Pixiemom

Now, I know I’ve said the ways of how I’ve enjoyed being offline more since I pulled myself away from chat and Facebook. I’ve found so many other things to do… but I’ve also found a bit of a downside to it as well.

While Jeremy was gone to Pycon (whatever that is… I don’t understand when he tries to tell me) I found that I was really lonely. I used to get onto chat and talk to people when he was out of town. Now, I wasn’t sure what to do. I read some and watched a movie, but I was so much more lonely. It was really, really hard.

Another thing I’ve found… people tend to put things on Facebook and expect that you’ll see it there. I used to be like that. “I put it on Facebook, didn’t you see it?” Now I make sure that the people that I think need to know things get e-mailed, texted, or if it’s really important I will call. It also makes me feel like family means nothing… when I feel like I’m the last to know things because I’m not online anymore and so I don’t get some big news and then later I find out through another source and not the person who should have told me. Does that make sense?

Anyway, it’s been a little weird to be offline more often, but I think in the long run, it is good for me.

I’m not doing too bad, but still having some trouble breathing. I guess I’m getting a little more oxygen in than I was before since I’ve finally got a bit more energy than I did. I still have a bit of resting and recuperating to do before I’m completely better, but I can see progress made now.

I haven’t written in a while because I haven’t been up to it. Last Tuesday, I started feeling a bit out of breath around 4, but I didn’t seem too bad otherwise. I couldn’t catch my breath no matter what. By 6, it concerned me because I could tell I wasn’t getting enough oxygen when my fingertips started tingling. Jeremy took me to the hospital. I told them that my kids had been sick and that I thought that was the reason I was having trouble. They put me on extra oxygen which helped with the tingling. Since I had no other symptoms though, they didn’t think so and after doing a ton of blood work, chest x-rays, and a chest ct scan, they decided it was my gallbladder and sent me home with instructions to see a dr and get an ultrasound on my gallbladder.

On Thursday, I went to the Dr. By that time, I had more symtoms. A headache and sore throat, but still no fever. He actually listened to me and after looking at the results from the tests at the hospital, he wondered why they came up with the diagnosis they did. He said they didn’t do all the bloodwork they should have or they would have known it wasn’t the gallbladder. He ordered a few more bloodtests to re-check his results and diagnosed me with severe viral bronchitis. He said if I didn’t get a phone call from him on Friday that it meant the tests he ordered just confirmed his diagnosis. He didn’t call, so that’s what it is. He said he was a bit worried about me because of how bad it was. He gave me an antibiotic. He said he knew it wouldn’t help against the virus, but because my body’s immune system was so drained, he was thinking that there was probably some bacteria taking advantage and attacking me as well, making me worse. The antibiotics would take care of those and let my immune system focus more on the virus. He also told me to stay at home and rest until Monday. If I wasn’t feeling at least a bit better by then to come back on that day.

Since then, my head and throat are no longer hurting, but I’m still having trouble breathing and getting a deep breath in. We’ll see how I am in two more days.

That’s what it was like around here last week. I mentioned that Noelle was sick on Sunday and I stayed home with her. She was still sick on Monday and Amie was too by then. Tuesday they seemed fine. Wednesday evening came and James didn’t feel too good. By Thursday evening, AnnaBeth and Chris had it too. It had gone through all the kids. I was surprised that I didn’t get it. I heard Little A had it over the weekend too. Jeremy woke up on Sunday morning feeling all blah. He stayed home with AnnaBeth and Chris while I took the other three to church. So… yeah, it kind of went through the house.

I’m not sure why I blogged this… LoL

Well, at least this time it didn’t hit all of them at the same time. That is not fun.

Little A is a talker. He can’t say much yet, but he sure tries. I love it. Those little syllables all strung together that mean something to him as he looks at the doggy and kitty pictures on my computer and points to them. The way he oohs and aahs with pitch changes as the music plays as his way of singing. It is all so adorable.

I do miss this with my little ones. Of course, there’s always the frustration part too. He wants something, but can’t tell me what it is, so he gets frustrated while I try to figure it out. Food? No… Drink? No… Tired? No… OH! He wants me pick him up and dance!

I hear actual words from him sometimes too. When we drop Jeremy off at the train station, he yells, “See ya!” and he says “Kitty” and “Doggy” when he sees pictures of them. He says “Train” and “choo-choo” when the kids pull out our Thomas track and he always yells for “Jayz” (James) if he can’t find his big buddy. Hearing him say new things is always exciting.

I love having a baby… er, toddler around.

I’m trying to change some things. It’s hard and I can’t explain online, but just pray for me.

Mostly, I know what needs to be done, but I don’t know how or where to start.

That’s kind of how my weekend was… Noelle and Jesus.

First, on Saturday, she asked if she could go out on a one-on-one time with me. It’s been a while since I took a child out on a fun date that I thought it would be a good idea. After a trip to Target for supplies we needed at home, we headed down to Oberweis and got her a strawberry milkshake and a turtle latte (decaf) for me.

We wanted to find something active to do, but we weren’t sure what so I just started driving around. We went a little further down this one road than we’ve been before and saw “The Shrine of Christ’s Passion”. It’s a pathway that follows Jesus from the Last Supper to the Ascension. It was a little chilly out, so Noelle and I weren’t able to spend as much time at each station as we would have liked, but we did talk as we walked. She has so many interesting ideas and thoughts… to listen to a child talk about Jesus and what He went through during that time was a very learning experience for me. I am amazed at what she already knows. We had a few problems because this is done by the Catholic church and so a few stations I was unsure of what they were, but other than that, it went very well. It was a nice beautiful walkway and we both want to come back when it’s warm, so we can take our time and maybe spend time at each station. I would like to have time for prayer and contemplation sometime also, so I may come by myself or with Jeremy.

On Sunday, Noelle was sick, so she and I stayed home from church. While the others were gone, she picked a clay-mation movie about Jesus to watch. I really enjoyed listening to her talk about things as they happened in the movie or answering her questions.

The thing that seemed to really get to her was how much Jesus suffered. She talked about how she noticed at The Shrine that He wore the crown of thorns and it must have really hurt His head and that falling while carrying such a heavy cross would have given him boo-boos much worse than the ones she got when she fell the day before. She also noticed the marks on His body where He’d been whipped and talked about the stinging like bees. Then the nails in His wrists… she was very observant of all of these things. A child of seven and she sees these and somehow she understands that He did that for us. She really amazes me.

Now she is asking to be baptized… time to talk to the Pastor at the church and set up a time. I’m so proud of my girl. It’s been about a year since she prayed and accepted Jesus as her Saviour and I’ve seen such growth in that time and she is so eager to learn. She opens my eyes with what she sees with her own.

Catnip On the Floor

Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around
Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around

Spread it here and spread it there
Get it all in our hair
Swat the toy through the stuff
Make sure it’s in the fluff
Hurry now before we’re found
Catnip is on the ground!

Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around
Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around

Get into our stance and give a big pounce
Let’s get every ounce
Jump on the couch and jump on the chair
Jump on everything everywhere
But don’t make too much sound
Catnip is on the ground!

Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around
Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around

And now we jump (Jump!)
And now we run (Run!)
And now we roll (Roll!)

And now we jump (Jump!)
And now we run (Run!)
And now we roll (Roll!)

Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around
Catnip on the floor
Every kitty roll around

Catnip on the floor!

I kept this for last. I probably can’t put into words what this experience was like for us, but I’m sure going to try.

The girls all wanted to try cross-country skiing. I am the only one who has ever done it before. It was quite an interesting experience. There was laughter, crying, frustration, and determination. We had to have teamwork a few times to get someone up who fell. It was quite interesting.

I wasn’t sure how Amie was going to do at first. She got frustrated at the beginning trying to figure out how to get the shoes into the skis. Then at the first hill, which was the steepest of the whole thing, she didn’t want to go down it because everybody else went before her and we all fell. We finally got her to take the skis off and walk down it and then put them back on. Not far along the path, there was a hump to go over. I and the other leader both were able to get over it okay, but none of the girls did without falling or rolling. Amie just had an emotional breakdown here, she didn’t want to do this anymore. She was so afraid of falling. The other leader and I talked and if Amie decided she didn’t want to go any farther than I’d take her back. She took off her skis and carried them and her poles and followed along with us for a while. When we got to some deep snow though, she found she couldn’t walk. I turned myself around, preparing to head back when she decided she’d give skiing another chance. She went the rest of the way on the skis until we came back to the hump and the hill. She took the skis off for those, but without any fussing.

The other girls did their best. There was a lot of falling, but they kept laughing. It was good to hear them laughing even when they said it was so hard to do. At the end, one of the girls went down into a copse of trees and got stuck, so I took my skis off and went down to help her get up and untangled from the trees. As we were there, another of the girls started down the same slope and the one I was helping said, “You’re going to end up running into the trees too!” Well, a moment later, I find one ski on one side of me and the other ski on the other side of me. The girl probably would have landed on me if a tree hadn’t been there to stop her. We all busted up laughing. It was kind of funny. After she got up and moved, I finally got the first one standing and somehow got her skis turned correctly.

One other thing that happened… while we were out there, we saw two boys skiing by themselves. They were off-path because they had wanted to ski on the lake. We were concerned about them. With all the falls and all that we had, we expected them to catch up to us, but they never did. The other leader asked for me to finish taking the girls back and she’d check on the boys. It was a good thing she did. They had fallen and couldn’t get out up and their fingers were too cold to get the skis off, so they felt like they were stuck. They were still not on the path when she found them. The sun was starting to go down and it wouldn’t have been easy to find them later. She helped them up and stayed with them until they got back.

I don’t know if I really conveyed what we experienced, but I sure tried. The girls have decided that though this was the hardest activity they did, they want to do it again next year and see how the kids who will be new to the camp do. They said it will be an initiation to camp thing to do every year. I’m glad they are determined to try it again.