Christmas!

We had a great Christmas this year. We spent the night at my mom's house on Christmas Eve, we woke up Christmas morning and opened all of our presents together. The kids got spoiled by Santa, and Soma (my mom) and even got a little spoiled by mommy and daddy. Then we came back to our house to open presents with Papa George and Grandma Bonnie and have breakfast. They were spoiled by Nick's parents too, of course. After we opened presents and ate, the kids played with their toys for a while. Then we went to my dad's house where, once again, they were spoiled. Our final stop for the day was to visit my Grandma Thomson. By the time the day was over, we were all exhausted, but we had such a great day!  

Hospital stay

On sunday, Ella woke up with a cough, but she had no other symptoms. She was still running around acting like the cute little monkey she is. On Monday, she still had the cough and for a few hours that was still her only symptom. I decided to make an appointment for early in the evening, just to be safe. One minute she was playing, and the next, she was laying down and I could tell she didn't feel good. I debated taking her to the doctor earlier, but, decided to keep my 5:30 appointment. As the day went on, she was coughing like crazy and laying around, mostly wanting mommy to hold her. When I took her in at 5:30, I thought it would be a quick appointment. I thought the doctor would tell me it was Croup, and then we would be on our way home, this was not the case, unfortunately. The pediatrician checked her oxygen levels and we discovered that she wasn't getting enough oxygen. They did two breathing treatments on her, which she HATED, and her oxygen levels still weren't going up. The doctor told me she needed to go have a chest X-ray taken, and then they would do another breathing treatment, if her oxygen levels did not go up, the doctor said she would have to go to the hospital. At this point, I lost it. My mom happened to call, as I was walking to get her X-rays taken, to see what I found out at the dr. as soon as I answered the phone I started to cry. My mom reassured me that if she did have to go to the hospital, she would be ok and that is where they could take the best care of her. Luckily my mom happened to be close by and came to be with me...Nick was still at work, and I needed someone to calm me down. The X-rays didn't show any Pneunmonia, thank goodness. Back at the pediatrician's, they did another breathing treatment, which brought her oxygen levels back up for a few minutes. The dr still didn't feel comfortable sending her home, so she had us wait there for a while while she monitored her oxygen. For a while we thought she was doing ok and that we would be going home. Then they started to drop again so the doctor said we needed to go to Primary Children's Medical Center. This of course brought on more tears from me!! Unfortunately, they wouldn't allow me to drive her there, she had to be taken by ambulance, which is just part of their policy. When the EMT's got there, Ella was scared, she knew something was going on, but she isn't old enough to understand it. One of them found her a stuffed animal, which made her pretty happy. They strapped her carseat to the gurney (not sure on the spelling) and wheeled her out to the ambulance, luckily they let me ride in there with her so she wasn't too scared. They didn't have to use the sirens or anything like that, but it was still intimidating and scary for a little girl. Not to mention the fact that it made mommy a little carsick. When we got to the emergency room, they hooked her up to monitors and she still wasn't getting enough oxygen and her respiratory rate was really high. Meaning she was working way too hard to breathe. They did some more breathing treatments, did a horrible test that involved sticking a long tube down both of her nostrils, to find out exactly what it was she had, and after what seemed like FOREVER, decided to admit her. Several hours later, we were taken to her room, where she was hooked up to some more monitors. By this time it was about 3:00 am and Nick and I were exhausted, poor Ella was exhausted and scared as well. She wouldn't let go of me. She had to have breathing treatments every two hours, and she had the little oxygen tube in her nose. It was so sad to see our baby girl so sick. While they were doing the test with the tubes in her nose, and putting in an IV, she just cried and screamed "Mommy" the whole time. I had to hold her down while they did this and she just looked at me and cried. Which made me cry. I thought they would release her the next day, however, I was wrong. She was running a fever and still not getting enough oxygen. I was so upset. Not only had I not had any sleep, but, seeing my sweet angel like that was heartbreaking, and I missed Jaxson. I was torn, I wanted, and needed to be at the hospital with Ella, but I also needed to see Jax. Tuesday evening, my Mom came to see Ella and her and Nick convinced me to go home for a few hours. They wanted me to get some sleep, but I told them that if I was going anywhere, it was to see Jax for a while and shower. It felt good to see Jax for a couple of hours and be able to shower and get a few things from home. Still, I could not get back to the hospital soon enough. Late tuesday night, the nurse came in and said that her test results were back and that she was Influenza A positive, meaning Swine Flu. Luckily the doctors decided to start her on Tamiflu before they even knew what she had. On Wednesday, she started showing signs of improvement. Her oxygen levels were slowly getting better and her respiratory rate was slowly going down. They decided to start slowly turning down the oxygen to see how she would do. Finally at about 3:00 pm they turned her oxygen completely off. I left for a little bit shortly before they turned it off, so I could see Jax and have another shower. When I got back, she had been totally off oxygen for 2 hours and she was still breathing great! One of our neighbors brought a friend up to the hospital to give Ella a blessing. Even though she was getting better, we knew that it couldn't hurt, and it made Nick and I feel better. After the blessing, I just knew my little girl was going to get better quick, and she did! The doctor came in late Wednesday evening and was very happy that she had been breathing room air for at least 4 hours and was still doing great! He asked us when we would like to take her home. While the thought of going home right then was so wonderful, we wanted to make sure that her oxygen levels and respiratory rate would be ok through the night. He told us he would get the discharge papers ready and, if she did ok through the night, we could leave the next morning. Nick and I were so happy!!! She did great all through the night, although her and I didn't get much sleep. I kept waking up to look at the monitors and make sure her oxygen was still good, and she just hated sleeping there, even though I was in the bed with her, she was scared. The next morning the doctor came in and said she was doing great and we could get out of there as soon as all the papers were ready and we had her prescriptions and all the information we needed. She had started to perk up Wednesday night, and by Thursday morning, she was sick of being in the hospital bed! When we got home, I realized how absolutely exhausted I was, mentally and physically. Nick put both Ella and I down for naps! Ella slept for 4 hours and I slept for 3 1/2. I was still in a daze when I woke up, but I felt a little better. Last night we could tell Ella was feeling more and more like herself, and today she has been playing with her toys, running around with her brother being our little monkey. She even has her appetite back! We are so thankful that our little girl is better and that the doctors and nurses took such good care of her!! We are so happy to be home with both of our sweet babies. We have so much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving, and I hope I never have to see either of my sweet angels go through anything like that again!!

This picture is really fuzzy, it was taken with my mom's cell phone, but this is when we first got into the ambulance.

My poor little angel was so sick!!

This is taken on Wednesday night, when she was starting to feel much better, I have never been so happy, or thankful, to see that sweet smile!!

Thank you to everyone who called to check on Ella, and everyone that said special little prayers for our little girl to get better quickly!

Halloween

We had a really fun Halloween this year! My Mom, once again, threw a really fun Halloween party the night before Halloween. We had yummy food, played fun games, read "scary" halloween stories and of course, she had her house all decorated for Halloween! This year Jaxson was Optimus Prime, from Transformers for those of you who don't watch that movie on an almost daily basis like we do at the Martin house, Ella was a furry pink bunny rabbit, and Gabriel was Iron Man.  For the party we all dressed up, but unfortunately, most of the pictures I did take, somehow got erased. Colby was Bret Micheals (not sure on the spelling) my Mom was a black cat, Dani was Cruela Deville...once again not sure on the spelling...Derek was Jasper (the robber from 101 Dalmations) I was "white trash" and Nick was a nerd...if you ask me, he pulled his costume off WAY to well...doesn't he make you proud, George and Bonnie????

The night of Halloween, we went back to my Mom's house, and the kids went Trick-or-Treating around her neighborhood. They got lots of candy, which I can't seem to stay out of, and they had so much fun. Ella would reach into the bowls and take as many handfulls of candy as she could before we could stop her. After that, we had some dinner and watched 'Casper the Friendly Ghost'. By the time we home that night, the kids, and Mommy and Daddy, were exhausted, but we had such a fun Halloween!

Family Pictures

My best friend Janelle took our family pictures...quite a while ago...I'm seriously slacking on my blogging lately! Once again, she did a fantastic job!! Thanks Janelle!!

(I have NO idea why some of them uploaded so small)

So sleepy

On Thursday, Nick put Ella in her highchair to have lunch, he walked into the other room for a minute, and was curious because Ella was being so quiet in the kitchen, which is not like Ella lately. He walked back into the kitchen, and this is how he found her...

Apparently Princess was exhausted from running around doing and saying everything her big brother says and does. She is like a little parrot lately, and she loves to be with her big brother. Sometimes it drives Jax nuts because she repeats everything he says and has to do everything he does, but for the most part, he loves his little sister and he loves it that she looks up to him so much and wants to be with him so much. Sometimes when we are driving in the car Ella will say the same thing to Jaxson over and over again, Jax will play along until about the tenth time she says it and then he will say "ELLLAAAA, I don't want to keep saying the same thing over and over again!" She even has to sit at the counter and pretend she is doing her homework when   Jax is doing his. She is getting so big and she is so much fun.

 Of course after she had fallen asleep in the highchair for a few minutes, her princess batteries were fully recharged and she had very little interest in taking a "nappy time in Ella's bed." However she didn't have a choice in this matter, and after singing and jabbering in her room for 20 minutes, she finally gave in and fell asleep.

Kindergarten update

After many tears and many days of taking Jax to Kindergarten and having him hang on my arm and cry because he didn't want to be there, Jax now LOVES Kindergarten! He is excited to go every morning, he loves his teacher and he has made a lot of knew friends. One night, while he was still not liking school, he said "Mommy, do you think dat I could ask my Heavenly Father to help me to be a brave boy at Kindergarten, and to make me feel better when I get sad because I miss you while I'm there?" Talk about breaking Mommy's heart! We would also put special kisses from Mommy in his pocket and in his hand before he would go every morning, I would kiss his hand a bunch of times and then that way he had some for when he got sad. Guess what? He doesn't need the special kisses anymore, which is bittersweet for me. But I do love that he is loving school. In fact, he is loving it so much that he is rather upset that it is UEA weekend and that he had thursday and friday off and also has monday off. Everyday he asks me how many more days it will be until he gets to go back to school, he is literally counting down the days! It makes me feel good when I drop him off at school knowing that he is so happy, instead of sad. Such a big boy!!

New family member

Yes, that's right, the Martin family has a new family member. Her name is Phoebe and she is little and furry and sweet and absolutely adorable. Obviously I'm not talking about a person, Phoebe is our dog. We were lucky enough to be able to adopt her from my best friend Janelle. Janelle and her hubby are getting ready to have their second baby, so obviously they will be very busy, and Jax, up until very recently has been deathly afraid of dogs. So Nick and I thought that getting a dog of our own might help him get over this fear but I didn't want a puppy that we had to train. Which is why Phoebe is perfect for our family. She is almost 6 and obviously fully trained, not to mention the fact that she is so great with the kids. We have had her for a little over a week now and all 4 of us are extremely attached to her! The night she came, Jax wouldn't get off of the chair because he was afraid of her, even when he woke up the next morning he was still afraid and wouldn't get down and play with her. We told him that if he didn't get use to her, then we couldn't keep her. This upset him because he was already attached to...even though he was afraid...go figure. One second he was crying because he was afraid and the next second, he got off the chair, walked over to her, and picked her up. He looked at us with tears in his eyes and said "Now I get to keep Phoebe because I decided I'm not afraid of her!" It was so sweet! Ever since then, he has been absolutely in love with her! He loves to take her on walks and both of the kids love to play fetch with her. We took her to Petco last week and Jax picked out some doggie treats for her, which he would give her all day long if I let him. Phoebe is my little buddy, she follows me all over the house, and when the kids go to bed at night, she snuggles up between Nick and I on the couch. She sleeps right next to me all night long and I love it. We are so happy that she came to live with us. Thanks Janelle, Keith and Gavin for letting us adopt sweet Phoebe!!

Best Buds!!

Isn't she precious??