Life is Wonderful: Josie is 14 Months

The day after Josie turned 14 months old she started crawling up the stairs. She went up three stairs at first before turning around and basically falling into my arms. After a few days of practice she crawled quickly up all of the stairs. She is so excited when she gets to the top and goes straight to her room to play. Thank goodness for baby gates!

Josie's back right molar has been bulging all month long. I keep waiting for it to break through her gums but it hasn't happened yet. She is chewing (and drooling) on everything! Anything is fair game for her mouth.

I think after her one year visit, Josie developed a fear of doctors. Sophie had a check-up and Joe took Josie along since I had something else going on. Josie was fine until the doctor came into the room. As soon as she started talking she burst into tears. I guess she had flashbacks of her last visit with all of her shots.

Keeping with the topic of doctors, Josie spent half of this month sick. The poor kid just couldn't catch a break! When she first started getting cranky I thought it was just due to her molar. Her fevers started around the middle of the month on a Thursday. I assumed that she had an ear infection again since she had some of the other symptoms that I noticed normally come with them (she is teething and had a runny nose, watery eye, etc). Saturday night was rough and Sunday she just wanted to be held the whole day. The only time she felt decent was when the pain medicine kicked in. Sunday evening her fever shot up to 104.4°. I was frantic thinking it was high enough to cause brain damage (it wasn't-it would have to be around 107° for that to happen). Luckily Joe kept calm and we were able to get her fever down. Around 1:30 in the morning she was up again, shaking and whimpering. I brought her downstairs for Advil and she started coughing. She ended up coughing/puking up a ton of white chunks all over me (high fevers + milk = nasty smelling cottage cheese-like puke). She drank some water and was able to sleep the rest of the night once the medicine kicked in. She and I slept on the couch so that I could keep an eye on her. She woke around 7:45 in the morning with another fever. Luckily I was able to get her into the doctor's early that morning. Josie was fine until the nurse started talking and checking on her. She started crying and only stopped when we were alone in the room. As soon as she heard the doctor in the hallway she burst into tears again. When the doctor came he did a quick check-up; Josie sobbed the whole time. He had to clean a ton of ear wax out of her ears so that he could get a good look in there. They were fine, which surprised me as I was sure she had an ear infection. They then did a flu test and a strep test. Both of those came back negative, so they decided to do a urine analysis. The poor girl became even more traumatized because they had to catheterize her. The results came back positive for a UTI. They gave her a shot of antibiotics and a prescription for more medication. They asked that we bring Josie back in after 2-3 weeks so they could do another urine analysis and do an ultrasound of her kidneys to ensure there are no issues going on with them. I still can't believe that she had a UTI. We change dirty diapers right away, wipe her properly, and bathe her properly so it baffled us (and made me feel like I was a bad mom). The only thing I can think of is that one time when the girls took a bath together we put in a bath fizz that changes the color of the water (Sophie loves those and they have never caused her issues before.) That was the first time Josie was even in a tub with those. Things like bubble baths can cause UTIs so I am assuming the bath fizzes can as well. Lesson learned. She is feeling better now that she has finished her round of medicine. Poor girl. I hated seeing her feel cruddy, especially with her high fevers!

My poor girl was so sick!

I'm pretty sure this bath water is what caused Josie's UTI.

Sophie and Josie's bond gets stronger all the time. It makes me smile every time I see them playing together or Josie chasing after Sophie. They are so sweet. Joe picked up Sophie for a dentist's appointment one day, leaving Josie behind at the baby sitter's house. Sophie was so upset and worried about Josie. She kept asking Joe if they could go and get her.

I hope that next month is a healthier one for Josie. I have felt so bad for my sweet girl.

Here are some more pictures of Josie when she was feeling okay this month:

We've had so many snow days this year. Sophie loves playing in the snow, but I worried about taking Josie out in the cold temperatures. I saw a blog post from another parent that mentioned bringing snow into the house for kids to play with instead of taking them outside. I loved the idea, so I filled their bath tub with snow. They had so much fun! This is definitely something that we will do again.

When Josie was sick the movie Frozen came out on DVD. I had to go to the store to get Pedialite for Josie and ended up buying the DVD as well (per Sophie's request). When we got home we snuggled up on the couch with some snacks and have a nice movie date.

Kisses from Daddy.

My adorable little girl!

Josie is starting to hate her booster chair so we pulled out our trusty kid table. She loves pulling up on it and grabbing food.

Mmmmm....breadstick

Josie loves grabbing books and toys out of the basket in her room.

I hate push toys because they are so light and don't support Josie's weight. They either fly out from under her and she falls on her face or back. It always scares her (and me).