Scrapperblog

Christmas Time, Again

Hello blog readers! Twelve days until Christmas and not much has changed around here. I'm still teaching. Still behind on my Christmas preparations. Still hanging out with my cool husband and little kid. 

The Weather: It's raining out there. The good news is that it's 40 degrees, so no ice or snow to worry about. But it's raining and I don't enjoy rain when I have to be out and about in it. 

I'm Listening To: Silence- it's still the early part of the day, after the husband has gone off to work, but the little kid hasn't gotten up yet. My golden hour. 

My Mood: Weary. I'm trying to keep up with all the things I need to be doing. I'm getting better at prioritizing things but I still have a hard time getting everything done. As a result, I wake up tired and fall asleep on the couch most nights. 

School is going well. This year's group is really nice. They are also a smaller group- 16 instead of last year's 25. It makes a huge difference. The Kiddo is in the other fifth grade but I see him a couple of times a day. This year is going by so quickly. I'm going to want to keep them another year, I'm sure.

The Kiddo is doing great. He just had a well child checkup. At 10.5 years old, he's already five feet tall, 100 pounds,  and in the 92nd percentile for height and weight. He's getting to be a big kid. He loves to play video games and hang out with his friends. He also loves to read and does it pretty well. 

We started him on allergy shots and an attention deficit medicine this year. I'm not sure the allergy shots are helping because he's often too sick to take them. And the drive into the city gets dicey as the weather worsens. I think I may cancel the shots, since he keeps having to start over. The medicine seems to be helping. He gets his work done more often and I can see him paying attention in class for myself. 

Last night was the Band Concert. I bought him dress clothes for the event. He called it his Monkey Suit. But he wore it. He looked so nice up there, playing his bells. The final song of the night was a Winter Cha Cha with the entire district band, including grades 5-12 (over 200 kids on stage). The bigger, more experienced kids carried the little guys, I'm sure. Kiddo said that at one point he lost his place in the music and just carried the beat with his bells. LOL 

I was so proud of my little man up there. Unfortunately, my camera didn't have a card in it, so I have no pictures of the event to post. I have gotten rusty... 

Christmas: This year's big gift is going to be a video game system, an xbox 360. Maybe that will get him off my computer. :) I still need to shop for some stocking stuffers and hubby's gift. I always have such a difficult time figuring out what he wants. Because he doesn't really want that much and when he wants something, he'll go out and get it. Grr. But a gift card just seems so small for someone you are married to. 

He says I'm hard to shop for. Right. I would be happy with a number of things- a Christmas charm for my pandora charm bracelet, a 16 or 32 gb micro sd card for my phone, an itunes or amazon gift card, a pair of brown ankle boots, a new computer keyboard, I could go on... :D 

Plans for the Future: Right now it's all about getting ready for the holiday and end of the semester. Grade cards need to be recorded. Reading groups need to be set in place for January. End of the semester assessments need to be given. Then I need to find hubby's gifts and get ready for Christmas, which comes three days after I get off work. After that I need to get serious about getting those 4 college hours so I can renew my teaching license in June. 

Okay, that was pretty painless to write. I don't know why I stopped writing a daily blog. I like writing. Now let's see how many of you still have this blog in your feed reader. Comment me if you get this, or I'll assume I'm just talking to myself. heh heh

The Weekend is Over?

Good morning, blog readers. Another weekend has come and gone. We had a pretty good time as a family this weekend. We took M to the video game place and did some shopping and got some things done around the house as well.

Saturday morning we had errands to run. DH had to stop by the tire place and get some tires for the boat trailer. So we stopped there to order the tires and then we headed to Dave and Buster's for lunch. The food was excellent, although overpriced. The three of us ate for about $30, plus we got $20 in game tokens to play with.

M was quite overwhelmed at the video game place. I thought he'd just jump all over all the games, but no, he just wanted to watch us play. He clung to us like a vine. The only game he really wanted to play was the Claw game. You know, the one where you move the crane claw over and snatch the prize you want. He saw it on an episode of Spongebob, I think. "Be the crane. Be the crane!" was his mantra. We did get lucky on the first try and got a little stuffed bear. M named him "Berry" and spent the rest of his time trying to win a baby brother for Berry. Whatever.

SkeeBall is also not M's game. He threw the ball everywhere except his own lane. After two tries, he ended up with four tickets. And I was trying to help him. That's now lame I am at this game. He did have fun, so I'm glad we all went.

After the video games, we picked up the tires and then went to Wally World to spend some gift certificates. DH got some movies, M got a movie and some clothes (Spongebob, of course) and I got some goodies for my laptop. A pair of stereo headphones for my webcam, with a microphone. It's supposed to work with voip and skype as well. And a new chill pad since the fans on the old one didn't work anymore. Yeah, I'm a geek mama.

On Sunday morning I decided to get some work done. We did some dishes and housecleaning in the morning, followed by grocery shopping at noon. After lunch I went into work for a couple of hours to get things organized at work. I wrote lesson plans for the next two weeks and found the top of my desk. Woo hoo! It is still there. I have some papers to grade, but I'll get to them this week.

I had to get home because I wanted to make spaghetti with the deerburger we had in the fridge. It was really good. It is so much leaner than cow meat and does have a flavor of its own. Even M liked it. He's always telling me that his babysitter is a better cook than me. Of course spaghetti is one of her specialties. And he actually liked my spaghetti tonight. I am flattered. Whatever.

This should be a fun week. We're having an assembly on Wednesday. The Egyptian animals are coming! We've been trying to book this group for two years. They will come and present a show about animals that lived in ancient Egyptian times. Fun, fun, fun.

Hope everyone has a great Monday and a wonderful week. :-)

Sleep Overs Are So Cool

When my girls were little we lived next door to poor little Lindsay Barnett. Lindsay would come over to spend the night and around midnight she'd want to go home. After a while her parents would just leave their back door open so Lindsay could go home at will. She'd even tell Jill to go home when Jill was spending the night with her. It was cute in a bizarre kind of way.

M and his best friend have been having the best time. They were so excited about the spend the night and could not wait to get started. They played army and spies. They watched a couple of movies, although "watched" is not terribly precise. They were in and out of the room while the movies were on. Spiderman 3 was a bigger hit, maybe because the idea of time travel and the space/time continuum just didn't mean anything to them.

I set up the tend in M's room and got them all ready for bed. They played chess (they don't really know how to play chess yet) and read some of M's books. I read them four stories. Then I tucked them in and turned out the light. B conked out first, around 10:30. And M was asleep by 10:45. And then I couldn't sleep so I puttered around online for a while, which was probably not such a good idea.

It's Digital Scrapbooking Day. And I've really not been too impressed with it. The sales are generous, but I feel like I already have so much digi stash that I don't need anything right now. Plus I'm having trouble channeling my inner life artist with the boys playing rough and tumble around me. Eh, maybe later.

I did find a couple of new blogs to read. If you want to read about a really cool lady who is lucky enough to be married to a cowboy, check out Pioneer Woman. I've always had a soft spot for a cowboy, which has not always been a good thing. Ree has an awesome series telling how she met her man and how she ended up living in the country, cooking calf nuts. Seriously.

The other blog I've become a loyal reader of is Boo Mama. Boo Mama and Big Mama also have a podcast that comes out whenever they feel like it. This blogger is hysterical in the most southern way you can imagine. My favorite post is the one she wrote about her son's teacher: "When a Pronoun Antecedent Makes a World of Difference." You will be glad you read this one.

School was interesting yesterday. My Fave Student was notable for his lack of notoriety. He didn't do any thing worth reporting. That in itself was interesting. My other Fave, the Runner Boy, has the wanderlust again. He spent time at home and doesn't really want to be back in school these days. His latest tactic is to be sick.

We had a scare the other day when one of our little guys started having a racing heart and chest pain. He's a little slip of a boy so it was kind of unusual. His parents took him to the doctor to get his heart looked at and it turned out to be muscle spasms. In his chest. Yikes.

Anyway, now heart trouble seems to be an epidemic in my room. The Runner Boy walked up to me and said, "I'm not feeling well. I think my heart is hurting." And then he pointed to an area to the right of his belly button. Um, yeah, we don't teach anatomy until sixth grade in our district. I had to stifle a giggle, wondering how his heart had meandered over towards his appendix.

But after sitting down for a little while, his heart apparently started to feel better. And he was totally recovered by the time the end of the day rolled around. Thank goodness.

I got some new Abby pictures this week. Jill sent me pics of Abby in her Halloween costume. I really need to scrap those. Maybe I'll do that before the boys get up and start demanding pancakes and bacon.

Hope everyone has as good a weekend as I'm having. :-)

How I Became a Mom, Part Three

Six years ago: we were at Lilith Fair celebrating Jill's 17th birthday with a concert. Bryan, Jenny, Jill, and a couple of their friends (I think this is Jill's friend Ashlea) headed out to watch Sara McLachlan, Martina McBride and Sheryl Crow among others. It was a wonderful night. Someone in the band had a birthday as well, so in the middle of her concert, Sara had everyone sing Happy Birthday and those of us in our area added, "to Jill..." and it was a good time for everyone.

Twenty-three years ago: Let's see... how did I manage, at 21, to end up pregnant again less than six months after having Daniel? Let's recap... I had Bryan at 17, then Daniel at 20. I started taking the pill because my OB didn't think 20 year olds should have tubal ligations. I was really fertile back then because I got pregnant while taking the pill and was quite surprised to be expecting again so soon. My OB of course was stumbling over himself to schedule my tubal this time...

Anyway, after having Daniel in near-record time (1 hour), I knew this baby was going to come quickly. And after having both boys six days early, I expected this one to show up six days early as well. Since this is Jill we are talking about, she did not disappoint.

I woke up around midnight to go to the bathroom and noticed that I'd lost my mucous plug, a sure sign for me that labor was starting. The contractions started as well and they were already 5 minutes apart. So I walked into our bedroom and flipped on the light switch. Jill's dad sat up and mumbled, "Wha..." and I said, "It's time to have the baby. Let's go." Oh, yeah, the boys were sleeping and we needed a sitter. So X called his mom to come and get them.

It was midnight, remember? X's sister answered the phone in her sleep, slurred something, and hung up. Yeah, she's like that. Then on the second call we got a hold of the MIL and she headed down. It took about 45 minutes for her to get there and in the meantime I was starting to notice some strong contractions.

By the time we got to the hospital it was already almost 1 am on Sunday morning. I could barely walk down the hall to Labor and Delivery. I was convinced that I was going to deliver in the parking lot. Once I got into a room and was checked, I was about 2 cm dilated. What's up with that?? The decided to keep me since I'd gone so quickly last time. I was prepped and put on monitors and my doctor was called.

Around 2 am my water broke and the nurse checked me. She pronounced me at 7 cm and asked me if I wanted something for the pain. "Well, yes, some demerol would be lovely," I said. But not really like that. So the nurse went off in search of my pain meds and it was then that I noticed that I really was feeling like pushing all of a sudden. All heck started to break loose for me at that point. My X was telling me not to push and he ran out to find the nurse.

The nurse came in, Demerol syringe in hand, and told me that I really wasn't ready to push since I was only 7 cm about 2 minutes ago. I begged to differ. So she put down my syringe and reluctantly agreed to check me again, just to humor me. She took one look and slapped my legs together and ordered me not to push. I'd gone from 7 cm to crowning in 2 minutes. And the worst part was that I wasn't going to get any of the Demerol in that syringe.

I was panting and trying not to push as they rolled my bed to the delivery room. Then I tried not to push while I scooted onto the delivery table. The nurse got gowned and gloved and told me I could go ahead and push and I barely gave one push and Jill was born.

The nurse said, "It's a girl!" and I said, "Are you sure?" I already had two boys and this was (I thought) my last chance for a girl.

Just as the nurse wryly answered, "I think I should know..." my OB doctor slid through the door to deliver the afterbirth. He cracked, "What are you going to do next time, Starbuck? Deliver in the parking lot?"

And I growled, "There isn't going to be a next time." Funny what you remember.

It was 2:10 am on the 18th of July and I finally had a daughter. It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

  

How I Became a Mom, Part Four

Jenny turns 22 today. I thought she was going to be my last child. Actually Jill was supposed to be my final  baby. I got pregnant with Jill when Daniel was just 5 months old, so when Jill was born I was going to have my tubes tied. Or my x was going to have a vasectomy. Well, after Jill's birth I was anemic so they postponed my surgery until 2 months after the surgery. I went in for surgery and had a fever, so surgery was postponed. A month later my x had his vasectomy and I discovered that I was pregnant again. Kind of makes my later infertility issues ironic, yes?

So here I was, barely 22 years old with a 5 year old, a 2 year old and an 11 month old at home and I was hugely pregnant again. My first three children arrived on the dot, six days early. So I expected Jenny to do the same. No way. She was a day late. My sister had come out to help and we were watching and waiting for baby to arrive. Pretty soon my sister would have to leave and still no baby.

On Bryan's fifth birthday we were enjoying the day and having lunch around 1pm when the first pain hit. My first baby arrived in 5 hours, my second in 1 hour, and my third in 2 hours. We weren't going to waste time with this one. I called my x and he came zooming home from work to pick me up. My sister stayed with the kids until someone could watch Danny and Jill and she could bring Bryan to the hospital to meet his new sibling.

I had a birth plan this time. I was going to labor, deliver, and recover in the same bed. Back then it was a revolutionary idea. Only 5 years earlier we had to get permission to bring our husbands or coaches to the hospital. This was the third baby I'd delivered in that hospital in 2 years and I did not want to play musical beds. So they accomodated me on that one. I also wanted my oldest child to meet his new sibling right away, another new-fangled idea.

Anway, I got to the hospital about 10 minutes into my labor, contractions coming every 5 minutes. Again I was checked and found to be at 2 cm dilated. They knew better than to cut me loose by now so they admitted me around 130 and said they'd be back to check on me around 3. My labor progressed and by three I was fully dilated and ready to push.

My midwife (also named Debbie) showed up and my bed was wheeled into the delivery room. They used a big wedge for me to sit up so I could push better. I noticed that I was in the same delivery room I'd used three times before. When I had the boys, the clock had been at my toes. When I had Jill, the clock had been to my right side. When they wheeled me in, I noticed that the clock was at my side and I said, "Oh, it'll be a girl this time." LOL The nurse from the OB office came down to "watch a pro," she said. I was laughing and joking and the mood was quite light considering a new person was about to come into the world.

I did not receive or need any drugs or epidural for the birth. I didn't even have an episiotomy this time. The midwife just told me to push slowly and we'd get the baby out without any tears. I gave a couple of controlled pushes and out slid my little strawberry blonde girl. It was 3:07pm on Friday afternoon.

I was wheeled in my bed to the recovery room and I got to nurse my 7lb 8oz sweetie. My sister arrived with my son dressed in an adult-sized surgical gown. He looked quite comical and his eyes were big with wonder as we asked him how he liked his new birthday present. He  referred to Jenny as his birthday present after that.

The birth was the easiest of my five deliveries and Jenny was a dream of a child. She was a little colicky early on but after we got the hang of nursing, she was the only one I nursed for an extended period of time. I tried to enjoy every moment of her infancy because I either thought I'd never get to do it again or I sensed that it would be a very long time before I'd hold a baby like that again. Happy Birthday Jenna Ben!! Now you are as old as I was then and you have a very different life than I did. I wish you happiness and good times. Love, Mom

If You Give a Mom a Muffin

This was posted on Danni's blog and in honor of the 27th anniversary of my becoming a mother, I will post it here:

If You Give a Mom a Muffin
If you give a mom a muffin, she'll want a cup of coffee to go with it. She'll pour herself some. Her three-year-old will spill the coffee. She'll wipe it up. Wiping the floor, she will find dirty socks. She'll remember she has to do laundry. When she puts the laundry in the washer, she'll trip over boots and bump into the freezer. Bumping into the freezer will remind her she has to plan supper. She will get out a pound of hamburger. She'll look for her cookbook. (101 Things To Make With A Pound Of Hamburger.) The cookbook is sitting under a pile of mail. She will see the phone bill, which is due tomorrow. She will look for her checkbook. The checkbook is in her purse that is being dumped out by her two-year-old. She'll smell something funny. She'll change the two-year-old. While she is changing the two-year-old the phone will ring. Her five-year-old will answer and hang up. She'll remember that she wants to phone a friend to come for coffee. Thinking of coffee will remind her that she was going to have a cup. She will pour herself some. And chances are, if she has a cup of coffee, her kids will have eaten the muffin that went with it.

by Kathy Fictorie
based on "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie" by Laura Numeroff

How I Became a Mom

Well, today is the 24th of June! Twenty-seven years ago I became a mom for the first time. And twenty-two years ago I became a mom for what I thought was the last time. Happy Birthday Bryan and Jenny!!

Bryan's Birth

It was a really long time ago, so the details will probably be pretty fuzzy by now, but I'll see what I can remember. I had turned 17  a week and a half earlier. Gosh, I was young! My xh had joined the military 6 weeks earlier and had arrived at his technical training base the day before. He was due to come home for a brief visit a few days earlier, but he didn't make it in time for the birth because Bryan arrived six days early.

I was living with my in-laws because my parents were still in the Philippines where my dad was stationed. They came back a month later, but I thought from their letters that they were coming back in June instead of July. Preggo brain, I'm sure...

So anyway, I woke up at 3 in the morning having to go to the bathroom, but nothing was coming out. I thought maybe I had a bladder infection. Yes, one that hurt every 10 minutes or so... duh. I had big plans back then. I was going to go gracefully into labor, take a shower, wash my waist-length hair, and leisurely get to the hospital with plenty of time to spare. Didn't happen that way. (Only five hours of labor later I'd be a mom). After several minutes of running to the bathroom, I woke my in-laws and sheepishly told them that I thought I had a bladder infection. My MIL asked if I was in labor and I said, "I don't think so." Then a contraction hit me and she knew it was time.

She drove me to the hospital with my little bag packed. We lived abot 45 minutes across town from the military base where I would deliver. She drove white-knuckled while I timed the contractions. I'd say, "Here's another one." And then she'd put her foot on the gas pedal some more. It was 4 o'clock in the morning and she had a pregnant girl in labor on board. What were they going to do, give her a ticket? When I announced that the contractions were 5 minutes apart she quietly freaked out.

By the time I got to the hospital my contractions were three minutes apart and I could barely walk. I got into a room and a gown and the nurse checked me out. I was dilated to 2 cm. Okay, I could stay or I could go home, my choice. I decided to stay. They checked me again at 6 and I was dilated to 7 cm and things were moving right along. They broke my water and inserted an internal monitor. I started to throw up and get restless and I got really scared.

By 7:30 I was fully dilated and they said I could give a couple of pushes until they could see a dime of the baby's head. As I fully hit transition, I started crying and begging to go home. I was too young and I was scared to death about pushing another human being out of my body. My MIL calmed me down and reminded me that in our childbirth class, I was really good at the pushing part. Finally she talked me off the ledge and I gave one good push and they said, "Stop pushing!!" They'd seen about a quarter of  his head and he was coming out fast.

In the seventies they didn't have all-in-one labor rooms. So I had to make the trip to the delivery room panting and trying not to push. After they got me all set, I gave a good push or two and my son arrived at 8:06am on Saturday, June 24, 1978. I was a mom and I was delirous. A nurse ran to the wall and pushed a red button and some more nurses ran in and began giving my son oxygen through a mask while someone else massaged his dark purple body. He wasn't breathing.

I was oblivious to the whole thing. I was just in shock over the whole birth thing and didn't notice any of it. My MIL later said that Navy Blue was not a very good color for babies. If I'd known what was going on, I would have been terrified.

Finally the boy started to cry and I looked up at the clock and whispered to myself, "8:12am" which was the time he started to cry. Later when I saw the time of birth on his isolette card, I asked my MIL about that  6 minute delay. Then she told me that he'd had the cord around his neck twice and that he'd not taken his first breath for six minutes, an excruciatingly long time.

After a four-day stay in the hospital (Bryan had jaundice) we went home to start our relationship and I had a nagging worry that he'd been damaged from the difficult birth. But he didn't have any lasting effects of his traumatic birth. The rest, they say, is history.