It was stomach flu. I was the final(?) victim today. I don’t know what’s worse, all the laundry, or knowing that your turn is coming.
I’m glad it’s over with and that it wasn’t a case of full blown H1N1.
The kids are recovering, though I am still watching closely for signs of dehydration, but they seem to be doing okay on that front as well. I am starting to recover. Just weak and tired.
I hope to actually enjoy next weekend…
We had a pretty low-key day. Captain Chaos got up and I found that he had hidden his throw-up incident under a pile of blankets. Joy. Washed all of his bedding while he was eating cookies out of the pantry. Guess he was feeling better.
Hollywood rolled out of bed at 9:30 and said she felt better. She hit the fridge for juice and breakfast. Then she went back to bed and stayed there most of the day.
Now MOTS is sick, as predicted. Frankly, I don’t see how Party Boy and I can escape this. I am so not looking forward to it.
It’s been about 5 hours since Hollywood last got sick. She woke me up because her “knees hurt.” I am assuming that she is dehydrated and suffering some aches and pains from that. No fever. Maybe this was just a little bug? Everyone else has slept peacefully through the night.
Well, except for when Captain Chaos shouted, “MOMMY, MOMMY, MOMMY!” at full volume and it came, rather amplified through the monitor. He was asleep at the time. Weird.
I got Hollywood some “tummy juice” (Pedialyte) and some water and she has now moved back into her (recently washed) sleeping bag. She has a low-grade fever (99.5) so I am holding off on the fever reducer/pain relievers until she starts showing more symptoms.
I am going back to sleep with the expectation that I will be doing this again tonight with one of the other kids. Or worse, Party Boy. Or even worser, me. <Gulp>
Still going to call the pedi about that fever though. Just in case they want him to come in and be checked out…
So, back at the beginning of October I sent the girls and Captain Chaos and Party Boy off to CC’s 2-year well-check. They usually all get flu shots then.
This year? No flu shots. Our pedi only provides thimerasol free flu shots and apparently there was a shortage. It’s also been hard to get the H1N1 shot unless you are in a high-risk category (asthma, pulmonary or cardiac circumstances). So, none of us have had a flu shot this year.
Now, I don’t think we’ll be needing one.
This morning I noticed that Captain Chaos seemed warm. I took his temperature and he had a low fever (100.5 – just barely over the definition of fever). My little daycare girl had a viral thing last week that caused a fever for about 2 days, so I felt comfortable watching and waiting. I gave him some ibuprofen and the fever came right down. Good.
Then at 4:00 Hollywood came and told me her tummy hurt. That’s a vague complaint. She had no fever and said she was tired so I told her to lay down in her bed. She was supposed to be cleaning her room, so I thought she was faking to get out of it (not unheard of).
At 5:00 as I was reading a story to CC to keep him on the potty long enough to have some success, Hollywood walked in and timidly let me know that she had thrown-up. On the floor.
<Insert mental image of me cringing and moaning>
Got her out of messy clothes. Cleaned floor. Stripped bed. Re-settled Hollywood in quarantine. Sent Party Boy for dinner.
Eat dinner.
More laundry.
Sit down to read.
More laundry.
Sit down to read.
More laundry.
Try to go to sleep.
More laundry.
Sit to watch TV and wait for the impending announcement that I need to wash more clothes/bedding.
Gather laundry. Annnnnnnnnnnnddddddd, discover that the handle to the laundry room door has frozen. I can’t open the door.
Party Boy is asleep, so I do what I always do when the handle does this. I grab the screwdriver and take the handle apart. Only I still can’t get the latch to pop.
So I wake up Party Boy. He tries unsuccessfully to pop the latch, but ends up kicking the door in.
Now the laundry is running again and tomorrow we’ll be replacing the door AND the handle.
Because the flu just wasn’t enough.
I’ll update as we know more. I’ll be calling the pedi in the morning as he has been keeping Saturday hours. He may or may not want us to come in.
…how about you, you, you? Sorry, that’s a song my Dad used to sing when we were growing up. But, we really did go to the big city zoo yesterday!
With both of us home and my little daycare friend out for the day we had a free day. I really expected that Party Boy would want to work on the wood floors, but he surprised me by suggesting a trip to the zoo instead. We love the zoo and try to go once a year or so, usually in the fall or spring, and since the weather was beautiful yesterday was perfect!
We are blessed enough to have TWO zoos nearby, and while we usually frequent one of the two, we decided to try the other one. It was fun, but we did have some observations/complaints. I’ll get to that later.
Walking in – See Captain Chaos lounging in the wagon? That’s the best way to see the zoo, in my opinion!
Captain Chaos says, "Hi Monkey!"
Yes, I know that a gorilla is an ape, but to a two year old, they’re all monkeys. The gorillas were completely uninterested…
Getting on the monorail.
Here’s where the observation/complaint comes in. This zoo, and the other nearby zoo charge the same amount for tickets. However, at this zoo you have to pay an additional fee to see all of the animals! Nearly half of the animals in the Africa exhibit are hidden on a monorail ride that costs $3 per person. So, you either pony up an additional fee or you miss seeing 1/4 of the animals at this zoo. We were lucky and a kind family with passes gave us their monorail tickets since they didn’t have time to ride this time. That meant we only had to buy one ticket instead of 4 (CC was free). Now, I know it’s not a lot of money, but it’s the principle. I likened it to Six Flags charging $50 for tickets to get into the park and then telling you that any ride worth riding would be an additional $1 per rider…
Okay, that aside, we had a great visit. Here’s some more pics -
That wagon was heavy!
An 8 foot albino alligator. Creepy.
Captain Chaos misunderstood and thought this was a DINO.
Captain Chaos loves to look at ducks!
This zoo did have an extensive children’s area. Most of it was playground though, and that wasn’t why we were there, so we didn’t spend any time on the playground. We did visit the children’s exhibits. We got to pet a lizard and visit some small farm animals – a miniature donkey, a rabbit, and a guinea pig. But the most fun was at the bird exhibit -
Party Boy and Captain Chaos feed the birds.
We’ve been to feed the bird exhibits before. It’s one of our favorite experiences at the zoo. We never had quite the experience that we had yesterday though! We walked in and purchased 5 seed sticks for the birds. Then we walked into the aviary and were immediately mobbed by birds. They were everywhere. I had 4 on me – 2 on the diaper bag (the TSA birds checking all of the pockets), one on my head (grooming me), and one on my hand eating the stick. Captain Chaos handled it all very well and enjoyed having the birds crawling all over him. The girls favorite part was having Scrappy clean their hair. 
The zookeeper explained that in the fall and winter the birds get fewer visitors and so, get fewer treat sticks. They get really excited when people come in. How fun!
It was a fun day and on the way home this was the aftermath -
He fell asleep reading his book.
Outside my window…Beautiful, finally. Bright blue skies, not a cloud in sight. Colors on the trees, and green grass peeking out from the leaves already on the ground.
I am thinking…about the upcoming holidays, what to have for dinner, and starting a new adventure. Also about the election today.
I am thankful for…modern conveniences. Every time I read a book about history I tend to focus on the beauty and simplicity of lives at the time. Until I come to a part that deals with illness, death, back-breaking work, or starvation. As much as I love the simplicity, I would miss electricity, indoor plumbing, and penicillin. I am also thankful for the right to vote, as I will later today – Thirteen state constitutional amendments to consider.
From the kitchen…Turkey sandwiches on whole wheat white bread, strawberry yogurt smoothies, and sugar cookies.
I am wearing…workout clothes and a ponytail. Hope to get a work-out in today.
I am creating… the base for my December Daily album and Hollywood’s Christmas stocking.
I am going…to vote, to swim class with MOTS, and then to relax!
I am reading…A More Perfect Union by J.A. Jance. Then it’s on to The Same Kind of Different as Me by
I am hoping…for some unitterupted creative time sometime this week or during the weekend.
I am hearing…Party Boy playing Modern Warfare and the rolling of toy car wheels across the wood floors.
Around the house…working on my 6th load of laundry today, piles on my desk that need to be filed, and toys all over the floor.
One of my favorite things…kids eat free nights at our local restaurants.
A few plans for the rest of the week…clean off the desk, judge a science fair, do some ironing, work on stocking and December Daily pages.
A picture to share…Captain Chaos being still for one of the few things that he will watch – Star Wars. What is the universal attraction to that movie?
Awhile back I took an excellent online class called Stories In Hand, from Jessica Sprague. It was free and it was totally worth the time investment. I still use my little notebook of story ideas to capture memories.
Today, Jessica Sprague announced, and opened registration for a new FREE class, Holidays In Hand.
I’m already signed up. You should sign up too. You don’t need to scrapbook. You don’t need photoshop. How great is that? Everyone has holiday memories and this class is about capturing those.
Go now and sign up. Yes. Right now!
Halloween 2009 is officially in the bag, so here’s the rundown of our day:
- The girls made cookies first thing after breakfast. These were the pumpkin consolation cookies – sugar cookies with orange sprinkles and chocolate chip with peanut butter cups. Yum!
- The kids and I had lunch and discussed the evening’s plans.
- Everyone had a nap and/or rest time. Didn’t want any cranky-pants ruining the Halloween fun!
- Costumes on and into the car to head to my parents church for their big Fall Festival blow-out.
- After playing games, hitting the bounce houses, riding the barrel train and collecting a big pile of candy we headed to dinner.
Princess MOTS
Water Talent Fairy Hollywood
Gingerbread Captain Chaos
Well, I thought I would be smart this year. We planned to get our pumpkins and carve/paint them tonight so they would be all ready for Halloween.
I was going to take fun pictures of the kids being all grossed out at the pumpkin guts and the final products and post them here.
We went all over town today looking for pumpkins. No luck.
I refuse to pay $12 for a pumpkin at the mud pit/pumpkin patch. And apparently there is a pumpkin shortage due to the massive amounts of rain this fall.
So, no pumpkin. No cute pumpkin pictures.
I managed to keep the kids from dissolving into utter despair by buying stuff to make yummy cookies in the morning and buying McDonald’s for dinner.
I am bummed. They are bummed. But them’s the breaks. How was I supposed to know that there would be a shortage of pumpkins? I mean last year they were still trying to get rid of pumpkins at Christmas!
Oh, well. I will post cute costume pictures tomorrow. The fairy costume is complete! We had to buy wings (purple) since I couldn’t find the proper fabric as called for in the sewing pattern from Hades. The costume turned out pretty cute, if I do say so myself, and the best part? Hollywood loves it!
It’s only 56 days away. But, you knew that, right?
As my friend Jen noted last night, the kids think that’s an eternity, but for those of us on the gift-buying end, it’s going to pass like a flash.
And speaking of gifts ( you liked that transition, right?), have you ever heard of Operation Christmas Child? No? Let me tell you about it.
Every year Samaritan’s Purse collect shoe boxes filled with little gifts to send all over the world to children in need. One of the most tragic stories I heard was of a recipient that hadn’t been able to attend school until she received her box. See, she had no pencil and that was a requirement for attendance. But in her box, she received several pencils and was amazed at the miracle that she would now be able to attend school.
I was sold the moment I heard that story.
National collection week for OCC is coming up soon – November 16th – 23rd. Participating couldn’t be simpler…
1. Find a shoe box. Our dollar store sells plastic ones.
2. Fill your box with small toys, toothbrush, toothpaste, bar soap, socks, hard candy, school supplies, etc. You can even write a note to your child – they might write back!
3. Place a rubberband around your box and take it to a collection or relay center anytime during collection week.
Bonus – Samaritan’s Purse asks for a $7 donation to help with shipping costs, and if you pay online you can see where your box went!
All three of my kids are chomping at the bit to go shopping for their OCC boxes. It’s one of our favorite Christmas traditions.
If you have more questions you can see the OCC FAQ.
