Riding along in my automobile…

Olivia cruising

Olivia had a great holiday weekend! On Sunday she went to Auntie’s house while Arnie and I took Maddie out. She LOVES playing with Auntie’s toys, especially the cars. Here’s a picture of her cruising Auntie’s front lawn wearing her lei from Disney and being SO proud of herself! She hasn’t mastered steering yet so she goes til she hits something and then we adjust her and off she goes again. 🙂

Lion King Show

On Sunday we took Maddie to see the Lion King at the Bushnell. This was the broadway production. It was an AMAZING show and at 2 hours and 45 minutes a bit long. But Maddie thoroughly enjoyed it !

The show did make her ask a lot of questions. We had to explain what happened to young Simba and young Nala when they “grew up” (older actors took over the roles). And she wanted to know if Simba’s daddy had *really* died. She felt better knowing it was all pretend. She watches mostly cartoons and very little live action shows.

She felt better at the end of the play to see that everyone was still there. It was a great time for Arnie and I to spend some one-on-one time with her.

Bad parents!

I still can’t believe we did this!

So last night Arnie had a golf lesson at 6:45pm. I was downstairs on the phone with Disney for a client before he left so he just dropped off Olivia downstairs with us and kissed us goodbye and off he went.

I got the girls into the tub and then ready for bed – and then realized I didn’t know if he’d given her the meds. Of course he had left his cell phone on the counter so I couldn’t call him.  So I gave her the enalapril (blood pressure med) and amoxicillan.

When he got home we were talking and I said “You didn’t give her the meds, right?”  Turns out he DID give them to her. I wasn’t worried about the amox, but the enalapril freaked me out. So we called cardiology to confirm it wasn’t going to be an issue.

We were all set – Dr. Salazar said just to not give it to her in the morning.  We’ve NEVER had an issue with mixing up her meds or giving it to her twice.  And I pray it won’t happen again!

Special Person's Day

Maddie, Katie & Mrs. Markowski (their teacher) Maddie, Mrs L (teacher’s aide) and Katie.

Today was Special Person’s Day at Maddie’s school. The kids can invite the special people in their lives (both sets of grandparents, and our Aunt Adrienne attended). They have their spring concert.

Maddie was SO excited and sang so loud and proud! She was in the front row and did such a great job! 🙂

Bye Bye Pacifier

Olivia with

I did it. I bit the bullet and gave in and we got rid of the pacifier.

Here’s how it went:

Yesterday morning Olivia cried the ENTIRE way to Diana’s for “Rah Rah” (pacifier).  I thought about it all day and decided the best way to handle it was to cut the pacifier off the stuffed dog (it was sewn on). And then when she asked for it, we’d hand her the dog.

We got home and of course, she asked for it. So Arnie brought it out. Immediately she put it to her mouth … wait? What’s wrong? I told her ‘rah rah’ is broken and she CRIED big big tears.  She was SO sad.  Maddie was LIVID that Arnie cut the pacifier off – she couldn’t believe it!  “Why did you do that to her Rah Rah?”

So she’s walking around with ‘rah rah’ and every once in a while she’ll put it to her mouth and then look at me and say ” Rah rah broken” with a very sad look on her face.  She slept well last night but woke up earlier than normal this morning. Of course first thing she did was show me that Rah Rah was broken.  Poor baby girl!

Welcome to the new & improved site!

I’ve switched over to a new design which will allow me to update much easier which means … MORE UPDATES! I’ll be able to quickly document cute things miss Olivia has done. I’m also going to branch out and update about Maddie Rose as well.

You’ll notice you can comment to each entry as well . I left the old guestbook up, but this will be easier to track.

Finally if you look to the left, there are different sections.

  • The menu section contains links from the old site.
  • The pages section contains a list of all the old pages but converted to this new format.
  • The calendar section will allow you to quickly see how many entries were posted this month and click on a day to access those entries.
  • The categories section is going to be great for me. As I type out an entry, I can “label” it so that way someone can quickly access all the entries relating to Olivia’s hospitalizations or cardiologist appointments, etc. “Life with Maddie” and “Life with Olivia” are going to be those general updates on what is new and exciting with them or if they said or did something cute and / or funny
  • The archives section lists all the months I have posts for. So someone can quickly go back to July 2004 to see my posts about Olivia’s birth.
  • The links section lists all my links for heart friends and other useful links.

I will still be keeping the Announcement Email List but I won’t be sending out announcements daily. Only after appointments or things like that.
So feel free to dig around and drop us an email or comment if you have any questions or concerns.

Updates all around

Olivia has been sick so I’m going to update from the beginning. Note that she’s doing great – just likes to make things interesting for everyone.

April 29 – May 6: We’re in Disney. Olivia had a GREAT time and was so easy going.

May 5: We note that Olivia’s coming down with a cold.

May 17: Olivia is very fussy over dinner. I take her temperature and it’s 101º+ after tylenol.

May 18:

102º+ fever. I stay home and take her in to see Dr. Friedman. Ears are clear and throat is red. Assumption is sinus infection and we’ll treat her with 3.5ml of omnicef (antibiotics – 250 mg / 5 ml) once a day for 7 to 10 days.

May 19: Still running a fever.

May 20: Fussy but no more fever.

May 21: REALLY fussy. I noticed she had a rash behind her ears which I assumed was relating to not rinsing enough after the bath so I put some lotion on it. I had to take her out of church during Mass because she was REALLY fussy which has NEVER happened before. I then notice the rash is EVERYWHERE (belly, back). Her cheeks were red.

Arnie calls Dr. Friedman after Mass and she feels it’s just part of the virus (fever, rash) so not to worry. Olivia ate next to NOTHING all day and then was up more than half the night. This is SO not our Olivia so we’re both a bit freaked. No fever but definitely not herself. We finally put her in our bed at 2AM because we’re all exhausted. An aside Maddie comment: the next morning we told her we were tired because Olivia was awake all night. She said “Why didn’t you wake me up?” HA!

May 22: Rash is much lighter in the morning but gets worse as the day goes on. Arnie stays home and takes her back in to see Dr. Friedman. She believes it’s still related to the fever but just in case she recommends stopping the omnicef because it’s a new drug for her and maybe that’s causing the reaction. We start her on benadryl as well to help.

Olivia finally ate decent last night (pasta). So I think we’re over the hump. I don’t like things that can’t be explained with her – it’s scary stuff.

Now on to the good stuff!

Talking
Miss Olivia is a talking fool! The girl doesn’t stop. She says so much it’s unreal. A few highlights:

  • Fresh (as in Maddie’s being fresh)
  • STOP IT!
  • Bad
  • Mickey Mouse (comes out as “Mi-ee Mouse”)
  • TV on?
  • TV off
  • stickers
  • color (comes out like “yellow”)
  • Duck
  • Bird
  • Kitty
  • Hot
  • Hot (for cold)
  • Water
  • Brush teeth
  • ketchup
  • ketchup (for toothpaste)
  • Markers

There are a ton more, but these are the ones she’s most recently picked up.