I Could Vomit

Ohmygosh, you guys gave me such much great advice on reading comprehension and writing, I am STILL combing through the comments from yesterday and Googling stuff.  I could end up sitting here all morning.

The first thing the kids told me yesterday when I saw them at school was, "Mom, mom, mom, mom.  Guess what?  There's a new diarrhea/vomit flu at school."

Super!  Right in time for the holidays!

"Gastroenteritis is not the flu.", I told them.  "The flu is an upper respiratory virus in your lungs.  Vomiting and diarrhea is in your intestines and is spread through oral/fecal contamination.  So wash your hands a lot!"


"Our teacher said it's the flu.", Sarah insisted.

"It's not the flu.  You get intestinal viruses by little tiny microscopic pieces of poop entering your mouth from poor hygiene.  So don't scratch your butt.  Make sure you wash your hands and keep your hands out of your mouth at school.  Do you understand?"

"It's the flu, Mom."

"Okay, whatever.  It's the flu.  Keep your hands out of your mouths."

I'm tempted to tell them to stay out of the bathrooms.  It's probably norovirus or rotavirus which we have had more than once and those viruses can live up to five days on surfaces.  UGH.  

Gregory is on his third week of being a Lunch Monitor, so I went down to school today and told his teacher he will not be doing that anymore and he'll be going to recess today, so find someone else.  We've put in our time for the year.  I am so over having four kids vomiting at the same time, I could just VOMIT.

Austin is still dealing with hives from the antibiotics he was on.  My poor baby.  I'm trying to build his system back up with probiotics to replace what was wiped out during the antibiotics.  He's on Goodbelly, kefir, Nature's Way Reuteri, and Primadophilus Kids.  The hives are only showing up now after his shower in the evenings.  He was down to one small spot last night, so hopefully we are almost done with that mess.

I drank some of the Goodbelly, which I never had before, and I became horribly ill.   I was sick all day yesterday from it.  It caused severe aching, intestinal cramping, brain fog, and malaise for me.  I still feel bad today.  I Googled the side effects and found a lot of interesting discussion about herx reaction when you first start a new probiotic.  Basically, the side effects are from a mass die-off of bad bacteria in the gut and the toxic side effects are a cleansing reaction.  The only way to get through that is to just keep taking the probiotic until all the bad bacteria dies.  It could take weeks.

I believe I'm full of bad bacteria, but being ill for weeks does not appeal to me.  At all.  If I wanted to be ill for weeks, I'd just go back up to the school and lick the door handle in the bathroom stall.

Do you hear me???????

Speaking of bathrooms, here is the progress.

There used to be a tiny corner shower, but Greg is putting in a much larger shower.   This bathroom is so incredibly narrow that we really were limited in what we could with the space.  He also installed a continuous hot water circulation line so we will always have hot water immediately upon turning on the faucet.  He cannot stand wasting one ounce of water waiting for the hot water to come over from the whole other side of the house.  

I'm sorry, Nancy.  Greg uses Pert.  

Greg has abandoned this project to start a new project for a friend of ours and it's entirely possible that it will look this until the New Year.   Or March.

That sort of makes me ill as well.

I Am Feeling Stabby

Last night was a three hour homework night.............. for me.   I am not kidding when I say we started at 5:25 and I finally finished with the last child at 8:30.

Austin is getting a lot of homework right now and he is very slow and methodical in the way he writes so it takes him twice as long to do a worksheet because it is neat and legible, unlike my girls who are pigs and have pig writing, yet fly through their worksheets.  

Their sloppy handwriting makes my eyes twitch and then I feel stabby when I look at it and I make them erase it a hundred times and rewrite it which makes us all unhappy.  I am seriously thinking of buying the Handwriting Without Tears program.   Have any of you guys tried this program before?  I think having three different kindergarten teachers, one being directly out of college with no classroom experience, and having three of them at the same time while learning to write, meant I didn't have time to watch their letter formation which has resulted in poor penmanship.  

Speaking of kindergarten, our school now has 50 students in the morning kindergarten class with one teacher.  I'm going to take a wild guess that they are not going to have great penmanship either.

Also, I cannot stand poor punctuation and spelling.  I want to see capital letters and proper endings to sentences, so if they answer a question with an incomplete sentence I make them erase it and put it in a full sentence.  It started in kindergarten that they were told to just "write the words the best you can" and that drives me INSANE.  No.  Write the words CORRECTLY.  If you do not know the proper spelling, then let's sound it out or look it up.  Let's not just "spell it the way you think it sounds" and then not correct it so you never learn to be a proficient speller.  Have you seen the way some of these kids spell on Facebook?

It makes me stabby.

So, anyway, back to Austin's homework.  He has a spelling assignment, reading comprehension worksheet, and a math worksheet daily.  Then he has a timed reading fluency test daily at home.  Then he has a book log and has to read aloud to me for 20 minutes.  Unlike the other kids, who had no concept of time and any book they read was "20 minutes", Austin calls me out on the time issue, making my eyes twitch and making me feel stabby.

Sarah is now getting completely different homework than the other two.  She was previously able to complete her homework entirely on her own, with zero input from me, but evidently that wasn't challenging enough for her because now I can barely do homework.   I had to read her reading passage several times last night just to help her find the answers to the reading comprehension questions because the vocabulary was way beyond her.  That made me very stabby.

We have the Award's Ceremony next week at school.  If you can recall last year, I watched as a boy in their grade sat on the floor and cried his eyes out because he had to watch everyone in his class go on the stage and receive an award for honor roll or attendance, and he was left sitting on the floor by himself like a dunce.  I still haven't gotten over that one and it wasn't even my child.   So I feel an enormous amount of pressure to make sure all of mine are on the honor roll and do not have to watch their siblings go on the stage in front of them, since it is done by grades, while they sit on the floor with the "dumb, crying" children. Can you imagine that?

The thing is that they still don't totally get the whole A, B, C, and F concept yet, so when they bring home a paper with a 75 percent, they say, "Is that bad?  Is that an A?"

In my mind I'm telling them, "Heck, yes, that's bad.  That will make you sit on the floor, OKAY???!"

Gregory and Amanda are both getting a couple Bs this time, so that made me an anxious mess that they might slip into C territory and be relegated to the lower elevation in the cafeteria.  Fortunately they will be all going on the stage this time.  WHEW.  

Gregory's B is in reading because his reading comprehension tests are bringing down his overall grade.  Do you guys have any strategies for reading comprehension?  He's actually brought home some Ds on several reading comprehension tests.  This caused me to immediately go online and research the reading curriculum they are using at our school.  We are using the Harcourt Trophies reading textbook and I found an enormous amount of teacher's resources and websites online to help him.

This ended up getting me sucked into teacher's support forums and reviews for this curriculum, which is a basal reading program.  The teachers were tearing each other apart in the forums regarding the "whole language" and "phonics" reading approach.  I was horrified at the way the teachers were speaking to each other.  Good grief.   Reading all that made me super stabby.

Since Gregory is slipping in reading comprehension, I have started having him read aloud to me again, so I can make him pause and we can discuss what he read.  I notice he reads very quickly and blows through the end of sentences.  They've been getting their reading logs done by reading independently this year as I push towards independence, but I think I'm missing something with Gregory and I need to spend more time with him.

So this is all adding up to 3 hours.

Which is making me want to stab something.  

Lunatic Watch: The Fall Edition

We are home!!!  We had a great time with family over the holiday weekend and had an uneventful drive home.

I spent the entire five hours in the car reading a new blog genre that sucked me totally in.  Have you guys heard of the Freegan movement?  I started reading Freegan blogs after reading an article about people who eschew buying food, rather choosing to dumpster dive for all their food behind stores.  These people aren't homeless or poor, they choose to forage for food in dumpsters on purpose.  And they blog!!!!


How awesome is that?  New lunatics!!!!  I had been in a horrible lunatic free rut.  You guys haven't pointed me to any new craziness lately.  


Several years ago, I was driving into Trader's and I saw a man walking a couple blocks from the store with a shopping cart full of Trader's food.  None of it was in bags and it appeared he had walked right out of the store with an entire shopping cart of food.

So when I got to the store, I approached the manager and told him what I saw and he said, "Darn it!  We forgot to lock the dumpsters.  That's the only way we can keep them out."

I thought he was talking about homeless people at the time.  I had no idea that Trader's dumpsters are one of the favorite Freegan places to forage for food.  Watch this documentary trailer if you don't believe me!



There are dozens and dozens of Freegan blogs where they document their dumpster finds.  Look at this one!  This young college student goes into details on how to avoid rat poison and leg injuries while dumpster diving.

There is also a Freegan cooking blog, for those looking to turn their expired food into luxurious meals.

I'm fascinated why anyone would need 15 jars of expired olives, but this blog has gorgeous photos.  When you see the photos of the nightly hauls, you have to wonder if this lifestyle isn't just another transformation on hoarding?  Why would anyone need 25 packages of cookies or 12 loaves of stale bread?  Is that really healthy?

And you can find dumpster diving tours on Meetup.com to help you get started.  There are 68 people on the waiting list in Tucson!!  This is how you can meet other Freegans and  learn where to go and how to collect discarded food, while avoiding obstacles like roaches, rats, and maggots.

I am not even kidding when I say I couldn't look away.  It's like peering into an alternate universe.  There all sorts of variations on the Freegan theme,too.  Some people only do it for dumpster diving and others do it in every aspect of their lives.  They even become squatters in foreclosed homes in order to live without using any currency.  I call them criminals and bums, but you may choose to go with "Freegan" if it suites you.

The last time I got caught up in an alternate blog universe was when I started reading patriarchal, Quiverful blogs.  I knew it was time to stop reading those blogs when I saw a lady make beds for her 10 children out of shelving from Costco, just so she could shove them all in one room, and I thought that was a resourceful idea to stack children like 50 pound bags of flour.  That actually seemed normal to me.

I wonder where this new blog genre will lead me?

I just know that Bob has beer in here.

Lucky for you guys that Las Vegas is one of the only cities in the United States that has a law making dumpster diving illegal due to someone being crushed to death in a waste disposal unit.  Or think of the possibilities!!!!!

Separate But Equal

Yesterday morning, my sister-in-law, Jill, my niece, Claire, and I drove to downtown L.A to the Garment District to go to the California market. 

We met up with Jill's mom and sister.  Jill and her family are shoppers.  They can shop for days. 

Jill even took me into the Santee Alley, which reminded me of the Broadacres Swap Meet in Las Vegas, mixed in with the Dolce Vita Stroll near the Trevi Fountain in Rome, where all the Gypsies peddle their wares.  I dropped my sunglasses on the ground and broke them and one minute later I had a knock-off pair for $5.

My friend Leslie, from Hawaii, just happened to be in L.A spending the holidays with her mom and family, so Jill and I drove from the Garment District down to San Pedro to see her. Little did I know that I had typed the wrong address in my phone.  Then to make things a big more interesting, my phone died, which had my GPS in it.  So I had no phone numbers and no internet and Jill and I were on empty and driving around San Pedro in circles at dusk.  People were honking at us.  I had no idea what to do. 

The only number I knew by heart was my sister.  So I called her and told her to look up Leslie's mom on Google.  Two seconds later, we had the correct address and we found them. 

So I got to visit with one of my Lucys. 

More importantly, Lucy's mom had wine.  What a great and unexpected visit!!!!  I got to meet Leslie's Uncle Rick and see Emma Rose.  I was just sad the kids didn't get to see her.

While I was having a completely enjoyable kid-free day, Greg and his mother and brother took the clan to the Labrea Tar Pits.

The kids all tried to pull a stick out of the tar.  That's all I'm getting out of them as far as what was their favorite part. 

Then they went to the Santa Monica pier.  While they were there, someone Greg knew from high school who was visiting L.A. from Michigan, just happened to be on the pier at the exact same time Greg was on the pier.  His friend's wife said, "Is that GREG S.?"  How bizarre!!!

Greg told the kids not to get wet. 

I guess Austin drove home naked in the car.

When I asked the kids what their favorite part of the day was, they said that out of the ENTIRE DAY, the best part was the rings at the beach. 

So it turns out that we all had a great day.  I highly recommend going on separate vacations------- together. 

All I Want For Christmas Is..........

I was so busy stuffing my face yesterday that I forgot to take pictures of of us actually eating.  But rest assured, we ate well.  Very, very well. 

We had turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, a wonderful corn casserole made with jalepenos, fresh cranberries, sweet potatoes, Barb's jello salad, and at least three of four more dishes I am forgetting.

Greg said he was having a pie-fecta for dessert -- apple, pumpkin and pecan.

We had such a wonderful dinner!  My sister-in-law's family ate with us and we hadn't seen them in a very long time.  Greg's brother set up a projector and we watched movies like we were in a drive-in.  It was a perfect day. 

We camped out all over the house and I actually got a comfy spot last night. 

The kids were so exhausted from dancing with the Wii that Gregory fell asleep at 8pm.

Seriously.  He fell asleep at 8pm. 

Guess what Santa is bringing us this year?



EDITED TO ADD:

My all time favorite picture of Greg at Thanksgiving.  I'm going to frame this one. 

Thankful For This Wild Ride

Bob invited us over last night to eat our turkey because we are driving to California today to have Thanksgiving with Greg's older brother and family. 

It turns out when he gutted her, he found a partially developed egg in her oviduct.  So that means she was going to start laying again.  My theory is that she started molting in summer because it was so hot.  Birds quit laying when they molt.  I think she hadn't laid since because she was growing her winter feathers in and I think she was probably on the verge of laying soon.  SOB! 

Doesn't this sound incredibly appetizing?  Enjoy your birds today!

Anyway, the kids loved her and gobbled her down.  I pushed her meat around on my plate.  I tried a bite, but I just couldn't go there. 

So if anyone is keeping track, I've been dealing with turkeys for 2 days in a row already.  SQUEE!

We are piling Grammy into our minivan with us to make the 250 mile drive today.  She has never in her life gone long distance with all of us in the car.  Because she is not insane. 

I made a seven layer salad for my contribution to today's festivities.  I used the Pioneer Woman's recipe. 

Every time I open the refrigerator, I am overwhelmed with the smell of hard-boiled eggs.  Since we'll be packed like sardines in the minivan, we'll just blame the eggs for any putrid smells coming from the backseat.  SQUEE!

I am so thankful for this wonderful, crazy family of mine.  Thank you, dear family, for making every day of my life a fun and interesting and wild ride.   I can't wait to wake up every morning just to see what sort of craziness will happen. 

Happy Thanksgiving, friends and family!!!  We love you!!!!!  Hope your day is filled with laughter and good food and lots of love. 

Grammy Has To Make It Four More Years

Wake up, Grammy!

Greg's mom won an award at school yesterday for Grandparent's Day.  She has the most grandchildren going to the school at the same time.  Even my Mormon friends can't beat 4 in a K-5 school.  You'd almost have to have a set of multiples in the mix to have four in a six year period, unless you are Mrs. Duggar.  So, ha, WE WIN!  If you have your children in a litter, nobody can beat you.  See?  That makes it totally worth it.  Totally!

Note: I'm going to get a lot of mileage out of the 32 dollar Justice shirts

These were the best pictures we got.  One with Grammy's eyes closed and one blurry one.  Everything came together and it was such a nice time.  I'm not in any of the pictures because I was trying to figure out why our 100 cup coffee pot wasn't working.  If you don't give the old folks their coffee, all hell breaks loose.  I finally discovered a faulty outlet and got it going.  Whew.  The third graders performed all 1950s songs for the grandparents.  It was really cute. 

Gregory told me, "I hope Grammy is alive next year to watch us perform."

He's worried about it. 

Since Grammy couldn't be in three rooms at the same time, Greg went to Amanda's room, I went to Austin's room, and Barb went to Sarah and Gregory's room.  I felt so bad for Amanda.  She felt really, really sad that Barb wasn't in her room.  She almost started crying.  Her teacher didn't put on much of a program.  Gregory and Sarah's teacher just goes so above and beyond on everything.  It is so hard to watch the differences.  Amanda's teacher is good, it's just that Sarah and Gregory's teacher is exceptional.  So when you see the difference in the level of attention and dedication in real time, it's hard to take. 

Sarah and Gregory were so darn cute.  We are so fortunate to have a grandparent who lives in town.  Some of the kids who didn't have grandparents living here read letters their grandparents wrote for them.  It was so touching. 



Once it was over, I zoomed Grammy home and threw her out of the car so I could get started on the next event. 

Fortunately for me, two men showed up to help carve the turkeys and I spent most of my time running meat from the teacher's lounge to the cafeteria.  We weren't allowed to actually carve in the school kitchen because it's against the law to have any real, actual food in the school kitchen. 

I had no idea what the Manners Dinner was, since it's only for fifth graders, and I was so impressed.  The fifth graders learned to dance and each class learned to dance a specific number, like Dancing With The Stars.  So each couple was up on the stage dancing in their formal wear.  It was just so adorable, I almost expired from the cuteness.  Each kid got to invite one special person in their lives, but in fifth grade they already hate their mothers, so some of the moms told me they had to bribe their way there.

Other mothers had to work the event because they weren't invited.  One mother said her first son invited their babysitter, so she told the second son she was going this time NO MATTER WHAT.  My children will HAVE to invite me since they'll need three special people to attend.  See?  If you have your children in a litter, you will get invited.  Makes it totally worth it.  Totally! 

Greg's mom better plan on living at least until fifth grade.

Only Because I'm An Optimist

If you've read my blog for more than five minutes, you know that I'm a Democrat and Greg is a Republican.  I plan on barely speaking to him in 2012, where I'll spend most of my time putting up competing yard signs and turning off Fox News. 

What this means for all of you is that our votes cancel each other out and the rest of you get to make all the decisions. 

So imagine my absolute delight to see that Newt Gingrich thinks children should be school janitors. 

“You say to somebody, you shouldn’t go to work before you’re what, 14, 16 years of age, fine,” Mr. Gingrich said. “You’re totally poor. You’re in a school that is failing with a teacher that is failing. I’ve tried for years to have a very simple model. Most of these schools ought to get rid of the unionized janitors, have one master janitor and pay local students to take care of the school. The kids would actually do work, they would have cash, they would have pride in the schools, they’d begin the process of rising.”

"Hey, Greg.", I yelled at him, "Your boy, Newt, thinks kids should be school janitors!"

Then I laughed like a hyena.  Seriously, sometimes this stuff just falls from sky, like manna from Heaven. 

"At least they'd get paid!", he yelled back at me. 

That's true, Newt.  Why pay them AT ALL?  That's the way we do it!  Talk about stupid!  The smartest guy at our school is our janitor!!!!!!

Speaking of unpaid work, I've got 180 hashbrowns to make for Grandparent's Day today.  After I'm done serving food to several hundred people and cleaning the cafeteria, we get to put it all back together for the fifth grade Manners Dinner, which is also today.  This is such a special event for our students.  The fifth graders invite one person to attend a formal dinner put on by the school.  We had a casino agree to cook 15 turkeys for our annual event and I have to carve them.  I have from noon until 1pm to carve 15 turkeys. 

Can it be done?   Given the fact I've never carved a turkey before in my life, since that's Greg's job, I'm going to guess I will fail.  Only because I'm an optimist.   

I Want Time To Slow Down Now

The kids went to my friend Andi's triplet girls' 5th birthday party yesterday.   Andi hired a Mad Scientist from Mad Science to perform.  We've seen a Mad Science performance at the library before and they are just so incredibly good.  They also offer after school programs in schools.  I highly recommend them and would love to get them at my school. 

The G Triplets

She had all the kids in a trance. 

Except for Austin.  He was absolutely hysterical.

We laughed and laughed at Austin.  He had the funniest answers. 

He must be such a hoot in the classroom.  She had the kids repeating words like "physics" and "abdomen" and "vortex".  She asked if anyone knew where to find a vortex?  I said, "SEDONA!" and then they made slime, and rubber balls, and spin art. 

She even taught the kids what a hovercraft was. 

Look!  I'm floating!!!! 

I can't believe the girls are five already.   Where is the time going?  These kids are growing up so fast.  I am so, so, so, so thankful I've kept this blog all these years because someday I'll be able to look back at all these crazy, kid-raising years and laugh and cry at how much fun we had the whole way.   

I can remember when we first started going to birthday parties and I would never sit down the whole time and my only goal was to not lose any of my kids or have my kids throw a temper tantrum, so I'd able to leave with my dignity.  I can remember being exhausted after going to parties.  I don't miss that stage at all, but this stage is a riot.  I LOVE this stage of childhood. 

Make it slow down!!!!  It seems like it's going faster and faster now that it got to the good part.  I want it to stop going so fast now.  Where is the Mad Scientist when I need her? 

This Is Greg's Fault

Gregory and Sarah had their last soccer game yesterday.  I haven't mentioned it, but their coach sort of bailed on us this season and they only had two practices the entire time. 

Yesterday was early registration for the Spring season, which is misleading because in Las Vegas it's actually the season of Wind, so we decided to hold off on signing anyone up for soccer for Spring. 

I cannot imagine sitting through another season of Wind.  The Fall season was absolutely perfect and lovely and would have worked out great if our coach had been actually coaching. 

Gregory wants to try baseball next year and Austin and Gregory are going to do a basketball team in January, which is indoors and climate-controlled and won't that be excellent for me?  Sarah wants to learn how to play tennis.  They want to do everything, these kids. 

Gregory is really good at soccer, but at this age I see no reason to tie them down to any one sport.  I say let them try them all at this age because who knows which ones they will ultimately love? 

 Austin really, really, really wants to play football, but I have a lot of issues with him getting his head knocked around.  I'd like to put that off as long as possible.  Like as in forever. 

I have settled with the fact I gave birth to jock children and I will spend the next 10 years at sporting events.  That's Greg's fault.  I don't have an athletic bone in my body. 

Greg finished our front bathroom and decided to rip out the master bathroom, too.  He had a jackhammer going all day yesterday.  Every time I finally get the fine, white layer of dust completely gone, he starts tearing up more stuff.  I haven't been able to breathe for two weeks!!!   I hope this one goes as quickly as the other one.

 The other bathroom looks great! 

This brings a whole new level to "Stop tracking dirt in the house."
. 

Do You Know What Your Turkey Looks Like?

Bob is slaughtering our turkey tomorrow.  I have to admit to feeling sorry for the old girl.  She stopped laying eggs over the summer, yet she's eating about 50 pounds of feed a month, so Bob has decided that her year stay of execution is over. 

I'm not eating her.  I think she's too old and she's going to be tough.  I'm not even going to watch this one.  If she had been a nasty, mean old Tom, I wouldn't care, but she was like a big, old, friendly dog. 

I have zero problem eating the boys, but I got attached to her.  The chickens think she's her big-boned sister from another mother.  Maybe Bob will change his mind today. 

My first assisted homebirth is now a gigantic rooster.  Look at him.  He started crowing this week.  I'm sure Bob's neighbor is THRILLED.   I guess we should name him because Bob is also taking out our old rooster, Matrix, tomorrow, and keeping this new virile guy.  Look at him looking at the back of that hen.  He hasn't had the nerve to get on any of the hens yet, but he will.  Damn, men. 

We still have the Foster Chickens segregated from the General Population but I'm thinking of putting them all together once Matrix is gone.  So what do you think?  I think the black one in the middle is for sure a rooster.  Doesn't he just look like an asshole?  I think the white one is a hen and I'm torn over the one on the right.  I think the one on the right could go either way.  What do you think, chicken experts?

I also have no idea what breed they are.  Look at the fancy feet!!!  They are big birds, too.  The black rooster looks like he has a nice, big, meaty breast.  That totally works for me, since his expected life span is about 6 more weeks. 

It sure is hard being a responsible Flock Manager.  I should put that on my resume.  Flock Manager. 

When Your Child Doesn't Feel Pain.......

Last week before we went to Phoenix, Austin approached me and calmly said, "My ear hurts."

He came down with The Plague the day after Halloween, and was mostly over it, but saying his ear hurt after the enormous amount of congestion he had for 10 days prior did not surprise me.  Honestly, if I had to guess what is going around my school, I would say it's RSV.  The only time I've ever seen kids with such wet coughs and pouring clear noses is when mine had RSV when they were three and Austin was almost 2.

So I whipped out my EarCheck Monitor to check his fluid levels.  Love, love, love my EarCheck Monitor.  It uses soundwaves to check fluid level in the inner ear.  He was the highest level there was.  The one that says, Consult A Doctor.

I got him in at the doctor's the very next morning before school and our doctor looked in his ear and asked, "How long has he been complaining about this ear?"

"He told me last night it hurt.", I said.

"This is a severe, severe ear infection.  Look.", she said and it was true.  It was really bad.  A normal child would have been crying over an ear that bad.  I hadn't even given him so much as ibuprofen for it.  My girls would have been writhing and screaming in pain and I would have known days earlier if it had been one of them.  I would have had to use ear numbing drops on them for sure.

The doctor and I both remarked about Austin's level of pain tolerance.  He doesn't feel pain like other people.  I don't know if it is from living through severe undiagnosed hydrocephalus the first two years of his life or he was just born that way.

So, anyway, she prescribed him Omnicef and he started taking it last week.

Three days ago, he told me he was itching.  We've all been itching since we turned our heat on.  We all have dry skin right now.  So I told him to go put some lotion on.  I didn't even look at him because he said it so matter-of-factly and calmly, I just figured he was feeling dry and itchy.

The next night he was digging his skin off and I got a good look at him.

That poor kid had hives all over him.  As far as I know, he could have had them the day before!!!!!  Austin doesn't complain like a normal child.  When Amanda gets hives, she screams the roof off the house.   It was obvious to me immediately that Austin was allergic to Omnicef, so I gave him Benadryl and did not give him another dose that night.  Sure enough, the hives were gone in the morning.  This makes two of my children who are allergic to Omnicef.  Remember when Amanda developed the severe adverse reaction, erythema multiforme?

Thank goodness Austin rarely takes antibiotics.  He hadn't been on any since he was two and he'd never taken Omnicef before, so we had no idea.  I called his doctor yesterday and made sure she knew what happened so she could put his allergic reaction in his medical file.

Poor Austin.  I can't figure out if he just has an enormous level for pain tolerance or he just doesn't feel pain, but I'm going to have to watch him closely his whole life.  I could see him breaking a bone and not even telling me.  GAH!

There's A Lot Going On Today

Today is World Prematurity Day and the March Of Dimes message for today is "Nothing is as dangerous to a baby than being born too early."




Gregory was only the size of his diaper rash cream tube when he was born.  Today is a day to remember how difficult it is to have a baby/babies in the NICU, struggling to live, and my heart goes out to anyone on the NICU roller coaster today.

I look at all my friends' kids now, who were born in the gestational age of 27-35 weeks, and you'd never know which ones were born as micropreemies and which ones were nearly full term.  They are all thriving.

Just look at the size of Gregory now!!!!

We have Grandparent's Day next Tuesday at school, so all the kids are putting on skits and plays in their classrooms.  Sarah is the narrator in her class and Gregory is a turkey.  Amanda is the letter R in the ABCs of Thanksgiving in her class and I'm not sure what Austin is yet.  The kids have also been studying Thanksgiving on Scholastic.com.  They have a great interactive link about The First Thanksgiving, and you can take a virtual field trip through Plimoth Plantation.  Here is the link.

I just got off the phone with my friend Laura.  It's Parental Involvement Day at her boys' school and she said in one of her boy's classrooms, not one single parent showed up.  She was the only parent and she was trying to split herself between three classrooms.  She felt so bad that nobody cared to spend 20 minutes in their children's classroom today.

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum, I've got pumpkin bread in the oven and I don't even have time to blog because I've got to get back to my unpaid job.

I can't wait to see how Greg's mom splits herself between three classrooms on Grandparent's Day.  She doesn't know this yet, but the kids are FIGHTING LIKE CRAZY over whose classroom she goes to first.  Good luck, Grammy.