1 toddler + 1 pen =

random story first....I was about to type this post while watching 'Mystery Diagnosis' on DHC (I'll admit, I'm addicted to any and all medical shows, as well as forensics/true crime shows). So there's this 20 mo. they're doing a story on, and the mother is talking about how all of a sudden her daughter started to demand food on an unnatural level. This little girl used the word "Num num" as "food"!! The EXACT same word Carolina uses! I just think that's so amazing that another child uses the same word, when we have no idea where "num num" came from. She's been saying that since November! Even now, she can say 'food', and does when we go to feed the fish, but still refers to her meals as num num. Anyway, just found that interesting....

Now on to the real point of this post....to show what 1 toddler + 1 pen =

The "What? There's nothing on my legs" look....

(it's hard to see, but there's also pen marks on her cheeks)

Haley and I spent a couple hours in Carolina's room Friday, going though all her clothes to designate which to keep and which to give away and/or sell. And I believe it's safe to say the child has more clothes than I ever imagined!! So while we were busy doing that, Carolina and Tanner had a less than normal amount of supervision...Before we knew it, Carolina found a pen, sat herself down and proceded to decorate herself. All this while Haley and I are 6 ft away with our backs turned.....

New this week.

Alright, this should be titled "New last week". I've been having issues with uploading, not too sure what it was all about. But I finally got it to work tonight! woo!

So Carolina finally learned the word 'No'....We'd avoided it for a while, though. Funny thing is, she said it for the first time in regards to getting off the swings. Which brings us to another point, she now likes the swings!! She's always been kinda iffy on them, cautious child that she is. Since it's new (and because she's not screaming it at us yet....), we find her little 'no' quite cute. Not only did she become a fan of the swings, but she also figured out how to go down a slide by herself! One day, we were still helping her, by the next day at playgroup she just climbed up and did it all on her own. I know everyone says this, but it's so true--they grow up so fast!!

Aw, ain't she cute!

In honor of tacky baby pageants everywhere, Carolina got her very first makeover today! Not really, in case anyone was fooled. Today while she was napping I decided to work some http://www.taaz.com/ magic on her picture. I'm sure there's some cleaning or tidying to be done somewhere...but this is oh so much more fun! I also did some trailer trash/barbie renditions on myself just for the entertainment factor, but I've decided to keep those to myself...:-)

And it's not even cold season :-(

So today was the first day since being home from New Orleans and Carolina getting better, that we decided to have a day out. Figured it was better than being home since our AC croaked yesterday afternoon, letting the house get up to 90 degrees. We got it repaired this morning/lunch time, and I did not want to be here until it was fixed, and the house cooled down. Playgroup was today, first time we've made it in at least a month. So after 30 minutes at the park, Haley and I went back to her house where Tanner and Carolina just played around for a little while. Then we decided the pool would feel good, and Tanner and Carolina hadn't been swimming together in a while. We were only there for 30-45 minutes or so, and Carolina needed to poop (apparently she can't do this in a swim diaper....). Once I got her suit off, I noticed she was audibly wheezing. I watched her closely for a while, and she was definitely retracting. Off to the ER we went. I decided on the ER rather than medicine at home because she seemed to be struggling fairly bad, and I wasn't sure how long this had been going on, since her swimsuit would hide any retracting. That along with the fact that she had just recently got over the previous episode. Good thing though, when we arrived at the ER her oxygen saturation was hovering around 90% and she had a slight fever. They immediately gave her a breathing treatment, which brough her sat up to 98 %. Within 10 minutes she was back down to 93%. So we were moved right away from triage to a room. At this point I was very worried. The 2 times she's been admitted to the Pediatric ward for 3-5 days, this was what her asthma looked like when we arrived at the hospital. It would respond to treatment, but only for a very short period of time. After another treatment, they did a chest x-ray. Lo and behold she has pnemonia AGAIN. This time it's 'typical' pnemonia rather than 'atypical', which is what she had at the end of August. So she's back on antibiotics and oral steriods. Thankfully, we were not admitted to the pediatric ward even though her oxygen sat. continued to be low (92 %) when they took the monitor off for us to leave. She was in great spirits the whole time, waving at all the docs, and talking up a storm. They let us leave based on how she was acting and the fact that sometimes when a kid is in an asthma attack, their oxygen level will actually drop after a breathing treatment, because it opens up so much extra space in their lungs, that it takes a little while for them to compensate (this was new info to me, but Carolina was acting better than the times she was hospitalized, so I took it this must be what was going on with her, but we are keeping an extra sharp eye on her throughout the night). The first appointment we could get with Pulmanology was Oct.27, surely something will open up before then. This is summer, the down season for colds, I don't even want to think about fall and cold season arriving before we have her asthma under better control. I feel so bad for her, she doesn't know what's going on when all the docs. are poking and prodding at her. She always does so good, and has such a sunny desposition, she amazes me every day!

On a lighter note.....As some of you know, we tell the dogs "Go to bed", and they all race to the bedroom to try and get the 'good' spot on their bed at night. Well, tonight I guess Roxy ran into a little problem, because when we went in behind them we found Roxy sitting there at the bed, with my bra around her neck, with this "help me please" look on her face. We have no idea how she managed this, or even where my bra was that allowed her to manage this feat. All I know the dog has a weird penchant for Victoria Secret's black under garments.....(excuse the quality of the pics, they were snapped really quick, while I was shaking with laughter.....)

i-i-ice keem

I gave Carolina some applesauce with her lunch, and seeing how well she had done with the spoon and ice cream after her shots the other day, I decided to brave it and let her feed herself the applesauce. She eats applesauce often, though usually I'm feeding it to her, and usually calls it 'apple'. Well this day, I guess because she was using the spoon, she started saying it was ice cream. I didn't have the camera at a ready, so for snack time I gave her applesauce and she did it again! Since then she hasn't done it, so I'm glad I staged this performance!

Carolina was reading up a storm, Rendon and I were very entertained. Of course, I pull out the camera and she stops, going so far as to glare at me over the top of the book. Eventually she gets over her 'shyness' and starts to tell us all about, well, something....not quite sure what though....

Right after Carolina had finished dinner, we had our backs turned and Roxy stood up to the table and helped herself to the leftovers. Even though she wasn't eating anymore, this distressed Carolina. She talked about it for at least 10 minutes afterwards!

couple more

I could have sworn I put these up with the others, but when I looked back over they weren't there. These were also taken at the park. She chased the ducks into the water, and then stood at the edge dancing.

View from our hotel over downtown New Orleans.

Whole lotta pics!

I kept saying I would add more pics from our trip, and after a specific request for more 'Appalachain Baby', I'm finally getting around to it. Enjoy 'em all!!

Takin' a nap before the aquarium and IMAX

She already has her own lil swagger to her walk! This was at the fountian right inside the aquarium.

Checking out the fish with Grandpa and outside at the rainforest exhibit.

Doing her best to give us all grey hair by standing on the railing of the boat on our cruise tour of the Mississippi.....

We went to the New Orleans City Park during the Katrina Tour that we took around the city to see all the damage still left behind. The park had been rennovated completely by hundreds of volunteers from around the town and it was absolutely beautiful. There were all sorts of ducks and birds; Carolina had a ball watching all of them.

Learning about ducks from Daddy

Welcome to 'terrible twos'. The face I recieved for asking her to please sit in the chair, not stand.

Something caught her eye on TV.

All bundled after a bath.

One of her favorite things in New Orleans was the mardi-gras beads. She was thrilled with having so many. Even wore them throughout dinner!

The much anticipated pigtails and Appalachian hairbows, crafted by yours truly!

Blowing bubbles at the game.

My self portrait in Rendon's sunglasses. Once your team is behind 41-10, you start finding other things to occupy your time rather than watching the game...




And here's a view of "Death Valley", again in Rendon's sunglasses. They were beating us so badly, even the LSU fans exited early (If you look closely, you'll see the empty stands)

Future Appalachian cheerleader.....? Even after a long time in the sun in the stadium, she was still in a good mood. Aunt Mariah helped with these big smiles by doing back handsprings and flips in the grass. Carolina loved it!

After watching Mariah, Carolina was inspired to do her owns jumps, which she refers to as "jumpa". No real air yet, but I'm sure that'll come soon

Well that's all for tonight!!

Doctor Visit and some new video!

Yesterday's doctor visit went pretty good. Carolina still had a little wheezing, so we just have to continue weening her off the albuterol over the next couple of days. They also put her back on pulmicort twice a day, instead of once. And even though they don't think at this point that it's asthma due to allergies, she's back on the singular, because it can help with asthma in general. Most immportantly, we got a referral to pulmonology so they can start following her. They can't do a lung function test until she turns 2, but they will help us with asthma education and such!



After the visit, she got her 18 mo. shot (yes a lil late.....). We decided she earned herself some ice cream, so we stopped by Baskin Robbins on the way home. Carolina discovered that she l-o-v-e-s ice cream. We let her take bites of ours using one of the sample spoons and she was in heaven. After every bite she would say quite loudly "i-i-ice keem!!". I just wish we had thought to pull out the camera phone for a little clip. This made for an fun afternoon, I talked to Charlie on the way home, and he can tell you she was quite hyped up!



Now time for the fun stuff. Some video and pictures from our trip!

Due to evacuation traffic, our car ride was super long. We sang lots of songs. Here she is reciting some alphabet and numbers. Notice the baby with crayon all over her head. It kinda turned into a 'let Carolina do whatever she pleases' trip, if only you could see HER face which at some point or another was covered with cheeto 'dust', m&m's, milk etc....

Baby getting some lipstick!

First entry...

Well, I have decided to try out the world of blogging. Thought it might be easier for everyone to see what was going on in our lives down here in San Antonio. Of course, that all depends on me figuring out the whole blog thing. Hopefully I will keep up with it, and post recent pics, videos and updates on Carolina...maybe some updates on Rendon and I, although we're kinda boring in comparison to her :-)

We just returned from our trip to New Orleans and Baton Rouge. Carolina ended up being pretty sick for the majority of the trip, she came down with pnemonia, causing her asthma to act up. As always, she handled the hospital visits and the medicine wonderfully, and is on her way to healthy again! Appalachian lost to LSU, which was expected. The game was a lot of fun, though it was ungodly hot there, "Death Valley" for sure. The ride home was loooooong due to hurricane evacuation traffic, I'll add some cute video and pics from the ride this evening. We have a doctor visit later this afternoon, so we'll see how her lungs are doing.