Bye, Bye February (a.k.a. Sabbatical Pt.1)

So much for being better about posting this month. Tomorrow is March 1st, hard to believe!

February sped past for us, mostly thanks to James' three-week long sabbatical leave and an [eventually] two week long stay in Barbados.

Barbados was amazing--gorgeous weather, perfect scenery, lots of family time...

Beautiful, huh?

The only not-so-fun part was when Annika decided to make the trip more dramatic, We arrived on Monday and by Saturday she was running her first fever, irritable, congested and somewhat lethargic. (As an aside, how do kids only get sick over the weekend, even in a foreign country on vacation???) By the next morning she was breathing rapidly and grunting/retracting part of the time. Not too fun anywhere, particularly in a place where you don't know the medical professionals, let alone know who is good.

We consulted the first doctor our condo complex recommended on Sunday afternoon. He told us that we hadn't told him anything that concerned him, just to treat the fever with Tylenol and that the breathing fast was likely from the elevated temperature. He also mentioned in the course of conversation that they're "just basically chicks at this point." Huh? Needless to say we didn't really click.

Monday she seemed somewhat better, but the fever and labored breathing returned late that evening, so we got an appointment with a different doc the next morning. Thankfully, this woman was on top of things and was able to give us answers and treatments. The diagnosis: RSV, severe bronchiolitis, and a double ear infection. :( Thankfully after a couple of breathing treatments and a number of prescriptions, she was feeling better quickly. Unfortunately, our flight was scheduled to leave early Wednesday morning. Yeah, that didn't happen--the doctor was adamant that Annika wouldn't be flying anywhere until at least Friday. So, the rest of Tuesday was spent trying to redo all of our travel plans. We got it figured out, but it was not cheap. Thank goodness for travel insurance and for the decision to purchase it!

By Wednesday Anni was feeling much better, so we were able to enjoy a couple more days in the sunshine without worrying about the little one so much.

Our return flights went smoothly with the exception of our first experience of airsickness (Lydia) and a crabby lady seated way too close. :(

We spent last week trying to catch up with ourselves. Thankfully, James had last week off so we could re-acclimate a bit more slowly. We enjoyed the extra time and got to a number of the projects we'd been meaning to do, but had been unable to find time for.

We're back to "normal" this week, Daddy was out the door to work first thing this morning, the kids and I are here on our own, and I have a feeling after three weeks with James around this day may seem VERY LONG. Wish us luck!