How the "Mighty" Have Fallen

I was one of "those" new mothers. I so wanted to do everything perfectly. I exclusively breastfed Michael for six months. I stubbornly continued for those six months even though it was miserable due in part to what I now think was undiagnosed reflux (his, not mine). Then I did the homemade baby food from organic fruits and vegetables thing and refused to let my parents give him anything else when they babysat.

By the time Ava came along I now had a 15 month old toddler. Well, I still did the exclusive breastfeeding which went much better the second time around. Ava was diagnosed with reflux and was on medication for it so perhaps that plus a more experienced mama made the difference. I tried to do the homemade baby food thing again even though it was crazy with two babies so young, but Ava just refused to eat it. Sure, she ate a little, but she just didn't like baby food. She wanted to eat the toddler food she saw her brother eating and so we switched over pretty quickly.

Skip ahead to yesterday morning and you find me feeding Ava a cookie for breakfast as we rush out the door to make it to therapy on time. Sigh. Guess I couldn't keep it up forever. And you know what? Now I realize that the cookie won't ruin her for life. Let her enjoy a cookie once and a while. Even for breakfast.

I suppose having a third baby just so that I can feed him or her cookies sooner is not an appropriate response to this epiphany.

Random Story and Random Contemplation

It was raining as I dropped the children off at preschool yesterday morning. The dropoff at our school is a horseshoe and the entrance to the horseshoe is at the top of the hill so you can see the entire parking lot as you pull in. As I was pulling in, I saw the person in the spot closest to the door pulling out and thought to myself, "I actually got lucky!"

Now you have to understand that although I am very lucky in the big things in life (wondeful husband and children, home over our heads, food to eat, extended family to love us), I am not so lucky in the little things in life. I do not gamble because (as one of many reasons) it just isn't that much fun to spend three minutes putting $20 of quarters into a slot machine and then walk away. I'm never the person that wins the free soda when I take the cap off the promotional bottle. I never get the best prize in the scratch off in the mail. So, I was genuinely surprised and pleased that on a rainy day the closest spot to the front door magically opened up as I was pulling in.

Then I noticed that another car was leaving as well, so I slowed down to allow her lots of room to back up before I continued pulling around the horseshoe. Well, she backed up and instead of leaving, took the closest spot. There! Classic example of my luck. :-)

_________________________

Sometimes, as I am waiting at a red light at a busy intersection watching a river of cars pass in front of me I find myself thinking about their passengers. I think about how every one of those cars has a person (or people) in it. Every one of those people has a life just as rich, complicated, and interconnected as mine. Every one of those people is essential to the people who love them. I think about the web of connections that spreads out from this exact geographical point. And I very genuinely wish all of them a safe journey.

Let the Games Begin

We've had the game Don't Break the Ice for a long time. The children love it. They never actually played the game mind you. I would spend three minutes carefully setting it up and they'd spend 5 seconds frantically pounding out all the pieces of ice in a fury of excitement. They simply couldn't grasp that the concept of the game was to prevent the bear from falling down.

This weekend Michael asked to play Don't Break the Ice. I pulled it from the shelf and set it up and in a rather pessimistic way told him, "Now, you lose the game if you make the bear fall. You win if the other person makes him fall." He got it. He loved it. I even loved it. Now that we were actually taking turns and using strategy to try to keep the bear from falling, each "game" lasted longer and I had an opportunity to play too. So far, he's a good sport no matter who wins. Game playing finally became fun.

I got really ambitious and pulled out the Candy Land game I bought ages and ages ago when Michael learned his colors and I overly optimistically assumed that meant he was ready for Candy Land. Turns out he's also ready for Candy Land. We played 4-5 games in a row. He wanted to discuss every character and really wants to build a real Candy Castle. I have rediscovered the fact that I personally find Candy Land to be a little boring and I think I'll search out some other games that might be fun. Any suggestions?

Oh, and Happy Father's Day. Enjoy it everyone.

And to my husband: Happy 7th Anniversary! I love you. (And Happy Father's Day - You are an amazing Daddy.)

Busy, Busy, Busy

This month we have had two sets of out-of-town visitors. My cousin (Michael's godmother) and her boyfriend came to visit from Louisiana first. It was an amazing visit full of our introduction to Erector sets, a trips to the zoo (the baby elephant was my favorite part), and lots of play.

After a brief, one weekend break, my husband's parents came into town. Their visit was perfect. The weather was beautiful. We went to the Botanical Gardens which has an absolutely amazing Children's Garden full of grand play structures, small creeks, and a water play area. We went to the Magic House which is a local children's museum.

Grandpa introduced Michael to the concept of building Erector Set cars purely for the purpose of an Erector Set Demolition Derby. Michael was also introduced to the fine art of "trash talk". The boast, "I'm going to crack your axles!" has been immortalized. After 20 minutes of each competetor designing and building their car, someone would play announcer and set up the battle scenerio complete with silly car names like "Roller-skate car" and "Derailer." After some trash talk, the furious 3 minute battle would commence and the competitors would bang their cars together until one fell apart. The car that managed to stay together would be declared the winner and then repairs would begin.

My husband has been rebuilding our old rotten deck. Demolition is complete. A contractor put in the new support posts and beams. We were able to salvage the old frame. In the evenings and weekends my husband is rebuilding the stairs and rail posts. Then he'll move on to the new floor boards and eventually the new rail. Of course, that means that the children and I are getting extended quality time together as I am watching them on my own during the evenings and weekends in addition to during the day. But the deck will be beautiful someday when it is done.

I've also been working on restarting structured speech therapy at home with Ava. It is going well, but I've been frustrated with the lack of materials that fit my needs perfectly. So in my spare time I've been making new card sets. That has pretty much been sucking up every last bit of available time.

And now you're caught up.

Picture Book Review: One by Kathryn Otoshi

Browsing the library books, I plucked this one off the shelf simply because the cover caught my eye. I briefly flipped a couple of pages and thought that the simple illustrations were quite beautiful and decided to bring it home. I knew nothing about the book. I didn't even know what it was about when I began to read it to Michael.

The characters are small watercolor splotches. The main character is Blue. The book begins simply by introducing him. We learn what he likes to do. We gain insights into his personality. We learn about his wishes and insecurities. We meet his friends: Yellow, Green, Purple, and Orange. Then we meet Red. As it turns out, Red is a bit of a hot head. He likes to tease and he particularly likes to pick on Blue.

After setting up the situation, Otoshi does a delicate, creative job of helping the colors stand up for their friend. You just need to find a copy and read it. It is a beautiful and unique book with a great anti-bullying message conveyed in a subtle and compelling way. Young kids will just enjoy the colors and numbers. Older kids will enjoy discussing the story as well.

I would never have gone out looking for an anti-bullying book to read with Michael. In fact, if I had read the book before reading it with him I might have hesitated due to the content (just because he is so young, not because it is objectionable). He found it compelling though. He was very interested in the different characters and talking about what was going on. Upon finishing he instantly asked to hear it again. In the morning he wanted to bring the book downstairs with him and he showed it to everyone who walked by (Ava, Daddy, Ava's therapist...).

The author's website has an excerpt of One that takes you through the first nine pages or so. It gives you a feel for the artwork and the beginning of the story. I highly recommend you check this out.

Extended Family

I grew up in New Orleans, LA. My mom is the oldest of five siblings all of whom lived within about 30 minutes driving distance of each other. Every weekend all the aunts, uncles, cousins, and assorted family friends would gather at my grandparents house to watch the Saints play football and eat my Pa-pa's Cajun cooking. It was boisterous, crowded, and loud but we were family. It was fun. To this day we are all close even though we are significantly more spread out around the country. My closeness with my extended family is a big part of who I am as a person and of the values I hold as important.

I am blessed to live only about five minutes away from my parents. We have them over for dinner once a week, and one of the kids spends the night at their house every weekend. It's wonderful for my children to have such a close relationship with their grandparents. It is a gift to the children and to my parents and watching those relationships develop and deepen is incredibly important to me.

It makes me sad though, that my children rarely get to experience the huge extended family gathering that I grew up with on a weekly basis. They don't know what it is like to be in a room crowded with family all talking at once. They haven't had the opportunity to become close to our extended relatives simply due to distance.

We prioritize visits. Many of my Louisiana relatives travel to us once a year and we go to them once a year as well. As the children get a little older, they remember those visits and begin to anticipate the next one. We also visit my dad's family in Arkansas once a year and my husband's family in Oklahoma once a year. My husband's parents are wonderful and come to us several times a year. They're here for both kids' birthdays and often for at least one bonus visit.

So we try to find different ways to stay close to family. And it works. But if I could only convince everyone I love to move into my neighborhood - that would be perfect. Weekend gatherings would be so much fun.

Memorial Day, Birthday, Visits

I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day. It was the last day of our family visit. We had a great visit. It was a nice balance of activity (zoo, restaurants, outdoor play) and just hanging out at the house (lots of erector set building, good conversation, and general horseplay with the children). Ava joined in the conversations with everyone else. It was really the first time we've had houseguests since Ava's started talking so much. She did a pretty good job of communicating. Most of the time, our guests were able to figure out what she was trying to say. I took comfort from that.

We spent some time outside in the sprinkler. Traditionally, my children are extremely suspicious of sprinklers and treat them with great caution. Today, we seemed to break through and the kids started to run through the sprinkler and laugh and giggle with glee. I loved watching them play. As I looked back at the pictures I realized how similar in size the kids look right now. I understand why people occasionally ask us if they are twins. There were many things that were difficult about having children 15 months apart, but it is starting to pay off now. I love watching them play together and talk together more and more as peers.

(Yes, Michael does indeed have his swim pants on backwards. He did that after a trip to the bathroom. When we pointed it out to him he said, "I like them that way." We just let it go. It gives the pictures that special, unique touch.)

Yesterday was also my birthday. We didn't do anything spectacular to celebrate, but my husband made sure my day was special in little ways that all added up. First, he let me sleep in. Several times during the day he took care of things (lunch, putting the kids down for nap) letting me have a few quiet moments to myself. Those things sound little, but around here they are much appreciated. It was a nice, quiet birthday.

Erector Set Marathon

Michael's godmother is in town for the holiday weekend and she brought him an Erector Set! He loves it. For the past three days he wants to play with it every spare moment. Of course, what that actually means is that he requests that an adult build something for him. The chosen adult spends 45 minutes building the requested model while he plays with random extra parts. The instant the model is done he plays with it for five minutes and then immediately disassembles it. We have at least convinced him that it is polite to ask the builder if it is all right before he begins deconstruction.

Here are just a few of the models he disassembled shortly after they were completed. We all had fun though.

Going to the zoo.

We have a wonderful zoo in town. Admission is even free. We took the kids several times last summer, but Ava was still a baby really. I'm pretty sure she didn't remember it at all.

We went yesterday and it was wonderful. We have family in town and so the ratio was four adults to two kids which is always nice. The weather was cloudy and cool which is actually better than blazingly hot and sunburn-inducing sunny. Neither child is taking a morning nap any more which allowed us to stay from 8am till noon for the first time.

Highlights of the day included the expression on Ava's face during the carousel ride. It wasn't her first one ever, but I think it's the only one she remembers. She loved it and the smiles and squeals of excitement were priceless.

The children were bored by most of the animals to be honest, but even the kids were excited to see the baby elephant playing in a pool of water. The water came up to about the chest of the baby elephant. The elephant was jumping up so that its two front legs were out of the water and then splashing down. It also would dive totally under the water and jump back up in a huge splash. The pool of water was extremely close to the fence so the view was perfect. You wouldn't have wanted to be closer to be honest. The whole thing couldn't have lasted more than five minutes, but it was amazing.

Car Seat Dilemma

There's been a lot of press recently about keeping children rear-facing in car seats longer. The statistic that is most powerful for me from the New York Times article is that "children under 2 are 75 percent less likely to suffer severe or fatal injuries in a crash if they are facing the rear." More and more often I am reading recommendations that you leave your child rear-facing until they reach the height and weight limits of your particular car seat. Depending on which car seat you buy, that can easily be until your child is four or five years old.

I had read similar recommendations when I was researching moving Michael from his infant seat to a convertible car seat back in 2008. At that time, I decided to buy the Radian 80 car seat because it would allow us to keep Michael in a five point harness until he was 80 pounds!! It also had the highest weight and height limits for rear-facing. Well, he's three and a half years old and still rear-facing. Ava is a little over two and she's rear-facing as well.

All of a sudden it occurred to me that I'd better check those height and weight limits, because I simply hadn't thought about it for a long time. We were just going on autopilot. Well, as it turns out, the weight limit for rear-facing on our model is 35 pounds. Michael currently weighs 33 pounds.

We have two choices. We can turn his car seat around. He'll remain in the car seat forward-facing in the five point harness until he's 80 pounds. That's a really long time. Or we can buy the newest version of the Radian 80 which has increased its weight limit for rear-facing to 45 pounds. That's the highest available in the US. The 50th percentile for 45 pounds is 5 1/2 years old. Buying the new seat would allow us to keep Michael rear-facing for at least another year and probably longer.

It's safer. We don't mind having him rear-facing. He doesn't mind being rear-facing. His sister is rear-facing and it is convenient to have them both facing the same direction. Pretty much the only negative is having to buy a new, very expensive car seat when I didn't expect I'd need to.

1. What do you think about the new recommendations to keep children rear-facing until at least 2 years of age and preferably to the weight limits of your car seat (depending on the seat, until your child is five years old)?
2. Do you think keeping Michael rear-facing for at least another year is worth buying a new Radian?

Be Prepared

With a two year old and a three year old you have to find the right balance when discussing extreme weather. You want them to take it seriously, but to not be terrified.

Ironically, my kids know what a "twister" is because of an episode of Wonder Pets. They enjoy singing the line, "They go round, round, round picking stuff off the ground." They know that sometimes there is a tornado warning which means that there might be a tornado nearby.

Last night a series of storms pushed through our area and we decided we needed to upgrade our plan of going to the basement with the kids and huddling in the darkness at the bottom of the stairs. We cleaned out the basement closet and put blankets, pillows, flashlights, snacks, water bottles, and a couple of just-in-case diapers in there. We also loaded up the iPad with episodes of Handy Manny.

Of course, by the time we got all that done, the storms had pretty much passed through, but by then the kids were excited about the "hidey cave" and so we went down there anyway and watched an episode of Handy Manny just to test it out. The kids loved it and protested when it was time to leave.

All in all, it was a pretty good upgrade of our What to Do When There's a Tornado Warning Plan and a great dry run. Now we just have to figure out what to do with all the stuff we pulled out of that closet and tossed into the center of the basement.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe Needed

Does someone have a great chocolate chip cookie recipe they'd be willing to send me? We lost ours. In our first year of marriage we made the best from scratch chocolate chip cookies. Then I got pregnant with Michael. Then we moved in the third trimester and three months later Michael arrived. Ava arrived 15 months after that. We went almost four years without even looking for that recipe.

A couple of weeks ago, unable to locate the recipe, my husband tried the recipe on the Toll House Chocolate Chips bag. Definitely not the recipe we wanted. Then we tried the one from the Better Homes & Garden cookbook. Also not right.

So now I'm looking for suggestions.

Please?

Free Themed Preschool and Toddler Activities

I stumbled upon a website with a great set of free activities. The authors have created themed sets of learning activities for toddlers and preschoolers. The reproducibles are downloadable in .pdf form. I downloaded all of them because I'm a collector and I'm like that.

I decided to start with the Transportation Theme Pack because transportation is popular with both my children. I did not print out every activity included with the pack because I didn't feel like my two and three year olds were ready for the letter tracing and writing activities just yet. I did print out the matching transportation picture/word cards, the shadow matching activity, the tracing lines activities, the 3-piece puzzle cards, the bus size sequencing activity, the counting cards, the left and right sorting cards, and the beginning-sound word cards. I printed most of them on cardstock and I may even laminate them. Here is a picture of some of the pages right after I printed them and a picture of the materials once I cut them out.

We have already tried the shadow matching activity and the number cards. The kids enjoyed them. They identified the vehicles and their colors. They practiced counting and matching. Michael worked on number recognition and Ava worked on her speech a little ("on top"). We had fun and there are several more activities left. You could easily play with the materials for a week, put them away for a while and pull them back out again in a couple of months and do it all again.

The Preschool Packs currently available are:

• Pond Life
• Peter Pan
• Knights
• Princess
• Transportation
• Doctor & Nurse
• Astronaut
• Solar System & Beyond
• Gardening
• Fireman
• Policeman
• Pirate
• Birthday Mini-Pack
• Cars
• Batman
• How to Train Your Dragon
• Birds
• Candy
• Robots
• Toy Story
• Gingerbread Baby
• Thanksgiving
• Nativity

The Tot Packs currently available are:

• Batman
• Cars
• Dinosaur Train
• Handy Manny
• Hermie
• Nemo
• Tarzan
• Thomas
• Veggie Tales
• Word World
• Brown Bear, Brown Bear
• Chicka Chicka Boom Boom
• Five Little Monkeys
• Very Hungry Caterpillar
• Big Machines
• Dinosaurs
• Farm
• Feelings
• Monsters
• Ocean Animals
• Pond Life
• Winter
• Christmas
• Valentine's Day
• Easter/Spring
• Noah's Ark

You might also be interested in the following articles:

Magic Tree House Progress Chart

Macaroni Colors

How did he do it?

First there was the redecoration of the room. Then there was the disassembly of the dollhouse. Then, following today's adventures in not-napping, we discover this:

Notice the new gold knob on the lower drawer. So, where exactly did he acquire the new knob?

And where did he put the old knob?

But here's the thing. How did he do it this time? There was no screwdriver in the room!

We obviously need to get this boy some kind of outlet! We're thinking erector set maybe?

Another Perspective (On NutriiVeda) Is Always Valuable

We've been trying NutriiVeda with Ava. I'm frustrated by the lack of anything other than anecdotal evidence of improvements, but given that lots of parents are seeing improvements with their children I had to try it. Tentatively, I feel like we've seen an increase in the amount of speech from Ava, and in the length of her sentences since we started using NutriiVeda about six weeks ago.

However, NutriiVeda is expensive and there is no scientific evidence. I came across a well written post on the blog of another mother with a daughter who has Childhood Apraxia of Speech. She tried NutriiVeda with her daughter for three months and did not feel like she saw significant improvements. She saw no regression when she stopped using the product. Check out her post on NutriiVeda. If you're thinking about trying NutriiVeda, you should read the opinions of people who tried it and didn't like it in addition to the posts of all the parents who love it.

While on the topic of the Apraxia Adventures blog, I really identified with her post on her son learning to kiss as well. I am way too familiar with that bittersweet feeling of being happy and sad (jealous!) at the same time.

Since both of my children have oral apraxia, I feel it when I see another woman's baby look at me and smile - so easily and naturally. I enjoy the smile. I enjoy the sweetness of it. And then I wish I had been able to experience that with my children. I wish it had been natural and easy. Or recently, I watched a video of a toddler Ava's age being interviewed by her mother about things like her favorite toy, food, game, etc. The video was adorable as was the toddler. Her speech was so clear. The sentences were so long. I want that ease for Ava. Will I always see other children through the lens of what I want for Ava?

Bah! Enough of this self-pity and sadness. Overall things are good. Improvements abound. I refuse to dwell overly long on depressing thoughts. I'll just share them briefly and then move on.

A Little Bit of Innocence Lost

A while back, I got Ava a box of assorted hair accessories hoping that three kinds of hair bands, two kinds of hair clips, and two kinds of barrettes all in 6 colors each would fascinate her enough to persuade her to let me put a barrette in her hair.

Instead she calls them all her treasures, the box they came in her "treasure box", uses the hair bands as bracelets, and thinks it's hilarious to put the hair clips on all her fingers at once. Well, at least it was entertaining.

A couple of months ago, when I was trying to persuade Ava yet again that these things were HAIR accessories by putting them in my hair, Michael decided that it was great fun and wanted me to put them in his hair. It was adorable. We all had fun. Ava though Michael looked great while still completely resisting participating herself.

Today I got the box back out for yet another try. My mom was over and snuck a hair clip into Michael's hair from behind. After asking her to take it back out he said, "I'm not a girl. I don't want those in my hair." I was actually completely surprised. I've never said anything like that around the house. He must have gotten that from school. It isn't that I want him to wear pink hair clips forever. I'm just sad that a little bit of innocence has been lost. He thought it was fun before and it was fun. Now he won't participate in that fun any more because someone at school told him hair accessories are only for girls. He's growing up so fast.

Oral Apraxia - Mealtime Consequences?

I have a question for those of you with children who also have oral apraxia. Oral apraxia is problems with the motor planning of non-speech movements like sticking out the tongue or blowing kisses or bubbles. Both of my children have oral apraxia. Ava has both oral apraxia and childhood apraxia of speech. Michael just has oral apraxia.

I have noticed that both children often seem to bite themselves while eating. Several times a week someone will end up in tears during mealtime because they've bitten their tongue, inside of the mouth, or lip. I was wondering if this is pretty typical for toddlers and preschoolers or if you have noticed the same thing happening with your children with apraxia. Any thoughts?

Disassembly

You might remember my post about Michael's redecoration of his room and my regret at overreacting to what was actually a pretty creative effort on his part. Well, I did slightly better this time when I discovered his efforts at disassembly.

I walked into the basement playroom and was astounded to discover our beautiful wooden dollhouse in pieces. I couldn't even figure out what I was looking at at first. The garage had been completely taken apart. The roof had been removed and disassembled. The screws holding the floors in place had been removed on one side so that they had fallen making it look like the dollhouse had been the victim of an earthquake.

The words that escaped my mouth in a tone of shocked horror were, "Who did that to our dollhouse?!?" Michael's instant response was, "I don't know!" At this point I was saved from another overreaction by the fact that I was still trying to figure out what on earth had happened exactly. I thought perhaps someone had fallen into the dollhouse and broken it? I was silent for several moments while I just tried to mentally process the scene.

Michael apparently interpreted my silence as evidence that I wasn't too upset about it and volunteered something to the effect of, "I used Daddy's screwdriver." At that point my brain went, "Ohhh....I get it now." (Inside my head a voice was still babbling, "Oh no, look. Look! Look what he did to the dollhouse. When? When did this happen? Wow!")

I took a deep breath and said, "First of all, wow Michael. That was a lot of really impressive screwdriver work. You have to be really, really good with a screwdriver to take all of that apart. But.... Well, some toys are take-apart toys. Toys like your crane truck, or your airplane, or your toolbench - those are take-apart toys. And some toys are stay-together toys. Some toys mommy and daddy work really hard to assemble and they are supposed to stay together and not ever be taken apart. Our dollhouse is a stay-together toy. From now on, we should only use screwdrivers to work on take-apart toys. You and Daddy are going to need to make a special project of reassembling this dollhouse later."

I felt pretty good about how I handled the situation. Michael is obviously really good with a screwdriver. I wonder if you can buy some sort of woodworking sets that involve assembling things (a simple dollhouse or birdhouse or car....) with wood and screws that we could get him that it would be all right for him to assemble and disassemble himself. I should look into it.

Mother's Day Recap 2011

I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day. I slept in a little and then came downstairs to discover two vases the children had made for me. Their daddy took them to an activity at Lowe's on Saturday where they made "surprises" for Mother's Day. Turns out the vases were the surprises. Daddy filled them with flowers from the yard before I came downstairs. There was also a very sweet card and my favorite special occasion treat. A local restaurant has the best apple pie ever and I only get one on special occasions. It was a beautiful way to start the day.

My parents came over and we all enjoyed a decadent lunch and then took the children out in the yard for a couple of hours before nap. The slide on the playset had gotten extremely hot in the sun and we decided on a whim to try to cool it down with the hose. That turned into a giant water slide adventure. Daddy climbed into the playset to turn on the hose every time Michael climbed back up. Michael probably went down that slide 50 times. He loved it. Ava tried it once, but it was too fast when wet for her. She couldn't control her landing and decided to just sit on the sidelines and cheer her brother on. We all had a blast.

After getting the children down for nap we had apple pie and ice cream for dessert. It was a really nice family centered Mother's Day.

As an almost completely unrelated tangent, I took this picture in the backyard today. It's two baby birds hungrily awaiting the return of their mother. You're looking at the nest from below. The nest rests under where our deck used to be before it rotted away and had to be demolished.

Friday Night Fun

So many things enter your life with parenthood. Love, tenderness and pride. Fear and worry. Responsibility and fatigue. Many you are prepared for, and some you are not. You get through them all. Sometimes with grace. Sometimes not so much.

And then there's the illness. The neverending illness. I do not exaggerate. I'm pretty sure that we have not gone more than one to two weeks since October with everyone in this household being well. I personally have not gone more than a week and a half since January without being sick. I had heard that having children in daycare often involves them bringing home bugs, but this is getting ridiculous. They are only there two mornings a week.

Last night my husband entertained the children while simultaneously getting a quote to replace our rotting deck, played with the children in the yard, and then fed them dinner. All by himself. I spent 2 and 1/2 hours at my doctor's office walk-in clinic and then waiting for my prescriptions at Walgreens. Diagnosis this time: Bronchitis.

Someone tell me this ends. Please. Tell me that I am not going to spend three out of every four weeks for the next 16 years sick.

Now I'm off to drink more hot tea and to try not to cough too much.