My Birthday

I might not have posted anything for my birthday, but it turned out quite interesting. Not at all an ideal birthday, but it worked out fine. Its very important to the girls (and Rick) that I had a great day. First of all, Darren started running a fever of 101 to 103 on Sunday and has been extremely cranky and not wanting any food but no symptoms other than that. I thought it must be his ears, but didn't want to take him to the doctor for fear of just being told it was a virus.

So we started out the day as our normal Tuesday with visits to grandmas. We were going to have a lunch party at my grandma's house so I picked up my other grandma here in Salt Lake and headed to Centerville. Here there was no snow on the roads but in Centerville it had started sticking and was super slippery. My grandma lives on a very steep hill and we tried several times to get there, but after sliding all over decided we'd better just head home. It was a bummer because we were starving and my mom had tons of food, but my grandma couldn't go trekking up a huge hill. So she and I decided to go to lunch in Salt Lake instead.

We went to Arby's where Darren screamed the whole time. It was frustrating for me because I knew he didn't feel well, but my grandma got really upset too and that didn't help. Oh, I forgot to mention that I forgot my wallet at home too. Grandma treated us as her birthday present to me. I dropped her off and Darren fell asleep right before we got home and slept for about an hour.

My mom left grandma's early due to the storm and came to our house just before Darren woke up. He didn't want her and was being very grumpy to everyone, including me. It was fun to see her and my niece Evynn, though it was just for a few minutes. Evynn was so sweet and handed me a folded dollar bill and said it was my birthday present. It was so cute!

At this point Rick tried to settle Darren down, but it still took him over an hour after having ibuprofen. At this point I called the doctor's office. His doc was gone for the day, and the other doctors were full so we called kids care and got at appointment at 5:20. The biggest problem with that was that it messed up our plans for Rick to make a cake and a nice dinner (he hadn't gotten to the store due to Darren.)

We decided I'd take Darren to the dr while Rick took the girls present shopping. It didn't take the doc very long to figure out his throat was the cause of grumpiness. She swabbed his throat and gave him a popsicle. She also said it is very rare for kids under 2 to get strep and almost didn't test him. It came back positive though and after a brief conversation we were out of there in less than an hour.

The medicine finally kicked in and here's my little guy as he normally is, but for most of the day and most of the appointment he was screaming. He liked sitting on that little part of the table and he tried to turn off their computer several times too.

We decided at that point to eat at the Old Spaghetti Factory. One of my favorites, plus I know the kids will eat there. He was given his first dose before we ate and already seemed better. We were very pleased that Darren did not scream through dinner and actually ate a little bit too.

It was very important to the kids that we have a cake so we stopped at Smith's so I could grab the cake I wanted. We got home and they sang to me. After we ate carrot cake they gave me presents. I got a flat iron, just what I wanted, and a bath pillow. I like baths when I'm pregnant and I hate leaning against the cold tub so they were the perfect gifts. I took a bath while Rick put the kids in bed and then he and I watched the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. My pick, not his :) All in all it turned out to be a good day, but mostly I was so much happier knowing Darren would feel better and he does already today.

Me with my flat iron and bath pillow. Yeah!