Ducks, Cake, Emergency, Ambulance, Puppy Bootcamp, Shaving, Campouts, Grooming

Wow, what a week!  Here's a recap.  The other day Daniel was really looking at himself in the mirror.  After a few minutes he came over to Aaron and told him (in the most serious voice) that he needed to shave his face because he was getting a mustache and beard.  Aaron went along with Daniel and helped him 'shave' his frog whiskers.  After watching Daniel shave Noah insisted that he needed to shave, too.  He was excited to get the shaving cream smeared on his face.

Noah got to get his frog whiskers shaved, too.  Aaron just used the back plastic end of the razor to not irritate the skin.  Noah was so proud to show me his smooth face with freshly applied aftershave. 

Here's Daniel getting his 'whiskers' shaved off:

What funny boys!

Two Wednesdays ago we got to drop off all 126 service project fleece blankets that we tied for Youth Conference down at Primary Children's Medical Center for our Young Women activity.  Wahoo!  It was a bit anticlimactic, though.  Since we were dropping off the blankets after regular hours we had to drop them off at the front entrance of the hospital with a security guard.  As we brought all four HUGE boxes in, the security guard just crustily told us to drop them off in the corner and went back to her work.  I then had to fill out a form giving all my information as a contact person for where all the blankets came from.  After I gave the security guard the form I filled out she just flatly told us, "Thanks" and went back to her work.  It was a bit of a letdown.  I guess we were hoping for a little bit more excitement or enthusiasm for receiving so many blankets, but we were wrong.  Oh well, at least they can now be given to those poor patients that need them--plus they are now out of my living room :).  To celebrate we stopped by for either an ice cream cone or a hot fudge sundae on the way home.

Friday we were looking at Sophie and she was looking a bit straggly.  

Luckily, our neighbor does dog grooming so we gave her a call and she squeezed Sophie in her schedule for the next morning.  When we dropped Sophie off she was just shaking because she was so scared.  The lady had her for almost two hours before we picked her back up.  She looked so darling!!  She even had a cute pink bow in her fur by her ears.  The bow didn't stay in longer than a few minutes, but it was cute while it lasted.

 Such a cute dog!

Since Aaron and I have never had an indoor dog it is easy to say that we have no idea what we are doing.  I have tried to train her, but things weren't going so well.  Luckily I found a puppy trainer who does a puppy boot camp where she will take the dog for two weeks and train it.  She picked up Sophie yesterday for boot camp.  We didn't realize how attached we had become to her until she was gone.  Hopefully she will be fully house trained, crate trained and not as nippy or yappy when she gets back.   Keeping my fingers crossed!  We do miss her, though.

We have been really using our Flex Spending Account so far this year :(.  Aaron was sick Last Sunday as well as some of the other kids.  When Aaron finally spiked a fever and had white spots on his throat he went in to be seen.  I was sure it was Strep and the doctor was, too, until the Rapid Strep test came back negative.  DOH!!  I guess it was some random virus that looked a lot like Strep, but this Strep doppelganger virus you couldn't treat with an antibiotic.  Fun times.  Luckily, it went away after a few days.

Last Monday was pretty scary.  I was out running errands in Layton, but I had accidentally left my phone in the car.  When I came out and looked at my phone I saw I had a missed call and a message from the elementary school.  DOH!!  Have I mentioned that I HATE calls from the school?!  Anyway Daniel had eaten something he was allergic to and was having a reaction.  I immediately called the school back who was on the phone with Grandma T because they couldn't reach Aaron either and were just trying to get a hold of someone.  I told them to give Daniel some Allegra immediately and for him to start his rescue inhaler while I drove over to pick him up.  Usually if Daniel has a reaction the Allegra and inhaler will stop it so I wasn't too worried, but I still hurried to pick him up since I was 20 minutes away.  By the time I got to the school he was covered in hives and a bit wheezy.  I brought him home and immediately made him use his rescue inhaler which didn't do very much for him.  His hives were getting worse as was his wheezing.  I gave him a dose of prednisone and a Zyrtec as well.  As I helplessly watched he got worse and worse.  Here's the hives as soon as I got him home from the school.  This was only 20 minutes after eating the allergen and after receiving the Allegra:

 After a few minutes his shoulder and arm were one big hive:

 I got out our pulse oximeter and he was measuring 84%. That measures the oxygen level in his blood and if can't breath his levels drop.  So 84% is pretty low!  YOWZA!!  Anything below 90% is not good.  Daniel plead with me not to get the Epi Pen shot because it hurts so bad, but I had to give it to him in his thigh.  I guess I must have promised him a Fiiz drink if he would let me give him the shot.  I don't quite remember that, but it must have worked since he got the Epi Pen shot.  After the shot we immediately drove over to the Instacare because they were the closest.  The Epi pen stopped the reaction for a few minutes so he was doing a bit better.  I was a bit annoyed at the Instacare because they made me check all the way in before they would do anything for Daniel.  I kept saying that this was an emergency, but the receptionist wouldn't budge.  I was about to leave and take him to the hospital, but when they saw his oxygen saturation was so low they got us immediately back.  The doctor came and took a look at Daniel and was not happy with the way he looked.  Then the hives started coming back on Daniel's body so the doctor called for the ambulance to transport him to the hospital.  Oh I could just kick myself for not driving all the way to the hospital in the first place.  I just thought the Instacare was closer.  Oh well, live and learn.  Here's Daniel waiting for the ambulance to come pick him up.  This is an hour after eating what we finally figured out was a chocolate covered cashew which he is deathly allergic to.  They gave him a megadose of Benadryl orally and then started an IV and gave him an IV dose of Benadryl and fluids as well.

 They wouldn't let me ride in the back of the ambulance with Daniel so I opted to follow behind in the car.  Here they are loading Daniel up in the ambulance outside the Instacare:

 We got to the hospital about the same time.  Here they are unloading Daniel:

 They did give us a copy of the EKG tracing.  I now know for sure that Daniel has a heart--haha!  For whatever reason it's upside down in the picture.

When we got to the ER Daniel was exhausted from the huge dose of Benadryl.  They also medicated him with some Solumedrol which is strong IV steroid as well as IV Pepcid.

 Even after receiving all that medication he was still covered in hives.  We just had to sit and wait and watch until things finally calmed down.  He then had to take oral steroids for the next four days until the allergen got out of his system.

 During this whole episode I got to hear the whole story.  Daniel's class had gone to their music prep time where they had earned a fun day.  For fun days the kids get to bring treats to share.  One of Daniel's friends offered him a chocolate candy so Daniel ate it thinking that it was just candy.  Unfortunately, it ended up being a chocolate covered cashew which is the nut he is most severely allergic to.  He ate it at 11:00 and was in the office at 11:05.  I picked him up at 11:25 and then I gave him his Epi pen and we were at the InstaCare by 12:00.  Things happened so fast!  It really scares me because each exposure results in a more severe reaction.  In all honesty I don't know if he would have 20 minutes to spare if he was exposed to it again which is scary.  While waiting in the ER we did call his allergist and signed him up to be on the waiting list to start the Oral Immunotherapy on cashews and pistachios to get him over the allergy.  The bad thing is there is a 9-12 month waiting list to start.  DOH!!  Hopefully, we don't have another issue before we can start the therapy.  I am keeping my fingers crossed!!  I am just dreading receiving all these medical bills.  I have already told Daniel that he's already gotten his birthday and Christmas presents for this year--a not so fun ambulance ride with accompanying ER stay.  I was kidding, of course, but he didn't think I was very funny.  Another funny tid bit is each member of our family has had at least one emergency ambulance ride now at some point except for Noah.  That is CRAZY!!  I think I will be keeping Noah wrapped up in bubble wrap for the rest of his life--haha!  Matthew has even had a Life Flight Helicopter ride, too.  We really try and maximize our insurance use--but not by choice--haha!!  That's how I can say I have rightfully earned every one of those gray hairs on my head!!

Let me just say that 'roid rage is a real thing.  Those steroids play with my kids emotions.  Daniel was so all over the map the next few days.  One point he would be yelling the next he would be crying.  I was glad to finish off those steroids for sure!!

The next day Daniel was not wanting to go to school.  I didn't push him since he'd had such a traumatic experience the day before.  He also had an orthodontic appointment at noon to fix a broken bracket so I would have had to check him out early if he had gone anyway so I just let him stay home.  He was fun to have around.  He helped me dust and clean up and chatted to me the whole time.  That kid can talk!  It was fun to have it be just him and me for a morning.  We then picked up Noah from kindergarten and got Daniel's bracket fixed we headed over to feed the ducks.  I think Noah ate more bread than he fed the ducks the crazy kid!

 We even brought along Sophie who was afraid of everything, but still barked at everything.  It was such a nice day.  We really have some Spring Fever going on!

 We must have worn Sophie out because by the time we got home she immediately curled up in my lap and fell asleep.

 Matthew had a super fun day last week in his after school program.  They spent the afternoon at the Railroad Festival.  They have this festival every year where a ton of hobby railroad guys bring and set up their train sets for everyone to see.  It is a really big deal.  Matthew went and had a fabulous time.  I can only imagine how much hand flapping and squeals of excitement were going on :).

Let me just say that Aaron LOVES Cadbury Creme Eggs.  When he found this Creme Egg Cake recipe he gave it to me just to show me that it looked good.  Josh and I surprised him the next day and made it for him.  It actually was pretty good.  I am not one that enjoys chocolate very much, but this was pretty good.  You make the cake batter then stick 6 creme eggs inside the cake.  After baking it you frost it with melted chocolate and more Cadbury Eggs.  Here's what it looked like before my family annihilated it.  It lasted less than 12 hours.

 I was looking at pictures from a year ago when I found the one where Josh was shorter than me.  That is crazy because looking at him right now he is now 3 inches taller than me.  He has grown 6 inches in the last year.  That is crazy!  Here's the two comparison pictures to show that he has truly grown 6 inches in the last year.

 He is really putting all that food he eats to good use I guess!

This weekend the scouts invited the Webelos along to a camp out  at Antelope Island.  The Webelos could only go if their dad went with them.  Good thing Daniel has that puppy dog look down pat because he got Aaron to go along with them.  They went up for dinner Friday night and set up their tents.  They had fun around the campfire Friday night.  However, it was super windy throughout the night and the rain flap on the tent flapped really loudly all night long.  It didn't bother Josh and Daniel, but it really bothered Aaron.  Aaron ended up trying to sleep in the cab of the truck, but his 6'1" frame inside a mummy bag didn't fit very well.  Needless to say he was a bit ornery the whole next day from lack of sleep--haha!  The next morning Daniel had a basketball game so Aaron brought Daniel home, but left Josh there because the rest of the scouts were going on a 5 mile hike which Josh wanted to go on.  Our neighbor brought Josh home after the hike and Josh said he had lots of fun.  Here's a few pictures from the campout:

 Do these boys ever get full?!

 Josh said the dutch oven chicken dinner was delicious!

 A few of the boys got up early to watch the sunrise.  You can bet Mr. Early Bird Josh was there.  His definition of sleeping in is sleeping until 7:30 am.  I don't think this kid could be mine--haha!

 The sunrise: