A Whole Month's Worth of Posts

I've been busy working with my congregation for our 3rd annual Nativity Experience for the community (nativityexperience.blogspot.com). I work on it every day, so I'm behind on Jessica's blog. So I'm warning you: this is a long entry.

This October, with high temperatures still in the 80's, we got a visit from Dave's old lab buddy from University of Texas and his new wife. They had just finished a cruise, and since one of their adventures got rained out, we went snorkeling here in Jupiter. 

I drug Ruth along for some letterboxing, since there are 2 hidden near the inlet. (One I still can't find.) Jessica played and napped, and Dave kept his cell phone out of the water.

Apparently it was jellyfish day at DuBois Park. About 7 people were stung by some bad, unseen jellyfish, including a little kid all over his body (he was OK after a vinegar spray), and Dave and Jay got a little zapped when they were snorkeling in the inlet.

There were also some harmless comb jellies, less than 4 inches long. They have rainbow lights along the edges and we picked some up in our hands. If you look close you can see tiny orange, green, and purple lights.

On Conference weekend, Jessica went to the hospital. She had had a 102 fever for a week, and the doctors decided it wasn't teething, ear infections, or viral, so they took some blood and urine tests and gave her antibiotics. The next day her white blood cell count was HIGHER, not lower, so they sent her to the hospital as a precaution and for more tests. Her only other symptom was sleeping more, and probably peeing less, although we didn't notice it.

It turned out all she had was a urinary tract infection, but those results didn't come for days. In the mean time, the hospital came up with all sorts of creative tests to figure out why her white blood cell count was higher than a UTI would indicate.

We were just along for the ride the first few days. We found out Jessica's veins are hard to tap, and I couldn't stand to see her hurt, so Dave held her. She didn't like her left arm tied up to an IV, but she figured out how to wriggle some fingers out of the tape and use just her right hand. She perked back up with fluids and antibiotics, and soon acted like she was just there for fun. She had a hightech crib and a gold star helium balloon and lots of attention. Dave and I stayed with her 24 hrs for 4 days, until the last night, when she was back to her 12-hr sleep schedule: we broke down, went out to eat, then slept at home.
  

By this time, to make a long story short, we were getting tired of waiting, testing, and the parade of doctors. A misdiagnosis of pneumonia didn't help. They wanted one more test, but I wasn't buying it. I stayed up two nights for hours reading medical information online, and we discussed it. We decided to check her out. And she is just fine so far--happy and healthy. We learned a LOT about when to trust the doctor and when to trust our instincts. We appreciated the attentive care she did get and the blessings of technology.

OK, back to the fun stuff! Jessica, in the last month, has learned a lot. After self-feeding only crackers for 2 months, she finally figured out pincher grasp and started getting Cheerios in her mouth. Hooray for self-feeding babies!

She can't pick up those slippery fruits, so we tried this game one day:

She also likes to try drinking from a cup (no love for the sippie, yet)  . . . 

. . . and last week I came in after her nap to see had she sat up on her own. 

She gets on her knees sporadically, so this is my best picture. We cheer every time she does, so she knows she's doing something good. Now if she's on carpet, she can move forward to get toys. It's more of a kneel-flop forward-kneel-flop forward procedure so far. She can sit up and lay down at will now, and we are so proud. 

She is wandering farther from where we put her down, and so pleased with herself!

She's learned to drum, and babbles all the time. She says "dadadadada" all the time, occasionally says something with "k" when she sees Smokey, and knows how to say "MA!" randomly, but we're not counting anything as words yet. She knows when we ask her a questions she's supposed to say something back, and when we are telling her the name of what she has in her hand.

A friend of mine watched Jessica while I did the sound checks for Nativity. Jessica  babbled "dadada", and their family dog ran to the door thinking that their "dad" was home from work!

But she has her bad moments. She's learned to pitch fits: throwing her head back, leaning to the right, grabbing her right ear, and wailing like she's dying. But you put Cheerios on her tray and the tears suddenly evaporate. She poops in her bath, pinches us, and tries her best to jump from high places. But not too often. It all melts away when she leans forward to kiss us without being asked.

Here's a clip of me trying to secretly film her doing her new "evil laugh". I was trying to only video her from the waist up since she was taking her bath. (Now we know why she does that evil laugh in the tub!) The bathtub surprise we caught on tape made me laugh too, but disgusts Dave. We've talked seriously about early potting-training techniques . . . 

Dave is training Jessica young to root for the family alumni college football teams . . .

and Mommy spent several hours sewing a biblical costume for Jessica's first Christmas.

And there's lots of time for laughing; at anything that comes near her chin:

And the cat, of course: