In many ways this schedule is awesome. We get a 3 day weekend nearly every week. It makes it easier to go places for the weekend when we get cabin fever. We get to sleep in twice a week (we have 9:30 church so no sleeping in on Sunday, at least for the mom.) But I'll tell you what. I am so ready for school come Sunday night! Having 3 kids home at the same time in an 800 sq foot house when it's freezing cold outside sometimes just about drives me to drink. (Winter starts in October around here.)
first snow of the season, October 6, 2011
and the next morning...
In fact, it's snowing right now.
Mack was in the ER last Thursday night with croup. He started on Wednesday with a pretty bad cough and by Thursday night he was struggling to breathe and was looking a little blue around the lips. Fortunately Dan was home so I didn't have to make the 30 minute drive over to Montpelier by myself. My friend Karla came and stayed with the girls. They gave Mack an albuterol breathing treatment in the ER and gave him dexamethasone, a steroid, that he took for 5 days. Oh, and he had an ear infection so there's 10 days of antibiotics as well. Mack was not impressed with the breathing treatment and we basically had to hog tie him so he would take the full dosage. When the nurse tried to give him his meds he hid under his woobie. I tried to get Dan to take some pictures but he thought it was totally undignified to take a picture of Mack in his moment of desperation. We were being discharged and Dan gave me the look like, "What are you waiting for? Let's blow this joint" and I just said, "I'm not leaving until you take a picture." That earned me a major eye roll. But I got the picture.
Aren't Macky's pj's cute? Grammie got them at Costco.
Speaking of Grammie, she came to visit us for 2 days last week. The kids had been missing her but I just had too much to do at home to make the trip down to Utah. So Grammie came and gave me some relief for a couple days.
I got to finish painting the living room,
a project I started at the end of June.
The kids got to play games with Grammie
and bake pressed cookies.
And with Mom's help we finally got the kitchen cleaned, including the mopping. I love Swiffers. Well, I love the idea of Swiffers. In theory I should mop the floor all the time because it's just so darn convenient. But I don't. I still let the kitchen floor digress to the point of nastiness before I clean it. But the Swiffer takes a lot less energy than filling a bucket of mop water, wringing the mop out constantly, and trying to keep Mack out of the dirty water.
Anyway, back to sick kids. Lily and I both got Mack's sickies over the weekend and Lily missed 3 days of school this week. After a long weekend with whiny sick kids and feeling lousy myself, I really needed some quiet time, but no luck. Lily was pretty miserable with a bad cough and fever. She and Mack basically brain rotted for three days straight. Luckily we have the portable DVD player we bought this summer so I didn't have to forfeit the computer to the kids. I really would have lost my mind then!
By the third day home Lily was feeling a little more spunky and she made her brother wear this sequined dress up shirt. He was not amused. After about 3 minutes he came crying to me, "I want this off!" Erin, I smiled and thought of Kole/Ariel. Big sisters are so mean sometimes!
One good thing that did come out of last weekend is we finally got the wood stove put in. And by we I mean Dan.
We always take the stove and hearth out in the summer to make more room and usually bring it back in at the beginning of October. But this year we were delayed for a couple of reasons. Our chimney cracked in March so we had to use propane for the rest of the season while we waited to have the money to buy a liner to put inside the chimney. It's made of steel (I think) and looks like a dryer hose.
It was quite tricky to install because the chimney is old and the hole that comes out of the wall in the living room is not perfectly round, so Dan had to really fight to get it in. The other problem we had is that the top fire bricks in our wood stove broke last season so we couldn't burn a fire until we had those replaced. Our wood stove is discontinued so it took awhile to find the bricks online. And let me tell you, you need a PhD to figure out how to install those fire bricks. It took Dan and I together nearly an hour to figure out the right configuration.
Mack was helpful as always.
He is totally fascinated with the ash shovel. He thinks it makes a good sword. Much to my great pleasure.
Next, look for a post about another project that I've almost finished after a year and a half.
1 comment:
Hope you're feeling toasty now!
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