The BIG 100 and a special vomit story

Here is my 100th blog entry chock full of our February ditties. Try not to eat while reading. Enjoy.

Blogging record high in January, is definitely being followed by the blogging record low in February. Can you tell it's been busy? :)

We've kicked off the month by signing both kids up for swimming lessons. Mia attended three times a week and Ivor attended 5 times a week. It was exhausting but they loved it and had great fun. The program was actually very useful for Ivor. He's made good progress in his swimming readiness. The exercise and excitement wore him out and most evenings he'd beg to go to bed as soon as we got home. Mia didn't get the expected benefits. She decided that swim lessons made a terrific play time pretending to be a mermaid, fisherman, boat, diver, bunny (apparently this bunny isn't afraid of water), princess... She was not inclined to go with the idea that she should learn how to swim or do any exercises as instructed. It couldn't be helped. I tried then gave up and just let her be. She was OK with making mommy do what she wanted. I saw no remorse in those pretty blue eyes. Ivor was very sad when the program finished three weeks later but we're simply unable to continue at this time. It was difficult to work in the time since the classes encroached on the kids' bed time. I think we'll give it another go come summer but that'll have to be it for now.

We went to Serbia one weekend to visit some of my relatives that never met Chris and the kids. The visit was fun (well, sort of, read on for more) but the cause wasn't. My uncle has been diagnosed with cancer and his health is declining very rapidly so we went to visit while he was still with us. He was so glad to see us and I am really glad we decided to do it. That was about a week and a half before the Kosovo independence announcement. As things are now, I don't think that we'll go visit any time soon so we really did it in the nick of time. Now Chris has another exotic destination to add to his "been there" list.

During the weekend both kids got sick at some point. Every parent's worst nightmare. Mia started off by running a fever as soon as we showed up over there so she was overly clingy and whiny the entire time. Fortunately, Tylenol we brought along kept things at bay until we could see a doctor Monday morning. Then, during the single night that we slept there, Ivor kept us up most of the night by throwing up an impressive 4 times. It was nasty. His vomit was "liquidy," brown and sticky and smelled worse than your average puke (as if there is any that actually smells good). Quite an awful site. After some investigating I concluded that he overate chocolate wafers (which he loves). While we were briefly away that evening, he got into some cookies and apparently ate more than one tummy can handle. Who knew so many cookies could fit into a child-sized stomach all at once. Well, they couldn't fit in there for a long time anyway. Result was unpleasant for all parties involved, especially grown ups (aka child's parents) as we got to do all of the cleaning. Now this is the crowning moment... My cousin just finished his house and got it ready to move in. His dad (my uncle) is, as I mentioned, terminally ill so my cousin and his family are staying with him for the time being. They have never slept at their new house yet. Not even once! When we came down for the visit, they've insisted that we sleep over there so we'd be comfortable. The house is beautiful, sparkling clean, brand new tan carpets, brand new furniture, just lovely... Come in the Phillips clan, two small kids in tow. We show up and what do we do that one night we sleep at the house? Have a kid throw up dark brown chocolate-laden vomit repeatedly throughout their beautiful house and onto spotless (never again) carpets. I just froze when it started happening. We cleaned and cleaned and hoped desperately that we wouldn't leave a mess. I hope that our incredibly gracious hosts will forgive us. Can you imagine? During the first episode I ran through the house rummaging through stuff trying to find something that I could use to clean up. Didn't want to use any of their brand new towels so I found what looked like a small white rag (yes, also looked new). At the end of the night (actually around 3:00am) it looked more brown than white and not even good soap washing would help. So there we were in the formerly clean bathroom with me feverishly trying to clean the rag in the sink. I looked up at Chris and asked him what we should do. Dead serious, he looked back and said:" You know there's only one thing we can do now." "What?" I said figuring that he had some awesome plan that will magically make everything right. "We'll just have to steal the rag." His suggestion caught me off guard so I burst out laughing as for a moment there I thought that to be a really terrific idea. I mean it was embarrassing enough already that we messed up the house that hasn't even been lived in; had to go through their closet to find something to clean with... Needless to say, I didn't sleep well for the rest of the night. All I could do was to repeatedly apologize the next morning and hope that they won't take it against us. Really, we make better guests than that. I promise. I think. Now you know that if you take us in and we have kids in tow, we can't guarantee anything. You've been warned. During the cleanup session Chris and I exchanged vomit stories and he sure has a winner. He said that one year he ate all of his Halloween candy on right after trick or treating. Apparently it took a little bit for it all to get bubbly inside. Next day in the lunchroom of all places, he got sick and vomited across the table onto a friend of his. As he had quite an audience in the full lunchroom, he said that once other kids took in the sight and smelled the delightful aroma of the half digested candy, several of them decided to join the party and vomit themselves. That must have been some site and, I am sure, a joy to clean up for some unfortunate person. Moving on...

As I've mentioned, upon our arrival to Serbia, Mia decided to start running a fever. She contracted scarlatina (throat bacterial infection accompanied by fever and body rash) several days prior but of course we didn't know it. Five day incubation period expired the afternoon we arrived there. Fortunately Tylenol was at hand so Mia made it OK. We made the doctor's visit when we got back home and antibiotics took care of the rest. However, that meant a 10 day period away from daycare. One day before she went back to daycare Ivor got sick. I promptly took him to the doctor. He contracted strep so then he got to stay home for 10 days, on antibiotics as well. A few days before he was to go back to school Mia got a fever again so we made another doctor's visit. Fortunately, it was something minor so she only stayed home for three days this time. I am happy to announce that as of Thursday they're both back to school and I hope that they stay that way for a while.

A week ago significant changes occurred in Chris' schedule as well. He's started intensive Croatian classes. He goes every evening, 5 days a week, for three class periods. At that pace he'll be speaking native in no time. I'll be sure to keep you posted.

Other news include Chris' job search. As of February he has his work permit so we've started sending out resumes. He's had two interviews so far. One of them was actually today at Ericsson's and it was very promising. The job seems good, the location is awesome (right next to daycare, yay me!) and Chris said he liked the people he'd be working with. Let's see how this one unravels.

I think this is enough for one blog entry. Stay tuned for more in March!

Computer "fixup"

My laptop has been "down" for some 6 weeks now. Simply couldn't boot it up at all. That was annoying and concerning but I moved to our secondary computer whose main purpose it to serve as a backup unit should my laptop malfunction. So I did. Then, last week the kid computer went down. So the family of three computers suddenly shrank down to one. That left one computer for us to fight over. Yes, including kids. Even Mia at the tender age of three has an array of games that she likes to play on her own. She's mastered the mouse and the keyboard and totally "gets" computers already. When I was three we were lucky to have a turntable. I think... Maybe those weren't out yet at that point. Anyway, today Chris fixed both computers and order will soon move back into our family's electronic world. The balance has been restored.