Preparing for the hunt

My sister hosts a family and friends Easter egg hunt at her house each year.  I used to do the same for K-'s siblings, but they've gotten old enough to think that Easter egg hunts aren't so cool anymore.  Since I have a bucket full of eggs, I go ahead and stuff them each year for the family hunt.

326.  That's just in case you were wondering.  I'm sure that I've lost a few here and there, but overall I believe that I've retained the number that I've collected.  That's why I have the X's on the eggs.  I used to let the kids keep the eggs, but I found that they were getting tossed at the end of the season.  Why not reuse?  The kids know to shell the eggs, snap the pieces back together and to go ahead and dump any X'd eggs in the bin for refill the following year. 

Hey, it works for me.

My sister has everyone bring a contribution to add to the already started pot of Stone Soup.  Yes, it does have a real stone.  I know that I've touched on her tradition before, but there is seriously not a pot of Stone Soup that I haven't liked.  This year, I'll be tossing ham, carrots, potatoes, barley and soaked mixed beans to the pot.  (Just in case someone forgets their thing, I bring extra.  It's habit.) 

We're so excited!  Rain may come and we are thinking of suiting the kids up in rain coats and soccer cleats, but we'll have a great time!

Smiles in my day:
-  Though the day started out a bit rough with, "Mom, I just puked," after an hour, the bit subsided.  I was able to talk to the nurse at her pediatrician's office who said that the stomach virus that she had tended to come and go a few times before it was completely gone.  Good to know.  Prefer it to be gone.  Yuck.  Still, other than an hour of major action, K- has had a little bit of a "squeezy stomach" all day, but has successfully taken items in and has not had the horrible stomach ache or high fever of last week.  The nurse predicts that we're seeing the end.  Hallelujah!  Even as I type, I'm happy to say that the "squeezy stomach" (ref: Junie B. Jones) has completely subsided. 
-  Getting the eggs all stuffed.  Tattoos, hair ties, stickers, dinosaurs, Sillybandz, suction cup balls, spikey balls, tops, marshmallow bunnies, slinkies and buttons (pins).  Tried to find something for everyone.
-  Hubs took the day off tomorrow so that we can spend the day together as a family.  :)!

We're excited about spending time with family this weekend.  I hope that all of you have a fantastic weekend!

What would you have done?

Last night, I didn't sleep that well.  They were calling for the potential of overnight tornadoes and frankly, those are the kind that frighten me the most.  I stayed up, watched the radar, knew when the storms were to start and slept a few hours before that.  I woke up at 2:45 AM (body alarm) and soon enough, a tornado warning crawl came across the screen.  It wasn't for my county, but it was for a county south of me that my friend lives in. 

My friend has M.S.  She suffers from neuropathy in her feet and for her to get up and get moving takes about an hour just to get all the right parts going in all the right places.  She can't just jump out of bed and run. 

So I called her at 3:15 AM. 

"Cj, I'm so sorry to call you in the middle of the night, but there is a tornado warning for [your] county." 

I tossed back and forth in my mind for a minute of what to do.  Here's the discussion that I had with myself:
-  Cj has MS.
-  She can't move that well.
-  She's in the middle of the country, on a hill away from close contact with neighbors and there is no tornado siren where she is at.
-  I didn't know if her partner was there to help her.  (Turns out he was.) 
-  She has three dogs to gather up and haul down with her.  She wouldn't leave them upstairs. 
-  I wasn't certain where the location was that the circulation was, but to boot up my computer and give it a run on Map Quest was me losing precious time for her to be contacted.
-  The storm was moving 55 MPH, which is kind of hauling at a pretty decent pace.

On my way to work, I called Cj to see how everything was.  She was at the dentist, but I did talk to her partner.  I asked him not to hate me.  He said that they didn't at all and that his friend ended up calling about an hour after I did for the very same reason. 

"At least you know that there are people who care about you!" 

He said that there was a tornado that touched down south of them and when I Map Quested the circulation location, I found that it was 4-5 miles away from their house.  Moving at 55 MPH, they wouldn't have had much time to act.  Cj's basement steps are kind of condensed and short.  It is difficult for her to navigate them anyhow, but squishy spaced steps are not run-down-them kind of steps. 

Cj e-mailed later (calling me darling) and said that she was absolutely not mad at me for phoning.  She had ear plugs in that muffled everything.  She would have never heard a tornado coming. 

I don't regret having called her.  I told her that had she gone by way of Mary Poppins and I knew that a potential tornado was coming towards them and didn't call and warn them, I wouldn't have been able to forgive myself. 

What would you have done?

Smiles in my day:
-  It looks like our collard greens are coming up.  Spike (our iguana) will be so excited to have garden veggies again.  (You think I'm crazy?  He begs for tomatoes when they are on.) 
-  I functioned surprisingly well, considering the lack of sleep that I had.  Perhaps I need less sleep than I'm getting.
-  K- and I have a date to stuff hundreds of plastic eggs tomorrow for our annual family Easter egg hunt.  We'll stuff to see if I need more.  I can't recall how many I have, but I believe it's something around 400 or so.

Have a great day!

Tales from the Trenches: God provides.

My sister and I decided to do a bit of a seed swap this year.  She's a little low on funds, we're being a bit more conservative and I just re-ran the seeding bit with last year's seeds.  Mine came up, but just in a quantity that I needed.  I might have one or two extra plants, but not like the 80 tomato plants I had the one year.  Because of that and the fact that my sister was about a week and a half behind my planting, I told her to seed heavy.  She now has probably 100 little seedlings. 

"What am I going to do with all of these?" 

I told her that we'll be having a canning clinic.  I know that she wanted to learn and my one cousin approached me for lessons in canning.  It isn't hard, but it is something that you must stop, think, take time and follow every step.  Well, that and everything needs to be spic and span. 

I told my sister that God gave her a sum and I encouraged her to instead of giving all but 5 away, plant them all over.  She has flower beds that can use some height in the back.  She has a step-type hill area that they planted the tomatoes in last year.  That worked well for them.  I told her that our goal is to get her to put away as much as she possibly can. 

Their house will be eating many tomato based meals, if my prediction is correct. 

Her peppers haven't come up yet, and neither have the ground cherries.  I told her that we'll do the same with those.  Can, freeze or otherwise preserve. 

She swapped some seed potatoes in exchange.  I have them planted, but haven't seen anything yet.  Soon and very soon she tells me.

I'm entertaining a cold frame near the house for a patch of lettuces for the iguana this next year.  (Test run it on the iguana, then do fully for us.)  I don't know if I'll get Hubs to run with that one. 

In the meantime, I'm going to suggest that she sell some excess plants at the end of her drive with an honesty box (she lives in the country) and donate some to the local jail that grows produce for the Meals on Wheels program that provides meals to seniors who wouldn't otherwise be provided with balanced nutrition. 

How has God provided for you this week?  Being Holy Week, we should be a bit more in tuned with how we are always taken care of even if, as I told my sister, it wasn't the path that you originally had in your head.  Any surprises that God had pop up in your garden of life?

Smiles in my day:
-  The ability I have to openly rejoice with everyone without worry of being put to death for it.

Have a great day!

The 50 MPH start to spring soccer season

Just check out those new soccer cleats and know that it rained a lot yesterday.

 

If K-'s hair wasn't pulled back, she would be doing what blondie is doing here.  But!  Look at girlie running for the ball like no tomorrow! 


We didn't quite know if soccer season was going to begin today.  We had a few inches of rain yesterday and thought that the field might be unplayable.  It wasn't unplayable, but it was like running on a sopping sponge.  My daughter?  She loved making a point of running through the mud puddle on the field.  She had so much mud in her shoes that it started chunking off in sheets. 

She wore a little head wrap because the 50 MPH winds with the 55 degree temperature made for a risk of ear ache.  She happily wore the head wrap.

She had a great time and was happy to get back into the game.  This year, she has progressed.  Her dribbling has improved and she runs the right direction this time! 

For these few weekends (next week excluded), we're running swimming on Saturday and soccer on Sunday.  I can tell you that at this point, K- is exhausted.  She missed three days last week while she was busy doing the sick kid thing.  She has run her leggin's off and did swimming for an hour to boot.  This evening she provided us with a lovely tired breakdown as a result. 

Once she sleeps and catches up on that which she lacked (either the stomach ache, the vomiting, the cough or me continually taking her temperature kept her up.)  Soon, she'll be caught back up and all will be right with the world again.

Until then, we have some clean soccer cleats drying on the downstairs freezer.

Smiles in my day:
-  K-'s return to health.  Whew!
-  Being able to stop by the mom and pop farm market for some produce.  I had a meatloaf in the crock-pot for us and was able to bring some really great vegetables home to make a mixed steam side dish with.  The yellow squash didn't turn out as I hoped (no taste and tough skin) but the snap peas, broccoli, carrots and little red skins did the trick!
-  I got my favorite sweet roasted red pepper hummus and sea salt chips from the market.  K- and I have to watch.  We've been known to eat the whole thing in one sitting. 

Have a great day!

The big bad stomach virus.

Strep test ran negative and the yucky stomach bug is going around.  Though this AM gave us a bright and sunny 103.2, her fever hasn't returned.  That's a good thing. 

Thanks much for the prayers!

Hello 104.

K- has been battling a bit of a thing this week.  She missed Tuesday, which we dismissed as major allergy drainage making her feel like gum stuck on the bottom of a shoe.  Her system seemed to have cleared that which ailed her, so she went to school on Wednesday.  She had a great day, did what she needed to do, MIL picked her up and reported that all was well. 

Then I got a 4:30 PM call.  MIL reported that K- didn't eat dinner, felt warm and was rolled up in a blanket on the couch.  Argh.

Hubs picked her up, took her home and she clocked in at a lovely 101. 

I got home probably 45 minutes after they did and up popped 102.5 for me.  Fantastic.  Advil was administered, the fever completely broke, all was well.

I got up and checked on her a bit during the night.  At 3, she rolled out 101.5, but I opted not to wake her for Advil since she tends to run higher temperatures anyhow.  Our Advil/Tylenol threshold is 102.  We've had too many years of experience.  Her waking temp was 102.5, so I gave her Advil, left her home with Hubs who went in late today, then shuttled off to her school at 7:45 AM to take care of my volunteer obligations.  I checked in on her when I got home and she was rolling about 100, so it seemed all was stable.  She fell asleep and napped for a good while.  When she woke up, she went to the bathroom and I could almost see flames rising from her limbs.  That's when the she clocked in at a nice and toasty 104.  I called her pediatrician.  Though they had nothing left for today (I called at 1:30 PM), she'll be seeing her tomorrow at 11 AM. 

In the meantime, my MIL nearly had a panic attack.  The 104 scared her to death and it caused me concern.  104 is the point that I take a deep breath, back away slowly and go seek some medical intervention.  We were at 104 for the week that she had chicken pox (from the varicella vaccine), the week that she had Roseola (from library group) and in that week that she had that weird "non-specific virus" that made her body break out into a rash.  (Okay, on that one I believe that we rocked 103.8, but close enough.)  We've seen 104.  We've dealt with 104.  We have an action plan, but it doesn't mean that I like to have to go there. 

Y'all, this isn't her allergies. 

So, I'll be utilizing the bladder alarm system this evening.  You know the one.  The one where you are too tired to wake for a check-on-the-kid alarm, but you'll certainly wake to pee?  I'll be drinking full glasses of water and keeping the ear scan thermometer nice and handy. 

It should be a long night.

Toss us a prayer if you can, please.

Thanks.

Smiles in my day:
-  Hubs covering me so that I could get some time sensitive volunteering done for the PTA moms to cover my responsibility for tomorrow.
-  K-'s fever continuing to break after Advil.  That is a very good thing.
-  The neighbor sending me over with cans of pop for K-, then coming over with brownie bites that he had baked for her.  Mr. D- and Mr. G- just love her. 
-  My flamingly hot kid being concerned about school work and getting it all complete within an hour of it hitting the doorstep. 
-  Her understanding and accommodating teacher being willing to gather up materials for her daily to keep her on track, and a neighbor who is happy to retrieve it.  Today, the PTA President came by for the membership materials I had put together and traded me with K-'s homework.  It takes a village, I tell you.
-  I can't wait for this to arrive.  It was out of stock, then back in stock briefly yesterday and now back out of stock.  I'm so glad that I was able to order it and can't wait for Hubs to get it installed when it arrives.  :)!!!

Perhaps, I'll be able to sleep tomorrow night. 

Have a great day!

ETA: 
Besides chasing a fever, this was what I was chasing by computer at 7:45 PM:

K-'s new love for Jamie Oliver

"Mommy, could you e-mail him so that he could come to my school and fix the lunches so that I can eat them?  Madison says that I'm allergic to the school food."

"Basically, you are."

"Mommy, can you ask him to come and help to make healthy food that won't make us sick?"

Then she stood there and watched the beef demonstration of what comes from where and what happens to the leftover bits and yuck. 

Watching that and knowing that is what they are serving our children in the schools brought me to tears. 

My daughter knows that school lunches aren't an option for her.  What does our school district provide?  They provide a cold breakfast and hot lunch to all K-5 children in the entire district.  The breakfast is a whole grain cereal or whole grain muffin, but they both have sugar-- more than I'd prefer.  They provide milk at each.  Breakfast has either string cheese or yogurt provided.  Lunches are atrocious.  I did not know until this year that their lunches are served to them on little styrofoam trays with food in individual cellophane wrapped formed square dishes with a chicken leg, nachos, chicken nuggets, pizza (the vomit inducing kind which is what tipped my child over the edge), macaroni and cheese, a cheese roll (I'm thinking something like a filled bun), taco, hamburger and a day that actually has a chef salad!  K- only ate maybe 10 school meals tops last year and I've sworn them off forever.  (That is unless Jamie comes to rescue us.)

When I was volunteering at the school, I ended up getting into an interesting conversation with the cafeteria lady.  Mrs. S- is wonderful and I hesitate to call her a cook.  She'll tell you that all she does is warm things up.  I told her about how my daughter cannot eat school food because it "makes her vomit" is how the gym teacher finished my sentence.  She knew exactly what I was going to say.  Mrs. S- hates that she is only able to warm things.  Neither the gym teacher, the cafeteria lady or the nurse are surprised by our personal findings with the quality of school lunches served and my child's digestive reaction. 

I get up each and every morning and take about 15 minutes to pack my child a wholesome meal.  No juice box goes to school.  K- has a Klean Kanteen that is filled with water.  (By her request.  Believe me, I used to send apple juice.)  There was a stretch of time where K- wanted to take a salad each day.  She wanted some turkey, soy nuts and mozzarella cheese with some homemade croutons.  (I cheated and bought those in Amish country.)  She usually takes turkey on double fiber wheat with a flick of mayo.  There is always a fresh fruit or vegetable.  There is always a yogurt.  Rarely, I'll make pudding cups for her to take.  (Okay, I know there's sugar in there.)  I will drop in a small treat like a cookie, a rice krispie treat that I made . . . something like that.  The kids were puzzled when she brought salad without white dressing.  (She had fat free sun dried tomato vinaigrette.)  She's had kids clamor for her fruit.  I've sent homemade soup in her hot food thermos.  I try.  Her lunch isn't perfect, but I'm working on sending her foods that are nutritious and filling.  I don't want her to feel left out because she brings a lunch, rather than being able to go through the line with her friends.  (Believe me, we've had that talk many times.)  The concept of "you get what you pay" for is definitely true when it comes to our district's elementary school lunch offerings. 

K-'s school is at a 50% poverty rate.  Of 22 children in her class, there are days that it is only her and one other child that bring a lunch in from home. The children get such rotten stomach aches from the chicken nuggets.  The macaroni beef is served with anchovy paste mixed in, which makes it far spicier than the children care to eat (that's what Mrs. S- told me), plus it puts another item out there that could cause a potential allergy reaction with some children. 

Parents have their children go ahead and get the lunch served probably out of convenience and of monetary help.  Still, where it seems to be cheaper in the short run, we have so many children who are obese.  K- has a family history of obesity.  We try our hardest to keep her reigned in and eating healthy choices.  It would make her heart happy if she could see her friends eating things that are healthier for them, too. 

I'm happy to report that not all of the schools around here serve inedible crub.  My sister's daughters have a wonderful lunch menu full of fresh salads and hot served and scooped up from lunch ladies type of things.  She only lives about 25 minutes away. 

There's hope.   Until then, Jamie?  Can you come, please?

Smiles in my day:
-  K- was able to return to school today.
-  I got a call from my MIL at 4:30 PM that K- seemed to be going down hill again. While she was running a healthy fever when I got home (102.4 F), the wonders of Advil kicked it back down and all is well.  She was able to sit and do her homework (lots of it because of the missed day), so her concentration was on that rather than roastificating.
-  K- got a wonderful report card today.  Sticking with tradition, I got her a report card prize.  She loves to work a good puzzle and was delighted that there were "diamonds" involved.
-  That we have a village raising K- and it is great how we are all able to pull together, keep each other covered and work together as a team in sickness and in health.  Very thankful that K- gets to hang with the in-law's, who spoil her to death, rather than having to go to a day care.  What an incredible gift.  I was a get-off-the-bus-at-Grandma's kind of kid and I appreciate that K- is (kind of) able to do the same.  (No bus in her case, but Grandma drives the 20+ minutes out to get her.) 

Have a great day!