Grateful

Today was another off day, only it was Mamá that was off not Da'Gorgeouses. It seems that my allergies are getting the best of me, and it doesn't help that the farmer across the street cut all the alfalfa during the last few days. For those of you that have really bad allergies and relied on Zyrtec, well, I have some good news. Costco has come out with their Kirkland brand of zyrtec which they call Aller-Tec. DrillSgt. did a happy dance when he discovered that Aller-Tec contains the exact same ingredients has 300 tablets vs. 75 and is a whole dollar cheaper. Poor guy, he lives on the stuff, I only take it when my allergies are super bad which lately has been about once a week. Anyways, every once in awhile when my allergies are really bad and I haven't taken anything, I'll wake up at night with the feeling that my entire skin is crawling. When that happens there's no going back to sleep until I've gotten myself up out of bed to take an allergy pill. Last night was one of those nights and since I didn't want to wake up DrillSgt. I just stayed out on the couch until I finally fell asleep.

Tomorrow is Da'Gorgeouses group class, which Grammy & I have started calling school. They seem to be looking forward to it, and get a little excited when we mention it to them. Today when Grammy mentioned it to them after dinner Pistol looked at her and said "yeah, cool". Maybe she was saying school, maybe she was saying school is cool---who knows? Anytime we're headed anywhere in the car they're glad to be going, until the car ride gets too long for them that is. Lately, when they've started getting tired of being in their carseats (which is usually 15 minutes into the drive) it's "no more, up" or "click" their sound for unclicking the harness. That's even with one of their favorite dvd's playing on the screen, I can't begin to imagine the torment we'd be going through without those.

LongRifle was in a wrestling mood today, she must have pinned Pistol down 5 or 6 times before it was even lunchtime. Poor Pistol kept saying "stop it" and "be careful" and I saw her contemplate biting LongRifle but I intervened and told her not to bite, to use her words. I think she doesn't quite understand that LongRifle is trying to play with her. It's very rare that Pistol initiates physical play with LongRifle, she seems to prefer pretending at tea party or building something with blocks or looking at a book. It's a different story when we go outside. Pistol will try to play with LongRifle only LongRifle's usually too busy climbing the slide or exploring the outdoors to pay attention to her sister. I guess it doesn't help that LongRifle seems to be on the overly strong side and seems to have a high threshold for pain. I think the high pain threshold may be left over from some of the early NICU days. She seems to have finally regained some sensitivity on her left side where she has some scarring on her skin. I've decided to tell her when she's old enough to notice those scars that they are battle wounds left over from her fighting in the Preemie Wars, she's a survivor (and so is her sister) and there's a reason for it.

That reminds me, I need to put together a collage for their upcoming 2nd birthday. I still need to deliver the one from last year to the NICU. It always gave me hope to see all of the pictures of the preemies that had come such a long way. I specifically remember one of a tiny 1 1/2 lb baby girl, next to it was a photo of a 20 something young lady and a caption that said she was now enrolled in school to become a nurse. Interesting how time and advancements in technology change. When Da'Gorgeouses were born we were told they were going to try their best, but that usually 24 weeks was the edge of viability. Once we arrived at the NICU one of the nurses told us that 5 years earlier, 30 weekers were considered the edge of viability. I'm so grateful to all the staff that worked with Da'Gorgeouses. They were willing to give them the best opportunity at survival possible---just look at them now.