End of 2nd Year

Last week Phil took the USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Exam) Step 1 and today he took the COMLEX Level 1 (Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Examination). Both are required for licensing to practice as a physician and there are 2 more parts to take before he is a full-fledged doctor. The USMLE is for MDs and COMLEX is for DOs. Since Phil is attending an osteopathic medical school he must take the COMLEX. We are electing to take the USMLE so that he may apply to MD residencies. (Whew! That is a lot of acronyms!)

Regardless of which test a medical student takes, they are each mammoth exams, 7-hour monsters that cover the first two years of medical school. Phil has been preparing endlessly and we are so happy to be done with them! He came home from studying yesterday surprisingly early, saying he was so burned out and his brain felt like it was going to explode. Poor guy. And then after taking the afternoon off and hanging out with us, he felt anxiety and guilt that he wasn't preparing for his test. Stress is his middle name. Last week after the first board exam the kids and I put together a little banner and went to get some balloons to celebrate Phil's big accomplishment.

 

Max and Kate loved the balloons and laid claim to the mylar ones we picked up at the dollar store. For $2 they kept my kids entertained for a few days. Kate took hers (the yellow smiley face) everywhere. It ate breakfast, lunch and dinner with her and if I didn't put it away at night she would have slept with it. "Baboon" was the first word out of her mouth whenever she awoke. I would be lying if I said I was sad when it finally died.

 

Back to my sweetheart. He is still at the testing center and I haven't heard from him since he walked out the door at 6:30 this morning. I hope he comes home feeling peace and confidence that he has done his best. We won't know the results for a few weeks. The outcome of these exams determine the rest of our lives. Sounds dramatic but it is true. He must pass the COMLEX to continue medical school. His score will determine how competitive he is in applying to residencies, not to mention what specialties he can even consider. The residency program he is accepted to will affect our family geographically and financially. No pressure, right? We are both looking forward to a bit more down time, even for just this next week or so before he starts rotations at the hospital early July.

We are so proud of our daddy! He has finished two grueling years of medical school, two board exams and I know that he will make a competent physician.

Rhett: 9 Months

Consider me a broken record but I am going to keep saying it: Babies grow too darn fast! I was getting the little sticker for his onesie yesterday to do this little photo shoot and realized that we are down to the last sheet. The monthly stickers came four to one page and we only have three stickers to go to the big 1 year. Sad, sad, sad.

Rhett is so fun right now. He is very mobile, interested in everything that goes on around him and continues with his happy disposition.

The army crawl is his main mode of movement and he is starting to get up and crawl on his knees. He is an expert finder of things on the floor and is a speedy little guy.

His hair keeps growing and now as the back is getting longer it is starting to curl on the ends when it gets wet. I love them and will be sad that they will most likely go away after a haircut. We have trimmed the top portion of his hair but I am not counting those as an "official" haircut just yet. 

Food and eating is fun for him. He drinks from his sippy cup well and loves to be independent in feeding himself. We are moving farther away from purees and he does very well with soft foods. He usually eats what we do for meals and that is nice for the both of us. The other night he awoke crying at 11:30pm, he was so sad and didn't want to nurse (not that there is much at that time of night anyway!) and was just acting weird to me. Because he is generally so happy all the time when he does cry I tend to over think and worry about what is really wrong. Turns out he was hungry. Hungry for real food, none of this milk business. Some pears made him happy and he went down without a fuss after that.

I think weaning him to cow's milk will be easy. He loves to nurse in the mornings and after his morning nap but interest is waning in the late afternoon and bedtime feeds. He is down to four times a day. He loves cheerios and eats a bowl every morning, I pour a bit of milk over them and then dish them out onto his tray. He is still a fruit buff but does eat his green bean purees and will eat fresh/frozen cooked peas.

Poor babe got his first ear infection last week. Almost a double as the other ear was starting to be infected as well. He has been on Amoxicillin and is doing so much better. It was sad to see how much it affected him. He slept more than usual, was clingy and just not his happy friendly self. I am so grateful for modern medicine! After just a day or two on the medication he was perking right back up.

Rhett's 9 month stats:

Weight: 17 pounds 10 ounces: 25%

Height: 28 1/2 inches: about 50%

He wears size 3 diapers, 6-9 month tops, can wear 9 month bottoms for length but still wears 3 month shorts for his itty bitty waist.

Still only the two lower central incisors but you can see his gums bulging where #E, #F will come in. 

I know the focus is off with this last image but I still love it so much! I still kiss him incessantly and seriously could eat the child. He has such a great laugh and loves to play. He loves his family, is friendly to most everyone from the safety of my arms but is acting more shy now around unfamiliar faces. He is such a lovebug and we are so grateful for this boy.

Things We'll Miss about Deanna Drive: Tumbling

I signed the kids up for a  six week tumbling class through the city before we moved. It was geared towards toddlers and was just perfect. The instructor, Mr. Robert, was fabulous and Max and Kate loved going. Their friend Lili was in it too and they loved running around together.

They fine tuned their somersault, learned to better follow directions and thoroughly enjoyed doing something special.





I am really impressed with The City of Peoria and the amenities and classes they offer their citizens. We really enjoyed our time living over there and I feel we were just starting to get comfortable and in a groove before we moved.

Rhett's 1st (and hopefully last!) ER Visit

Last Friday evening after dinner we went on a walk on the empty golf course behind Phil's parent's cabin in Pinetop. Remember our daddy had just surprised us and we were basking in his attention. The weather was gorgeous and the light pristine. I didn't grab the camera since I was holding Rhett and my sweetheart's hand.

Picture Kate in her tutu/cheerleader costume with the baby doll, her hair a hot mess, dirty cheeks and dragging a broken branch. Max dressed casually, also a mess and walking proud with his broken branch-walking stick. Phil looks weary from being a student bachelor all week and has a week's worth of stubble on his manly chin. I am sporting the bedraggled mother look, whatever make-up is left on my face, hair thrown up in a haphazard mommy bun, adorable babe with a dirty-from-dinner-face perched on my hip. Picture perfect family, right? In spirit, yes. But certainly a bedraggled group.

 During our walk Phil handed Rhett a broken off branch of Aspen, it had some leaves still attached that were semi-dry. He loved shaking it and making noise. I turned my focus to our slow walking Kate and didn't catch Rhett eating the leaves until I heard him gag and then he spit up a bit. I fished a piece of leaf off his palate and we went on our way. No harm, no foul right? We went back home, did the bath and bedtime routine and went to bed ourselves.

 Six hours later, roughly midnight Rhett wakes us up with a strange barking cough and raspy cry. We pop up and quickly assess. He seems uncomfortable, cries and keeps doing the scary cough. We assume he has something stuck in his throat and naturally our thoughts turn to the leaf incident. We dress and leave for the hospital, roughly 20 minutes away. Rhett is so uncomfortable and upset that we don't put him in his car seat, (ahhh! terrible, I know! We also were worried the incline would impede breathing). He got more upset if we put him down and was only okay if he was in a certain position, more upright against my chest. This encouraged our thinking of a foreign body in his airway.

 We check into the hospital, wait and wait and finally get taken back. We already had some reservation that we were far from a children's hospital and up in a smaller rural area. We recount our story, he gets checked out and the ER physician orders an x-ray after listening to his breathing. At this point he was not laboring for breath and would bark-cough occasionally. The doctor thought he was coming down with croup. We didn't agree. His cough seemed to be of an effort to clear his throat and he grimaced afterwards with a sad cry.



Look at that beautiful spine and all those teeth! I love looking at x-rays.


At the end there was nothing they could do and the doctor was sure that nothing was in his airway and that it was just the beginnings of viral croup. We were still skeptical but respectful and wanted to be discharged. At this point it was pushing 2am and we were dog tired. Rhett couldn't fall asleep with all the interruptions and was desperately tired. The computer charting system was down and I had a feeling they were waiting on the system to boot up again before they were going to discharge us. I told Phil and he went to the nurse. They were waiting and who knows how long we would have been there! Finally a good old-fashioned paper discharge and we were on our way.

We decided to wait it out that night and if he was still uncomfortable and acting weird we would drive down to the Valley to go to a children's hospital. Phil was very worried and we both wanted to do what was best for Rhett. Imagine how awful you would feel to find out you had delayed treatment because you weren't sure. My instincts told me to wait and we so did. He went to bed after 3am and we all crashed.

Since then he hasn't had the barking cough and all that lingers is a booger nose and a slight congested cough. So definitely not croup but also not a leaf stuck somewhere, which we are very grateful for! Call us over protective but we are better to be safe then sorry.

Things We'll Miss about Deanna Drive: Color Group

Back in March-April we met with a small group of friends for a weekly art class. The brain-child of my friend Julie, we took turns hosting and went through the colors of the rainbow. The kids loved it and it was fun to find activities that were toddler friendly and see our kids learn and interact. And let's be honest, the mommies loved to mingle too, even though with nine kids (including our babies) between the four of us it was more crowd control than visiting.

Here are three of the five kids. We did orange at our house and were having orange juice, fishy crackers and cuties for a snack.



Shanna taught the color green and the kids had fun gluing leaves on their tree. Immense concentration is required. We ate cucumbers, roasted broccoli and drank green juice.



Julie taught the color blue and all the kids loved playing in her blue goop. We ate blueberries.



We are lucky enough to have two of the families moving over to the East Valley and will greatly miss regularly seeing our friends Shanna, Austin and Kensley who stay in Glendale for podiatry school. We are going to meet at the train park to get our fix with them.

We have been so blessed to be surrounded by families going through medical school with us. Friends who understand the challenges, ups and downs and who have kids the same ages as ours is wonderful. I could not go through medical school without them. Big hugs to them!

Picnic with Daddy

What do you do when your daddy lives at the empty church during the week studying for boards? Why pack a lunch and join him for a break.

Phil sent me a text this morning asking if we wanted to do lunch and play for a bit. Of course we said "yes!" and I quickly packed some tuna, oranges, crackers, pickles and vanilla cookies. Kinda sorta healthy but all kids of kid friendly and quick.

We loaded up and first stopped at the post office to mail off some love to family in Utah. The kids were anxious to see their dad.

We packed the push car and Max and Kate's plasma cars to take advantage of the church gym.

Rhett is taking over Max's little car and today Max was okay with that. And Rhett thought it was hilarious fun to chase after Max and Kate.

One week to the USMLE Step 1 and then the COMLEX Level 1 is at the end of the month. Prayers and hard work are going to get us through and on to the next step of medical school. I am so proud of Phil, the endless effort he puts into his education. This hasn't been easy for us at all but I know that we can do it and we are putting a lot of hope into these next two years and beyond. 

10 on 10: June 2012

One photo, every hour, for 10 hours, on the 10th day of the month. 

 Yes! I did it! And on the 10th for that matter. We were up in Pinetop at Phil's parent's cabin, it was Sunday and we traveled home that day.

My view from the kitchen window. The kids and I went up last Monday to give Phil a quiet empty house so he could study for his board exams. Apparently he got stir-crazy and missed us (warms my heart! Plastering your home with images of your family helps too.) and drove up Friday afternoon to surprise us. Phil says that Max was so excited to see him when he walked onto the back porch of the cabin where we were going to eat dinner that he was shaking.

Needless to say, the kids were stuck to him like glue the remainder of the weekend and he obliged their every whim. Lucky ducks.

We played ping pong after sacrament meeting. Ahem, only made it through one meeting (barely, we still left early, just before the closing song). Rhett was tired, the kids hungry since they didn't eat their breakfast and I was exhausted as well since I had been up during the night with a congested and sad Rhett.

Kate fell in love with this outfit that she is wearing. A sparkly pink bedazzled cheerleader costume and she had to have a pink tutu underneath it. Top it off with pink plastic heels and a baby doll. Not pictured is the tiara she broke.

Rhett crashed after church and slept for over 2 hours. Wish I could have done the same. Sweet little lamb.

In the one o'clock hour we were packing, cleaning and prepping lunch. We loaded the truck, cleaned our room and bathroom and ate lasagna, salad and crusty bread. Phil indulged the kids with a Heath Klondike bar. Even Rhett. He loved it and his enthusiasm necessitated a quick wash down.

Driving home and watching Thomas the Train. 

Three hours later we rolled into town. So happy to see our exit! Rhett was done, we all were.

Dinner of cereal, thanks to an empty fridge and then we washed away our travels.

Rhett had a rough night yesterday. We thought he had allergies up north as he was stuffy and had a little cough. He would perk up during the day and nap well. Nighttime was a whole different story! He slept in my room and cried and cried. Breaks my heart that he is uncomfortable and I don't know what to do to help him. Is it teething, does he have a cold? I asked Phil to give him a blessing and prayed that he would rest well that night. Finally at midnight he settled and was up crying at 5am. He has already taken a good nap this morning and is a bit more himself. 

Things We'll Miss about Deanna Drive: The Library

We lived only 1/2 mile from the best library. A train table, puppets, stuffed animals, Little People toys, computer stations, outdoor courtyard with toys, gobs of toddler books, gorgeous light and free, wholesome fun for this bunch. Sometimes we would walk if the weather was nice and it was always a welcome respite when we were all going stir-crazy in our house.

Since moving to Mesa we have tried out two libraries, one in Mesa and one in Gilbert, and neither can compare. In fact, they are downright dismal and severely lacking in appeal for the toddler crowd and this mama. Our search continues for a good library. Our friend Terina tells us that the Apache Junction library looks promising and it is on our list to try out.

Even Rhett got to enjoy some play time and if we still lived in Peoria I know we would be making biweekly trips here during the summer to beat the heat and get out of the house.

I am glad that I thought to bring the camera on our last trip here before we moved.  I love these images and these three turkeys.