Last week I wrote about how Kate came into her own this year with her love of swimming and basketball. I am a firm believer in the importance of athletics for girls (ask me sometime, I’m sure you’d love to hear me get on my soapbox), and I love to watch her confidence grow with every game or meet in which she competes. And let’s face it – I like to pretend I am still an athlete too.

This week we both get to live out our dreams at the Nike Young Athletes Innovation Summit.

We’re traveling to Beaverton, Oregon to visit the Nike world headquarters and to learn about what Nike is doing to advance youth athletes. We are so, so excited for this once-in-a-lifetime experience, and I am thrilled to have three days of one-on-one time with my girl. I also can’t wait to tell you all about it, so I’ll be tweeting and facebooking throughout the weekend. I’ve been scouring the internet for pictures of Nike’s campus, and it looks like an absolutely amazing place. I cannot wait to go.

I promise not to steal any Michael Jordan paraphernalia. Maybe.

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Kids Nike FREE Run: If your feet flex, shouldn’t your shoes flex too? Must-
have flexibility for young feet.

Disclosure: Compensation was provided by Nike via Glam Media. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of Nike.

Kate,

In a few days, you’ll turn eight. You’re having a skating party with your friends, and your dad and I have a few surprises up our sleeves. But before we get there, I want to stop and remember the year you were seven.

For about a month, you were a Star Wars fan.

You gave that up pretty quickly, and just yesterday you made your brother cry by asking him if the Yoda on his shirt was Darth Vader – you insisted you didn’t know the difference.

You gave softball a shot, but decided your love was swimming.

It was your third swim season, but this was the year it clicked for you. After standing on the block in tears the first time you had to swim the butterfly at a meet, you discovered that it was actually your best – and favorite – stroke. Your coach watched you swim and said “It looks like we’ve got a butterfly-er on our hands!” You won more “personal best” ribbons than you did “first place” ones, but the most important thing you won was the Gator Award at the end of the season, given to you for sportsmanship, attitude, and just being an all around great kid.

You and I did a lot of fun things together this year, just the two of us. We got pedicures one day.

We went to see the Beach Boys.

We painted pottery.

We did lots of fun things as a family, too, like taking a vacation to Michigan, where you and your dad bought vintage cowboy boots.

You started second grade.

You were a good friend, and a loving and protective sister.

You also found your second sport – basketball. I know we’re not supposed to live out our dreams in our children, but I can’t tell you how happy it made me to see you learn to love to play. You practiced, worked hard, and learned so much.

This year, you sat me and your dad down and told us your suspicions that Santa wasn’t real. You were sad for a moment when we told you the truth, and then you quickly started to think about how you could be in on making holidays fun for Sam.

You grew up a lot this year, Kate. Not all of it has been easy for you. You’re so smart and mature that your dad and I often expect too much from you, and sometimes it’s hard being the older sister. But I hope you will always know that you are the most important thing in the entire world to us.

I love you, Kate. More than everything put together.

A week or so I wrote about how Kate’s been puking intermittently for more than a month. (Actually it was more about me being a complete idiot, but I did reference Kate’s troubles.) In any case, the last week has been a flurry of tests, scans, and medicine. She’s had blood tests, upper GI scans, stool screenings (earned my mom stripes with this one), colon cleanses, and more, trying to determine why she’s been so sick to her stomach.

So far, we’ve determined that she has acid reflux and rotavirus.

What is rotavirus? I’m so glad you asked. According to cdc.gov…

Rotavirus is a virus that causes gastroenteritis (inflammation of the stomach and intestines). The rotavirus disease causes severe watery diarrhea, often with vomiting, fever, and abdominal pain. In babies and young children, it can lead to dehydration (loss of body fluids). Rotavirus is the leading cause of severe diarrhea in infants and young children worldwide. Globally, it causes more than a half a million deaths each year in children younger than 5 years of age.

Rotavirus was also the leading cause of severe diarrhea in U.S. infants and young children before rotavirus vaccine was introduced for U.S. infants in 2006. Prior to that, almost all children in the United States were infected with rotavirus before their 5th birthday. Each year in the United States in the pre-vaccine period, rotavirus was responsible for more than 400,000 doctor visits; more than 200,000 emergency room visits; 55,000 to 70,000 hospitalizations; and 20 to 60 deaths in children younger than 5 years of age.

So that’s exciting. Honestly, I was somewhat relieved by that finding, because it’s something that, while not pleasant, will eventually go away. My Google MD diagnosis had been a gluten sensitivity, which would have been much more complicated to deal with.

We are still waiting on results from a few tests, and because she had a combo of symptoms that is sometimes a red flag (waking up vomiting and right-side headaches), she is scheduled for an MRI on her brain. (Any Teen Mom 2 watchers out there? Every time I hear/say that phrase, I apply Leah’s accent.) Provided that doesn’t turn up anything exciting, that should be the end of it. And hopefully, with a daily regimen of Prilosec, we’ll be all done with the random puking.

Crossing my fingers.