a very hectic day - in detail

Whoever thinks being a stay-at-home mom isn't as demanding as an outside job, definitely does NOT know what they are talking about! Okay, so probably everyone reading this knows that already, but it felt good to write anyway. :)

For the record here is the very detailed (don't say I didn't warn ya) breakdown of the day I had today:
6am -- scripture study (I feel best if I start the day this way.)
6:30 -- get ready for the day
6:45 -- get breakfast ready (and feed myself simultaneously)
7:10 -- wake up kids (all except Alex who is strangely still sound asleep), give morning loves, prod children along, stop fights, feed 4 small hungry people, pack snacks and lunch and toddler backpacks, make sure papers are signed and M & T have "something white" to take to school today, encourage M & T to pee & poop before bus comes
8:05 -- bus arrives 10 minutes early, whisk M off of potty, dress M & T in winter gear and load them on bus with lots of smiles and hugs and kisses all in the next 2 minutes
8:10 -- Alex wakes up with his face all swollen up and covered completely in snot, remind Emma to do her piano practice, clean up and dress Alex

(Note: On Monday and Tuesday Alex had what we assumed was a weird mild allergic reaction to 2 different kinds of spaghetti sauce. Yesterday he was congested and his face seemed a little puffy. I assumed this was still allergy stuff. He has never had any sort of allergy, so this is all new. Yesterday, of course, I did not feed the boy anything red whatsoever, so I was distressed to find him even worse this morning.)

8:36 -- kiss Emma goodbye, give Alex some Benadryl, try to get him to eat his beloved super porridge, but he will only eat a banana and a drinkable yogurt, get an appointment with Alex's pediatrician for 11:45, call my awesome neighbor to help with the others when I take him, make pb&j sandwiches for her to feed them while we are at the doctor, read books and play trains with A & I
9:30 -- take Isabelle to speech therapy, go grocery shopping with A (poor kid)
11:00 -- pick up Isabelle and get home just in time to...
11:25 -- get M & T off the bus, unload groceries, orient my neighbor to the lunch & nap routine, say goodbyes (another round of hugs and kisses)
11:38 -- leave with A for the doctor

[I had thought this was all from some sort of a new allergy and expected them to try to determine exactly what it was he was allergic to. Instead she quickly asserted that although some of the puffiness may have been allergy related, there was definitely something else going on here. He had a temperature of 100.6 and was breathing very noisily, but his lungs sounded fine, his ears looked fine, his oxygen level was fine, the strep culture turned up negative and the toe prick to check for mono (which is very rare is kids this young) also turned up negative. She did find that his tonsils and glands were very swollen.]

12:30 -- go to hospital lab for chest and throat x-rays and blood draw

(I was so proud of my little guy! He was a real trooper through all of this. You could just see how miserable he felt, but he didn't cry or fuss at all until the shots at the very end. That was especially bad because she tried one arm and the vein collapsed, so then she had to do the other arm too!)

1:30 -- home! my awesome neighbor has gotten M & I & T down for their naps, so I put A down and start a humidifier in his room. eat lunch, clean up kitchen, check email, look for a twin bed and bookcase on craigslist
2:55 -- Jeff comes home early to help, I wake up M & T and prepare them for their first visit to the dentist while he moves their carseats to the car, prepare M & T mentally for this visit and what is going to happen and how they can show me their sparkling clean teeth when they get home

(Tristan came home from Russia with a huge black cavity in one of his back molars, so we are addressing this)

3:45 -- Alex wakes up, wake up Isabelle too
4:05 -- greet Emma home from school, make them their promised hot chocolate--with 4 multicolored mini-marshmellows each (they have to have the same amount, or course), encourage them to drink it quickly, and load kids in car once again

(Lately we've been using hot cocoa as bribery the reward for going right to sleep at night when we put the girls to bed, rather than goofing around and coming down again and again, complaining to us about each other until 10 or 11 at night.)

4:20 -- drop off Emma for her piano lesson
5:00 -- arrive home for good now, Alex and Isabelle play without too many quarrels while I throw some hamburgers on our indoor grill for dinner.
5:30 -- Jeff and Maya and Tristan and Emma get home. feed family
6:15 -- finally get call from doctor with results from tests.

(Turns out Alex's white blood cell count is through the roof, over twice what it should be! The throat x-ray showed his very swollen tonsils and glands, but not bad enough to remove them or anything. The chest x-ray was clear, thank heavens! The doctor, who is not really his pediatrician, but one of the partners, thought that he probably has mono, or a mono-type of virus! Apparently you may have to be sick longer than Alex has been for the toe-prick test to come up positive. We go back on Tuesday. Meanwhile he will be starting antibiotics tomorrow to address the swelling and maybe some of the congestion, as well as to avoid other secondary infections. Okay, so I realize this paragraph shows my utter ignorance in the world of medicine, but you also have to take into consideration that the doctor we were dealing with has a very strong accent and even after having her repeat things, I still wasn't sure I got it right!)

6:30 -- give kids popcorn and watch half hour of WALL-E as a family (we started it last night, but 30 minutes is about the right length for M & T & A)
7:00 -- family situps and pushups (New Year's resolution! --I'll have to tape it sometime cause it is hilarious to watch them try to do these. :), family scripture and prayer
7:15 -- put kids to bed
7:45 -- watch an episode of Hannah Montana with Emma for our bonding time (we used to read, I'm not sure what happened. ;)
8:15 -- catch up with Jeff, blog and try not to eat all the sweets I'm craving right now (I've resisted my sugar addiction all week, so I can't break now)
10:45 -- hit the sack! Jeff and I are paranoid we are getting sick now.