She's still got something...

Last week Luci came down with the stomach virus that's been going around here.  I think we were the last home to get it, from all the Facebook status updates.  Since then, she's spread it to Daddy, JT and me (but I didn't actually throw up--not that I'm complaining!!). 

I think she's still got something.  Only one day since she was struck with the ickies has she begged to go play outside.  Yesterday she fell sound asleep at 5:30 pm and tonight, the same--here she is in her chair at supper.

Asleep before 9 pm is rare for her! 

Poor baby.

I'm doin' my Skoo-Work!

Luci has been ill the past few days with congestion and a fever. What does she do when the fever finally breaks? She gets out one of our Childcraft books (Volume 4, in case you are interested) and starts copying poetry. At 9:30 at night. What a funny kid.

Cruisin'~~A WONDERful trip!

We went on a Disney four-day cruise in the Caribbean this week. Talk about FUN (except for Bryan getting seasick--Sunday night was rough and it caught up to Bryan on Monday night). We had a "kids sail free" deal.

Here are some favorite shots of the trip:

Here we are in Nassau, Bahamas. We found the Straw Market and got a couple of things..Luci's little purse, and a little Conga drum for JT (would you please quit playing that, JT?!). That's our ship, the Disney Wonder, in the background. Luci was thirsty at this point, and tired of walking. Can you tell?

Since I'm taking the photo, I am not in the shot...and I have the right to not show myself. So there.







It really is a lovely ship. There are art deco touches all through it, but it's modern, too. A classic look to the ship.

On deck 10, looking out over Nassau.

At Castaway Cay, Disney's private island. Gorgeous there! This was taken around 11 am. There was a breeze, and about 80* weather. It felt wonderful! The water felt cold, though, until you got used to it. After lunch this lagoon had more families in it, but before lunch we pretty much had the water to ourselves. John, JT and Luci are on the inner tubes and Bryan is sitting next to me on the sand. He wasn't feeling too well after his night of sea-sickness.

Bryan with Captain Jack Sparrow from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. That shipwreck in the background is the very one used in some of the scenes in the Pirates movies. Too cool!

I do hope Captain Jack was not giving Bryan pointers on how to deal with the ladies....

John and JT took a bike-ride around the island. This was at one of the view points along the way.

Luci did not feel like riding. She rested after lunch. She's in there somewhere!

We had a different towel-animal in our cabin every night.

Luci tried her own hand at this craft. Here she is with her very own creation, made with her napkin.

Are you ready for this?

"I made a bar of soap!"

Gluten-free bread just for JT! It was delicious. The basket started out much fuller. This was after we all had a sample.

Some of my favorite shots:

Luci on our veranda, on Deck 8. We had just left port and headed out to sea the first night.

And two shots from Castaway Cay. I can't decide which I like the best. Mom, do you recognize the hat you gave me? Luci used it that afternoon, and I had to arm-wrestle her to get it back.

I think I like this second shot best.

Funny, Funny Boy

Janet gave me an idea for the boys: to do some research on Shingles. John loved this idea, thinking it might increase the boys' empathy for me. My thoughts: it couldn't hurt!

I told JT about this new assignment yesterday. Here is his report:

Shingles
.

They go on the roof.

.

The End

When John Deploys, Things Happen

This time it's shingles for Susan. Whoopee.
.
As I'm finding out, shingles can be painful, and it can be isolating. We've had to cancel travel plans for this weekend, miss karate class since I can't take Luci to the child watch area, and skip worship. Can't wait for the spots to dry up!
.
Neuralgia is a part of shingles, the part everyone's heard about--and it's changed the dates for our trip to Disney World. The kids haven't minded the changes in worship (we have a worship time at home) or the karate classes. For the Disney trip now we are going to Vero Beach instead of Wilderness Lodge (the only time and place we could get in exchange for our vacation club points), and spending Luci's birthday there. She is totally excited about going to the beach on her birthday. We will manage to get to Magic Kingdom for one day, to visit Cinderella and ride Winnie the Pooh's Honey Pots. It will be so fun to do something totally different. We've never been to the resort at Vero Beach.
.
This also means changes in schoolwork and chores, which is not going over well right now with the boys. They try to put off things, thinking mama doesn't know what is really going on. Mama knows, but sometimes just does not care much. So things pile up for them.
.
We were going to go to Huntsville this weekend, to the Bridge Street Town Centre, but that's out now. This morning I took the money budgeted for food and fun and got lots of food for the freezer (i.e., boys can cook for themselves) and a blue ray disc player (Wal-Mart has one for $98!); I told the boys when they were all done with schoolwork and chores they can get it out of the van and watch movies in the Man Cave. They are off and running with their list of things to do!

Valentine's Day

Don't know if this will work, since the page is messed up and I can't upload pictures (rats!), but here it goes:

John sent Luci some flowers for Valentine's Day! Poor baby has been sick since Tuesday with a respiratory virus of some sort and these flowers cheered her up. JT asked Luci if she had a boyfriend. "Yup! He's in Af ghan istan."

John sent me flowers, too, sweet, smart boy that he is.

I Was Wrong! ... and other stuff

Gasp! How often have I said that?!

Every time I have taken the kids to the doctor, I have pre-diagnosed them. I've gotten it wrong only once. Until today. Today makes twice. Luci's been so congested for the last month or so. It got much worse over the last three days. She spent last night crying and not sleeping. An ear infection or sinus infection for sure, right? Wrong! I was so glad to get it wrong. The nurses worked Luci in this afternoon. The doctor (who also has a Lucy at home) gave us a steroid nasal spray and right now Luci's taking a much-needed nap. He even got Luci to quit crying and smile, which was a miracle in itself. Any kind of medical person terrifies her.

Like the dentist. This morning I had a regular check-up, and had to take Luci. She sat in the visitor's chair in the exam room, with a blankie over her head the entire time. It made her invisible. I wish I had my camera! She's had two trips to a doctor's office in the same day. Horrible mama! After the pediatrician visit, we hit Wal-mart and got a Barbie. Perfect reward for surviving quite nicely two traumatic doctor visits.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
John's off on a three day camping trip with the boys, and my camera. They are in the Smoky Mountains near Gatlinburg. Two other guys are going, two of John's long-time friends. They go to the area around Cades Cove. He is under strict orders to bring back lots of pictures (the man usually takes 5 or 6 total for a 3 day trip!) and two boys completely intact (ask JT about a bike ride in the Smokys when he was 7 years old). My idea of camping is going to a hotel and eating in a restaurant. I don't understand the thrill of roughing it. Hikes would be nice, but not the whole tent thing. Watch him come home with the whole 1 gigabyte card filled up. As long as the boys don't have any boo-boos, that's okay with me.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Pirate's Cove, the gas station that I reported for gouging before Hurricane Ike even hit shore, now has gas for $2.22. That is a whopping 3 dollars and 15 cents lower than it was in September! They now have the distinction of having the lowest gas in our part of the county. Next time I need gas, I'm going there.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The leaves here are absolutely gorgeous! This is the best year for leaves that I can remember in all of the 18 autumns I've lived here. Really makes you feel wonderful just looking at them. Even with all the emotional stress of John's upcoming trip, I feel totally happy just looking at the incredible show of Nature.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
P.S. to the previous post: I don't care what my Dad says, or how much I like the man--SPIDERS ARE NOT OUR FRIENDS!!!

709 Miles to Mickey!

Woo-Hoo!

Luci is finally feeling a little more like seeing a character or two...as long as she doesn't have to talk to them. I think she and I had some sort of 'flu; it didn't last long enough for a cold and certainly was not as long-lasting as fall allergies.

Thanks to my Feingold friend Sharon who told me how to make my own Feingold-safe medicine...it did make me feel a lot like Mamie and Emily Baldwin from The Waltons, who made their own "medicine" out back.

Say It Aint So!

Wouldn't ya know? Luci and I both have COLDS. We leave in a few days for Disney! Luci's been whiny and clingy today, not like herself. (Clingy, yes, it's normal. Whiny, no.) She told me today that she didn't even want to meet the Princesses!

.

This is serious.

.

I did finally talk her into a McDonald's Happy Meal at Downtown Disney, and going shopping with her birthday money (thank you, Nana and Papa!). Even when she's sick, she still wants to go shopping for a tiara.

Moms Just Aren't Supposed to Get Sick

It's the flu ... it must be, it feels too bad to be just a cold. The symptom checker on WebMD.com comes out with me more on the flu side. I don't think I'd still be feeling this bad with a cold. Moms just aren't supposed to get sick! I searched for quite a while to find a clip-art of a sick mom and this was as close as I got....

I didn't realize how much John does for me here until he got home last night ... and even though he was dog-tired, he still did the supper dishes for me and even did his own laundry from his suitcase. How nice was that?!

The boys started in on the schoolwork they have put off while Daddy was gone and I was too sick to care about. John has a few more trips this Spring...army stuff...and the boys are thinking, "Wow! More vacation days!" No way, guys. If you want any summer vacation at all, you're going to have to buckle down.

Some pictures of John's trip coming in a later post.

The Best-Laid Plans ...

This week, while John is gone, I planned lots of fun things for us to do. We were going to:

• go to the Nashville Zoo
• see Kalyn and her mommy
• see Nathan Riley and Casey Brooke and their mommy
• have dinner with Diane while Bryan babysat Luci at JT's play practice
• do our spring cleaning

Three of those things would have had me face-to-face with a grown-up! But I got sick with this nasty cold, and that canceled all the plans. JT got sick a day later. So far, Luci and Bryan are well. I guess it's a very good thing I also planned a very light school week, since none of that is getting done at all.

Update on Mom!

Mom is fine! I just called their house and she answered the phone--what a nice surprise for me!

Mom even bragged on the omelet she was served while in the hospital today; she was treated very well while there. Dad was able to stay with her the whole time, and he was a real trooper, according to Mom.

Thank you for your thoughts and prayers for my Mom today.

Please Pray for My Mom

I got this email this afternoon. Boise is simply too far away to "just go visit."

Dear everyone,

I took Mom to the ER this morning at about 6:00 because she had her left leg go numb - nearly collapsed.

She has been moved to a Stroke/Heart monitoring section of St Luke's Meridian where she will have an MRI and ultrasound on her carotid arteries. They think it is a Transient Ischemic Attack (TIA) and haven't yet found any problem.

We hope she will be able to come home this afternoon.

More when I hear it!

Love,
Dad