TV programme: Superman. Anything Superman, cartoon, live action doesnt matter as long as the Man of Steel is in it. iPhone App: You love taking pictures with my iPhone. ‘Say cheese’ is your catch phrase. Meal: You eat pretty much anything we eat although you are not too keen on pizza, you prefer spaghetti and meatballs. Fruit: Bananas and apples and grapes. Vegetable: Carrots. Breakfast: Coco Pops. Drink: Cream Soda. Toy: Lego, lightsabers and your dolly. You love: Your brother, animals, school, and cuddling with mom.
Something that happened yesterday:
I wasn’t home most of yesterday so I will tell you something that happened this morning. You were brushing your teeth and you turned on the tap to rinse and couldnt turn it off. You came running into the dining room calling for Aaron to help you. Once he had you smiled at him and said ‘Hank you Aaaaron’.
Today I had the absolute pleasure of attending the local Girls in ICT (Information and Communication Technology) event.
What is Girls in ICT you ask?
International Girls’ in ICT Day is an initiative backed by ITU Member States to create a global environment that empowers and encourages girls and young women to consider careers in the growing field of information and communication technologies (ICTs). International Girls in ICT Day is celebrated on the 4th Thursday in April every year.
Hosted by Anglo African Events in partnership with HP, a few of us bloggers and journos were honoured to be included among about 200 young ladies, these lovely learners are all in grade 12/matric and are starting to seriously think about what to study in the near future.
We got to listen to Keynote speaker, Melanie Botha, Marketing and Ops Director at Microsoft SA, she told us of her fascinating history in various companies across the globe, and imparted one of the most important lessons of the day: ‘Never stop studying, keep learning!’
This was followed by a truly inspirational panel of women, Pippa Tshabalala, Palesa Sibeko, Lebogang Madise, Ntokozo Ncongwane, Shana Kay and Tsoanelo Takaendesa. These six women are, gamers, programers, IT security experts, app developers, business owners, teachers, tech consultants and all around awesome geeky gals.
These are the women that I want my daughter to look up to. I want her to see what these women have accomplished and know that she is capable of greatness. Whether she wants to be a ballerina, am astronaut, a doctor or a techie, she will know that she role models to aspire to.
Myself and Queen. Future tech wizard? I hope so!
I think that todays event gave that opportunity to a room full of intelligent, driven and motivated young women and I hope that they know they can make it in the ICT world, they just have to reach out and grab it with both hands.
TV programme: You love anything super hero and Tazzmania. iPhone App: You still play Angry Birds but you also enjoy playing flight simulators and a puzzle game called Water. Meal: Pizza! Its still your very favourite although you dont have olives that often anymore. Fruit: Red apples and grapes. Vegetable: Do oven chips count? Breakfast: You have started eating All Bran Flakes with a bit of sugar and milk, very healthy. Drink: Cream Soda or Sparberry. Toy: Lego and your lightsabers! You love: School, your friends and helping to clean off the table.
Whale watching on the computer
Something that happened yesterday:
You swam without holding onto your teacher, doing crawl and blowing bubbles and not sinking. So proud of you!
Today in the car from our house to my mom, a 15 minute drive, Aaron and I had a little lesson on the ocean and the various creatures that inhabit it.
We started off talking about octopuses (or octopi or octopodes – yes there are three ways to make octopus a plural!) and how they squirt ink and have suckers on their tenticles, then moved on to sharks and their many many teeth. We spoke about whales and the fact that they have no teeth and eat plankton. We spoke about jelly fish, blue bottles, manta rays and electric eels, all of whom can hurt you with a sting or a shock. We then spoke about sea horses and the fact that the dads carry the babies.
This is where I had a small heart palpitation, cause if daddy sea horses carry the babies why do human mommies and not the dads carry the babies. Which led to how do babies eat when they are in your tummy? Ummmmmm, Im not ready for this kind of discussion. I explained about the umbilical cord and that when you are born it is cut and when the piece falls off it leaves a belly button.
We arrived at my mom then and I was saved from more questions about babies!
About a year ago, Aaron was diagnosed with asthma. I knew he had asthma from when he was less than a year old but the peadiatric pulminologist (our day to day pead, who we no longer use) told me that, no, they can only diagnose asthma from 3 years old.
Anyway! Once Aaron was on the right medication (two times a day every day) his asthma was under control. We havent had a single attack in over a year. Until Sunday.
Well Saturday night. Aaron started coughing in the middle of the night, we nebbed him and gave him cough mixture and he eventually fell asleep again. On Sunday morning though he woke up coughing and didnt stop. Paul took him to our GP who consults on Sundays and he gave us Pulmicort and antibiotics. We nebbed him with the new beds and after an hour or so it hadnt helped so I called our (new) pead, also a pulminologist and Aarons asthma dr, and spoke to his partner who was on call. He suggested a double dose of Combivent and 10ml of cortisone. Half an hour after giving him those meds there was still no change.
Poor Aaron, he literally could not take one single breath without coughing.
I put him in the car and took him to the hospital where our pead has rooms and called the on call pead again to tell him we were coming.
The nurses in the pead ward were amazing. Friendly and helpful and kind. The dr arrived and admitted us. He put in a drip (not sure who was more traumatised, Aaron or me!) and gave him an adrenaline nebuliser and put him on oxygen.
Within 10 minutes he had stopped coughing!
Silly monkey!
Turns out he had a croup attack which caused an asthma attack. Poor child couldn’t breathe in or out!
We settled ourselves into our room, a private room as there were only 4 or 5 kids in the whole ward. Aaron was a little hyped up due to the adrenalin and the cortisone they gave him but he was so good. He charmed all the nurses and the dr and was an absolute angel.
3 adrenalin nebulisers, 4 doses of cortisone and 1 night of broken sleep and by yesterday morning we were allowed to come home.
This was the first time either of the kids has been hospitalised and was pretty traumatic. Im so very grateful for the dr and nurses that made the whole event so easy and comfortable to deal with.
