ER & Dinner Conversation

OK...so last summer was the season of ER trips for the kids. This year seems to be mine. After we got home from ER, I was knocked out on the couch for 2 1/2 hours while the kids finished some school and piddled. They were so quiet and let me sleep.

Tonight's dinner conversation starter was: Invent 3 things; one for the household, some type of clothes and something for fun. Based on the answers for household inventions, I think people really don't like vacuuming or sweeping the floors because there were lots of ideas for self-cleaning floors.

We have great plane tickets for our vacation in that we have 1 stop, but don't have to get off of the plane to run to another gate (that in evidently ends up being about as far from the arrival gate as possible. LOL!) Still no passport for the little girl  ~nail biting nail biting~

Light school day tomorrow, but will have to do some make-up on Saturday.

Opportunity to Serve

We were in school this morning when the dog started barking at our neighbor. He was tangled up in his lead and when Jordan went to get him, she noticed that our neighbor was raking leaves. There were a lot of leaves. Jordan felt bad for her as she is in her 70's and raking alone. Jordan stated that she wished that she could help her. Problem is...our neighbor is not very warm and fuzzy. In fact she is quite prickly and kind of cantankerous at time. She became widowed about 1 1/2 years ago. He husband was the sweetest and nicest man you could meet. If the kids kicked or hit a ball into their yard and she got to it first, it was gone for good. If he was in the yard, he would smile and throw it back over.

I convinced Jordan to go out and offer to help her and we were all surprised when she said, "Yes"  So the kids went over and raked for about an hour and did 6 or 7 bags of leaves. She was very curious about their schooling and they learned a lot about her. It was a good opportunity.

On the vacation note, I cannot find enough rash guards for everyone. I have search E bay for 2 weeks. They are just not easy to come by. Oh, and my foster kid still does not have her passport and I talked to the worker today who forgot to pick up the paperwork needed. ~nervously biting my nails~

Road Trip

Today we drove about an hour to take the preschooler to a specialist for a follow-up appointment. The kids took school with them and got all set up in the waiting room to do their work, we were called back pretty fast and the doctor came in right away. He was in the room for about 2 minutes, 20 seconds, said everything looked good and told us to have a great day. He left, we left and made it back to the waiting room before one of the kids could even get their paper dated and labeled. LOL!

So we took a drive down a long 2 lane highway through hundreds of walnut trees to a little town called Walnut Hills. Beautiful and quaint. We had packed a lunch so I looked for a small park. The children really enjoyed their lunch. It was a wonderful day.

I think the 3 year old is completely potty trained. He stayed dry on the road trip and has been staying dry through the night. Next week we meet the foster parent that will be doing respite care for him while we are gone. It will be hard to leave him. Poor little dude.

The cleaning of the fridge will happen this weekend. Yippee!

Yes He Is

About 2 weeks ago I received about 25 pounds of potatoes. We have had potatoes in every way imaginable, but the favorite has been baked in the crock pot. Tonight while I was peeling and preparing hot potatoes for the 3 yr old I was being very verbal about how hot they were and saying that the potatoes make you talk in the "hot potato language" i.e. "Yowza, Zowy, Humanama-Yipowy" Every one was laughing and copying. The preschooler started cracking up and said, "I'm funny!" which made us all fall on the floor laughing even more. He is a very funny little dude.

Having major passport issues as it relates to my foster child. Hope it gets worked out in time.

The Way It Is

This is not related to homeschooling.

We do not have central air, but instead use window units and I have one of those portable room air conditioners that needs to be vented out of a window for the living room. The venting system uses an adjustable track that fits into any size window and it has two holes that the intake and output hoses fit into. Those hoses have fittings that have never fit just right and every year it seems to take more and more duct tape to keep them in the track. This year I spared no duct tape and I wrapped those suckers but good. Jordan teased me all summer about the "ghetto hook up". Believe it or not, they still occasionally fell out!

Today, James and I took the track out of the window and proceeded to unwrap miles and miles of duct tape. One of the hose fittings came out easily. The other just WOULD.NOT.COME.OUT!!! Couldn't keep it in all summer...couldn't get it out this fall. Just the way it is I guess.

Morning Tears

My foster child who is in PS cries every morning as we are getting her ready for school. She gives different excuses everyday so it is hard to pinpoint if there is a specific reason, but we suspect it is related to her being the only one that leaves the home in the morning. Last week she had a 1/2 day of school and when she came home, we were just getting ready to break for lunch. After lunch, she went to her room, changed into 1 of our school uniforms and came to class with the biggest smile.

I am scheduled for IEP and teacher conference in a couple of weeks. Hope to figure some things out.

I am excited that she gets to go on vacation with us this year.

And the Verdict Is...

Gastritis! It seems that after having a running nose/sinus issues for three weeks that the amount of mucus in her stomach has caused gastritis. Of course she comes out of the doctors office and says with conviction, "I told you I was sick!" ROFL!! My daughter.