Christmas Baking + Christmas Eve

This past holiday season seemed to just fly by! There didn't see to be enough time to fit everything we wanted to do on the calendar. But we managed to get the "major" things done, like baking!

 We started off strong this Christmas by making a practice batch of Kringler. I'm still working on finding the perfect mix of powdered sugar and milk for the frosting, but it tastes yummy regardless. HD nominated himself to be the head of the baking committee, so he was in charge of making sugar cookies.

 Ms. Gail and I worked on making our 2nd batch of Kringler while HD was in charge of making sugar cookies. He loves being in charge of that to make sure the cookies get made!

JP is never any real help in the kitchen; he seems to just pop in at the right moment to get in on the real fun. Little stinker!

As per usual, we had our jammie exchange. We need to find a better way to go shopping. HD ended up with some Star Wars jammies, JP snagged a pair of Wreck It Ralph pjs and Ms. Gail picked out her beloved princess nightgown.

The HD thought he was getting the Wreck It Ralph ones, and JP thought he was getting the Star Wars ones so they were surprised at the switcheroo that happened!

Needless to say, it was a successful swap for the kids. Dad enjoyed the pair HD picked out for him, but the pajama set Dad picked out for me was...well, a little big. If he'd have held up the bottoms, he'd have known! Hahaha but he tried! He took them back and found a better pair for me somewhere else.

A few days before Christmas we finally sat down to decorate cookies. I say finally because we planned on doing it several nights before but things kept coming up. Then the night we were setting up, I asked JP to go get his glasses on, and they were no where to be found. Dad said we aren't starting until they were found.... an hour later we still hadn't found them so it we had to stick to the plan, so the kids went to bed. Ms. Gail and I prayed to Saint Anthony and he led me right to them. So the next night we *finally* sat down to decorate.

Ms. Gail did really well this year in not spilling *all* the sprinkles everywhere!

HD was super focus on decorating that he only decorated a couple.

HD's snowman vs JP's blue man. I can't pick a favorite boys!

The were all pretty excited to decorate cookies, but I was surprised at how much longer it took them to decorate them all! The older they get, the longer it takes! I thought it'd be the other way around!

On Christmas eve, the kids got together and made Strawberry Santas. They started out strong.

But we didn't have the willpower to not eat them immediately after so while dinner was cooking, they were snacking on their strawberries.

Another one of our traditions is reading, "A Child's Christmas in Wales" and while I'm not super fond of the book, it's becoming more enjoyable now that Perry and I aren't the only ones reading it. Both boys took turns along with us but I was surprise at how many turns HD took. He brought one of the copies to school several times to read on his own. A true Dustin!

HD was finishing up reading the last paragraph when Ms. Gail attempted to jump from the couch to the bean bag on the other side of the coffee table. She lost her footing and tipped over my eggnog, which spilled alllll over the carpet and splash onto the couch. The story was immediately over as we then shampooed the carpet and clean the couch so it wouldn't smell rotten the next day. Happy Christmas Eve!

Before the kids went off to bed, they each were allowed to open one present from under the tree. HD picked one from Dad and received a collection of Star Wars actions figurines. He was thrilled!

JP opened up a coloring book from mom where you color in a circle to see see the image. Ms. Gail opened up a sticker maker. It was supposed to be opened the next day so when she wasn't paying attention, we put it back under the tree!

Ms. Gail finished up her letter to Santa as HD set up a camera to see if he could catch him. 

Happy Halloween from the Ninjas + Witch

I am not a fan of Halloween. Actually I’m not a huge fan of really any holiday, other than St. Patrick’s day and Thanksgiving. I’m just not a planner so both Christmas and Halloween stress me out a bit. Obviously Christmas more so than Halloween but still.

The planning for Halloween has the potential to be very stressful by making costume at home, but I took the easy, more expensive way out and bought Halloween costumes. We bought them about two ago, when they were 20% off. Because I kept putting it off, we saved money, but the choices were slim. Ms. Gail knew immediately that she wanted to be a witch. JP was fairly quick to decide on the green ninja costume. HD himmed and hawed for a while before also deciding on the green ninja costume. JP then decided they couldn’t be the same color so he grabbed a red one instead. JP not wearing green?! Seemed a little weird to me!

I sang Ms. Gail to bed the night before - some made up song that went like “Now it is time for bed for tomorrow is Halloween.” Of course I spruced it up a bit and made it sound scary. She loved it and woke up singing in the morning.

For dinner I try to theme it with something Halloween-ish. I used to make Halloweenies, which are basically pigs in a blanket, but they look like mummies instead. One year we had cheeseburgers and I cut the cheese into jack-o-lanterns. Other years it's make your own pizza. Because Ms. Gail had gymnastics right after school, I wasn't going to have a ton of prep time, especially because in the morning I went to quilting, and then right over to my neighbor's house to clean. This year, it was make your own pizza again, but I rolled out the dough into ghost-like shapes for them to decorate with pepperoni, sausage, and cheese.

Once dinner was out of the way, the kids eagerly jumped into their costumes. As always, I asked for a group photo before we left and asked JP to put his ninja mask on for the full effect. It went downhill from there. Instead of putting his mask on, he went to his room, took his costume off, and then sat on the floor and pouted. With a lot of convincing, I was able to talk him into getting it back on so we could get a picture.

 That's about the best picture of the three of them. I love when the boys match!

At one of the first houses we went to, Ms. Gail was taken as a hostage by the witches. They have a party every year, and the kids were excited to go trick-or-treating at their house this year, because they had scary decorations outside and knew what to expect. The ladies were tickled when they saw this little witch in training, and were even more delighted when she realized it was her neighbor! Ms. Gail walked past their house at the end of trick-or-treating, and said in the creepiest of voices, "There's that GLORIOUS house again!"

JP really just didn't want to go trick-or-treating. We went around the loop and I was having to push him up to each door and hold up his arm to get candy in his bucket. After a little while he just slunk around until Perry finally took him home and prepared him a cup of hot chocolate. In the mean time, HD and Ms. Gail were hilarious to walk around with. I don't know what it is about Halloween, but my kids are just so funny to listen to. HD declared, "This is the latest I've ever stayed up! It's practically morning!" It was 7:23pm, not even bedtime. At another house that had stairs leading up to it, he came back down and rolled his eyes while casually saying, "Well their dad needs to fix that crookedy stair." We also went to a house where someone was hiding on the front porch so she could jump out and scare people. Both kids decided they weren't going to that house after they watched it happen. We went to that house when the girl was taking a break. She was getting back into position when we were leaving, so HD and Ms. Gail said we had to watch her scare the next people, which she did. Ms. Gail then walked off saying, "Wow. That was so satisfying." Ms. Gail also pointed out that recognized one of her friends from school by her face and her hair. Is there another way? Hahaha!

Upon their arrival home, they immediately dumped out their candy to see what they got. It was so exciting for them!

After their candy had been sorted, both HD and Ms. Gail went back and forth trading candy WITH NO FIGHTING! JP eventually joined in with the few pieces I forced him to get, and the few handfuls his sister gave him from her bucket before he headed home.

 Bless her little heart, she gave him more candy when he was sorting through his small pile, because, "I just missed you so much!" She also gave him her Fun Dip because it was the best candy of the all, even after she realized it was the only one she got. Oh my heart! We later found out JP was just really tired....

Happy Birthday to my Titanic-Loving Kid

Happy happy birthday to HD who is now double digits. Like how though?!

 At the beginning of the school year, he was really into the Titanic. We found a fictional book series about the passengers on the Titanic and he couldn't read them fast enough. He also enjoyed the book, "I Survived: The Sinking of the Titanic" which he also quickly read. He had no idea what he wanted for a cake this year, so I surprised him with the idea of the Titanic. He was quick to inform me he didn't want it to be sinking!

 He liked it, but he said he would have loved it if it had four stacks like the actual Titanic....

 I could not have done this cake without my dear friend, Alicia, though! She and her daughter came out for a concert and stayed an extra few days. Because that weekend coincided with HD's birthday party weekend, I suggested she help me with his cake. We had always talked about getting together to make a cake, but we never set aside time to actually do it. I figured now was a good time to check that one off our list. 

 She's got a pretty steady hand, so she did all the little windows on the bottom of the boat. HD was very interested in what she was working on and wanted to try it himself. 

The cake decorators and perfectionists in us were both thinking NO, it'll ruin it! So we let him do windows on the back of the boat, since there's ALWAYS a backside!

School is Back in Session!

I've been waiting for this day for YEARS!  It's a bittersweet thing - seeing my babies grow up, but wanting them to stay young longer. I didn't want to wish time away but yet here we are anyways. Most importantly, my baby is in KINDERGARTEN you guys!! We've officially closed the chapter in our lives where little babies and toddlers keep us preoccupied and said farewell to paying for childcare. There's still the occasional camp here and there, but nothing too serious!

We were supposed to start school the last Wednesday in August, but the teachers went on strike. I was okay with a delayed start because a) I had the day off anyways b) we were going on vacation on Thursday and Friday (sorry perfect attendance!) and c) I wasn't mentally prepared for school to start.

Ms. Gail is in a bi-lingual kindergarten class where she'll be taught half the day in English, and half the day in Spanish. I'm already impressed with what she's learned. She came home after a week counting to 10 in Spanish, and the next week to 20. Her Spanish alphabet is almost there, but she's practicing hard! 

On her first day of school, I attempted to dress her up really cute, and have adorable hair but she was having none of it. It was imperative she wore her cat pants, cat socks, and cat shoes. We compromised on the shirt. She needed it to be a cat shirt so her friends would know she liked cats (because the extra backpack, lunchbox, and water bottle weren't telling enough) but I told her she could wear whatever she wants tomorrow, as long as I pick out her top. She reluctantly agreed, but wasn't too happy about it. I could feel the eye rolls as she said, "Oh fine." 

We agreed in the morning I would take her to school so she knew where to go but she decided at the last minute she actually wanted to ride the bus with her brothers. I hadn't gotten my photos of her yet so we quickly snapped a few and hustled to the bus stop. It was early. GO FIGURE. I wanted to take her school anyways. 

I met her at the bus stop after her second day of school and she was SO EXCITED to tell me she found HD's lunchbox (that he forgot at school the day before.) I asked her if she was sure it was his, and she happily replied, "Oh yes! It's his Star Wars one! I saw it sitting by the fence so I asked my teacher if I could go get my brothers lunchbox and he said I could!" Imagine my surprise when it was not his. I had her return it to school the next day and she was afraid the bus driver wouldn't let her on the bus because it had food in it. (Wha??)

Picking out clothes for my boys is clearly coming to an end. I was able to recommend he wear his new green shirt, and suggested shorts to go with, but the shorts were vetoed and replaced with these. I strongly don't like them... But he likes them, so whatever. I can't save you from yourself. JP was a little disappointed to not have any of his friends in class with him but I think still being able to play with them at recess makes it better. He's a quiet guy so I didn't get much out of him. 

Middle child problems right here: He's just a good kid so I don't have much to say about him. I'm not forgetting about him though!

My first born is a 4th grader! Say what?!?! He's wayyy too cool for school now. You can't really tell in the picture, but he's got a nice red ring around his mouth. I'm not sure if he was sucking on something or sucking his lips, but seriously, could he have better timing? Things went as good as expected with him. He came home with a crappy attitude because school is boring. "Recess is the only thing I'll ever like."

As school has progressed, he's taken a strong interest in the Titanic. In fact, I came home from work one afternoon to find him staring at the tv watching the Titanic sink, in real time. It was a computer rendering of the ship sinking, popping up timeline facts along every so often. He was an HOUR in. I let him finish it, but in fast forward. I was not about to have him spend 2 hours and 40 minutes watching that. When I sat down with him on the couch, I asked the obvious mom question, "What are you watching." "The Titanic." My heart stopped for a second. At a quick glance of the screen, I could see the Titanic sinking and immediately thought it was the movie. I casually asked, "Did you happen to see any naked women?" "Mom! I'M WATCHING THE TITANIC SINK! WHAT DO YOU THINK?!" Such relief washed over me as I watched screen for a little longer. Phew! 

Since then, he's finished the book, 'I Survived: The Titanic' and has moved on to a 'Rescuing from the Titanic' series, or something similar. I've never seen him more enthralled with a book before! He thinks it would be a lot of fun to scuba dive down to the Titanic to see it. I don't want to be the bearer of bad news for another career path he can't realistically do because of diabetes. No sense killing his curiosity now. 

Now that school is back in full session, I'm going to be over here relaxing on my days off, but only after I frantically pack lunches in the morning and herd kids around in the morning. WALK FASTER THAN WHAT YOU'RE GOING! GET YOUR SHOES ON! I ALREADY TOLD YOU TO GO BRUSH YOUR TEETH. WHY AREN'T YOUR SHOES ON?! Some day I'll miss this. Some day. Not today though. 

Seriously, where all are the freaking shoes?!

Let’s Talk About the Lows

It has been a long 5 months but then I stop to think and have a hard time realizing it’s *only* been 5 months since HD was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. A year ago I would not have guessed this to be my new focus in life. A year ago, we were elbows deep in occupational therapy. I thought that was stressful, dealing with insurance not paying. I never knew how easy I had it.

I feel on a day to day basis we have a good system in place for managing his diabetes. We are beginning to understand which foods are better to dose for after he eats, and which ones we should dose before and then wait a hot minute before eating to avoid a spike in his blood sugar. We’re getting there but it’s far from easy.

After calling back and forth between our insurance, our doctor’s office and our medical supply company, we finally received our Dexcom starter kit in the mail at the very beginning of July. A Dexcom is a continuous glucose monitor, in other words, it’s a sensor HD wears that takes blood sugar readings approximately every five minutes. Previously, to get a blood sugar reading, we had to poke his finger, put a drop of blood on a test strip and the meter would spit us out a number. With his Dexcom, as long as he has his phone near him, I just need to look at my phone to see what his blood sugar is AND where it’s trending to go AND how quickly it’s guessed to changed. A finger poke is like lighting a match, you can see where you are at that moment. A Dexcom is like turning on a flashlight, you can see where you are, where you’ve been and where you’re going. Sounds pretty legit, right? It was very reassuring to have when we were on vacation, out in the sun all day. I felt very helicopter-y as I followed him around with his medical bag, just so I could get a reading on him.

 

We received his Dexcom with enough time to insert his first sensor and then head out for vacation. The sensors last 10 days before they need to be replaced so his next ones were handled by Grandma and Nanny. I handed over all the things, and said, “Here’s the directions- I’ve only done it once. I can’t troubleshoot yet...” It was reassuring to me to be able to see his numbers anytime I wanted to, even at 1:00 am.

His Dexcom isn’t fool proof though. The first one Grandma inserted ended up with a sensor failure so another one needed inserted after only a few days. ( The company is good a replacing failures!) The Grandmas had an extra task, since they were caring for him during the summer - swimming. He can wear it to swim but it needed a little bandaging to make sure it didn’t fall off and get lost on accident. Due to it being submerged, it’s sticky adhesive tends to weaken.

This was the first time I heard European sirens go off on my phone. I set his urgent low alarms to European sirens so I would know it was a medical emergency, as opposed to, “what did that beep mean?” (I have the option to have alerts on my phone when his blood sugar is too high, too low, increasing quickly, dropping rapidly, or if there is no data being received.) At 1:30 am while at the dome home, I had sirens blaring into my ear. Not exactly how one wants to wake up... I quickly grabbed my phone and looked at HD’s blood sugar number via Dexcom. 39 with an arrow pointing  down. My heart sank as I dialed up Nanny. She answered rather quickly, so I explained that she needed to go down and wake HD up because he was needing medical attention. Long story short, his sensor fell off and wasn’t able to get a reading. Phew! I was calmly panicking inside. My mom was impressed with how calm I was despite the circumstances. (For those not familiar with diabetes, too low of a blood sugar, and he’s at risk for passing out or having a seizure. If unresponsive, he has an emergency medication to jump start his system. Left untreated, and he’s a goner 😐)

While at my soster’ wedding the other weekend, I had a similar heart stopping experience. Throughout the day, we just let him roam free with the other kids. My dress didn’t have pockets so for a good part of the day, I wasn’t able to check on him by glancing at my phone. Perry has the app on his phone so he kept an eye on him. He had pretty decent numbers all day (especially considering all the food out for snacking on!) That evening all the adults gathered on the dance floor to celebrate. Around 8 pm I found raced him to the house we were staying at 50 yards away. He was a little high and wanted a snack, so I gave him a correcting dose to bring him back down, and added in units to cover the carbs he was about to eat. Once that was done, I gave him his nighttime insulin and off we went.

Half an hour later Aunt Bobby snagged HD for a dance, but he insisted he wasn’t feeling well so he and I sat down and together we checked his phone. 69 with an arrow angling down. I loaded up his shirt pocket with a large handful of gummy worms and he proceeded to finish dancing with his aunt, all the while diving into his pocket for worms. Fifteen minutes go by and we sit down to recheck his numbers. 39 with the arrow pointing down. My heart sank. HD knew that wasn’t good. He calmly looked at me and said, “Mom, I think we need to get the emergency stuff ready.” He’s not a particularly heavy kid, but after a few glasses of wine, and heels, he’s not the lightest thing ever either. I scooped that kid up so quickly, dove past a few people, and sprinted to the house. I laid him down on the bed, and gave him an “old fashioned” blood test. I’ve never get so much relief pass over me. 169. We discovered his sensor was falling off. He was fine. I was in a little shock, but we both managed to enjoy the rest of our evening. Crisis averted.

Not all the problems we’ve had are from failing Dexcoms. Early into our diagnosis, HD started his honeymoon period. Essentially after not working for a while, his pancreas starts producing insulin again. When we left the hospital, we were giving him 1 unit for ever 15 carbs consumed. After about a week, he would start crashing with low lows right after eating until we realized this phenomenon. We’re now using a 1:30 ratio, so in therory we were unknowingly overdosing him. This happened to my sister once when she was watching them. She knew we changed his breakfast ratio, but didn’t realize his dinner one was changing too. Luckily I called to check in with her and caught the error in time so she could give him extra carbs to even it all out.

That situation was just me not being clear on his dosing. We haven’t had any changes lately, but I still managed to overdose him the other night and I felt terrible. I don’t know if he had a cookie at school and wasn’t dosed for it, or if he had it one the bus, but regardless, he had a cookie without taking insu, so by dinner his numbers were through the roof. While Perry and I debated about who was at fault, the school or HD for not getting insulin (I would fault the school, but am happy to see he at least wasn’t left out  of having one), I was calculating how much of a correction to give him and then how much for dinner. AND I COUNTED HALF UNITS AS ONE. As soon as he pressed the button, my heart sank and I immediately told everyone to stop talking as I recounted. He should have had 3 units, but he took 5.

If I hadn’t caught it, he could have died. I had to take Ms. Gail to gymnastics so Perry watched him like a hawk. After two extra chocolate cups of milk, two spoonfuls of honey, and an orange he was perfect at 116. Thank you to Dexcom for tracking all that. I watched it unfold while at gymnastics. Thank you for technology! But seriously this diabetes stuff is no joke.

As his primary caregiver, this has been my worst fear, overdosing my kid. Why if I didn’t realize my error? Also equally as terrifying is my kid overdosing himself. Kids with diabetes are 50 percent more likely to deal with depression. That statistic is staggering. (I go through bouts of depression myself so I’m no stranger to it.) While overdosing can happen innocently enough- miscalculations and such, it can also be purposeful. I have seen stories posted in the mom’s group I’m in about their child deliberately giving themselves too much insulin and the mom’s are thankful they found them in time. I pray that thought never passes through his mind. But in just two short years, he’ll be in middle school, managing his diabetes on his own, carrying his supplies with him through the halls. At least that’s how it sounds anyway. But at this point, a half a unit too much of insulin (think the size of a the head of a pin) can send him low.

It’s hard not to be anxious and worried about it all the time. There have been more days than I can think of where I show up to work with puffy eyes from crying. There are days when I’m exhausted from staying up to check his blood sugar. The morning tend to be frantic, making sure he’s dosed for breakfast, he has his phone, and his carb counts are in his lunch box. It’s not big stuff, but it adds up to a lot of stuff to constantly be thinking about. I don’t wish this upon anyone.

Now I’m going to go wake him up from his slumber to force a cup of milk down his throat to perk his numbers back up so we don’t end up with sirens again like this morning.