Update

(you may already know about this, thanks to facebook.)

I found out on Friday that Ella has a broken clavicle. It is already healing- we assume it's from birth. I'm actually pretty positive that it happened at birth. A few clues (looking back):

1. Right after she was born I tried to nurse her on my left side- she wouldn't take it, she just kept whimpering. (The broken clavicle is her right, which would have been the side she was laying on to nurse on my left.

2. Ella cried for hours one night in the hospital. I remember calling in the nurse at 3 a.m. to bring me a pacifier and a turkey sandwich cause I was starving. She tried to re-swaddle and bounce the babe to sleep, with no luck. Finally an hour later I got her to fall asleep (exhausted- and with a pacifier.)

3. A few days after we brought her home from the hospital, I lifted her up under her arms and she seriously SHRIEKED. My mom was right there, and I wondered outloud if she could have a hurt shoulder. Broken clavicle never crossed my mind.

Last week, after one long and miserable night when Ella screamed before bed and the again in the middle of the night, I decided I'd had enough. I took Ella in to the doctor to have her checked for silent reflux- her doctor had me take her to get a 3D x-ray thing. It showed the break/fracture, and it also showed lots of bowel gas, like more than normal. So the doc told me to focus my efforts on helping her be less gassy (and not swallow so much air when she eats, etc.

In other news (you may have seen this on facebook too)- I had a particularly DIFFICULT Saturday over the weekend. Two birthday parties to go to (family) and Samuel was working again. Ella was fussy, the girls had totally dirtied up their brand new matching outfits (what was I thinking sending them to outdoor birthday parties in new clothes? duh.) and to make things worse, I have been in a ton on pain in my left leg and hip. I put the girls in their bedroom with the door shut because my OB-GYN had called me to find out more about my pain. He is going to send me to an orthopedic doctor, but ANYWAY, I was probably only on the phone for 5 minutes when I came out and found these girls like this:
That is a $30.00 tub of Triple Paste, the best rash cream I know of. (The girls are REALLY lucky I found it on clearance for $10, but still-- it was brand new.)

Ella was crying of course, so I couldn't even put her down to clean it up. I think I cried a little, I might have said a swear word, and at least I had enough sense to know this will be funny one day, and I took some pics. (It's not funny to me yet- Annie's hair still looks grease-soaked after TWELVE washings with dish soap, and the carpet might be ruined.)

I made the girls sit in chairs in the living room for half and hour until Samuel got home. Then I let him deal with it. We were not happy parents that night.

Having 3 kids can be pretty tricky.