Hay Haulin'

Every year around this time, I get the joy joy experience of working in the hay field. For all you out there who this doesn't translate for, this is when you go out in a big open country field and haul hay in for your livestock. I've been working in the hay field every year since I was a kid. I couldn't exactly toss fifty and sixty pound hay bales back then, so us kids were put to use rolling them around until they lined up so machines could pick them up easier. Of course we have no machines now...just pure old fashion muscle. The deal with bringing in your own hay is that you save a whole ton of money by doing it yourself as opposed to having it bought and delivered. Lucky for us, my aunt owns this particular field of prairie hay. I don't know what we'd do without her. So, as soon as I got the call from my mom, I gussied up in my holey hick jeans and faithful baseball cap and headed out to the wide open fields right smack in between 'Nowhere' and "Where the heck am I?". Lucky for us, my brother Jeremy had awesome friends growing up and they are still willing to aid us as hay hands in these situations. God bless them for being so wonderfully helpful. So in order to feed my three retired cows, one horse, and my pony (all whom still live with my folks), we had to bring in 250 bales for the winter. We also had to get 150 for my pal Mandy's livestock. And it wouldn't be fun to go out haying unless you pick the hottest day of the year to do it on. (sarcasm intended) I think the heat index was nearing 110 this past weekend. Ouch! Boy howdy! It was hot out there for sure! I swear at one point I was certain that I had teleported to the surface of the sun. I drank so much water that I thought I might have floated away. But as fast as I gulped it down, I sweated it all right back out again. I'm still fairly certain that I sweat off half of my left butt cheek. Not that this would be a bad thing, ya know? I'm sure I can even things back out with my next splurge of ice cream. So, several bruises, some sore muscles, lots of hay splinters and a tick bite later...we were done. All in all, it was nice to have it finished and know that my ladies (cows) are taken care of for the winter. As hot as it was and as hard as I had to work, it was actually nice to let Josh man the ship (kids) for awhile. I went two days without putting them to bed. This is the first time this has ever happened and they did great. Didn't miss me at all. (How touching.) Operation Hay Haul 2010 - Complete.

Bad Elmo

Every day, Alex has quiet time. During this wonderful time of the day, Abby takes a nap while Alex watches his pick of movie and I get to lounge around the computer and play Farmville. Pathetic, right? But I love this time of day and so do the kids. It's a nice break for us all. Yesterday, I picked through our dwindling VHS collection and found 'Elmo in Grouchland'. I showed him the case and he was excited to watch it. Seeing as it was an Elmo movie, I didn't think twice about letting him watch it. Um, hello? Elmo's a furry red puppet who's key audience is children under three years old. How could it go wrong? Well, in case anyone out there was wondering about that movie, I'd heard a few years back that this particular Elmo movie had a history of terrifying some kids. Mandy let her son watch it and he liked it so I figured, what the hay. I never actually let Alex watch it because of the abnormal reviews it got. It was about an hour into the movie and I was mindlessly blogging away at the computer when I hear Alex starting 'roaring' like a lion at the TV. (He sometimes roars at things that scares him. Don't ask.) About ten seconds later Alex lets out the kind of blood curdling scream that usually involves Abby's teeth and his skin making contact. Of course, Abby was nowhere near him and he came running at me absolutely horrified. Tears were streaming down his little cheeks and he was sobbing uncontrollably. He was pointing at the TV telling me that the movie was scaring him. I believe his words were, "The movie is scaring me! Turn it off! Turn it off! It's scaring me!" He threw his little arms around my neck in a kung-fu grip and refused to let go for the better half of an hour, sobbing all the while. Needless to say, that movie is going to a far away land called 'Library donation box'. I never thought I'd see the day when Elmo goes on the 'bad' list. He just went from friendly, furry, red puppet to scary, red devil doll. Sorry Elmo...but the moment your movies start mentally scarring my children is the moment we say farewell.

Back to Basics

Here's what I don't understand. How is it, that we can go the entire winter without so much as a sniffle and then manage to get sick multiple times in a two month span over the course of summer? I really don't get it. I was paranoid (and I do mean paranoid) about swine flu. Heck...so was half the world. We even got the vaccine due to the fact that Alex and Abby were in the 'high risk' category. We went the whole winter with zero illnesses. No idea how we got away with that, but we did and I was more than grateful for the break on Alex's poor lungs. He needed a break for his lungs to heal from all his past wheezing. So enters summer. The joy of leaving the house - parks, zoos, playgrounds...the sky is the limit. And instantly, we end up with two stomach bugs (which is a first for my kids). We also caught a nice cold somewhere in there which we just so happened to pass on to Mandy's kids thanks to a tornado warning and us needing shelter in their basement. We now are working on the second cold of the season. After our trip to spend time with family, Alex picked up something that he unwillingly shared with the rest of us. His asthma has been under control for the most part and so I was mildly surprised to hear him wheezing. He hasn't had to use his inhaler in over a year (thank you God). So I'm okay with that and I never once had my 'oh-my-gosh-my-kid-might-stop-breathing-in-the-middle-of-the-night' panicking. He actually only needed the inhaler at night due to drainage so it's a massive improvement from his past bouts of illnesses. The last night and day of our trip, Alex started to get really congested and coughed a lot. Heather and Ben have dogs and I assumed they were kicking his dog allergy into high gear (which we are seeing signs of him outgrowing). Honestly, I'm glad that it turned out to be a cold. It means that his allergies are not bothering him as bad as they used to and we are getting more freedom as to what he can be exposed to. Is that wrong? It's not like I secretly wish for colds. I just have to second guess ever drip of snot that comes out of his nose. It was nice to know what caused it this time. So after the past weekend, I've had to break out his Xopenex and other various meds to keep him out of the danger zone. I must admit it was a challenge for me to remember everything I had to do. I even discovered that his inhaler is expired along with one of his other rescue meds. (Don't worry...the doc said that's okay and I've got an order for new stuff.) Even though it was a rough weekend going back to the basics, the cold is on the way out and it was 90% stress free.

Rite of Passage

This past week I did something that I quite honestly never believed I would attempt to do. I visited my brother, sister and nieces. (They're my in-laws but I'm dropping the 'in-law' bit. Cuz, let's face it, they're just too cool for the 'in-law' title.) They live in a far away land riddled with dangers and adventure. Okay. So maybe that's a bit of a stretch. Unless of course, a four hour trip where the roads have four lanes and lots of busy traffic is considered dangerous. To me though, traffic is the enemy. I dread driving in the city and avoid it like the plague. I also have zero sense of direction and could easily get lost on a one way road that leads to only one destination. I'm hopeless when it comes to driving and finding my way. It took me at least a year to get used to driving from home to college without panicking that I was going in the wrong direction. BUT, back then there weren't handy dandy GPS machines to get you where you're going. And Mandy just happens to have one of those handy machines. So about two weeks ago, Heather invited me and the kids to visit for a week to pass the time while Josh is out of town. I'll be the first to admit that I was about 99% sure that this would not happen. The moment I even gave it a millisecond of consideration, my stomach flipped and my heart raced at the idea of driving a four hour trip by myself. Oh, I've been there before so in theory it shouldn't be a problem. But Josh was always the driver and I was the 'kid entertainer'. So I convinced myself I wouldn't do it after about three minutes of considering it. Then Alex and Abby got bored...again. So I picked up the phone to call Heather and tell her that I'd do it. I'd make the trek alone. It became my new goal. I wanted to be able to make this drive and visit Heather, Ben and the girls. (I took a lot of Tums the week before going.) So after the use of Mandy's GPS, a map from Josh, a map from Heather and a whole of nerve, I set out on my first long trip with the kids. I'm not gonna lie. It was the most nerve wracking, scariest, insane trip I've ever taken. Did I get lost? Yup. Road construction screwed up the GPS and I ended up driving around a town on the verge of hyperventilating for about ten minutes before finding my way again. Did I make it alive and well? Yup. I had to pry my kung-fu grip from the steering wheel and peel my body from the sweaty car seat like a burned pancake...but I made it alive and well. It was totally worth the panic and worry because the kids had a blast and I had a great time too thanks to my gracious hosts. When my mom asked my why I didn't just stay home if it made me so nervous, I told her it was my rite of passage. I had to prove to myself that I could do this. Call it weird. Call it Silly. Call it a pre-mid-life crisis. But I felt really good about making that trip. It was totally worth the worry. I think I'm going to invest in a GPS so I can do this more often. It was great to visit the family for so long. I miss seeing them and have already convinced myself to do it again soon. (If they'll have us anyhow.) Rite of passage - complete.

God Bless America

Happy Fourth of July! We celebrated by blowing up a nice crisp $20 bill. Oh wait. No. That's not right. We decided to transfer that twenty bucks into fireworks. And then we blew it up! Some people think fireworks are a waste of money. Okay, okay. So maybe in theory it's a waste. But between the joy it brings to the kids (and adults) and the memories that it gives, it's totally worth it. It was a blast. (Literally) We went to watch the town's big show too and the kids were thrilled. Mandy came over with her two wee ones to my mom and dad's house to give them a nice experience. Turns out that fireworks and miss Greta didn't mix well. So Mandy left Wesley with us for awhile and all the kids did snappers and champagne poppers while watching us big kids play with explosives. I hope you all have an amazing Independence Day as well! Thank you to all the men and women out there that continue to serve this great country so that we can continue to celebrate this wonderful day. God bless America!

Zoo 2010

It seems like we just went to the zoo yesterday, but it's actually been about a year since our last visit. I feel as though it gets a bit mundane to repeat the same blog over again. I mean, seriously, how much can I actually say about the same zoo trip? I will say that the kids seem to be the perfect zoo age. We probably could have stayed for another two hours and they wouldn't have complained a bit. They were actually quite unhappy to leave. It was fun and I think we will probably go again this summer because Alex was aware of the animals we missed out on seeing. It was really fun to get out of the house for awhile as well. Of course, my main goal was to wear the kids out so much that they would pass out at bedtime. Operation: Child Energy Drain - fail. Apparently not even the power of the sun and long bouts of walking will wear out my superkids. I put them to bed at 8:30. They fell asleep at 10:30.

Reason #1 why our zoo is awesome. You can take pictures and it looks like you took them in the wild. Grizzly bears.

Abby could have fed the Giraffes the entire day. Most of the kids were terrified of getting licked. Not Abby. She asked if she could ride one.

Reason #2 I love our zoo. They have a sense of humor. That's sculpted tiger poop on the ground if you were wondering.

Don't you love Abby's new 'smile' for the camera? Lovely.

A Welcome Return

Play dates are back! Woo-hoo! My days just got a little bit easier. I don't think I can stress the sheer joy I feel for being able to give the kids another thing to do. And might I add that Alex and Abby are incredibly excited as well? I haven't seen them so happy as they were after our outing yesterday. We decided to go to a school playground and play. Alex and his buddy Wesley chased each other around and played for over an hour. Wesley and Greta have had a cold recently and we were hesitant to go over in fear of the spread of germs. But it's been well over a week and I finally threw my hands up in the air and said, "I don't care. I'm done with the over-protection gig." I figure that if Alex was in school, he would have been exposed to Wesley much sooner than yesterday. So seeing as how Mandy's kiddos seemed well and Alex was devastated at the idea of not continuing his play-date with Wesley, we headed over to Mandy's house for the remainder of the time. So what has kept me in the 'protective' state as far as sickness goes? Oh, that's easy. Alex's doctor. He told me that I need to keep him as well as I can by even keeping him out of school for an extra year until his lungs had time to heal. Well, it's been a year since his last asthma flare and he's doing great. So I'm hopeful that his lungs have healed enough that a little cold now and then won't be so devastating. I hope I'm not wrong about this because I sure don't want to land him in the hospital due to my 'under-protection.' For now, I'm just thrilled to have some normalcy back for awhile. Next week we're even going to go to visit my brother and sister-in law for a few days for some fun for the kids. Wish me luck though, because I'm making the trip alone and I am not good at driving in the city. That...and I have no idea how to get there by myself. Thank goodness I have a friend who's willing to loan me her GPS for the week. Otherwise, our long-distance play-date would land me somewhere half-way across the country. I'd probably hit the Atlantic Ocean and wonder where I made the wrong turn.