Sawyer Gets Sick

 As I wrote before, Sawyer seemed to be getting sick on Christmas Eve night. And then the following day, on Christmas, we seemed very much sick. He didn't have a cough or a stuffy nose. He wasn't throwing up or anything. He didn't have any of the normal symptoms. But he laid around the house all day, not doing much. He fell asleep twice, just randomly on the couch while we were all opening presents, and then once in my bed after he crawled into bed to snuggle with me. He didn't eat hardly anything that whole day, and he only got up to play a few times. His neck also seemed to be hurting him a lot. Anytime someone grabbed or touched his neck, he screamed in pain, and it looked a little bit swollen on the right side.

The day after Christmas, he wasn't at all improved, so I made a doctor's appointment for him at our pediatrician's office. Daniel and I both took him to the doctor, because we could leave the other kids with mom and dad at the house. They decided to stay a few more days after Christmas with us. The doctor checked him out and ran tests for covid, strep and flu, all of which came back negative (we discovered after some time... some of the results took some time). Because of his neck issues, she advised us to take him to the emergency room at Primary Children's Hospital on the chance that we were dealing with meningitis. 

It was late afternoon by the time we walked into the hospital with Sawyer. They got him checked in, we waited, and eventually were called back to a room. The doctors we met with there said immediately that they were not worried about meningitis, but that they thought it was some kind of infection or abscess in his neck causing him pain and discomfort and fevers. They ran a CT scan on him to see if they could find any fluid buildup in his neck... which they couldn't. There was no abscess for them to work on. And so, their plan of action was to admit him into the hospital and administer antibiotics and fluids through an IV to make the infection go away. An IV team came into the room and went to work putting an IV into his arm, in the crook of his elbow. He hated that. But he was fairly malleable because he was exhausted from having to spend all afternoon and evening in the doctors office and hospital. They took some blood tests, checking for inflammation markers, and administered antibiotics right away.

We made it into our own room in the hospital late that night, nearing midnight, I believe. The nurses got him all checked into his room with the fluids hooked up through the IV, and then they left us to sleep. I laid down with Sawyer in the hospital bed, and Daniel took the little side bed/couch thing. At around 1 in the morning, after we weren't really sleeping much, Daniel left the hospital so that one of us could get some sleep. 

That night was rough. The IV machine kept beeping at us because Sawyer would bend his arm and cut off the running of the fluids through the IV. It woke us up several times, and the nurses and techs kept having to come in to turn the beep off and start the machine up again. Plus, they kept having to come in to check his vitals and bring in the antibiotics, fluids or tylenol. He and I finally got a good stretch of sleep around 2 or 3 in the morning for a couple of hours. 

Daniel came back to the hospital that next day towards lunchtime, bringing clothes and things with him. We talked to the doctor about Sawyer's condition. They measured his inflammation markers and he said they were really high. The number he gave was 29, and normal is less than 1. He told us he wanted to keep Sawyer another night on antibiotics to see if we could get him feeling well enough to go home. He was still operating under the assumption that Sawyer had a (what sounds like) fairly common infection in the lymph nodes of his neck. (He didn't sound quite 100% sure that this is what was really ailing Sawyer.) Apparently kids get this kind of thing often. All they wanted was to see him eating enough on his own, drinking plenty of fluids, and those inflammation markers to make a downward trend. But, it meant another night in the hospital.

Daniel sent me down to the cafeteria to get food, considering I hadn't eaten almost anything in the past 24 hours. While I was down getting food, I ran into one of the women in our ward, Amanda Howells. She asked what we were doing at the hospital, and I tried to explain. She was there doing some test with one of her kids that had cancer years ago. Anyway, news spread quickly after that. I got a text shortly after from Hannah Kimball asking if all was okay. She had the compassionate service leader in our ward send something over facebook asking for meals for our family, and I started getting texts from a bunch of women asking if we were okay. It was so nice to be worried about and prayed for. We had so many people praying for us and thinking of us.

We've been in the hospital for the past 4 or 5 days, now. The days have kind of blurred together, and it's hard to keep straight what day it is. We had to cancel all of our plans for the week. We had intended to go to John's party, and we were going to visit family members (Bekah and her girls, and a play date with Cap). I also had an appointment for the temple. But, ah well. We were more concerned about Sawyer getting better and coming home. It's very boring and anxious to wait in the hospital, especially if you don't know what's really going on. Each morning, the doctor came in to talk to us and tell us the most recent results of the inflammation test. And the results were down, and then up again, and then down again, but never to his satisfaction. He said, the first couple of days, that some kids recover more quickly than others, and if he took longer, that was okay. But the last couple of days, he's said this isn't working like it should. And they've started testing for other things. More serious things. Like cancer. All of those tests came back negative, though. 

Daniel and I have been switching off, taking shifts at the hospital. I spent a night, then he spent a night. Then me again, etc. We filled the days in the hospital mainly trying to get Sawyer to eat (which was unsuccessful the first few days, but has been better lately) and drink, and watching whatever he wanted to watch on TV. I had a chance, while sitting in the hospital, to catch up in my journal and read most of a book (which I binged on one of the sleepless nights in the hospital. That was an awful night. I didn't sleep more than a handful of 20 or 30 minute stretches. The machine kept beeping at us, and I kept nagging at Sawyer to straighten his arm, which frustrated him to no end. After that night, we had the IV team come put an IV in his hand instead, so that wouldn't be a problem anymore. Thank the heavens.). Sawyer watched Cars multiple times, Lion King three times, Thomas the Train (spare me. Seriously), and this new show called Go Buster, which he watched almost exclusively once we found it on Youtube. One day I tried downloading a book from the library to my phone, one of the Mercy Watson books, and read a little to him. But he wasn't super patient with that and just asked to watch TV again. 

After the first few days, we got him to eat a little better. Every little bite was a huge victory. Michael, Michelle, Brixton and Mackenzie came to visit Sawyer in the hospital one day. They brought him toys and a stuffed animal and a candy bar. Then Michael and Mackenzie went down to the cafeteria and brought back a bunch of food for Sawyer: chicken nuggets and fries, cheesecake, and fruit snacks. Sawyer looked visibly excited by the nuggets and fries they brought and ate more that day than he had all the week up to that point. It was wonderful!

 My parents left Friday morning early. They had been sick basically since the day after Christmas with something awful, some flu or severe cold, which they had given to Camille by the time they left. They were invaluable this week, helping take care of my kids while Daniel and I were in the hospital with Sawyer. They managed everything at home. But I knew they needed to get back home to their other responsibilities. Mom asked if we still needed her and if they should stay, but I told her that we had other people that could step in a help, that it was okay if they needed to go home. 

Anyway, that Friday they left, I was hanging with Sawyer in the hospital, and Daniel came late in the afternoon to take his shift in the hospital. He'd left the kids at his parent's house. I started feeling that sickness coming on all day that day. That night, after getting the kids to bed and going to bed myself, I felt freezing and had to get up and bundle up: sweatshirt, socks and an extra blanket on the bed. Then yesterday, of course, I ended up being very sick: chills, body aches, massive headache anytime I tried to get up. I felt awful. And of course that meant that I couldn't go take my turn with Sawyer in the hospital, which made me feel so badly. I wanted to be there with him, and I also wanted to let Daniel rest. But there was no way with how I felt, and I didn't want to spread what I had to everyone in the hospital. So Daniel had to keep pushing through on his own. We asked his parents to come help him in the afternoon and evening; his dad went in the late afternoon so Daniel could come home, and then his mom stayed the night there for us, so Daniel could sleep. 

 Daniel is back at the hospital today. I'm still too sick to be there. And it sounds like he is a much better caregiver than me, anyway. He turned the TV off, he helped Sawyer take a couple of little walks, he got Sawyer to eat and drink more, and even got him to play with toys a little bit. Daniel went to a little Sacrament service there at the hospital today. And the doctors finally came up with a diagnosis: Sawyer has mono. So it looks like, as long as he can eat and drink on his own tonight, they'll be sending him home tomorrow! There's not much they can do to help with mono. Sawyer's body is just going to have to fight it on it's own. 

The kids and I have mostly been watching TV and laying around the last couple of days. Jack was sick most of yesterday right along with me. He went and took a nap in his bed VOLUNTARILY. That's a sure sign that a kid is sick. So, Jack and I did not go to church today. We were still quite hot on the wings of illness. But I let both of the girls walk themselves to and from church. Brooke was very anxious not to miss her very last time in primary, and I couldn't keep her home. We watched Seven Brides for Seven Brothers together this afternoon/evening. The kids loved it! It was very fun. And after putting Jack to bed tonight, the girls and I played games until way past their bedtimes.

 This is certainly not how I expected or wanted our year to end and our new year begin. But ah, well. 

A list of the people who helped us and checked in on us: Kimberly Davis, Amanda Howells (helped spread the news of us being in the hospital), Hannah Kimball (brought us dinner one night), Sarah, DeAnna, both of our families, Hailey Shoemaker, Lauren Harrison (came over with a treat for the kids and a bag full of gifts for Sawyer), Stephanie Mitchell, Liisia and Cody Putnam, Jessica Tanner, Annette Perkins.

Christmas

On Christmas Eve, I went to Brian's ward again to hear him sing in Sacrament meeting. He sang "what child is this?" and did so good. Then when he was done singing, I rushed home to go to church with my family. 

Daniel told me during Sacrament meeting that he saw his mission president during with a family in our ward, the Curtises. So afterwards, we went over to say hello. It was so fun to meet Daniel's mission president! And Daniel got to meet me and the kids. They said something so sweet, like, "It's so nice to see you doing well and living the life you should." I'm sure that's so gratifying as a mission president and wife to see one of their missionaries staying on the covenant path. It was also so fun to realize the connection with the Curtis family! We'll need to get together with them! 

Mom, Brooke, Camille, Daniel and I made food and cleaned up all afternoon when we were done with church. We made a beautiful salad, a jello salad, dinner rolls, Brussel sprouts, mashed potatoes and our favorite salmon. It was a delicious dinner. After dinner, we did our candy cane hunt and sand Christmas songs around the piano. It was a wonderful Christmas Eve. 

Brian and Sammy left, and we got our kids to bed so that we could wrap presents and prepare for Christmas. We watched "It's a Wonderful Life" while we waited for kids to fall asleep. 

Sawyer woke up several times that night, before and after Daniel and I went to bed (and we didn't get to bed until 1 on the morning 🫠). He acted like he was sick, but nothing really seemed to be wrong. It was very strange. 

It kind of put a damper on our Christmas. The kids came up to wake us up at like 7 in the morning or so, after we struggled to sleep. It was a bit hard to wake up. 

We got Sawyer up, even though he wasn't feeling well and likely wanted to keep sleeping. He laid on our bed while we went down to watch the kids go through their stockings. They were so excited. ❤️ They got a bunch of little things they wanted (like jump ropes for the girls, caution tape for Jack, a suction cup ball for Camille, and cars for Sawyer), plus candy, oranges, underwear and socks, dental hygiene things, and personal hygiene things. 

We brought Sawyer down to watch the nativity video from the church. We had a little discussion about it, and then let the kids start into opening presents. I think everyone had a great Christmas. We got Jack a small (Chinese, haha, it had Chinese characters and these funny little Chinese jingles) power wheels; Sawyer a ride on police car, complete with siren and radio; and the girls roller blades, which they have basically been living in since they opened them. Everyone also got books and clothes or shoes of some kind. I got Daniel a panini press, a new sweatshirt, and a book. He got me a new straightener and a new balance ball. Plus, my main gift was a girls trip with my friends to Austin, Texas. 😊 

We spent the rest of the day playing with our things. The girls went outside to skate a little bit and Jack joined them in his new car. Sawyer was mostly lethargic and either sitting on the couch or sleeping on our bed the whole day. He did get up for a little bit to play with his police car and try out Jack's car. And he joined us for a little dinner. But that was it, poor little guy. 

Daniel and I started one of dad's new puzzles with him. And we watched some TV, which we put on for Sawyer Man. Winnie the Pooh Christmas, I believe. 

We made panini for dinner that night with our new press, which I think Daniel was excited about. The few days before Christmas, he started talking to me about the fact that we hadn't gotten a new press, and "should we ask to see if anyone has one we can borrow?" And "we won't be able to have panini on Christmas now!" It was pretty funny, knowing I had one wrapped under the tree for him. 

And that was basically our Christmas! It was a good one, I think everyone was happy, with the notable exception of poor little sick Sawyer. 

Christmas Season

The week after we got home, we went to Luminaria. We've never been altogether as a family, and it was very fun. The lights at the Thanksgiving Point gardens were absolutely beautiful and magical, and they paired the lights with Christmas music. They also had this fun game where they had hidden little yeti ornaments around the gardens with numbers on them, and the kids task was to find all the yetis. They loved the game! We took the kids through the Jesus garden (I don't know what it's actually called, but it's the one with all the bronze statues of the Savior). We talked about the stories of Jesus as we walked around, and it was such a great way to start the season. The kids (especially the boys) started getting cold after that, but we got them to walk around for a little bit longer before leaving. 

I got sick late in November, so I missed so many Christmas events... again. I feel like this happens every year. I get sick, and then Daniel takes all the kids to all the things: the ward Christmas party, the McMurtrey's Christmas party. I also missed bunco, book club and a girls night. It stinks. I stayed home and did nothing a lot. The cough was particularly bad this time. We did have Daniel's parents for dinner and the Christmas devotional before I was too sick, which was nice. 

Brooke started a regular babysitting job this month!! Gina Smith asked if Brooke would babysit Wade every Friday for a couple of hours, so she started doing that a few weeks ago. I think she likes doing it. She says she just plays with Wade, and she's thrilled with being able to make such easy money. 😂 So she's gone to babysit him a few times, and I think after Christmas break, she'll start up again, going every Friday. 

Sarah and I took our big girls on a little date to see Jack Christensen's play that he did this month. It was the musical version of a Christmas Story. It was fun to go together. A Christmas Story isn't my favorite, but the girls liked it and Jack did a great job. 

DeAnna came for lunch one afternoon, which was lovely. We don't see each other nearly enough these days. She's really quite busy all the time. And I am too, I suppose. Our busy times are kind of opposite, because she has more free time during the day when her kids are in school, which is when I'm busiest. But we ate and talked for a few hours. She's struggling with a number of things, and I think it was good for both of us for her to be able to talk about it. 

I had a girls night with DeAnna and Sarah one Saturday night. We talked for a nice long time and ate some good snacks, and then right when I was thinking I'd probably better go home, they wanted to start a new Korean show. Haha! I figured we spent our time talking, which is great! Probably better than just watching a show. But then they still wanted to watch. And I caved in. I didn't get to bed until almost 1am that night. 😱😬 Probably wasn't my best move. 

Camille and I had a fun little mommy time one day. She got this bubblegum making kit from one of her friends for her birthday, and she'd been waiting weeks to do it with me. It was a pretty fun activity, although I don't think we did it exactly right, because it was pretty difficult to mix the ingredients up. But it was fun and the gum was pretty tasty. We had a good time together. 

This December has been weird. It hasn't really felt like Christmas. We decorated right after we came home from Medford. And I started listening to Christmas music. And the kids and I read a Christmas book together. And we watched Christmas movies and shorts. And we did our special stories of Jesus scripture study. But for whatever reason, I just didn't feel the Christmasy-ness of this season! It was kinda sad, actually. I don't think it helped that I hadn't even started Christmas shopping until the beginning of the month. So I was rushing around and trying to squeeze in any chunks of time to go do some shopping. 

Mom and dad came to be with us for Christmas starting on the 17th. They were in Idaho prior to that for Scott's graduation. That Sunday, we went to Brian's ward because they were blessing Lia. Then to Denise's house for a luncheon with all the family. We went straight from the luncheon to Michael and Michelle's house for a Holbrook Christmas dinner. We had a great time, dinner was good, and afterwards, the kids did a nativity program, which was the cutest. We sang Christmas songs together with Jennie accompanying on the guitar before heading home. It was just a lovely day. 

We had a few more days of school before taking a break for Christmas. The kids and I kind of struggled with it, though. We were all ready for a break, so it was hard to be motivated for them, and I got kind of impatient with them when they didn't cooperate and get school done quickly. Plus, with Gramma and Grampa around to distract them and play with them, they were doubly unmotivated. But we made it through, mostly unscathed. 

On Tuesday, mom Holbrook and Sarah came over to do a fun Christmas tree craft with the kids. They turned out so so cute! Grampa helped Jack with his tree. Jack really wanted a tree to put on his hauling truck. 😆 so cute. 

We went to do the Giving Machines with Brian and Sammy's family and Gramma and Grampa. We always love doing that. We bought a bunch of food for people, some books for kids, a, baby kit and a chromebook for a girl in Africa. We had dinner at Brian's house afterwards, and then drove out to Spanish Fork for their festival of lights. The wait was crazy. There were so many people in line on the streets to get into the park. And Brian and Sammy had borrowed Dannika's big 15 passenger van so we could all go together, which was a lovely thought. But that van was so gross, and smelled like puke. The girls and I were struggling a bit with it. I was convinced that I would end up feeling sick driving in that van, and I'm glad it didn't actually get to that point. But it was fun to go together, and the lights were so fun. The kids, especially the little boys, loved it. 

We hung out with Brian and Sammy at our house for the next couple of days, just the kids playing and us playing games and talking and making food. Mom and I also did a bunch of Christmas shopping the few days before Christmas, for gifts and food. 

Thanksgiving

 We had a couple of weeks at home to relax and catch up with life after the craziness of Halloween season and before we left for Thanksgiving. 

Brooke had a team party at her coaches business. It was a tea party, which I thought was fun, but I think Brooke was underwhelmed with it. Plus, she's not super comfortable with her teammates. 

We went to Cornbelly's as a family one more time, the last Saturday it was open and had a good time. At one point, we met up with the Freis, which the kids loved, and we kind hung out with them for a few hours. 

I signed my kids up for this homeschool fitness pilot program in Lehi. A family was trying to start a business doing fitness and p.e. programs for homeschool kids, and they offered to let some kids try it for almost nothing. The kids loved it! They played all kinds of games with the other kids and ran around and it was really great. 

The kids had their primary program the Sunday before we left, and it was so wonderful. They did such a great job. I was very emotional, it being Brooke's last primary program. I cried during it and after it. Lately, over the past several months, I've just been struggling handling my kids growing up. I love that they're growing and progressing. I love watching them become who they are, and seeing the kinds of things they are into and watching their imaginations. But I miss having little kids and babies. I miss them BEING little kids and babies. And I can't believe that Brooke is going into young women's in January! I think it'll be fun to be in there with her when she starts in young women's. But that just also means that she is growing up, that she's not little anymore, and there are only a handful of years left with her in the house. It just makes me feel sad. They're all getting big and changing, but just Brooke. Brooke is just the first one to move on to new things, so I feel it more acutely with her. 

The girls went to classic skate night with the Perkins when they went, and they had such a blast. They came home asking for roller blades for Christmas. 😂

Camille and I had a mommy date the Saturday before we left. We biked to the big park in our neighborhood to bike the track and play on all the new workout machines there. Then we biked to Cubby's for fries. It was a wonderful date (but quite cold there at the end).

We left for Medford halfway through the week before Thanksgiving. We kind of rushed to get caught up in our schoolwork before leaving, cleaning the house and packing, and all that. We drove all day on Wednesday. The drive went pretty well, I thought. The kids are pretty used to road trips at this point. They read books and played with Legos and toys, the girls had bracelet making things and other projects to work on, we listened to books and music together, and at one point closer to the end of the drive, we let the kids watch a couple of movies.

The 10 days we spent in Medford for Thanksgiving was so fun. The kids spent every day playing with their cousins. They wanted to go to Julie's house every day. She had all the cool games and toys. 😊 I feel like I hardly see my kids very much during our stay there. 😂 We all ate really good food, we played games, we watched movies and Korean shows. 

For Julie's birthday, the night before, we had a girls date to go get permanent jewelry. We all got matching bracelets, and then we each got something of our own. This lady out close to Jacksonville has this cute trailer where she does get jewelry, and she took us all in turn to put the bracelets on us. It was actually really fun (if much more expensive than I thought it would be). 

The wave is the one we all got, in commemoration of our girls trip to Hawaii. Mom gave me the idea of the "faith" bracelet, and I liked the look of the 3 together.

The next morning, on her actual birthday, we had a birthday breakfast at mom's house, with all of Julie's favorite breakfast things: orange waffles with very sauce, orange juice, sausage and bacon, etc. It was delicious! We spent most of the day at Julie's house. The kids just played together, and Julie and I hung out. 

Then that evening, we went to red Robin for burgers before going to see The Ballad of Songbirds and Snacks, the prequel to the Hunger Games. I spent the previous few months reading the book in preparation, and I had to rush to finish it the first few days in Medford. I read almost the whole drive to Medford, haha, and still had a ways to go. But I made it! And finished the book the day before our girls date. I LOVED the book!! It was so so good. And I thought the movie interpretation was excellent as well. It was a fun girls date. 

Daniel was sick with a pretty bad cold while we were there, so he spent a lot of time in our room staying away from everyone. He worked for a few of the days we were there and took the other days off to be with everyone. He took dad mountain biking one day, early on in our trip, and there was a bit of a disaster: dad rode off the trail a couple minutes into their ride and was scraped up really badly by some trees and shrubs. But they kept riding, the weirdos. When they got back, dad's ear was in really bad shape, all cut up badly, bleeding everywhere. He had to go to the ER to get it stitched up, and he was in a lot of pain and bandaged up for the rest of our stay there. 

We went to the park to play and do pickleball a couple of days, we went to play in the cultural hall of the church and pickleball one day, we had a Christmas movie night watching Klaus one night. 

Mom's birthday was on Thanksgiving this year, and she didn't want a traditional dinner on her birthday. So we had lasagna. 😋🤤 Schpuck made a delicious salad, there was jello salad, garlic bread and a yummy drink. We had a great Thanksgiving. My sisters and I bought mom a beautiful new nativity, and my brothers and I bought her a fun See's advent calendar. The kids worked the day before on a nativity drawing, each kid taking a new piece of it. It was so darling. 

We went home the Saturday after Thanksgiving, and the trip back was about the same and as uneventful as the trip there. We had a great time with our family.