On Vomit and Confession

My past week has really been something.  It's the kind of something that I'd choose never to experience again if I were in control of such things and I'd certainly go back and delete it if that were even a possibility.

Last Friday afternoon Anthony started spitting up huge amounts.  So much that I started to question whether there might have been oatmeal in his new box of rice cereal since he was reacting the way he does when he has oatmeal.  The spitting up, which we later realized was vomit, kept happening, and it wasn't until he vomited about two ounces of baby food that I was still in the process of feeding him for dinner that we realized there was something other than just regular spit up going on.  Almost immediately after the disturbing dinnertime display he began vomiting a lot and his color quickly turned very sickly looking.  He was starting to remind us of how Katie looked when she dehydrated from her bout with pneumonia so Bryan ran out and got him pedialyte and we began hydrating him every ten minutes with a few MLs of pedialyte.  After an hour or two he was seeming a bit better, but it was obvious that he wasn't feeling well.

Neither of us was comfortable with the idea of putting him to be in his room, so we set up a playpen in the family room and decided he would stay down there with us until we were certain the vomiting had passed and he was hydrated.  I had kept telling Bryan that I thought I felt sick, too, but he kept telling me that I was just worried about the baby and his impending business trip to Denver.  I figured he was right since I do stress out to the point of feeling ill when he goes away and I was also stressing out about the baby.

Around ten or eleven at night I started getting sick.  By midnight I was vomiting all over the bathroom floor because I had no other choice.  Within minutes Bryan was also sick and once the next wave of feeling sick came around Bryan and I were practically doing synchronized vomiting.  Then Anthony got in on the action and woke up wanting of all things, to be fed and held and neither Bryan and I were in a position to tend to him.  Nursing a baby while succumbing to a nasty stomach virus just isn't possible.

We ended up having to wake Madeline at 1AM and have her come down to take care of the baby and help us as we tried to clean up two bathrooms that were covered in vomit.  An hour or so later Katie woke up and had vomited all over her bed, herself and her carpet.  So Madeline had a new patient.  I tried as best I could to help clean up the mess, but that's not easy when you're also throwing up and running to the bathroom every few minutes.  We got Katie settled and an hour or two later Ellie fell victim to the same horrid fate as the rest of us [except Madeline].

I don't think Madeline got much sleep the rest of the night as she helped her younger siblings and did her best to get the loads and loads of vomit laundry through the washer.  She came through for us in a huge way.  I'm not sure if we would have survived without her.  She kept the baby hydrated, made sure Bryan, the girls and I had drinks, saltines and orange slices.

I'm amazed that the didn't get hit with the stomach bug, too, but we think she may have had it last month.  The day after Christmas she was sick and had very similar symptoms to the rest of us.  She was the only one to get sick with it then.

The timing for this virus was not ideal.  Bryan was getting ready to leave for a business trip and I had loosely planned out my Saturday.  Once I had gotten sick I realized that heading to Mass for the feast day of St. Francis de Sales who has become one of my favorite saints over the past year or two was out.  And going to confession was also out.  Soon enough I realized that there was no way I was able to teach my CCD class on Sunday and there was no way we could go to Mass and share our grotesque stomach bug with everyone else.  Even though we all stopped vomiting by early Saturday morning the fun of horrible body aches, fevers and dizziness were just getting warmed up for their two day stay.  I laid on the couch thinking to myself that labor, strep throat, ear infections, and possibly hand foot and mouth disease were all less miserable.  Of course, that last one is a misery in itself and I'd rather have the stomach bug for a few days than relive a day of hand, foot and mouth disease.

We were mostly all on the mend by very late Sunday night or Monday morning.  Katie and Ellie had some lingering effects for a day or two after, but were doing much better by today.  Anthony, on the other hand, will seem like he's doing just fine and out of nowhere have an explosive diaper.  That I could handle.  But this evening I fed him dinner and then loaded the kids into the car so we could go to confession.  All was going well.  We were there right at 6:00 when confessions begin and I was hopeful that we might not be at the end of a long line since the parking lot hardly had any cars in it.  Then I opened the door to get Anthony and was met with a baby sitting in a puddle of vomit that consisted of all the freshly pureed peas I had just fed him.

I thought maybe the spit up wasn't as bad as I thought but a quick attempt to clean him up with a burp cloth revealed that there was no way I was getting this child out of his seat and standing in a line for confession.  We would have had a slimy green trail following us.  It was that bad.  It was so bad that I took pictures when we got home so I could show Bryan.

As I stood in the cold parking lot completely defeated, I told the girls to get back in the car.  They were more than happy to comply.  I was just left with the feeling that if I didn't need to go to confession when I pulled into the church parking lot, I certainly needed to go now.  Patience had officially left the building.  Inside my head I raised my little white flag of surrender to God, all the while grumbling that I now had a phenomenally bad mess to clean.

When we got home I made the unhappy discovery that Anthony needed bath number two in four hours. The kid was covered in green pea vomit.  Can I shock all of you and tell you that I've bathed Anthony three times in the past two days which is more times than I've bathed him in the past month.  Bryan is much better at washing babies than I am, so I usually propose to him that I'll dry and dress the baby if he washes.  So yes, he's cleaned regularly, just not by me.  I will say that I'm feeling more confident washing him after the last two baths I gave him today.

Once he was cleaned I set about getting his clothes sent down to the laundry room only to discover that the dog decided to try washing them.  Arrgh!  Why are dogs so gross?

The real fun began when I had to pull the carseat out of the van.  That cute cover that can be pulled off for washing so you don't have to remove the harness is a load of crap for people who don't live in reality land.  When junior pukes all over the harness and there's so much vomit that it dribbles out of the car seat and onto the car upholstery, the easy remove seat pad is worthless.  I had lots of choice words and thoughts about the engineers and designers of the Britax Marathon 70-G3.  Ignore my 5 star review of it on Amazon.  I obviously didn't have real world baby disaster experience with the seat when I wrote the review.  My recurring thought was "What genius makes a car seat where the *@&%@*$ harness cannot be removed?!"  It's covered in green pea sludge and the omnipotent owners manual is telling me to "sponge clean" the harness if it needs to be cleaned.  Ok, Britax manual writer....you're drunk, you probably don't have any children and have never had to clean up green vomit; it's time to pack it up and go home.

So picture me dear readers at the kitchen sink with a giant car seat sitting on the counter top with the harness, dripping with green oozy grossness hanging out of the bottom of the seat and into the sink so I can wash it with mild soap.  The seat and the fantastic design that does not allow the harness to come out is an occasion of sin, my friends.  Plain and simple.  On the bright side, I kept all the expletives that I had regarding the seat, and it's designers in my head so the kids were at least spared that nice little show.

Madeline had very kindly offered to clean the puddle of green slime off the car upholstery, so that was a huge help.  I was really impressed to see that the got it all up.  I guess she gained some practical life experience this past weekend.

I was going to attempt to put the carseat cover back on the seat tonight and get it back out in the van, but it's not dry.  I hope it will dry sometime this evening so I can get everything back where it belongs.  I'd really like to get to Mass tomorrow morning.  This is one of those times where I wish I didn't keep our spare carseat in Bryan's car.  Since he's out in Denver until tomorrow, my spare seat is sitting over in the Philly airport parking lot.  Some days it just seems like nothing can be easy.  Too bad this happens to be one of those days, right?

I'm looking forward to tomorrow.  Bryan will be back and I don't know about you, but I'm confident that it's going to be a vomit free day.  If it's not, I'm going to go and eat a lot of chocolate and have a glass of cranberry wine.

If you made it to the end, thanks for sticking with me.  I promise not to talk so much about vomit next time.  Maybe I'll talk about the upcoming name change for the blog.  Oh and how happy are you that I didn't share any pictures with this story?  I almost did.  Sure they aren't something anyone really wants to see, but the watermark on the picture would have revealed the new name for my blog.

You know you have an awesome husband when...

I use Grammarly's grammar correction feature because having bad grammar is like washing dishes with no soap.  It just doesn't make sense.

I need to give a major shout out to Bryan that comes with some big awesome husband kudos.  All week long he's been getting up at 5:30AM and leaving for work only to return home around 8PM.  He's had a lot of important all day meetings with different vendors over the past month and it's not only exhausting for him, but it's pretty exhausting for me.  The kids and I are used to him working from home three days a week which clearly has us spoiled.

I had a bit of a melt down this evening.  Bryan was still working even though he thought he'd be home a bit earlier today.  The hand wash only pans and bakeware were piling up in the sink and we had no dish soap.  I was hungry and we had nothing good to eat and the baby was on a cry jag.  Also add in that I was exhausted and I haven't been feeling well.  Poor Bryan patiently let me complain to him via text and then over the phone as he made his way home.  I lamented that I really needed meat and have been dying for a filet mignon for the past six or seven weeks.

Now if I were Bryan, I'd have been a lot less patient and I certainly wouldn't have done what he did.  After a long day at work and a long commute he took a detour to the local grocery store to buy me a steak which he then had to prepare outside in forty some degree weather.  And to earn even more awesome husband bonus points, he even brought home two bottles of dish soap in the brand and scent that I like best (He did use a "phone-a-wife" life line to verify the brand and scent that I wanted.).  And the steak?  It was awesome.

So sorry, ladies, I'm keeping him.  I have a feeling that not all men would come home from a long day of work, stop at the grocery store and then grill up an amazing filet mignon for their complaining wife.  Clearly I'm helping him on his way to sainthood.

Found them!

After I blogged that last post Bryan walked in the door from a long day of work and I let him know that I was on the verge of either crying or having a major freak out because the SD card with Katie's second birthday pictures was MIA.  So before even getting a chance to sit down he helped me to find the memory card.  Everywhere I looked I found nothing but clutter and messes that needed to be addressed.  He managed to find the memory card in a pretty obvious spot: with the rest of my camera equipment.  I think he deserves some awesome husband points for saving the day.

So I can breathe a massive sigh of relief now.  Bryan insisted that I upload the pictures to my laptop right away.  As I scanned some of the images that were on the card I found pictures from our trip to the local pumpkin patch, both of Katie's parties and a series of pictures that make me so happy that we homeschool.

You see, in a regular middle school setting you don't have your parents goofing around with you while you take a test.  With homeschool, you might find that you have an inflatable pony inches away from your face as you take a vocabulary test.  So you really do have to learn how to concentrate and filter out even the most bizarre situations.  Life skills.  She's learning life skills and demonstrating that she can focus on academics even in odd situations.

Finding Arrested Development in the Past

Lately Bryan's sister has been texting him different pictures from when they were kids.  Most of these pictures are hilarious.  There are pictures of Bryan wearing a blue leisure suit as a baby and lots of other equally funny pictures.  To date, my favorite childhood pictures of Bryan are of him proudly sporting a white bunny suit for a school play.  The bunny pictures are something that he wishes would go away.  I have them safely hidden so that he won't burn the evidence.

This morning Bryan got another picture from his sister.  This time it was Bryan as a toddler on a bike with his dad.  Bryan showed it to me and says "Arrested Development."  If you have ever watched the show then you might be familiar with the term "never nude."

It's Soccer Try-Out Season

Last year we invested a lot of time in shuttling Madeline from one soccer club to the next doing try-outs to see what her options were.  In the end our soccer club made a few coaching changes and we were able to stay with the club.  Overall, we've been very happy with the arrangement.  This year we don't have to go from club to club since Madeline is sticking with her current team, but we still have to get through two weeks of soccer overload.

In a typical week Madeline has two practices and a game on Saturday.  Ellie has a practice, usually on one of the nights when Madeline has practice and a game on Sunday.  So four days a week have us working around soccer practices and games.  For the next two weeks we're looking at an additional night of try-outs for both girls.  I feel like we're up to our eyeballs in soccer.  This Sunday is going to be very busy.  Madeline has a make up game that was rained out a couple weeks ago that is causing some schedule issues.  This week I'll have to bring Katie and Ellie with me to teach my religious ed class which happens to be the week our class is putting on a show for the parents.

Last night both of the girls had practice.  Nights like that can be brutal when Katie goes on a cry rant.  She spent about three hours screaming and crying off and on while they were gone.  She doesn't like when her Daddy leaves the house.  She thinks he should be playing with her instead and I'm apparently not a good Daddy substitute.  I'm not looking forward to two more nights in a row of Katie crying for Bryan.  It's exhausting.  They're calling for warmer weather today so maybe tonight will be better if I'm able to take her outside for a walk.  It was too cold last night so we had to stay inside.

Did I mention that Ellie is going to try out for the U-9 travel team?  Bryan isn't sure what her chances are of making the team.  From what he tells me the present team looks pretty good.  He thinks she might have a shot if she goes out there and plays her best.  If she gets offered a spot on the team we'll then have to weigh out our options and see if it's the right decision for her.  Bryan has been coaching her the past three or four seasons, but he feels that she learn better from other coaches based on the progress she has made while going to some training sessions this winter.  In the event that she does get selected for the team and we go forward with it, we'll have a lot of schedule juggling to do on Saturdays beginning this fall.

Now I just need to make it through Katie's teething/evening Daddy withdrawal for the next few days.  I miss the really warm weather of last week.  She didn't miss Bryan and the girls at all last week since she was having too much fun playing outside and going for walks in her little red car.

Quick Takes Volume 55

~1~

I was just telling Bryan that I was thinking about what I was going to blog for this edition of Quick Takes and he suggested that I blog about him.  So I think I'll do that for at least a couple of these takes.  As soon as I started typing away I think he realized that he got his wish.  He's not feeling so good about this suggestion.

~2~

If I'm writing about Bryan, I guess I should tell you that he tossed on his spiffy new sweatpants that one of the girls got him for Christmas and headed into the back yard to suck up the leaves with his awesome leaf blower/sucker.  The yard is looking pretty good, by the way.

~3~

Bryan keeps telling me about the possibility of us getting snow this weekend.  I don't like to hear things like that so I keep refusing to acknowledge the possibility.  To make sure he's not stuck with snow on the ground and a snow blower that doesn't want to start (this happened to him two years ago) he got the snow blower up and running.  It just needs to move to the garage.

~4~

Bryan is feeling more self conscious about me writing about him so I think I'll keep going with the Bryan themed quick takes.

~5~

Recently someone insinuated that I have "a lot of personalities" so Bryan and I have been joking around about it.  We have a lot of nicknames for ourselves and the kids so Bryan decided to write my gift tags out to my different personalities for Christmas.  I especially like the one for Brunhilda.  That's my newest alter-ego.  She's strong like bull and built like an ox. 

~6~

From the time I was six years old, my mom and dad used to take me to Disney World every year.  One of my favorite rides was Mister Toad's Wild Ride.  I was so sad when they removed it several years back to make way for the Pooh Bear ride that is there now.  I noticed while we were on the Pooh Bear ride that there was a Mr. Toad "Easter egg" in the ride.  It was a portrait of Mr. Toad looking rather stately.  Bryan and I got to head out to Downtown Disney one night while my mom and dad watched the girls so we could do some souvenir/Christmas shopping for the girls.  Bryan thought we should look for something Mr. Toad for me since I had no intentions of getting anything for myself beyond a magnet.  We were in the Art of Disney Store when Bryan spotted this print of Mr. Toad.  Right away he told me he was buying it for me for Christmas.  As soon as I get out the hammer and a nail it will be hanging in our bedroom.

~7~

On Christmas Day Bryan made yet another delicious turkey.  This one was practically swimming in butter. [My CCD kids would tell you that I am frequently praising God for his amazing gift of butter.]  Look at all buttery the drippings are and this is just the baking sheet he moved it to so he could carve it.  He added two lemons to the 20lb bird so the turkey had a subtle lemon taste to it.  YUM!

Using Zimbabwe to Prove a Point

Being the only girl in the family, I never really experienced hand-me-downs.  I had older girl cousins and occasionally one of my aunts would give some of my cousin's clothes to me.  I suspect my mom wasn't a fan of hand-me-downs given that she almost always found something wrong with the clothes and I seldom ended up wearing any of them.

Bryan, being a younger brother, had to wear hand-me-downs.  As a result he has a different take on hand-me-downs than I have.  I won't put stained or ripped clothes on my kids.  So items like that don't get handed down to the next child.  Bryan agrees with that take.  We differ when it comes to things like socks and underwear.  I saw nothing wrong with saving gently used socks and underwear to hand down, but that's where Bryan draws the line.  For the most part, I have humored Bryan in his request that Ellie not wear her sister's skivvies with the exception being training underwear.  I figure those who cloth diaper reuse the diapers for their next child, and I don't see there being much difference between cloth diapers and cloth training pants.

I like to rile Bryan up from time to time by telling him that I'm going to put outgrown underwear in the hand-me-down pile.  Comments like this are usually met with a resounding "NO!" followed by him telling me that we can buy new underwear.

Tonight he was sure to tell me that Zimbabwe placed a ban on second hand undies.  I thought it was a joke, but he sent me a link to the story.  I was a bit surprised to see that they're not the first country to ban second hand underwear.  Who would have guessed?

Princess Green Goblin Monsters

What happens when you ask four and five year old what they'd like to call their soccer team and you have a coach who's completely open to suggestions?  You get a team name that's rather unique.  Bryan, not wanting to impose a name on his co-ed soccer team for four and five year olds asked the kids what they thought their team should be called.

The kids wear a green uniform shirt, so it was no surprise that the word green made it into their name.  I was a little surprised that the name incorporated not only goblin monsters, but also princesses.  And the best part is that all of the kids, even the boys, were ok with being the Princess Green Goblin Monsters.

I was at Madeline's soccer game when Ellie's team was playing so I missed out on the fun of naming the team.  Bryan tells me the parents found the team name to be rather funny and the kids were happy with their name.

I can't wait until I get to go and cheer on the Princess Green Goblin Monsters.

Swoon

Bryan called me today to tell me he was having lunch at Maggiano's.  He eats there frequently enough. His brother is a manager there so when he goes there, he gets to catch up with him, not to mention he generally gets a very nice discount.  I love their chocolate cake and I usually feel a little jealous or passed over when he tells me that he ate there on any given day.  I generally respond with "And you didn't think to get me a piece of chocolate cake?" when he tells me he went there.  Most of the time that garners a sigh from Bryan or an explanation of why getting me a piece of cake on his lunch hour that is about 7 hours before when he'll be home is an unreasonable request.  Fine, I'll admit it's a bit of a stretch to ask for the cake, but I think in the freezing cold months it's not an impossible request to carry out.

I was surprised when I got a call from Bryan today asking me if I'd like a piece of chocolate cake from Maggiano's.  How awesome was that?  And to make the situation even better, he even remembered to pick up the gift cards that the restaurant is donating to Ellie's school fundraiser.  Looks like Bryan is on his A game today!  I can't wait to dive into that chocolate cake.  I think I'll even share some of it with Bryan.

If I were a water ice.....

Bryan's company is really into "Team Building" activities.  The corporate environment that he works in is very different from the corporate environment that I worked in before I took up my current gig as a stay at home mom.  His company really tries to make sure their employees have some fun.  Some of the time they succeed and other times, their little projects just seem ridiculous.

Today was one of the ridiculous project days.  Bryan sent me an IM informing me that he needed to come up with a water ice name for himself.  Really?  After a month of having snow on my lawn every day, the last thing I even want to think about is water ice.  I'm not a fan of water ice.  To me, it's glorified snow.  Generally, water ice isn't sugary enough for me, and the taste isn't bold enough for my liking.  I don't like watered down flavors, and that's precisely what you get when you have water ice.

I decided to help him out and offer up some suggestions.  Obviously, if he's telling me about this water ice project he must be fishing for ideas, right?  So I rose to the occasion and spit out a few ideas in rapid succession:
Cyborgic Ice
Bry-dog days of Summer
Fruity Fattingham
Our last name-berry delight
Geekalicious
Essence of Bryan

All of those got shot down.  Personally, I thought Cyborgic Ice was pretty good.  Then I jokingly offered up Bitter Husband, which got ignored.  Hey, Ben and Jerry's has Chubby Hubby so why not Bitter Husband? It could be a sour lemon water ice.

So then he explains that the name will be visible to everyone in the office, not just his team.  Fine.  I'll play nice.  To understand the following names, you need to know that Bryan has no sense of smell.  He never has and likely never will.  There is a movie called Walk Hard where the main character loses his sense of smell and they make a big deal about it.  They announce that he's suddenly "Smell Blind" which is a term that is related to anosmia.

So going along the smell blind path, I came up with this lovely water ice name:
This is really just [frozen] water, but I have no sense of smell/taste so I think it's flavored water ice.

Bryan liked it, but thought it was a little long.

Odorless Fish flavored water ice and Shrimp Surprise both got shot down. Then Bryan came up with his own:"Smellblind-ice."  I countered that one with "I can't believe it's not flavored."  Bryan liked it, so his official water ice name is I can't believe it's not flavored.

Where can I get a job where they will actually pay me to come up with stupid team project ideas?

Do I really only have two children?

Sometimes I wonder if I'm playing Mommy to more than just the two children I delivered. Sometimes, I think that my husband is my third child. How this happened is beyond me.

Bryan just came bounding downstairs in an undershirt and pajama pants to find me. Bryan works from home on Fridays and he likes to be comfortable, so that's the reason for the ridiculous attire. Personally, I'd rather him put on sweatpants or something of that nature, but I'm not going to insist on them. As I'm talking to him I couldn't help but stare at his bushy configuration of hair. He usually sports a short buzz cut, but he hasn't gotten around to shaving off his hair in a few weeks. I mentioned to him that he was a bit fluffy and that's when he told me perhaps the stupidest thing I've heard all week. A co-worker "double dog dared" him to grow a mullet. Are you kidding me? Does this not sound like something you expect your third grader to come home and tell you? I had to explain to Mr. Overgrown hair that he needs to cut his hair today.

I didn't say a word when he decided to sport a scruffy beard for a few days, but mullet hair? I don't think so. Someone is going to be cutting his hair or I'm going to do it for him.

Nine Years

Nine years ago today Bryan and I got married in front of God, our family and friends. It amazes me how quickly time flies. We've set up home in three places (an apartment, and then our first house followed by our current home), welcomed two children and two furry creatures into our family. We've had many trials and lots of laughter and wonderful memories. I can't believe how fast the first nine years have passed. I'm so happy that I married my best friend and I look forward to many more years with my wonderful husband.

I'm still here

To look at my blog, I get the feeling that I must have fallen off the face of the earth or I've hit a major time warp. Actually the time warp thing is partly right given the recent time change for daylight savings time. Let me just say that I think that particular practice should be abolished. I'm taking a beating with the time change. Who would have thought that "gaining" an extra hour of sleep could screw a person up so much?

My past week has been a whirl wind of activity. Friday was jam packed with fun and not so fun moments. I saw the classroom Halloween party that I planned for Madeline's class come to fruition. For the most part, I'd say it was a success. The kids, the teacher and the wonderful parents who took a few hours out of their day to help run the party all seemed pleased with my efforts. Bryan took Ellie on her field trip to the pumpkin patch before he dropped her off at Madeline's school for the class party.

When I finally returned home on Friday afternoon I spent a couple hours engulfed in Madeline's social studies project. Sadly, the project was a bust and I found myself redoing it this afternoon. At long last, it is finished.

Since Bryan took Friday off to take Ellie on her field trip and to go to the doctor we decided to head out to the Olive Garden for a much anticipated dinner. Once we arrived at the restaurant, disaster struck. As soon as I got out of the car I heard this loud hissing sound and immediately suspected the tire I was standing next to. Sure enough, I had a tire that was going flat. Figures, when I'm starving and haven't eaten since 7:30 AM we would encounter a flat. Ugh! I wanted to scream and cry. I think my blood sugar had totally plummeted by the time we arrived at Olive Garden based on the massive headache I developed and we weren't able to go eat because of the tire. We rushed over to Target so Bryan could get fix a flat so we could make it home. The Olive Garden is about 30 minutes from our house and once the flat was discovered our new focus was to stop the leak and get home ASAP. The drive home was interesting. We only made it home thanks to the little air pump in my car, and the lovely air pump at the WaWa. Of course, when we got to the WaWa with a gas station we had to wait for the air hose. While waiting for 10 minutes, the tire went completely flat and all of the fix a flat oozed out of the tire. I had to yell and scream at someone who decided to butt in line and take the hose. Extreme hunger, less than desirable situations and cranky kids and husband can make me lose my composure very quickly. After letting the poor inconsiderate man from Delaware have it, he backed off and got in line for the hose. Bryan was annoyed and willing to let the guy go ahead of him, but I wasn't having it and neither was the man who was next in line. The moral of the day for the young man from Delaware was don't mess with a tired and hungry Karen and wait your turn like everyone else. We managed to make it home. Within seconds of pulling into our garage the tire was totally flat. Turns out we had quite a large gauge in the tire and how we managed to make it home is a mystery.

Saturday saw a day with a no-show soccer team (Madeline's opposing team decided not to play and didn't think to let the soccer club know.) and trick or treating. Sadly, trick or treating wasn't all that fun. It started off rather nicely with just Bryan, the girls, Oscar and me. By the time we almost made it around our block our neighbors asked us to join them. I didn't want to simply because one of Madeline's soccer teammates was going with them and I wasn't fond of the mother. Before we were done trick or treating I found myself wishing we had taken a different route when we set out. The mother of the soccer teammate criticized my dog's appearance, his rectum and the fact that we actually paid money for him when he's "so ugly". My decision to stay at home was also attacked and the mother asked me if I at least had a college education. She seemed rather stunned when I told her that I did. (I don't stay at home because I can't find a job or because I'm uneducated. I stay at home because I don't want someone else raising my children.) This woman then began to go on about how "superior" her children are because they are or will be going to private school. Her son goes to the local parish school and her daughter is in Madeline's school. They don't use the public middle school because of the "riff raff" and because their children are "superior" to the "inferior children who go to public schools". She went on and on telling me how her children are better than every other child who gets a public education. I held my tongue and decided not to say anything to her. I just said oh and I see as she and her children went on about how "superior" they are. I found it really sad that this woman has warped her children into sounding a lot like Hitler youth. And I learned that if I want my children to be "superior" all I need to do is give them a Catholic education. Since I know that our local Catholic school has a curriculum that lags behind the public schools, I'll let them find out for themselves how "superior" that education they're paying for really is. My "inferior" children will have to go to the public school and learn that not everyone is as blessed in life to have all the nice things that they do. I try to teach my children to have humility and not flaunt anything that they have and quite frankly, I'm shocked that there are parents who teach their kids that they are better than others. It's something that I found totally sickening.

Sunday was Bryan's birthday. I took the girls to Mass early in the morning and they both behaved for me (What a shock!). My CCD class was half empty due to illness for the second week in a row. I'm beginning to wonder when I'll have a full class again. The girls both had soccer games in the rain at the same time on Sunday. I'll be so happy when we can have a weekend without rain.

I don't know that I remember Monday. I'm sure I spent most of the day reading books that I have waiting for me to review. I know that we had to take Madeline to my parent's house to spend the night so they could take her to the dentist since my car went into the shop Monday night.

Since I had the tire issue on Friday, we sent the van to the Toyota dealership for repairs. I wound up with new breaks, four new tires and a bunch of routine stuff. So my flat tire led to a $1,200 bill. Just what we needed.

While Tuesday wasn't the most delightful day thanks to the car repair bill, I did have a good day. My parents took Madeline to her dentist appointment and I did some of my Christmas shopping from home. When they brought her back home, I got to go vote and I'm happy to report that New Jersey will have a Republican Governor. So I certainly feel like my vote counted. I also stumbled upon Halloween costumes for 75% off at Target. Madeline found a costume she liked for next year. She's going to be Super Girl and for $7.50 with all accessories included I'm one happy mom. I LOVE a good bargain.

Madeline is off from school all week (except Monday) so after we dropped Ellie off at school today we did a little more Christmas shopping. Then later in the day I immersed myself in Madeline's social studies project. I'm happy to report that it's finally finished and it looks pretty good if I do say so myself. I hope it gets an A. I even got some Christmas gifts wrapped today. Now I just need to go relax and read a book.

I now feel like I'm caught up.

It's going to be one of those days!

When Bryan travels I call him before I go to bed to talk to him for a few minutes and to say good night to him. Most of the time Bryan is in a different time zone when he travels. Occasionally, my beloved spouse is having too much of a good time and I'm not able to get in touch with him. Other times he doesn't have cell service in whatever place he's in. There have been times when my husband has thought it was ok to call our house at 1 or 2AM while the girls and I were sleeping. I do everything in my power to make sure the phone doesn't ring in our house past 11PM.

Last night, I was feeling especially tired after two days chock full of activity and single parenting. I sent Bryan a text at 11:55PM to let him know that I was going to bed early and I would be calling him in 5 minutes. (I go to bed between Midnight and 1:30 most nights.) After making sure the dog was locked in his crate, locking up the house and making sure the girls were still alive (Yes, I check every night to make sure my girls are alive before I go to bed.) I gave Bryan a call. He was at Wolfgang Puck's Vegas restaurant. I only talked to him for a few minutes. I explained to him that I was rather exhausted after hosting my parents for about 5 hours that afternoon/evening. When they come over the kids and the dog get very excited, and my parents both talk to me about different things at the same time. The noise level alone wipes me out. I said good night to Bryan and didn't expect to talk to him until around 8AM this morning.

I'm not sure what exactly happened to my husband, but he must not have checked his text messages for many hours. At 4AM my phone rang, and as luck would have it the handset I had on Bryan's pillow was the loud one from the kitchen that plays a song when Bryan calls. So I was startled out of a deep sleep by the phone. I answer it to an overly bubbly Bryan who is literally shouting into the phone. My first thought was the he must be drunk. Why else would he call me at 4AM? No, my perfectly sober husband was blissfully unaware that Las Vegas was several hours behind NJ. He insisted for about a minute that it was only 1AM and that he hadn't said good night to me. It wasn't until I firmly pointed out that it was 4AM here on the East Coast and that I had already talked to him four hours ago that he realized he made a big mistake. Part of me thinks he was just so excited that he won $400 playing black jack that he had to call me.

Because of my 4AM wake up call I couldn't fall back to sleep. My stomach was killing me because I am generally starving when I wake up. So I had to go downstairs to the kitchen to grab a pudding cup to make my stomach feel better. Around 5:30AM I finally managed to fall back to sleep. When the alarm went off at 7AM I felt anything but refreshed.

The day got more interesting when I asked the director of Ellie's school if it was still NJ law that children under 5 are required to have the flu vaccine to attend preschool. Unfortunately the answer was yes. So I spent this morning scrambling to locate a pediatric dose of the flu vaccine for Ellie. Our pediatrician is out and doesn't know when they'll have it. Our family doctor was also out. I wound up on a wild goose chase to get her the vax. After calling the 800 number for the Walgreen's Take Care Clinic I was told that the local Walgreen's had it. So I signed Ellie out and took her there to get the flu shot. Once I got her signed in (We were first on the list...yeah!) I talked to the nurse on duty and found out they have been out of the pediatric dose for weeks. Ugh! But she did tell me she's heard rumors that the Minute Clinic at a CVS 20 minutes away had it. I decided we'd take a chance and drive over there. There was a crowd of people around the Minute Clinic and I began to wonder if Ellie would be 5 before she was seen. We were 9th in line and spent about 90 minutes waiting to be seen, all the while not being sure if they even had the pediatric dose of the flu vax. Fortunately, our wait was not in vain. Ellie got her flu shot so I now have one less thing to worry about.

Bryan is now on a plane that is heading home. Provided the flight was not delayed (I haven't checked the status yet.) he should be home in just enough time for me to get over to the parish school in time for the class I'm required to take by the diocese to be a catechist.

I'm very tired and I can't wait until this day is over. I'll be very happy to have Bryan home and snoring in bed next to me instead of calling me at 4AM.

I feel like I've been MIA

I'm starting to think that I've been busier that I previously thought. I'm a little lazy and didn't go and look at any of my more recent posts, but I don't think I've shared my pumpkin patch pictures from two weeks ago. I know I didn't put any of my recent beach pictures up either. Did I even blog about my trip to the beach this past Saturday? I think I'm in the middle of a time warp. How is it that Madeline's birthday was a month ago? Time has been zipping past me ever since I got sick back in August. Here's hoping it slows down sometime soon.

Today was a rather busy day here. Bryan left at 5:30AM to catch a flight to Las Vegas. He's out there for a meeting. So my day consisted of waking up early (kind of) to say good bye to my husband, worrying for his safety while he was flying (worrying and praying that is), driving to Stone Harbor for a dentist visit for me and Madeline, checking on my parents' house "at the shore" (non-public bathroom break), lunch at Mc Donald's with my best friend and her four kids, and a visit to the Cape May County Zoo. When we finally got home I crashed on the couch for a nice long nap.

I'm happy to report that I successfully kept the girls busy today. I like to keep them busy while Bryan is away so they don't miss him too much. I particularly like to keep busy while he's flying. Otherwise I obsessively worry about him. Tomorrow my parents are going to visit so that will create a diversion for the kids for tomorrow. I just have to get past two mornings and one more bedtime routine and life will be back to normal for a few more weeks.

Unfortunately, I'll likely only see Bryan for 30 minutes on Wednesday night before I have to go to a class I'm required to take as a catechist in our diocese. The kicker is I'm not even sure if I'm actually registered for the class since the DRE appears to be a bit of a scatterbrain. I've emailed, given her handwritten notes and spoken to her in person and I still do not have a straight answer. I'll be calling tomorrow to try to follow up once more. I'm frustrated to say the least.

I'm looking forward to Thursday when life goes back to normal for a few more weeks. Bryan has two more business trips coming up next month. I honestly don't know how I used to cope when he used travel frequently. Before Ellie was born he used to travel almost monthly. In fact, I think he was away for about 45 days of my pregnancy with Ellie (spread out over many trips). We don't have the exact dates for his next two trips, but I'm really hoping he won't be traveling on our anniversary since it's the day before Thanksgiving.

This tired mom is going to head off to bed now. Maybe tomorrow I'll find the time to post my beach and pumpkin patch pictures. My new profile picture is from our beach trip this past Saturday. Bryan played photographer for a few minutes so I could get in a few pictures.

Can I get a germ-proof bubble here?

I've been a bit preoccupied over the past week or so with all the medical types of issues going on with my little family.  

About a week and a half ago, Mr. Furkins stubbed his foot when playing fetch in the back yard with Bryan.  So for a few days, the dog walked around with a little limp.  I'm sorry, but Oscar is the clumsiest thing on four legs.  He's always tripping or falling over things.  He even underestimates the traction on the kitchen floor and runs into doors and walls and furniture.  I have little sympathy for him since I think he could avoid these accidents if he'd slow down a little.  But he's a crazy dog and I don't think he knows how to relax.

A week ago Ellie went to the doctor for her 4 year old well visit.  Turns out I haven't been putting the sunscreen on her funny.  She really is spotted, and apparently the pigment loss is caused by eczema.  So she's has white spots.  I'm told by the doctor that dry eczema patches don't tan.  Every moisturizer I try on her makes her skin red and it hurts her.  Lanolin is the only thing I can use on her that doesn't irritate her, but that unfortunately stains everything.  Sometimes I wonder if the hypoallergenic dermatologist tested creams and lotions have ever been tested on people who actually have sensitive skin.  My guess is probably not.

Ellie also has a cough that the doctor thought was nothing last week.  Now I'm not sure if she's getting better or not.  It's hard to tell when compared to the other sick people in the house.

Bryan has bronchitis.  He started to feel unwell this weekend, but he's stubborn and decided to suffer rather than seek medical attention so he could feel better.  He realized on Monday after he got to work that he probably shouldn't have gone to the office.  Fortunately, he decided to capitulate and seek the advice of a medical professional.  I got to the point where I told him I wasn't going to have sympathy on him if he wasn't getting help for his ailment.  He's now on 5 different medications for his bronchitis.

Madeline woke up in the middle of the night on Monday and was crying that her ear hurt.  She was so miserable and crying so much that Bryan and I thought Ellie was the one calling us.  So we walked past Madeline's room to check on Ellie only to find her fast asleep.  Turns out Madeline has a really bad ear infection, and the nurse practitioner told Bryan that she may have the beginnings of bronchitis.  So she's now on an antibiotic.  She has seemed pretty out of it for most of the past two days.

I am just hoping that I get through this unscathed.  I'm constantly next to at least one sick person.  Bryan keeps telling me that it's only a matter of time before I succumb to illness, too.  I'd like to think that I may be immune.

I do think that Ellie is getting better. The cough doesn't sound as bad as I remember it being last week.   She's been hanging out with me a lot more since Madeline hasn't been up for playing.  I've taken her to stores while Bryan and Madeline stay at home and rest.  Ellie was so happy to go out with just me.  She had the biggest smile on her face when she said "Look Mommy, only one child is going to Target!".  She skipped and pranced all though Target yesterday.  She smile on her face was infectious.  Since Madeline isn't allowed in the pool for a few days (nurse practitioner's orders) Ellie has been relishing her one on one time with me in the pool.  She is such a little love and I know she has enjoyed her one on one time with me as much as I have.  She's making me feel like four isn't a bad age.  I guess I'm not missing age three all that much anymore.

Not Guilty!

Bryan just got a call from the Apple store.  Turns out his laptop issue is totally unrelated to the ball throwing incident.  So I didn't break his beloved MacBook. Whew!  That's a relief.

I asked Bryan if he was happy that he didn't jump to conclusions and blame me for the problem last weekend.  For the past 4 days, it has been pretty evident that he wanted so badly to blame me for the problem.  I called him on it just now and as he's telling me he didn't want to blame me, I could see in his face that he did want to be able to say it was all my fault.  I'm very happy that I am not guilty, because if I had been, I would have never heard the end of it.  Now I don't feel like I should offer to pay for the repairs out of my money.

Guilty or not?

Hmm...that's the looming question here.  Last Saturday while sitting on the love seat in the family room (wanted a change of scenery since I own sitting rights to the couch), Mr. Furkins, in a dubious plot to cause destruction, brought me a ball.  The dog, as well as every other breathing creature on the planet who has seen me throw a ball, knows that I pretty much have no aim.  Did I hit the plasma tv?  No, that would destroy my documentary watching and probably land me out on the street as a homeless person and I wouldn't be blogging right now.  Did I knock another picture off the wall? No, of course not since I was throwing the ball in a carpeted room (Pictures only fall off the wall in areas with no carpet, we have to keep things interesting here!).  Did I break a window? No, of all the things I could possibly hit, I hit the screen portion of Bryan's MacBook Pro.  Now in my defense, he knew I was throwing the ball in his direction, and he was ready to catch it (we like to tease Mr. Furkins).  So my throw went slightly awry and squarely hit the apple in the center of Bryan's laptop top.  I knew instantly that I had just turned into a pumpkin.  I'm pretty sure Bryan growled at me.  Not wanting to be the guilty party here, I yelled at the dog (he is the resident scapegoat, and he seems to be OK with it as long as we feed him).  I also decided that it was a good time to stop playing ball with Oscar, too, since I don't want to break anything.

So let's fast forward to Saturday night.  Bryan somehow managed to not freak out on me for the ball incident.  For some reason, his laptop was mysteriously experiencing some technical difficulties.  He spent a decent amount of time working on getting it fixed.  I spent most of that time cleaning and doing things that made me look disinterested and unaware of what he was doing.  Every once in a while, I'd stupidly ask what he was doing and get reminded that we had a little ball incident earlier in the day.  

Last night, Bryan's computer (the laptop apparently hates me) decided to stop working and wouldn't start up for Bryan at all.  So my technical, computer geek spouse had to set up a Genius Bar appointment at our local Mac store.  I think when you are someone like Bryan, when it comes to computers, that seeking tech support is an emasculating experience.  So while he dealt with the Genius Bar guy, I got to stand by as the computer killer and watch the girls play games on the Macs set up for kids.  I'm not sure how long we were there exactly, but I do know that I got to have my ears blasted by an obnoxious Dora the Explorer game.  The Mac Ellie was using had some sort of issue where you couldn't control the volume.  I think I can still hear the Dora the Explorer song.

Bryan will now be without his beloved MacBook for 3-7 days.  With the holiday weekend coming up, I suspect it will be on the longer end.  At most, the repairs will be $350.  Amazing how an $7 Kong ball can cause so much damage, isn't it?  I cautiously asked my agitated Bryan if the Genius Bar tech thought the problems were related to a direct hit from a ball.  Bryan tells me that it most likely is given that they can't get the laptop to start up.  He's clearly not happy with me and I know he's very annoyed that he doesn't have his laptop, but he hasn't come out and blamed me for the incident. Want to know what the worst part all of this is?  If this had happened a month ago, it would have been covered by the Apple Care protection.

So am I guilty?  He knows I can't throw accurately and he knew the ball was coming his way.  I tend to think I'm not, but maybe I am.