Growth Spurt City at the Cooper's

Hi everybody!  Well, I didn't get the blog done any faster this week.  Sorry about that!  The problem?  I really haven't had much to report.  It's been a pretty quiet week around here.  But here's the latest on all of us.

I am feeling much better and healing great.  I am pretty well back to normal and have been feeling so much better!  I am so happy about that.  I have definitely had my moments of pain and discomfort and some digestive issues that I won't go into, but still overall, I am feeling better.  I go back to the doctor next week and am hoping that by then my belly will look a little more normal or at least he will be able to give me a time frame in which to expect to see my normal shape again.  Right now I just see a very bruised and swollen belly.  It's a little scary, folks.  Even to me.

Carissa is really pulling up to things now.  Like, constantly.  When I had previously reported that she was pulling up, she was doing it very infrequently.  But now, all she wants to do is stand.  Yay for her!  What does that mean for the rest of us?  That we have to keep the end tables pretty well cleared of everything.  If you tell her "no", she looks at you and laughs.  Then she continues on with whatever she isn't supposed to be getting into.  If the gate to the kitchen isn't kept closed, you can pretty well bet that she is headed into the laundry room to eat cat food.  Ewww.  She keeps me and her Dad hoppin', let me tell ya.

Maleah had Dad's Night at her school tonight.  It's a night for the pre-k students to bring their dads (or special person) to their school and have just dad/child time.  Maleah was so excited about it that she couldn't hardly fall asleep last night.  It was ALL she could talk about.  And you guys know how much she talks, so we heard a lot about it and how excited she was.  She came home from school today and picked out a pretty dress to wear tonight.  She chose the dress, the leggings, and all matching accessories all by herself.  I really don't think I could have done a better job.  She asked me a million times if it was time to go yet.  She was surprised to find her Dad already awake when she got home from school and made a remark about how he was probably too excited about Dad's Night to sleep.  I didn't burst her bubble on that one.  So finally, they were out the door.  Unfortunately, my camera battery was dead and I didn't get a picture of her.  About the time they left, Carissa fell asleep and I had an entire hour by myself in a quiet house.  So I ate my supper in my recliner and watched Everybody Loves Raymond all by myself.  It was so nice.  She came back home just as excited as when she left, and told me all about it.  They had hot dogs and chips for supper and then they made a very pretty birdhouse together.  She is sooo proud of it.  Does she have a good Dad or what???

On my agenda this week:  shopping at Tuscola.  I went through Maleah's closet this week and removed about 75% of her clothes because they do not fit.  All of her shirts are too short on her and it drives me nuts!  I really wish that she could've waited until closer to spring to have a growth spurt, but that just can't be controlled.  The good news is that all of the long sleeved shirts should be marked down really cheap.  Little sister will probably end up with some new stuff too.  It's weird how Maleah's old clothes do not fit Carissa seasonally.  Their birthdays are four days apart.  At first, none of Maleah's clothes fit Carissa because Maleah was a preemie and Carissa was not, so I had to buy a lot for Carissa.  Well, now it's the opposite problem.  When Maleah was almost 1 she was a lot chunkier than Carissa is now.  And her head was bigger.  So a lot of Maleah's clothes that she was wearing in February/March are size 18 mos. and Carissa needs a size 12 mos.  And in the size 12 mos. clothes that Maleah did wear, all of the necks are stretched out on them so even they seem too big on Carissa.  Did you follow all of that?  It's so frustrating!  But it is an awesome excuse to go buy cute new stylish clothes for both girls.  I'll fill you in on all of my purchases next week.  Until then...

Na-Na-Na-Na, Hey, Hey, Goodbye Gallbladder!

Sorry the blog is a few days late.  I haven't felt like writing a thing.  I had my gallbladder surgery yesterday and I lived to tell about it.  So here goes...

I was kind of stressed out about the whole thing and considered "rescheduling" it more than once.  But my lazy little gallbladder was in there to remind me that waiting was not an option.  So, I headed into the surgery center bright and early Tuesday morning.  The nurses were all very kind and reassuring.  They put me at ease and helped me to relax with the help of some really good drugs.  I usually do not get stressed about going to the doctor or about pain but in the past I've always been handed a beautiful baby girl afterwards that made all of the pain worth it.  This surgery didn't seem natural to me all.  Do you guys remember that scene in "The Goonies" when Stef says "Umm, Brand, I think, ummm, that God put that rock there for a reason, and ummm, he doesn't want you to move it."  And then Brand moves the big rock and all of those bats fly out of that tunnel into all of their faces!?  Well, I felt that God put that gallbladder there and what if I needed it later and it was gone?  But luckily, they took it all out and no bats flew out or anything.  In fact, I'm already feeling better.  I am very sore but I feel better today than I did yesterday.  And hopefully, I will continue to feel better each day after this.

Carissa has still been sick.  She has been a very needy, very fussy baby during this whole getting-ready-for-surgery, having-surgery, and post-surgery week.  That hasn't made it any easier on me for sure.  She is on her third antibiotic and it finally seems to be helping.  She hasn't been as fussy today and her runny nose and cough are better too.  It is so hard not to pick that sweet little thing up.  She needs her Mommy and I can't pick her up.  She is a little confused by that and luckily her Daddy is here to take care of her needs.

Maleah has been a great help this week.  She is our constant source of entertainment.  She has been looking at her picture Bible for the last 10 minutes or so and singing us the stories.  Very entertaining.  One song goes something like this "The King is sleeping, the mommy has brownish-blondish hair and is soo pretty, everybody stomp your feet, it is party time!  Oh yeah, the King is sweet but then he grows up.  He's all grown up!  He's all grown up!"  I can't tell you what tune this is sung to.  She keeps switchin' it up.  Again, very entertaining.

Jason has been everyone's caretaker this week.  He's been a busy guy.  I'm so thankful that he is such a good husband and father.  I don't know what I'd do without him.  He went to Walmart a to pick up a few groceries and came home with new t-shirts and pants for the girls.  Well, let me tell you what!  That is the fastest way to Maleah's heart!  She can totally be bought with clothes or shoes.  He had two happy little girls when he started passing out the t-shirts.  Maleah put her outfit on right away and Carissa wanted to chew on hers.  But oh well.  They were both happy!

I don't know where I'd be without my Mom either.  I owe her a big thanks too.  She took care of the girls for us yesterday and has been a big help around the house.  It's a good thing she actually enjoys doing laundry because I had plenty of it for her to help with!

Thanks everybody for your prayers.  I am so glad to be able to put this all behind me and am happy to be on the road to recovery.  With any luck, the blog will be on time next week and be full of funny stories and cute pictures of my kids again. 

Living with the Paparazzi

Hello everybody!  I hope everybody is doing great.  The girls are both starting to feel better here.  Carissa ended up with an ear infection and I could not get that girl to take her medicine for anything.  She gagged, sputtered, screamed, covered her mouth, threw a fit, and threw up everytime I gave it to her.  So I had to call the doctor and change to a different medicine.  She is still fighting me on this one but she isn't throwing it back up, so that's good.  She is finally starting to get better.  Whew!  I've never had to deal with that before.  Maleah always loved taking medicine and would've probably drank the whole bottle if I'd let her.  Carissa prefers Similac and Similac only. 

I saw a surgeon today and it is confirmed that I have to have my gallbladder removed.  I am pretty nervous about it and am not looking forward to it at all.  I have never had surgery before and was hoping I would never have to.  But I really want to start feeling better.  After the surgeon finished telling me about the small chance of everything that could happen but probably won't, I was about to back out.  I kept thinking "maybe it will just go away and I'll start feeling better".  But then I ate supper and remembered exactly why I am doing this:  because I don't want to feel sick and have pain after I eat every time.  Apparently veggie burgers pretending to be chicken patties really trigger my gallbladder.  I won't make that mistake again. 

Carissa was a funny little character this week.  She has turned into a real mess maker.  And she is fast!!  While I had my back turned she got into the diaper bag that I had left sitting by the front door.  She pulled out a bag of chocolate chip cookies that I had stashed in there to prevent "maleah meltdowns".  She dumped those out and chowed down.  By the time I got over there she had already eaten half of one and so I just let her finish.  So she was a chocolatey gooey mess by the time she finished.  I was busy and didn't have time to bathe her yet so I just let her play for a few more minutes.   Well, by then she had moved on to the cracker puffs that she likes to eat.  She dumped the whole container out on the floor and decided to eat those.  Now I know that I have said that she doesn't eat much and let me tell you if I had wanted her to sit and eat, she probably wouldn't have.  But since it was on her own terms and she was calling the shots, she was fine with it.  What does this say about her?  She is already proving to be very independent.   I am going to have my hands full in a few more years I bet.

Here she is chowing down on a tomato slice.  Probably not something I would've thought to offer her but she reached for it off the top of her Dad's taco salad and actually liked it.  She ate about half of it.  Kind of weird if you ask me.  She must get that from her Dad.  : )

Maleah didn't have school today and she was pretty disappointed about it.  She misses her friends when there is so school.  But she did get to see her buddies Sophia and Maddy.  So she was happy about that.  She played all afternoon with them and then went to tumbling this evening.  So needless to say, she fell asleep early tonight.  She was lights out by 8:30.  She has been really busy the last few days taking pictures.  She's actually pretty good with the camera.  It's really interesting to look through her pictures and see things from her point of view.  She also took some really bad pictures (especially of me) but there were good ones in the bunch.  Here are a few that I think are interesting...

Eloise

I think she sees me as very tall!!  I am also her favorite subject.  lol.  I've never had so many pictures taken of me in my life!  It's like I live with the paparazzi!Baby Polar Bear, all tucked into bed

Big Sister is better, Little Sister not so much

I have lots of news this week.  And it's all about who's sick and who isn't.  We'll start with my kids.  Maleah is better.  She still has a little bit of a lingering cough, but is pretty well back to her normal self.  She went back to school yesterday (Thursday).  She hadn't been there since last Thursday.  As we were walking into the school yesterday she said to me "Mom, do you think they will remember me?".  I laughed and said, "Yes honey, you haven't been gone that long!".  Her teachers were glad to see her and so were the other kids I think.  She was certainly glad to be back.

So now it's little baby Carissa who is sick.  Poor baby has an ear infection.  And she ain't happy 'bout it either!  But she has now started antibiotics so hopefully by tomorrow she'll be feeling a little bit better.  We had a long night last night.  She screamed and cried and kept grabbing her ear.  Before that I thought she just had Maleah's cold.  Neither one of us got as much sleep as what we like.  But we survived.  Hopefully tonight goes a lot better.  I'm tired!  It's just not fair when babies are sick.  They can't tell you what's wrong or what's hurts.

I heard back from the doctor's office this week on the results of my gallbladder function test and it's official.  My gallbladder is not functioning correctly.  I am not surprised.  I knew something wasn't right.  So now I have to schedule surgery.  It's not really what I want to do but I definitely want to feel better.  As it is right now, I feel good but still have some days where I feel awful.  So now I am just looking forward to feeling better!

We had some upsetting news this week.  One of Maleah's friends, a 5 year old named Madison, was diagnosed with bone cancer.  We were all very worried about her and sad to hear about her diagnosis.  She is the one that Maleah went with to Chuck E. Cheese's last week and the one we inadvertantly exposed to Maleah's bad cold.  Her leg had been sore for several weeks and after several trips to various doctors, they were told that it was Ewing Sarcoma.  She went back to the doctor today (Friday) to get the last of her test results and to possibly start treatment.  I found out this afternoon that the doctors told her parents that she does NOT have cancer after all but that she does have a staph infection in her leg.  So we were very thankful and overjoyed to hear that news.  Praise God for that!  I am a little confused though and am wondering why on Earth the doctors told her parents she had cancer if they weren't 100% sure.  That is every parent's nightmare and I'm sure it was incredibly scary for them and for little Madison.  But thankfully, she will now just have to have the infection treated and doesn't have to worry about starting chemo.

Right now Maleah is enjoying her first John Wayne movie with her Dad.  She thinks Rooster Cogburn is hilarious.  Too cute!  Hopefully, she just doesn't repeat some of their language.  : )

Well, I have to wrap this up.  Maleah thinks she left her purse in the car and she needs it. 

Good news and bad news...

Well, the good news is that I'm feeling better. Yay!! I felt much better this past week than the week before so that's great. I even felt good enough to try out a spin class today. I am beginning to wonder if I'll even be able to walk tomorrow. Yikes! It's only been a few hours and I'm already sore.

The bad news is that now Maleah is sick. When she left school on Thursday of last week the teacher told me that she was pretty sure that Maleah had Pink Eye. The doctor confirmed that she did indeed have Pink Eye on Friday. By Saturday she had two rounds of antibiotics in her and wasn't considered contagious so she went to a birthday party. I noticed that she coughed a little off and on Saturday but she didn't cough at all that night or Sunday morning. She had been invited to go to Chuck E. Cheese's with her friend Madison on Sunday afternoon. So I let her go. By the time she got home that evening she was coughing constantly and sounded horrible! I felt bad that I let her be around other people. Had I known that she would be coughing like that, I definitely would've kept her home. So now it is Monday night and she is still coughing like crazy! Poor kid. Hope she feels better soon and I really hope her sister doesn't get it.

Here is one of the latest pictures of Carissa.   She is so darn cute!  She is turning into quite the little talker.  She says  mama, dada, bye-bye, baby, and bah-bah for bottle.  She really has her B words down pat.  I expect her next word to be "no" because she's really been hearing that one a lot lately.  She loves to dance!  She moves her body back and forth and grins.  So cute!!

Last week we had our sorority meeting at my Mom and Dad's house and Nikki hosted a Murder Mystery Dinner.  We each got invitations and were told to come as rock stars.  My invitation said to come as Tina Turnaround (Tina Turner).  I had always always wanted to go to a Murder Mystery Dinner but never expected that I would also get to participate!  There were 12 rock stars that were invited.  We were a few girls shy of 12 because a few of our sorority girls couldn't come so my Mom and two women from her sorority filled in.  It was so much fun!!!  Oh my gosh.  We had the best time.  Our group included Madonna, Annie Lennox, Mick Jagger, Elton John, Sheena Easton, Tom Jones, Jon Bon Jovi, David Bowie, the girl from Abba, Kate Bush, and Freddie Mercury.  Here are some pics of all of us dressed for our parts and one of me as Tina Turner.

Well, I'm going to head off to bed now.  That is if I can get out of this recliner.  Maybe I should take a hot shower first and several ibuprofen.  I am seriously hurting here people!  Please use the comment section below as a sign-up sheet for those who can babysit and cook for my family for the next few days.  lol.  Just kidding!  I hope I won't be that out of commission.  Maybe spin class just isn't for me...