It was bound to happen....

Well, I kind of  figured it was only a matter of time, but  today Brielle officially came down with  hand, foot, and mouth disease....ugh! She was  up every 30 minutes last night screaming but I still didn't see anything wrong at that time, but then today some blisters showed up behind her lower lip---poor girl. Surprisingly  thought she hasn't been too bad tonight and she's been  eating fine all  day....so hopefully it's a mild case! So far everyone else has had mild cases too. Raya still  looks and acts totally fine though...fingers crossed! I'm  bummed  because our town is having their  little festival this weekend...so tonight  was fireworks, parade on Saturday, and we had a birthday  party on Sunday....but now we're skipping the birthday and the parade is up in the air---if Raya  still feels fine I might just  take Raya to the parade and  leave Lee  home with Brielle. Tonight lee  took  Raya to the fireworks by  himself  and Miss Brielle just laid down for the  night--hopefully tonight goes  more smoothly than last  night!

Other than that, today I had  my  much awaited doctor appt. for  my rhuematoid arthritis. I don't know  if I've mentioned  here, but  it's been REALLY bad  the last  few weeks.  It's in my knees, and  I can  barely walk on my  left knee, so I've got a really attractive  old lady  hobble going on right now. My left shoulder is  so bad  that  I  can't  lift my left arm to get dressed or wash/dry my hair, and  hooking a bra in the back? Almost impossible LOL. My right  wrist has  also suddenly acted up, making typing painful at times (but thankfully not too  bad). So anyways, long story short, today I had xrays and  lab and started some  new and stronger meds, so  hopefully I  can get  this under control  in the next couple w eeks! Lee  and  I  just booked  our hotel for our  upcoming anniversary trip  in early  August  and I'd like to be able to walk ! :-)

Speaking of our anniversary trip, we ultimately decided to go back to St. Louis for our vacation---this  time kid free! My parents  will  have  the girls for  4 nights while Lee and I hit  up a couple baseball games, shopping, sight seeing, museums, etc....we haven't planned it all out quite  yet....but  we're  excited for  baseball games without the kids :-P I  can't wait!

In other  news, last night I  shot  my  camera in manual  mode for the  first  time!!! It wasn't  quite  as hard as I  expected, but I"m still  definitely learning.

These pictures  aren't  amazing by any means, because it  was a spur of the moment thing  sitting in front of our house...but  at least everything isn't dark and out of focus or overexposed, etc lol

I made Lee  sit for me because I didn't  want to chase  kids  all around while learning, so  Lee got some "glamour shots" taken hehe. I  now refer to them as his senior pictures ;-)

When I was  editing the picture below, he had  me try to  clone  in a full head of hair hahahaha...needless  to say it didn't  look  natural  so we abandoned  that idea. I  should have saved that picture to show you guys  how funny it  looked!

All  of  the sudden during his glamour shots Miss Raya popped  into the frame--she wasn't  in focus since I was intending to  take a picture of Lee, but I kinda like how  it turned out!

I  did play  around with manual  photos of  Raya too...it's hard when kids  are  moving  all over  to adjust  your settings and  think about what  you want! Especially  when  said  kid is trying to poke you with a stick ;-)

She  also picked her  nose for photos....awesome

Brielle was even a worse photo subject....I  like to say that giving birth is easier than taking pictures of an 18 month old!

In Brielle's  defense, she's  sick  now....so  pictures were probably not a big  priority

Tomorrow I have Sawyer  and  Harper....plus Brielle who's sick...plus  Raya who's  probably going to be tired  after having  stayed up for fireworks tonight....I'm thinking tomorrow is  going to be  called  "F--- me  Friday"  haha ....and yes, I just swore!  Well, sort of ;-)