Croup

   Well…we have been battling croup. The nastiest five letter word ever. Kaya started out with a simple lil cough, slight fever and runny nose. By Wednesday fever was gone but the runny nose stayed and a HORRIBLE cough took over. The dr asked if she had ever had it…which she’s not…and gave her three doses of steroids to take. Directions too that if she coughed uncontrollably to sit in the bathroom in a steamy shower with her or take her outside in the cool air. Either would decrease her discomfort in her throat.

  First night..the steamy shower did nothing but make her hot and uncomfortable. That day we went on about three hours sleep and she coughed off and on all day.

  Finally the warm vaporizer last night seemed to help. We let it get steaming ,then put it behind a fan set on low….and barely coughed all night till four am.

  Bad part of the steroids is that it does make her a little emotional and teary eyed at times. I'm just excited that tonight I might get six hours sleep…lol..>I’ve been going on anywhere from three to five hours a night. Thank goodness I'm on vacation!!!

  Worst part of croup is the cough..and the inability to really do anything much for it…to hear your baby cough like that about kills you.

  Thankfully she seems to be on the mend!

Kaya’s first “baby shower”…

  Well Sunday the 24th was Kim's baby shower. They are expecting their first little one on December 25th which is pretty cool in itself…and doubly cool because Kim’s birthday is Christmas Eve!!!

  We couldn't attend the baby shower due to me having to work ..so we decided to go up after work and hang out and visit. Kaya was in seventh heaven checking out all the baby stuff! She toured the whole nursery checking it out. She gave it her stamp of approval.

The nursery is beautiful…cream and dark brown with a raspberry stripe…then the bedding is flowers and ladybugs.

Kim got alot of stuff for her shower but Kaya was most excited to give her her lil gift. She got her new cousin to be Addison Lou a ducky that temps water, a rattle and a set of toy keys…She told Kim “its for Addie”..Kaya was convinced that we were going to Kim’s cause “Kimmy FINALLY had the baby”..we explained to her Addie was still in her Mommy’s tummy….

I'm really glad Kaya seems excited about the baby. Kim does a great job of including Kaya in stuff and we were all impressed with how much Kim’s belly has grown in just a couple weeks! She looks beautiful…

  Before we left Kaya kissed Kim’s belly and goes “Bye Addie”…very sweet. I cant wait for Miss Addie to make her much anticipated arrival into the world..and to see Kaya’s face when she “finally” gets to hold that baby!!

Jack o lantern

  Well Kaya and Daddy decided to carve Kaya’s pumpkin Saturday. Kaya had a blast being Daddy’s “assistant”..

She thought the “guts” were neat…but yucky. Steve let her help separate out the seeds from the “guts”.  Steve boiled the seeds and then baked them with butter and cinnamon ..Kaya really seems to like them as does Steve. I'm not too big of a fan of pumpkin seeds! Kaya put the rest of the yucky stuff out in the yard for the deer to eat on.

Her pumpkin ended up looking awesome and they did a great job.

Once it got dark, we took it outside and Steve lit it up. Kaya shouted “WOW the monser”…

  She’s pretty impressed with ALL pumpkins carved or not..sooo she was VERY impressed with this one. At bedtime she asked where her “punkin” was…we told her on the porch. She informed us it would get cold and should sleep with her. Needless to say it did NOT sleep with her! :)

A nice Sunday drive…

  We decided since the weather was so great today and there was nothing on our agenda…that we would pack some snacks and the camera and take a nice drive.

   We started out heading towards Williams where we took one of my favorite pictures

This is on Hwy 450 heading out of Williams towards Shoals. Kaya had fun pointing out the red,orange,green and yellow leaves.

  We headed back the country roads in Williams..cutting through to Silverville…

This is the road off of the Graded Road that leads down to Padanaram.

  We drove to Fayetteville then cut back Coxton headed towards home. On that road we saw Kaya’s fave thing…

COWS!! haha She loved naming and finding the cows, horses,and birds along the way. She decided all the animals were eating supper…but wasn't happy that she hadn't seen any piggies..haha

  It was a great drive and fun to get out and see all the fall colors. Wont be long till winter will be on its way!!

Counting down…

  I am counting down to vacation. And to say I'm excited..is a mere understatement..I will work seven straight days starting Monday..then be off…fourteen whole days. I cannot wait.

  It doesn't matter that we don't have a ton of plans or trips etc…its just going to be nice to be with my husband and my daughter for two whole weeks..no alarm going off at six am…wellll…knowing Kaya she will be my alarm but its much nicer to wake up to her than the screaming normal alarm!

  We spent this evening outside,playing, looking at the leaves and just talking. Every time I look at her..I cannot help but smile and think…what a wonderful little miracle. How did I get so lucky to have her. And when she puts her little hands on both sides of my face and smiles..well ..my world is instantly better!

  Kaya was 28 months on the 12th of October. I look back at some of her baby pictures and she has grown so much. Chatters like crazy…a big vocabulary.  She is a little mocking bird..picking up every word and sound. Loves to laugh. She has decided that ranch is the best…everything needs to have ranch on it, in it or be dipped in it. Every day is just a day full of new “awws” and excitement

Enjoyed a family day

  We decided last weekend to hit Spring Mill again..mainly because the village is up and running ,the grist mill would be going and they had decorated for fall.

  Kaya was more than ready to hit the road…asking several times on the way over there if she would see “punkins” and “monsers”…she was dead set on seeing at least a “tiny lil monser”…

  Once there she was very excited to see all the pumpkins lining the paths..each one carved differently. She excitedly had to open each pumpkin up..check the inside and laugh. She was particularly fond of the puking pumpkin…  The whole village had lots of fall colors,scarecrows, pumpkins and mums.

Kaya liked the scarecrows…stopping to check each one out..and to squeeze the legs of them. We have two smaller ones on our front porch..but they are different from the ones at Spring Mill…

I like this picture…lil miss Independent hiking along the trail..lol…

She stopped at each flower in the flowerbeds..smelling them and smiling. I love this picture..mainly cuase she looks soo..angelic and sweet..

It was a super fun day…I think Kaya could go there every day and find something new and exciting. We love to see the smiles on her face and hear the WOWs she exclaims as she finds something new. They had the loom going too and she had fun watching them weave.

Trip to Spring Mill

We decided today since we had Ethan and Emily up to take a trip to Spring Mill. All the kids including Kaya like it over there.

  We hiked around the village. Kaya was in awe cause the people were in the house performing different duties (such as pottery,woodworking etc) and each house had a fire in the fireplace and they were cooking outside.

  We had a great time even though it rained on us a little bit. Trying to get a picture with all three kids in it was nearly impossible as Em is against all pictures and Kaya couldn’t sit still long enough to have all three in a picture! 

First we stopped at the concession stand and got hot chocolate. No one could resist this sweet little face! LOL

We managed to get this cute fall pose of Kaya. Even though she looks very serious in it!

And we managed one good picture of Ethan and Emily together. With Emily its either no smile or a goofy face…lol..so it was nice to have a good picture of the two of them.

In this picture we let Kaya check out the fireplace…not too close and it was screened in but the look on her face says it all. She informed everyone that the fire was “very hot and hurt”…

  After Spring Mill we decided what was more fall like than going to Appleacres and getting cherry cider,popcorn and caramel apples with nuts. All four kids (I say four cuase I am including Steve..hehe) approved it.

 

I think all three pictures speak volumes..the apples were well received! haha

  All in all even with a little rain the day was fun. I love hearing all three kids laugh and have a good time. We adore Ethan and Emily and they are so good with Kaya….truly good big cousins!