This Weeks News...

Mike doesn't like his picture being taken 
hence the blanket over the head

 Michael's Foot Surgery

There was some confusion as to whether the surgery would be Tuesday or Friday of this week. First we heard it was Tuesday... then we heard it was Friday. Finally the claims department and doctor's office figured out what they needed to and next thing you know, we get a call late Monday morning saying that the surgery will in fact be Tuesday.

So Tuesday was yesterday... and Mike  had surgery on his foot to put a pin in by the pinky toe, a plate in the foot near the big toe where bone was shattered, and re-attach tendons and ligaments that tore away from the bone on the bottom of his foot. It took longer than expected and when the doc finally came out to talk to me, the first thing he said was... "Well... I put Humpty's foot together again! Any questions?" (Maybe it was the pun on the nursery rhyme... or that I know a lot of nursery rhymes because of my background with primary grade levels... I'm not sure... but I think I like this doctor!!). The doc said that there was a lot of damage, but the surgery went well. The prognosis for Mike walking normal and pain free looks good. He also said that it would take months of healing and he wasn't even willing to speculate at this point as to when Mike would be able to return to work even for light duty. It's almost been 24 hours since the surgery and Mike is still laying flat and has been in pain even with the medications he was given. We are hoping that the pain recedes more in the next day or two, at least to the point where he can sleep and relax without cringing in pain frequently. His foot is wrapped up in a lot of gauze, wrappings and a boot that has metal for support inside it so no gruesome foot pictures this time.

 Students of the Month

Caitlin, Aidan and Kevin holding up there certificates

During the day of the surgery, my friend Merri went to watch her youngest son receive student of the month. To her (happy) surprise... along with her son, Kevin... out walks Caitlin and Aidan, as well. They both received student of the month too!!

I am so proud of my kiddo's and I also feel very blessed to have such a wonderful friend as Merri  (and her family) as neighbors. These are the pictures that Merri took of the kids and shared with me. Thanks Merri!!

Parent Teacher Conferences

 With all the drama of last week, I had to delay the kids parent teacher conferences until today. Both kids are doing great at school with both their grades and their behavior. See above  :)

Ewan is Starting Preschool

I took Ewan in to the school district for testing on his speech as several people had told me they had a lot of difficulty understanding him. Michael and I also have difficulty at times, which often frustrates and angers Ewan. As suspected, Ewan has a speech delay. I was actually taken by surprise when they told me that he is learning sounds from the back of the word forward which is quite rare. This is also the same thing they told me with Aidan when he was in speech therapy. It is not dyslexia... but rather if you were saying the word "cat" for example... Ewan (and Aidan) learn the 't" sound before the "c" sound. Next the learn the middle sound (the "a") and last they learn the "c" sound. Normal progression starts with the "c" sound first, then the "a" and  last the "t". Ewan is set to start preschool with speech therapy included at the kids home school November 4th. He is very excited and looking forward to going to the same school as Caitlin and Aidan.

Halloween Costumes

The kids are excited about Halloween and we have a busy weekend planned that includes trunk or treating at  Merri's church... and a party with neighborhood friends Saturday followed by a jaunt around our neighborhood. With all the events of the last week... I have put of costume buying until last Monday night. I ended up going to Goodwill and was able to get Ewan a Dash outfit  from The Incredibles Movie for $3, Aidan a Darth Vader costume for $7 and Caitlin a witch costume including cape and hat for $6. I thought $16 was pretty good for costumes that almost looked new and other than play... will only get worn outside just once.

Nothing beats a little Drama...

 So I decided it would be better to have the opening picture of the beautiful roses Mike ordered me for our 15 year anniversary, verses a picture of his foot. Maybe this way you will want to read the rest of the blog?

Micheal's Foot...

So... this has been a very busy, hectic and dramatic week in our household. It started off a normal Monday and went downhill from there. Mike left to go to work at 11:40 Monday night and hadn't been at work all that long before he managed to smash his foot with an electric pallet jack... twice! He then couldn't get anyone to drive him to the hospital as the night crew consisted of about only 2 or 3 people... and he was in charge... so he ended up driving himself to the closest hospital. Personally, I can't believe he made it to the hospital safely and thank God for looking after him on the trip there. His whole body was shaking in pain so the the hospital admitted him and gave him morphine, Darvocet and Perkocet in those first 8 hours to help him manage the pain. 2 days later they released him to home-care while he waited to see the specialist.  He saw an orthopedic surgeon Thursday who has scheduled him surgery on his foot next week. In addition to broken toes... Mike also has bones broken in the foot above the toes. They are going to put a metal pin in one area and a metal plate near where the big toe attaches. Mike is looking at being out of work for quite a few weeks to recover.

I took some pictures... but please forgive the blurriness... I had to work fast as Mike did not really have the patience for me snapping pictures of his mangled foot.

First Picture last Thursday

I took these pictures Saturday...

 Mike has fracture blisters on the top of his foot...

 

 

 

It's funny how life works... as if Mike's accident could not be the only thing to happen... Ewan came down with the worst case of croup I have ever seen Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. He was gasping like a fish out of water... his throat and his skin around his ribs were sucking in (retraction) and he was gasping (strider). I ended up taking him to Good Night Pediatrics where they gave him a Decadron shot to open up his airways. I also learned that strider while crying is okay... strider while calm can be deadly and is an emergency situation.  If any of you have little munchkins in the valley... I would highly recommend Good Night Pediatrics.  I first heard about them from my cousin Chris. They are open from 5pm - 5 am for all those middle of the night emergency's. I was fortunate enough to not even have to wait as there was no one else there when I took Ewan in.

and for the icing on top of the cake... Can you guess??? I developed a head / sinus cold!! My goodness aren't we a mess over here! I am sure I will have a better outlook once my cold is gone.

Roses for our Anniversary...

One bright spot (well... actually there were more... like the well wishes from friends, the help my Aunt Shirley, in-laws Carol / John and my friend Sadie provided... and that I lost 6 pounds from stress and the head cold and now have some breathing room in my blue jeans)... but this was a really bright spot because despite all his pain and time in the hospital... Mike remembered our 15 year anniversary and surprised me by having  2 dozen beautiful roses delivered.

Aidan's Cub Scouts...

Aidan loves cub scouts and is very enthusiastic about learning and earning his badges. With this last ceremony... Aidan earned his whittling chip card and badge, his bear badge (in only 1 month), and 4 red beads,  his Leave No Trace badge, and his outdoor activity badge (1st year) and pin (2nd year). From here on out we slow down a bit and work on his electives and academic/Sports belt loops and pins.

Aidan receiving his awards...

and reading his pocket knife pledge...

Other News...

Caitlin's girl scouts started not too long ago. She is excited about it like Aidan is about Cub Scouts and looking forward to earning her badges and completing activities.

I start college again on Monday. This time around not really looking forward to it as I have to complete a field experience with this class. I am still trying to figure out where I can complete it and waiting to hear back from RIO if I can ask one of the kinder teachers at the kids school.

Moose winked at me the other day!Really!! Take a look at this picture...  :) You might have to click on it to enlarge it and see that one eye is closed.

Moose has grown quite a bit too. 

He is now larger than Zoe and still a very bright dog.

Sitting on our outdoor sofa...

 

My Garden October 2009

my first tomato growing...

My Fall Garden...

The beginning  of October brought cooler weather and I decided it was time to plant my fall garden. I decided to make the borders around the yard my herb, sweet pea and pepper area. The main box has most of my veggies... and the smaller box my tomatoes.

Tomatoes

I turned the smaller bed into my tomato area... there are three regular plants and one cherry tomato plant. They have been thriving in this location and growing quite exponentially.

This is the beginning of October

This is now...

One of my first tomatoes...

My tomato plants are loaded with blooms... YIPPY!!

My Main Vegetable Garden Box

Contains onions, chard, carrots, green beans, and several varieties lettuce/spinach

Carrots are growing great... 

I should thin them to get larger carrots... 

but hate to rip out living plants.

15 Onion Plants

Swiss chard... you can't kill this stuff if you tried!

I recently took out 3 plants because we don't use all that these plants produce.

check out the link to the side for information about this very healthy vegetable

green beans sprouting the beginning of the month...

 

my green bean plants now...

Peppers

I have several types of peppers growing including: bell peppers of various colors, cayenne peppers, jalapeno peppers, and Serrano peppers. Peppers are very easy and fun to grow. Not to mention... the cost mere pennies to maintain and grow once established compared to the several dollars you spend at the grocery store just to buy 1 bell pepper.

my main pepper area

bell pepper - I love the shape of this one!

cayenne pepper

my loaded jalapeno pepper plant

Does anybody have a great recipe for fresh, home-made salsa?

 Sweet Pea Pods

I put in a row of snow pea pods from seed. All of them came up... but before I could get the pest fence up... Moose ate about half of them. I found a great deal at Target and was able to get 6 already started pea plants for $1 to replace the ones he ate. So I should still have plenty of snow pea pods this fall. I love to eat these right off the vine. MMMM... Yummy!

Herbs

I have quite a few herbs planted and they are all thriving under the current weather conditions. I have 2 types of basil, 2 type of lavender, thyme, chocolate peppermint, regular peppermint, curled parsley, chives, 2 types of sage, 2 type of rosemary and one or two others that I currently can't recall the name of. Don't worry... I won't bother with pictures of all of them... just the more artistic ones!

 Flowering basil

second type of flowering basil

Mint plant

Cotton lavender

September 2009

 Beautiful sunset in September...

but alas... still no rain!

So this is going to be short and sweet... I forgot to take pictures this month... life hit... and I was busy... but this also tells you that my garden was not my priority this month. Aphids and the heat took out all of my pumpkin plants... swiss chard still growing like weeds... herbs all doing well in the ground... really well in fact! I am getting ready to start my fall veggies soon... end of this month, hopefully. I will get some pics of the new garden in October.

August 2009

Sunflower Harvesting...

During the beginning of August my sunflowers finally matured and were ready to be harvested. This was actually a lot of work. I had to saw through the tough stalks to get the heads off. Then I let them finish drying in paper bags for a few days. I enlisted the help of my children and their friends to pick the seeds from the sunflower heads. They actually thought it was a lot of fun! Woohoo! After the seeds were plucked form the heads... I set some aside to plant and then dried the rest in the oven to munch on for snacks.

close up of seeds on flower head

Caitlin was the first to join in and help

kiddos helping me out

My garden this month...

My garden  is looking a little sad this month! It has been very hot and there has been very little rain for our rainiest months of the year. Water from the faucet just doesn't do the same thing for plants like natural rainwater. My pumpkin plants have their first blooms and are actually seeming to do okay despite the heat. I also decided to move my herbs out of the hanging baskets and place them in the ground along the wall border. The baskets were drying out to quickly... I couldn't get outside to water them three times a day and figured they had a better chance in the ground with some peat moss.

my first pumpkin bloom from the new plants

 

my pumpkin patch... I had to thin it to 5 plants

my Big Max pumpkin plant is also holding in there

several folks asked me why I named this plant after my dad... I didn't... It was actually the name of the type of pumpkin plant.

my swiss chard plants grow like weeds...

I end up clipping and throwing out leaves because it produces so much.

I planted prostrate Rosemary in the wall border 

 

My herbs are now in the ground and doing better

my pepper plants... serrano, bells, cayenne, and  jalepeno's

I was so happy to find this praying mantis in my garden...

he or she can help himself to as many aphids as he can eat!

The flash made him fall of the plant... LOL

I put him back so he would remain safe.

 

Yard is doing good... grape vine... and herbs...

I am going to have to purchase a garden fence...

Our new puppy is a pest... he keeps digging up and eating my plants!