Welcome to the Great White North

Right now, I would like to be in bed. I don't necessarily feel horrible, but the medication that is supposed to make me better is kicking my butt. I am soooo sleepy. But that is what the doctor wanted. He wants me in bed, asleep, taking care of myself, so I can get over all of the illness that plagues my body. After 6 weeks of coughing, 2 weeks of earaches, 1 week of a runny nose, and 1 week of not being able to catch my breath, I finally went to the doctor yesterday. The real reason I went was because of my ears. I can't hear a thing! I found out that I was a lot worse off than I ever imagined and have probably been causing the illness epidemic plaguing the country. So if you have seen me in the last couple of weeks and you are sick, I am so sorry. It is probably my fault. But in my defense, I am a mom. I am used to running on empty and feeling bad all of the time and just sucking it up and doing what needs to be done. Now on to the multiple diagnoses that I was given... The ears... yes, both infected. The cough is caused by bronchitis which has gone untreated and turned into pneumonia. And the breathing is effected because I, apparently have asthma. I have never had asthma before, but I do now. I had a fever of 101.2 when I was in the doctor. And my oxygen level was so low, the doctor did not know how I was walking around. What? I feel FINE! I can handle this! Piece of cake. Except for the fact that I am on a heavy duty antibiotic, a steroid, cough medicine, and 4 breathing treatments a day for a month. I am sleepy and really shaky from the breathing treatments. The doctor told me to not eat peas with a fork this month. (funny! that is the least of my worries) I cannot be lazing around the house. There is laundry to do, floors to clean, surfaces to dust, dishes to wash, and 3 children to take care of! Not to mention the shuttling that needs done. Caroline has gymnastics today, Hilton has a party to go to this afternoon... and of course there is Trick or Treating tomorrow night!!! And it snowed last night. Lorelai is dying to get out there and play in it! You ask where my beloved husband is during this time? He is in production of a play. That means I am a single mom until Thanksgiving. He leaves at 9 am and gets home at 11 pm. There is nothing he can do about this. He is gone all day, every day except Sunday. So he just isn't part of the equation. You poor single mom's out there. How do you do it? Can I ever do something for you? Please let me know! But you will have to wait until I am not contagious. Did I mention the girl next door just had a sweet baby girl Wed and now I don't get to hold her??? You know how I am about babies! I can't get enough! This totally sucks.

Miche Handbags

Have you seen the Miche Bags? If you are a fan of handbags and purses, this may be like meth to you... You buy the purse and then purchase the shells to go with it. You can put any shell you like on it! So you have like a million different possibilities for your purses! And at a very reasonable price! They go on by magnets. I saw them at a boutique on Saturday and wanted one (or several) so badly. But I could not justify another handbag... well... at least not to Justin...

Soccer

Saturday was Hilton's last soccer game of the season. Aside from one day of 20 degree weather, it was a great season. Hilton's team won on Saturday, due in part to one of Hilton's great saves in the goal. He is a great goal tender and seems to prefer being there to being on the field. Last week he got hit in the face with the ball and he was not happy about that. I think he feels like he has a little more control in the goal because he can use his hands. All in all it was fun for him and I hope he wants to do it again in the summer!

Caroline is 10!

My baby girl is now 10. I cannot believe how the years have really gone by so quickly. As I put Caroline's old clothes on Lorelai, I cannot believe that it has been 8 years since Caroline has worn them. It seems like just yesterday. How cliche, right? I can't help it! Caroline is taking a babysitting class... she is almost old enough to babysit! She already does an excellent job with her baby sister. She does get annoyed when I make her play with her when Caroline would rather just be playing by herself. Caroline loves to play outside. She prefers to be outside. She likes to swing, and slide and climb and run and practice tumbling. She has just started gymnastics and really loves it. She seems to have a great natural talent for it. Caroline likes to read, but the books are a little under her age bracket. She still loves Junie B. Jones and Magic Treehouse. She is not quite ready for Nancy Drew, yet. She is starting to enjoy Beverly Cleary books as well. She has a good head on her shoulders and got an award last year for being on the honor roll or principal's list the whole year. She got one "B" the whole year and she was very disappointed because it kept her from being on the principal's list the whole year. She is learning that there are consequences to her actions and that I cannot make her work hard to get good grades. She has to do this on her own. Caroline loves clothes. Her favorite store is Justice. They have all kinds of trendy and sparkly clothes for tweens. The sparklier the better!!! She likes animal prints and florescent colors and she is totally against wearing dresses. She only likes skirts. She is just about the complete opposite of me. I really try to choose clothes that she likes rather than what I like. It is hard for me because I still want to dress her in jumpers and sweaters and cute things like that. Caroline prefers yoga pants and jeans with appliques all over them. She got a digital camera for her birthday and she has not stopped taking pictures. She is quite frustrated because it was cheap and it is not great quality. She wants to do all kinds of things with it and unfortunately it just does not have the capacity for that. She may have to get a better camera for Christmas. (Presents for kids get a lot more expensive as they get older!) The last 10 years have been difficult in some ways for Caroline. She has moved 9 times in her short life. She has been to 6 different schools. She has had to pick up and make new friends over and over again. She has tried to keep in touch with old friends, only for them to forget about her after just a few weeks. But she is strong. She makes new friends and makes her way through life. She is quite the drama queen at times, but our lives would not be the same without her. Happy Birthday, Caroline! We love you!

Grandma's sweater

This is the sweater that my mom made for Lorelai. It is really a coat, it is long and warm and beautiful! I picked out the pattern and my mom whipped it out in just a few months! I absolutely love it!!! Lorelai looks so cute in it. She will be able to wear it next year too, I am sure. Thank you, Mommy!!!

So, I did it again today! I stayed on the treadmill for 30 minutes. I sweat a lot, got my pulse up. I feel like I did well. I will keep it up! To other news, my dad has the MRSA virus. He has had it for about a month now. It has caused pneumonia as well. Mom said he sounds like he smokes a couple packs a day with his cough. Anyway, he was in the hospital for several days last month, but they let him go home and put him on a heavy duty antibiotic for 30 days. It hasn't helped. So he is now having to get 2 IV treatments a day at 2 hours each time. Hopefully this round will kill off the MRSA and get rid of the pneumonia so he can breath again. I tell you what, I really don't know how my dad is still living. He must really have some important work to do on this earth for Heavenly Father to keep him around after all that has happened to him.

I did it!

So this morning I went down to the clubhouse in our complex and I exercised. I exercised my butt off! Ok, not off... I have a long way to go for that. But I was sweating and my pulse was racing and it felt really good. I did the treadmill for about 10 minutes, then I did the bike for 30. The bike is cool because you can play Tetris while you pedal, but you have to keep pedaling in order to play. I feel like I accomplished something! I feel very proud of myself and I am really going to try to keep it up. I was by myself, so that was good. There is a tv in there but you can only watch DVD's on it. I need to get a tv series from Netflix or something so I can have something to watch so I will stay on the treadmill longer. When I was in college, I used to read a book while I was working out. So I tried that again today... yeah right. That was not gonna happen. I am about 1/100th the shape I was in back then. But maybe someday I will get back to the point where I can read while exercising. Or maybe I will just enjoy it so much that I won't need to read or watch tv or anything to keep my mind off of my screaming thighs... It is only the first day of the rest of my life. That seems really far away. But I am not going to put a time limit on myself. I am not going to set myself up for disappointment. I am just going to take it one day at a time and hope and pray that I lose weight and get healthy. Right?

I was NOT prepared!

I thought I had a little more time! I was not going to get snow boots and snow pants and coats until the next paycheck. I was going to spread it out a little. Since we have lived away from the cold for so long, the kids do not have the appropriate winter wear. We got Hilton a couple pairs of jeans this weekend. Since all he had was shorts. Caroline has 3 pairs of pants. Lorelai is in pretty good shape with her hand-me-downs from Caroline. She is still in 18 month-24 month stuff, so she is wearing Caroline's clothes from Montana. Those are great. But I sold her good snow suit on EBay last year because I did not think I would be needing one for her anytime soon. And I did not have a good winter coat for her! So we tromped off to Walmart and bought the LAST 24 month coat they had. I am not a big proponent of WalMart winter weather gear, but I would rather only spend $20 on a coat for her that she will just wear one year. The big kids will get Lands End or LLBean coats. You need them up here! I cannot believe it is already so cold! But it is supposed to warm up a little later this week and be more fall-like. I will not complain though! I would much rather be cold than turning up the air-conditioner!!!