost felt fungal. They were raised and kind of bumpy like roundworm, but it was just bizarre.

Saturday I showed them to my mom and dad because there were a few more. They weren't particularly painful or itchy, but they were growing. Some looked blistery and both my sister, Angie, and I even said...I wonder if it's shingles. My dad didn't think it looked quite shingly enough.

Sunday came and we were over at my parents' house again celebrating my birthday and my dad's when it became pretty obvious that it was shingles. I had all the symptoms, but my dad said I should just ride it out and not try an antiviral. It would just run its course.

We both regret that decision a little because what we thought was the top of the hill wasn't. I ended up getting many more spots and it became painful. I took ibuprofen fairly regularly but it wasn't unbearable. I ended up putting a capzasin cream on the spots to try and help it heal quicker. It was most obnoxious because it was fairly wide spread all over my arm. Shingles normally stay in one "dermatome" and I was lucky enough to have gotten them on one of the largest dermatomes. I say that sarcastically. It was my right arm so I was constantly trying to carry my car seat and hold my baby with it and then it would be really annoying. Here is the progression in photos.

This was on birthday. The bracelet was a present from Pete. I love it.

These next ones were from April 20th. 

April 23rd:

And then on the 28th:

The last two were more scabs than anything. I didn't really have itchiness until after scabs started falling off. I actually consider myself lucky because I didn't have extreme pain with them. I couldn't wait for them to be gone, but it really was more of a nuisance. Teaching classes got funny because people would see the stuff by my armpit and ask me what happened and then I would rotate my arm and they would audibly gasp. Even today, you can still see where it is healing and I have spots but they don't bug me.

My husband and daughters were actually very good to me on my birthday and so was the rest of my family. My watch is one of my favorite parts of my birthday. It does this:

Also my favorite gift (besides my awesome Alex and Ani bracelet) was this:

They are 8 oz glass bottles with our names on them! It's true. I'm a Diet Coke Lover. They make me happy every time I look at them and they are prominently displayed in our house. I certainly had a birthday I won't forget.

Miss Iva

Our Miss Iva is two and a half already. Two and a half going on eight. It's finally time for the potty training post. It feels like we can't move on past the first week of April in this blog. Hahaha! But that first full week in April kind of started out with a bang for Iva. Around April Fool's Day, Mom showed Iva her fun big girl panties that were just waiting in her drawer. They are Inside Out (the movie) undies and have the days of the week on them. (Bing Bong had to be thrown away in the tragic potty accident during my babysitting attempt...see previous posts on that. :p ) Iva was excited and put on a pair and Mom walked away. Soon Iva came to her crying. She was very frustrated. It turns out she had tried to put on every single pair which warranted a photo, but no actual peeing in the potty. 

A little back story here. She has had basically no relationship with the potty. Well that's not true. We have a fun potty training potty that sat in the living room or in Mom and Dad's room and Iva would sit on it bare bummed and watch her movies, but never actually going potty. There were a few times several months ago when she would accidentally pee and it would scare her. The potty would play music and we would all scream and jump and down and essentially scar her emotionally. She really wasn't interested in peeing in that potty. Or in the big potty. She wasn't scared of the big potty, but didn't get how to release her pee. She was actually quite good at holding it in. She only peed on the floor a handful of times otherwise she could wait until she had on a diaper or pull up. Mom really wasn't feeling like pushing her although she would dream about being able to just put her in underwear. Anyway, in February Iva actually developed this huge problem with pooping. She wasn't constipated. She just didn't want to poop and would SCREAM. Not just kind of scream, a full on freak out if she was pooping. This actually facilitated being able to use the potty because you knew when she had to poop and could move her on to the big potty, but you had to endure shrieking and crying. It was kind of awful. People who witnessed it thought for sure she was in pain, but we don't think she was. It was truly an ordeal. She was only pooping three times a week because of it. We use to refer to her "poop alert level". She would start to freak out a little bit, but you knew it wasn't imminent until she reached that orange level of freak out. It was stressful especially if she had to poop in public or at Grandma's house. We went to Disneyland knowing that this was part of the issue. Luckily, she actually managed to do her pooping at Grandpa Great's house and then quite loudly at his church which was moderately embarrassing, but at least wasn't in a crowded Disney bathroom. 

And now I also have to mention that Iva was also not wanting to take baths or showers. She just didn't love it and didn't want to wash her hair. She was fine with swimming, but no thank you to getting clean. 

Now back to that first week in April, Mom was getting into the shower one morning and Iva was playing around in the bathroom. Mom invited her to take a shower too and was surprised that Iva said yes. The water was running and warming up and Iva was naked in the bathroom. She looked up and Mom and panicked said "I have to go pee pee!" So Mom plopped her on the toilet and she went! Iva was so happy so was Mom. Mom tried not to get her hopes up and thought at least it was a good experience we can build on it. Iva proceeded to wear diapers the next few days, but also managed to pee on the potty at least once more. Showers also turned in to her favorite thing. If you get in the shower, she comes running and stripping. 

And then Tuesday morning, April 5th, at 4 am, Iva was having a freak out in her sleep. She was crying and writhing around and make it impossible for Mom or Dad to sleep. Mom was nursing Sam in bed and said to Dad, "Go put her on the potty. She might have to pee." He got up, carried her to the toilet, set her down and she peed. She woke up all the way, was thrilled, flushed the potty and then told Dad, "I don't sleep in Mommy's bed, I sleep in MY bed." and demanded to go back into her own room and sleep. From that moment on, Iva has only had one accident. ONE. She peed the bed once and unfortunately for Dad he was lying in bed with her. Oops! We traveled to SLC for that surprise weekend and she never peed in her pull up. Mom had just bought a huge pack of pull ups and OPENED it. Iva just mastered the potty in her sleep. Mom was putting her in pull ups every night because of the one accident, but it has been unnecessary. Mom keeps saying that if there was ever a poster child for waiting until the child is actually ready it is Iva. She potty trained herself. 

Aside from potty training, Iva is Sam's favorite. He lights up when they make eye contact. She loves to lay with him and regularly fights with people who try and talk to "her brother". 

She's also starting to drop her naps. If she naps later than 1:30 pm, Mom and Dad are in trouble and she is awake much past her bedtime. However, she can't quite make it to 7:30 pm, let alone our normal bedtime of 8 pm, when she doesn't nap. This has led to several hilarious sleep moments for her.

Mom also ends up yelling and singing loudly in the car to try and keep Iva awake.

She has turned into Mom's buddy though. They hang out together and shop together. Sam is always in tow, but Iva is the one who does the talking.

She loves to swim and jump and play with the big girls outside.

One last thing about her! She HAS to drop the big girls off at school with her own backpack. Her epic bedhead and the fact that she had packed her own drink made the moment picture worthy:

Triathlon Baby!

Our hurried trip back home from SLC was for my triathlon! I did the Trick or Tri last October and this triathlon was the spring equivalent. We decided last minute to sign me up and I even agreed to do the longer distance. Unfortunately, I was still sick. I had a fever and was a bit lethargic, but I still wanted to do it. Looking back, Mom wishes she had changed my distance to the shorter one, but oh well! She gave me some cold medicine and wished me luck! Haha!

I was pretty excited, a little nervous, but mostly excited.

I had to swim down and back TWICE, but I miscounted and almost took off another time. I went pretty slow, because I was feeling so weird, but I was happy and smiling. It was so fun.

I wasn't the last person to hit transition from bike to run but I was close! Mom was worried that I was miserable, but I was still smiling and having a great time as I left on my quick run.

Second triathlon in the books! It was GREAT!

Note from Mommy: I truly was terrified that I should not have had her compete. I was worried that she really was too sick and that she would just HATE IT. I was also feeling hyper competitive and was stressed that she was being slow, but it was hard to argue with her smile. Plus she actually told kept saying how much fun she was having and isn't that literally the point of triathlons? Most of us aren't fast enough to be competitive! I've never even done a triathlon so lesson learned!

SURPRISE!!!

So as we ended our first week in April (Oh dear...we are blogging this on the first week of May! HA!) , my mom and dad found out that our Seattle cousins were in Salt Lake City. I don't remember why they were there, probably spring break, but everyone was going to be getting together for dinner on Friday and Aunt Rachel was sad that we weren't going to be there. Mom and Dad were sad too, but there were lots of reasons for them to be home that weekend. Saturday was filled with things to do! I was signed up to do a triathlon and my good friends were getting baptized! But...Mom's wheels got turning in her head and what if we drove up to SLC on Thursday night and then drove home Saturday morning? She talked it over with Dad and they both agreed that even though it would mean a really really late night on Thursday and an early morning on Saturday that it would be worth it.

They decided to surprise Aunt Rachel though. Dad called Aunt Margaret and asked if we could stay at her house this time. Both Mom and Dad had to teach on Thursday night so we weren't going to be able to get on the road until 8 pm at the earliest so it was easier to stay with someone who had no little kids who should be sleeping and getting to school.

Thursday came and as fate would have it, good friends from Mom and Dad's past were in town for a funeral. The Toones live in Sacramento and we rarely get to see them and so we HAD to take the time to catch up. And catch up we did. At Dairy Queen at 8:30 pm at night! I don't think we got a single picture, but it was fun for Cara and me to re-meet the kids. We played with them once a long time ago, but we didn't really remember! We finally got on the road at about 9:30 maybe to head up to SLC.

Mom and Dad were feeling quite silly and decided to be cryptic. As we got settled in Aunt Margaret's spare room, Dad took this picture and captioned it "Siblings Slumber Party". He posted it on Instagram at two in the morning or something so we knew it would be awhile before anyone would see it.

What makes it so awesome is that this room is in Margaret's basement which is a place that Aunt Rachel doesn't go very often. We weren't even sure she would know where we were. And true to form, Aunt Rachel commented fairly early in the morning, "Where is that?"

Oh Mom and Dad were giggling. Do we tell her? Do we just show up at her house? Should we drag her along? Post more clues? We opted to head to the zoo as family and then send her a picture from there to see if she could figure out where we were.

Mom posted this next photo on Instagram and said "Here's a hint...."

It was glorious. Uncle Troy almost immediately saw the picture and commented "Did you come up?!"...followed shortly by "Please say yes." and then "Certainly a reasonable question since this could be a stock family photo." Dad thought he would be funny and said back "We were going to call I swear."

Aunt Rachel actually took the time to text Mom and not comment on Instagram. She demanded to know if we were really in SLC. So we sent her this and "SURPRISE!!!"

She was so happy and so surprised. We enjoyed a VERY busy morning at the zoo thanks to field trips and weird family groups and I think it was still someone in northern Utah's spring break, but it was worth it. We had missed good old Hogle Zoo.

We got to see the trainers working with the lions which was very neat.

Mom has decided she is an orangutan mom. Although Acara, the older orangutan, is actually the sister it was fun to watch her interact with her little brother who she is a surrogate Mom for.

Gotta love the rhino bums...

Iva was tired of walking so we improvised and she loved pretending to be a baby.

She was funny all weekend. You'll never guess what she's pretending to do!

Unfortunately, I ended up getting a bit sick. I had a fever and needed to nap for a bit, but a little ibuprofen and I was a new woman.

It ended up being the most glorious of evenings. We didn't realize how good of a surprise it would be for the Seattle Romneys, but they yelled when they walked in and saw us. The weather was perfect and us cousins played outside for what felt like hours.

Sam was passed around plenty and actually was pretty happy with that.

It was quite the Herculean effort to get a photo with everyone looking. Dad didn't succeed. HA!

The drive home was awfully early. I think Cara even cried "I didn't even get to sleep!" when Mom and Dad drug us out of bed to head home. It was so worth it though. Such a great trip.