Family Portrait

Carter drew this family portrait at school a few weeks ago.  He even included Charlotte and our two fish!  And I'd apparently already had my birthday :)

Perforated Ear Drum

Grayson is doing much better.  I took him into the pediatrician on Wednesday and Dr. Huss was not at all concerned about him.  Grayson's ear infection had cleared up and his lungs were sounding improved.  Dr. Huss took him off all of the medications except for one antibiotic.  We agreed that the urgent care doctor is not used to treating children and went a little overboard on all the medication.

While we were at the pediatrician's office, I had Dr. Huss glance in Carter's ears since they were still hurting him some.  Dr. Huss said there was a lot of fluid but no real infection still.  He suggested using a saline spray to help reduce the fluid but that was it.

On Wednesday evening, Carter's ears started to really hurt him, especially the left one.  We gave him some Motrin and thought that maybe the storms that were coming through were increasing the pressure in his ears.  He was in a lot of pain though and there wasn't much we could do to help him.  Luckily he was really tired and fell asleep easily.  He woke up a couple of times that night but was able to get back to sleep pretty quick.  He woke up again around 5 am with a small puddle on his pillow and more fluid coming out of his ear.  And he finally wasn't in pain.  We were pretty sure then that he'd reputured an ear drum.  

I got the first appointment at our pediatrician's office with another one of the doctors (it was Christmas Eve).  And we were right - he'd perforated his left ear drum.  And had a pretty good infection in the right ear.  Dr. Collins said Dr. Huss made a judgement call with not going ahead and giving Carter antibiotics the day before.  Unfortunately, Carter did not improve on his own.  But not that Carter perforated an ear drum, he'll probably get antibiotics right away from now on :)

Carter's doing fine.  But now Rylan started complaining that his ears hurt today (on a Saturday after our pediatrician's office closed).  And he's having a lot of trouble hearing us.  We gave him Motrin and that seemed to help with the pain.  I'd really prefer to get into our pediatrician's office on Monday but we may be going to an urgent care tomorrow - yay :)

Pneumonia

It's been a rough couple of months in our house.  We've all been battled various colds (at least one of us is always sick).  But Grayson has won the prize for "most sick".

Grayson started running a fever on Saturday afternoon.  He didn't sleep great that night but had a lower fever on Sunday morning.  I was able to get Gray a long nap in the car on Sunday morning, and when he got up, I fed him lunch.

I noticed as I was feeding Gray that he kept tensing up and shaking.  It was odd but not overly concerning.  But them Brian noticed that Gray's lips had turned blue.  The intermittent shaking continued and his hands were ice cold.

We immediately got ready to head to the ER but I called our pediatrician real quick.  I got the doctor on call and he said going to an urgent care was fine so I took Gray to our usual one next to the hospital where he was born.  That urgent care is run by emergency doctors and the hospital just opened up a brand new children's ER run by Vandy.

Carter rode to the urgent care with me to keep an eye on Gray.  He was really lethargic and sleepy but his lips where returning to their normal color.  Brian got to the urgent care just after us with Rylan and took the big boys back home since Gray seemed to be doing okay.

There was only one doctor on a busy Sunday afternoon so it took about 1 1/2 hours to be seen.  Gray's fever started going up and he cuddled with me while we waited.  He fell asleep after awhile too.

When we finally got called back, the nurse took Gray's vitals and he had a fever of 102.5F.  She measured his oxygen saturation and was getting only 89%.  After a few minutes she finally got the reading up to 95%, which she said still wasn't good.

When the doctor came in to check out Grayson, she gave him a dose of Motrin and then listened to his lungs.  He was wheezing and she suspected pneumonia.  She checked Gray's ears and he still had the ear infection he was diagnosed with on Tuesday.

The nurse gave Gray a steroid shot and we did a breathing treatment with him.  Then she did a chest x-ray.  That revealed pneumonia in the right central lobe.  Gray was given an antibiotic shot then too and several prescriptions.  Because Gray has been on amoxicillin for his ear infection yet still developed pneumonia, the doctor guessed that he may have atypical pneumonia which she's been seeing more of this season (and requires a stronger antibiotic).

Hopefully all this helps our little man out!

1. Ibuprofen for fever
2. Amoxicillin for ear infection
3. Steroid
4. Z-pak (stronger antibiotic)
5. Albuterol inhaler

Gray slept a little better last night but not well still.  He was more active today but still very clingy.  His fever wasn't as bad.  And the inhaler helped a lot to calm down his coughing when that got going.  Gray has an appointment with our pediatrician on Wednesday to make sure he's improving.  Hopefully he does!

Santa

We finally visited Santa today!  There was no way I was going to the mall, but I saw that the Franklin Farmer's Market was having Santa visit so we opted for there.  Good choice!  No line.  And a friendly, not too creepy, Santa.

Carter made a list and he was so excited to give it to Santa.  He asked for a particular Star Wars Lego set, a remote control truck, a remote control Hexbug, "and nothing else".

Rylan had seen Santa (the real one, according to him) at school the day before.  But he was willing to tell this one again that he wanted a remote control truck.

Grayson slept through it all (which was probably good because he would have refused to let Santa hold him).  Plus, he's starting another round of sickness.  The three boys have all been sick since we got home from Thanksgiving.  The two older ones have had mostly a bad cough that keeps them up a lot at night.  Carter was complaining that his ears were hurting on Tuesday so I took him in.  He has a mild ear infection (not bad enough for antibiotics yet).  Dr. Huss also checked Gray's ears since he was with me and he has a bad double ear infection.  So he's on antibiotics.  But he started a new illness today that involves a pretty good fever (102.7F when I took him temperature this afternoon).  We are concentrating on getting rid of all these germs over Christmas break!!!  There will be lots of hand washing and sanitizer!!!

Christmas Playdate

I hosted our annual Christmas playdate on Monday.  This year I only had Gray with me.  I gave Rylan the option to stay home but he didn't want to miss anything at school!

This year we had Suzy, Missy, Jen, Laura, Auburn, Melanie, and Ashley and all of their kids that are not in elementary school yet (which was 13 kiddos).  It was lots of fun with lots of good food, crafts, and laughter!

We decorated gingerbread houses that Brian and I built the night before.  Everyone brought along some candy so we had lots of different things to use.

Colson:

Mae:

Carter and Rylan did their gingerbread houses Monday night.  Rylan used one of the ones from the party but Carter decided to design his own "castle" with some help from Brian.

Rylan:

Carter:

I prepped some canvases with a snowflake made out of masking tape on each of them.  Then the kids got to paint the canvas with blue paint.  When the tape was taken off, they had a pretty cool work of art!

My kids all painted after school.  I even squirted some paint on one and let Gray go to town spreading it around with his hands.

Carter:

Rylan:

Gray:

I also had a bunch of Christmas photo booth props for the kids to play with.  We got a few pictures out of them!

Caroline (how cute is she!):

Reed:

Gray:

Hutch:

Some of the little ones (Raleigh, Gray, & Ellie):

More little ones (great picture!!!) - Caroline, Raleigh, Gray, Jessie, & Ellie:

And some of the big ones - Hutch, Cole, Maddie, Luke, Harper, & Colson:

Rylan got all decked out after school:

I made soup, spinach dip, and chocolate covered pretzels but everyone else also brought some treats to share.  We had lots of leftovers!

The kids ran around the house for a few hours getting out all toys and having lots of fun!  When everyone left, it looked like a tornado had been through the house, but it was definitely worth it!  I love hosting this party every year!!!

Elf on the Shelf Friday

There have been more silly antics from our elf this week!!!

On Saturday morning we found him having a date with another elf in a row boat in our kitchen sink!  Very romantic!

Mr. Elf was a being naughty on Sunday morning when we found him fishing!!!

On Monday morning he was taking a bubble bath (sort of) ...

On Tuesday he was hanging out in one of the milk bottle floral holders I made ...

On Wednesday he got into our gummy bear stash and made a Christmas tree ...

Mr. Elf was playing "Elf Twister" with some Lego Duplo guys on Thursday morning ...

I think Mr. Elf was being naughty again on Friday, but I'm not sure.  Carter says he wanted to have a hammock above some water.  I think he may have gotten caught setting up a practical joke :)

14 Points

Carter was the game's high scorer today with 14 points!!!  He did great, but it also helps when the defense backs up from you and you get lots of open shots :)

Go Laser Cats

Carter had is first basketball game of the season on Saturday.

Let me start off with noting how different the league is this season.  I think all the good kids moved up an age group.  Carter's team didn't win a single game last season.  And most of the games were complete blow outs.

The two teams playing before Carter's game and the team he played against were all about equal to Carter's team (and Carter does not have a strong team).  There's a chance Carter's team will win a few games - yay! :)

Our head coach's son picked the team name and he picked "Laser Cats".  None of the rest of us knew for sure what a laser cat was.  Apparently, it's what you probably guessed - a cat with lasers coming from its eyes.  Hmmm.

Carter still looks pretty good in his uniform (and oddly tall in this picture) ...

Carter's team did great.  Like last year, the game is 3 v 3 and there are four 8-minute quarters.  At halftime, Carter's team was winning 4-0.  But one of the boys on Carter's team figured out how to make some shoots and the final score was 22-4!  Carter has finally won a basketball game!  And he scored 2 points!!!  Drew had 14 and Jacob had 6.  I unfortunately didn't catch Carter's shot on video (keeping up with Grayson on the bleachers is fun!) but I did get this really good play just after his score ...

I'm sure there will probably be a few rough games this season, but I'm really looking forward to a better balanced league!!!

Elf on the Shelf Friday

He's back ...

Mr. Elf arrived on Tuesday morning.  He even had some cool new clothes!

On Wednesday he must of have gotten stuck while trying to get himself some water.

I think Mr. Elf has been playing Minecraft while at the North Pole.

On Friday morning we found him trying to repair one of the boys' trucks.

Orthodontist

The boys went to the dentist for a checkup back in August.  For the first time in a very long time, Rylan actually let the hygienist do everything she needed to.  Last time was awful with the screaming through clenched teeth.  I'm really proud of Rylan because I know it was hard for him, but he did it!

Carter did great too!

And no cavities - woohoo!

However, Carter got the official recommendation to go see an orthodontist.  We know he has a very small mouth - his baby teeth overlap.  So this wasn't a surprise.

The dentist showed me Carter's x-rays which show his upper 6-year-old molars coming in at an angle and eroding his baby molars.  They have not gotten to the nerves of these teeth yet but they most likely will and start to hurt.  Also, the reason Carter has only lost 2 teeth (it was only 1 at that appointment) is because his permanent teeth are blocking one another from coming in.  The dentist described it as cars all trying to merge into one lane at the same time.  So the permanent teeth aren't pushing on the baby teeth because they are kind of stuck.  They will eventually push up but come up very, very crooked.  His recommendation was to pull the back baby molars to allow room for the 6-year-old molars to come in straight (EEK!!!).  But he wanted us to see an orthodontist first.

Here is an xray from an orthodontist that I took a picture of:

We had consultations with two of the more populars orthodontists in our area.  I asked several friends with older kids for recommendations because I really wasn't sure who was good.

We first saw the orthodontist that the boys' dentist recommended - Dr. Kemp.  He had a very nice office with lots of fun tech things (like you check in with your fingerprint) but he was just a little too odd for me - he looked like he still loved the early 80s (mustache, collar a little too open, gold chain).  The office seemed to be run very well and I'm sure Carter would end up with very straight teeth.  Here is the summary of what they recommended for Carter:

They wanted to go ahead and do upper and lower palette expanders to try to create more room in Carter's mouth.  From talking to other parents, these are not very comfortable and Carter was a little freaked out when the orthodontist was talking to us about them.

A couple of weeks later we visited another office - Dr. Lucas.  While still nice, his office is much smaller and basic.  Dr. Lucas is younger with children the same age as ours.  Though the office wasn't as high tech we just got a better vibe with Dr. Lucas.  He also automatically saw that Carter was nervous and wanted to treat Carter less aggressively.  Carter will probably still be getting palette expanders in a year, but first Dr. Lucas wanted to first install a bracket in Carter's mouth to try to get those 6-year-old molars to come down straight.  This would be a little easier on Carter and also allow him to build a relationship with Dr. Lucas and a little trust.  He also is going slow on the bracket to allow Carter to get used to it.

First Carter got spacers put in to create some room for bands to go around his teeth:

Unfortunately the assistant at his first appointment only put the back spacers in and there wasn't enough room on the front side of the molars for the bands so Carter had to get the front spacers put in at his second appointment.  At Carter's third appointment the assistant sized the bands for the molars and took a mold of Carter's mouth so his appliance could be made.  The spacers were put back in for another week and on Monday, Carter got the appliance installed.  Here's a picture of it:

In six weeks, Carter will have something attached to the brackets on the bands to push those 6-year-old molars into place.  Once again, Dr. Lucas wanted Carter to get used to this first.  He has said that because Carter's teeth are moving so much still with being young, we're not in a huge hurry (though we do need to go ahead and start treating him to make it easier later).  Thank goodness no one wants to pull any teeth like the dentist recommended!!!  Carter is already freaked out enough and super nervous before each appointment.

I never thought we'd be starting orthodontics this early but Carter has a super small mouth.  And we should have expected it considering both Brian and I had permanent molars pulled to make more room in our mouths!!!