Worst. Night. Ever.

It is so true that mothers can never be sick. Although I do have to say that I have been mostly lucky in that Grammy watches the girls during the day so if I am home sick, I can usually get some rest. In the middle of the night, forget about it.

My head started throbbing before I went to bed last night. Ironically, it all started when I was trying to renew my driver's license online only to receive a "your request cannot be processed at this time as we are unable to access the system" error message. So I went to bed. With the throbbing headache.

Em was sick for most of the day Wednesday but did okay yesterday. She didn't eat as much and appeared tired but was keeping food down and playing.

I was awakened some time after midnight by the sound of crying kids. I jumped up out of bed. It felt like I had been hit in the head with a hammer (I've actually never been hit in the head with a hammer but I'm imagining the feeling is comparable) and my stomach was oh so very queasy. Both Em and Allie were in their beds lightly crying and whining. I'm assuming that one woke up the other. I ran back and forth between their bedrooms hoping that one of them would calm down and fall asleep while waiting for me. I kept saying, "I'm going to check on (Em/Allie) and then I'll be back. It didn't work.

Em has not been clinging to me as much as she did in her earlier years and will usually hang out with Rich without flipping out. Not last night. I finally went to Rich and told him that I had to go downstairs to the bathroom. I was sick. I was hoping that they would fall asleep if I left the scene. It didn't work. Miraculously, Anna slept through everything.

After puking, I managed to coax Allie into Em's bed. This took a bit of finagling as I wanted to sleep on the edge of the bed in case I had to make a mad dash for the bathroom. With Allie in the middle of the bed, I wasn't able to sleep right next to Em. Thankfully, holding my hand was good enough.

They both fell asleep in five minutes. I popped up the safety rail and went back to my bed. Unfortunately, Allie was sleeping on my pillow that I had thrown into Em's bed in an attempt to placate her so I had to use a spare pillow, which was so big and lumpy. This morning, I woke up with a crick in my neck.

Amazingly and thankfully, the two of them slept quietly together for the rest of the night. I heard them talking nicely to each other this morning while Rich was showering. I told them that if they are scared in the middle of the night, that they should just go climb into bed with sissy. When I asked them who Anna could sleep with if she was scared, Em said, "Anna can sleep with me. I'll give her a big hug and kiss." How sweet is that?

As for me, I survived. I always do. I figured that if I can puke in the middle of the night and then drag myself through Animal Kingdom, I should be able to puke in the middle of the night and then drag myself to work. Stomach Virus Round 1 ate up half of my sick days.

So as not to end the day with another downer post, let's talk about some cute stuff. Here's the quote of the day from Em:

"Can you turn the bathroom light on, Daddy, so Lion can go poo poos?"

Allie cooperated last night and I was able to get this great picture of her. This is what she does when she gets the "bad woman" during Old Maid. Insert the "aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh."

I'll end by asking for a favor. They reset the voting back to zero over at Top Baby Blogs. I don't win anything - it just helps our ranking. So if you like my blog, I would appreciate a vote. All you need to do is click on this button and then click again on the top part of the page that pulls up. Two clicks - that's it. Thank you!

Allie thanks you as well.