Checked out!

At least that's how I feel lately. Thursday May 8th I took Bailee in for her well check. She had been well for 1 week and this well check should have been a well visit. Well - not well - she started with another cold and by that weekend she was wheezing again and back on breathing treatments. Tuesday May 12, Jacob got a fever. The rest of his week was spent with a fever of 101-103, sleeping and drinking liquids. Tuesday, May 19th a week later, Bailee was still not getting better and back to the doctor again with more prescriptions. So she was to the point of behaving like she wasn't sick except that her breathing wasn't great. Which means we will be treating her with breathing treatments for a couple months in hopes this doesn't continue to repeat or become asthma. So Friday May 23rd, Jeremiah has the same fever Jacob had and now Bailee too.(The stuff she's taking makes her immune system extra sensitive and so we are watching her. She is on everthing to help her breathing improve so at least we hope she won't get anyworse there.) This morning Joshua came home from a scout hike and crawled in bed with a headache and fever of 102. This stuff takes about a week of fever and no appetite and lots of sleep, but no puking (Yeah!) This will have made its round to all my children now, but hopefully not to David or I. All I can say at the moment is I went to school for the wrong education. I didn't need to learn to type and file(though I really still need a lot of help there). I should have gone into being a nurse or some germ control specialist.:)

Running Late and All That

So like I said my life is always more than I expect. Like you think you have enough time to get somewhere and then you find your child needs a diaper change and you can't find his shoes and then your baby has an explosive diaper and need a full change and wash and all of that explains why I'm late or later than I ever plan. Well Monday I noticed Joshua's shoes had blue stuff on them and didn't think too much about it except wonder if he'd got a drink spill or paint spill at school or something. It took until Wednesday for me to find out what. In our garage, the cupboard above the shoes, was a box that was leaking blue stuff and boy did it smell and sting our eyes. So I took it and the shoes outside and Thursday(day of open house) decided it was time to clean up.(I'd put that off because I've got sick kids again.) Anyhow it turns out this blue liquid is old portipotty stuff that is seriously toxic. And Joshua had been wearing these shoes with the blue on them and I'd touched it, though I'd washed for the sake of blue on me, not for the sake of health. Campa Chem - if you have this stuff (can't imagine why you would - why would you want a porti potty - well I do when I go camping (something I don't do anymore anyway). So needless to say, the rest of my afternoon was spent calling poison control and hazardous waste and heading to home depot to clean and dispose of everything properly. Well there goes 15 pairs of shoes. The only good side of this is I don't have to feel guilty about keeping a bunch of old shoes. But I was really bummbed about a handful of pairs in current use. So if I get cancer or some other serious health condition - I may blame it on being in contact with and breathing this formaldehyde and menthol poison. So that was my Thursday and running to walmart for new shoes for Joshua since he had only the pair he was wearing and Jacob wore a pair of Joshua's flipflops and we shoveled frozen pizza in us before we headed to open house in the poring rain and then to Joshua's Pack Meeting(which we were also late to). Story of my life. And I'm okay with that, though some may complain. Too bad.:)

School Open House

Well again I thought I'd remember to get pictures but my life is just a bit more than I plan for lately. Thursday Joshua and Aimee had Open House at school to show off all the work they have done over the past year. I really enjoyed walking through and seeing what they'd done but more than that I loved watching them show off. They were so excited and proud of all their hard work and projects and pictures and favorite things to do in class, etc. I can't believe it, Joshua is almost through 3rd grade and Aimee with 1st grade. Kids grow way way too fast. When I can I will post a piece of Joshua's work that was really cool.

Our Garden

One of the great benefits of living in California is the extremely long growing season. On the flip side they don't give you enough land here to really be able to grow anything, so as many of you know we grow everything in containers. It has become a real fun experiment each year to see what new plant we will add to see if it will actually grow in a pot. Last year Chanda really wanted corn so we tried it and we really enjoyed the results. This year she added pumpkin and cantaloupe, oh yeah, and the blue berries. The way the garden works is Chanda picks what she wants to grow and I grow it. Since growing things is one of my great loves in life this arrangement works out pretty well. I thought I would show off just a little and let everyone see how our garden is doing this year.


Here are the onions, cucumbers, zucchini, cantaloupe, peppers and tomatoes.


We have 5 different peppers this year. Red, green, and yellow sweet peppers. Jalapenos and Italian roast.

We also have 6 different types of tomatoes.




This is Chanda's Pumpkin. We'll have to see if we get more than just this one.




The corn was such a success last year that we decided to add it back in this year. You can also see out pomegranate bush and raspberries.





the peas, which you can never actually grow enough to not just eat straight from the garden.








Finally out peach, orange, lemon, and two blue berries. In the front yard we also have strawberries, spinach, lettuce, cabbage, and Swiss chard. Hopefully when you all get here we will have plenty to share and if nothing else Chanda will make her home made salsa.

Strawberries - YUM

So I don't have a picture, though I did intend to take one. Last week I came by Henry's strawberries at $.77 a quart, so I bought a few and chocolate chips and made chocolate covered strawberries. I found out David has no sense of reason when it comes to eating them and they were gone in a flash.:) The kids loved them too. And I have to say strawberries are one of the yummiest fruits.