Missing My Baby

Last week we spent traveling to the Midwest for Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful trip, exponentially better than the same trip last year thanks to a certain little electronic device that I broke down and bought (portable DVD player), but now I'm sitting here lonely because we are home without Hannah. You see, Hannah stayed behind with my mom to have fun and visit more family that we didn't have time to fit into our brief visit because Kyle had to get back to work for Monday. Hannah's having the time of her life playing with cousins, staying up late, and making cookies and Christmas decorations, but I'm missing her desperately. The house just seems so empty, quiet and lonely. I know it's a good thing for Hannah to have this opportunity since we live so far away, but I still selfishly want her with me. I've called her every single night so far. She doesn't appear to be homesick at all. I suppose chasing little black kittens around in the fresh air will do that to you.

I know you are all dying to know about our trip so here goes. We left on Saturday morning. We had intended to let Hannah go to her dance class and then leave from there, but an hour long tantrum to start the day caused us to miss dance. Still, once we got into the car things went very well and we made great time. Hannah and I alternated between doing school work and watching movies. We stopped somewhere in PA and got a hotel for the night. Hannah was a wild woman at the hotel jumping on the bed and shouting at the top of her lungs. When it came time to strap her into her braces and go to bed she complained about being lonely (we were in the bed right next to her for pete's sake!) and grunted and grumbled until she fell asleep. It was all we could do to keep quiet while she carried on! We were up relatively early the next morning and then drove the leg into Columbus, OH without incident. In fact, we arrived much earlier than they were expecting us thanks to the fantastic time we had made the day before. Hannah had fun playing with Pap and Mindy and climbing around in the woods with Baba (Kyle's grandma). Baba sure can hike with the best of them considering she's in her 80's! Baba took us out to lunch and spoiled Hannah with lots of Christmas presents. Hannah, however, in her not so tactful 4 year old way, generously pointed out that she already had 2 of the books that Baba gave her and that the 3rd one was the wrong book. She had asked for an Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) chapter book and this was an Ariel (Little Mermaid) chapter book. ~Sigh~ It looks like we have even more lessons on how to be a grateful receiver of gifts on our plate. Then we headed off to the Columbus Zoo to check out the animals and the Christmas lights. Hannah had a blast feeding and brushing the goats and then managed to make Mrs. Claus feel about "this big" (imagine my thumb and index finger very close together) when she offered to pass along a message to Santa about what she wanted for Christmas for her (we had chosen not to wait in the ridiculously long line to see him and had instead peeked around to the end of the line to watch Santa passing out candy canes to the kids as they exited his lap) and Hannah told her that she wanted Santa to know that what she really wanted was one of his candy canes! Poor Mrs. Claus didn't have any candy canes! She was pretty much helpless. It was heartbreaking and humorous all at the same time.

The next day we headed to Indiana and Hannah had her first meltdown of the actual trip. While it was not pleasant, I'd call it a huge victory that we made it to within an hour of our final destination before she had one. At Grandma's Hannah had fun chasing around and carrying a little black kitten for hours at a time. That poor cat really earned it's keep that day! While in Indiana we visited Lafayette to see our friends the Bowe's and Hannah got to play with her friend Evelyn. They were so cute together. We barely saw them they spent so much time holed up in Evelyn's room playing with her dollhouse. Then we spent Thanksgiving Day with my mom's side of the family. Hannah had a blast hanging out with the "big kids" and playing Bingo for prizes. She was even faster than I was at reading the Thanksgiving themed words on her card and finding them before the caller called out the next word. Then on Friday we visited with my dad and my aunts Jo and Terri and my cousin Becky in the morning/afternoon and then headed over to Tiffany's house (Hannah's birthmother) for dinner and to spend the evening. At Jo and Terri's Hannah had a blast chasing their cat and playing Wii. She really loves the fencing on Wii Sports resort and she's actually pretty good at it. Terri spoiled her rotten by giving her a few of her little knick-knacks and her father's old keyboard. I can't wait until Hannah's home so we can give the keyboard a whirl. At Tiffany's house Hannah turned into a wild woman again. I suppose an entire week of over stimulation will do that to a kid, but boy was she wild- not the finest representation of our parenting skills! Hannah had so much fun with Chase and Kayla though. They played on the trampoline, Chase gave horsey rides/bucking bronco rides, they watched a movie, and wrestled like siblings that have never been separated. It was lovely to watch. Hannah even gave both Donna and Charlie (Hannah's birthgrandparents) hugs which she has been hesitant to do in the past. It was a great visit.

Then, on Saturday Kyle and I headed back to RI and Hannah stayed with my mom. Now I'm here typing this childless. I suppose it was fortunate for both me and Hannah that Hannah stayed with mom because today I'm sick. I've vomited 3 times already today and Hannah's hates to see me get sick. It makes her so nervous when I throw up, while at the same time she doesn't seem to be able to take it easy on me when I can't do everything she wants to do. So, I suppose for today at least I'm grateful she's there, but I still miss her.

Photo Notes: The picture with Hannah in the dog crate with BOTH of the dogs was not my doing. I came downstairs one morning and found them all 3 in there together. Hannah had coaxed both of the dogs in there and then got in herself and locked them all in. Even though she was able to lock herself in she was unable to get the crate unlocked from the inside so they were all stuck there until I decided to release them. I couldn't resist snapping a picture before I did so though!

Irrational Laughter

This past weekend was rough at the Spontak house. Kyle has some sort of viral throat infection, thankfully not strep and I caught a particularly nasty stomach virus that KICKED MY BUTT. Consequently sensory diets were not high on our list of things to do and poor Hannah received very little quality time Saturday (Sunday Kyle was doing a bit better and was a fantastic Daddy even though he still didn't feel tip top), dare I say little attention period! As a result of the lack of heavy work and attention, behaviors skyrocketed on Hannah's end and we had little patience for dealing with them appropriately or heading them off at the pass. It was a vicious cycle. On Sunday I watched as Hannah disobeyed and then smarted off to Kyle as he attempted to discipline her (I don't even remember what she did or said) as I sat completely devoid of energy, dizzy, and just trying to keep what little was in my stomach in there. For some reason the absurdity of the situation struck me and I began to laugh. Laughing made me more nauseous and also hurt my overtaxed abs from all the vomiting. The pain became so intense that I was crying all the while still laughing. It was such a WEIRD sensation. I wasn't laughing so hard I was crying in the normal sense, but yet I was laughing and crying at the same time and unable to stop either. Kyle and Hannah just stared at me confused. Luckily I didn't get screamed at or hit (Hannah doesn't really care for other people's laughter because she usually thinks it's directed at her although this time in a way it was so she might have been justified at being upset!) and I managed to somehow not throw up all over the dining room. The odd thing was that after that bout of irrational laughter my mood was much better even though I still felt awful. Nothing pleasant or good had happened, just more of the same, but the simple act of laughing uncontrollably cheered me up. I guess that maybe laughter really is the best medicine.

The new bedtime routine is going pretty well. Last week Hannah slept completely through the night for the first time since at least May. It may well have been even longer than May, but we know for sure that we hadn't had a full uninterrupted night of sleep since moving into the house. It was amazing how refreshed I felt that first morning. Hannah was better behaved too. I'm sure lack of sleep has been making us all cranky and impatient. Hopefully the success continues. Oh, and she's also managed to stay dry on her own ever since we stopped waking her up to pee as well. Yahoo to full night's sleep and no more pee soaked sheets!

Just within the last week Hannah has realized that she can read. I mean she's known she can read for a long time, but now she'll actually pick up a book independently and read the words she sees rather than making up her own story or just looking at the pictures. Before she would only actually read a book if asked to read it. If left to her own devices she'd much rather make up her own version of the story. Last week though, something switched. She's been asking to read to us instead of asking us to read to her. She's been reading aloud in the van to pass the time. She's independently and almost without conscious thought using the skills she has to make her life easier and more informed. For example, she'll see a piece of paper on the counter, look at it and read what it says and then ask questions about what it says. She'll read the titles flashed on the screen before her Curious George TV shows start so she knows what to expect. She's checking the school calendar to know what the day holds before I tell her. Reading has switched from being something she could do easily, but chose not to do, to something she does without thinking like adults do. It's now something that just happens. She sees a word and it's read. It's like she can't not read it now. Not only is it read, but it's processed, understood, and used to her advantage. I have a feeling a whole new world has just opened up to my little girl. It's going to be exciting, but heaven help us as we cope with all the new information that brain of hers is going to be packing!

Hannah seems to have handled Kyle going back to work quite well. I guess I underestimated her. We had a few rocky days, but on the whole she's done fine. We're still trying to getting back into the grove of our old routine, but that will come I think. I hope it will anyway!

The last few days Hannah has been eating like crazy. She's been consuming more food in any given day than I normally would! I know she's grown lately because Kyle pointed out to me that her houseslippers are definitely too small for her (yet there's no way I'm going to be able to get rid of them until I have a replacement pair!) and I felt her shoes today and I'm pretty sure it's time for a new pair of them too. That's one of the drawbacks of her being able to do her shoes completely independently is that I don't have a daily check on how her shoes are fitting. She certainly hasn't mentioned that they are too tight, but they definitely are! I've also had to retire several shirts and pants this past month. Come spring time I'm going to have to buy her a whole new short sleeved shirt wardrobe because I don't think she has more than one or two that could be worn alone and be considered decent. The clothes in her closet right now are shirts sized 5-6 and pants 4T (a little short, but at least they'll stay up!) and dresses 5-6. Her current shoes are 11s and her slippers were 11/12s. She's only 3 1/2 for pete's sake! This girl totally is going to out grown me before she's half way through elementary school.

And It Begins Again

It seems that our almost one year reprieve from near constant ear infections and fluid in the ears is over with. This morning Hannah complained that her ear hurt and when preschool called to tell us to come pick her up because they thought she had pink eye Kyle took her to the doctor and it was confirmed. She does indeed have an ear infection as well as pink eye. The worst part about it is that her ear tubes have slipped out of position in both ears (we found out they might be starting to shift in October). It appears that she got an infection pretty much immediately after the tube had moved out of place. This does not bode well. The way I see it (I realize I'm jumping to conclusions, but I have lots of experience with Hannah's ears to go on) we have two options. First we could just let the tubes fall out and go through the cycle of constant ear infections again and risk Hannah having hearing loss from the fluid building up on her ear drum again like last time. OR we can put Hannah through another surgery to replace the tubes and hopefully get another reprieve from the constant infections, but risk having a recurrence of the post op pneumonia she had last time after being under general anesthesia. I don't like either option. I suppose a third option is that we do nothing and the infections just never come back, that this infection was just a coincidence, but somehow I don't think that is a viable option or a likely outcome. Oh, and to top off poor Hannah's ear infection and pink eye she also started complaining of a tummy ache around lunch time and then finally threw up right around dinner time. I was actually pretty worried about this day. The last time Hannah threw up (not counting the times she's made herself throw up when she was angry) she was only a year old and not really old enough to remember how it feels. I was worried about how she would react when the day finally came that she got sick to her stomach. I expected her to be hysterical. After all, it's a scary feeling to not be able to control your body. I shouldn't have worried though because she took it like a champ and was actually fascinated by the products of her efforts. I suppose it helped that her vomit was bright purple thanks to some blueberries! After throwing up we gave her a bowl to take around with her in case she felt sick again and wasn't able to make it to the toilet. When it was time for bed (she actually ASKED to go to bed around 6pm tonight by the way! That about gave me a heart attack!) she said that she thought she needed to take the bowl with her. Just a few minutes ago when she got up to go to the bathroom she told me that now she was just like me because she had her own bowl by her bed (I have gastropariesis and frequently throw up a night) and she sounded so proud! Great! That's not exactly what I had imagined her wanting to emulate about me! The funny part is that she was concerned that Kyle doesn't have his own bowl. She even offered to share her bowl with him if he needed it. How generous of my little girl :) Then the final nail in the coffin today was that both Kyle and I are pretty sure that we both have pink eye too!

Super Virus

Well it turned out that the virus that Hannah, Evelyn, and the other baby (Eleanor) got was a super contagious one because entire families have been succumbing to it! The casualty count is now 3 babies, 2 siblings, 3 daddies, and 2 mommies (and that's just what we've heard of so far)! Both Kyle and I came down with it, as did Evelyn's parents, as well as Eleanor's dad and two brothers. Hannah is still not completely back to normal, but hasn't had any vomit or diarrhea since Friday. Now the challenge is to get her fever to go away completely (it keeps going away and then reappearing again) and get her back on a regular eating routine. She actually did some pretty good eating today, but it just wasn't consistent. Sometimes she was absolutely ravenous and at others she didn't even want to look at a bottle, sippy cup, or piece of finger food. I seem to be through the worst of it. My fever is gone and I've been vomit free for over 24 hours. I'm starting to get a bit of energy back, but am still feeling quite weak and achey. Kyle is just starting the process, however, so I hope that for him the virus has weakened as it has passed through Hannah and I and maybe it won't be so hard on him. The hardest part about Hannah's entire illness was yesterday. It wasn't the puke or the diarrhea, but her desperate pleas for food. Because she was vomiting everything she ate or drink straight back up, the doctor said she was only allowed to have 2 sips of water every 15 minutes and then a few bites of applesauce if she managed to keep her water down. She was so thirsty by this point that she wanted to just guzzle the water down and 2 sips was just torture to her. She would get hysterical when we took the cup away and sign more to drink over and over again while she looked at us like she couldn't believe we were starving her! It would take the entire 15 minutes to get her calmed down and distracted by something else and then it was time to give her another sip and we had to start the whole process over again. Once she was tolerating her water and Kyle gave her some applesauce (which she ate greedily and that is a big deal since she HATES applesauce!) she even signed more to eat PLEASE to Kyle. She just kept pleading and pleading for more to eat and drink and it broke our hearts to not be able to give it to her. Today Mamaw came to watch her since Kyle and I could not keep up with her and she was really good about eating and drinking for awhile and then decided she didn't want any more to eat or drink at around 6pm. I'm worried she didn't get enough today, but I couldn't force it on her. I bet she won't make it through the night. I actually hope she wakes up in the middle of the night hungry. I would feel a lot better if she would even take 2 more ounces of formula.

Here are some more videos of Hannah from before she got sick.

This video is of Hannah and Evelyn using the cat food tins as drums. They get more enjoyment out of those old pop corn tins than I think they do out of any other toy.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5460520082233794110&hl=en

This is Hannah's first balloon. She LOVED it (she actually still has it although the helium of course doesn't make it float anymore). Her favorite thing to do was hold it and then let it go and watch it float up to the ceiling. Then she would say and sign help for Kyle to get it down so she could do it all over again!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8431588526699197909&hl=en

Here is Hannah's first time having a bowl and spoon on her tray. She really wasn't quite sure about the whole thing.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3206610299863713137&hl=en

Hannah developed her own way of using her spoon. Unfortunately she got sick the day after these videos were taken so we haven't been able to continue her spoon training!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2366650058610898850&hl=en

Mountain Climber

Hannah is now a little mountain climber. Since she learned that she could climb up steps at the park she has now learned how to climb onto chairs. Today she crawled up onto the footstool and from there onto to the chair to get to me! After I put her back down on the floor she climbed right up again into the chair and then turned around and gave me a look like she was so proud of herself.

Lately Hannah has been obsessed with the sign for flower. She finds flowers all over the house (it's not hard considering all the daisies I have everywhere) on the walls, in pictures, in books, on her videos and does the sign for them ever single time. She's so cute when she does it because she scrunches up her nose and sniffs like she's smelling a real flower in addition to doing the sign. Last night she was sick (I'll tell you about that in a bit) and I had her in the guest bathroom stripped naked trying to clean vomit out of her hair. I sat her on the counter and she kept pointing to the pictures of the flowers on the wall and making the sign for flower for each one. She did the exact right number of signs, one for each picture. Even though she was feeling so crummy she still couldn't let her flower guard down!

Ok, now about her being sick, this week I was helping out at Vacation Bible School and Hannah was staying in the nursery at church. Well on Tuesday night one of the other babies in the nursery ended up getting sick and was vomiting. So, she obviously was not back in the nursery yesterday. So, yesterday Hannah had a great day in the nursery and even actually enjoyed herself for most of the time. Then at home around 7:30 Hannah did not want to finish her bottle. So, I took her back to her room to read her a story and put her to bed and she vomited pretty much the entire contents of her stomach onto me, the chair, the floor, and her book-or so I thought it was the entire contents. I got her cleaned up and ready for bed again and she went to sleep easily. Then at about 9:00pm I heard her choking on the monitor. She had thrown up again and was on her back and it was pooling in her throat and nose! I could not believe she even had anything left in her stomach, but she threw up a considerable amount and since she was laying down it all pooled around her head and in her ears and hair. So, I tried to clean her up some more and then she started having dry heaves. The poor things was so scared. Her stomach kept contracting, but there was nothing left in it so just mucus came up. Today she kept her morning bottle and some cereal down, but then threw up her noon bottle. She is also running a fever today which she wasn't doing last night. Other than being more tired than usual she seems to be acting normal so that is a relief, especially after the last time she was vomiting and we ended up in the ER. Along with Hannah, another baby in the nursery also got sick last night and was vomiting. It turned out to be a little epidemic with at least 3 of the 6 babies getting sick. I haven't heard from the church today to see if any of the other 3 babies came down with the same thing, but I sure hope they don't. Hopefully they were able to clean and disinfect the nursery so that nobody else picks up whatever it was that these girls caught.

Walk America

Kyle, Hannah, and I will be participating in Walk America this year for the March of Dimes. While Kyle and I have both participated in the walk for several years (Kyle for 5 years and me for 7) it has taken on a special meaning last year and this year. We lost our baby Gabriel to miscarriage 2 weeks before last year's walk and this year we have a beautiful healthy little girl who has benefited already from research that the March of Dimes has funded. So this year we walk for our babies. If anyone feels led to help us raise funds for the March of Dimes (an organization that helps to save lives by educating and researching about preterm birth and various other newborn ailments) you may donate directly to the March of Dimes via my personal Walk America website at http://www.walkamerica.org/personal_page.asp?si=6AEA2FCC-404C-4F01-9377-5A014FC02125&prefill

Updates on Hannah's illness, Hannah went to the doctor yesterday and we found out that she DID NOT have pneumonia at all. It makes me angry that those ER doctor's put her on that strong antibiotic which made her even more sick when it was not necessary at all. When Dr. Hendrick redid the chest x-ray there was nothing on the film to suggest that she had even a touch of pneumonia. When he reviewed the blood work further he said that she had a stomach virus. Now that the antibiotic is working it's way out of her system her poop is firming up and the attacks are becoming fewer and further between. Her bottom is still pretty nasty looking, but it is getting better thanks to lots of neosporin and butt paste! Today we gave her a shower (we were afraid to put her in the tub because we didn't want her to poop in the tub and then have it wash back into her girl parts and give her a bladder infection on top of the stomach bug. She's been cleared to eat, drink, and go anywhere she wants which makes us very happy.

I'm back now and it's Sunday. Hannah and I just took a nice walk around the bike trails because it is absolutely beautiful outside. It felt so good to be out in the fresh air after being cooped up inside all winter. Hannah really enjoyed looking at all the scenery for a brief moment and then promptly fell asleep with the warm breeze blowing on her face! Now that is the life!

Next Sunday we are going to go down and visit with Tiffany and her family and have all of kids' pictures taken together for Easter. Kayla was absolutely adamant that she and Hannah have matching dresses so both Tiffany and I have bought sets of matching dresses (but left the tags on for the time being) so that hopefully when we hook up at least one of the sets will actually fit both of the girls! The pictures should be cute and we are really looking forward to visiting with Tiffany since we haven't seen her since Christmas.

Hannah recently started to eat biter biscuits and Zweibeck Toast and she thinks they are absolutely great! When you hand her one of them she just grins from ear to ear and then starts to gnaw away at it! She uses her two bottom teeth to scrape chunks of it off and then mashes it up and eats it. She's getting quite adept at eating table food and absolutely loves to feed herself. My little girl is growing up so fast. It's hard to believe that she is actually 8 months old! It won't be long before I'll be planning a big bash for her birthday!

Well, I think that is all the Hannah updates I have for now. I'll keep you all posted as she learns new things!

ER and Pneumonia Take 2

We had a very scary Saturday night and Sunday with Hannah. Hannah spent most of Saturday with Mamaw and Papaw and had a great day. She had a blast playing with them while Mommy and Daddy and Aunt Heather worked on Grandpa's house. We took her home and she was happy as a clam. When it came time for her last bottle and bed she was still in a great mood and laughing and giggling. I fed her and she drank all, but an ounce of her bottle. This hadn't happened since we cut her formula back down an ounce per bottle, but it wasn't totally unusual fer her not to take all of her last bottle. We just assumed she was tired and she was certainly acting tired. Kyle took her to her room to read her a story and sing to her before bed and no sooner had he sat down in the rocker than he hollered for me to come quick. Hannah had just projectile vomited pretty much her entire bottle all over Kyle, the chair, and the floor. The puke shot almost 3 feet! Kyle said it was like a scene from the Exorcist! I quickly cleaned up Hannah and got her changed. We took her temperature and it was 99.8. That wasn't a huge fever so Kyle picked her back up and started her bedtime routine again while I tried to clean up the floor a little bit. She threw up again almost immediately and it was projectile again and I got to witness it first hand this time. Kyle got a lot more of it on him this time so he gave her to me and went to change clothes. I got her new outfit off and was about to wash her off when I heard her having diarrhea. When I opened up her diaper there was the most foul smelling and liquidy poop I had ever seen. I changed her diaper and then took her temperature again, this time rectally which she normally hates. While taking her temp she actually fell asleep and was VERY lethargic. Like I said she really doesn't care for having her temp taking so her falling asleep was a huge red flag for us. This time the thermometer was 101.8 corrected for the rectal reading. We got her dressed and started thinking about if we should take her to the ER. Kyle decided to take her temp again under her arm after a few minutes had passed and while he was taking it she threw up again. The thermometer was reading 102 and still climbing when she threw up and the session was aborted. We cleaned her up and high tailed it to the ER. While I was checking her in and Kyle was parking the van Hannah threw up on me and my coat, but that was the last time she would vomit that night (and actually we haven't had anymore up to this post yet so keep your fingers crossed for us). By the time we actually got out of the ER waiting room and saw a doctor Hannah was burning up, but shivering since they had us take off all of her clothes. They took her temp rectally again and it was 104.5! They gave her Tylenol and Motrin and then started to do a bunch of tests to see what was causing the fever. They catheterized her to test her urine, did another awful chest x-ray on her, and then attempted to take blood for some blood tests. There we ran into a road block. Two different ER nurses couldn't get Hannah's veins so they called for the pediatric nurses to come down. Two of those nurses couldn't get her veins either so they then called in the elite special forces from the NICU to try. They ended up getting a bit of blood from Hannah's arm, but it immediately clotted from the damage to her veins and wasn't any good for the blood tests. Eventually they got a tiny bit of blood (they had to prioritize what tests to run because there wasn't enough to run them all!) from a vein in her forehead and started her IV in that same place in order to rehydrate her since she was very dehydrated from the fever and her vomiting and diarrhea. Eventually they came and told us that Hannah had pneumonia and said that that was what was causing the fever and vomiting. They sent us home around 3am Sunday with a prescription for a very nasty antibiotic cocktail and an extremely tired baby. Kyle and I took 2 hour shifts throughout the rest of the night and day giving Hannah her Tylenol and Motrin every 2 hours and Pedialyte every 20 minutes. It was exhausting, but Hannah's fever started to stay down around 8:00pm Sunday without any fever reducer and she started keeping down some formula.

Today her fever stayed down until about 10:00am and then spiked back up to 101 degrees so I had to start giving her fever reducer again because they said to not let her temp start to climb at all. She started back on her normal bottle schedule and has so far kept everything down. The antibiotic has started diarrhea very badly and Hannah's soaked through more onesies and sleepers than I can count. She's been averaging at least 1 diarrhea soaked diaper every half hour! All that pooping has really been wearing her out so she's slept a restless sleep on and off all day. I took her to see her doctor (we LOVE Dr. Hendrick) as a follow up today. The first thing he said was, "Tell me the whole story from the beginning because no offense, but I don't trust ER docs with my babies." After reviewing the ER notes and the x-ray tech's notes he severely questioned the decision made to put Hannah on the strong antibiotic. He wasn't even sure if he thought it was pneumonia given her other symptoms and if it was pneumonia he thought what the report described sounded like viral pneumonia and not bacterial which would mean that the antibiotics would do Hannah absolutely no good and only serve to keep her dehydrated. So, he ordered yet another chest x-ray and said he wanted to personally speak with the technician that read it to see if it was really pneumonia and if so what kind it was. So far the techs haven't sent him the results so we are still having to give Hannah the nasty medicine and change the diarrhea diapers, but if he gets confirmation that it's not bacterial pneumonia or even pneumonia at all he will call us tomorrow so that we can take her off the meds.

As for other Hannah updates, she has managed a few one and two step crawls since her first try, but so far she's not really figured out that she can indeed use it as a means of transportation. Today she did crawl backwards for 5 steps, on accident I think, when she was trying to sit up on her new play mat. It's a bit slippery with her sleepers on and she couldn't quite get the traction she needed and she kept sliding back on her knees. Before getting sick Hannah sampled many more table foods. She's tried chunks of softly cooked carrots, potatoes, and green beans as well as pancakes and whole wheat toast. Hannah got a new rocking chair the other day and she really seems to like it. She moves her upper body back and forth to make herself rock and she thinks that's pretty cool. She used to like doing that in our rocker and my little rocker from when I was a girl, but neither of those chairs were safe to let her sit in without being closely monitored. This new chair has a harness that keeps her safely inside the chair and specially designed rockers that keep her from tipping it over. It even has a vibrating seat which is pretty cool and we can attach a toy bar to it if she wants to play.