The baby is well! And then she's not..

So there isn't a whole lot new this week. We were starting to notice, toward the end of the antibiotic, that Alaina had been doing much better. She had no cough whatsoever and her congestion had cleared up. Within three days of being off the medicine, all of that came back. On Tuesday she was very congested and Wednesday morning she woke up coughing. One of my colleagues said that her daughter's allergist told them that if babies and small children have sinus infections, 10- or 14-day courses of antibiotics tend to be fairly ineffective, that you really need a 21-day course. This was interesting to me so I plan to research that a bit. The fact that everything was clear until she stopped the medicine makes me wonder, for sure. Unfortunately, I also get the feeling that her ear infection never actually went away. On Tuesday, the owner of the daycare called because Alaina was very difficult to soothe and her teacher said she seemed in pain. They gave her some Tylenol which helped a lot. Repeated on Wednesday. Today she has been (and has made us...) miserable. Her congestion and cough were awful and absolutely nothing was making her happy. I ended up giving her Zyrtec this morning which helped a little with the congestion and just had to give Tylenol when I saw her pulling her ear. Thank goodness we have an appointment on Monday.

You can sort of even tell in this picture that she is having to breathe through her mouth more. Poor little thing.

So I noted in the last blog post that she isn't standing on her own, etc. However, she LOVES to stand up. You just have to help her. She really likes standing on the couch and going for the kleenex box. Whatever makes you happy, silly girl.

This is just an old picture from early December when Alaina went to work with me following her shots. She loves Ricki and even reaches for her to be held.

We got to celebrate Christmas again this week. Alaina got some more fun presents. She loves them...and the wrapping paper! (you can also see the little rash she developed on her chin that we are hoping is from drool and not from a wheat allergy...)

As I said, there isn't much excitement this week. On Thursday I got my very first flu shot. I am allergic to eggs so I've always been hesitant to get it but based on the new recommendations and also having an itty bitty that I do not want to get sick (and also carries germs back from the germ factory!!), I thought it was best. It ended up being a big ordeal. It took about 20 minutes and talking to six different people before they would finally give me the shot. Then, they made me wait a half an hour while under 1:1 observation in a patient room before I could leave. But whatever. My throat was a little itchy for a few hours after the shot and I've had a headache on and off since Thursday but no real reaction. Now we better not get the flu--I've only had it twice in my life! The other excitement is that Chad is building a computer this weekend. This is the fourth computer he has built. It's always a long process from its inception to completion and of course now he is being stopped every few minutes/hours to help with the baby. But it's pretty much done. He is obviously very excited about it.

In terms of my goals for the new year, I would give myself a C. 

• I've cooked a meal two out of the three weeks (second recipe I made). Though to be fair, I cook on Thursdays and this week I had a work event until 10 pm so clearly I couldn't cook then. I was going to make something yesterday in the crock pot but Chad forgot to pick up a necessary ingredient at the grocery store. So we had pizza instead...

• I am 3/3 on taking lunches at least twice per week. 

• Alaina is moved to her crib! Hooray!

• I was doing awesome staying off Facebook at work but I slipped on this a little bit in the last week. Must do better!

• I have not yet opened the 30-day Shred DVD. Oops.

• We have not found a church.

• Chad chose Baked's peanut butter milk chocolate chip cookies for this month. I made them last Sunday and they were fabulous. We both took them to work with us the next day so they wouldn't all be consumed in one sitting. Which was a possibility. I haven't heard from Kris if she has made them yet. Unless you hate peanut butter (sacrilege!), I highly encourage you make them! They are a little more work than traditional peanut butter or peanut butter chocolate chip cookies (Southern Living also has a good recipe) but very worth it. Note that you must chill the dough for at least 3 hours prior to making them. Also, you should refrigerate the dough and stir it between batches or the last batch gets pretty funky. I am very excited to see what the Lawsons pick for February!