Still recovering...and exhausted

Everyone is still recovering from what is supposedly bronchitis. It has kicked the kids' butts. But it seems they are on the mend. Night time is the worst. Rayne wakes up coughing horribly and says she can't breathe. We took her into the ER yesterday and they took chest Xrays...and said they looked clear. They gave her a breathing treatment and took a Pertussis (whooping cough) test just in case. I wanted to know for Quinn's sake. I'm supposed to call tomorrow for the results, but I'm thinking it's not that. We were also sent home with a nebulizer for her. I will be so glad when she isn't coughing at night anymore like she has been. It is so scary sounding and she really does lose her breath for a while. I am hoping Quinn is NOT going to get this. PRAYING he doesn't. So far, he hasn't, but I still worry. I think it should be called having worries, not having kids. It's constant worry. I guess that's where I need to work on my faith in God. One of the areas anyway. I'm not feeling much like doing biography tonight again..just too burned out from a rough 2 weeks. We are hoping to do our little trip this weekend, assuming Rayne keeps improving.

I've never been so scared in my life...

This weekend was supposed to be chock full of fun and adventure. But instead, it was a scary and worrisome weekend. After we picked up the rental car for the weekend, we went to pick up my niece who was going with us on the trip. We got there and my SIL was transferring car seats to the rental car and my brother had just got home. Miette, my youngest niece has had a really bad cough for a few weeks now and having a hard time getting through them without choking on the mucus. Well she had a really bad one and turned purple and passed out. We of course called 911 right away and my brother ran and got their neighbor lady who is a nurse. I was freaking out and screaming for them to hurry. It was that scream you do when you know something is terribly terribly wrong. She was out for at least a minute, it seemed like an eternity. The paramedics got there lightning fast, as they are just up the road from them. One of the firefighters was a friend of the family and when he heard that address with a breathing stoppage come over the speakers, he was very worried. Thankfully she came to right before they got there, but my brother and SIL still took her to the ER and found out she has bronchiolitis and likely so do all the kids. Even Rayne. Thankfully Quinn has been spared thus far and we had them all annointed, even Quinn. I am worried though that he could still get it, so prayers are appreciated. I am watching him closely. Miette is on medication to help, but she doesn't want to take it and they are having a really hard time getting it in her. If they try and force it, it causes a coughing fit and they DO NOT want to do that. So, hopefully she gets enough and just gets better. Rayne is still coughing, but I think she will start improving in the next few days. Cough medicine is helping her right now. Yuck, coughs are awful.

I don't have it in me right now to do a bio blog, so you'll just have to wait until life returns to "normal".

The picture is of my little niece, Miette.

Updates first.....Quinny-poo is getting big. And heavy. But he is just so cute about it. He has chub! Chubby cheeks, double chin, monster thighs...just what everyone wants to hear right? Well..on a baby of course it's squishy cute. And he is. Rayne is also doing well. Her behavior seems to be getting better. I hope it lasts. We have our trip in a week and I am hoping she does well. We are going to Oregon zoo and Enchanted Village. And now Esme is coming with us so Rayne will have a pal along. Hopefully they get along well and Esme doesn't get sad being away from home. Poor Rayne..I have to tell this...we have 2 strawberry plants that have strawberries on them and Rayne has been watering them and watching the strawberries start to ripen and gets all excited for them to finally become edible and then her youngest cousin (who is not even 2 yet) comes over and picks them all and eats them. I feel so bad for Rayne. She has been SO patient waiting for those berries to become their juiciest and sweetest. I think I am going to have to move them somewhere when the cousin comes over so she can't pick them. Anyway...one of life's many disappointments I guess.

Okay, on to the biography....

So I left off still in Alaska. But I was in Salt Lake City being trained to take care of the 14 year old girl with cerebral palsy I was going to start caring for. A very difficult job too I might add. She wasn't light and needed to be lifted...A LOT. She couldn't even go potty by herself..pretty much anything. She couldn't talk, couldn't walk, and had VERY limited mobility. She was born normal and fine. She got vaccinated and reacted very very poorly. Her Mother even alerted the doc and nurses about her daughter not responding well at the first one, but they just wrote it off and gave her the second dose. That was all it took. Brain damage. They sued and won, but not really. They won enough money to care for their now mentally and physically handicapped child for the rest of her life. Not exactly a victory. I would be so mad...I can't even imagine. I'm glad we don't vaccinate. They are BAD. But that's a whole other story. So where was I...oh yes...crash course training before going back to Alaska. So they bought a summer home in Alaska (yes they had money) and I was in their winter home being trained. The husband owned a plane and had flown ahead in this small plane to set up their house before we all flew back. Remember that piece of information. So we are not even there a whole day before I somehow get wrangled into singing at some forum type thing! As soon as she found out I liked to sing, I was signed up to be a number in this show or whatever it was, I can't remember. So I sang, because I love it. And the little girl I cared for, loved it! So I continued to sing for her whenever I could. She would get laughing (sort of) and banging her tray on her wheelchair in joy. It was worth that. This little girl was so sweet. Too bad her Mother wasn't so sweet and a total fake. I think their marriage was a sham. She always complained about him when he was gone. And he was always on overdrive and very selfish. He pretended to be so concerned with his daughter and her care, but he was just more concerned that he didn't have to worry about her. It irritated me to no end. So anyway..day 2 of being there and her husband doesn't show up at his check in point on his way to Alaska in his dinky little 2 seater plane. Big shock. But she melts down. So now I am consoling her too. She is crying hysterically on the stairs with the phone in her hand, trying to find out where her husband is. We don't hear anything all night and FINALLY in the morning he gets to a place he can call. He apparently got stuck in a storm and couldn't make it to his check in point so he put the plane down somewhere and there was no phone. Sure. Ok. And that is all I have to say about that. So after 4 days, it's time to make our way to Alaska. The home they bought is not just a cabin. It's a HUGE gorgeous home with cabins, Silos, a POND and tons of land. TONS. It was so beautiful. The pond had beavers too. And there were eagles flying around. What I wouldn't GIVE to go back with my DSLR camera now. Oh man..that would be so great. So I am seeing all they have and then in the back of my mind I'm thinking...they are paying me $9/hour to take care of their completely needy child? Hmmm....something wasn't right. They also kept promising me to hire the other part time nanny so I wasn't always doing all the lifting. They were actually supposed to do this, not just because they were nice. Well..their promises were empty. I was doing EVERYTHING. Lifting, physical therapy, feeding, bathing, toileting, medicine, playing...all of it. My days were long. Very long. I loved the little girl, but the job was taking it's toll. It was a catch 22 and I kept being told there would be help soon. Well, along down the line I finally tell them that I either will require more pay or room and board on top of my salary. So of course they jump on the room and board. I get one of the cabins. It's a studio, but roomy and nice. I really liked it. And the empty Silo was a great place to go stretch my vocal chords when everyone was gone. I of course did the National Anthem. Over and over and over and over. Gotta love those acoustics. Doesn't get any better than that. Wow, I'm tired now. I think that's all for now. Oh wait...you probably thought I forgot to tell you what type of business they owned in Salt Lake City. Also known as Mormon capital of the world. Well...I found out what they did in a very sneaky way on their part. She told me that she needed to run by the office really quick once day, I thought..no big deal. So we go into the actual office part..she does whatever she needs to do and then we go to the other part of her business. We walk into this building and through these doors and it's pretty dark inside. I look around and realized there were women with basically nothing on but those earring things on their BOOBIES!!! It was a strip club! I was floored. I think my mouth hit the floor..I'm sure of it. I didn't know what to say. She was so casual about it like it was a coffee shop or something. I couldn't believe that's what they did and how they made their money. Ew. and Yuck. I seriously considered not staying. But I figured, my job was to take care of their daughter...it wasn't my business what they did. That would NOT have been my thoughts now. I was very young then and just didn't have my standards fully in place. So there ya go..that's what they did. And they owned 2. Later on while we were in Salt Lake she tried to get my opinion on which boobie jewelry they should keep out of a huge bag of 'em. I told her I certainly was not the person to ask. ew and yuck. That's all for now. For the next biography I will answer the following...what did these people that owned strip clubs do to me after all the hard work and long hours I gave to them...it wasn't nice at all!

Blog update: Quinn is now 9-1/2 weeks old and doing great. He's a little chunk which I love. I never thought I would have a baby with chunk. I think it's the length difference between him and what Rayne was at at his age. He is smiling a lot and cooing which is so cute. Rayne is loving her little brother and can't wait to see him in the morning. She loves doing his buttons and snaps on his outfits..which thankfully he has patience for because sometimes it takes her a little while to do. Rayne had a pretty good week. We are hoping her behavior is mellowing out. It's so much fun when she is good and happy. She did great in Church today and yesterday. It was Pentecost today so we had Church both days. That's usually difficult for her, but she did great. She even fell asleep at Church today! She stopped doing ballet for now and is only in Contemporary Dance for now. I think ballet was too structured for her liking right now. I attended the class with her in the beginning and thought it was too much for her. The teacher was going really fast and it was very confusing to the girls. Too many technical terms being thrown at them and they didn't know what they were before they were having to use them in a dance. Oh well, she may want to try again when she is older. So in the fall she will be in 1st grade. She learns so fast and asks a million questions all the time. Sometimes my head is buzzing with all her questions, lol.

Just a little biography stuff tonight..it's late:

I left off in Alaska...well, after working at McD's, I got a better job at a pizza place that my friend's friend owned..it was a family business. They needed a daytime food prep and evening driver, so I applied and got the job. I actually really liked it. I would get there at 12:30 and start prepping toppings..shredding cheese, chopping veggies, etc. Then, after that I would either help make the pizzas or deliver. And this was in winter. I only ditched my car once and that was because I turned too sharp and didn't realize that what looked like the road was actually just a ditch filled with snow. So the guys at the pizza place had to come pull me out. I learned Kenai very quickly doing that job. It was pretty fun. For some reason I thought I needed to make more money after a while and decided to quit there and work at the cannery. Oh man was that a mistake. That place was horrid. It stank. It was long hours and they always wanted you to work overtime on top of that. I came home smelling like fish and had to take my clothes out to the porch. I had to shower right away and even then, my roommates claimed I still smelled like fish. I would get up when it was dark and come home when it was dark. Barely had enough time to eat and sleep and get up and work again. I lasted 2 weeks and quit. From there I got a job in a daycare as a preschool teacher/lunch person. I liked it, but while I was on vacation I was offered a nanny position for a 14 year old girl who had Cerebral Palsy. I didn't have much experience, but I guess they like my phone interviews and while I was visiting friends out in upstate New York, I was hired and they paid to have my plane tickets changed to fly from there to Salt Lake where they lived. They had just bought a home in Alaska for the summers and had me come to Salt Lake first for training. The little girl was very sweet. Her parents were another story. They were VERY interesting...and when I found out what they actually did for a living...I have to say I was appalled and considered not working for them...but that's all for now, lol. I'm going to keep anyone that doesn't know what they did hanging for a bit. Stay tuned...:)