This has been quite the week! Only Luke and Jonathan went to co-op yesterday. Caleb's eye was better, but his throat was still hurting. Nathan's eyes were a mess, and he was still running a fever, so that was an easy decision. Anna and Grace also had very gunky eyes yesterday, and the pinkeye spread into their other eyes. My other eye also got infected. Sigh. All that handwashing for naught!
Today I did make an appointment for Nathan and me at the clinic. What finally made me go in you ask? Well, last week I had a hangnail. And on Saturday I started putting neosporin on it, as it was getting infected. It was a case of "too little, too late", however, and by yesterday the finger was swollen, red, and very painful. I have to wake up at 6:00 to call and make an appointment, but I was glad I made the effort--by morning, the poor finger was hugely swollen so that I couldn't even bend it, and I about went through the roof if anyone touched it. The boys said it looked like a hot dog, LOL. Good thing we're not a crass family, as it was the middle finger of my right hand! And since I had to go in, I decided I may as well have Nathan be seen as well.
I had quite a time getting to the clinic. Sometime in the night I guess, since my eye was bothering me so much, I must have rubbed at it. Anyhow, when I woke up, I realized that it was scratched, so my vision for the right eye was a blurry teary mess. I was a little aftraid to make the big journey to the clinic on the Beltway, as both eyes would start watering fiercely at times, but the Lord kept us safe. I don't think I even changed lanes though!
My appointment was first, and after getting over his astonishment at the sheer number of bodies in the tiny exam room, the doctor prescribed antibiotics for my finger, and an ointment for my poor eye. I could not wait to get either one, LOL!
Nathan's doctor did prescribe an antibiotic ointment for his eyes, and she did a throat culture after I asked her to. She said she didn't think it would be positive, and I said I didn't either--I was sure he had the same sore throat/pinkeye thing that I and the others had, but I just wanted to make sure. Nathan was the only one who ran a temperature. You guessed it--the rapid test was positive. So now I am totally wondering if I and Caleb actually had strep as well. My throat is still a little sore, but Caleb's is all better. But I didn't think to ask my doctor for a culture, and frankly the thought of getting another appointment and driving there tomorrow almost makes me cry. All told, our trip today took 3 1/2 hours. Now I am pooped, and my eyes are both killing me! One girl is down, the second will soon be as well, and I will hopefully be able to take a nap. I am so ready for this week to be over!
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Monday, March 03, 2008
Hey, I'm going to try to post a YouTube video! This is the wrong season for it, but I tell you, this is exactly what our shopping trips are like! We've heard every single one of these comments many, many times, LOL. I'm quite impressed that they got all their kids to say their lines at the right times. Don't be expecting a music video from us, however. This family may call themselves the "Von Tone Deaf Singers", but I think we would win first place for that title, LOL. All except for Anna maybe. You can't understand her words, but she seems to be able to carry a tune, so we can usually tell what song she is singing. Anyways, fun video! (And you can tell we aren't doing school today, can't you? I have nothing better to do than sit around, find funny YouTube videos, and figure out how to post them!)
Odds and Ends
Yesterday's Big Accomplishment: Nathan swallowed a Motrin pill!! Believe me, this is a HUGE deal. I thought we were going to have to keep on giving him liquid medicines until he got big enough to down a bottle in one sitting. Whew! We averted taht! Amazingly, he did better by drinking no water with it. After many non-successful attempts, I finally told him that he swallowed bigger chunks of carrot, apple, etc. when he ate, than that tiny pill! Finally he got it down, and he was a very happy camper. Us too.
When I say "Yesterday's Big Accomplishment", maybe it would actually be more accurate to say "Yesterday's ONLY Accomplishment". Caleb and Anna were the only kids who even got dressed yesterday, a fact which was remarked upon time and time again by Nathan and Luke. They couldn't believe they were eating lunch . . . eating dinner . . . etc. still in their sleepers! I guess I've been a stickler or something. It never occured to me that not getting dressed would be a red-letter occurance, LOL.
Bob got off to the airport this morning for his week TDY. I sent him off with plenty of food. This is a sort of compulsion of mine. I can't stand for any of my loved ones to be without food on a journey. Maybe I'm secretly an Italian mama or something? That's why there is a permanent snack tub in the van, and whenever we go anywhere there is a possibility of getting stuck in traffic, I always bring a water bottle. The only thing worse than being stuck in a car without food is being stuck there without water, I always say! (Well, not really. But I live that way!) Whenever someone has to go the the ER, I always pack granola bars and other snacks to tide them over, and when our whole family flies, I practically bring a covenience store, it seems. I've searched my memories, and I can't recall any instance where I was trapped without food or had to go without for a number of days. Maybe I've blocked the memories . . . Anyways, I sent Bob off with a huge turkey and spinach sandwich, a baggie of pretzels, a cheese stick, 2 zucchini-chocolate chip muffins, and an apple. No way I'm letting my man wither away on a hostile airplane, LOL.
Today is scheduled for a "getting well" day. No school. We'll just read aloud or something. I'm hoping that tomorrow some contingent will be able to still go to co-op. Right now Luke and Jonathan have never been sick, and Caleb is pretty much better--just a little matting when he wakes up, but nothing during the day, and his eye isn't red anymore. Nathan still looks like a puffy-eyed racoon, and he is still running a fever off and on, so I'm saying it's pretty unlikely for him. We'll see what tomorrow brings . . .
When I say "Yesterday's Big Accomplishment", maybe it would actually be more accurate to say "Yesterday's ONLY Accomplishment". Caleb and Anna were the only kids who even got dressed yesterday, a fact which was remarked upon time and time again by Nathan and Luke. They couldn't believe they were eating lunch . . . eating dinner . . . etc. still in their sleepers! I guess I've been a stickler or something. It never occured to me that not getting dressed would be a red-letter occurance, LOL.
Bob got off to the airport this morning for his week TDY. I sent him off with plenty of food. This is a sort of compulsion of mine. I can't stand for any of my loved ones to be without food on a journey. Maybe I'm secretly an Italian mama or something? That's why there is a permanent snack tub in the van, and whenever we go anywhere there is a possibility of getting stuck in traffic, I always bring a water bottle. The only thing worse than being stuck in a car without food is being stuck there without water, I always say! (Well, not really. But I live that way!) Whenever someone has to go the the ER, I always pack granola bars and other snacks to tide them over, and when our whole family flies, I practically bring a covenience store, it seems. I've searched my memories, and I can't recall any instance where I was trapped without food or had to go without for a number of days. Maybe I've blocked the memories . . . Anyways, I sent Bob off with a huge turkey and spinach sandwich, a baggie of pretzels, a cheese stick, 2 zucchini-chocolate chip muffins, and an apple. No way I'm letting my man wither away on a hostile airplane, LOL.
Today is scheduled for a "getting well" day. No school. We'll just read aloud or something. I'm hoping that tomorrow some contingent will be able to still go to co-op. Right now Luke and Jonathan have never been sick, and Caleb is pretty much better--just a little matting when he wakes up, but nothing during the day, and his eye isn't red anymore. Nathan still looks like a puffy-eyed racoon, and he is still running a fever off and on, so I'm saying it's pretty unlikely for him. We'll see what tomorrow brings . . .
Sunday, March 02, 2008
Weekend Update
First, the fun part of the weekend--I went to a girls' sleepover Friday night! Four of the ladies in my Tuesday evening Bible study were going to a ladies' retreat at a big church not too far from us. The retreat was Friday night and Saturday, so Elizabeth decided to have a sleepover on Friday night. She also invited the women from our couples' Friday night OCF study. I decided I wasn't up to a big conference, but the sleepover sounded fun. Christine and Dawn, 2 women from the Friday night study, also just slept over.
I got to Elizabeth's house a little before 7:00. I was the first one there, and it was so nice and quiet. Ahhhhhhh. I brought some scrapbooking stuff and actually finished several pages before Christine and then Dawn came. We snacked on chips and dip (using Amy's good recipe, which was a hit) and talked.
The other women came back from the conference aaround 10:00, and then we brought out the rest of the snacks--a trifle, brownies, veggies and dip, strawberries and chocolate fondue . . . yeah, we were living it up, LOL! We talked and laughed for awhile, culminating in the decision to play the game where everyone tells 3 statements about themselves, 2 true and 1 false. THat was a lot of fun, although I was battling this head cold and had a stuffy head. I could not think if ANYTHING remotely interesting to lie about. I went last, and hemmed and hawed around for awhile. Eventually I came up with 3 things, but they weren't my best work. I went to bed at 12:15, and others stayed up and watched a movie until 2:30. I enjoyed an uninterrupted night of sleep until 8:20 or so, when I realized I'd better get up if I wanted to say goodbye to Elizabeth, since the conference was starting up again at 9:00! Dawn, Christine, and I had a leisurely breakfast, including Elizabeth's homemade cinnamon rolls, and then Christine and I stayed and talked until 11:30, when I realized I needed to get home before Nathan's basketball game!
Back at home, Bob was dealing with more sickness. Caleb and Grace still have pinkeye, although it hasn't been a very gunky, nasty deal. But every morning, they wake up with their eyes matted shut, and each one has had the virus spread to their other eye. Nathan also was running a fever when he got up Saturday. We gave him some Motrin, but still sent him to his game, since the season is almost done, and he really wanted to play. He even scored, so he was very happy he didn't miss!
My eye has also been bothering me, so I guess I have pinkeye as well. It mainly bugs me at night, when it waters and gets a little gunky, but it's not too bad. This cold I have is another story, however. I have a stuffy head and a sore throat, and naturally Bob is going TDY next week for the whole week. Oh well, we'll survive. He let me just stay in bed this morning, in an attempt to fight it. Anna woke up with her eye gunky, as did Nathan, who is still running a fever, so needless to say, we did not make it to church. I'm sure everyone there will be thrilled when they find out we did not expose them to all our various diseases and plagues, LOL.
Bob's not feeling 100% either, so we're praying he doesn't get sick during the TDY. Maybe getting away from this house o' germs will be just what the doctor ordered! We really haven't been sick at all this winter, so I guess we are due.
I got to Elizabeth's house a little before 7:00. I was the first one there, and it was so nice and quiet. Ahhhhhhh. I brought some scrapbooking stuff and actually finished several pages before Christine and then Dawn came. We snacked on chips and dip (using Amy's good recipe, which was a hit) and talked.
The other women came back from the conference aaround 10:00, and then we brought out the rest of the snacks--a trifle, brownies, veggies and dip, strawberries and chocolate fondue . . . yeah, we were living it up, LOL! We talked and laughed for awhile, culminating in the decision to play the game where everyone tells 3 statements about themselves, 2 true and 1 false. THat was a lot of fun, although I was battling this head cold and had a stuffy head. I could not think if ANYTHING remotely interesting to lie about. I went last, and hemmed and hawed around for awhile. Eventually I came up with 3 things, but they weren't my best work. I went to bed at 12:15, and others stayed up and watched a movie until 2:30. I enjoyed an uninterrupted night of sleep until 8:20 or so, when I realized I'd better get up if I wanted to say goodbye to Elizabeth, since the conference was starting up again at 9:00! Dawn, Christine, and I had a leisurely breakfast, including Elizabeth's homemade cinnamon rolls, and then Christine and I stayed and talked until 11:30, when I realized I needed to get home before Nathan's basketball game!
Back at home, Bob was dealing with more sickness. Caleb and Grace still have pinkeye, although it hasn't been a very gunky, nasty deal. But every morning, they wake up with their eyes matted shut, and each one has had the virus spread to their other eye. Nathan also was running a fever when he got up Saturday. We gave him some Motrin, but still sent him to his game, since the season is almost done, and he really wanted to play. He even scored, so he was very happy he didn't miss!
My eye has also been bothering me, so I guess I have pinkeye as well. It mainly bugs me at night, when it waters and gets a little gunky, but it's not too bad. This cold I have is another story, however. I have a stuffy head and a sore throat, and naturally Bob is going TDY next week for the whole week. Oh well, we'll survive. He let me just stay in bed this morning, in an attempt to fight it. Anna woke up with her eye gunky, as did Nathan, who is still running a fever, so needless to say, we did not make it to church. I'm sure everyone there will be thrilled when they find out we did not expose them to all our various diseases and plagues, LOL.
Bob's not feeling 100% either, so we're praying he doesn't get sick during the TDY. Maybe getting away from this house o' germs will be just what the doctor ordered! We really haven't been sick at all this winter, so I guess we are due.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Pinkeye Update
Caleb's eye is so much better! He got up once during the night, but by morning, it was not anywhere near as red and swollen or gunky. I did indeed have some breast milk handy, so I put some of that in there (thanks for the idea, Carri!). I called it "medicine". He did want further clarification, though, because he was a little worried it was "regular milk", to which he is quite allergic. I told him it was breastmilk, and he was fine with that--anything as long as it's not regular milk, LOL. His eye looks great this evening. Praise the Lord!
Grace had some gunk in her eye tonight after dinner and before bed, so I put some breastmilk in there too. Hopefully that will prevent anything from really developing. We'll see! So far everyone else has clear eyes. I have a terrible head cold though, so I am not feeling my best. But as I keep telling myself, at least my eyes aren't all swollen and itchy!!
Grace had some gunk in her eye tonight after dinner and before bed, so I put some breastmilk in there too. Hopefully that will prevent anything from really developing. We'll see! So far everyone else has clear eyes. I have a terrible head cold though, so I am not feeling my best. But as I keep telling myself, at least my eyes aren't all swollen and itchy!!
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
In other news . . .
Well, the only thing marring Luke's birthday celebration is the fact that Caleb has come down with pink eye. Ack!!! He came in this morning saying, "Hey, Mom, my eye is all gunky!" Words to strike fear in any mom's heart, especially one with lots of kids. Sigh. I'm pretty sure it is viral, not bacterial, so there's no point in going in to see anyone. We've instituted strict handwashing protocols, but it will still take a miracle for everyone else to escape unscathed.
The other problem with this little outbreak is that we spent yesterday morning at our homeschool co-op, and yesterday afternoon over at Johanna's house. Johanna has 3 boys and is about 35 weeks pregnant with a little girl. And her husband is deployed. I brought her a gift of dinner . . . and I am hoping and praying we didn't inadvertantly bring her a very unwelcome gift of pinkeye!!! (I'm so sorry, Johanna--Caleb was fine yesterday! I had no reason to think this was coming at all!!!)
One reason we went over to Johanna's was so that I could borrow her pilates DVD. I was supposed to take that class tomorrow at lunch time. Well, I've rescheduled that for next Thursday. That will give me some more time to figure this pilates stuff out, LOL. We all did the abs workout last night, and let me tell you, that was a riot! It was a little embarrassing to realize that although you once used to be able to do things like roll yourself up to sitting, there is no way that you currently can do that without a good deal of reaching and grunting, LOL. Definitely not with grace, like the lovely teacher, who has probably not had one pregnancy in her life, not that I am resentful of her perfect abs or anything, LOL. Who knew my midsection was so incredibly weak?! I really was surprised. No wonder my pelvis shifted out of place! It's a wonder it didn't just fall out altogether! So now I have a week to improve before facing a class situation . . . I'm off to the basement right now to do some more. Nothing like being in front of a group for motivation!
The other problem with this little outbreak is that we spent yesterday morning at our homeschool co-op, and yesterday afternoon over at Johanna's house. Johanna has 3 boys and is about 35 weeks pregnant with a little girl. And her husband is deployed. I brought her a gift of dinner . . . and I am hoping and praying we didn't inadvertantly bring her a very unwelcome gift of pinkeye!!! (I'm so sorry, Johanna--Caleb was fine yesterday! I had no reason to think this was coming at all!!!)
One reason we went over to Johanna's was so that I could borrow her pilates DVD. I was supposed to take that class tomorrow at lunch time. Well, I've rescheduled that for next Thursday. That will give me some more time to figure this pilates stuff out, LOL. We all did the abs workout last night, and let me tell you, that was a riot! It was a little embarrassing to realize that although you once used to be able to do things like roll yourself up to sitting, there is no way that you currently can do that without a good deal of reaching and grunting, LOL. Definitely not with grace, like the lovely teacher, who has probably not had one pregnancy in her life, not that I am resentful of her perfect abs or anything, LOL. Who knew my midsection was so incredibly weak?! I really was surprised. No wonder my pelvis shifted out of place! It's a wonder it didn't just fall out altogether! So now I have a week to improve before facing a class situation . . . I'm off to the basement right now to do some more. Nothing like being in front of a group for motivation!
Happy Birthday, LUKE!!!
Luke is 9 years old today!! We're going to celebrate with ice cream tonight, and then we'll bring a cake to Bible study next Friday, since we don't have Bible study this Friday. For his birthday dinner, Luke has requested . . . (be prepared for a gourmet dinner menu) . . . tuna and noodles. Yes, that's right! Out of my whole repetoire, he selected a meal that I make when I am totally rushed for time. It's out of a box (well, lots of boxes, LOL). Sigh. Caleb did a similar thing on his last birthday. I'm not sure why I bother with more elaborate meals, LOL. Oh well, anything for the birthday boy.Of all my kids, Luke so far is the most like me in personality. The things that bother me about him are weaknesses of my own! He is still really shy, but this year has been a year of growth for him. He conquered his fear of riding horses, as well as climbed all the way up the rock-climbing wall at White Sulphur Springs this past Fall. I've seen him become more comfortable in his class at co-op, and he was a very confidant soccer player during the season. Who knows what this next year will bring?!
It's so nice to have another detail person in the house. Luke is my go-to man whenever something is missing. It is wonderful to have another set of eyes to help! Believe me, so far no one else in the house really gets all that concerned when things are missing--not anywhere near as concerned as I always get! He is a great big brother for the girls too. He loves to get Anna and Grace up from their naps. He is Anna's car buddy, and he is a tremendous help there, keeping her entertained.
Luke is such a blessing to our family. I am so glad God put him in our family 9 years ago, and I'm especially thankful for the Lord's care and mercy during his first few days of life, which were scary.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Working Together
The boys had a good time working together to make these kits from Lowes. We got them from Chik-Fil-A, where we went for dinner Thursday evening. Thursday night is Family Night there, and that night they had someone from Lowes helping kids make things. We didn't make the stuff there, but we took home 4 kits. The boys made 2 flower pot holders (what you see in the picture), as well as a picture frame and a desk calendar holder. 
And here you can see what the girls accomplish when they work together. In our coffee table, we have a basket which holds ziploc baggies of all our various card games. Monday night, the night before the appraisal so we can refinance, when I was frantically running around trying to make sure all the last-minute cleaning was done, Anna opened all of these baggies and dumped them out. Grace thought that was a great idea, and she helped by flinging all the cards all over the place, so that they were good and messed up. Note my very disgruntled expression. It took me quite a long time to sort out all those decks of cards. Our kids all work so well together! LOLA Big Day For the Kitchen
Look! A new dishwasher! Bob got it in and working today. We've already run our first load!! Its a Bosch SHE45M06UC, and we got it from Lowes. It is REALLY quiet, and it fits a lot of dishes. We are quite pleased. Bob was able to install it himself without too much hassle. I'm so thankful I have a handy husband!!
Here is our other new kitchen feature: a pot rack! We ordered it from Sams, and Bob put it up this evening. I am so totally thrilled to have another cabinet free, now that most of my pans are hanging. We will be able to store the coffee pot in the kitchen, instead of down in the basement like it is now! (Can you tell we are not coffee drinkers? We normally bring it up when we have company, LOL.) I feel like I have a totally new kitchen! How exciting!!
Friday, February 22, 2008
"Fitting In"
Nathan and I listened to Adventures in Odyssey last night on our way to basketball practice. We rarely listen, but this episode really bothered me. So here's the story: a boy named Freddie wants his dad to change jobs so they would have to move. It turns out that he is getting bullied at school, has no friends, and the reason it takes him an hour to get home from school in the afternoons is that he is taking this long, circuitous route home so he won't get beaten up. The dad talks to the principal, who is sorry and will discipline the offenders but said it wouldn't really make that much difference, since he can't watch over Freddie all the time. The parents decide to send Freddie to a private school, although the dad doesn't want to teach Freddie to "run from his problems". Poor, poor Freddie! Nathan and I were quite sad at this point, and I was glad that Nathan wouldn't have to face that sort of treatment as an elementary age student!
So then Freddie went to the private school. His teacher asked him to stand up and talk about what he liked to do. "Collect butterflies" was his answer. Everyone laughed. The kids also laughed at how he combed his hair when he first stood up. Then his teacher asked about an interest in music, and Freddie said he wanted to learn how to play the harp. Yeah. Through a conversation with another kid later, we also find out that Freddie wears pants that are too short. Freddie tries to change his hair, but he still ends up getting beaten up at the new school. The parents are full of platitudes such as "Well, we think you're great just the way you are, Freddie! Why should you change your hair and clothes?" Eventually the dad has a talk with him about how no matter what he does to the outside, the inside will always shine through (which must have been so depressing to a kid who can't find a friend anywhere!) Now Freddie eventually accepts Christ as his savior and is going to let Christ work in him, so it ended up okay. But I was very bothered by the story on many levels.
First of all, if you as a parent are going to send your child out into the wide world all by themselves, then I think it is up to you to teach your child a few tricks of how to relate and get along in social situations. It cracks me up that people always think homeschoolers are so unsocialized, and actually my fear was that they were going to start homeschooling this poor geeky kid (which wouldn't have been a bad option for him), thereby adding to the myth of the unsocialized homeschooler. Obviously this boy's problems started earlier, and the parents never helped him see that you don't try to make yourself stand out in hostile situations? That you wait until you get to know people a bit before telling your big dreams, especially if they are what others might consider weird, like a boy wanting to play the harp? Why let your child MAKE himself into a walking bully target?! And make sure your child is not wearing clothes that are way too small and has totally geeky hair!
Obviously, there are going to be people out there who are just bullies no matter what you do, and of course there are areas that you should not change, no matter how you are bullied, but just leaving it as "Well, we like you!" seems to me to be a bit of a cop-out on the parents' part when there WERE legitimate social areas they could have helped their son develop in that would have made him not be such a target.
And the whole thing about "not running from your problems"? Good grief! The kid was obviously in late elementary school. I'm sorry, but life just should not be so dreadful for a CHILD at that age. Parents should be helping him avoid those kinds of problems, not letting him potentially be scarred for life! Take the kid home, teach him some social skills, let him enjoy life and whatever his interests are at his own pace, and then when he is older, let him find people out there who share his unique interests. By then, a person is much more confident in himself, and there are just more options for finding like-minded people than when one is in grade school.
Boy, the whole thing made me glad to be skipping the public school stuff though. Children's hearts are tender and precious. I don't want my child's heart out there, being stomped on daily, and me feel like there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.
So then Freddie went to the private school. His teacher asked him to stand up and talk about what he liked to do. "Collect butterflies" was his answer. Everyone laughed. The kids also laughed at how he combed his hair when he first stood up. Then his teacher asked about an interest in music, and Freddie said he wanted to learn how to play the harp. Yeah. Through a conversation with another kid later, we also find out that Freddie wears pants that are too short. Freddie tries to change his hair, but he still ends up getting beaten up at the new school. The parents are full of platitudes such as "Well, we think you're great just the way you are, Freddie! Why should you change your hair and clothes?" Eventually the dad has a talk with him about how no matter what he does to the outside, the inside will always shine through (which must have been so depressing to a kid who can't find a friend anywhere!) Now Freddie eventually accepts Christ as his savior and is going to let Christ work in him, so it ended up okay. But I was very bothered by the story on many levels.
First of all, if you as a parent are going to send your child out into the wide world all by themselves, then I think it is up to you to teach your child a few tricks of how to relate and get along in social situations. It cracks me up that people always think homeschoolers are so unsocialized, and actually my fear was that they were going to start homeschooling this poor geeky kid (which wouldn't have been a bad option for him), thereby adding to the myth of the unsocialized homeschooler. Obviously this boy's problems started earlier, and the parents never helped him see that you don't try to make yourself stand out in hostile situations? That you wait until you get to know people a bit before telling your big dreams, especially if they are what others might consider weird, like a boy wanting to play the harp? Why let your child MAKE himself into a walking bully target?! And make sure your child is not wearing clothes that are way too small and has totally geeky hair!
Obviously, there are going to be people out there who are just bullies no matter what you do, and of course there are areas that you should not change, no matter how you are bullied, but just leaving it as "Well, we like you!" seems to me to be a bit of a cop-out on the parents' part when there WERE legitimate social areas they could have helped their son develop in that would have made him not be such a target.
And the whole thing about "not running from your problems"? Good grief! The kid was obviously in late elementary school. I'm sorry, but life just should not be so dreadful for a CHILD at that age. Parents should be helping him avoid those kinds of problems, not letting him potentially be scarred for life! Take the kid home, teach him some social skills, let him enjoy life and whatever his interests are at his own pace, and then when he is older, let him find people out there who share his unique interests. By then, a person is much more confident in himself, and there are just more options for finding like-minded people than when one is in grade school.
Boy, the whole thing made me glad to be skipping the public school stuff though. Children's hearts are tender and precious. I don't want my child's heart out there, being stomped on daily, and me feel like there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.
Funny Caleb Story
One of my friends from co-op called yesterday afternoon. She wanted to discuss a First Lego League team, which I think Nathan and Luke would really enjoy. She was also Caleb and Jonathan's teacher at co-op on Tuesday, and she had a funny story to tell about Caleb. She was talking (the subject this unit is "Jewish Feasts"), and she noticed that Caleb was leaning over and smelling the hair of the little girl in front of him! She caught his eye, and he sat back and grinned, obviously not at all bothered that she had caught him. Then, a few seconds later, he leaned forward and took another big whiff. What a goose! I'm not sure what this all means. Although Lisa didn't specify, I think I can guess who the little girl is--Taylor, who was also in his class last year, and who he hung around with on the playground during soccer saeson while we waited for the later practice to finish up. She's a sweetie. I guess her hair smells really nice too! This must be what happens when you grow up with only older brothers, and ones who could care less about taking regular baths. I certainly haven't noticed anyone burying thier noses in Nathan and Luke's hair and breathing deeply! LOL!
Lunar Eclipse
I'm a little late in getting around to posting this, but we were able to watch the lunar eclipse Wednesday night. We had a co-worker of Bob's over for dinner that night. His wife and baby daughter are down in Texas still sorting through things after the death of her mother, so he was lonely. We had a great time, including a game of Scrabble, and when he left, he mentioned to Bob not to forget about the eclipse. Which of course we totally had, LOL. We got Nathan and Luke up and we all went out to the deck to watch. Amazingly, the sky was pretty clear, so we had a great view. I think we came in a just the right time--the moon was still lit a little bit by the sun, but it was getting darker. We stayed out there with the boys until the moon was all the way dark and red. They were pretty impressed.
Back on Jan. 20, 2000, when we were stationed at the Air Force Academy, Bob and I watched a lunar eclipse. (I remember the date so clearly because I have a page in my scrapbook devoted to the event, LOL.) Because we were in Colorado, the eclipse seemed to be clearer, and the colors more vivid, but this one was nicer because we had Nathan and Luke to watch with us. Fun! I really enjoy sharing things like this with them!
Back on Jan. 20, 2000, when we were stationed at the Air Force Academy, Bob and I watched a lunar eclipse. (I remember the date so clearly because I have a page in my scrapbook devoted to the event, LOL.) Because we were in Colorado, the eclipse seemed to be clearer, and the colors more vivid, but this one was nicer because we had Nathan and Luke to watch with us. Fun! I really enjoy sharing things like this with them!
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Chiropractic Update
This evening I had my fifth chiropractic treatment. All I can say is--wow! What a difference! My shoulder is so much looser and less tense. It's absolutely amazing. The doctor has given me several different exercises to strengthen the shoulder/back muscles to keep the shoulder from rolling forward. I've been doing them, and I have been so surprised at how weak that area is when isolated. No wonder I've had so many problems!
My hip is improving as well. Apparently my pelvis just got really twisted in this last pregnancy, and after I delivered, it stayed out of place. I could tell it was really off because I couldn't even comfortably cross my right leg over my left one anymore--it was so painful. Sometimes it hurt even just to walk. I was sure my hip was going to go into arthritis at the ripe old age of 34.
I really feel the Lord led me to the right chiropractor, one who specializes in skeletal-muscular issues. I can't believe I am feeling so much better! It feels like a miracle to me, because I really just thought I would have to live like this for the rest of my life.
Today the doctor was talking to me about what I do to exercise my abs. I told him I do sit-ups, crunches, etc. He asked how effective I thought they were, and I told him not at all, LOL. I always tell Bob that I feel like I could do sit-ups faithfully forever and still have the same saggy, poochy tummy! He told me I was exactly right, and that my weak stomach muscles are the ones underneath the outer "6-pack" layer". Those ones are pretty much shot after all these pregnancies. So the doctor told me he wanted me to go to one of their pilates classes (for free!) so I can learn those exercises and do them at home. He thought I was "self-disciplined enough" to do them at home. Well, hopefully so, especially if there is a chance that they might help my tummy, as well as helping my hip and shoulder stay in the correct alignment! So I am signed up for a pilates class next Thursday from 11:45-12:45. I must say this is incredibly out of my comfort zone. I am definitely an "exercise on the treadmill or bike in the privacy of my own bedroom" kind of gal, not one who does anything in front of strangers. I need to get a video out of the library or something so I'll at least know what to expect. (This is the exact sort of situation where I am reminded how very much I am like Luke, LOL.) I need to line up baby-sitting as well. I tell you, if this class wasn't going to be free, I would definitely just never get around to signing up for it!
My hip is improving as well. Apparently my pelvis just got really twisted in this last pregnancy, and after I delivered, it stayed out of place. I could tell it was really off because I couldn't even comfortably cross my right leg over my left one anymore--it was so painful. Sometimes it hurt even just to walk. I was sure my hip was going to go into arthritis at the ripe old age of 34.
I really feel the Lord led me to the right chiropractor, one who specializes in skeletal-muscular issues. I can't believe I am feeling so much better! It feels like a miracle to me, because I really just thought I would have to live like this for the rest of my life.
Today the doctor was talking to me about what I do to exercise my abs. I told him I do sit-ups, crunches, etc. He asked how effective I thought they were, and I told him not at all, LOL. I always tell Bob that I feel like I could do sit-ups faithfully forever and still have the same saggy, poochy tummy! He told me I was exactly right, and that my weak stomach muscles are the ones underneath the outer "6-pack" layer". Those ones are pretty much shot after all these pregnancies. So the doctor told me he wanted me to go to one of their pilates classes (for free!) so I can learn those exercises and do them at home. He thought I was "self-disciplined enough" to do them at home. Well, hopefully so, especially if there is a chance that they might help my tummy, as well as helping my hip and shoulder stay in the correct alignment! So I am signed up for a pilates class next Thursday from 11:45-12:45. I must say this is incredibly out of my comfort zone. I am definitely an "exercise on the treadmill or bike in the privacy of my own bedroom" kind of gal, not one who does anything in front of strangers. I need to get a video out of the library or something so I'll at least know what to expect. (This is the exact sort of situation where I am reminded how very much I am like Luke, LOL.) I need to line up baby-sitting as well. I tell you, if this class wasn't going to be free, I would definitely just never get around to signing up for it!
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
A Dishwasher Saga, Ongoing
So I wrote a while back that our dishwasher up and died Friday, February 8. Bob and I looked at new dishwashers on our weekend away, but we still do not actually have a dishwasher. It's been quite an experience. Here's what's happened, and is happening, for those (like Melinda!) who are curious.
We read the Consumer Reports article on dishwashers at the library on Saturday, Feb. 9. Their top recommendation is the Sears 1374. We finally decided we would get that one (as opposed to the cheaper Whirlpool that was a Best Buy, but not so highly ranked) on Sunday, but when we were in the process of buying it, the not-very-helpful Sears salesman Derek told us we wouldn't be able to get it until Tuesday. Well, that stunk, since we really wanted to pick it up Monday so my dad could help Bob put it in. We were really hungry, so we just left without buying it then.
Bob went back to Sears on Thursday, Feb. 14, to actually buy it. Derek was still there, and this time he told Bob we couldn't get it until Feb. 23. This was frustrating, but oh well. We laid in a stock of paper plates and prepared to wait things out.
After that, Bob thought that maybe we should get stainless instead of black. Saturday we all went back to Sears to look at the stainless one and see if we should change our order. Well, Derek told us this time that we couldn't get a stainless one until March 1, either pick-up or delivery. Forget that!
Coincidentally, my brother Dan and his wife Melinda down in Texas were also looking for a dishwasher that same day! They decided they wanted a Bosch, so they went to Lowes and bought one, getting it price-matched to the cheaper Sears price. After we left Sears, we headed over to Lowes to check out Dan and Melinda's model, since we're nosy. Nice! Very nice! Quieter, with a stainless steel tub inside, and a Bosch name. Hmmmm.
After the kids went to bed Saturday night, Bob got on the computer. We didn't think there were any other Sears really close, but it turns out there is another one not too terribly far away. On the Sears website it showed that they had the stainless one in stock and available for store pick-up the next day. So Bob bought that on-line. Yay! Well, the next day I stayed home from church with the girls, and around 1:00 we got an email from Sears saying that, lo and behold, that model of dishwasher actually was NOT in stock, so they cancelled our order. When Bob got home, he called that Sears. Ahmed, the salesman at that store, told Bob that we actually could pick one up at their distribution warehouse (the same one that the Sears close to us uses) on Thursday, Feb. 21. Well, that's a whole lot sooner than March 1, but Bob asked him how come they have a "next-day delivery guarantee" on their website. Ahmed eventually said that was only for delivery. Bob said he'd much rather have them deliver it--he only said pick-up because he thought it would be faster, since the web site had said "available for store pick-up"! So then Ahmed said that it could be delivered Monday (yesterday). Bob signed up for that deal, but the whole exchange left us scratching our heads:
1. Why was the other store able to get things so much faster than the times Derek was giving us?
2. Why did it seem like if you said the magic word ("Next-day guarantee"), then all of a sudden you moved to the top of the list? Why did no one at either store ever say anything about this?
3. Why didn't Derek at least check around with other stores? If they all share the same warehouse, and evidentally there were ones in the warehouse, then . . .
4. Was Derek's lack of desire to expend any extra effort at all for us indicative of what we could expect for future customer service from Sears, especially in the hopefully unlikely event of there being a problem with the dishwasher? (Actually we had some other concerns in this area. Until the time when we brought in all the kids, Derek had a bit of an attitude with us. When Bob went in on Thursday to buy it, Derek said, "Hey, aren't you the guy that needed it in such a hurry on Sunday?" When Bob told him that is was because his father-in-law was in town, and he was hoping for his help, but now he had gone, Derek said, "Well, that's good, 'cause you're not getting it until Feb. 23!" Definitely not feeling our pain, LOL. Also, when just Bob and I were there, I was looking at cooktops and overheard a really weird phone call that Derek was having with a dis-satisfied customer. It was obvious she wasn't happy, and then Derek started dropping the phone on the counter! It was so bizarre! He would say something like, "I don't know what happened . . ." but there was a group of salesmen standing around snickering. Yeah . . . not sure what his deal was, but I didn't really look forward to dealing with him anymore.)
So, long story short, Bob and I just really didn't feel comfortable with the whole Sears situation. We ended up cancelling the delivery that would have come yesterday, and Bob went to Lowes and bought the same Bosch dishwasher that Dan and Melinda just bought. We'll have dishwasher twins, LOL. It should be delivered on Thursday. I'll let you know if it actually happens. Totally weird.
We read the Consumer Reports article on dishwashers at the library on Saturday, Feb. 9. Their top recommendation is the Sears 1374. We finally decided we would get that one (as opposed to the cheaper Whirlpool that was a Best Buy, but not so highly ranked) on Sunday, but when we were in the process of buying it, the not-very-helpful Sears salesman Derek told us we wouldn't be able to get it until Tuesday. Well, that stunk, since we really wanted to pick it up Monday so my dad could help Bob put it in. We were really hungry, so we just left without buying it then.
Bob went back to Sears on Thursday, Feb. 14, to actually buy it. Derek was still there, and this time he told Bob we couldn't get it until Feb. 23. This was frustrating, but oh well. We laid in a stock of paper plates and prepared to wait things out.
After that, Bob thought that maybe we should get stainless instead of black. Saturday we all went back to Sears to look at the stainless one and see if we should change our order. Well, Derek told us this time that we couldn't get a stainless one until March 1, either pick-up or delivery. Forget that!
Coincidentally, my brother Dan and his wife Melinda down in Texas were also looking for a dishwasher that same day! They decided they wanted a Bosch, so they went to Lowes and bought one, getting it price-matched to the cheaper Sears price. After we left Sears, we headed over to Lowes to check out Dan and Melinda's model, since we're nosy. Nice! Very nice! Quieter, with a stainless steel tub inside, and a Bosch name. Hmmmm.
After the kids went to bed Saturday night, Bob got on the computer. We didn't think there were any other Sears really close, but it turns out there is another one not too terribly far away. On the Sears website it showed that they had the stainless one in stock and available for store pick-up the next day. So Bob bought that on-line. Yay! Well, the next day I stayed home from church with the girls, and around 1:00 we got an email from Sears saying that, lo and behold, that model of dishwasher actually was NOT in stock, so they cancelled our order. When Bob got home, he called that Sears. Ahmed, the salesman at that store, told Bob that we actually could pick one up at their distribution warehouse (the same one that the Sears close to us uses) on Thursday, Feb. 21. Well, that's a whole lot sooner than March 1, but Bob asked him how come they have a "next-day delivery guarantee" on their website. Ahmed eventually said that was only for delivery. Bob said he'd much rather have them deliver it--he only said pick-up because he thought it would be faster, since the web site had said "available for store pick-up"! So then Ahmed said that it could be delivered Monday (yesterday). Bob signed up for that deal, but the whole exchange left us scratching our heads:
1. Why was the other store able to get things so much faster than the times Derek was giving us?
2. Why did it seem like if you said the magic word ("Next-day guarantee"), then all of a sudden you moved to the top of the list? Why did no one at either store ever say anything about this?
3. Why didn't Derek at least check around with other stores? If they all share the same warehouse, and evidentally there were ones in the warehouse, then . . .
4. Was Derek's lack of desire to expend any extra effort at all for us indicative of what we could expect for future customer service from Sears, especially in the hopefully unlikely event of there being a problem with the dishwasher? (Actually we had some other concerns in this area. Until the time when we brought in all the kids, Derek had a bit of an attitude with us. When Bob went in on Thursday to buy it, Derek said, "Hey, aren't you the guy that needed it in such a hurry on Sunday?" When Bob told him that is was because his father-in-law was in town, and he was hoping for his help, but now he had gone, Derek said, "Well, that's good, 'cause you're not getting it until Feb. 23!" Definitely not feeling our pain, LOL. Also, when just Bob and I were there, I was looking at cooktops and overheard a really weird phone call that Derek was having with a dis-satisfied customer. It was obvious she wasn't happy, and then Derek started dropping the phone on the counter! It was so bizarre! He would say something like, "I don't know what happened . . ." but there was a group of salesmen standing around snickering. Yeah . . . not sure what his deal was, but I didn't really look forward to dealing with him anymore.)
So, long story short, Bob and I just really didn't feel comfortable with the whole Sears situation. We ended up cancelling the delivery that would have come yesterday, and Bob went to Lowes and bought the same Bosch dishwasher that Dan and Melinda just bought. We'll have dishwasher twins, LOL. It should be delivered on Thursday. I'll let you know if it actually happens. Totally weird.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Teething Troubles
Grace and Caleb are both teething. Grace is getting in 2 more teeth on the top, and this means that she has a runny nose, a killer diaper rash that is just now starting to clear, lots of droll, and extra crabbiness.
Caleb's bottom 2 grown-up teeth are coming in, and this means he has turned into, I don't know, a moth. Or maybe a silverfish. Or just a plain old beaver. Whatever. He is chewing holes in all his shirts. It is driving. me. crazy. He came to the dinner table several nights ago, and I stared in horror at his shirt. It looked like the sleeves had turned into Swiss cheese !! There must have been 10 little holes on each sleeve, plus the hem was so frayed and gnawed! I asked him what on earth happened, and he couldn't really give me a straight answer, but when I went to the computer after dinner, there was green thread all around the computer chair! Good grief!! I pass down all the shirts, so really he is chewing up Jonathan's shirts, which made me even more displeased. So I put him on long-sleeve probation, and he is having to wear short-sleeve shirts until further notice. I still let him wear his jacket, although he was chewing on that last night as well. Grrrrr. Dan and Melinda got Grace some lovely little teething rings for Christmas. I'm thinking of tying them around Caleb's wrists. And I guess I will be looking for used 4/5 shirts at the consignment sales next fall. These ones we currently have are headed for the garbage can, I'm afraid.
Caleb's bottom 2 grown-up teeth are coming in, and this means he has turned into, I don't know, a moth. Or maybe a silverfish. Or just a plain old beaver. Whatever. He is chewing holes in all his shirts. It is driving. me. crazy. He came to the dinner table several nights ago, and I stared in horror at his shirt. It looked like the sleeves had turned into Swiss cheese !! There must have been 10 little holes on each sleeve, plus the hem was so frayed and gnawed! I asked him what on earth happened, and he couldn't really give me a straight answer, but when I went to the computer after dinner, there was green thread all around the computer chair! Good grief!! I pass down all the shirts, so really he is chewing up Jonathan's shirts, which made me even more displeased. So I put him on long-sleeve probation, and he is having to wear short-sleeve shirts until further notice. I still let him wear his jacket, although he was chewing on that last night as well. Grrrrr. Dan and Melinda got Grace some lovely little teething rings for Christmas. I'm thinking of tying them around Caleb's wrists. And I guess I will be looking for used 4/5 shirts at the consignment sales next fall. These ones we currently have are headed for the garbage can, I'm afraid.
Ear Problems
Well, last night is was Anna's turn to be the one keeping us awake. She has had a bad cough/runny nose thing going on for a little while, but last night she cried from 1:00 until 3:00. Not steadfast crying of course. No, the kind where she fusses around for a bit, then is quiet for just long enough that you start to drop off to sleep, and then she fusses around some more, so you constantly wonder if you should go do something, and if you do get up, what should you in fact do. Not much sleeping was done, either on her part or on ours. I went in several times with water, motrin, etc., but I will say that my parenting was not the best. I am exceptionally crabby in the wee hours of the morning, especially when I can't tell what the problem is and how to solve it. She wasn't running a fever, but I think that she might have an ear infection. She was tugging on her ear some this morning. I don't want to camp out in Bethesda's ER, so hopefully she'll kick it on her own. I put some olive oil in her ear, and she was much happier after that. She seems to be having a good nap now. We shall see.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Happy Valentine's Day!
I was the recipient of not one but 7 Valentine balloons, one from each child plus Bob! We had a really nice dinner here at home. Bob grilled steaks in the kitchen. Our cooktop has a grill attachment, which we've never before actually used. To our surprise, it worked really well, and the steaks turned out great! (We were so surprised because 2 of the burners don't work so well, and the cooktop is about 15 years old--we figured something like the grill would for sure not work!) We also had baked potatoes, steamed broccoli, and heart-shaped sweet potato biscuits, with heart-shaped rice krispie treats for dessert.We ate this grand feast on fancy paper plates because we are still without a dishwasher. Bob bought one from Sears tonight while Nathan was at basketball practice, but it won't be in stock and ready for us to pick up until next Saturday (as in Feb. 23 just to clarify). So in the meantime we'll stick with paper plates. I know, I know--we're just like the pioneers . . . roughing it. Actually it hasn't been too bad. The boys have been good about rinsing cereal bowls, etc. out really well and just reusing them. We use these plastic bowls with built-in straws from WalMart, and each child has their own color. That makes it easy to keep track of!
I hope you all had good Valentine's Days with your sweeties!
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The Reptile Man
Today at our homeschool co-op, we finished off the reptile unit. The units all have 4 weeks of teaching, and then something special for the 5th week. For this fifth week, the Reptile Man (Mr. Michael) brought a bunch of reptiles to visit us. He talked from 10:30-12:30, and the kids were all very quiet and enthralled. The first thing he brought out was an alligator snapping turtle named Alexander. He put on a show by stretching his neck all over the place while opening and shutting his jaws. Next was a Mexican beaded lizard, which was quite a large lizard. After that came an alligator, which was only a few years old. This picture is of the assistant, Mr. David, holding the alligator. As he was getting the alligator out of his box, we got to hear the alligator hiss!
After the alligator, they brought out a crocodile, which was also only a few years old. The girls and I missed him because we went home so Grace could take a short nap. After the crocodile came the snakes--2 milksnakes, an anaconda, a copperhead, a rattlesnake (which actually did rattle), 2 cobras, and an albino python. That was where the girls and I came back in. Here is a picture of the python.
The kids all got to touch the python if they wanted to. Here are all the boys touching it. They all thought it felt really neat--soft instead of hard.
The man was really interesting and well-informed about reptiles. I, however, will never share his dedication and enthusiasm about reptiles, and I am just as glad to have this unit be over!
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Rest and Relaxation
Well, I must say that I am feeling rested and refreshed. It all started Friday afternoon, when I went for my first chiropractic appointment. I have had chronic pain in my right shoulder ever since May 95, when I had surgery to remove my right first rib after all my blood clot problems. We moved almost immediately after the surgery, and I never had any kind of follow-up with physical therapy or anything, and I have had such problems with that shoulder--hot, burning pain when it is stressed, and just sort of a dull ache most other times. Things that set it off include nursing, carrying a baby around, etc., so obviously things that don't impact my daily life. LOL!! You may wonder why I never got help before, but frankly, I think I have a high tolerance level for pain, and also I didn't know that anyone could really help me. I just thought it was my cross to bear, so to speak. Also, the military doesn't cover any sort of chiropractic care, so that never even really option. When we were in Colorado, I did get massages frequently from a massage therapy school, and those did help manage the pain.
What tipped me over to really look into chiropractic care was that last March, when I was 7 months pregnant with Grace, I started having real problems with my right hip. It felt like I had pulled something, but I just figured it was pregnancy-related and would go away after I had the baby. But it didn't. In fact, the pain got worse, and I felt like I was sort of hobbling around. Well, at this point I thought I was well on my way to becoming a crooked little old woman, and I was pretty desperate for relief. Also, this all came to a head in December, when I wasn't getting any sleep, and I thought I was going to have some kind of whole-body breakdown! I started asking around for chiropractor recommendations, since I was pretty worried about getting some crazy neck-cracker. I dithered around for awhile, but eventually I settled on a man that several people in our homeschool co-op go to. His website talked about the technique he specializes in, and it was for soft-tissue injuries such as chronic muscle problems. Hey! That's me!
When I found out my parents were coming, I sprang into action and scheduled my first appointment for Friday afternoon so they could watch the kids. The appointment went really well, and I finally have hope that I will be able to find relief from all this pain. He did a lot of stretching and muscle manipulation, as well as electric stimulation of the muscles, both in my shoulder and my hip. He did some adjusting, but nothing violent. I really felt a difference after he finished, although the problems are not completely gone. He said that after maybe 2 or 3 weeks, I should be straightened out enough that he can give me exercises to do to strengthen my shoulder muscles so they don't roll forward like they have been. Also, he said that it is very common for your pelvis to rotate and shift during especially the last trimester of pregnancy, and that is what happened to mine. It just never shifted back.
So I was feeling pretty relaxed and happy by the time Bob came home. The only fly in my ointment was that our dishwasher had chosen Friday morning to give up the ghost. What timing, although is there ever a convenient time for a dishwasher to go out?! We went to Cheesecake Factory for dinner, where Bob and I split a salad so that we would have room for us to each get a piece of cheesecake for dessert. As Bob said, "This is not the 'Chinese Chicken Salad Factory'; it's the Cheesecake Factory!" So we both thoroughly enjoyed cheesecake: caramel pecan turtle cheesecake for me, and chocolate coconut creme for Bob.
After dinner, we checked out dishwashers at Best Buy. Then we came home so I could nurse one last time, and when we set out again, we looked at Home Depot and Lowes. Hey, that might not seem very romantic to you, but let me tell you, anything that keeps us from having to bring all 6 kids to several different stores, just for us to look around and get an idea of prices and features is VERY romantic in my book! Then we had a very restful night of sleep--from 11:00 to after 7:00 with no interruptions!! I will cherish this memory . . . sigh . . .
Meanwhile, the kids reprised their night-time restlessness for Grandma and Grandma. First Anna and Grace fussed around off and on for quite a while. Then Jonathan was up to his old early morning stand-by-the-bed-for-attention potty routine. Caleb got up a little while later feeling wheezy. After an unsuccessful search for his inhaler, Grandma sent him back to bed. Obviously he must not have been too bad off because he did go right back to sleep. The other boys took turns coughing through the night as well. At least Grace (who had gotten shots Friday morning) did not wake up in the middle of the night wanting to be nursed! She did very well with a sippy cup.
After Bob and I had a nice big breakfast at the hotel, we were off again, this time to Sears for more dishwashers. The good news is I think we have narrowed down our choices. The bad news is, if we get one from Sears, then we will probably wait until Feb. 15 to get one, since the salesman told me they were having a 15% off sale starting then. Mom and Dad will be gone by then (and Dad happens to have experience installing dishwashers!), and I am not looking forward to another week without a dishwasher. Even with paper plates, 8 people use up a lot of dishes! But I am looking forward to a nice, new dishwasher. Ironically, a new dishwasher has been on our list for quite a while already. Our old one, a GE, has been recalled for some kind of electrical problem, and we also were having some problems with the seal. New ones are so much bigger and quieter. Almost anything we get will be a real step up! Of course, as long as the old one was still working, replacing it just didn't have the same sense of urgency that it does now, LOL. Hopefully I will have something concrete to report to you within the next week. In the meantime, I am hoping for another restful night sleep, this time in my own bed. We'll see . . .
What tipped me over to really look into chiropractic care was that last March, when I was 7 months pregnant with Grace, I started having real problems with my right hip. It felt like I had pulled something, but I just figured it was pregnancy-related and would go away after I had the baby. But it didn't. In fact, the pain got worse, and I felt like I was sort of hobbling around. Well, at this point I thought I was well on my way to becoming a crooked little old woman, and I was pretty desperate for relief. Also, this all came to a head in December, when I wasn't getting any sleep, and I thought I was going to have some kind of whole-body breakdown! I started asking around for chiropractor recommendations, since I was pretty worried about getting some crazy neck-cracker. I dithered around for awhile, but eventually I settled on a man that several people in our homeschool co-op go to. His website talked about the technique he specializes in, and it was for soft-tissue injuries such as chronic muscle problems. Hey! That's me!
When I found out my parents were coming, I sprang into action and scheduled my first appointment for Friday afternoon so they could watch the kids. The appointment went really well, and I finally have hope that I will be able to find relief from all this pain. He did a lot of stretching and muscle manipulation, as well as electric stimulation of the muscles, both in my shoulder and my hip. He did some adjusting, but nothing violent. I really felt a difference after he finished, although the problems are not completely gone. He said that after maybe 2 or 3 weeks, I should be straightened out enough that he can give me exercises to do to strengthen my shoulder muscles so they don't roll forward like they have been. Also, he said that it is very common for your pelvis to rotate and shift during especially the last trimester of pregnancy, and that is what happened to mine. It just never shifted back.
So I was feeling pretty relaxed and happy by the time Bob came home. The only fly in my ointment was that our dishwasher had chosen Friday morning to give up the ghost. What timing, although is there ever a convenient time for a dishwasher to go out?! We went to Cheesecake Factory for dinner, where Bob and I split a salad so that we would have room for us to each get a piece of cheesecake for dessert. As Bob said, "This is not the 'Chinese Chicken Salad Factory'; it's the Cheesecake Factory!" So we both thoroughly enjoyed cheesecake: caramel pecan turtle cheesecake for me, and chocolate coconut creme for Bob.
After dinner, we checked out dishwashers at Best Buy. Then we came home so I could nurse one last time, and when we set out again, we looked at Home Depot and Lowes. Hey, that might not seem very romantic to you, but let me tell you, anything that keeps us from having to bring all 6 kids to several different stores, just for us to look around and get an idea of prices and features is VERY romantic in my book! Then we had a very restful night of sleep--from 11:00 to after 7:00 with no interruptions!! I will cherish this memory . . . sigh . . .
Meanwhile, the kids reprised their night-time restlessness for Grandma and Grandma. First Anna and Grace fussed around off and on for quite a while. Then Jonathan was up to his old early morning stand-by-the-bed-for-attention potty routine. Caleb got up a little while later feeling wheezy. After an unsuccessful search for his inhaler, Grandma sent him back to bed. Obviously he must not have been too bad off because he did go right back to sleep. The other boys took turns coughing through the night as well. At least Grace (who had gotten shots Friday morning) did not wake up in the middle of the night wanting to be nursed! She did very well with a sippy cup.
After Bob and I had a nice big breakfast at the hotel, we were off again, this time to Sears for more dishwashers. The good news is I think we have narrowed down our choices. The bad news is, if we get one from Sears, then we will probably wait until Feb. 15 to get one, since the salesman told me they were having a 15% off sale starting then. Mom and Dad will be gone by then (and Dad happens to have experience installing dishwashers!), and I am not looking forward to another week without a dishwasher. Even with paper plates, 8 people use up a lot of dishes! But I am looking forward to a nice, new dishwasher. Ironically, a new dishwasher has been on our list for quite a while already. Our old one, a GE, has been recalled for some kind of electrical problem, and we also were having some problems with the seal. New ones are so much bigger and quieter. Almost anything we get will be a real step up! Of course, as long as the old one was still working, replacing it just didn't have the same sense of urgency that it does now, LOL. Hopefully I will have something concrete to report to you within the next week. In the meantime, I am hoping for another restful night sleep, this time in my own bed. We'll see . . .
Grace at 9 months
Grace turned 9 months old on Feb. 1, and she had a 9 month well-baby appointment Friday morning. Since my parents were here, I was able to just take her! How nice! She weighed in at all of 14 pounds, 2 ounces, which puts her under the 3rd percentile, so she is still officially a peanut. The doctor didn't give me too big of a hassle about her, since she is obviously alert, healthy and active. The one big beef I had with the doctor was when she found out I was still breast-feeding, she told me that I was only breast-feeding for comfort now, not nutrition, and I should start giving Grace milk in a sippy cup. Well, I don't have a problem giving Grace milk in a sippy cup, but I certainly know that breast-feeding is still the best thing nutritionally! Even the American pediatric doctor society (whatever its acronym is, LOL), recommends breast-feeding until a year. I guess this doctor didn't get that memo. I went back and checked Luke's baby calendar, and he was 18 pounds, 1 ounce at 1 year. Grace, being a girl, should be a bit smaller, but she is definitely on the same pace as he was (is). So what else can Grace do now? Well, she has mastered climbing stairs, a feat of some significance since 1. she has not yet mastered going down stairs without falling, and 2. we have 3 sets of stairs in this house. Everyone is on high alert to grab her if she should happen to start climbing. In my spare moments, I am working on teaching her to turn herself around to go down. With all the spare moments I have, she should be good to go . . . in a year or so.
She will also stand for a minute unsupported, although she still will not move her feet. She will cruise around a bit on furniture, and she loves to walk holding on to someone's hands. She also loves to clap her hands, especially at Nathan's basetball games.
She is mainly eating table food now. I still give her baby food, especially at lunch, just to make sure she gets more, but she also eats sandwiches and pretty much anything else we are eating. She picked up on feeding herself pretty quickly. I think that's a survival technique for #6, LOL. I certainly don't have time to just sit there and keep spooning food into her mouth!
Grace is a happy girl with a big smile, who is fortunate to be adored by 4 older brothers and one older sister! She leads a pretty great life right now!
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Happy Birthday to Me!!
Wow, another birthday for me! For all those who have sent me cards or wished me a happy birthday, thank you very much! I did have a very nice day! My friend Johanna came with her 3 boys after her midwife appointment, and they played here the whole afternoon while Johanna and I visited. My boys had such a great time. Johanna and I went to high school together, and it is so fun to still be in touch with her and realize how much we have in common!
My parents drove in from Ohio this afternoon in time for dinner. What a wonderful birthday present! But wait--it gets better! Tomorrow night Bob and I are going away while they watch the kids--all 6 of them! I was trying to remember the last time Bob and I were able to spend the night away from the kids, and I think it was when we went up to Amish country with Amy and Jason back when I was 35 weeks pregnant with Jonathan. So I guess you could say we are due for another night away! I am so looking forward to a night of uninterrupted sleep, and a morning of sleeping in. Although our issues of the past few months seem to have resolved themselves, there are still times when Grace wakes up earlier than ideal, or someone else has some other personal problem. Hopefully I can get all the recharging I need out of one night away, LOL!
After a spaghetti dinner tonight, we all had ice cream to celebrate (remember, cake is not my thing). It was a great birthday, and I'm looking forward to a great birthday weekend as well!
My parents drove in from Ohio this afternoon in time for dinner. What a wonderful birthday present! But wait--it gets better! Tomorrow night Bob and I are going away while they watch the kids--all 6 of them! I was trying to remember the last time Bob and I were able to spend the night away from the kids, and I think it was when we went up to Amish country with Amy and Jason back when I was 35 weeks pregnant with Jonathan. So I guess you could say we are due for another night away! I am so looking forward to a night of uninterrupted sleep, and a morning of sleeping in. Although our issues of the past few months seem to have resolved themselves, there are still times when Grace wakes up earlier than ideal, or someone else has some other personal problem. Hopefully I can get all the recharging I need out of one night away, LOL!
After a spaghetti dinner tonight, we all had ice cream to celebrate (remember, cake is not my thing). It was a great birthday, and I'm looking forward to a great birthday weekend as well!
Friday, February 01, 2008
Mama's Kind of Birthday Treat
I am not a cake person. I know, I know--I make all those elaborate cakes for the kids, but for me, I really don't love cake. So to celebrate my birthday, which is next week, I made something different to share at Bible study tonight:
. . . chocolate-covered strawberries. Mmmmmmmmmm. I double-dipped 2 1/2 quarts of strawberries this afternoon in the good, good chocolate that I use for my Christmas candies. I left the other 1/2 quart updipped so Caleb wouldn't feel left out. I did half in milk chocolate, and half in dark chocolate. Personally I thought the dark ones were the best, but some others at the study preferred the milk ones . Regardless, they were all VERY yummy, and they all disappeared in a very short amount of time. Good thing I had also brought some chocolate oatmeal walnut bars left over from a co-op moms meeting last night! I am thinking I will go for the chocolate-covered strawberries each year now. That sounds like a wonderful tradition to start, don't you agree?! Much less complicated and better tasting than elaborate Star Wars cakes!
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Taboo Memories
Bob is TDY this week, so the boys and I decided to play a game to fill the time after dinner. Nathan went downstairs to find a good one, and he came back up with Taboo. That game was really popular back when we first got married, and I always enjoy playing it, but we haven't played it in a long time. Nathan said that one of his teachers at co-op had played that with them during a game-time, and he thought it was really fun, so could we try it? Luke, Nathan, and I had a great time playing it, and we will definitely play more of it. What a good way to help kids (especially boys!) be able to articulate their thoughts and learn to describe things creatively! And without writing!! We didn't play competitively. Mainly, we each worked through 3 words, with the other 2 guessing. It was fun.
It also reminded me of a long-buried Taboo memory. When we lived in Colorado, we spent one Memorial Day weekend in a mountain cabin with the L's and another couple, the B's, who were out visiting from Ohio. We had just gotten our new Honda Odyssey minivan 2 months earlier, so we were still learning new things about it. We got the van all packed up and headed over to the L's house to meet up. On the way over, the van started making this horrible alarm noise, especially as we would turn a corner. I searched through the manual but couldn't find any description of this new warning sound. It sounded like it was for the sliding door, so at the L's house, we opened and shut the doors, all of them, several times. The thing was, the alarm only happened while we were driving, so we couldn't really recreate the sound. Nervously we drove off into the mountains.
Fortunately, the drive was fairly quiet, with not too much beeping, so we relaxed a little. We made it to the cabin with no mechanical problems, and the doors didn't fly open or anything, so that was good, although the noise was certainly loud and annoying when it happened. If only we knew what it was warning us about!
After we got there, I started unloading the van. As things shifted around, I heard the noise again. Hmmm . . . that's odd . . . the car is not even on. I dug around until I finally discovered what was making the noise--the buzzer for the Taboo game, which we had packed as a fun way to spend an evening. Good grief! That never even occurred to me (although I'm sure it occurred to you, seeing as how this post is about Taboo, LOL). So every time we went around a corner or over a hard bump, the thing would buzz. On the way home, we packed the game on the top, and amazingly, we didn't have any more problems.
It also reminded me of a long-buried Taboo memory. When we lived in Colorado, we spent one Memorial Day weekend in a mountain cabin with the L's and another couple, the B's, who were out visiting from Ohio. We had just gotten our new Honda Odyssey minivan 2 months earlier, so we were still learning new things about it. We got the van all packed up and headed over to the L's house to meet up. On the way over, the van started making this horrible alarm noise, especially as we would turn a corner. I searched through the manual but couldn't find any description of this new warning sound. It sounded like it was for the sliding door, so at the L's house, we opened and shut the doors, all of them, several times. The thing was, the alarm only happened while we were driving, so we couldn't really recreate the sound. Nervously we drove off into the mountains.
Fortunately, the drive was fairly quiet, with not too much beeping, so we relaxed a little. We made it to the cabin with no mechanical problems, and the doors didn't fly open or anything, so that was good, although the noise was certainly loud and annoying when it happened. If only we knew what it was warning us about!
After we got there, I started unloading the van. As things shifted around, I heard the noise again. Hmmm . . . that's odd . . . the car is not even on. I dug around until I finally discovered what was making the noise--the buzzer for the Taboo game, which we had packed as a fun way to spend an evening. Good grief! That never even occurred to me (although I'm sure it occurred to you, seeing as how this post is about Taboo, LOL). So every time we went around a corner or over a hard bump, the thing would buzz. On the way home, we packed the game on the top, and amazingly, we didn't have any more problems.
The Contraceptive Mentality
Thinking about the sad anniversary of Roe V. Wade, I am linking a blog called Et-Tu, where Jen has written a well-reasoned post about her conversion from being pro-choice to being pro-life. It's a very good post, so I encourage you to read all of it. Her blog is very interesting, as is her story. She grew up aetheist but recently became Catholic. Her blog is her journey in faith, and she thinks very deeply about it. It's challenging to me, a Protestant.
Here is a brief excerpt on what she calls the contraceptive mentality many people have today:
The message I'd heard loud and clear was that the purpose of sex was for pleasure and bonding, that its potential for creating life was purely tangential, almost to the point of being forgotten about altogether. This mindset laid the foundation of my views on abortion. Because I saw sex as being closed to the possibility to life by default, I thought of pregnancies that weren't planned as akin to being struck by lightning while walking down the street -- something totally unpredictable, undeserved, that happened to people living normal lives.
Being pro-choice for me (and I'd imagine with many others) was actually motivated out of love and caring: I just didn't want women to have to suffer, to have to devalue themselves by dealing with unwanted pregnancies. Because it was an inherent part of my worldview that everyone except people with "hang-ups" eventually has sex and sex is, under normal circumstances, only about the relationship between the two people involved, I got lured into one of the oldest, biggest, most tempting lies in human history: to dehumanize the enemy. Babies had become the enemy because of their tendencies to pop up and ruin everything; and just as societies are tempted to dehumanize the fellow human beings who are on the other side of the lines in wartime, so had I, and we as a society, dehumanized the enemy of sex.
It was when I was reading up on the Catholic Church's view of sex, marriage and contraception that everything changed.I'd always thought that those archaic teachings about not using contraception were because the Church wanted to oppress people by telling them to have as many kids as possible, or something like that. What I found, however, was that their views expressed a fundamentally different understanding of what sex is, and once I heard it I never saw the world the same way again. The way I'd always seen it, the standard position was that babies were a horrible burden, except for a couple times in life when everything is perfect enough that a couple might temporarily see new life as a good thing; the Catholic view is that the standard position is that babies are a blessing and a good thing, and while it's fine to attempt to avoid pregnancy for serious reasons, if we go so far as to adopt a "contraceptive mentality," feeling entitled to the pleasure of sex while loathing (and perhaps trying to forget all about) its life-giving properties, we not only disrespect this most sacred of acts, but we begin to see new life as the enemy.
Here is a brief excerpt on what she calls the contraceptive mentality many people have today:
The message I'd heard loud and clear was that the purpose of sex was for pleasure and bonding, that its potential for creating life was purely tangential, almost to the point of being forgotten about altogether. This mindset laid the foundation of my views on abortion. Because I saw sex as being closed to the possibility to life by default, I thought of pregnancies that weren't planned as akin to being struck by lightning while walking down the street -- something totally unpredictable, undeserved, that happened to people living normal lives.
Being pro-choice for me (and I'd imagine with many others) was actually motivated out of love and caring: I just didn't want women to have to suffer, to have to devalue themselves by dealing with unwanted pregnancies. Because it was an inherent part of my worldview that everyone except people with "hang-ups" eventually has sex and sex is, under normal circumstances, only about the relationship between the two people involved, I got lured into one of the oldest, biggest, most tempting lies in human history: to dehumanize the enemy. Babies had become the enemy because of their tendencies to pop up and ruin everything; and just as societies are tempted to dehumanize the fellow human beings who are on the other side of the lines in wartime, so had I, and we as a society, dehumanized the enemy of sex.
It was when I was reading up on the Catholic Church's view of sex, marriage and contraception that everything changed.I'd always thought that those archaic teachings about not using contraception were because the Church wanted to oppress people by telling them to have as many kids as possible, or something like that. What I found, however, was that their views expressed a fundamentally different understanding of what sex is, and once I heard it I never saw the world the same way again. The way I'd always seen it, the standard position was that babies were a horrible burden, except for a couple times in life when everything is perfect enough that a couple might temporarily see new life as a good thing; the Catholic view is that the standard position is that babies are a blessing and a good thing, and while it's fine to attempt to avoid pregnancy for serious reasons, if we go so far as to adopt a "contraceptive mentality," feeling entitled to the pleasure of sex while loathing (and perhaps trying to forget all about) its life-giving properties, we not only disrespect this most sacred of acts, but we begin to see new life as the enemy.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Expensive Kids
Back on Jan. 25 Barbara at Mommy Life posted a little article from Time called For a Few, the More Kids, the Merrier . I love reading articles about big families, especially in places like Time magazine. "Experts" give their opinions after observing a big family or two, like it was a zoo exhibit. They especially love to postulate about reasons why people might possibly have more than one or two kids, and this article did not disappoint.
The article even mentions Loudoun County, home of yours truly, by name, as a place where "highly educated, highly compensated couples [are] popping out four or more children--happily and by choice".
This is funny, since I don't think most people in this area would consider an Air Force Lt. Col. with a stay-at-home wife to be "highly compensated", LOL. But hey, we must be, because the government has figured out that it takes a whopping $269,520 to raise one child until the age of 17.
Raising a passel of kids is an enormous financial undertaking even for the affluent. An oft quoted 2004 study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that families earning at least $70,200 a year spent $269,520 raising one child--and that's just until the age of 17. Tack on four years of college, and you're looking at a nearly half-million-dollar tab for each, or almost $3 million for six. "If you sit down and write out the numbers, nobody would have children," scoffs Jen Reid, 37, a stay-at-home mom in Berwyn, Pa. "You would scare yourself out of it every single time." She and her husband Charlie, 43, apparently don't scare easily; they've produced Charlie, 10; Lizzie, 8; Michael, 7; twins Mary Grace and Marta, 5--and Baby No. 6, due in February. Charlie's work as a real estate lawyer covers expenses, but "we spend what we make," says Jen.
That's $15,854 a year!!! As soon as I saw that number, I thought, "That is a ridiculously insane number. How on earth did anyone come up with that? Obviously not by talking to people with lots of kids." So I did some googling, and I found a short little article detailing some of the problems with the methadology, a large part being how the government accounts for housing and transportation costs. Obviously, each time we have another child, our housing and transportation costs do not go up 1/6. In fact, we go less places, since it's a hassle, so many things decrease!
Of course, big families never really disappeared. Immigrants tend to have more kids, as do Mormons, some Catholics and a growing cadre of fundamentalist Christians. But in the U.S. today, the average number of children per mom is about 2, compared with 2.5 in the 1970s. While 34.3% of married women ages 40 to 44 had four or more children in 1976, only 11.5% did in 2004, according to the Current Population Survey. Though factoring in affluence can be statistically tricky, an analysis by Steven Martin, associate professor of sociology at the University of Maryland, shows that the proportion of affluent families with four or more kids increased from 7% in 1991-96 to 11% in 1998-2004. Andrew Cherlin, a sociology professor at Johns Hopkins University, speculates, "For most people, two is enough because there are so many other competing ways to spend your time and money. People prefer to have fewer kids and invest more in them. My guess is the wealthy are having more because they enjoy children, and they have the time and resources to raise them well. They don't have to make those trade-offs."
It goes on to talk about a couple with 5 kids at home from New York who have nothing in common with any other large family I have ever even heard of; a family who, it sounds like, relies on a bevy of baby-sitters to make any sort of order in their life. Just like us! Ha!
The article even mentions Loudoun County, home of yours truly, by name, as a place where "highly educated, highly compensated couples [are] popping out four or more children--happily and by choice".
This is funny, since I don't think most people in this area would consider an Air Force Lt. Col. with a stay-at-home wife to be "highly compensated", LOL. But hey, we must be, because the government has figured out that it takes a whopping $269,520 to raise one child until the age of 17.
Raising a passel of kids is an enormous financial undertaking even for the affluent. An oft quoted 2004 study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that families earning at least $70,200 a year spent $269,520 raising one child--and that's just until the age of 17. Tack on four years of college, and you're looking at a nearly half-million-dollar tab for each, or almost $3 million for six. "If you sit down and write out the numbers, nobody would have children," scoffs Jen Reid, 37, a stay-at-home mom in Berwyn, Pa. "You would scare yourself out of it every single time." She and her husband Charlie, 43, apparently don't scare easily; they've produced Charlie, 10; Lizzie, 8; Michael, 7; twins Mary Grace and Marta, 5--and Baby No. 6, due in February. Charlie's work as a real estate lawyer covers expenses, but "we spend what we make," says Jen.
That's $15,854 a year!!! As soon as I saw that number, I thought, "That is a ridiculously insane number. How on earth did anyone come up with that? Obviously not by talking to people with lots of kids." So I did some googling, and I found a short little article detailing some of the problems with the methadology, a large part being how the government accounts for housing and transportation costs. Obviously, each time we have another child, our housing and transportation costs do not go up 1/6. In fact, we go less places, since it's a hassle, so many things decrease!
I decided to think about how much Nathan is costing us this year, since he is the oldest and has the most expenses. By that I mean he's pretty much the only one who gets new stuff, and even that is rarely. I would say 90% of his clothes are either passed on to us by friends or bought at a consignment sale, so don't be feeling too sorry for the other boys! Here is what I came up with using very generous estimates:
food: $2000 (I am estimating $1000/month for food and other WalMart-type toiletry expenses for all of us, a generous estimate in and of itself)
clothes: $200 (mostly used; I do have to buy maybe 3 new pairs of shoes, but we get cheap ones at WalMart, and we pass down the church shoes)
school books: 100 (mostly used)
co-op: $50
Upward basketball and soccer: $170
Camp Caleb: $150 (I think that's about right--I couldn't remember exactly, but it's less than $200 for sure)
gifts (Christmas and birthday): $100 total
That all adds up to $2,770. Even if we round up to $3,000, that still is not that much, and the other kids don't cost as much, since they wear the clothes and use the books that we already have. So for 6 children, not counting housing, insurance, utilities, and transportation, we spend less than $18,000. Hmmmm. I guess this is why it is somehow possible to have more than 2 kids, live comfortably, and yet not be independently wealthy. And frankly, I haven't noticed in the general population at large how "having fewer kids and investing more in them" is neccessarily turning out incredible citizens all around. I honestly don't think we've made any trade-offs by having a big family. Even if we were only blessed with 2 kids, I would STILL shop mainly at consignment sales and used curriculum sales, and I would STILL avoid expensive Disneyworld vacations like the plague, because I can't stand crowds! Sometimes I wonder if I didn't want a large family to give me a good excuse to do the things I would do naturally, LOL!
Here's the conclusion of the article: So why do it? Why, in this day and age, would any American adult--rich or not--have so many kids? Because they love them. Because professional achievement and money are something, but, asks Kellie Weiss, 37, a mother of five in Oradell, "What does it mean without family?"
Yep, we love them! And the more we have, the more we love. And the more fun we have. Really! Maybe someday someone will come ask us about it. We'll even break down how we do it for them! In the meantime, I would guess they are observing us in the aisles of WalMart and jotting down their observations so they can scurry back to their lab and make hypotheses, LOL.
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Encouraging Words . . .
We made our big every-6-weeks run to the commissary on Thursday. We get tons of attention at the commissary, what with our caravan of 2 shopping carts, loaded to the gills, a stroller, and several kids orbiting the whole procession. Nathan was worth his weight in gold, as he kept Anna entertained by goofing around with a stack of coffee filters as a hat. I would say that at least 10 different people said something to me about how nice, well-behaved, etc. our family was, and one person stopped me to tell me that she had heard 6 people talking about us an aisle back and saying how great our kids were! Warms my heart and almost makes the whole trip worth it, LOL. But the nicest thing someone said was . . . . . . . .
"You don't look like you've ever been pregnant a day in your life, much less 6 times!"
LOL! What a bald-faced lie, but very encouraging none-the-less!
Four people also said the famous line, "Well! You finally got your girl!" I am always so glad that we also had Grace (who the people couldn't see because she was in the stroller behind all the carts), because then I could point her out, and say that we actually have TWO girls! That always stops people in their tracks, LOL. What?! They kept going even after they got their girl?! That must mean the second, third, and fourth boys weren't just dreadful disappointments, LOL!
Caleb and Luke were also very encouraging this afternoon. Caleb had asked what we were having for dinner, and I told him enchilada casserole.
Caleb: "Why do you always make such good things for dinner, Mom?"
Luke: "Because that's all she knows how to make."
Awwww! How sweet! I guess I'll keep cooking for them, even though they eat everything up like I haven't fed them in weeks. Good to know I'm appreciated!
"You don't look like you've ever been pregnant a day in your life, much less 6 times!"
LOL! What a bald-faced lie, but very encouraging none-the-less!
Four people also said the famous line, "Well! You finally got your girl!" I am always so glad that we also had Grace (who the people couldn't see because she was in the stroller behind all the carts), because then I could point her out, and say that we actually have TWO girls! That always stops people in their tracks, LOL. What?! They kept going even after they got their girl?! That must mean the second, third, and fourth boys weren't just dreadful disappointments, LOL!
Caleb and Luke were also very encouraging this afternoon. Caleb had asked what we were having for dinner, and I told him enchilada casserole.
Caleb: "Why do you always make such good things for dinner, Mom?"
Luke: "Because that's all she knows how to make."
Awwww! How sweet! I guess I'll keep cooking for them, even though they eat everything up like I haven't fed them in weeks. Good to know I'm appreciated!
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Anna's Milk Challenge
This morning Anna had her milk challenge test at Bethesda at 8:00. Anna, Caleb, and I rolled out of here at 6:45 because we weren't sure how traffic would be on the Beltway. There were no accidents, and we made it there at 7:30. Drives like that make me think I should have had Grace at Bethesda--but then I'll hear about some accident tying up the Beltway for hours, and I know I'll again be so glad I didn't bother with it, LOL.
Anna drank her first bit of milk at 8:00, followed by increasingly more milk every 15 minutes until 9:30. I was worried that she wouldn't like the taste of regular milk, since she's never had it, but she did just fine. After her last drink, we still had to wait in the same little room until 10:30, just to make sure she wouldn't have a delayed reaction. Over the course of the morning, we watched 1 1/2 hours of the Wiggles (more than any person should have to watch at one time, LOL!), as well as a half hour of Blue's Clues, and then finally a half hour of blessed quiet where I read them books. Funny how techs never believe that really, it's fine to not have the TV on; we can entertain ourselves! We also had some fruit snacks, graham crackers, and laffy taffy. Pretty special! Nothing every happened to Anna, so at 10:30, we were allowed to walk around the hospital for another hour, just to make SURE sure that she wasn't having a delayed reaction. This was where Caleb came in. (Were you wondering why he was tagging along at such an ungodly hour?!)
When I talked to the allergist at Anna's appointment a few weeks ago, we also talked about Caleb. The allergist looked him up and decided he wanted a few blood tests run on him--blood tests that would have to be done at the lab at Bethesda because he didn't think the lab at the little Fairfax Clinic would be able to do them. I didn't want to drag everyone up there a different time to go to the lab, so I decided Caleb would just come with Anna and me and get it done then. And he could help me entertain Anna!
Caleb was not thrilled with the idea of having his blood srawn, but he was very brave and only cried softly a little bit. Afterward he and Anna both got a lollipop, which made both of them very happy. Aftr waiting just a little bit more, we were cleared to go home a little after 11:30--with only one child with milk allergies. I still can't believe it!
While we were at Bethesda, Bob was holding down the fort back home with everyone else. Nathan and Luke were very motivated to finish their schoolwork in a timely manner, since Bob said they would play Phase 10 after they finished. The best news was that Grace took breast milk in a sippy cup! I was so happy to hear that! Obviously things went just fine without me here at home, and I must be totally honest and say that I enjoyed the break from Gracie, who has just been so needy since she's been sick! And I LOVED having the break from nursing, LOL.
Anna drank her first bit of milk at 8:00, followed by increasingly more milk every 15 minutes until 9:30. I was worried that she wouldn't like the taste of regular milk, since she's never had it, but she did just fine. After her last drink, we still had to wait in the same little room until 10:30, just to make sure she wouldn't have a delayed reaction. Over the course of the morning, we watched 1 1/2 hours of the Wiggles (more than any person should have to watch at one time, LOL!), as well as a half hour of Blue's Clues, and then finally a half hour of blessed quiet where I read them books. Funny how techs never believe that really, it's fine to not have the TV on; we can entertain ourselves! We also had some fruit snacks, graham crackers, and laffy taffy. Pretty special! Nothing every happened to Anna, so at 10:30, we were allowed to walk around the hospital for another hour, just to make SURE sure that she wasn't having a delayed reaction. This was where Caleb came in. (Were you wondering why he was tagging along at such an ungodly hour?!)
When I talked to the allergist at Anna's appointment a few weeks ago, we also talked about Caleb. The allergist looked him up and decided he wanted a few blood tests run on him--blood tests that would have to be done at the lab at Bethesda because he didn't think the lab at the little Fairfax Clinic would be able to do them. I didn't want to drag everyone up there a different time to go to the lab, so I decided Caleb would just come with Anna and me and get it done then. And he could help me entertain Anna!
Caleb was not thrilled with the idea of having his blood srawn, but he was very brave and only cried softly a little bit. Afterward he and Anna both got a lollipop, which made both of them very happy. Aftr waiting just a little bit more, we were cleared to go home a little after 11:30--with only one child with milk allergies. I still can't believe it!
While we were at Bethesda, Bob was holding down the fort back home with everyone else. Nathan and Luke were very motivated to finish their schoolwork in a timely manner, since Bob said they would play Phase 10 after they finished. The best news was that Grace took breast milk in a sippy cup! I was so happy to hear that! Obviously things went just fine without me here at home, and I must be totally honest and say that I enjoyed the break from Gracie, who has just been so needy since she's been sick! And I LOVED having the break from nursing, LOL.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Sleepless in NoVA
Since November I have had a few nights where I have had uninterrupted sleep. I mean, maybe 4 nights total. "How can this be?" you might ask. "But I thought your kids were such good sleepers!" Well, yes, they were, LOL, all of them. Something happened in November, and, well, that was that. We started on a rash of unrelated night-time awakenings for all little people in the family--accidents, poopy diapers, bad dreams, upset tummies, teething, dropped pacifiers . . . the list goes on.
Grce has by far been the worst offender. She got sick with a cold or something after we came back from Ohio after Thanksgiving, and she had a hard time sleeping while being all snuffly. Then she spent the month of December teething (and sleeping restlessly). Finally those teeth broke through right before and after Christmas, and she settled down for a few nights here and there (bad habits die hard and all, LOL). Then she got sick after being in the nursery while I taught at the co-op. After the first week, she got some tummy virus, complete with vomiting. Even after she was better, she still kept on vomiting once a night at some random time for a few more days, neccesitating not just comfort but also sheet changes in the middle of the night! She was better when I taught the second time, but she was obviously still weakened because she picked up what I am sure was roseola. She began running an extremely high fever that I had a hard time getting down for several days. She slept VERY poorly during this time, even during the day. Now she's got the classic trunk rash. She is still waking up a few times during the night.
The other boys have had their issues as well, particularly Jonathan. In December he started a phase where he would wake up in the middle of the night to go potty, but he felt compelled to make us aware of what he was doing. So he would come stand by the bed to tell us he was going potty until he knew we were awake and had heard him. Then he would go (in our bathroom), and he wanted one of us to go back with him and help him pull up the covers. Yeah. We stopped the tucking back in pretty quickly, but it was a harder task to convince him we didn't want to know about his night-time pottying! One night a week ago or so he came into our bathroom (why?!) and I woke up enough to realize he was sort of stumbling around aimlessly in there. I started saying, "Turn on the light! Turn on the light!" because somewhere in the recesses of my sleep-deprived brain, I realized that he must not be able to find the potty. And sure enough, a few minutes later, we heard the unmistakable sound of pee-pee hitting the back of our bathroom door. Argggh!!
At least he is once again waking up to go, however. He has had very few night-time accidents in his life-time, up until December that is. Then both he and Caleb began having accidents (but never both in the same night, LOL). Eventually I put them both back into pull-ups for a week or so because I was so tired of all the sheet-changing and night-time disruptions from them! This past week has been accident-free, however (except for the unfortunate bathroom door incident), so I am hopeful we have turned a corner here.
Add in a few random disturbances from Anna, Nathan, and Luke, and you can see that the end result is not much sleep. I have never had a period of time where there were so many disruptions from so many different people at night! It really has made me get run-down. For November and December, my mouth was just under attack by canker sores. I never had less than one, and I usually had more than one. When one would start to go away, another one would start. It was crazy. We finally had a good week of maybe 3 nights of good sleep after we got back from Bob's family, and that seemed to break the cycle in my mouth. But I know that I am just much more on edge than I normally am, and I think that is a result of not getting enough good sleep.
At our church care group, which meets the third Sunday of each month, we have been studying a small book called, "How Can I Change?" by C. J Mahaney and Robin Boisvert. The theme is sanctification, and how we can "close the gap between who we should be in Christ, and who we are in actual practice". Back in November, we all said an area where we really felt like we weren't living up to God's expectations. My area was how I easily get frustrated with the kids (particularly when we are running late, which is most of the time, LOL) and I know my responses aren't what they should be. So let's recap--I recognize an area of struggle, and immediately everyone stops sleeping, which makes me tired and crabby and more likely to fall into easy habits of cranky, irritable, selfish responses. Hmmm. Obviously the devil is not letting this go without a fight, LOL!
One strategy we discussed on Sunday was attacking sin, particularly "at the moment we become conscious of it existence". I am becoming more aware of my bad attitudes and calling them that, instead of just sort of stewing in them, waiting for them to work themselves out. The chapter also emphasized not just taking off sin, but putting on righteousness in its place. So if I criticize, confess that, and then consciously focus on encouraging and honoring others instead. Here's a quote: "If selfishness is a recurring theme, place yourself in situations where you are required to serve." Well, that's checked off, LOL! Nothing like the home environment to bring out areas of selfishness, as well as give opportunities to serve! So yesterday morning I started out grumbling to Grace, who was up early (on a holiday no less!), after being up several times at night. Obviously that was just selfishness talking, as what I wanted for myself was a good night's sleep. I started thinking about how I was serving Grace her cereal and taking care of her (and I certainly wouldn't change that opportunity!), and my attitude and perspective was changed.
So we'll see how I continue to do with all this, and how many new ways the kids can come up with to interrupt my sleep! The things I took for granted back before I had kids . . . you know, back when I thought I was so patient and even-tempered, LOL.
Grce has by far been the worst offender. She got sick with a cold or something after we came back from Ohio after Thanksgiving, and she had a hard time sleeping while being all snuffly. Then she spent the month of December teething (and sleeping restlessly). Finally those teeth broke through right before and after Christmas, and she settled down for a few nights here and there (bad habits die hard and all, LOL). Then she got sick after being in the nursery while I taught at the co-op. After the first week, she got some tummy virus, complete with vomiting. Even after she was better, she still kept on vomiting once a night at some random time for a few more days, neccesitating not just comfort but also sheet changes in the middle of the night! She was better when I taught the second time, but she was obviously still weakened because she picked up what I am sure was roseola. She began running an extremely high fever that I had a hard time getting down for several days. She slept VERY poorly during this time, even during the day. Now she's got the classic trunk rash. She is still waking up a few times during the night.
The other boys have had their issues as well, particularly Jonathan. In December he started a phase where he would wake up in the middle of the night to go potty, but he felt compelled to make us aware of what he was doing. So he would come stand by the bed to tell us he was going potty until he knew we were awake and had heard him. Then he would go (in our bathroom), and he wanted one of us to go back with him and help him pull up the covers. Yeah. We stopped the tucking back in pretty quickly, but it was a harder task to convince him we didn't want to know about his night-time pottying! One night a week ago or so he came into our bathroom (why?!) and I woke up enough to realize he was sort of stumbling around aimlessly in there. I started saying, "Turn on the light! Turn on the light!" because somewhere in the recesses of my sleep-deprived brain, I realized that he must not be able to find the potty. And sure enough, a few minutes later, we heard the unmistakable sound of pee-pee hitting the back of our bathroom door. Argggh!!
At least he is once again waking up to go, however. He has had very few night-time accidents in his life-time, up until December that is. Then both he and Caleb began having accidents (but never both in the same night, LOL). Eventually I put them both back into pull-ups for a week or so because I was so tired of all the sheet-changing and night-time disruptions from them! This past week has been accident-free, however (except for the unfortunate bathroom door incident), so I am hopeful we have turned a corner here.
Add in a few random disturbances from Anna, Nathan, and Luke, and you can see that the end result is not much sleep. I have never had a period of time where there were so many disruptions from so many different people at night! It really has made me get run-down. For November and December, my mouth was just under attack by canker sores. I never had less than one, and I usually had more than one. When one would start to go away, another one would start. It was crazy. We finally had a good week of maybe 3 nights of good sleep after we got back from Bob's family, and that seemed to break the cycle in my mouth. But I know that I am just much more on edge than I normally am, and I think that is a result of not getting enough good sleep.
At our church care group, which meets the third Sunday of each month, we have been studying a small book called, "How Can I Change?" by C. J Mahaney and Robin Boisvert. The theme is sanctification, and how we can "close the gap between who we should be in Christ, and who we are in actual practice". Back in November, we all said an area where we really felt like we weren't living up to God's expectations. My area was how I easily get frustrated with the kids (particularly when we are running late, which is most of the time, LOL) and I know my responses aren't what they should be. So let's recap--I recognize an area of struggle, and immediately everyone stops sleeping, which makes me tired and crabby and more likely to fall into easy habits of cranky, irritable, selfish responses. Hmmm. Obviously the devil is not letting this go without a fight, LOL!
One strategy we discussed on Sunday was attacking sin, particularly "at the moment we become conscious of it existence". I am becoming more aware of my bad attitudes and calling them that, instead of just sort of stewing in them, waiting for them to work themselves out. The chapter also emphasized not just taking off sin, but putting on righteousness in its place. So if I criticize, confess that, and then consciously focus on encouraging and honoring others instead. Here's a quote: "If selfishness is a recurring theme, place yourself in situations where you are required to serve." Well, that's checked off, LOL! Nothing like the home environment to bring out areas of selfishness, as well as give opportunities to serve! So yesterday morning I started out grumbling to Grace, who was up early (on a holiday no less!), after being up several times at night. Obviously that was just selfishness talking, as what I wanted for myself was a good night's sleep. I started thinking about how I was serving Grace her cereal and taking care of her (and I certainly wouldn't change that opportunity!), and my attitude and perspective was changed.
So we'll see how I continue to do with all this, and how many new ways the kids can come up with to interrupt my sleep! The things I took for granted back before I had kids . . . you know, back when I thought I was so patient and even-tempered, LOL.
Sunday, January 20, 2008
| What American accent do you have? (Best version so far) Neutral You're not Northern, Southern, or Western, you`re just plain -American-. Your national identity is more important than your local identity, because you don`t really have a local identity. You might be from the region in that map, which is defined by this kind of accent, but you could easily not be. Or maybe you just moved around a lot growing up. |
| Click Here to Take This Quiz Brought to you by YouThink.com quizzes and personality tests. |
Beverly had a fun quiz over at her blog today. I've always thought I didn't have much of an accent, so I was eager to take this quiz. And it turns out I was right! I guess this is a result of my military brathood! (Beverly's blog had a cool map image that came with the quiz, but for some reason, that didn't translate on mine, so I have a box with an "x". Oh well!)
The link to my actual results page is here, and there you can see the map where my non-accent may possibly have come from. It's Illinois/Indiana/Ohio, which seems pretty accurate, as I have spent a good deal of time in Ohio! But you will also notice that Western PA is included on that map, and let me tell you, people in Western PA most definitely have accents! Bob is especially good at telling if people are from around Pittsburgh, but even I can usually pick up on it. Most of the members of his family have definite accents as well. Bob has lost his, however (thankfully, LOL).
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Little Snow Bear
It snowed today, and surprisingly, it stuck! We actually ended up with several inches, enough for everyone to go out and play in it after lunch. I got Anna all dressed up as well. It was her first time to play out in the snow--usually the boys go out while she's napping. She seemed to have a fairly good time, although she was so roly-poly that it was hard for her to keep her balance sometimes. She looked like a fat little blue marshmallow!I was so glad that we got our errands out of the way yesterday. We went to Sams, so our fridge and pantry were full! It was a great day to stay home and have Amy's yummy lasagna recipe for dinner. Nathan's basketball practice was cancelled, so we don't have anywhere to go tonight either! Speaking of basketball, I meant to mention in my update last post that Nathan had his first basketball game on Saturday. His team won, but more importantly, Nathan scored a basket! He was pretty happy!
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
SInce I last posted . . .
Here are new things going on here . . .
. . . the Christmas tree is down! We're mowing right through those goals! Now, 20 pounds off by next weekend! LOL! We took it down Sunday night, mainly because we had our pastor over for dinner last night. Sometimes I think company is my biggest motivator. We have to have people over for me to get anything done.
. . . we have a new treadmill! The tread part of our last one had been slowly starting to fray, and in October it finally tore. That made it easy not to exercise, LOL. We do have a recumbent bike, so I was not without exercise options, but . . . somehow I was a lot less consistent. No more excuses, however--we have the new one all set up, courtesy of Bob! It is funny--it is still near the bottom of the line, but it is so much nicer than our old one! My most favorite feature is the built-in fan. Ahhh. I'm really liking it.
. . . Grace has been sick! I think she actually WAS sick last Wednesday night--she vomited twice and was running a fever. She has taken a long time to really get all the way better, though, and she still keeps throwing up at weird times. She has been throwing up once at night, somewhere between 1:30 and 6:30. There's no rhyme or reason to this, and she's fine the rest of the day, even after I've started her back eating solid food (she wasn't interested at all in it Friday or even much on Saturday). It's a mystery . . .
. . . I'm done teaching reptiles! This week, one of the boys, Eric, brought in his pet corn snake. That was actually really interesting. We all got to touch and hold the snake. "Spot" is about 3 ft. long, and Eric's had him for 3 years. He keeps him in an aquarium and feeds him frozen mice once a week that he heats up in the microwave. Yum! Spot was really kind of cute though, I must say. Then we talked about different tricks various reptiles have for defense and camoflage, and finally we watched a video that pretty much summarized what we've talked about these last 2 weeks. I remember watching videos in class, however, so I made up a sheet of multiple choice questions for them to hear the answers to as they were watching. That helped keep their attention. This week, it was the 4th graders that were more easily distracted, but that was mainly because everyone wanted to share some story of a reptile contact they, or someone close (or even not so close) to them had experienced at some point. I guess everyone has had some memorable reptile experience. I trotted out my old thriller, where my mom threw rocks at a habu (a venomous Asian snake) from our back porch in Okinawa until she had killed it. They were all very impressed.
Well, that's all that's new around here! How about for you?
. . . the Christmas tree is down! We're mowing right through those goals! Now, 20 pounds off by next weekend! LOL! We took it down Sunday night, mainly because we had our pastor over for dinner last night. Sometimes I think company is my biggest motivator. We have to have people over for me to get anything done.
. . . we have a new treadmill! The tread part of our last one had been slowly starting to fray, and in October it finally tore. That made it easy not to exercise, LOL. We do have a recumbent bike, so I was not without exercise options, but . . . somehow I was a lot less consistent. No more excuses, however--we have the new one all set up, courtesy of Bob! It is funny--it is still near the bottom of the line, but it is so much nicer than our old one! My most favorite feature is the built-in fan. Ahhh. I'm really liking it.
. . . Grace has been sick! I think she actually WAS sick last Wednesday night--she vomited twice and was running a fever. She has taken a long time to really get all the way better, though, and she still keeps throwing up at weird times. She has been throwing up once at night, somewhere between 1:30 and 6:30. There's no rhyme or reason to this, and she's fine the rest of the day, even after I've started her back eating solid food (she wasn't interested at all in it Friday or even much on Saturday). It's a mystery . . .
. . . I'm done teaching reptiles! This week, one of the boys, Eric, brought in his pet corn snake. That was actually really interesting. We all got to touch and hold the snake. "Spot" is about 3 ft. long, and Eric's had him for 3 years. He keeps him in an aquarium and feeds him frozen mice once a week that he heats up in the microwave. Yum! Spot was really kind of cute though, I must say. Then we talked about different tricks various reptiles have for defense and camoflage, and finally we watched a video that pretty much summarized what we've talked about these last 2 weeks. I remember watching videos in class, however, so I made up a sheet of multiple choice questions for them to hear the answers to as they were watching. That helped keep their attention. This week, it was the 4th graders that were more easily distracted, but that was mainly because everyone wanted to share some story of a reptile contact they, or someone close (or even not so close) to them had experienced at some point. I guess everyone has had some memorable reptile experience. I trotted out my old thriller, where my mom threw rocks at a habu (a venomous Asian snake) from our back porch in Okinawa until she had killed it. They were all very impressed.
Well, that's all that's new around here! How about for you?
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Goals for the New Year
Now that the business of the holidays is over, I've had some time to think about what I want to focus on this year.
1. Taking down the Christmas tree. Yes, ours is still standing proudly in the corner of the family room. All the ornaments are off, and we never turn the lights on anymore, so it is a bit like a light-sink over there, blocking light from the windows, as well as just being 9 foot dark shadow. I keep thinking we'll take it down during the weekends, but we were gone last weekend, and this weekend there's football . . . maybe in February, LOL. But I thought I'd start off with an easy goal.
2. Losing 20 pounds. This next goal is not quite as easy as taking down the tree, yes? I still have 10 extra pounds from Grace, and they have not budged so far. I also have an extra 10 pounds from after I stopped nursing Jonathan. Evidently my metabolism really slowed while we were in Ohio, but I was pregnant or nursing the entire 3 years and never noticed. When we moved here and I finally stopped nursing Jonathan, I just ate as I always had, and I gained 10 pounds in a few months. I was horrified, of course, so I cut back and never gained any more, but I never lost it either (and then I got pregnant with Anna . . .). Well, this year I have a wonderful motivation--weddings!! Bob's niece is getting married on May 18, and my cousin James is getting married around the 24th of May. I'm still nursing, so I'm sure nothing is going to melt off, but we'll give it the old college try. Really I would be happy with just tightening up a few inches around my waist, so I am once again doing sit-ups and crunches like a mad woman (and if I ever told you that years of doing sit-ups have not gotten rid of the extra post-pregnancy pouch before, please be so kind as to not remind me of that, LOL).
3. Catch up on scrapbooking. I have stayed fairly caught up with my individual albums for the boys (if you don't consider that I haven't started one for either girl, LOL). I need to do Caleb's for last year, but that's all. I have 2 Christmases to do in my Christmas album, and I will pick up the digital pictures from Sams this week for them. That shouldn't be hard to whip out. My regular family album is almost 2 1/2 years behind, and includes the birth of 2 kids, so I am looking at a steeper challenge there, LOL.
4. Use more dried beans. I cook with beans a lot, but I've always tended to use canned beans just because they're so quick and convenient. I can have no idea what is for dinner, and then decide at 4:30 to have one of my many soup recipes that use canned beans, and voila! We're still eating by 5:30 or so. But I need to be more organized, cook a lot of beans at one time, and freeze them, like I do chicken and ground beef.
5. Have the boys do more writing. I've actually already started on this. I just want them to get more comfortable putting thoughts down on paper. Last year I started giving them 4 Latin sentences each morning to translate--2 into English, and 2 into Latin. This year I have added having them write a paragraph on whatever topic I come up with the night before (nothing involving research though--something like "Write about your favorite character in the Redwall series" or "Write about what you learned about reptiles at TnT"). One boy is very loquacious, and writes many more sentences than I ask for. The other boy puts down a bare-bones paragraph. The surprise for me was that it's Luke that writes the long paragraphs. Who knew he had all this bottled up?! LOL! Nathan talks a big paragraph to me, but when it comes to writing it down, he just sort of summarizes everything as briefly as possible. He doesn't like the physical act of writing, but maybe this exercise each morning will help with that.
Well, those are a few goals for this year, some easier than others. I'll keep you updated on our progress!
1. Taking down the Christmas tree. Yes, ours is still standing proudly in the corner of the family room. All the ornaments are off, and we never turn the lights on anymore, so it is a bit like a light-sink over there, blocking light from the windows, as well as just being 9 foot dark shadow. I keep thinking we'll take it down during the weekends, but we were gone last weekend, and this weekend there's football . . . maybe in February, LOL. But I thought I'd start off with an easy goal.
2. Losing 20 pounds. This next goal is not quite as easy as taking down the tree, yes? I still have 10 extra pounds from Grace, and they have not budged so far. I also have an extra 10 pounds from after I stopped nursing Jonathan. Evidently my metabolism really slowed while we were in Ohio, but I was pregnant or nursing the entire 3 years and never noticed. When we moved here and I finally stopped nursing Jonathan, I just ate as I always had, and I gained 10 pounds in a few months. I was horrified, of course, so I cut back and never gained any more, but I never lost it either (and then I got pregnant with Anna . . .). Well, this year I have a wonderful motivation--weddings!! Bob's niece is getting married on May 18, and my cousin James is getting married around the 24th of May. I'm still nursing, so I'm sure nothing is going to melt off, but we'll give it the old college try. Really I would be happy with just tightening up a few inches around my waist, so I am once again doing sit-ups and crunches like a mad woman (and if I ever told you that years of doing sit-ups have not gotten rid of the extra post-pregnancy pouch before, please be so kind as to not remind me of that, LOL).
3. Catch up on scrapbooking. I have stayed fairly caught up with my individual albums for the boys (if you don't consider that I haven't started one for either girl, LOL). I need to do Caleb's for last year, but that's all. I have 2 Christmases to do in my Christmas album, and I will pick up the digital pictures from Sams this week for them. That shouldn't be hard to whip out. My regular family album is almost 2 1/2 years behind, and includes the birth of 2 kids, so I am looking at a steeper challenge there, LOL.
4. Use more dried beans. I cook with beans a lot, but I've always tended to use canned beans just because they're so quick and convenient. I can have no idea what is for dinner, and then decide at 4:30 to have one of my many soup recipes that use canned beans, and voila! We're still eating by 5:30 or so. But I need to be more organized, cook a lot of beans at one time, and freeze them, like I do chicken and ground beef.
5. Have the boys do more writing. I've actually already started on this. I just want them to get more comfortable putting thoughts down on paper. Last year I started giving them 4 Latin sentences each morning to translate--2 into English, and 2 into Latin. This year I have added having them write a paragraph on whatever topic I come up with the night before (nothing involving research though--something like "Write about your favorite character in the Redwall series" or "Write about what you learned about reptiles at TnT"). One boy is very loquacious, and writes many more sentences than I ask for. The other boy puts down a bare-bones paragraph. The surprise for me was that it's Luke that writes the long paragraphs. Who knew he had all this bottled up?! LOL! Nathan talks a big paragraph to me, but when it comes to writing it down, he just sort of summarizes everything as briefly as possible. He doesn't like the physical act of writing, but maybe this exercise each morning will help with that.
Well, those are a few goals for this year, some easier than others. I'll keep you updated on our progress!
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Reptiles, the First Week
People have been asking how my reptile lesson went, and I am happy to say that it went just fine! I am teaching the 3rd and 4th graders this year, and so I have to teach the same hour and fifteen minute lesson twice, once to each grade. The third graders were first, and some of the boys were pretty distracted, but most people were interested. That is Luke's class, so it's fun to interact with him in there. I was a lot more nervous about the 4th grade class, because of one the boys in there has some definite learning issues and I would say is probably on the Aspergers/autism spectrum. He just is a little . . . off . . . in his dealing with others, and his response to social cues. He also doesn't read or write much, so I wasn't sure how he would do. It turned out that he did just fine. He is quite smart, and I think he picked up everything I wanted him to get, even though he didn't do the worksheets with us.
I started out talking about how we like to have things organized, like grocery stores, our clothes, etc. People wanted to organize animals as well, but it took until the 1600's before someone figured out the best way to organize them, by studying details of their bodies, as opposed to where they live or other ways of dividing them up. I have a poster showing how to classify a polar bear, so we talked through all the levels of classification, as well as how to remember the levels ("King Phillip Came Over For Green Spinach" or whatever sentence you may dredge up from the recesses of your high school biology class memories, LOL).
The we talked about what made an animal a reptile. When I asked what animals were reptiles, most kids said things like frogs as well as snakes and crocodiles, so this led naturally into the differences. For those of you who have not recently boned up on your reptile identifying characteristics, let me just refresh your memory:
1. They are vertebrates
2. Their skin is covered by hard, protective scales
3. They reproduce using eggs
4. They breathe oxygen using lungs
5. They are cold-blooded and cannot regulate their own body temperatures
We looked at each characteristic individually, so I think by the end the kids knew those 5 things pretty well. I did learn some interesting tidbits about reptiles. For example, did you know that nest temperature determines whether a crocodilian or turtle egg will be a male or female? It is not inscribed in their DNA. Interesting! Usually one nest will be only males, or only females. Also, some snakes incubate their eggs inside their bodies, so it looks like they give birth to live young. This is useful if the snake lives in a climate where the temperature might not be as regulated, since a steady temperature is so important. Also, sea turtles and sea snakes can absorb some oxygen through their mouths (turtles) and skin (snakes) so they can stay underwater longer without breathing. Sea snakes can stay underwater up to 8 hours without breathing! Sea snakes are also the most venomous snakes. I would never go swimming in the waters of Indonesia, where the highest percentage of these snakes live! Also, saltwater crocodiles live in those waters, and those things are nasty. Yuck. One last fact--if a snake eats, but it gets too cold, then he can't digest the food, and it will jsut rot inside him and kill him. SO he has to throw it back up before that happens. Gross!
After we talked about those 5 characteristics, we talked about each order of reptiles in a little more details. For example, why are legless lizards not snakes? In fact, lizards and snakes, while having similar body structures, have some differences. Lizards have a distinct neck and tail, they have ear openings behind their eyes (snakes don't have any ears at all--they only sense vibrations), and they have eyes with lids. Snakes' eyes are covered by transparent scales. Now you know.
After we got through all the lizards, snakes, turtles, crocodilians, and tuataras, we did a little worksheet I made up. It had 6 boxes--one for each level of classification, except for the bottom box, which had the genus and species: Alligator mississippiensis (American alligator). So the top box was Kingdom--Animalia. Then in the box I had lots of things, like snake, shark, mushroom, horse, starfish, potato, spider, alligator, etc. They had to cross out what didn't belong in the animal kingdom. The next box was Phylum--Chordata, and there they had to cross out anything that didn't have a backbone, like insects, mollusks, , spiders, etc. The next box was Class--Reptilia, so they had to cross out everything that wasn't a reptile, and then it was Order--Crocodilia. The only things in that order are crocodiles, alligators, caimans (they only live in South America), and gharials (only live in India and Nepal). The second to the last box was Family--Alligatoridae, which has alligators and caimans, and they didn't have to cross anything out there either. The kids got the idea, and could generally figure out what to cross out, although there were some tricky things (coral IS in the animal kingdom). It defintiely reinforced the idea of the levels of classification. If they went away with that, as well as knowing what 5 characteristics reptiles share, then I will be happy.
Next week we will review, talk about a pet snake that one of the 4th graders is bringing in, watch a video that we have, and I think talk about ways reptiles survive (camoflauge, losing their tails, mimicing coloration of more dangerous reptiles, etc.). And then I'll be done! Goodbye reptiles!!
I started out talking about how we like to have things organized, like grocery stores, our clothes, etc. People wanted to organize animals as well, but it took until the 1600's before someone figured out the best way to organize them, by studying details of their bodies, as opposed to where they live or other ways of dividing them up. I have a poster showing how to classify a polar bear, so we talked through all the levels of classification, as well as how to remember the levels ("King Phillip Came Over For Green Spinach" or whatever sentence you may dredge up from the recesses of your high school biology class memories, LOL).
The we talked about what made an animal a reptile. When I asked what animals were reptiles, most kids said things like frogs as well as snakes and crocodiles, so this led naturally into the differences. For those of you who have not recently boned up on your reptile identifying characteristics, let me just refresh your memory:
1. They are vertebrates
2. Their skin is covered by hard, protective scales
3. They reproduce using eggs
4. They breathe oxygen using lungs
5. They are cold-blooded and cannot regulate their own body temperatures
We looked at each characteristic individually, so I think by the end the kids knew those 5 things pretty well. I did learn some interesting tidbits about reptiles. For example, did you know that nest temperature determines whether a crocodilian or turtle egg will be a male or female? It is not inscribed in their DNA. Interesting! Usually one nest will be only males, or only females. Also, some snakes incubate their eggs inside their bodies, so it looks like they give birth to live young. This is useful if the snake lives in a climate where the temperature might not be as regulated, since a steady temperature is so important. Also, sea turtles and sea snakes can absorb some oxygen through their mouths (turtles) and skin (snakes) so they can stay underwater longer without breathing. Sea snakes can stay underwater up to 8 hours without breathing! Sea snakes are also the most venomous snakes. I would never go swimming in the waters of Indonesia, where the highest percentage of these snakes live! Also, saltwater crocodiles live in those waters, and those things are nasty. Yuck. One last fact--if a snake eats, but it gets too cold, then he can't digest the food, and it will jsut rot inside him and kill him. SO he has to throw it back up before that happens. Gross!
After we talked about those 5 characteristics, we talked about each order of reptiles in a little more details. For example, why are legless lizards not snakes? In fact, lizards and snakes, while having similar body structures, have some differences. Lizards have a distinct neck and tail, they have ear openings behind their eyes (snakes don't have any ears at all--they only sense vibrations), and they have eyes with lids. Snakes' eyes are covered by transparent scales. Now you know.
After we got through all the lizards, snakes, turtles, crocodilians, and tuataras, we did a little worksheet I made up. It had 6 boxes--one for each level of classification, except for the bottom box, which had the genus and species: Alligator mississippiensis (American alligator). So the top box was Kingdom--Animalia. Then in the box I had lots of things, like snake, shark, mushroom, horse, starfish, potato, spider, alligator, etc. They had to cross out what didn't belong in the animal kingdom. The next box was Phylum--Chordata, and there they had to cross out anything that didn't have a backbone, like insects, mollusks, , spiders, etc. The next box was Class--Reptilia, so they had to cross out everything that wasn't a reptile, and then it was Order--Crocodilia. The only things in that order are crocodiles, alligators, caimans (they only live in South America), and gharials (only live in India and Nepal). The second to the last box was Family--Alligatoridae, which has alligators and caimans, and they didn't have to cross anything out there either. The kids got the idea, and could generally figure out what to cross out, although there were some tricky things (coral IS in the animal kingdom). It defintiely reinforced the idea of the levels of classification. If they went away with that, as well as knowing what 5 characteristics reptiles share, then I will be happy.
Next week we will review, talk about a pet snake that one of the 4th graders is bringing in, watch a video that we have, and I think talk about ways reptiles survive (camoflauge, losing their tails, mimicing coloration of more dangerous reptiles, etc.). And then I'll be done! Goodbye reptiles!!
Monday, January 07, 2008
Checking in briefly . . .
We went to Bob's parents' for the weekend, getting back late last night. It was a good visit, as visits out there go. To be completely honest, you can't make up stories like we can tell. It's always interesting.
The trip was much more pleasant this time. We went up for the whole weekend, which we haven't done for a long time. The first night we stayed at our usual Comfort Inn (where Bob was the "guest of the day" and received not only a free bottle of water and package of peanut butter crackers, but also a bear with a t-shirt saying "Someone in New Stanton loves you"). This was fun, as we had time to go swimming Saturday morning, and the night was not as disruptive as it usually is, with all 8 of us in one (big) room.
Saturday night, however, we stayed with friends. Yes, some friends of ours from here in VA, the ones who first told us about our wonderful church, got out of the Air Force and moved to PA, only 30 minutes away from Bob's parents. Wow, talk about your worlds colliding! They live in a beautiful almost new house with lots of space and bathrooms. Their basement is finished, walk-out, and has lots of toys for the kids to play with. It was so, so nice to stay there. We even went to church with them on Sunday. It was so fun to visit with Paul and Lisa and have the kids all play together (they have 4). It really made the weekend nice, and now I am looking forward to March, when we are slated to visit again! Lisa did talk about the culture shock she is experiencing, moving from northern VA to western PA, LOL. It is just so different.
This morning, Anna and I got up early and drove to Bethesda for an allergy appointment. She had such problems with milk even in my breast milk as a baby, and she has had at least 2 reactions of hives after milk and ice cream. With Caleb's history, I was not surprised that she would have food allergies, and when the doctor at her 18 month well-baby appt. said she would give me a referral to the allergist, I jumped at the chance. The allergist did a prick test for milk (only), and I was completely unprepared for what happened--nothing. She did not react to milk! The allergist said that based on what had happened before, she probably outgrew a minor allergy, but it was such a complete shock. So now we have to go back on Jan. 23 at 8:00 for a milk challenge. She will drink a little milk at various intervals, eventually drinking 100 cc over 90 minutes. If she hasn't reacted during the actual test, then we will wait 2 more hours to make sure she doesn't react then. If still no reaction, then she will be free to have dairy stuff. While that would of course be really great, I will be sad for Caleb. He usually has such a great attitude about his allergies and all the stuff he can't have, but he does get sad sometimes. It was nice for him to know that Anna couldn't have stuff either, and he didn't feel so alone. Oh well.
Alright, back to reptiles. Tomorrow is my first big teaching day. I have never felt so uninterested or unprepared for teaching, LOL.
The trip was much more pleasant this time. We went up for the whole weekend, which we haven't done for a long time. The first night we stayed at our usual Comfort Inn (where Bob was the "guest of the day" and received not only a free bottle of water and package of peanut butter crackers, but also a bear with a t-shirt saying "Someone in New Stanton loves you"). This was fun, as we had time to go swimming Saturday morning, and the night was not as disruptive as it usually is, with all 8 of us in one (big) room.
Saturday night, however, we stayed with friends. Yes, some friends of ours from here in VA, the ones who first told us about our wonderful church, got out of the Air Force and moved to PA, only 30 minutes away from Bob's parents. Wow, talk about your worlds colliding! They live in a beautiful almost new house with lots of space and bathrooms. Their basement is finished, walk-out, and has lots of toys for the kids to play with. It was so, so nice to stay there. We even went to church with them on Sunday. It was so fun to visit with Paul and Lisa and have the kids all play together (they have 4). It really made the weekend nice, and now I am looking forward to March, when we are slated to visit again! Lisa did talk about the culture shock she is experiencing, moving from northern VA to western PA, LOL. It is just so different.
This morning, Anna and I got up early and drove to Bethesda for an allergy appointment. She had such problems with milk even in my breast milk as a baby, and she has had at least 2 reactions of hives after milk and ice cream. With Caleb's history, I was not surprised that she would have food allergies, and when the doctor at her 18 month well-baby appt. said she would give me a referral to the allergist, I jumped at the chance. The allergist did a prick test for milk (only), and I was completely unprepared for what happened--nothing. She did not react to milk! The allergist said that based on what had happened before, she probably outgrew a minor allergy, but it was such a complete shock. So now we have to go back on Jan. 23 at 8:00 for a milk challenge. She will drink a little milk at various intervals, eventually drinking 100 cc over 90 minutes. If she hasn't reacted during the actual test, then we will wait 2 more hours to make sure she doesn't react then. If still no reaction, then she will be free to have dairy stuff. While that would of course be really great, I will be sad for Caleb. He usually has such a great attitude about his allergies and all the stuff he can't have, but he does get sad sometimes. It was nice for him to know that Anna couldn't have stuff either, and he didn't feel so alone. Oh well.
Alright, back to reptiles. Tomorrow is my first big teaching day. I have never felt so uninterested or unprepared for teaching, LOL.
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Scenes from New Year's Eve
Here is what our New Year's Eve party looked like as we started the countdown (at 9:15, LOL). All the kids had noisemakers in hand (or mouth, more accurately) and hats on head!
Anna was ready too!
The big moment!
Grace partied hard too, and even picked up some much-needed "hair"! She actually did not really know what to do with all the noise and merriment, so she looked very serious and concerned the whole time. She didn't cry though, and neither did Anna!
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