The Flu continued. ...

I thought we were through the flu, but we had yet another week of it. Teig would not eat all week.  He is at the stage where he does not want to be fed anymore, plus he was not feeling well.  And on top of that, his favorite thing to do is to throw his food on the floor and then look at me to shake his head with a little grumpy scowl like I do to him.  It's cute, but oh so frustrating.  For most of the week I was only able to get him to eat a few bites here or there.  Most of the time when he will finally consent and let me spoon something in his mouth, he will open his mouth and let it ooze out everywhere.  The worst part is watching him get skinnier every day and not have wet diapers.  He was drinking a bottle or two of milk a day a bit at a time, and Thursday he finally drank a bottle of pedia-lite.  By Thursday, he finally ate a small meal and by Friday he was asking for food again.  All along Joren has been feeling fine so Tuesday I sent him to a valentine's party at Erin's house.  I did not go and I did not take Teig because he was still too sick.  Well, the next morning Joren woke up throwing up and it lasted miserably through the day and evening.  He felt awful and could not keep down even a sip of water.  It is so hard to watch your kids be sick, and hard to stay positive through the torrential complaining and grumpiness.  Wed night we had a mid week RS meeting where we had a trivia game about the Daughter's in My Kingdom book.  I went even though I was not feeling emotionally fit to be in public.  I was so exhausted.  At the end of the meeting, someone asked me how Teig was doing and I starting crying.  They were all really supportive and let me vent for a few minutes and it was really great to be with my sisters from the ward.  They all gave me hugs and encouragement and love.  I felt so much better after getting my tank refilled by their love.  I realized after talking for a few minutes that it was mid February and I have a tradition of getting down in February.  It's been really rainy and very cold for several weeks I have not been outside at all.  Staying in the house for 2 weeks with sick kids and a stinky, hairy messy dog gets me a little crazy, and I was on my period, so all in all, I was quite an emotional mess.   My friend Erin, who I don't think has ever been depressed in her whole life asked me what was taking my time, what my stresses were.  I think she was trying hard to understand where I was coming from and I could tell that my emotion was a little foreign to her.  I thought about it for a second and realized that the most honest answer was that my time was being filled with my desire to do art.  Not actually making art, but my mind realing with plans to do art.  When I don't have any control over the actions of my kids and things aren't going as I would like them to go, I find that I escape to something that comforts me, something that I have control over and usually it is with food or art.  I told Erin that I was working on my plans to design Paul's office and trying to get some knowledge about healthcare design, but really I said, the truth is I love art and design so much and I feel like I am so much better at them than I am at motherhood.  Saying it out loud in that setting was really freeing.  I felt like all these women work so hard to be excellent mothers, just like I do and it was a good moment for me to tell them all how hard it was and I think we all bonded a little bit and they all willingly helped me bear my burden by loving and supporting me.  It was a really special moment for me and I was really grateful for their friendship.

Today is Friday and we drove to Birminham to drop Paul off at work and hang out with him before and after.  We all went to Pei Wei for lunch.  Paul bought two entres, edemame, and lettuce wraps and hot and sour soup.  I thought it was so extravagant and as we ate I felt so cared for and loved.  I would never have bought all of that food.  It seemed like more than we could possibly need, but that was the absolute beauty of it.  In that simple act, I felt like life was good again.   I get into scarcity mode sometimes and need to be reminded that life is to be enjoyed as well as endured.  We had such a nice meal and I loved every minute of it.  The kids loved trying chopsticks and getting fortune cookies.  Teig's fortune was the best:  one side had the translation for MILK and the other side said, "Be patient, the beginning is always the most challenging." 
After lunch we went to Nordstrom Rack and I got to shop for a few minutes.  Not the easiest with three boys, but Paul was wonderful and accommodating and I felt really loved and it was GREAT to be out of my house and in the actual, tangible world outside of my little tiny dark kitchen with sick kids.  We came home feeling much better and then Paul took me to our ward Valentine's Dance.  We danced like crazy fools with our crazy, great little ward family around us.  It was a marvelous time and Paul was wonderful.  He could have easily had a really bad attitude, but he chose to be awesome about it and he was the life of the party.  I love him so much.

A day of Love

I decided to start a new tradition this year.  I made cheese and chocolate fondue for our Valentine's dinner.  We had french bread and veggies for the cheese and strawberries, grapes and bananas to dip in the chocolate.  I used amazing recipes from Erin's sisterscafe blog.  I made the "gentlemen" in my house dress up and we all sang songs that had the word love in them and then went around telling each other things we love about one another.  It was pretty nice.  I had fun amidst the farting, climbing on the table, knocking over glasses of water and Teig screaming.  It was ok.  I had the great idea to use our new candle warmer to keep the chocolate warm.  It worked great!  I think this tradition will be one of those things that gets better with time.  I hope. :) The food was delicious and Paul did the dishes, so it was a big hit for me!

We made these cute valentine's for the kids friends this year:  Mrs. Biro, Eirik's K teacher has her birthday on V-DAy, so she get's special card with her arrow this year.  Eirik just loves her. 

The Flu

Eirik stayed home from school Monday and Tuesday with a sore throat, cough, runny nose and crazy irritability.  He gets so controversial when he does not feel well.  Everything is a fight.  I just had to put on my blank, "I'm really in Aruba" face to make it through until Wed when he went back to school.  On Thursday night he started saying he did not feel so well and cried and moaned until he threw up in his bed and then laid on the couch for several hours vomiting intermittently.  Friday was a lot more fighting and moaning.   Friday night Joren peed in his bed. Saturday morning we thought we were better and went to a craft/ storytime at the library and then to the grocery store as a family, but at the end of the day Teig was not looking good.  He would not eat and that night he threw up in his bed.  I did not realize it until we smelled it and realized he was asleep in it. Ugh.. I had to scrub it out of his ears and hair in the bath in the middle of the night.  Sunday morning, after changing the laundry again, we decided Paul would go to church this week since he stayed home with sick kids last week.  A bit before church Paul got a call telling him he was supposed to be on snow removal and there was a fresh 4".  (Thanks for the early notice.)  As Paul was trying to rush to the church, his car would not start.  We could not find the jumper cables.  Then, when we found them, they would not work.   I could not get anyone on the phone to ask them to conduct for me, so I had to send a lot of stuff with Paul which made him even later.  Our house is full of mice and we had to clean out 3 mouse traps before church.  We just washed Tor and he rolled in something dead so he smells too gross to let in the house.  There is a leak in the laundry room and there is water all over the floor.  We just had the plumber fix it.  The whole time, sick kids are crying and being super annoying. A comment of Paul's describes this morning perfectly. "I love our kids, but sometimes they suck out my soul."  After Paul left the boys were watching a show on the couch.  I walked in and could tell someone had vomited, but I could not tell where or whom.  I looked and looked for the cause of the smell.  Of course, the boys were not helpful on this important issue.  Finally I located the curdled throw-up in Joren's rubber (inside and out) rain boot.  To this I offer a big thank you to future grown up Teig for finding the one washable container in the room to throw up in.  How an 18 month old is smart enough to do that, I will never know.  That was the best part of my day.  For some reason, having cranky, sick kids equals double the mess, double the cleaning and by Sunday night I was just at a breaking point.  Our friends Annie and Ryan stopped by and brought us homemade snickers and invited us over to watch the Grammy's.  I looked at Paul with tears in my eyes and said, can i go??
He said of course and pushed me out the door.  What a great husband.

 

And he keeps us laughing too. : )