Still not Pregnant

I went to the doctor yesterday for my pregnancy test and unfortunately it was negative. They did a blood test so I had to wait until about 3pm to get the results. It is frustrating that we are not pregnant, but we'll try again. My hopes are still high and maybe next month is our time. I'll keep you all updated.

Just some family updates

Since I haven't been very consistent in updating my blog I thought I should do a quick update of things happening. With Ella turning 3 in September I was able to sign her up for preschool through the park district. She started on September 22 and absolutely loves it! She gets to go with her best friend Emma. Her teachers name is Miss Jenny and she goes Tues and Thursdays from 10:30-noon. It's not too long, but enough time for me to run a couple of quick errands! She is having so much fun so far.

Here is her and Emma walking in on the first day.

That same week she also started her gymnastics class, through the park district as well. She gets to go into class without me and I actually don't get to watch or anything! They shut the door, so that the kids can stay focused and listen to the teacher. I get to see what she has learned on the last day of class. She is loving it and really likes her teacher Ms. Kelly.

Here she is on her first day (in front of the Gatorade machine)

Other happenings in our family is that we are trying to have another baby. For those of you who don't know, Marc and I have been trying to get pregnant since July 2008, so for about 14 months now. We decided to see a fertility specialist and I had my first appointment on September 8th. So, we went through a cycle of fertility treatments, medications and hormones, nothing too major. I will go to the doctor on Monday to see if we are pregnant! If not, we'll try again. Hopefully, I'll have some great news soon!!!!

I'm going to try and keep up better with my blog. I enjoy writing it, I just haven't been getting to it.

Look Who's Three!!!!

That's right, Ella celebrated her third birthday last weekend (Sept 27th). I really can't believe that she is three years old. She is such a fun little girl, so full of life and imagination. She has really been celebrating her birthday for the whole month of Sept, but her birthday party was last Saturday. We had a "My little pony" theme and she was so excited. We thought we were going to have 7 kids at the party, but the morning of the party two families called and said the kids had fevers and weren't going to be able to come, bummer :( So, it ended up being Ella, her friends Ella and Brady (sisters) and her cousin Johnathon. We were also lucky to have Marc's brothers, John and Adam come over and their girlfriends and our neighbors Jamie and April. Ella didn't mind that there weren't many kids, Ella and Brady are two of her best friends so she had a blast.

I made her a "My little pony" cake! It turned out pretty well, not the best, but Ella loved it.

We had the party on our rooftop deck, so we could have more space to play. I found a "my little pony" pinata at Party City. It was a pull string one, I didn't think that a baseball bat and three year olds would be good together. The girls loved pulling the strings off! Here they are trying to get it open.

There were even a couple rounds of ring around the rosie played!

Instead of giving out goody bags I made stick horses for the kids. They turned out so cute and the girls thought they were pretty cool. Johnathon didn't care much for them, he is getting a little too old! But Ella and Brady got to take theirs home with them and Ella has been playing with hers all week. Here is Ella riding on her "Pinkie Pie". Notice her birthday shirt too! I ordered an iron on transfer that had her name on it and just put it on a white shirt. She thought that was really cool and wore it two days in a row.

After her friends went home we let her open all her presents, she was so excited. She loved everything she got. Her big present from Marc and I was a playhouse tent for her room, it is really cool. Here she is trying it out.

Her real birthday was the next day, Sunday. I made her cinnamon rolls for breakfast and put a candle in it for her. She was really into the candles this year.

After we all got ready we took Ella to see Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs at the theater down the street. She loves going to the movies and having popcorn! The movie was cute and Ella enjoyed it and spending time with Mommy and Daddy.

We finished off the day by taking her out for pizza for dinner. I think that she had a great birthday this year. I had a lot of fun planning her party and making sure she had a very special day. I love her so much and love the little girl she has become (most of the time!). I have to say that she challenges me on a daily basis and sometimes this attitude is more than I can handle, but overall she is very fun.

Allergy update

I just realized that I never posted an update about Ella and the possible allergies. We saw a specialist while we were in MN and he was very helpful and answered all my questions. Basically he said that he doesn't believe Ella has any allergies! There is a 50-60% false positive rate with the blood allergy tests. He said that in children they almost never test for food allergies unless they show a reaction to food. Good news for us, but a very stressful couple of weeks. Glad that we saw the specialist and got some expert advice.

3 year Check-up

Today I took Ella in for her three year check up and she got her flu shot. So, she is 36 1/2 inches tall and 28.5 lbs. A little small, she is about the 25% for both height and weight. I'm not surprised that she is small, I was the same way. I was always really small until I hit puberty, so she may be the same way.

I can't believe that she will be three is less than 2 weeks!! She is such a great little girl. She is very caring and always thinking. She loves animals (both real and stuffed), hot dogs, crackers, her kitties, and blanky! She told me that her best friends are Emma and Kaia (her cousin). Ella is also going to start a preschool program next week. It is two days a week for and hour and a half. Not much, but something for now. I'm excited for her to have more independence and see what she can do.

What to do now?!?

Ella got blood taken the other day at the doctor to test for allergies, and the doctor called last night with the results. It turns out she has quite a few mild allergies; milk, egg whites, wheat, household mildew, cat and dog dander. To be honest I'm not even sure what all this means. I spoke with her doctor's nurse today and asked a few questions, but I still have more. From what I am understanding, mild allergies means that they can usually tolerate the allergens, but if they keep being exposed to them, then the allergy can increase. So basically everything that Ella eats right now she is allergic to! I don't even know where to begin with trying to change everything, this is very overwhelming. Little steps for now and hopefully get in to see a nutritionist soon. If anyone has any ideas, I'm open for ideas.

I know it's been forever!!!!

It had been forever since I posted but I thought that Ella's trip to the hospital deserved some writing. So, on Friday night I had to take Ella to the ER. She was having some trouble breathing and it was getting worse. She had an episode similar to this about a month and a half ago and I took her to urgent care and they did a chest xray and ruled out pneumonia and said as long as it got better and not worse it was probably nothing major to worry about. We went to her regular doctor the next day and they said it was probably caused by a virus that was causing brachial constriction. So, when she started having the same issue again on Friday I was concerned, but not overly worried. But when she went to bed at 7 and then woke up at 8 and it seemed worse, I started getting concerned. I took her to the ER at about 8:30pm and we were seen right away. As soon as the doctor came in and saw her he ordered a nebulizer treatment for her and we got transferred to a different room. In our new room they came and put an IV in her little arm and took blood, gave her some magnesium and steroids and let us be for a while. She then got another round of nebulizer treatment and was feeling better, besides all the "pokes".

Doing her nebulizer treatment in the ER

They decided that she needed to be admitted to the hospital and be monitored for 24 hours :( I then called Marc and he was on his way, in a cab! All Ella wanted Daddy to bring was a balloon, so Marc stopped at the grocery store and found her a butterfly balloon, a race car, and a box of Reese Pieces. Once Daddy came with the presents she was feeling a little better.

Happier after daddy brought her a balloon

As soon as they told me we had to stay, my heart just sank. I couldn't picture how it was going to be to stay in a hospital with a two year old. It was so painful to watch her get poked and prodded by all the nurses and doctors. I shed a few tears to say the least.

We didn't get sent up to the hospital room until about 2am! I was exhausted and had been up since about 5:30am, Ella was also exhausted (obviously). Marc stayed with us until we were all settled in and then headed home, as we had his sister and her boyfriend staying with us. Ella ended up sleeping for about 4 hours and I think I maybe got about an hour. Saturday morning we waited until the attending doctor arrived at about 8am, for him to tell us the next move. He came in and listened to her breathing and decided that we better stay for another 24 hours. He also wanted to hook her back up to her IV and do nebulizer treatments every three hours and steroids every 6 hours. That news broke me, I couldn't imagine spending a whole day and another night there. I called Marc and told him the news and he came back over as soon as he could. I was able to get home and shower and relax for a bit then headed back. Ella was so brave the whole time and such a good girl. We got up a few times and walked around our unit with her IV pole and everything! We managed to make it through the day with lots of cartoons and treats. Marc stayed with us through the evening and then headed home again to spend some time with his sister and get some good sleep. Ella and I managed to get to bed about 10pm. She decided that she wanted to sleep in the pull out bed (that was supposed to be my bed), so I let her sleep there, I figured as long as she slept I didn't care. So, that left me sleeping in the child size bed/crib! Ella slept for almost 10 hours and I got at least 4 or 5, so not that bad. We patiently awaited the doctors arrival the next morning. He came at about 8am again and gave us the ok to head home. The diagnosis is still not 100%. It could have been an asthma attack or some kind of allergic reaction. She was breathing fine when they let us go home an the doctor gave us a prescription for an inhaler to use until we saw our regular doctor. We went to the regular doctor yesterday and she gave us a prescription for Singular, which Ella will take daily and they took blood to do some initial allergy testing.

It was the most emotionally exhausting thing I have every been though! I can't even imagine how parents do it when their kids have to be in the hospital long term. My heart goes out to all families with kids in the hospital. Thank you to everyone for all the kind words and thoughts. Ella is back to her regular self, attitude and all!

Hooked up to her IV and watching cartoons