Lots to Be Thankful For!

I'm 20 weeks along now, and I had another appointment this morning. One thing I am so thankful for is that I can leave Nathan and Luke home with everyone, while I go on my merry way to Bethesda. I had to wait awhile to be seen this morning, but I was just relaxing in the quiet, reading a Reader's Digest I had brought. Ahhh. Very unlike the last several pregnancies, with everyone squirming around in my lap as we read book after book in the waiting area, and as we crowd into the too-small exam rooms!

Another thing I am very thankful for is that I did pass my 3 hour glucose test! Yay! I have to retest at the normal 28 week time, but I was expecting that. I'm just glad to knock 10 or 12 weeks off the finger-pricking!

The baby's heartrate was once again in the low 140's, which makes me think boy. The girls' heartrates were all in the 160s. But I know there are plenty of exceptions to that little old wives' tale! I have my ultrasound on Dec. 3, so hopefully s/he won't be bashful and modest! None of the rest of my kids ever have been, LOL.

I went ahead and got a flu shot today. I don't ever go out of my way to get the flu shot, but sometimes, if it works out, then I get one. The kids got one last year, although I never did take Faith back for her second dose. Oh well. I doubt they'll get one this year, since I'm not really planning on taking them all in. Anyhow, my arm is really hurting tonight--I should definitely have had the tech give the shot to me in my right arm! What was I thinking?!

One thing that has been bothering me this pregnancy that I have never had trouble with before is that my arms are always falling asleep. Really. If I sit at the table and support my head on one arm/hand, then that hand will almost immediately start getting tingly. When I wake up at night to pee, whatever arm is on top (I always sleep on my side) is sound asleep. And it is PAINFUL to wake it back up again! I asked the doctor about it, but other than saying that pregnant women often had more trouble with carpel tunnel-type symptoms, which I knew, she didn't really have anything to add. I have cogitated upon this problem quite a bit, and I finally decided maybe it is a pillow issue. I sleep on 2 very cheap pillows that are squashed down, so that the 2 of them together fit into one pillowcase. I have noticed lately that they are even less puffy than ever! So I think a weird neck angle at night might be contributing. Tonight Bob and I went to Walmart, and I bought a new pillow--NOT the cheap $3 one we would normally buy, but a memory foam one! Ooooh . . . I hope it works anyway. I would really be thankful for that!

I'm also thankful to have good friends who are like family to spend Thanksgiving with! And the absolutely lovely thing about a potluck Thanksgiving meal is that any one person doesn't have to do too much cooking! So today I made a chocolate pecan pie, cran-apple-pear sauce, and the dough for ginger snaps, which I will bake up tomorrow. I also have to make the sweet potato casserole tomorrow. And that's it! Since my arm is so sore, I was also very thankful tonight for my wonderful Electrolux mixer. I love that big thing!!

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving day tomorrow! Here in America, we truly do have so much for which to be thankful!

Bunches of Bananas

Does this happen to any other family?! The kids go through a phase, I guess you'd call it, where they eat a ton of bananas. I can't keep them in the house. For snacks, at breakfast, in smoothies, etc. Then, all of a sudden--it stops. Usually right after I've been to Sams and bought 2 bunches.

So there the bananas sit. I am no help, because I only eat bananas that still have a hint of green on the skin. What can I say--I'm a banana diva, LOL. I try to pass off some of the ever-ripening bananas to Faith by peeling them before giving them to her, but she doesn't buy it. And everyone is just no longer interested in bananas at all.

The past week I've made banana bread, a double batch of banana oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, and finally today, frosted banana cookies. The oatmeal ones were just okay, I thought. I just grabbed a likely looking recipe off the internet because I wanted something easy and banana-y to take for our church fellowship meal Sunday. But I got no complaints, and all the cookies were gobbled up!

My kids' favorite recipe to use up over-ripe bananas is the frosted banana cookie one. I got it from my friend Felicia Gruber back in Colorado. She brought them over when we had a playdate at our house one time, and I immediately asked for the recipe! They call for nuts, but it's been years and years since I baked cookies with nuts in them--a little less than 9 years, LOL. They are more time-consuming, however, and don't make very many, which is why I wanted a different recipe for church. I do have a good banana snack cake recipe that I like to make, but I had just made that for a church small group meeting not too many weeks ago, so I was kind of bored with that. I probably have posted this recipe on here before, and some day I will update my blog so that I have all those cool sidebar options, like the ability to click on the different categories I have tagged (like "recipes"). But until then, I guess I'll have to repeat myself, since it is almost impossible to find old things I posted!

Frosted Banana Cookies

2 cups flour
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. cloves

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup mashed bananas (about 2 med. size bananas)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Grease cookie sheet and preheat oven to 375. Mix together first 6 ingredients in a small bowl and set aside. Cream butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla. Beat well. Add the mashed bananas and dry ingredients. After batter is well-mixed, add nuts if wanted. Drop from a teaspoon 2 inches apart on a well-greased cookie cheet. Bake at 375 for 10-12 minutes until golden brown. Remove from cookie cheet immediately to cool on a wire rack. Frost cooled cookies with banana butter frosting or any other glaze. Can also be served unfrosted.

Banana Butter Frosting

2 cups sifted powder sugar
2 Tbsp. softened butter
1/4 cup mashed banana (about 1 small banana)
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Stir all ingredients together well. If necessary, add additional powdered sugar to make the right spreading consistency. Frost cooled cookies.

Rivendell Update

On Tuesday we finished our 12th week of the jr. high co-op. Since we only have 33 weeks of academics, we are already over 1/3 of the way for the year! We are taking a break next week for Thanksgiving, and then we'll have 3 more weeks to go until Christmas break.

I think all of us moms are still pinching ourselves each week, as far as how well it is all going! Theresa has the boys reading interesting books, writing tons of papers, and doing lots of 20 minutes essays (which Nathan hates, but I keep telling him how grateful he'll be for the practice when SAT time rolls around). Siri is definitely teaching a Spanish 1 class. Nathan is going to be WAY more competant in Spanish than I ever was in French after my 2 years of high school French. Languages are definitely not his first love, but he is having a fun time. Now history with Christine--he loves that! They have lots of interesting discussions and books to read there. I would say that is his favorite class. In science, we are finally past all the botany chapters, which are definitely not my strongest interest, and into some genetics chapters. I LOVE genetics, so that is a welcome change! Right before Christmas we finally get into more zoology stuff, and we start doing dissections, beginning with the earthworm. I remember doing the earthworm in high school as my first dissection! I can't wait!

The last few weeks we've had some fun lab activities, many of which involved various candies, so you know they were a hit with the boys, LOL. We modeled DNA with Twizzlers, gum drops, and toothpicks.
Here in a non-candy activity, Nathan is putting yarn chromosomes through the stages of mitosis. As I am sure you can tell, these chromosomes are clearly in metaphase.

Last week I cut up these labeled genes, and the boys picked one of each allele from each parent. Then they had to put together this "spudoodle" based on the genetic code they picked out. So their alleles determined eye color (purple or white spice drops), ear type (popcorn or puffed wheat), hair or no hair (toothpicks), dorsal spines (3 different colors of marshmallows, as that one demonstrated incomplete dominance), leg color (push pins), curly or straight tail (pipecleaners), and either a 1 or 2 "hole" nostril (more pushpins). Nathan was the proud papa of this fine creation, LOL.

In the afternoon, after we pick up the younger kids from their co-op, Luke and the other 5th/6th graders have a writing class also with Theresa. She is really challenging them with writing assignments and books to read, and it has been so good for Luke! Christine is teaching a little writing class for Caleb and the other 3rd graders. It's a gentle introduction to IEW-style writing, and Caleb's writing is coming right along. He's working on a 3-paragraph paper on Pecos Bill right now. Jonathan often tags along in this class. He is my only one who really WANTS to write, LOL.

The younger kids are doing so well with their memory work time in the afternoon. They have memorized Heb. 11: 1-13 so far, as well as a science fact from each chapter of the older boys' life science book. This week's fact was "DNA segments called genes are arranged on chromosomes, and chromosomes are found in the nucleus. Human cells have 46 chromosomes." (I didn't really touch on the fact that gamete cells only have 23 chromosomes, LOL.) We've memorized 2 complete poems so far--"The Owl and the Pussycat" by Lear, which was a real kid-pleaser, as well as "True Nobility" by Guest. Now we are in the middle of "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day", which I thought would be good leading up to Christmas. We're memorizing it like the hymn, not as Longfellow originally wrote it. We've also memorized 12 points in my 32 point timeline, complete with dates. The last point we memorized was "Charles Martel and the Battle of Tours--732 AD". A very important date in history!

We also do mapwork each week, usually relating to something the older boys are doing in history. One week we all made salt maps of Israel, so they could be more familiar with the geographic features of the country. We've memorized locations in Egypt and all over the Fertile Crescent, as well as India, China, and Greece. We're back in Israel for a few more weeks, and then we'll move back into the world of ancient Greece. I've tried to work on modern neighbors of these countries too, because I think that is so important.

Lastly, this picture doesn't have anything to do with Rivendell, but I thought it was too cute. The co-op for the younger kids had their Civil War 5th week activity Tuesday morning. They had some great speakers come in--re-enactment soldiers and ladies in period dress. Most of the kids dressed up as well. I think this dress is another hand-me-down from Aunt Rose's girls, and it is still a little bit big, but Anna looked so cute as a little girl in the Civil War time! All the kids got either bonnets or army caps, as well as a little haversack filled with a sample johnnycake, hardtack, and 2 pieces of taffy. Anna's class also made these little drums. So it was a really fun day, ending a really fun and interesting unit.

Interesting Report from the Football Team Party

Tonight was the team party for Nathan's football team. Some parent on the team knows someone, and so the party was at a place that sells entertainment stuff for the home--arcade games, gaming systems, etc. The shop was just opened up to us all, and we could play whatever games we wanted to! Since we don't have a Wii, X-Box, or any other sort of game, you can imagine the fun the boys had! We had all thought it would be sort of a "Chuck E. Cheese for Older Kids" sort of place, where you have to pay like a dollar for each game you want to play. We had already told the kids we would just eat and not stay too long if that was the case, so don't pester us for money!

The night started off very bizarrely, however. This store was in an industrial business park type place, way down at the far end. Definitely a hole-in-the-wall location, and not a place we ould ever have stumbled upon on our own. We were, of course, about 10 minutes late, so all the close parking places were taken. We had to turn around and park closer to the entrance of the business park, several doors down from the game place. As we got out, we noticed a pizza delivery guy further down. He was backing out and then driving weirdly--there were lots of speed bumps, and he would speed up and then slam on the brakes, screeching and roaring. We hurried to the other side, where the place was we were going. The pizza guy was coming toward us, and although I was sure he saw us, he still was driving very oddly, so we made sure to hurry across. Then it took us a few minutes to walk down to the storefront. When we got there, we were greeted with a very odd scene--the pizza car was stopped but running, the driver's door was wide open, no one was in the car, 2 people were running away, and one of the moms from our team was standing there, in a bit of distress! I thought her wallet had been stolen or something, since the people were running off (was the pizza man chasing the robber?!), but no, it turns out the pizza man had turned in and had HIT the mom! Thankfully, it wasn't that hard, and she was at the right angle, so she didn't fall and go under the car--the Lord was definitely watching over her! Then the passenger, a girl, had jumped out and started running, and the driver ran after her. Okay . . . Bob wrote down the license plate and tried to call the police, but his phone wouldn't work. It was all so surreal--are we in the twilight zone?! Fortunately another dad from the team was also outside making a phone call. He was able to call the police, who came quickly.

As it turned out, the pizza delivery man was drunk. He was arrested, and although he will be in a heap of trouble, at least he didn't kill someone! Hopefully this will be a huge wake-up call for him. He definitely won't be driving again for awhile, and I'm sure he'll never be delivering pizzas again. The girl was totally weird--she told the police she usually is on valium, and she has anxiety attacks. Evidently she then had one, because an ambulance came and took her away!

Meanwhile, inside we all ate pizza, played games (well, not me, LOL), and had a lovely little recognition ceremony for the boys. They each received a minature replica of their helmet, complete with decals and team number! What a great idea! Much better than a trophy or something! Nathan really liked it. So it was a nice night, although it was definitely one to remember. I think the whole scenario made a big impression on our kids, to say the least!

Caleb's Birthday Weekend

Caleb turned 9 early Friday morning! We've been celebrating all weekend! My parents went to a retirement ceremony down in the Norfolk area, and they drove up here Friday night, just in time for cake and ice cream. We also had the McC's and the P's, both from our Bible study, over to join the party. Normally we would just bring the cake to Bible study, but we didn't actually have Bible study that night, so we had to make our own party!

Caleb wanted a "jersey" cake, like the Pittsburgh Penguins cake I made for Jonathan and Nathan back in June. Caleb, however, roots for the Anaheim Ducks (rather randomly, I might add, since we don't even know anyone who lives in Anaheim, LOL), so he wanted a Ducks jersey. I am fine with jersey cakes--they are not hard at all to shape or even decorate. I think it's funny that I seem to have "series" of cakes--first the Lego Star Wars series (crossing light sabers, A-wing fighter, R2D2, clone trooper, pilot clone trooper, and Anakin), then a brief Bionicle series (put to an end by my refusing to make any more, LOL--Vezok and Toa Gali), and also a "military" series (B-2, USS Nimitz, F-22, and a tank before I started blogging), as well as a few odd cakes before we moved to VA (cowboy boot, construction hard hat, space shuttle, dolphin, and pirate ship). Out of all of these options, jerseys are by far the easiest!

I decorated the cake Friday afternoon. I didn't quite get done before Faith woke up from her nap. She helped herself to what was left of the black (chocolate) frosting. She was quite a fan! The boys said she looked like her Uncle Dan, who has a goatee, LOL. I'm sure he is flattered.

Caleb got some fun presents. He got this Lego set from Bob's parents, and some 39 Clues books, plus a cool activity book about ancient Egypt from my parents. He also got a set of juggling balls from the McC's, and he has been diligently trying to make that all work. We needed Ed L's expertise, but unfortunately they were in OK, which is why we didn't have Bible study in the first place! It was a very fun evening, and I think Caleb had a really good birthdya celebration!

We continued celebrating Saturday, when we had Caleb's actual birthday dinner. He requested this sausage roll I make, and we also had fresh stir-fried garlic green beans, broccoli slaw salad, and some pineapple and grapes.

My parents are leaving tomorrow, and we are all sad to see them go, since this was such a quick trip. But we are thankful they came at all, since it was kind of a spur of the moment, last minute decision to drive out for the retirement ceremony and Caleb's birthday! It made Caleb's birthday really special to have them here to celebrate!

The Leaves Are Changing . . .

. . . the bruises are fading . . .
(One day after the 3 hour test)

(This afternoon, five days later--and no, I don't know the results yet, LOL)

. . . Ah, it must be fall.

I think football ended not a moment too soon. We bundled up for Nathan's playoff game on Saturday. Isn't Luke's reflective jacket nice?! He won't get hit by a car playing in the snow, if we get any snow, that is. Nathan's team lost, and I was sad for them . . . but happy to have our evenings and Saturdays back!

Sunday we had our annual time of fun at Chuck E. Cheese with our Friday night Bible study group. The kids all had a blast! I enjoyed the fact that they could all run around without me, while I sat and visited. Next year I'll be dealing with a 6 month old again . . .

When people ask me about what we do for Halloween, I like to point out that our kids dress up all the time! That's nothing special! Going to Chuck E. Cheese, however, is a once-a-year thing, and they REALLY look forward to that, LOL. I did have to run to Walmart Monday, so I did pick up some half-price Halloween candy. We discovered over the weekend that Caleb likes Twix bars, when a neighbor girl down the street gave him one. The first chocolate thing he has liked! So I bought a bag of those, and I'll put one in their lunches for co-op day for the next little while.

And in the spirit of dressing up . . .

. . . here is Grace, as a lovely ballerina, although I think her leotard is actually on backwards. This is another one from Bob's sister Rose and her 2 girls. I tell you, Anna and Grace have LOVED the stuff they have passed on to us!

And lastly, here is a picture of Faith, fresh from a nap. She is eating a Tootsie Roll that Luke bought for her out of his Chuck E. Cheese winnings. (He got 301 tickets, and everyone else combined got 318 tickets, LOL. Of course, Jonathan drove the average down, as he seems to have spent all his allotted tokens on things that take pictures. He has 13 pictures from Sunday night! Ah well, the prizes you can buy are nothing to get excited about, so whatever makes him happy!)

Happy Fall!

I'm Glad That's Over!

I took my 3-hour glucose test this morning. I left the house at 6:30--and got back home after 1:00. A big accident on the Beltway? Something went horridly wrong in the lab? Not at all! Just par for the course!

I arrived at Bethesda at 7:30, where I had to take a number and wait 40 minutes to get my fasting blood drawn. Then (and NNMC is the ONLY lab with this proceedure I have ever gone to), I had to wait until those numbers came back normal before I could drink the glucola and start the 3 hours. So I finally started the test at 9:05, having already been there over an hour and a half.

When I was pregnant with Grace, I also failed my 1 hour one and had to take a 3 hour test. I blogged about my vein worries here, since my right arm had so much vein scarring from my blood clots. But the test went just fine, and so did my 3 hour one with Faith, so I had not even worried a bit about the quality of my veins for this one! I thought those veins had finally repaired themselves or something! Alas, this test did not go so well. I ended up with 7 sticks for 4 draws, and I can tell my arms, especially my right one, are going to be a mass of bruises. I'm not really sure what the problem was since people have been able to draw blood from my right arm these past few years. Not today though. Oh well, they got all the blood they needed, and eventually I was able to leave, LOL.

I did enjoy the nice quiet time, though. I read a book by Adriana Trigliani called Very Valentine. It was not bad--not heavy or anything; just the thing to read when you haven't eaten anything but have swallowed a ton of hummingbird feeder nectar. It was about a girl in NY who was carrying on her grandfather's wedding shoe business (making these special shoes by hand). I really am NOT into shoes in any way, shape, or form, so I couldn't really relate, but the author's descriptions were good.

So now I wait for the results. I remember with Faith the doctor didn't call until over a week later--giving me hope that I had passed. I know now not to get my hopes up! I do have an appointment the day before Thanksgiving, so I will know for sure by then, I guess.

In other somewhat related news, I was finally able to schedule an ultrasound for Dec. 3. I'll be almost 22 weeks, and I don't like to have them that late, but oh well. I had called the radiology number on Monday, and I left a message, just like they instructed--name, sponsor's social, good number to reach you, etc. They said they would call back within 48 hours, but that simply did not happen. So I called again Thursday, getting the same message. I eventually just starting calling them every time I thought of it, and FINALLY I got through to a real person who deigned to talk to me, LOL. She said November was all full, and the December schedule wasn't out yet, but she would "reserve" a spot for me Dec. 3 at 10:00. We'll see how that all works out. I'm not really all that trusting of their ability to keep their word!

Today . . .

. . . I called off school.

The day was not a total waste, academically. Nathan of course still did all the stuff he had to do. And the rest of us headed to our old Classical Conversations group so I could lead a starfish dissection. I had gotten a starfish from the lady who ordered them yesterday, so I was able to dissect one myself last night, to use as an example. I also realized that you really needed a good, sharp scalpel to be able to cut the skin of those suckers, and the scissors the kids were going to have simply wouldn't cut it! So we went early so I could make slices with my scalpel in all the starfish. They were still hard to open, but thankfully CC has lots of parents around to help. The kids seemed to enjoy it! It's fun for me too. I actually feel like I am using my degree when I do things like that!

In the afternoon, since we weren't trying to finish school, I did a pregnancy pilates video. This was because I had only walked 20 minutes on the treadmill this morning, and I've upped my exercise to 45 minutes a day. Once I am officially diagnosed, I'll have to up it again to at least 1 hour a day. Not looking forward to fitting that in to a normal day!

After I finished, Anna and Grace wanted to watch our old "Riverdance" video. Anna has really been fascinated with dance lately. She has been interested in ballet, but also in Irish dancing, because Jessica L. has been doing it for several years now and is a willing demonstrator on Friday nights! Anna dresses up in an old black leotard (from Rose's girls!) and her black church shoes (which do have a little heel), and she kicks and dances around the house. So cute! So I knew they would get a kick out of Riverdance. They were both quite enthralled! It brought back wonderful memories for me of . . . hmmm . . . one of our anniversaries in Colorado, when Bob got us tickets to watch Riverdance downtown. I LOVED it! That was such a fun night! So if Anna does decide to take up Irish dancing, I will be a willing spectator! [Okay, I have devoted more thought to the date question, because that was really bugging me. We were in our USAFA house, so I am pretty sure it was July 2000, so that would have been our 7th anniversary. Ta da!]

I was also able to make banana bread out of the overripe, brown, oozy bananas that have been sitting on our counter, waiting for me to have time and energy to do something about them. I used Splenda and whole wheat flour--might as well get back in the habit!

I also uploaded pictures onto Snapfish, something I apparently hadn't done since the middle of August. It actually didn't take that much time, because, as it turns out, I have hardly taken any pictures these past 2 months! I need to get on the stick! I guess we just haven't done anything fascinating, and no one has had a birthday. Caleb's birthday is coming up next Friday, though, so we should get some pictures from that! He still hasn't given me a definitive answer on what he wants for a cake. That worries me, LOL. I am taking suggestions!

So see, we didn't do school, but I got a lot of other stuff done. Of course, I have tons of laundry that needs to be folded, and more laundry that needs to be washed. I also need to mop. We are struggling with ants in our kitchen--and why wouldn't we be?! With all the crumbs and spills on our floor, it must seem like the Big Rock Candy Mountain to them! They probably come from miles away! We're famous! Never the less, we are continuing the good fight. Maybe in 16 years or so, when everyone still at home is bigger, we'll make some headway. In the meantime . . . school is on for tomorrow!

Whew, What a Week!

I'm glad it's over. Hopefully next week will be more restful!

1. We're not out of the woods with Grace yet. She did really well on Thursday and Friday. She ate and drank normally, and she also played and generally acted totally normally. No stomach pains or anything. But early this morning, around 5:00, she woke up crying. She ended up vomiting a total of 4 times in one hour, each time nothing more than stomach acid. She just kept clutching up under her ribcage, making me again wonder about a reflux-type thing going on. So if she keeps doing that, I guess I'll try to take her in again on Monday. She seemed fine today, although tired and a bit crabby. She didn't eat much in the morning, but by the afternoon, she was fine.

2. Today was Nathan's last regular season football game. They lost, but his team won 3 games this year. One of his coaches told them that was a record for an expansion team in their league! Last year's expansion team didn't win any games last year--or this year. That would really stink. Earlier in the season we had been wondering why the league even decided to have another expansion team this year. It seemed like a boy from Nathan's team could have gone to each of the other teams. We have decided that the league, when they realized Gary was wanting to coach again, thought that they should do an expansion team this year with him coaching it, in hopes that in a few years the team would be a successful part of the league, as opposed to a perpetual bottom-dweller. I think Nathan has learned so much about foootball this year. And I know he would not have played anywhere near aas much as he did if he had been on an established team, where most people had played plenty of organized football before. It's definitely been a good experience for him. I, however, am not sorry to see the season end. It definitely takes up a lot of time! They will still have at least one playoff game.

3. Tonight we went over to the McC's house for chili, along with the other 2 families in our jr. high Rivendell co-op. The kids all watched the first half of The 10 Comandments, to celebrate our finishing Unit 1 of Tapestry of Grace. We adults made so much noise talking and laughing in the dining room that the kids had to come in and tell up to keep quiet! It was a fun evening! We are so blessed to have these families for friends. Developing good friendships, the iron-sharpening-iron type, especially for our boys, was a big goal for our co-op, and I would definitely say we are succeeding, praise the Lord. The boys all played football out front before eating, and I am sure it was a bit shocking for the neighbors to look out and see the 11 boys from our combined families all out there running around!

Grumpy Grace's Big Day

I realized this afternoon that I had my camera in my diaper bag, since I keep meaning to take pictures at football games, Rivendell, etc. Instead, I was able to capture for posterity my charming, sweet, and cooperative Grace! Ha!

Let me back up a bit. Grace was still vomiting off and on through the weekend. Saturday was an especially bad day. She just laid around, moaning and groaning, most of the day. Eventually she ate some small bit of something (a few bites of toast, maybe?), felt better and went outside to play for a bit. We had pancakes for dinner, since we were heading off to Nathan's game and were short on time. She ate 2 of those, but started complaining about her tummy immediately after. She did throw up all of dinner, she felt better, and we headed off to the game (which Nathan's team won. Yay!). She complained of being hungry throughout the game, however, so I finally said she could have applesauce when we got back home. That came back up around 1:30.

Sunday morning she felt bad and ate hardly anything, but I was able to distract her with picking out a church dress and tights, and we went to church. She seemed like she was doing better Sunday. She even kept down a tiny bit of beef barley soup that evening. She slept through the night without waking (due, I am sure, to all your prayers!! Thank you!), and so I decided not to take her in Monday after all.

That was not the right decision, as it turned out. She did not throw up Monday, but that was because she pretty much ate nothing. Tuesday morning she woke up thirsty, drank some water, and threw that back up 30 minutes later. She didn't eat anything more, and she was definitely not herself the rest of the day. She just laid around, groaning, and complaining that her back was hurting. Because I was teaching at the co-op, I could not take her in, and so she went to Christine's for the morning, and just laid around the church in the afternoon. She ate a little bit of oatmeal when we got home, and that came back up at 10:30. She did sleep the rest of the night, but I got up at 6:15 to call and make an appointment for her today.

We left for Bethesda at 9:25 for our 10:20 appointment. The doctor didn't find anything really wrong, but she ordered some bloodwork and IV fluids, since Grace was dehydrated. The doctor said that they had been seeing quite a few families where a few people got sick with a bug, but one child just couldn't shake it. The stomach got irritated from the vomiting, which led to more vomiting, and eventually dehydration. She said the pain was so bad for some kids, they were working them up to check for appendicitis. That actually happened to us with Luke when he was maybe 3, although his "sickness' turned out to be an impacted bowel. Thankfully, that was not the case here, as that episode is not really my favorite memory with Luke, LOL. Quite tramatic!

Speaking of tramatic, it took 2 attempts to get the IV in Grace, and she was not a real happy camper about that, as you can see in the top picture. I took a picture of all the tubes so we could show the boys, especially Caleb. I am sure he would have jumped through the roof if this had been attempted on him! Maybe the dehydration took the edge off Grace, but at least she didn't struggle or cry too terribly much, LOL. I told her that Mommy always got IVs when I had babies, so she could tell Anna she was being like Mommy, but amazingly, that didn't go over well. LOL! She did get an Ariel sticker.

She also got a chewable anti-nausea pill. She chewed it up and took a sip of water, but then she decided that it tasted so bad that she didn't want to swallow it. So she held it in her mouth for over 45 minutes! Stubborn girl. Finally I resorted to forcing her head back and her mouth open several times, which made her swallow most of it. Good grief. I felt like Dr. Herriot or something, with a recalcitrant dog!

And finally you can see the difference that one bolus of fluid made in her disposition. Before the second bag was started, we tried getting a urine sample from her. We had already tried, before any of the IV fluid, but that was not a success at all. The second attempt was not either. Sigh. So we headed back in for more fluid. After that was done, we tried again in the bathroom--for 45 minutes. Grrrrrrrr. I was not a happy camper myself at that point, since it was already close to 3:30, and I knew we would be facing serious traffic. Plus, all I had eaten since we got there was a small bag of trail mix and a granola bar, which I happened to have in the diaper bag. I was SO hungry!! Eventually the doctor knocked on the bathroom door, and we went back to the treatment room. She said all Grace's labs had come back perfectly normal (except her glucose level was low, wonder why?!), so it was highly unlikely that she had a urinary tract infection. So she let us go without getting a sample, thankfully. I was about on my last legs, and so was Grace.

Of course, I was worried that she would have a terrible accident on the way home, with all that fluid, but not to worry. She fell asleep and had a nice nap, but she didn't pee. She didn't even go right after we got home. Maybe an hour later she finally went. I guess she really was dehyrated!

So that was my very long day. My wonderful friend Christine called me at the hospital and told me she was bringing a meal for us for dinner. What a tremendous blessing!! I inhaled that, then drove Nathan off to his football game (which they also won--yay again!). And now I'm eating ice cream. Oh, I've decided I'm not doing the glucose test until next Friday, LOL.

I do want to mention how wonderful the boys were today. I was gone pretty much the entire day, but Nathan and Luke kept everything running. They changed poopy Faith and put her down for her nap, they got lunch, they made sure everyone did school and chores . . . I am so thankful for such responsible and helpful boys. I could not have taken everyone with me--there simply wasn't room where we spent the day. What a relief to be able to leave everyone here and know they were being well taken care of!

A Prayer Request

I am planning on taking my 3 hour glucose test next Friday. I actually have to call the lab and schedule it, so hopefully that will work. I am not planning on taking it any earlier, LOL. One reason is that I am not sleeping well at night because people keep waking me up. I know from the last time I had ges. diabetes that not getting a full night's sleep really wreaks havoc with my glucose readings, no matter what I eat or how much I exercise. When kids were sick and I was getting up during the night with them, I could eat turkey breast and salad all day, but still have high readings.

But I have only had one full night's sleep since 2 Sundays ago. Grace has been the culprit most times, including 3 times last night (once at 2:00 because she needed to pee and couldn't get her arms back in her sleeper, another at 4:30 where she did her little cry loudly, cough hard, and throw up trick for the first time in 3 nights, and another time at 6:00 because she had a bad dream and was thirsty). There have been a few other random accidents and other disruptions, however, and it is making for a tired and crabby mom. I am sure I will have absolutely no chance of passing a 3 hour test if I can't have a few good nights of sleep.

So that's my prayer request--that somehow people will stop waking me up! What in the world?! They are all normally such good sleepers, and I don't know why they are choosing now to have problems! It feels like an attack, and I am trying not to take it personally, LOL. I guess I will call Monday to try to schedule the test on Friday if the weekend has gone okay as far as sleeping. And if next week is bad, then I will just try to move the test to the following week. Surely this phase will pass soon. I'm praying that, anyway.

Some Updates

Let me start with the good news: no one woke me up last night. Well, that's not 100% accurate--Faith did cry out some time in the middle of the night, but she stopped right away and went back to sleep, as did I. It wasn't until she woke up in the morning, and I went in to get her, that I realized she had thrown up some time in the night. Her bed was a mess, and I put her straight into the bath tub. Nothing like dealing with vomit first-thing in the morning! She also has diarrhea, which she's been struggling with for the last 2 or 3 days (she is teething her eye teeth), so she has a rash. She has not been a happy camper today.

Grace did not wake up last night, but she is still not feeling the best. She fussed around this afternoon, and finally I told her to just go lie down in her bed. She fussed there for awhile, but eventually fell asleep. Yay! Now Faith is down too, and the house is nice and quiet.

I left all this chaos and sickness behind this morning in Nathan and Luke's capable hands, and I waltzed off to Bethesda for my OB appointment. They did a fine job, although Luke did have to change a poopy diaper, and Faith pitched such a fit he couldn't get her pants back on her! He had to settle her down with some apple juice, a special treat.

At my OB appointment I found out that I did not pass my 1 hour glucose tolerance test. I was 2 points too high, so I have to take the 3 hour one in the next week or 2. I do not have high hopes for passing this one either, unfortunately, and the thought of 25 weeks of poking my fingers and exercising an hour each day is quite depressing right now.

The baby seems to be doing just fine, however. S/he was very active, moving around so much it was hard to get a good reading of the heartrate. It was about 144, which is low--maybe it is a boy after all? I knew I had been feeling a lot of movement lately!

What's New?

(Besides a job, I mean . . .)

1. Grace has some sort of wierd tummy thing going on. She woke up last Monday night starting at 4:00 and vomited 4 times. It was like her food from dinner had never digested one bit! Since then, she has woken up almost every night, usually somewhere between 4:00 and 6:30, and heaved up a bit of stomach acid. This is very disturbing, not only for me, LOL, but also Anna, who sleeps with her. So both girls have been very crabby this week. Grace had been just fine during the day, but today she moped around and hardly ate anything. She is one of my "5th percentile" kids, so we certainly don't want her losing any weight! My mom suggested possibly reflux of something. If she keeps on with this pattern, I'll try to get an appointment maybe on Thursday.

2. I can't take her in tomorrow because I have my second OB appointment. I took a 1-hour glucose tolerance test last Thursday, so I am assuming I'll get the results of that. We'll see if all my exercise is paying off so far. I also need to call to schedule my 20 week ultrasound. Wow! Time is flying! I'm only 14 weeks, but I definitely (as always) look bigger than that. That's why I no longer take belly shots until I'm maybe 30 weeks along, LOL. Then I finally look the right size for how far along I am! I'm feeling lots of little flutters and kicks now.

3. I had a big day on Saturday--I drove down to Richmond for my niece Christi's baby shower! Bob's sister Ann did such a nice job with the food and all the other details. There was an excellent turnout too--around 40 people! Christi got a ton of lovely and practical gifts, including lots of diapers and wipes! It was fun, and I was so glad I was able to go.

4. Our church picnic was Sunday after our morning service. The weather was absolutely perfect! We ate tons of food and visited for a long time. We got there around 1:30, and we didn't leave until 6:00! Bob actually stayed later and played some soccer and football. I had whiney dirty kids in my car, LOL. I was glad we didn't take baths and showers Saturday night, as we usually do. They all needed something when we got home! Craig McC had taken Caleb, Jonathan, and some of his boys down to the Potomac for awhile, where they had an absolute ball catching tadpoles, clams, and a dead crayfish. They wanted to take the tadpoles home for pets and dissect the crayfish! I was so tired by this time--the last thing I wanted to deal with was how to get tadpoles and a dead crayfish home, mush less actually dealing with them AT home, LOL! I already had several leaf-laden twigs for my science lesson today that had fallen around the playground in my hands--and those were much less messy. Ha! We finally made it home, sans animal life, where I collapsed. But it was so wonderful to get all that visiting in!

5. Another successful week of our Rivendell junior high co-op is in the books! The moss I collected a week and a half ago did manage to survive in the tub on our counter, and after our class today, I planted it in our front area. We'll see if it takes. I love moss! The focus of the week was plants, and so we did alot with leaf characteristics. Brought me right back to botany class! I searched around our yard and the walking path through the woods behind our neighborhood to find all sorts of samples of various leaf possibilities--simple, compound, oppposite, alternate, pinnately compound, palmately compound. I am happy to say I found representatives of all, even a horsechestnut for the palmately compound! I knew that would be the hardest! Fall is the perfect time to look for leaves, since so many are already on the ground. I switched the order we are covering several of the chapters in the book, and I was so glad I did. I think in another week or two it would have been to hard to find good leaf specimens.

As part of the memory work time today with the younger kids, we made salt maps of Israel, to help them get a good idea of the topography of some of the places we've been learning about in our mapwork. The kids all really enjoyed it. We mainly focused on the Coastal Plain, Central Mountains, Jordan River Valley, and the Valley of Jezreel. I stayed up way to late last night making 5 batches of salt dough, LOL.

So now you know what I've been up to, and why I've been too busy to blog! I have really been tired in the evenings, especially since certain parties ("Grace") keep interrupting my sleep. I am definitely one who notices when I don't get several hours of unbroken sleep each night. I am starting several canker sores in my mouth, which is always my first sign that my body is running down. So with that, I am heading off to bed! Hopefully I'll blog again before this time next week!

Jehovah Jireh

"And my God shall meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus." Philippians 4: 19

So Bob retired from active duty on 1 August, and he was already engaged in job-hunting at that time. He learned quite a bit about resume-formatting and searching for jobs on the internet! Finally just a week or two ago, things started to come together. He received an offer from one company, for a job down at the Pentagon. He decided not to take this offer because 2 other jobs looked very promising. One had given him a contingent offer, and another one had told him twice on the phone to expect an offer. Unexpectedly the first compnay came back last week, after telling Bob they were moving on if he didn't sign their offer, and they increased their offer! After we talked about it for awhile Thursday night, Bob felt like the Lord was leading him to take that offer. So he faxed in the paperwork Friday morning--about 30 minutes before the contigent offer company emailed to say someone thought they needed a guy with more hands-on experience with some program, so that didn't think Bob was the right guy after all! And we never did get the offer from that 3rd company. It could come sometime, sure, but I don't think either of us would really have any confidence in the company or their word at that point! This first company really wanted Bob, and they wanted him to start work today. It seems like this is the job God has provided for right now.

Bob did have an interesting point to make about the job search last week. He told me he had been approaching it with sort of a "marriage model" mindset, but really that wasn't the case. He doesn't need to find the one true perfect job that he can commit to for the rest of his working life (or even 23 years, which is how long he served on active duty!). But he does need a job right now, and this job seems like a good fit. He liked the people with whom he'll be working. The one big drawback is the commute. Today was his first day (just inprocessing stuff right now), and it took him a long time to get down there. He's still working on the best route to take and time to go in (early!). So we'll see how it goes, and we are very thankful to the Lord for providing a job in this uncertain economy!

This time without a job has helped both of us reflect on how it really is the Lord who provides for our needs. I know for me it has always just been the thought of "the Air Force" as the one supplying us. Taking that away, with nothing in its place for a few months really helped me see the hand of the Lord in our lives, and he takes care of the family he has given us.

We really cut back spending, starting in July to just bare neccessities. That is always a good thing to do! We even started doing things like make our own pizza, which was fun and something we will definitely continue doing. But even in little things, God was providing things for us. For example, as a sort of frivolous thing, we had already signed Nathan up for football several months before Bob retired, not having any idea of how long it would take to find a job. In July we realized he would need some Underarmour type shirts to go under his pads. When we visited my parents in Ohio, we found a long-sleeved one and a short-sleeved one at Once Upon a Child for just a few dollars each! What a savings! And when I went to see what sort of fall/winter clothes I had for Anna in the tub of clothes that various people had given us, I realized we don't need one. single. thing for her this winter. We have everything we need from all our friends' generosity! And Nathan hasn't grown a ton, so he should be okay too. First boy and first girl--that's really all I need to worry about, clothing-wise, LOL. Everyone else gets hand-me-downs. But our neighbors down the street, after their garage sale a few weeks ago, gave us all their boy clothes that didn't sell--a whole bunch of shirts that fit Caleb and Jonathan. So now I can be done with any shirts from Nathan and Luke that are just too ratty! How exciting!

It also has been a refreshing time to have Bob not work. He and I have gone on walks many mornings after the kids got started with their school. We would often run errands together--cheap date! He was able to take some of the kids riding on the bike path sometimes, which was a special treat. And he got a lot of things taken care of around the house. Which brings me to another thing the Lord provided--that 40 foot ladder we found by the curb, waiting for the trashman back in July. We have certainly gotten a lot of use out of that, as Bob has repaired a lot of trim, and unfortunately has a lot more to do. (And by "we", I mean "Bob", since I have only set foot on the bottom rung of the thing to steady it, LOL.)

I know a lot of you have been praying for Bob's job search, and we are so thankful for your prayers. We don't take this job for granted. We have friends who have been out of work for a year or so. It's sobering to even think about. Hopefully Bob will be a blessing in this new job, and we are thankful to the Lord for providing for us in this way.

And Now, a Few Random Pictures

I finally got around to uploading pictures off the camera this afternoon . . . let's see what we have . . .
Well, what do we have here? A picture to trot out for the high school boyfriends, I'm thinking! These are self-described "cowboy princesses". They are indeed wearing cowboy boots and riding stick horses in their princess dress-up gowns. The girls in the middle is Kenna, Beverly's daughter (they were the company we had last weekend). She's the same age as Grace. They were all so cute, dressing up and playing together!

Here they are in a more natural state. Kenna has very short hair, due to her giving herself a haricut one night after her brothers had gotten cuts. But she looked so cute with short hair, and she really fit in with our girls! At church everyone commented on how she looked like she was related!

Moving on to more recent pictures, these are 2 roses from our rose bush. Bob planted the bush earlier this summer to hopefully eventually hide our air conditioner units outside. So far it has produced several very beautiful roses! Nathan brought these buds in yesterday, and they really opened up and looked lovely on the island today for our church small group meeting! Anna loves that they are pink, which of course is exactly why Bob picked that particular plant!

This is the other lovely "arrangement" we have gracing our counter. We went on a little nature walk down the path behind our neighborhood Friday so I could search for some things I needed for science this week. I needed to get some pond water, since we hoping to look at algae and protozoa this Tuesday. We have more of a creek, but there was a pool of standing water off to the side, so I scooped up some of that and am hoping for the best. I'll get out the microscope tomorrow to see what there is to see. I put some grains of brown rice in one small tub of it, to hopefully encourage more protozoa growth, and a few drops of plant food (in complete sun, although it's been rainy lately) to hopefully encourage algae growth. I know I can use water from our rain barrel, which does have some algae, if the one doesn't work, but I didn't see very many protozoa in the rain water last time I looked.

As I was scooping out the water while on a little concrete bridge, I was noticing how terribly smelly it was down by the water. I assumed it was the standing water, so I tried to be done as quickly as possible. Anna had been going back and forth across the bridge, and as she came back over, she sort of stumbled over this big pile of leaves and sticks which had washed onto the bridge with all the torrential rains we had last week. As I helped her up, I all of a sudden noticed TEETH in the pile of leaves! Ack! There was a dead weasel staring at me! It gave me quite a shock! No wonder it smelled so bad, LOL. And it is only going to get worse, as it didn't appear too badly decomposed yet. We won't be getting anything more from that creek anytime soon.

The other thing I collected was moss, and it wasn't until I got back home, proudly displaying my find, that I realized we actually are studying moss NEXT Tuesday. So now I am trying to keep the moss alive in the tupperware tub of water until then. They were some great samples, with visible spore-producing stalks and everything! I hope they make it . . .

The last thing in my tub are some mushroom samples. I need to do 2 spore prints, which I am hoping to do tomorrow. On our walks, we've been scouting the neighborhood for fresh mushrooms so I can have each boy dissect one Tuesday. Fortuitously, this has been a very rainy week, so there are mushrooms popping up all around us! I think I should have plenty of samples to choose from! The mushrooms in my tub are not really doing so well, actually, so I might just go get 2 more fresh ones tomorrow morning for the spore prints. I guess they don't grow well hydroponically, LOL. I actually can't stand eating mushrooms, so I have never paid much attention to them and their likes and dislikes whatsoever, to be honest! I won't be starting a mushroom farm, that's for sure.

So that's a small sample of what was on our camera memory card. Actually, that was really about all. We haven't been taking too many pictures lately!

A Few Random Thoughts

Today has been a deluge of Biblical proportions, which is nice if you don't have to go anywhere. I like sitting here in a quiet house, listening to the rain fall outside. And since it's dark, I don't have to look at the back yard and see the puddles turning into lakes! Here are a few random thoughts from the past week:

1. We had all sorts of technical difficulties getting ready for science on Tuesday. I was doing a demonstration of anaerobic respiration with yeast, involving a bottle, 2-hole stopper, thermometer, and glass tube. Monday night I tried to put the thermometer and the glass tube in the stopper--no way, even with copious lubrication. I asked Bob for help after I snapped a glass tube. After suggesting we drill the holes wider (which I shot down right away), he struggled manfully until he broke a thermometer. Sooo . . . before we broke anything else, he drilled the holes bigger on the second stopper, and I decided we would not have any control bottle. That worked fine.

Today I finally got around to emailing Home Science Tools, which is where I ordered all my stuff, and I asked them what they thought the problem could possibly be, since I didn't think my technique was wrong, and I had never had any problems inserting tubes into stoppers in all my previous lab experience (*massive run-on sentence alert*). Well, a very nice lady called this afternoon, and she told me that after she read my email, she had grabbed several stopper and measured the holes--they were all almost 2 mm too small (they should all be 5mm)! So they are going to talk to their supplier to correct this, but in the meantime, she was refunding what I paid for the stoppers, as well as sending me a new thermometer and glass tube! I was so excited! I had heard that this company had good customer service, but now I really believe it! I was also just glad to know that I wasn't crazy, LOL. There really WAS a problem!

2. After Tuesday, my left foot has been really hurting. I couldn't figure out what I possibly did to it, but today I wore my good running shoes to exercise, and after that, my foot felt better. But when I put my old tennis shoes back on to run to the post office and library . . . my foot started hurting again. Hmmm, might be time for new shoes. I remembered I had posted about buying this pair of shoes back in November 2007, and I said there that I usually wear shoes for 2-3 years. It'll be 3 years in November . . . call me Nostradamus!

3. Anna has been bugging me to paint her toenails for quite awhile, so tonight we had a little party up in my bathroom, and I painted hers, Grace's, and mine. Faith was quite upset about being left out of this girly fest, even after my explanation of, "You just have to get potty-trained and start wearing big-girl panties!" The funny thing is that this afternoon Luke took it upon himself to put her on the little potty several times, and she did indeed produce pee (she was very proud of herself and we all celebrated with M&Ms, as usual). But she is nowhere near being ready to potty-train. Maybe next summer, I am thinking. Seems like she will be motivated, though!

Hmmm, I thought there was more I was going to mention, but I can't remember. My brain is such a sieve these days! We have been enjoying the break in football practices with all the rain. Otherwise, we are just busy doing school, laundry, trying to keep the house from becoming a disaster area, and the other usual stuff. I am actually putting off reading through the next science chapter by doing all this blogging. I guess I should at least skim it before turning in!

Company!

We are having such a fun time with our company! We first met Ted and Beverly when we were all stationed together in Ohio, and we were all attending the same church. They had a daughter and were expecting their second child, while I was expecting our third. After we moved to VA, they moved to MD for a year, and we did get together once. Since then they have moved to Las Vegas and then back to Ohio. We kept up originally by Christmas cards, but now we can stay in touch much better with the great convenience of Facebook!

Now Ted and Beverly have 5 kids--2 girls and 3 boys. Their oldest daughter, Charis, doesn't have any girls here her age (and so has had to content herself with books from our bookshelf), but their next 2 are boys Caleb and Jonathan's age. All the boys have been having fun playing outside as well as playing many games of Stratego. They also have a girl, Kenna, who is the same age as Grace. She, Grace, and Anna have been having a ball dressing up as many variations of princesses and playing all sorts of girly games involving lots of giggling. So cute! Faith either tags along with them, or plays with Ted and Beverly's youngest, a boy named Lucan, who is about 6 weeks younger than her. She calls him "Baby" however, since he is soooo much younger than her, LOL. Sometimes she calls him "Theodore", which is the name of Ed and Elizabeth's baby, and that seems to be the name she thinks all babies are technically called by. Anyhow, she and Lucan are getting along well. Sometimes they play Duplos together, and they enjoy chasing each other up and down the stairs.

They are all actually here to sightsee, this being a big "American history vacation". They went to Monticello, then to Williamsburg for homeschool days, and now 4 days in D.C. They will continue on to Philadelphia for 2 days before heading home. That's a nice little history vacation! Right now Ted, Beverly, and the older 3 kids are on a night-time bike tour of the monuments. It was raining this morning when we all went to church, but we prayed the rain would go away, and the Lord answered! It seems like it should be a lovely niight for a bike ride, with nice, cool weather. I'm eager to get the report when they return!

Ted made us whole wheat pancakes for breakfast this morning, with fresh strawberries for topping. YUM! The recipe was his parents' (grandparents too maybe?), and it uses fresh ground wheat berries that you grind in the blender. I'm definitely going to have to get that recipe! We all ate several pancakes this morning and noticed how full we felt all through church!

Well, I am supposed to be working some more on my science lesson for Tuesday, but I am clearly procrastinating by blogging, LOL. I must get back to work . . .

Done!

I'm done teaching at the morning elementary co-op!! I got my two weeks of teaching out of the way early this year, and I am so glad! The unit was chemistry, and I taught the 5th and 6th graders. I can't believe Luke is in 6th grade this year!

The first week we talked about the periodic table--who is creditied with discovering it, how you read it, what all the numbers mean, what the different families mean--and also atomic structure. Then this week we made models of sodium and chlorine on paper using red and blue hole punches for protons and electrons, by way of reviewing what we learned last week. That led into talk about bonding, with those two elements representing ionic bonding, so they could really see the outer shells electrons. I told "The Love Story of the Two Ions", just like Mr. Belue told us in 8th grade! We also talked about covalent bonding and modeled water as an example. At the very end I passed out some "edible electrons" (M&Ms) for a little treat. That went over well!

I know the kids probably would have preferred some showy and cool experiment, but I think it's time for them to be introduced to some of the principles behind why things react like they do. And for the next 2 weeks the teacher will be doing some labs, where they have to write up lab sheets and everything, so that will be good experience for them, and fun.

It has been kind of hard to switch gears in the afternoon and go straight over to Rivendell, where I'm teaching life science! This week we talked about parts of cells, and we did a lot of introductory microscope work for the lab. That was fun. Last night I made some fresh slides to go along with the prepared ones I have. I did a geranium leaf cross-section (yes, Elizabeth, your plant donated one small leaf to the cause of science! Thank you!!), and a section of onion skin, which I stained with methylene blue. The onion skin turned out great, but I had quite a hard time with the leaf cross-section. I needed to go find Bob's box cutters. My scalpel was just not sharp enough. But you could see the chloroplasts and some other things. The hairs on the outside of the leaf looked like huge spikes! I'm hoping my slide-making skills improve over the course of the year. Plenty of room for improvement, LOL.

So now you know what has been keeping me too busy to post since last Wednesday! Well, all that science, plus Bible study, football (Nathan's team won on Saturday!!), church and small, group, and other sundry things! Tomorrow I'm heading to the commissary because we're having company this weekend! I can't wait to see Beverly and her family!

A Few Random Pictures

Here is a picture of Nathan in his football uniform. After being demolished in their first game by a team that was much larger and more experienced than they (Nathan's team is a new expansion team this year), they had another game tonight. This one went much better, and the teams were much more evenly matched! Nathan's team lost 27-19, but it was obviously a much closer and more exciting game! His team played well, and they scored 3 times!

Here is Bob with a relic from the past--something archeologists call a "typewriter". You can see the interest it has aroused from curious onlookers! Bob was filling out a job application, but the file was a read-only one. So he printed it out, and we commenced a grand search for the typewriter we knew we once had. I was quite worried that it had not survived the "Guam purging" last year when we thought we were moving there. But no worries--it was down at the very bottom of the same box it inhabited when it moved here to VA 6 years ago, LOL. We do not, however, have any White-Out.

This rag-tag bunch of insects were all collected by us over the summer so the jr. high boys could work on classifying insects according to order for science. I just wanted to have a record of them, LOL. I should have put something beside them so you could get a better idea of size. The big bugs on the left are cicadas, and they are actually on the larger side--2 inches from nose to tip of wings. The big brown grasshopper is about that same size. Jonathan also found a very impressive black beetle, which you can see up in the top right corner.

I got quite a few bugs from the L's deck and kiddie swimming pool when we were taking care of Ned this summer. The others were found mainly by the boys around the yard or at my parents' house. I did have to make a "killing jar", which was very galling for me. In a tupperware container we cut a cardboard circle and put cotton balls soaked in rubbing alcohol on the bottom, underneath the cardboard circle. Theoretically the bug would stay neatly on the top of the carboard circle, but that didn't always happen, unless it was one of the big bugs. I will say that we only had to use the jar a few times. Most of our specimens we found dead. Phew! I am really not the insect-collecting kind.

And last but not least, here is a picture of one of my maps that I got laminated for the co-op. It turned out pretty well, I thought! It has a fairly wide range so that we can see the extent of all the ancient empires, as well as where the Germanic tribes came from who ended up conquering Rome. Since it's laminated, I can just draw each week's stuff on there! It's not really to scale at all, so don't look too closely. I just winged it as far as the drawing went!

Look at That Smile!

Luke had an orthodontist appointment this morning. The doctor said he didn't have to wear his headgear any more! Luke was really crushed to hear this, but I managed to console him. Then the doctor started talking about phase 2 . . .

I had been quite happy with Luke's smile, especially considering where he was when we started! But it turns out the the $1300 we spent was only on the TOP part of Luke's mouth. His lower jaw is also narrow. And there are 2 teeth fully formed and waiting to emerge--with absolutely no room for them to do so. You can clearly see them on x-rays! If you don't know they are lurking down there, then his bottom teeth look great too--all nice and lined up!

So phase 2 of the operation involves braces to move the bottom teeth out of the way to let these 2 teeth come up in peace. I don't recall mention of another expander, but I could be wrong. Otherwise, the danger is that they will become impacted and require surgery. Without taking any off for insurance, this will cost another $3700. Sooooo . . . now Bob just has to find a job with good dental insurance, LOL. Actually, even if he had stayed active duty, since the military dental insurance also paid $1300 for the first phase (1/2 of it), then they would only have paid $200 for this. Each person only gets $1500 total for orthodontic care under the United Concordia dental plan. No real loss there!

And once again, Nathan's need for an expander and braces because of a crossbite moves down to the bottom of the priority pile. His mouth just doesn't seem too bad! Nice, wide jaw--plenty of room for teeth!

Minivan

We have several little chairs. We got the blue one free from someone who was giving it away at our co-op. The two white ones we picked up from someone's trash pile on a walk through our neighborhood one morning several years ago. And the brown one was given to us by our good frined neighbors down the street after their kids got a little too big and old for it. Unfortunately, these chairs don't stay lined up by the wall . . .

Usually they are arranged in a "minivan" formation, smack-dab in the middle of some room. In this case, they are in the middle of the entry way, effectively blocking traffic both in front and in back.
The driver steers with a genuine "Tonka Joe" dashboard that came with a really cool "Tonka Joe" computer game my brother gave the boys many, many years ago. All 4 boys thoroughly enjoyed driving the big dump truck, bulldozer, crane, etc., but we don't anymore have anyone who fits the game's target audience. Not to worry! Anna has discovered you can pilot an imaginary minivan just as effectively as an imaginary big rig with this steering wheel, complete with horn you "honk" by pulling down on.

There's always a row of "carseats" for the babies. Where do they get these ideas? LOL--looks like our vans! We don't have quite enough small chairs, as it turns out, so strollers have to be pressed into service. I'm sure they're very secure and safe, LOL.

There are various and assorted passengers riding along with whatever actual little girls are in the minivan. Today's passengers include this bear from Aunt Rose, dressed up in princess dress-up clothes, also from Aunt Rose. Anna hit upon the idea of dressing up this big bear just last week, and we were all pretty impressed that she made it work! Princess Bear lends a touch of elegance to the backseat of the van, don't you think?

I actually cleaned up the entry way and playroom this morning, while the girls were outside, but I thought I should memorialize one of Anna's minivan arrangements before I destroyed it. Even though all the chairs and toys have been moved back into the playroom, I'm sure they will make their way out into some other inconvenient place as a new minivan soon!

First OB Appointment!

This afternoon I had my first OB appointment with this pregnancy. I got to see one of the midwives there at Bethesda, and she was so very nice. She told me she would refer me for a level 2 ultrasound, since I am over 35 (of course, I was over 35 with Faith too, and I don't recall anyone even mentioning a level 2 ultrasound!). She said I could also have genetic counseling with that ultrasound, which I declined. At the OB orientation I was alarmed when the lady leading it said that to be referred to your regular 20 week ultrasound, you now had to take this mandatory 1 hour genetic counseling class. What in the world?! I absolutely do not want to waste an afternoon listening to someone blather on about stuff I either already know or could certainly read up on my own! So I asked the midwife about this mandatory class, and she said, "Oh, I really don't think anyone is going to make YOU take that class! It's mainly for first-time moms with lots of questions." Whew! It did seem like the powers-that-be wanted people getting the level 2 ultrasound to have had the genetic counseling though. The midwife asked if I had any counseling with Faith, but I did not. So then she said, "Well, if anyone asks, I'll just say you were over 35 when you had your last baby, and you delivered here . . . I don't think anyone will ask any more questions . . ."

She did a dating ultrasound, and each picture showed the baby measuring 9 weeks, 2 days, instead of the 10 weeks, 4 days just going by my LMP date. But I have longer cycles usually, so I am sure that is right. That gestational age moves my due date back a week, to April 11. I would much rather have an accurate due date, especially if I have gestational diabetes again and feel pressured to deliver before 40 weeks, when they will induce! Jonathan was 2 weeks overdue, but I think his due date was off. He did not look like a very post-term baby when he came out. Also, he was the last baby I had the triple screen done, and that number came back very low (so we worried until the ultrasound, which didn't show any problems). But one reason the number could be low is if the baby is not as old as they think he is!

The baby looked like a little teddy graham in there, and the little heart was beating away. I love seeing that beating heart! I definitely don't take that for granted.

I do have to take a one hour glucose tolerance test before 20 weeks. I'm not looking forward to that, but I'm not surprised either. I have another appointment on Oct. 12 (maybe--I'm not looking at my calendar), so I'm hoping to do it before or after that appointment. I had a fasting blood sugar draw the end of August, and that was fine.

Nathan's Very Large Water Bottle

Nathan has his first football tonight at 5:15, and I wanted to post a picture of this enormous water bottle his coach provided for everyone on the team. They use it for exercises, like squats. Almost like a kettlebell or something! There's a line on the front so we can see how high to fill it each night. And it's motivation to drink the water during practice! They have really long bendy straws that fit down inside the bottles to make it easier to drink from. Even during all the really hot practices, I never had to worry that Nathan wouldn't have enough water available, LOL. He brings 2 1/2 gallons! You can also see his "leadership stickers" there on the front. I just want to comment again on how organized his coach is, and what a great motivator he is! We are so blessed to have Nathan be on his team for his first year of football!

A Good Day

It's late and I should be in bed, but I figured I'd take advantage of the quiet house and blog really quickly! Nothing red-letter is happening, but today was a good day, so I thought I'd write about it.

1. A friend of ours from way back stopped by with 4 garbage bags of hand-me-downs this morning! It's been like Christmas here, as the girls especially have excitedly pulled out dresses and other clothes to try on! Mark and Lori have 6 kids, and their youngest is a girl a year older than Anna. So the sizes are perfect, the clothes are cute, and the girls were in heaven! There were shoes too . . . too much excitement! There were boys' clothes too, but somehow the boys just weren't as excited, LOL. I am always so thankful for clothes we can use! What a huge savings!

2. Nathan just missed one on his first life science test! He's got this really great teacher, you see . . . LOL! No, the material is not that difficult so far. But I'm glad he is remembering it!

3. Caleb drew this really great map of the the world (well, technically it was yesterday), with all the continents and everything labeled. I know that was a result of the time last year in Classical Conversations, so I am glad to see fruit from that! Then he made up his own continent, divided it up into countries, made a flag for one country, and stationed armies in various places in it, LOL.

4. I got my maps laminated today! I spent a good deal of time drawing 2 maps for the memory work/mapwork part of Rivendell. One covered the Mediterranean area all the way over to India. On the back of it, I drew a close-up of Israel. I put all the cities, mountains, and rivers that we'll be learning on the maps. I also already had a map I drew of Greece (for the Greece unit in the other co-op several years ago, when I was pregnant with Grace), and on the other side of that is a slightly closer view of the Mediterranean area. I added cities and features to both those maps, and then I started asking around for places to laminate them. I made a big map of Africa and the Mediterranean last year for CC, and I never laminated it, and by the end of the year, that poor map was looking a bit wilted! People on my homeschool email loop recommended Staples, Office Depot, and a teacher store about 20 minutes away. Staples quoted me $20 EACH, Office Depot said $1.99/sq. foot (each sheet of poster board was less than 2'x3'), and the teacher store said $1.oo per sq. ft. Clear winner there, so I drove out there this afternoon. The girl at the counter told me she couldn't work the laminator, so they'd have to take my maps and call me when they were done. Ack! I need one Tuesday, and I really hadn't planned on driving back out to the store to pick up the things! But what could I do, so I left them. I went outside and called Bob to relate my tale of misery. As we were talking, he told me the store was calling our home phone, which for some reason was the number I had given them. I ran back inside, since I had never left the parking lot, and there were my maps, all done! I'm so glad I took my time leaving! And the grand total was only $5.25! I'm not sure exactly how they calculate the square footage, but I'll take it! They look great! (Well, as great as hand-drawn maps can look, LOL.)

5. Tonight Nathan's team got their jerseys. Well, they aren't really the permanent jerseys. Because his team is an expansion team, they get new jerseys, and apparently the jerseys are journeying here from the factory by mule train, because the coach thought we'd have them by last Monday. The first game is Saturday, so they are using some other team's old jerseys (Steeler colors, woo hoo!). Nathan got to pick his number first because he had the most "leadership points". These came from times when he led exercises and what not. Sometimes the coaches picked him to lead, and sometimes the other team members picked him. That was really cool! He picked #7, which is Ben Rothlisberger's number, LOL.

6. I got to talk to Amy tonight! It's been several weeks, but that always makes a nice end to a day! It was great catching up with her!

So that's where we are. Still no job for Bob, so keep praying! And now I really must get to bed, or I will REALLY be sorry in the morning!