He's Still Older

So last week Mike and I both celebrated out birthdays. He turned 31 on Wednesday. And for two whole days, I could rag on him, through email anyway, about his age. Then, on Friday, I joined him in the ranks of the thirty-somethings. He celebrated his birthday surrounded by sand and soldiers. I celebrated mine surrounded by 9 of my friends (and quite frankly, I can't tell you how many kids were running around in the yard. Just know that they outnumbered the adults!)

My girlfriends and I have started a 'window's club'. No, we aren't widows, but with our husbands deployed, it sure feels like it sometimes. We typically meet here at my house on Friday nights. We do a pot luck type dinner and the kids get to run around and wear themselves and each other out. My best friend Amy took it upon herself to invite all of our friends to join in on Friday night to celebrate my birthday. Of course not everyone could attend. I can't tell you how lucky I feel to be able to say that not all of my friends were in attendance, but NINE were. It just reasures me that staying here while Mike is deployed is the best move we could have made.

As far as birthday gifts I got a couple of new outfits for that job I may be startig on Wednesday. I also got some cash, some DQ certificates and batteries. I have to say... the batteries were probably the best thing I opened... after all, it was a widow's club meeting.

Dad Gone Mad

WOW.
If you have never read the blog Dad Gone Mad, where have you been?! Go on over and read what they have going on... it's amazing the love and support people show for our troops.

My online friends from my parenting websites and email list have already adopted about half of Mike's platoon. I know how much these soldier appreciate all that my friends have done for them. You wouldn't believe the difference a note or package from a stranger showing support means to them. Most of the soldiers are young, early twenties. They have never been away from home. They are supporting our way of life. I feel the least we can do it to honor then, care for them, and show them that we are behind them.

An Answer...

Jacob went back to the doctor on Tuesday. And Thursday. We found out that the infection is his finger is MRSA.. go ahead, google it... yeah, penicillin resistant staph. Nice. And contageous to boot. Joy.

It is drying up and doing much better. And he is taking his medicine like a trooper. We go back to the doctor again on Monday for a final check. All I can say is thank goodness we don't have a copay!!

More ER Frequent Flyer Miles...

So, this is what I typed about yesterday :

Jacob has been complaining all day of his finger hurting.. and under his arm. I thought maybe he pulled something under his arm yesterday at a birthday party. I couldn't see anything on his finger, so I blew that off too. Tonight, as I was getting dinner ready, he showed me his finger again. It kinda looked like a wart. My friend Amy was over, so I had her look at it as well. When she touched it, the thing popped.. weird. I put peroxide on it and we left it alone. While we were sitting down eating, Amy and I noticed at the same time that it was starting to streak! I look at Amy, she looked at me and off Jacob and I went to the ER. (She stayed here with Matthew and Lauren).

They diagnosed it as herpetis whitlow. Basically, it's a cold sore on his finger. BUT, the infection has traveled into the lymph node under his arm as well. They gave us antibiotics and we have to go back in the morning to see his PMC.

We got home and I got him to bed. I sat and took a test for my online class. Next thing I know.. he is puking! UGH... The meds didn't come back up, so that's good. He does have a fever, 101.6. I called the ER back. They said to make sure he eats when he takes the meds in the am and to give him motrin or tylenol for the fever. He is sleeping now. Man, I hope he has a good night...

He puked again around 4:30 this morning. So, uh, not a good night. I got him an appointment this morning to see his regular doctor. She said the ER docs were wrong. It's an infection of some sort. They drained it and are going to run cultures on it. To make things more interesting, he is allergic to the antibiotic they gave him (augmentin) so they switched that too. He has to go back to the doctor in the morning to see how it's doing.

He is sleeping now. I should be. I pray he is doing better in the morning. I feel so helpless. I broke down in the doctors office today. The nurse was triaging him and asked what was wrong. I just lost it. Damn it.

Back To School...

The kids went back to school yesterday!
My baby started Kindergarten, and I didn't even cry. And I almost feel guilty about it. Almost. The boys are in 2nd and 4th grade this year. I will complete my Bachelor's degree around the same time they finish this school year. YAY!

The Floor..It is

FINISHED! Whew!

I can still feel a little bit of the grain of the wood.So I polyed a small section in the corner to see if a 4th coat would make a difference. It didn't. So, it stays as is. We get to put the furniture back in tomorrow! I can't wait. I'm even anxious to CLEAN! HA!

Oh, and the color is a little lighter than the rest of the house. It could be because the rest of the floors have darkened with age. I happen to like the color differnce. :)

I tried to upload pics, but it isn't working right now... go figure!

The Floor Saga...

still is NOT done!




This picture was taken this morning..You can see the room on the left is sanded. The room on the right has one coat of poly on it. And the floor to the bottom of the picture is the hallway. That is what the floors should look like when it's all over. No more poly has been put down since these pictures were taken.
An attempt was made at putting up a new ceiling fan, but the fan is defective. Damn.
Will this ever end?!

Floors... Day 2 of Sanding

This is going to take FOR-EVER! UGH
So, he came here around eleven or so yesterday. Taped plastic in the first room (to cut down on sawdust on the walls) and did the first sanding of that floor. He left around 8:30 last night. He is back now and has taped the second room. Sanding is going strong...
I pray this is done today, but being realistic, it will likely continue tomorrow...

Wood Floors.. Part 2

I am waiting for my contractor to come sand the wood floors in the boys rooms. I can't tell you how excited I am about this. Also, I'm just ready for it to be OVER! He will sand today and poly tomorrow. We have to wait 72 hours from the last coat until we can put their furniture back into their rooms. That means I can't put their rooms back together until SUNDAY!! UGH...
The kids start school next Thursday! I want their rooms done and normalcy returned to our home. I can't wait until we are back into our routine.

And We're Back!

We got home from our vacation on Tuesday. It's been nonstop since.
We had a great time. The boys got mohawks in Florida!! :)















I'll need to go back and read the kids journals to see what all we did. I can't remember everything. We did have a good time, but the kids were ready to get back home.
I am in the middle of composing a post in my head. I need to get it typed out... I'll post it soon.

In Florida

We arrived here in Florida on Wednesday. It's Thursday, about midnight here, so technially Friday morning. Everything is going well. The kids are great! I got to chat with Mike tonight for a long time. It's so great to be able to communicate with him! I miss him so much, but this makes things so much better.

We plan to visit the flea market tomorrow. Downtown Disney on Saturday. We will also go bowling and maybe to the beach as well while we are here. We head back to Louisiana on Tuesday. The time seems to be moving so fast...

Just wanted to update. Need to get some sleep. I'll post more later. Here is a picture of the kids right after we crossed over from Louisiana into Mississippi the other day!

It All Began During my Second Pregnancy

I was getting out of the shower this morning and Lauren came into the bathroom. We had the following conversation:

Her: I can see you naked because we are both girls.

Me: Well, I have the same part as you do.

Her: Yours are bigger!

Me: Only because my body is bigger, and well, I've had a few kids.

Her: Yeah, well, when you were pregnant with Jacob in your belly, he kicked my Egg!

All I could do was laugh!

On 'Vacation', Part 1

So, things are CRAZY! I am on ‘vacation’. We arrived here in Louisiana last Monday. We have been here for a week now. I have been to Target (TWICE!), Wal-Mart (more times than I can count), eaten at Olive Garden and finished a term paper, a midterm and an essay. OH, I’ve also attended TWO baby showers! And today I have a shrimp po-boy, crab stew and boiled crabs! YUM! Things are going fairly well. There hasn’t been much drama or conflict with my sisters yet. I’ve received two emails from Mike as well as two phone calls. The kids are having a great time. They are loving the fact that COUSINS live just around the corner! They slept at my sister’s house last night. All three kids!! It was, um, weird! to not have them here with me. But nice because I was able to finish my mid-term in relative peace.

Of course, this wouldn’t be ‘home’ without drama. The drama is between my Mom’s family. My Grandmother is sick. She has four children. Oldest Uncle Son, Oldest Daughter, My Mom, and Youngest Son. Youngest Son has everything handed to him by Maw Maw (my grandmother). He works, makes good money, and does drugs. He has NOTHING to show for his life. She pays his truck note, insurance and provides a place for him to live and food to eat. He does nothing for her. Oldest Son lives next door. His wife runs over to help Maw Maw numerous times a day. They give her all her insulin shots as well. Oldest Daughter doesn’t come around. Hasn’t in about 2 months. My Mom lives around the corner from Maw Maw. Since I have been home I have witnessed everyone talk about the issues with Youngest Son. I have listened as stories get passed back and forth. This one says one thing and the other reports it to someone else. It’s like that game in school where you whisper something to the person next to you and by the time it reaches the last person, the story has changed so much it hardly recognizable. It amazes me that no one will tell Maw Maw all the drama going on behind the scenes. It also amazed me that Maw Maw is so blind she can’t see how her son is draining everything she has right from under her.

I don’t handle conflict very well. It is hard for me to be here witnessing all of this taking place. I want to sit everyone down and make them see what I see. But I know that is not realistic. And I am sure there is more to this than I what I am aware of. It is just so hard to watch the drama unfold. Knowing how much it hurts my Mom.

This trip has been eye opening for me. I’ve come to realize that my family has changed in the thirteen years since I moved away. So many things are still the same. But my family isn’t the same as it was when I left. Or maybe it is and I have just changed so much I am viewing them all through different eyes. I can feel something inside of me changing. The past month has been a time of personal growth for me. It isn’t something I can point out, but I know some changes are happening. I am becoming more aware of a lot of things around me. There is a lot of change happening in my life right now. I feel it’s a time of redirecting my priorities.

With Mike being gone I have been thinking a lot more about where I want my life to go. It’s easy to settle into a routine when we are together and not think too far into the future. With this deployment, I find I am more focused on our long-term goals. I see where I want us to be and I am working on getting us there.

Ok, I have so many more things going through my mind right now. It is hard to capture them all and get them down. I’ll write more later, but wanted to at least start to write about the things going on.

I’ll close with a crappy thing that happened to me on Friday. My Mom, my Sister, her daughter, my other neice, my three kids and I were getting ready to go out to eat breakfast. As I was loading the kids into the truck my sister says “You aren’t going anywhere in that truck”.. I looked down and my tire was FLAT! To the RIM, flat! We used my Mom’s car the rest of the day. The next day I got the tire fixed. Hopefully it holds up for a LONG time!! But man, what a crappy way to start the day!

Doing Better

I am happy to say that Lauren seems to be over the virus. She has been fever free for about 36 hours now!! Woohoo!!

I'm doing much better as far as dealing with things right now. And the kids were awesome today!!
Time to go to bed and sleep before something too bad happens! hehe

He Called...

I missed TWO calls from Mike yesterday. TWO. I had taken Lauren a doctors appointment for the fever the keeps spiking. Seems it's just a virus. I really hope we see the end of this virus soon. I can't stand to watch her with the fever anymore. She is fine between fevers, but when her temps start to go up she just goes to bed. And sleeps. Until I figure out, HEY, she is doing it again, go drug her! She has only had motrin once today... it's a start I guess.

I stayed busy today. Mike called last night around 9 and it totally made me happy. He called again this morning and I have to say hearing from him totally makes my day. After I spoke with him today we walked a little over a mile (kids pooped out on me), sanded and repainted the boys baseboards, cleaned out the workshop so that when I'm on vacation the dogs don't destroy everything, burnt trash, cleaned the cusion thing for Mike's ATV, moved some things around in the garage so I can park the van in there while I'm gone, and even managed to grill some pork chops for dinner. It was a wonderful day. The kids have been in better moods as well.

So, before I leave for Louisiana on Monday I have to finish a term paper, do my homework due tomorrow, a quiz due Saturday, and two essays due Sunday. I need to vacuum out both vehicles and armor all the interiors. I have to get the laundry all caught up and pack for all of us. I have to finish sewing some pillowcases I was supposed to do back in January, and drop those off with a birthday gift for the party we misses last weekend. Hmmm, what else. OH, I need to go to the commisary tomorrow for dog food so they don't run out while I'm gone. And I'd like the leave the house as clean as possible so I don't come home to a mess. We get back on the 1st of August and the floors will be sanded and refinished in the boys rooms on the 3rd. On the 2nd, I'll be busy unpacking and getting groceries.. joy.

Ok, I'm going to go shower now and get started on that quiz, so I can pretend I don't have a term paper due!
Here is a picture of Mike from June, when he was in Florida visiting his Mom. She shot it and I altered it. He is my hero!

Half Way Better Day...

My mood did improve some this afternoon. PMS is a bitch.

The kids are still driving me insane. Hopefully now that the hormones are leveling out again I can handle them better.

I still haven't heard from Mike since I missed his call yesterday. I am getting pretty upset about it. I really want to hear his voice. I saved the message on the machine so I can play it again and again.

Lauren is still sick. It's been over a week. The fever is starting to come back before the meds wear off. I hope they can get her into the clinic first thing in the morning. I am getting very worried about her.

Amy and I took the kids on base tonight to watch the fireworks. After we got back the kids and I did some fireworks we bought the other day. The kids had a good time.

Why is it so exhausting to just BE sometimes?!

Hard Day

Today just sucked. I missed Mike’s call. And this is the day when I really need to hear his voice. I am so sad right now. I can’t even think straight. I know we will make it through this year, but God it hurts so much to be so far away. I am terrified of what could happen. I am really trying to stay strong. To hold it in and keep going. But sometimes the weight of it all is just so much to bear. I am so frustrated and sensitive right now. I can’t deal with anything. The kids haven’t done anything specific, but MAN they are driving me insane. I just want to be alone in a quiet place with nothing to think or worry about. I want to escape my feeling and thoughts for a while.
I sent Mike a few emails over the last few days. All I got back was a seven word reply. From one of the emails. This shit is going to kill me, I swear.

ER Frequent Flyer Miles...

I swear there should be a club!

I took Lauren to the ER tonight. She has had a fever of unknown origin since last weekend. It was getting better (not as high) and we were able to go longer between doses of motrin. This morning it was back up to 102.6 and six hours after the motrin was back up to 102. An hour after another dose of meds only brought her temp down to 99.9, so off we went to the hospital. They did a UA on her because of her kidney reflux and everything looked fine. She has no other symptoms, so the dr wrote it off as a virus. I just hope we see the end of this soon. I hate when she feels miserable. And I am exhausted!

A Phone Call and Lots of Wood

Things are going well. I got an email from Mike this morning that made my day, then he called later and I was thrilled! We are getting lots of great feedback and info from his unit's rear detachment and I think that totally helps at this point. It's nice to know they are concerned about the friends and family members as well as the soldiers.

The floor guys came today. They installed the floor in Matthew's room and started in Jacob's room. They have to come back tomorrow to finish the installation. Next week a different guy will come and sand and refinish the floors. Here are a few pictures from today... click them for a bigger view.

He called again!!!!

YAY!! He just called back!!
It is so wonderful to hear his voice. He said all is well. A friend of ours is scheduled to arrive tonight and his old unit from our last duty station is there, so he knows more people.

Ok, I MUST finish pulling the tack strips and baseboards out of the boys rooms. The floors are being laid tomorrow!!