Vacation

Today was the first full day of being home from a 10 day vacation. Usually it is really nice to be home, but I had so much fun that I still wish I was on vacation. Plus having our entire family together made it a lot more fun. Our main purpose for the vacation was to attend the wedding of my youngest sister in Michigan. She married a great guy. We had a great time in the days leading up to the wedding and the wedding itself was great. There is so much to share and pictures as well, but I still need to collect my thoughts or this will be one long incoherent ramble. Congratulations Laurie and Eric!

Two sides of Torii

This week has been very busy at work as the end of the year field trips are in full swing. The fourth graders from the boys' school were out this week. One of the helpers, Miss D., that is in Torii's class a lot was helping out on the field trip. She saw me and told me she just had to tell me that I had the best kid. It told her how it was funny because out of all my kids, Torii is the one that gives me the most trouble. She said she couldn't imagine that. He is a good listener, raises his hand all the time, he's smart, and stands in line so nicely. The teacher always tells the other kids to be more like Torii. It is amazing seeing him at school. He is so quiet and polite. He may misbehave at home, but we must have done something right if that's how he acts in public.

Torii's class also had a substitute for four days this week. The sub told Fred on Thursday that the class had gotten punished for their behavior, but she didn't feel Torii deserved it. He was really great all week. Torii had to tell me all about it that evening. I was really proud of him for being so good and not following the bad behavior that the other kids exhibited throughout the week.

As far as his behavior at home, it has gotten better lately. We have tried a few things like the traffic light chart and rewarding good behavior with extra time playing video games. It seems to be working. And when he got a little out of hand the other night I told him I was going to video tape him and bring it to school. Then Miss D. would see how he acts at home since she didn't believe me. That stopped his tantrum cold.

Happy mother's day

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms out there. Hope you enjoyed your day today.

I had a very nice Mother's Day. I actually woke up childless this morning, which is kind of funny on Mother's Day. My parents had the kids overnight on Saturday so Fred and I had a night out. We decided not to do the usual dinner and movie date so we went bowling. I'm so out of shape that my legs hurt a little today. I bowled the worst I have ever bowled, but we had fun. After bowling we tried out Reza's Pitch. We've been meaning to try it out because we have always liked the owner. We ate there quite often when it was the A&W and the owner was always super nice so we wanted to support his new restaurant. The burgers were great, so go check it out and support a local business! While we ate we started watching the Twins game so after dinner we headed to a bar and watched the rest of the game. I have a really bad itch to see a game live now.

So this morning I planned on sleeping in late, but I was up at 7:00. The one morning we haven't had an overcast morning. It's funny because I didn't have to drag my butt out of bed like I usually have to do. Something about getting up because I wanted to, not because some kids needed breakfast or I had to go to work. The kids didn't get home until after lunch and Fred went fishing so I enjoyed my morning alone and got to watch two chick flicks uninterrupted. The rest of the day was a pretty typical Sunday. I did my grocery shopping and cooked supper. I tried to do some baking, but messed it up. (It doesn't turn out if you don't add eggs. Oops.)

It was a very nice weekend. I've got my batteries recharged and I'm ready for another week.

Cordelia stuck

Today Torii and I were playing Monopoly when I looked over and saw Cordelia. Instead of helping her like I should have, I grabbed the video camera. I don't think she will be doing that again.

That's why it's called "practicing" medicine

Rion stayed home from school today. Again. He has been battling this cold/cough/stomach pain on and off for about a month. He gets sick, gets better, then feels sick again. I feel like I am in a no win situation with him half the time. If I send him to school I get called by the school nurse to come pick him up. If I leave him at home I get a letter from the school about the amount of school he has missed. (Which happened in the fall when schools and doctors told parents to leave kids at home if they suspected H1N1). I have avoided taking Rion to the walk-in because I only leave frustrated and we end up going back because the doctor didn't get the diagnosis right the first time. In some cases the second time. So while Rion has been off and on sick I've only taken him to the doctor once. I swear the walk-in doctors only diagnosis whatever current sickness is going around. And sure enough I heard, "well, stomach flu is going around," and we were sent home with medicine for the stomach flu. That was two weeks ago and Rion hasn't gotten any better. I really didn't want to go to the walk-in again, but when Rion got sick at school yesterday I made an appointment with his regular doctor, but May 10th is the soonest I can get him in. I was hoping Rion could hold out until then, but tonight he was feeling really crummy so I brought him to the walk-in. The doctor felt a lot of his symptoms have to do with a sinus infection and he wrote out a prescription. He was ready to be on his way when I asked about the stomach pain. That was my biggest concern and Rion's biggest source pain. The doctor looked at me like this was the first time he heard me saying anything about stomach pain even though he felt around Rion's stomach and saw him grimace when he examined his stomach. The kids have a great pediatrician, but we can never see him unless we have an appointment so the walk in is usually the only option. Had I know Rion would still be sick I would have made an appointment long ago, but when I do that, the kids get better before the appointment ever comes. It's just so frustrating. The only doctor I really have any faith in is the one doctor I can never get an appointment with when I really need to. For now I'm keeping the appointment until I know Rion is completely well. We have an antibiotic for the sinus and medicine for what the doctor thought was just constipation causing the stomach pain. I really hope the doctor is right and I don't have to bring him in on May 10th, but from my experiences I feel like we will be going to that appointment.

Playing outside

Today was a cool and rainy day so we didn't get to spend time outside. We were outside a lot on Friday and Saturday. I started cleaning up our shed and it was like Christmas for the kids. All the summer toys they had forgotten about over the winter were found again. Torii was mad that he didn't have any Rollerblades so I had to get a pair for him. We've been doing a lot of rollerblading which the boys love. I can't wait until they are real good and then we can go rollerblading along the river trail.

I know there has been a lot of blog worthy comments from the kids this past week, but I can't think of any of them at the moment. Last week was such a long week, I'm not even sure what we did. All I know is that everyone in this house was sick at some point in the last week. I'm sick of being sick and taking care of sick people.

Easter

I haven't even posted my Easter pictures yet. We had a good Easter. Dinner ended up being at our house because my parents lost their electricity in the Good Friday storm. It still wasn't on yet on Saturday so we decided to do it at our house. Our neighbor brought over cookies for the kids. Even though they were already loaded up on sugar, they had no problem devouring the cookies.

Cordelia figured out the baskets pretty quick. She knew the place to be was parked in among all the baskets. The kids also hunted for eggs in the morning. The boys were up bright and early, but I made them wait until Cordelia got up. We hid over 50 eggs! They each had a bagful. I thought I would find random eggs for the next few days, but they must have found them all because I haven't seen anymore.

This must have been before Easter because the floor is still clean! (And Kelly and Laurie-it took dad less than a minute to complain about the Easter grass in our house on Easter).