Planets Align

This morning Adara was uber-cranky for no particular reason. Her fever has gone down but she was just pushy and nasty this morning. So, Len and I got out the tin whistles and harmonica to entertain her. For those of you who don't know, we have two tin flutes, a harmonica and two guitars in the house.
Neither of us know how to play any of these instruments.
As a child I played the organ, In highschool I played trumpet, french horn, and tried to teach myself guitar. I never really had enough time to learn guitar. I could acceptably play trumpet and french horn, but don't own either of those instruments: plus you just don't play them casually for yourself or at a party. So, while I theoretically play instruments, I never do. Len never had any training but has always wanted to.
So, this morning, we were noodling around for Adara, picking out little tunes. It took me back to my grandfather Slesser, who was a great harmonica player and played all of the time. I remember him playing Roll out the Barrel, Oh Sussanah and My Darling Clementine by the campfire all of the time and in their living room when my mother would play the organ and my cousin, the piano. It was always a great time and as kids we would jump around like mad and sing along. I miss this. Len and I talked about how we never have time to learn ( and more specifically practice), sighed and moved on with the day.
Tonight, I was Listening to Randy Bachman's Vinyl Tap on CBC. It's on CBC radio every saturday night and I usually listen while I do all of the chopping and prepping for the big weekly meal that I make on sunday nights. With Adara and I home alone on Sunday I have to start prepping saturday night in order to pull off a big family meal for six pm on Sunday. So, Randy Bachman's show is great for cooking to. Good tunes (50's, 60's, 70's and 80's), inside stories from the music business and details about how songs are structured and interrelated. I love it! So, anyhow, tonight he's talking about a guy ( Adam Gussow) who teaches beginner to advanced Harmonica over youtube. It's Kismet, I was meant to check this guy out and see if I can learn the harmonica. So, I'm off to try that in a few minutes and I'm uber excited. Realistically between baby, crazy work, house cleaning, cooking, occasional workouts, finishing a baby quilt and sleeping, this harmonica obsession might last a week. Then again, you never know where planetary alignments will lead you!

Recovered Mamma, Sick Baby

I got over my cold, Adara has a fever again. Is there something about weekends that brings this on with her?

Recovered Baby, Sick Mamma

Check out the very much recovered baby below.
She was so content tonight, she laid on my chest sucking her thumb and patting her cow for 25 minutes without a sound or movement. This kind of contentment without motion/toys/books/songs is so out of character for my wee one that I took her temperature. It's fine, I guess that she was just relaxed. I'll belive it for real if she's not sick tomorrow!
Len and I went to our dance class last night and finally mastered the cha-cha that has been the bain of my existance for three weeks. I think that I'd had so much to be angry at at work all day, that I decided not to be annoyed by the cha-cha, went at it in good humour and conquered! It was actually quite a relief cause we were both within an inch of giving up on it.
In the midst of Adara being sick I forgot to mention Liam and Kristens' visit. They were here for family day weekend. LIam and Kristen went to Medieval Times to see the jousting knights and Len took Liam to the Science Centre. Kristen showed up with gifts and wines and cheeses as per usual; that girl makes an awesome guest!
Thursday of this week Julia and Rafa are coming with their new four week old baby, Diego. They're arriving thursday around 10 pm and leaving friday at 5 am, so a very quick tour. Jenn's going to come by and say hi too, so a very busy midweek.
Meanwhile, at work, all of my grants are due at the end of the week. They were well in hand and ready to go when the arrangements for one of my shows fell through. So, a quick rethink, rebudget rewrite, all to be done by Friday. Woo Hoo! I'm reallly a fan of this kind of last minute bleeping grant crap. Oh well, the last time this happened to me, the show that we substituted in at the last second ended up winning four major theatrical awards. Let's hope that this ones' worth as much!

Hurray!

Kiddo was back to her old self this morning. Slept more in her usual pattern, ate breakfast without complaint this morning. Also far sunnier and easier to get along with today.
Thank heavens!

Len's Birthday Party

Left for the party an hour later then it started so that I could put Adara to bed comfortably. Arrived at the party two hours late due to travel time. Left the party an hour and a half earlier then planned as the babysitter was worried about her as Adara was crying throughout the evening. Total party time, one hour, 45 minutes. Total travel time, one hour 30 minutes. Total exhaustion.
Still, the babysitter made the right decision. Better to be cautious then not.

Finally the fever broke

Adara's fever finally broke this morning. Hurray!

Update

So, my taped on bag did work (Yes, I am a rockstar, doctor, mother, goddess,; etc....) and we took the sample into the clinic. Where they told us that we'll have to wait two days for the results. Meanwhile, high fever, up in the night alot and nothing to be done until they figure out what it is.

When I'm not a great parent...

When I have to watch her in pain. I'm terrible at this, I cry and make things worse, I can't help it. We took Adara to a clinic this morning as she still seems to be in pain. They concluded it's not ear nose or throat, so they're thinking kidney or UT infection. They held her down and taped a collection bag to her to try and collect a sterile urine sample while she screamed her guts out. I'm supposed to try and get this sample back to them before 5pm. If not, they're closed, all doctors are closed tomorrow so I wait for Tuesday. The sample bag that the doctor taped to her didn't work. He gave me a 2nd one in case I needed to try again. I don't have much faith that this will have worked. So, now I'm debating. Take her to emergency and get her to put a catheter in to see if it is a kidney or urinary tract infection. Or wait it out until Tuesday.

Waiting and Worrying

First off, to avoid creating the panic that I created on facebook today, I think that we're probably ok. I'm a bit worried about Adara, as she's been acting weird and has a nasty fever today. Yesterday she cried for an hour straight for no good reason and none of her favourite things (including tv) made it better. She'd wacked her head on a coffee table at daycare yesterday, so I thought that maybe she had a headache. So I gave her some advil and she went to bed.
This morning she was running a bit hot. She usually is a cool child, at about 36.5 degrees celsius. This morning she was 37.5. By this evening when she woke up from her nap she was at 39.2 degrees. This worries me a bit. We undressed her, gave her lots of water, a cool bath and some more advil before bed. I hope that this will settle things down but she wasn't much cooler when I put her to bed. So, I worry. I made the mistake of posting the status on my facebook today that I was " a wee might worried about my baby girl" and got an instantaneous reaction from several friends checking in by facebook or phone. It was lovely and supportive and one of the things that I like best about facebook. However, I felt a bit guilty for worrying everyone!
In other news we got a new sweatshirt in the mail today from Auntie's Ruth and Carole. Thanks Auntie, it's gorgeous! we also got a new ebay box sent by Auntie Kristen. It was chock full of size three clothes that will do us into the summer.
Thanks to all of the fabulous stylish Aunties!

February update

On Monday Adara will be 16 months old. This month we've added some new words again.
Towel, shower, Achoo (as in a sneeze) We all fall down, are the big ones right now.
She's also, much to our dismay, learned to open the fridge door. Today after daycare, I set her down at the door while I took my shoes off. Before I got them off, she ran to the fridge, took out a baby yogurt and was determinedly attempting to get a spoon from the cutlery drawer. Craziness!
Len had three days off this past week, sunday night, monday and all day and night Tuesday. It was glorious! I took Monday off and he and I ran errands without all of the interruptions and had a lovely afternoon nap together in the sunshine in our room. Last night we had a game of scrabble and I totally whooped his butt! Starting next week, Len will have every Sunday night, Monday night and Wednesday night off, which will be lovely. I can get some exercise and see some folks.
We're still doing our dance class on Mondays. The last few weeks we've been working on the Cha Cha. We're terrible at it. Truly awful. Not like waltz where we were terrible for a week and then got good and now are quite beautiful waltzers (not a word, I know). Just bad at cha cha and not really improving all that much. Sigh, I lack a latin lover gene, I guess...

Thanks Zoe!

Check out my cool robe. It even has wings on the back! I grab hold of them and whisper "flap,flap, flap, flap..."

Reading a valentines card from Grammy and Poppa. For about the thirtieth time!
Just reading the morning papers! (Thanks for the cool shirt Auntie Ruth)