It's Coming!

The first day of school is fast approaching. On Monday Grace will officially be a KINDERGARTNER!!!!! She is beyond excited approaching bouncing off the walls. We met her teacher today, and I loved her. She had books everywhere, a piano, musical instruments, her calendar and a warm cozy feeling everywhere. Grace doesn't know anyone in her class, but I do know a few of the parents from my various jobs in the community. All the little girls had on their dresses and the little boys were excited about the instruments. She has a few kids from her bus in her class and it looks to be a great year. I am very nervous about being on this side of the teacher line. I want to do everything so that Grace has a good year, but I don't want her to hide in my shadow like she did today. She seems to do better when mommy is not around. Oh well we will see, come Monday..........................

10 months and counting........

Lily is officially ten months old. She is scooting everywhere. She scoots on her bottom, her belly and occasionally gets the knees and arms working into an actual crawl. But give her something to pull up on and she is vertical in a heartbeat. It is obvious that she prefers the walking on two legs to the four appendages. She hasn't started cruising yet, but she is trying a few steps here and there. She is approaching 21 pounds and is still on the shorter side. She has fallen into a routine quite nicely here in July of two naps and going to bed earlier than midnight. She still has some of the acid reflux but loves to eat, especially big girl food. She loves scrambled eggs, pasta, crackers, puffs, cheerios, and any other food that she can put into her own mouth. I am still shoveling in the veggies too, I figure I gotta stock her up so she can go years like her sister without anything other than nuggets. Speaking of her sister, Lily loves to play with Grace, watch Grace, giggle at or with Grace, play with Grace's toys, be in Grace's room and anything that has to do with Grace - she even says her name. Lily's words consist of Gacie, Dada, ni ni, and Tom swears she is saying mama - I haven't heard it yet. We are working on the baby sign language - milk seems to have stuck in her brain. She still has NO TEETH, but we are hoping that the 1:00 or later wake up calls have something to do with teeth coming in. We'll see. Grace starts school in a week and Lily will be going with me to preschool in August, should be an interesting month. I will let you know how it all goes.

Sissy getting in on the fun!

Our Trip

If a picture says a thousand words then these memories would take up a couple million. For such a short week, we had so much fun with the Florida Campbell's. Grace is already asking when we can go back. Until we do, she will have to live off of pictures and memories.

Summer fun with the cousins!

The boat ride!

The Pool!

Grandma and Lily

July 15

Brendan Daniel Campbell

2 years

Angel Baby

You will always be missed.

WE MADE IT!

After a lot of packing and and a few mishaps, we got on the road Sunday afternoon. We drove all the way to Tifton, with a few potty stops, ate dinner and got back on the road to Valdosta for an overnight in the hotel. Unfortunately, Mommy then had a few "explosions" of her own, thank GOD for immodium. We made it through the night and breakfast and got back on the road to Cortez, FL. No more illness, only a few potty breaks and a stop for lunch and we made it to Grandma's house. Lily was thrilled to get out of the car seat, Grace was ecstatic to see her cousin Faith and the rest of her Campbell family. Daddy and Mommy were glad that we finally made it and did not have to run to a potty or ride in the car.
Now for the good times to roll.



On another note, Taylor is not recovering as well as we hoped. He was back in the hospital yesterday for iv fluids. Hoping he goes home today and stops being so stubborn.


CJ should be having his tonsils and adnoids out right now. We are hoping for a quick recovery for him too.

Are we finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel?

Well, the "explosions" as Grace calls them are less and less. She says the "diarena" is all gone, that the medicine is working. She has been so upset that she is delaying our trip to see Grandma and Faith. (Sorry rest of the Campbell clan, that is who she really wants to see, she just tolerates the rest of us.) So far,(knocking on wood) Lily seems fine. I pray every second that Grace is getting better and that Lily doesn't get this. For two neurotic parents who have been through H@** the past 2 years, this has been very trying.
Grace was able to sleep about 5 hours last night. She awoke at 3:45 with the urge to go and wet sheets. She was then up to 8:00 when she fell asleep for maybe an hour. Of course we had the parade at 4:00am. Lily knows her sisters voice very well and wakes up out of a dead sleep to see what is going on. Luckily Lily and I got to go back to sleep and Daddy took over Grace's care. He then got me up at 7 and Lily got up before 8. We have all tried to nap throughout the day but not Grace!
Now that things seem a little calmer, I am trying to do laundry, pack and get things ready for our trip that were supposed to be done, on Thurs then on Fri. Maybe we will get out of here?!? Wish us luck and send your prayers our way.

The Saga continues........

Poor pitiful Gracie! Now she has problems the other way. She can keep food down just not in for long. This morning she was going to the restroom every 5 minutes until everything she ate yesterday was gone. Now she is up to every 45 minutes. She has had 4 cups of G2 and 2 pieces of toast, some yogurt and lots of cheerios. Yesterday she barely weighed 40 pounds at the doctor, who knows what she ways now. She is one kid who can't afford to lose weight. She barely eats as it is and when she gets this mess - she really doesn't eat. Oh and she is hating the Gatorade, Pedialyte is worse though. And now the medicine they called in for her is so new that no pharmacy in the area seems to have it. She is miserable, I am stressed, Tom is very stressed and we are PRAYING that no one else gets this mess.
We are STILL not packed, laundry is not done and the suitcases are only half full.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Seriously!

To quote a good friend and fellow blogger. "Seriously!" New Orleans drawl and all.

Today I was awakened by a five year old running around and demanding something to drink at 6:30 am. Needless to say seconds later she was vomiting in the toilet. Now she has a weak stomach and high gag reflex but come on she was asleep 5 minutes ago. So now that we were all awake, always lovely to wake up to retching, just ask Lily, she had to see what all the commotion was about. We gave Grace some juice and proceeded to call into work (I was supposed to teach dance camp today, Sorry Amanda!), call Grandma to watch the Lilybug and try to figure out our trip that was supposed to start tomorrow. Grace handled the juice and asked for more, so we watered it down and told her to sip slowly. Meanwhile I got Lily's breakfast, my breakfast and Tom started getting ready for work. After that I started to feed Lily her bottle, when Grace started running again looking for an appropriate place to get rid of the fluid = so I multi-tasked. I fed Lily the bottle while holding the spit up bucket as far away from us as I could for Grace to vomit and screamed for Tom to come help. So once we all calmed down, before 8:00, we tried again this time with the miracle drug Zofram in Grace's system. So far it has done the trick.

We have been back to the doc for a strep recheck and the 10 minute version was negative. So we are treating her as a stomach bug patient, postponed our trip 24 hours and trying again.

Will we ever get packed, on the road and well again? Stay Tuned........................

Happy Fourth!

Just a few fun pics from our fourth of July weekend. Grace actually enjoyed the fireworks on our street last night. I must say my neighbors put on a pretty awesome show and had sparklers for all the kiddos. Lily stayed inside and slept through it all until about 8:30 this morning. I guess all the family activities of going to Grandma's and playing with cousin Taylor really wore her out.

Just hanging around!

The one good shot!