The Stewarts: Weekend in San Diego

Since Mike's Paternity leave was coming to an end we decided we'd milk the last few days and went on a mini vacation to San Diego. Our first stop was the New Kid's Museum. Lilah loved this pillow section. All they had were mattresses and pillows everywhere.

She explored and played and played some more.

She wasn't a fan of the paint. She doesn't like getting dirty.

She didn't like touching the clay either.

Or the sand.

Back to the pillows we went.

And this little dude so content just checking everyone out.

After the museum, we found a water park for Lilah to play in. She LOVED it.

She would go around and kick water on people. What a little punk! Haha!

She ran around for about 2 hours.

Here she is taking a break and chasing a pigeon.

And she found this little girl to play with and they played for quite some time.

Back at the hotel.

The next day we went to church and learned all about 72 hour kits and even re-did ours when we got home. We still need to re-stock on food though.

After church we went to Mission Bay. This little girl is starting to love the water. She will be getting tubes soon and will not be able to get into lakes or beaches so we had to take advantage.

Her piggies are getting so long. She has so much new hair coming in. Look at that cute smile!

Daddy and Lilah playing in the water.

She loves her floatie because she can lay back and float on the water.

Happy girl

I also discovered how much she loves hummus. This girl was using the chips as a spoon.

David and his double chin ready for bed.

Nothing cuter than sleeping babies.

The following day we went to the San Diego Zoo.

It was hot by the time we got there so we started off with a tour of the whole zoo. It was a nice way of seeing everything without having to walk so much. After we were done, we knew what we wanted to see and what we were okay not walking to.

Lilah playing with daddy's hat. He was not a fan, ha!

So many compliments for this glasses wearing, sassy, shorty girl of mine.

It makes me sad to see these animals caged up. We read that they were able to recover the bald eagle from going extinct by having an online dating site where they match animals to reproduce. I love this about zoos and the fact that Lilah can learn about animals other than just seeing them on pages.

I took out my camera and didn't realize how zoomed in it was. But I saw her smile and snapped a picture and this was the result.

Lilah is still not sure about characters. She seemed to be okay from far away.

She wasn't quite as comfortable when we got closer.

She was okay with mom in between after a little bit.

The giraffes are always my favorite part.

And let's not forget my little man. I just realized he's sporting a giraffe outfit. How fitting!

Helping daddy cool off by spraying him in the face. I think this little girl got all of us. People around us probably thought she was dripping in sweat but she was just soaked with her own cooling fan.

It was a fun little vacation in San Diego. After that we headed home and started our new life with me at home with my TWO little ones.

The rest of the month was interesting. I had NO idea how I would handle 2 little ones all by myself. I was so nervous but the day finally came. Thankfully it wasn't bad at all. David is such a great little baby. I am so thankful that I healed a lot quicker with his C-section. I was strong enough to be able to carry even Lilah. I quickly started loving being home with these two. Our days were filled with sleeping in, playing, doing arts and crafts, and doing many activities. I slowly learned how to care for two even though at times it was challenging going back and forth and trying my best not to make Lilah feel less loved.

One day while I was about to take David to his doctor's appointment all by myself, Mike decided he would join us. I wasn't sure about how the two would do but we ended up taking the whole family. After David got his shots, we parked in the shade and I fed him. This whole time, Lilah had been waiting for ear tubes and I had asked the nurse about the process while I was waiting to make another appointment for David. I asked her how any ENT doctors there were and she said there were only 2 or 3. I wanted to know so I could call and see if I could do anything to speed up the process for Lilah getting her tubes.

While we were in the car I got the idea of instead of going to Sam's club like we had planned to do, to drive over to Highland and see where we were in regards to Lilah getting an appointment.

You see, when I talked to her doctor about Lilah possibly needing tubes he told me she would need to see an audiologist first and then the audiologist would send their consult to the ENT doctor. The thing was, the only audiologist for kids was in Loma Linda, which would mean transferring to a different hospital and service. When I called to make an appointment, the first opening was in 5 MONTHS. I remember going in to my OBGYN (Which I happen to be transferred to Loma Linda for a VBAC with David) and realizing that the Audiologist's office was one floor down from my OBGYN. One day I decided to walk in and see if there were any cancellations. The girl informed me that Lilah's papers weren't fully transferred over and that there had been an error and she wasn't in the system yet. After many phone calls with Beaver and Loma Linda and the insurance company we finally got Lilah an appointment which was still in 5 months.

Okay so flash forward to where we finally saw the audiologist and now we had to wait for them to send the papers over to the ENT. While we were sitting there in the parking lot leaving David's appointment I thought, "Let's just drive to Highland's ENT and make sure the papers were sent over" I didn't want the same thing to happen where papers were lost and incomplete.

So we drove to Highland and I told Mike to drop me off in the front while I went in and asked around. I went in and asked the receptionist about how long the wait was to see the ENT. She said Lilah was "pending" and said to go talk to the scheduler. So I went over to the scheduler to ask how long we would have to wait this time around.

The receptionist said she was working on a pile of papers and could see where Lilah was at. She said she had one opening from a cancellation in 2 weeks and I said "YES" She called and worked on the computer and asked me to take a seat. A few minutes later a nurse came out and said, "If she's here we can see her right now." I tried SO hard to hold in my excitement because I wasn't 100% sure she was talking about Lilah and the Appointment clerk was working with someone else when I over heard. Finally when she was done, she called me over and asked if Lilah was here. I said yes! Apparently they had, had a cancellation for their upcoming appointment and would see Lilah if she was in the building!

I immediately called Mike and told him to come meet me upstairs. I was SO excited!

Here we are waiting to see the ENT.

The doctor cleaned her ears out and set us up with the surgery scheduler who happened to have a cancellation for the following week! Miracle, upon miracle, upon miracle!

Sometimes I feel that I get inspiration to be this little girl's mom. I hope that I continue to live in a way that I am inspired to know how to best care for these little ones.

Here she is cheesing before it was time to look in her ears. I had to hold her down like I was holding a baby alligator. When it was time to clean her ears, it took 4 of us. She's such a fighter!