Fort Lauderdale

We left for Fort Lauderdale on Wednesday. Cannon was feeling like himself again, so I expected a nice fun relaxing trip.

For a few weeks now, we have been reading books about trains. Cannon knew that we were going to ride a diesel train. He is also obsessed with pistons and always asks me to point them out. I wish I got a picture of one of the conductors. He was a silver-haired man with white teeth and a shining smile. As we watched our train pull up, the conductor saw Cannon and yelled, "All aboard!" It was perfect! Just what Cannon was expecting! He enjoyed the train ride and even took a nap on my lap. He mostly enjoyed just looking out the window. And we ate a snack in the dining car. The train was about an hour and half delayed, so Cannon was anxious to get off.




Impatiently waiting for our train to arrive.





No train ride is complete without a peanut butter samich!

Ryan picked us up and we ate dinner at Bravo, an Italian restaurant. Cannon ended up leaving his car and train there, but we were able to get them the next day.

We stayed at the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Marina, a.k.a. senior community. I noticed that there was an unusually high number of old people in our hotel, even for being in Fort Lauderdale. It turns out that Ryan picked the hotel where Florida's largest bridge tournament was to be held. Oh my!


The view from our hotel. Too bad we didn't get to enjoy the pool, but it sure looked nice!

So Ryan woke up at about 1am vomiting. He only did it twice and was able to go back to bed. Well, Cannon woke up at 5am vomiting too! Only he vomited probably a dozen times in three hours. It was all over both beds and the floor, both trash cans, three sets of pajamas, and his blue blanket. I called his pediatrician's office and they wanted him to be seen. Since we weren't home, our only option was to take him to the ER. Luckily, Chris Evert Children's Hospital was literally only four minutes from our hotel. Ryan dropped us off on his way to work. I felt bad that he had to work because he still didn't feel well and he was exhausted. We were in and out of the hospital in a few hours. They gave him Zofran, some popsicles and gatorade and said it was probably a stomach virus or food poisoning if he had diarrhea.


Chris Evert Children's Hospital



We went back to the hotel ready to take a nap and I was so upset when we came to our unmade hotel room. We had told the front desk our situation and wanted new bedding (we literally only had mattresses). I had to call the front desk twice and wait for over an hour! I was so mad! We finally got to take a nap around 1pm.

Cannon was starting to feel a lot better by then (except for the diarrhea that started) and playing. We went for a walk and did our throw-up laundry while Ryan was taking a cat nap around 4:30. When we were finished we decided to go get dinner. As we were driving Cannon threw up all over himself, his car seat, and the back seat. So we turned around and went back to the hotel. It was such a horrible mess that I had to clean up!

We made it through the night without any problems, so I decided to take Cannon to the beach Friday morning. We really needed to get out! It was a nice day at the beach and the water temperature was perfect! Cannon loved getting in the water with me. Then we spent some relaxing time on our beach towels. We were there for a couple hours (maybe a little less) and Cannon was wanting to go home. We had taken the shuttle van from our hotel and it wasn't scheduled to come back around again for another 45 minutes so we decided to play on the playground for a bit. Ryan ended up finishing his work early so he said he would pick us up. It was almost good timing. Some big rain clouds came in and Cannon and I found ourselves camped under the playscape until Ryan could get there to rescue us! It was fun at first, but the rain was coming down so hard that there were no more dry spots left. We were cold and soaked when Ryan got to us!


Fort Lauderdale Beach




He stayed like this for about 20 minutes.



We went to lunch at Panera and Cannon fell asleep on the bench. I could tell that he still wasn't feeling his best. We hung out at the hotel for a while and then went to the Galleria. We walked around and ended up eating dinner at Sbarro, which was an eat in Sbarro.

Saturday morning we checked out and headed home. We got to drive through the Everglades. I saw two alligators, but Ryan saw a black panther! I was so jealous! He always sees the best animals. Cannon slept for a couple hours and was quiet the rest of the trip (it was almost a five hour drive). It felt good to be home and to see Blue again.


On our way home we stopped at the building site for the new Fort Lauderdale Temple!

So then Cannon woke up at 3:30 this morning because he had vomited. He threw up again at 4 and then 4:30. And he was still having diarrhea. He ended up sleeping in our bed the rest of the night. Ryan had to go to church to teach his lesson. I called Cannon's pediatrician and they said to take him to the ER again since the only thing they could do was give him more Zofran, but she was suspicious that more was going on. So we headed to the ER again. Cannon felt proud to know the routine: get on scale, blood pressure, temperature. He requested to watch Cars when we were in our room. The doctor said he was dehydrated and needed an IV. He didn't think it was intussusception again, but wanted to rule it out. So he had another ultrasound and some blood tests, but everything came out normal. Cannon had a hard time with the IV this time. They got it in quick, but it bothered him more. He was tired and hungry too and had a major tantrum. He really wanted to eat pancakes because that's what he ate the last time. He felt better once they let him have some gatorade and graham crackers. So we were there for about five hours or so. Since it was so close to his birthday they let him take home a toy, a Toy Story 3 garbage truck with Woody and an alien. He was so excited!


He was not a happy guy today.


But he was sure happy to go home with these new toys!

After we got home I made pancakes. He only ate a few bites, but he was satisfied. It's good to be home, again! Here's to a healthy and slow week for us!