After dinner tonight, while the girls were playing, Kayla started complaining of itches. She was writhing around on the floor trying to scratch her back, her stomach, sides and arms. As an allergy Mom, I immediately feared the worst and inspected her for hives. Alysa had feeding therapy today and being in a room where kids eat all kinds of foods always makes me nervous. Even though the chair and table are cleaned when we get there, I know it can always happen from residue missed or crumbs gone unnoticed by me on the floor. Thankfully I found no hives, but she was clearly suffering. I tried helping her scratch with no success. We headed upstairs to put lotion on her hoping it was just dry skin. This didn't help either. My next step was to give her Zyrtec - I'd rather err on the side of caution. This, to my unhappiness eased her "itchies". Don't get me wrong, I'm glad she's feeling better, but I don't like that it seems to be allergy related. Since she's never shown signs of environmental allergies, it makes me nervous. I know she didn't ingest anything, as she's had nothing new today, I'm hoping it was some fluke or environmental. Unfortunately, I will probably never know. And since she has biphasic reactions (a secondary reaction hours after the first), I'll be checking on her a few extra times this evening.

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In other, more positive news, we've tried a few times without success to get Alysa to start potty training. She's definitely ready both physically AND intellectually. Unfortunately with her smarts comes a VERY strong stubborn streak. I can't imagine where she gets that trait from... Tonight, as I was helping Kayla put lotion on, Alysa comes in Kayla's room stripped down and in big girl undies. She was so proud of herself too. I then asked if she wanted to go on the potty which had her promptly running to the bathroom with success on the potty (of course that is not new, she will go on the potty). She was very proud and excited to get her reward of 3 mini chocolate chips. After I told her to go put her big girl undies back on, I went into her room to see her sitting in the middle of her room surrounded by toys with her pink undies on backwards and inside out. But she was Oh So Proud!

So let's hope the fact that I just bought a box of 176 diapers brings us good luck tomorrow.

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And in further frustrations, I just read in our local paper that our township taxes will be increasing over $250 this year that is on top of the ever increasing education taxes. Welcome to NJ, please check your wallet at the door!