I got up, did my morning routine and was packing up my computer to go into the office when EB wandered into my office and curled up on the guest bed. She quietly snuggled while I completed my packing and then she got up to walk out the door ahead of me. It was fairly dark in the room. A shaft of light caught her face and my heart stopped. The right side of her face was swollen roughly 1/2 again its normal size, the right side of her upper lip was enormous, and there was rash all over her lower face like a beard. I asked her to stop and turn around. I snapped on the light and things looked even worse. Her left eye was swollen with some rash above and below it. There was rash behind her left ear and down the back of her neck. The tip of her nose was rosy red and swollen. The entire rash was blistered and angry looking. When she tried to talk to me her speech was slurred. I am normally very calm with it comes to emergencies with other people and their children. With my own I am a neurotic, panicky mess. I was very proud of myself. I calmly called for DH to come into the room. There must have been a little bit of “that tone” in my voice because he did not waste any time moving up the stairs to get to me. But evidently there was not enough of a tone to startle my little one. He walked in and his face mirrored what is in my brain. We determine that she was responding appropriately, that all body parts other than one side of her mouth were functioning and that she was breathing without difficulty. She demanded to look in the mirror to see what we were talking about. She just peered at herself and declared that she was hungry. OK, so much for traumatizing her! Since she was in no immediate distress and did not appear to be getting any worse, I called the pediatrician to see what they wanted us to do. At 0930 EB and I troop into the office. When they called us back into the room the nurse took one look at her and did not even question why we were there. They put her on another LONG prednisone dose-pack. It is one of 2 things – either she has been re-exposed to poison ivy or the last dose of prednisone was too fast a wean and she had a rebound effect and the dermatitis came back with a vengeance.
EB is perfectly capable of swallowing small pills – I should have just stuck with that. Instead I said yes to the type that dissolve on her tongue. She HATES them – this is going to be a long 12 days! At least they are only 1 time a day. After the first mega dose of prednisone and some routine benedryl, by this evening she was looking much more normal – the blisters were starting to dry up (or they popped, could not tell which) and her lips looked much more symmetrical. Poor little punkin! She may not share her Popaw’s genetics, but she does share a horrible allergy to poison ivy!
I have been asked what the brand name of the poison ivy wash was. We used the Walgreen’s generic Poison Ivy Wash. The brand name one is Zanfel. Here is a link on the Walgreen’s site.
http://www.walgreens.com/search/search_results.jsp?_dyncharset=ASCII&term=poison+ivy+wash
We were camping this past weekend, so I have not had a chance to scrap anymore of our vacation pictures. I am hoping to get more done this week. I do need to stop the presses – we now have an offical first grader – she started school on Monday. She even rode the bus. She loves her new teacher and is having so much fun. I have some cute pictures of her from that morning – they are joining my list of pictures to get scrapped. Hope everyone had a great weekend!
July 26th – The day of frustration! DH and Popaw spent the day running between our camper and Wal-Mart to find the parts needed to fix the leak in the camper. DH was very, very frustrated. I think he has decided that the entire camper just needs to be replumbed to correct all the issues in the camper. But finally the leak was controlled – in time to give the girls a bath that night. But through out the day, little EB kept breaking out more and more, her face really looked bad. So the guys, on one of their trips to Wal-Mart got some calamine lotion and generic benedryl to control the itching, since the hydrocortisone cream was not doing the job. We decided that after Mass the next morning we would run her over to an urgent care clinic. For being such an itchy girl, she was such a sweetheart! The calamine lotion did help a lot, but it was evident that the rash was still spreading. Poison ivy ran through out minds, but it was not blistering like typical poison ivy. It was just weird. The evening was spent daubing on calamine lotion, watching about 20 minutes of the movie at the campground and then watching the girls play on the playground for another 1.5 hours. Once again they were very dirty. Thank goodness this time we had water in the camper and could bathe them there instead of trying to get them clean in the bath house!
July 27th – We attended early Mass at a very small parish and then headed over to the Urgent Care center.
Credits for this layout: Papers – Nina WishWash
Jennilynn Designs – bended photo
Staples – Chunlin Fresh Summer
Floral Border – Shabby Princess Floral Garden
The first thing they did was send out the Nurse Practitioner who stood a few feet away from us and ask if she could see a little of the rash. She then explained that she was pregnant and if was chickenpox, we would have to go to the actual emergency room. By that time some blistering was very evident on her arms and legs and she decided that it was some type of contact dermatitis and she would be able to help us. After some discussion with her it was decided that it was probably poison ivy, that somehow the oil had gotten on her bedclothes and that was why she was continuing to break out. Because it was up by her eyes, and was so widespread they prescribed her prednisone and a wonderful new over the counter poison ivy wash. Wow, was that stuff great! We headed to the pharmacy that carried the wash and got it and the prescription filled. Then we headed down to the main part of town for breakfast and to walk around a little bit. Unknown to us the restaurant that had been suggested was right in the middle of a car show. So after eating we wandered around and let the guys have their fill of looking at cars. Meanwhile Mimi and I and the girls headed over to an old building that had been converted to a mall and restaurant. There were some neat stairs and I got some snapshots of the girls. It was not until I got them downloaded and started working with them that I realized how great these pictures are! I also got a glimpse of the gorgeous young woman JB will blossom into. EB was her typical 4.5 year old hammy self for the camera.
Credits for above layout: Papers and flowers – Valentine Memories by Teriann Hanks, picture mat – Mask Fancy #2 by Teriann Hanks
Credits for the above layout: Paper – Valentine Memories by Teriann Hanks, photo corners – More Corner Fancy #2 by Teriann Hanks
Credits for above layout: background paper and frames – Valentine Memories by Teriann Hanks
Credits for above layout: paper and elements – Valentine Memories by Teriann Hanks
The remainder of the day was spent doing the normal housekeeping things we do the first day of vacation – getting settled in the camper, making a grocery store run, and just relaxing.
Friday, July 25, 2008
The goal was to head out at 0800 on Friday morning. I actually got up on time and got moving. The girls were a little slower, but once they realized that vacation was starting, they really started moving. Mimi and Popaw slept in their camper on the street outside of our house. JB hustled out to wake them up, but she a little too late. We actually pulled out of the addition about 0830 because I had to get some scrapbooking items loaded on the laptop so that I could record this epic journey.
JB began asking if we were there yet about 20 minutes into the trip, and did not stop asking except when we were eating and for the 45 minutes she napped. EB, my quiet, subdued child, chattered and sang non-stop except for the little while she napped . EB had a nasty rash on her face and arms and legs, but a call to our pediatrician the day before assured us it was probably nothing, apply hydrocortisone cream twice a day and have fun on our vacation. Little did we know how those words would come back to haunt us.
We arrived at our campsite a little after 4, were checked in and set-up a little after 5 and were eating a little after 6 – AND it was STILL light outside! YEAH!!!!! OK, there a little snafu – we had a leak in our camper. DH and Popaw sat around tried to decide how to fix it. Yogi made a surprise stop at our campsite.
The girls also learned how to snap fresh green beans, played in the dirt and helped us warm up the wonderful casserole the Mimi had prepared in advance. JB helped season and cook the beans.
Both girls played in the sand around our site and got very, very dirty.
It was an experience getting them cleaned up in the shower house. DH and Popaw decided to sleep before any further action was taken on the camper. We went to sleep, waterless, but having fun.
Papers used in the layouts are from Kay Miller’s All Organic Kit. Template used for the pictures of my dirty girls is a Teriann Hanks template now available on the Polkadot Potato bar
We have been on vacation for a week. While we were gone we only had spotty internet access, so I had no way to get an update posted. I will be posting layouts and descriptions of what we have done over the next few days. I will see if I can get the things loaded from the first day when I get home, after I get the girls tucked into bed.
Need to ask for some prayers. One of my very special nephews has a mass on his adrenal gland. They will be doing surgery sometime in the next 2 weeks to remove it and determine if it is benign or malignant. Please pray for him and his family. He is one of 6 children, and all of them are such precious little souls. They are all going to be touched by this situation, even if it nothing more than a benign tumor – he still has to recover from the surgery, and that will be some upset to the balance of the family – it always is. I will keep you posted as I hear more. Thanks in advance for your prayers!
