Whoops, missed a couple of days there. Monday night, I came down with Penny's bug, though thankfully it didn't seem to hit me as hard as it hit her. (Which is to say, I only threw up once.) But I did spend all of Tuesday feeling like I'd been wrung out like a washcloth and fighting assorted other ailments. Though, like Penny, I never even had so much as a low-grade fever. If she hadn't had it first, I might have thought it was food poisoning. (We did in fact consider that possibility for her, and threw out about a third of a tin of formula mix we thought might have gone bad.)

So I called my Mom to come help me keep an eye on Penny, and spent most of the day in bed trying to sleep. I did come downstairs at one point to a cute picture:

I'd thought Penny was mostly better, but Tuesday night, she threw up again. And Matt started feeling queasy, too. So we all stayed home Wednesday morning, though Penny by then seemed fine, and I was feeling much better.

Matt managed to avoid throwing up entirely, so we decided around noon to try life again, and we packed up and went to work and daycare. I didn't do a journal entry, though, because I had too much else to do.

Last night was better - Penny's appetite is still lagging a little, but I did manage to get some cereal into her, and Matt felt brave enough to attempt some chicken soup along with his saltines and pretzels. (What do people on Atkins do when they have the stomach flu? Go off-program, I'd guess. I can't think of anything easier on the stomach than unflavored bread.)

We're not entirely back on our feet, yet. Matt's still a touch queasy, and Penny's lack of appetite means that she's not eating enough to sustain her through the night, so she woke up around 3 in the morning. And I had trouble going back to sleep afterwards, so it was pretty hard for me to climb out of bed this morning. We were running a good half-hour behind schedule today.

But with any luck, we'll all be recovered soon.

"Is there something you need to tell me?" I asked Matt this morning.

"Um...."

"Because I dreamed at least three times last night that we had another daughter, a little older than Penny. Pretty little black girl." (More coffee than black, really, with curly dark blonde hair and great big eyes and a smile just as fantastic as Penny's. Adorable child.)

Matt laughed. "Nope, nothing to report."

I don't make this stuff up.

--Liz