Beat the Bridge 2012

Yay, another year of Team Zane under our belts!  We had a blast today!  Unlike last year the rain held off until we were done with the walk/run instead of drenching us from the get-go and for that, I think we were all grateful!  Zane did really good - only rode in the stroller for about a mile of the walk and walked the other 3, I was very proud of him.  We had a team of about 40 people and raised over $6000 for research to help find a cure for Type 1 Diabetes and I pray everyday for that cure to be found in Zane's lifetime!  Thank you to everyone who came out to brave the weather today and for helping make Zane feel so special, he can't stop talking about everyone who was there for him!

My friend Lori trained really hard to run the 8K - here she is before her run!

Here is most of our team - so blessed to see this many people out for Zane and such a great cause.

Zane and his buddy Bashir at the beginning of the walk!

Dr. B - one of my favorite people!

It was Zane's turn for a ride in the stroller, so Landon had the fun of riding on mom's back (have I mentioned this kid is HEAVY)! 

My good friend Krissy pushing Zane :)

 

Here we are after the walk - headed to the field to find daddy (he ran).

This was a fun treat - running into a girl I went to grade school with (and honestly don't think I've seen since then).  Sarah was diagnosed with Type 1 when she was 5 - pretty cool to see her again.

She did it folks - Lori ran the entire 8K and Beat the Bridge...I think she was just a little bit happy!!

Here is daddy after his great run too!  He is still recovering from strep and still not feeling so hot, I was so proud of him for getting out there and running in spite of his ailments - he did great!!

Zane and his friend Claire after the walk (Claire was diagnosed last September)!  These two are so cute!

Ice Skating

Zane started ice skating lessons (again, thanks to Groupon) this past Saturday!  So what if he spent most of his time sitting falling on the ice - he still had a great time!  He's already looking forward to next week, all I can say is; I'm glad its him and not me, haha!

What NOT to say to the parent of a Type 1 Diabetic

I follow a few blogs of parents of Type 1 kiddos and a few blogs written by Type 1 adults and all of them usually give me great information and pick-me-ups when I need them - but there is one that I really get excited for when I see its been updated and its Death of a Pancreas.  Joann is a mom of a 3 year old daughter with Type 1, who was diagnosed at 12 mos and she also has a younger son.  Her posts are always full of REAL information and I really appreciate her candidness and honesty about raising a child with Type 1.  Everything she writes I have thought at least one time - she articulates so well and most of all she is full of humor which I LOVE!  One of my favorite quotes from a recent posts is: "I think that it's important that Elise grows up seeing that although I take diabetes very seriously, we can still laugh at it's expense." I couldn't agree more!

I wanted to share a video with all of you that Joann put together - although I have yet to encounter a lot of ignorance and stupidity from people, I have encountered more than I would like.  She sums it up well here:

There's no day off when you're a mom!

I absolutely LOVE being a mom, I have wanted to be one since as long as I can remember and its the thing I love most about my life and what I am the most proud of.  Motherhood is not easy and it is not for the faint of heart!  These past few weeks and this past weekend have proven that like none other!

It started with Landon a week ago, the kid caught a stomach bug from somewhere and gave us a run for our money on the puking train!  I honestly don't think we've seen so much puke come out of such a small body in our lives as we did over those 3 days - yes, you read that right THREE days, ugh!  On day 2, he started to also develop a rash of sorts on his face - the doctor wasn't concerned and just said that there are over 500 virus' that cause rashes...ok, can we start from the top then?!  Fast forward a couple days Landon's puking finally dissipates but the rash continues, now there are a few spots showing up on his legs and arms - he doesn't seem bothered by them, so I try not to be - but he is starting to look like a polka dot prince!

Thursday of last week it was Zane's turn to come down with something.  Thankfully, the puking train didn't make a stop inside his body this time.  After work I had an errand to run in Tacoma and about 1/2 way there Zane started complaining he was tired and just wanted to go to bed - very unlike him, especially at 4 p.m.  We ran our errand and I offered to take him to McDonald's for dinner and he turned it down saying he just wanted to go home and go to bed - after a quick blood sugar check (it was fine), we headed home and straight to bed he went.  I woke him up at 8 to try and get him to eat to no avail - so we just kept a good eye on his blood sugars and he slept most of the night (waking up a few times).  Friday was much like Thursday, he would be fine and then just crash and sleep for hours.  This continued into Saturday, only the non-stop sleeping was getting worse, and now he was complaining of his ear hurting.  Josh and I headed out to the Sounders game Saturday night (Zane seemed ok when we left) and my brother was watching the boys.  The game had just started and my phone rang, it was my brother, I knew something was wrong, he NEVER calls when watching the kids (usually just texts me).  Zane was just crying uncontrollably, to the point of hyperventilating - my brother put him on the phone and I finally got out of him that he just wanted mommy (again, something very out of character for him - to not be ok with me being gone for a couple hours).  I had my brother do a quick blood sugar check - a little high, but still fine.  I head back to my seat and let Josh know that I have to go, so I take the keys and head home and leave him to take the bus, haha!  Zane now has developed pretty high ketones, quick call into Children's, some new instructions, and away we head into the night.  Its another long night, up every 3 hours to check him and again, he cries out in pain for his ear.

Sunday - yep Mother's Day - here is how that day went:

First thing after waking up, I take the boys out to Urgent Care, I wanted to get Zane's ear checked out and figured since we were there I might as well have the doc take a look at Landon's rash again.  Zane's ear is fine - just has a virus, ugh. Landon apparently has Hand, Foot, Mouth - ugh!  Apparently, the worst is behind us with Landon though! 

Zane's impressed with his ID bracelet - Landon, not so much!

Here we are, killing time before the doctor came in:

We finally get home from our quick trip to Urgent Care and I find out that Josh is sick now too!  He too just gets progressively worse as the day goes on and he and Zane spent the ENTIRE day sleeping.

Since Landon was fine and no longer contagious (too bad his most contagious days were spent at daycare, oops) - he and I celebrated Mother's Day a little (too bad, he had no idea what that meant).

We...

went for a walk:

went to Costco to fill the car up with gas:

and went through the carwash:

Last night was another really long night, checking Zane's ketones every 3 hours and dealing with his ear pain and just plain not feeling well.  At 5 a.m., Josh woke me up to tell me he couldn't swallow it hurt so bad - here we go!  I headed into work for 2 hours to get some essentials done and then came home and took Josh to the doctor, the man has strep!  Can anyone catch a break in this house, please?!!

Landon staring down the camera!

Zane and Josh slept most of the afternoon again today, but I'm happy to report that Zane seems to be slowly, but surely getting back to his normal self as of tonight!  We are still fighting some ear pain (which I have just diagnosed as "swimmers ear" after a little cyber trip to webmd.com and will be talking to his Dr. tomorrow for some drops) and some high blood sugars, but the ketones seem to have finally gone away - hope it stays that way all night!  He will be staying home one more day from school and if all goes well tomorrow, he can head back Wednesday!  Josh started antibiotics today, so hopefully within a day or two, he'll be getting back to feeling normal again soon.  Landon's rash is slowly disappearing and hopefully will be gone by the end of the week as well.

Ok, so that has been our week and my Mother's Day - who needs a day to be pampered with yummy food and fun activities?!

I have these two littles and never mind taking care of them - even if it is on Mother's Day!

Skate Park

There is a skate park not too far from our house that we drive by quite often and Zane loves to watch the kids/adults skateboarding and/or biking as we drive past.  There's a big park that surrounds it and its a perfect place to take pictures.  I had some last minute pictures I needed to take of the boys for a gift and told Zane where we'd be going to take them.  He quickly asked if he could bring his bike to ride at the skate park.  I told him he could, but only if there weren't other kids on it already because I knew he would be nowhere up to their levels and I didn't want him getting trampled.  We were over there early enough this morning that there was just one guy skateboarding, so we decided to give it a whirl.  Lets just say that Zane needs a little more practice before going back there and lets say its a REALLY good thing he had his helmet on! I looked at all of the hills and told him which two he could go down - the two without the 90 degree angle to get down!  The first one, he went down was no problem, the second one...well, that one posed to be a problem - twice!  The first time he went down it, it barely missed heading down the stairs instead by about a 1/4 of an inch.  It scared the living daylights out of me - but he insisted in trying again.  I let him go again and this time half way down the little hill he turned his handlebars right into the wall - oops.  He fell off his bike, the bike fell on top of him, his head hit the concrete (helmet saved it thankfully), hurt his shoulder (its fine now, was just sore for a few mins) and scraped up one of his fingers (thankfully, I keep a little firstaid kit in the car).  Needless to say - we were both done at that point!  Obviously, he is totally fine - I think it really just scared him (and me) more than anything.

So I took a couple of pictures, but only of him before the great fall - I'm too nice of a mommy to snap pictures of him in pain and that might later burst his ego a bit!

This is at the top of the little hill he bit it on...

Here he is just riding around the skate park after his first successful trip down one of the hills.

Landon just taking in the scenery!

Swimming Lessons

We are back at it again - new pool, new teachers and new excitement!  Yesterday was Zane's first lesson of the season and he did WONDERFUL!  After only one lesson I'm already liking this program better - the last place we went, the teacher to kid ratio was pretty high and the teacher was too lax on Zane!  This time, there are 2 teachers to 4-5 kids - AWESOME!  I told one of the girls that Zane needed some extra help with putting his head in the water and told her be as forceful as she could without freaking him out of course!  They did and he did - yahoo!!  AND, he's not even freaked out to go back tomorrow!

Check it out folks...that is Zane's head UNDERWATER!!!

At home after getting all clean!!!  What a goof!

Playground

Our new "thing" lately on nice days is to drive around and find elementary school playgrounds to try out! My goodness these playgrounds have sure changed since I was a kid - I would've loved a playground like the ones we're finding!  I'm glad my kids will get the cream of the crop - too bad when they are parents their kids will probably be playing with flying cars at recess, haha!

Yeah, these lasted for about .25 seconds!

I can't believe how big Zane is - this kid needs to stop growing!

I'm so happy Landon can finally walk - it makes these playground stops so much more fun!

Once a kid, always a kid (at heart anyway)!

I love this picture!