life can never be too busy

Or it just doesn't matter if it is...life doesn't stop just because it gets too busy. I probably should've learned that already. So we'll just say I'm learning it again.
Update on Krysta: the nurse called today to tell us that she has a condition called "vesicoureteral reflux" [vesi-co-ureteral]. Say that fast 10 times. ha ha. It just means that urine is "refluxing" back from her bladder through her ureters into her kidneys. We will have an appointment with a pediatric urologist next Monday, where we'll find out if she has damage to her kidneys already, and whether or not she needs surgery. I'm still not clear on what will be the deciding factor either for or against the surgery. I have lots of questions for the urologist next week. :)
The poor little girl came down with a nasty cold this weekend. As if she wasn't sick and miserable enough already. What can I say? She must be a tough little cookie. The hardest thing for me has been that her kidneys still hurt her. She comes up to me, says, "Hold you?" So I pick her up, and she says, "It hurts. My back hurts Mommy." However, on a positive note, we at least know what she has and pretty soon we're going to know how to fix it. Yippee!

Tyler and Emalyn are in swimming lessons again. And loving it. Emalyn had to choose between dance lessons and swim lessons- and it really shocked me when she chose swimming. Although I have to say I am so proud that they love something that I've always loved. They are having a blast and getting very good at staying afloat and learning their strokes.

We had an eye therapy appointment for Tyler today. It was a follow-up 3 months after his graduation from eye therapy. Dr. King says that he's doing really well!! His eyes are still doing better than they were 6 months ago. He even saw 6 3-D images!!! Dr King kept saying, "oh, I'm so proud of you Tyler" over and over. We are so proud of him.

Emalyn finished her first real homework booklet last week in Kindergarten. Her teacher gave her a coupon for a free meal at Olive Garden for finishing it. So she and I got to go out to lunch just the two of us. It was the first time she's been to a restaurant that's more elegant than Wendy's, so it was a little overwhelming at first, but afterward she said it was fun. I think her favorite parts were the raspberry lemonade and the fact that we sat across from the fireplace. She also really loved the Italian music. I can't wait until she finishes her next homework book!

Krysta

Sorry, I kind of dropped out of the blogging community for a while. It's been a rough couple of months for our family. I'm not going to share all the gory details, but two major things that happened were, first, my grandma, Barbra L. Jensen, died in October, then Scott's grandpa, John D. Jensen, died in December. Interesting, wierd sidenote: Scott's grandpa died on the one year anniversary of my grandpa's (Denmark C Jensen) death and his funeral was on the anniversary of my grandpa's funeral, Dec 23 and Dec 29, respectively.

But I need to catch up Krysta's birthday party, which was in November. We celebrated it at Ryan and Melanie's house up in Genesse, ID, since we were already there for Thanksgiving.

Krysta on her 2nd birthday. We celebrated it at my brother and sister-in-law's (Ryan and Melanie's) house in Genessee, ID. Here is the cutest cake that her Aunt Melanie decorated, a pink and a purple balloon.

I made this pinata. It was a red car. Krysta was really into cars at the time. Here she is, having a go at it. It was a pretty big hit with all the cousins.

Also, Krysta had a wierd illness last month. She got septicemia. Her fever had been around 104 F all day, (which the dr said was NOT A PROBLEM) and she'd thrown up that morning. I took her into the dr that morning, and they did lots of tests, none of which came up positive. They said it was probably just a virus and to give her Tylenol for her fever. That night, Scott and our home teacher gave her a priesthood blessing and then we put her to bed. I was not feeling comfortable with just doing nothing though, so after talking to Scott for a while, I called the on-call dr and he said since her fever had never come down that I should take her back in for a UA. We got to the Instacare and her fever read 106.2 F. She was also sound asleep and we had a hard time rousing her. She just laid there. Needless to say, I kinda freaked out. So did the nurses and the dr. The UA came back, and as they said, it was inconclusive. I guess there was bacteria in her urine, but not enough to be causing her fever or her listlessness. So then they decided to do a blood test and a blood culture. This is when they started suspecting Septicemia. The dr recommended a shot of antibiotics. He said no test confirmed that she needed them, but he felt that if we didn't give it to her and it was septicemia, then "we didn't want to know how bad it would be in the morning." So, yea, I voted for the antibiotics. After that very painful shot, we went home. Her fever never went above 103 F the rest of the night (it is odd to think of that as low), so we were feeling a lot calmer. Since she'd responded so well to the antibiotics, they gave her a prescription for more until we found out the results of the blood culture, which would be back in a couple more days. They called a couple of days later, and yep, she'd gotten bacteria in her blood, septicemia. So it was a pretty bad scare, but we were pretty sure the worst was over.

Then this last Tuesday, she woke up with a low-grade fever. I was worried, just remembering last month. I even called Scott, who assured me that you really shouldn't take a child to the dr when their fever is less than 100 F and they've only had it for a few hours.:) And really, he was right. But I just couldn't shake that worried feeling. And then, just like last time, it got higher. But I didn't get really worried until she started shaking. And then screaming. From pain. In her lower back. That's when I freaked out again. I took her back to instacare. They did another urinalysis, (which if you're in diapers involves a catheter-not fun, believe me) and found that the bacteria in her urine was three times the amount that it was last month and she has "another" kidney infection. This time helped to put the puzzle together from last month. She had gotten a bladder infection, which had turned into a kidney infection, which had turned into an infection in her blood. Luckily, this time, it didn't get into her blood yet. So she's had two shots of anitibiotics in the last two days, and she's on oral antibiotics too. She had a kidney scan yesterday, which showed that she has urine going from her bladder back into both of her kidneys. I don't have much more information. The dr still has to go over the radiology pictures and then we'll have to meet with a pediatric urologist. I don't know if she'll need surgery or not yet. But I am very happy that we've figured out what the problem is. The scariest part, to me, was how sick she got both times. And for now, they said we'll keep her on antibiotics until we find out what to do. So she won't get another kidney infection. That makes me very happy.

Thank you to all of you for your love and support and prayers.