G5 Weekend Report

Better late than never! I actually had this post ready last night, but had one video that had to be uploaded. I got a migraine and never finished it ;) Hope everyone had a wonderful Superbowl weekend.  Friday and Saturday were pretty uneventful since two out of three kiddos were sick.

Friday, I made some Greek chicken avgolemono soup for Mark and I for lunch.  I had prepared chicken souvlaki (Greek marinated chicken breast) for dinner for ladies' dinner and a movie night on Thursday, so we had a lot of leftovers.  It was d'lish soup!  We also had some leftover pita and tzatki that we munched on with the soup.  

That afternoon, we had a "Superhero Afternoon" boys played a little live action Super Smash Bros with their plushy Sonic and Mario dolls.  We also watched Fantastic Four, Silver Surfer.  I also worked on the football cake a little.  I baked the cake part.  I rested most of the evening and went to bed early, since I too was feeling a little under the weather.

Saturday morning, Ethan and I made the chocolate buttercream for the cake.  Yum!  It smelled heavenly.  Ethan was the official taste tester.  It is so cute to see how interested he is in cooking and baking.  He would rather cook with me in the kitchen than play video games.  He actually shut off Wii when I asked if he wanted to cook with me!!  

Javi went to Bates' Nut Farm with his cousin, Nana and Aitona for the day.  Javi's dad left for the CHP academy in Sacramento on Saturday and will be there for the next six months.  He will be coming home every other weekend, so Javi will still get to see him, but it's definitely going to be a big change for him.  It was a nice distraction for Javi to do something fun with his grandparents for the day.

Daddy brought home some McD's for lunch and a much needed ice coffee for Mama.  It totally hit the spot and I felt recharged to finish off decorating the cake.

I stayed up pretty late on Saturday night preparing food for our party on Superbowl Sunday.  I made all the dips, veg tray, etc.

Sunday the kids woke up early and we played for most of the early morning.  Then it was go time for mama.  I started cleaning, more food prep, and setting up for the party.  I made a much needed coffee run to Starbucks for daddy and I.  Since the kids had gotten up early, I was sooo ready for a cuppa.

Our party kicked off around 2:30.  We served food from just about every ethnic group.  I had made some lumpia, pizza, wings, hot artichoke dip, garlic fries, my famous roasted salsa, asian pineapple teriyaki meatballs, hummus & pita, and of course, cake for dessert.  

We had a really good time.  There was about 15 of us, including the little people.  Even did a little karaoke during half time.  Here are the pics and vid.  Mark & the boys were very elusive and managed to skip out on the pics and the vids.

Christmas 2008 Pictures

We had a great Christmas and here's our proof:



Kaylee Motoring around with her new walker. Hopefully she'll be walking in no time with some practice ;)

...and then there were SIX!!!

Santa's hour glass is slowly winding down!  Hope you are getting close to finishing your shopping.  I finished my shopping for the kids today.  Hooray!!  Now just need to pick up some gift cards and we are set!  Yesterday we read the Night Before Christmas and the Christmas Mouse for our 12 days activity.

Tonight we are working on the prep for our tamale party tomorrow.  We loosely celebrate some Mexican holiday traditions, like Tamales for Christmas and Menudo for New Years, which is by the way, a hang over cure!  Tamales are typically made by the family and eaten on February 2nd, which marks the end of the holiday season, but for some reason, in California, it's become a tradition to have them around Christmas.

For those of you that do not know, a Tamale is a meat, cheese, fruit or veggies all enclosed in "masa" which is a corn meal dough and then wrapped up in a corn husk and steamed.  It's eaten by unwrapping it from the corn husk and eating the cooked "masa" and whatever is incased inside.  Yummy!

To lift your holiday spirits here's a musical interlude from the boys and also became part of our 12 days activity, which was watching Christmas movies ;)

Getting in the holiday spirit

My friend posted this to Facebook and I got such a kick out of it, I thought I would post it. It especially reminds me of you Danielle, since you are the only one of us that can really say you had Christmas in Africa!

This will song will definitely get you in the holiday spirit and put a smile on your face.

Kaylee Dances to Elmo

Kaylee was so cute this morning.  She was playing with her little Elmo toy and shaking her hips.  I love to see her dancing.  It gives me hope that I will someday have my little cheerleader.  I was in dance and cheerleading and I always wanted a daughter that would share the same love for dancing.  

Of course, I know kids do their own thing, but I think I can hope that I will have my little dancer for a few years while she is little. 

The therapist says that her love for dancing will really help her want to walk.  Maybe we can find a dance class where she is allowed to use her walker if she still needs it as a toddler.

On another note, I did speak with the service coordinator from the Regional Center.  He recommended a place in Poway (the next town) that sells gently used medical and handicapped assistance items.  I am going to try to see if I can find them on the web today (he didn't have the name of the biz).  They may have the posterior pedi walker I am looking for.  All her therapists agree that she will probably take off and run with a walker.  She is in to everything already, so I can only imagine.

The service coordinator also said to let him know all her measurements for orthotics and we can order them through the Regional Center.  Apparently, it's difficult to get a good fit for the shoe in an infant size and they have a place that does it.   Kaylee is still pronating her feet, which we thought over time it may correct itself, but it hasn't.  PT is going to see how she walks with hard bottom shoes before she makes a final decision.

Well, we are off to Costco in a few.  Going to do some cleaning and cake making today.  Have some friends and family that could use a little pick me up, so I am going to try out the cupcakes in a jar.  My friend Sharon makes delicious cupcakes in a jar and the most beautiful cakes I have ever seen, so we are using her recipe.  I may try a GFCF version too.

Happy Birthday, GG!!!

We hope you got to relax a little today. Wish we could spend it with you.

We love you,
The Grimes Family 5

A Day at the Pumpkin Patch

We had a really good time with the kids.  They loved hunting for scarecrows while we were on the hay ride and they learned from Mark to always keep to the right wall to make it through a maze.  It totally worked!!  The kids also got to pick a pumpkin out of the patch right off the vine.

My neck was killing me after carrying Kaylee in the carrier and going on the hay ride.  It was pretty bumpy.  Probably not the best thing to do with whiplash :)  Hope it gets better soon.  I'm going to call and make an appointment with the physical therapist.

Kay seems to be doing well with her increased dose of  Topamax.  We are going to call Dr. Neuro tomorrow to set up an appointment with him and also with the dietician to get more info about the ketogenic diet.

Return of the Spasms?

Well, we have had a few more of the complex partial seizures than normal. She may have 3-4 a month, but this week, she's had seven in the last four days. I spoke with Dr. Neuro today and he decided to up her dosage of Topamax. He said that if we didn't see a reduction in her seizures by Monday, that he wanted to move up her vEEG and possibly change her meds. We discussed putting her back on Keppra, since we had great luck with it before the onset of the IS. We were so confident that the spasms were not going to return, but two hours later, I took some video of Kaylee.

I just stared at her, completely frozen when it first began, even though the camera was right in front of me. I was in such shock and disbelief, that I guess it just didn't process right away. She was making these movements for a good two minutes before I started filming and they occurred every two to ten seconds. The whole top half of her body would stiffen up. Please comment and tell me what you think. I will be calling the doctor tomorrow.




I'm trying not to get too upset about it yet, because I have only caught it once. She's definitely been making some weird movements lately, but we have been so busy this week, I haven't had a chance to just stare at her to see a pattern. My gut tells me that this isn't good, but I want to see a pattern before I start to worry. We know that even if it is, ACTH is not an option for us. It didn't agree with her the first time, so we will definitely be headed toward Vig. I actually already have the referral letter to a doctor in Mexico just in case the Topamax didn't curb the spasms when the ACTH didn't work the first time around. We'll see what happens tomorrow. Please pray that I am wrong...

We won't forget

Playtime with Pooh Bear

This is my first time uploading a video to the blog, so I hope it works out. They were so cute playing together. He hasn't really been able to play with her since he got sick (I have been quarantining them). I let them play since he wasn't actually touching her and Kay thought the pooh bear puppet show was hilarious.


Ethan is finally feeling a little better. His eyes are still irritated and his nose has been running like a sieve, but he may be ready to go to school tomorrow. We will see how he feels in the morning. I know he is still sick because he took a four hour nap today and he hardly ever takes naps anymore, so that is a long nap for him. He was feeling better this evening, but we'll see if he wakes up with his eyes gummed shut.

Unfortunately, I have pink eye now. I will look nice and hideous for the next couple days. I started the antibiotics today, basically as soon as I started to feel it coming on. My eye hasn't been that red or gummy, but I have that "poked in the eye" feeling and they itch like crazy. More so in my left eye than the other. Ethan's doctor was nice enough to give us a refill on the antibiotic eye drops because he was positive either one of the other kids would get it or Mark or myself. Mark is still sick with his cold. Javi's lip is doing much better. The Aquaphor seems to be doing the trick. Hopefully we will all feel well enough to go to the Magic Show tomorrow night.