We need some Lily cuteness.

So I usually try to tell a story with some pictures, but there were too many cute pictures from the weekend, and the only real story is one I'd rather not retell again.

So let's move on with some random Lily cuteness, shall we?

There was the time she felt the need to wear her winter hat and panda slippers. I don't try to understand, I just play along.

With music!

Then there was the time she got all dressed for pictures, and I wanted to take a couple at home first. But she wanted to watch Yo Gabba Gabba.

I tried turning Yo Gabba Gabba off, but that didn't go over well.

Yo Gabba Gabba coma.

Dancing with Yo Gabba Gabba.

Arts and crafts time! Well, just the arts. Fun with the new chalkboard.

The chalk was more fun the board.
See how well she can write her name already?

Thinking....
Revision time.
Lately, she's been showing an interest in the potty. So we got her a potty of her own.

Yes, it's a frog.
We have a ways to go until potty training.


Oh, and Lily got a car!


Even more fun than driving it was pushing it.

We've all been there, Lils.

Getting in and out of the car was even more fun.
But she stopped to smell the roses and watch the birds fly.



Foreshadow? Sniffle, sniffle.

Just when I thought things were getting "back to normal"

I've been craving some kind of regular routine lately, and it's just not happening for me. Pretty much since December, we just can't seem to have a normal week.

(...perhaps that is your normal week, Kate?)

Well, after the stomach bug and the New York trip (no complaints about that) stuff started to settle down, I thought this week would be our first real shot at it. Yesterday, Khan went to work, and Lily and I stayed home to play all day. That's what we're supposed to do on Mondays. We had a great day, Tere came over for awhile, everything was great.

Then Lily felt a little warm. No biggie, the girl has had plenty of fevers. I gave her some ibuprofen, her fever started to come down, and then she fell asleep.

I sat down with the computer and started to write a Monday post to report my progress on my personal goals, and I was making some plans for what I would post on Tuesday and Wednesday. But I heard Lily make a noise, and mid-sentence, I got up to check on her.

Her eyes were half open and she was breathing heavy and somewhat erratic. I tried to wake her up, but she was semi-conscious at best. She was completely droopy and limp, she didn’t respond to her name; she didn't respond to anything, she just kept breathing hard and I felt some body tremors.

I started to get scared, took her outside to see if that would get her to wake up or respond or something. Her eyes were open, but she wasn’t looking at me, she wasn’t responding to me, I don’t know where she was, but she couldn't focus and she was sort of fading in and out.

I called Khan. Poor Khan. Can you imagine? I called him while he was in rush hour traffic and told him that Lily was not responsive, not breathing well, I was scared and please come right home. He told me to call 911. I quickly called my dad at his desk first just to make sure, and he didn't tell me not to call 911, so I did.

The EMTs were at our house in no time, probably less time than it took the 911 operator to understand that I don't live on Firetruck Court. (Does anyone know if it's possible to have your street name changed?) They were so awesome; they were calm, confident, and knew all the right things to say and do. Her temp had gone up to 104, which made me panic because it's never been above 102, but they reassured me that it wasn't as scary as it sounded. They also reassured me that her heart rate was OK and her breathing was OK.

All of this happened at around 5:30, you know right around the time when all my neighbors were getting home from work. Only a couple of minutes after the EMTs were in my house, a couple of my neighbors were there, too. They were also wonderful, helping me find the stuff I needed to leave, and reassuring me as mothers themselves.

Once Lily and I were loaded into the ambulance, she threw up all over me. Not that I minded, but I'm pretty sure I'll never eat peaches again. The EMT told Khan to go get a shirt for me to change into. He came back with two outfits for Lily. Poor guy.

After Lily threw up, she started to improve a lot. When she saw Khan, she smiled and said "Daddy?" And I was starting to come around, too, but even the feeling of relief made me fall apart. What a sight I must have been - shoes half on, vomit all over me, tears streaming down my face.

When we got to the hospital, Lily was given Tylenol and fell asleep on her Daddy's shoulder while I put my shoes on and traded my vomit shirt for a I heart NY tee-shirt. Our neighbors gave Khan a ride and were outside waiting in the ER room of horrors.

A pediatric ER doctor came to see us, and I wish I caught her name because she was such a great doctor. She confirmed what the EMTs suspected, Lily had a febrile seizure. Apparently, about 1 in 20 kids get these, and it happens between 6 months of age and 6 years, but it is most common in 12-18 month-olds. The doctor told me she might have one every time she has a high fever, and she might never have one again. There’s no long-term damage or concern; it’s just the way her body reacted. She wanted us to stay a bit longer to make sure Lily's fever was down.

So Khan went out to get Doug and Patti, and then we all entertained Lily for awhile. She was getting much better by the minute. Before long she had us all singing the Itsy Bitsy Spider, and she made sure we all did the hand motions too. Yup. If one of us tried to cheat, she took our hands to show us how to do it. And when we were done, she clapped for us and signed "more."

Fast forward to now, and Lily is back to her energetic, mischief-seeking self. She had a follow-up visit with her regular doctor, who ran a couple of additional tests, but basically gave us the same news. She may have these seizures every time she spikes a high fever. She may never have one again.

I, for one, hope it's the latter.

I interrupt this week's usual topics to bring you

The trip that interrupted my usual weekend -- I went to NYC, baby!

Friday morning I drove to work thinking about what we might do over the weekend. I was leaning toward cleaning the house. Then Jeanette called me asking if I would ever be interested in a spontaneous weekend getaway via flying standby.

Um, yeah.

And before I could say "how much will this cost anyway?" we were on a plane to NYC Saturday. First class.

Here we are in Central Park.

Yup, those are first class peanuts. First class! Seriously, I'm not sure I'll be able to sit with the rest of you now that I've been spoiled.
Here's some graffiti in Queens on our way into the City from JFK.
Speaking of first class, did I mention we stayed at the Waldorf=Astoria on Park Avenue? Apparently, mid January is not peak season for visiting New York, and good deals can be found pretty easily. And quickly.
This is the chandelier in the bathroom. Not in our bathroom; it was the main bathroom in the main lobby area. But still. C'mon.
So after dumping our stuff and freshening up, we set out on foot. We started at Rockefeller Center, which was right down the street.

We went to the "top of the Rock" for a view of the City. That's the Empire State Building behind me.
Then we kept on down the street toward Times Square. And then I saw Elmo! There were some other characters there, too, and I thought there was some kind of promo going on. I knew I had to get my picture with Elmo to show Lily. Mama's guilt, y'know.

Well, Elmo didn't say anything to me; he just grunted and pointed to a sock that he was collecting cash in. It wasn't Elmo. Just some dude dressed in a rented Elmo costume getting cash from suckered tourists. There was an Elmo on every damn corner.

Figures. I'm off the plane for an hour and I fall for some stupid scam. Oh well. He only got a dollar.
We did make it to Times Square and that's one well-lit place.



The next morning, we had a great breakfast at an extremely small, extremely packed diner. It was one thing to get a good room rate at the Waldorf, but it was a whole 'nother thing to do the whole "Waldorf thing."

Do you know how much a Snickers from the mini bar was? Guess. You'll never guess. You know it's going to be more expensive than a movie theater, maybe $5-$6, right? Wrong. It was $9.25. No lie.

Anyway, so we found Grand Central Station after a couple of wrong turns.

A few more wrong turns later and we were on the subway.



We went all the way to the last stop on Manhattan Island. We saw the Brooklyn Bridge! Next time we're in NYC, we'll hike across it, but we just didn't have time during this weekend.
We went to Ground Zero. I don't really know how to explain what that was like; I'm just really glad we did it. It was especially good to go to the small visitors center and see the plans and progress for rebuilding.



Well, after that, our first-class luck seemed to run out. It started to rain. Not just an annoying sprinkle, but an all-day washout complete with cold, blustery winds.

Actually, I think we did pretty well with making the most of our situation. We hopped on a tour bus for a narrated tour of the City. We saw everything from Uptown through Downtown. The only problem was that with the rain, well, this was our view.

So it wasn't conducive to photos, but it was still interesting and I saw a lot more than I would've on foot. Especially since I didn't want to poke my head out from under my hood out there.
We got off the tour bus on "Restaurant Row" to find some place to eat. We stumbled into the first of several Irish Pubs we'd visit while in New York. It was warm, cozy, and totally hit the spot.




The next morning, the crappy weather was gone and the sun was finally out. It was cold, but sooooo much better. A perfect day to go to the park. Central Park.
What an amazing place; it's just the most bizarre juxtaposition of green bordered with concrete.

And all the little bridges and tunnels were just so beautiful. I can't wait to go back when it's warm and the trees have leaves.
The highlight of the park, for me, was the carousel. It was old and rickety. I loved it.
But holy crap the artists who painted and carved for this carousel must really hate kids.

We made our way to the other side of the park to the American Museum of Natural History. We had a little more than an hour to spend in a museum you can't possibly see in a whole day.
But, again, we did the best we could with the time we had and we learned about weird little monkeys.
And their skeletons.

We even learned about evolution. You know, if you believe in that kind of voodoo.
Well, before we could even process the fact that we were actually in NYC, we were in the tunnel on our way out.
And we saw the sun setting as we flew into Tampa.

You know, in first class.