Treating myself Right and Wacked Out Thursday

On Monday I had a massage with a certified prenatal massage therapist. It was lovely, and she said I'm in great shape. My lower back has been hurting some of the time, and it was tight, but not too bad. This inspired me to do something else I've been wanting to do, get a belly portrait of myself taken while pregnant. I look really great right now, large belly but thin extremities, no swelling, nice tan. People have been commenting on it. So I made an appointment to have it taken in 2 weeks--hope I still look great then!

Last weekend D and I went to a huge antiques show. We were looking for a piece of furniture to hold our stereo and CDs. Currently the stereo sits on top of an antique buffet/sideboard that I inherited from my grandparents, which I want to put my antique pitcher and washbowl on. We didn't find anything that was the right size, style and price, but I stumbled on an old photograph, late 1800s, of a woman in a long white gown holding her baby. It is somewhat beat up, but large, 13x19", and very beautiful. It is perfect for our house, which was built in 1862. So we bought it, and looked for an antique frame but couldn't find one we could agree on. All in all it was a nice date, but I was exhausted when we got home from all of that walking. Then my mother-in-law came for a visit, to see our new car. It is always nice to see her, and she stayed for dinner, which was delicious: beef on the grill rotisserie, caesar salad and crusty french bread.

Our oldest is at 7th grade camp this week, and it seems very different without him. He comes home tomorrow. We have missed him! I hope he isn't too grouchy--I'm sure he'll be worn out.

I'm renaming Thursday: Wacked out Thursday. Everyone is exhausted and has just about had enough by Thursday night, so there is usually lots of fighting and crying.

Today my stupid dogs ran away--the invisible fence isn't working due to a break in the line. I got home in the early afternoon, and they were gone. I took a nap, and was awakened by J telling me that the telephone man was here. Not expecting any repairman, I hurried out. He had the dogs in the cab of his truck. He'd found them about 1/2 mile down the very busy road we live on, laying next to a deer carcass. I'm not sure if they killed it or not, although it is certainly a possibility. If they did they are very lucky, because it is illegal for dogs to run deer down here and it is legal for someone to SHOOT the dogs for doing so! Anyway, they were exhausted and filthy.

J felt sorry for them and put their food and water dishes right next to their dog pillows. The food and water are supposed to be kept outside to keep K out of them. Sure enough, not long after that, K dumped the water bowl on the floor, and not long after that I slipped in the spilled water and fell. K was right behind me, and so before I could even begin to wipe it up (after picking myself up) HE slipped and fell, got his backside all wet and hit his head. All of this led me to tell D that we should go out to dinner.

We attended a school open house first, and so it was after 7pm when we arrived at the restaurant. I had fed K before we left, but he will usually eat twice without hesitation. He was in a very unruly mood, however, and was screaming, and when let out of his high chair kept running along the bench of the round booth we were in, then began playing on floor under the table. At this point, D was done, and took him outside while the rest of us finished eating. All in all, not a very relaxing experience. And I am blaming ALL of it on the dogs! They aren't good for much else, but they make GREAT scapegoats.

J is worried they will catch a disease from eating the deer. I am worried they will get sick in the house, and D says if they get sick and die it is OK as long as it is done cheaply and quietly!

New Car

Our Dodge Sprinter arrived today, delivered to my door, no less. It is one LARGE vehicle. At 102" high (8' 6") it is the SHORT version. It looked so tall that I made them give me the height measurement, since I live near a narrow one lane underpass that is only 11 feet high and I was worried I wouldn't be able to get under it!

The past few days have been miserable, between the amount of driving kids place to place, with 4 school open houses in addition to the usual activities, a husband who has had to work late 3 days out of 5 the past 2 weeks, and 3rd trimester fatigue combined with trouble sleeping kicking in.

The weather is also not helping--I hate hot weather! Who wished for this? Autumn is my favorite season--bring it on!

Tonight is book club again--we are reading "Hell at the Breech" this month. No one volunteered to hostess, so we are meeting at one of my favorite restaurants. A night off for me! Woohoo!

Trip to the ER

D has to work late 3 nights this week and next, leaving all of the driving to me. Last Thursday went something like this:

4:55pm Load everyone into car and take girls to piano lessons.

5:10pm Pick up D at soccer scrimmage.

5:15pm Pick up pizzas for dinner.

5:25pm Eat pizza.

5:45pm Take L to soccer practice, picking up teammate on the way.

6:10pm Pick up girls from piano lessons.

6: 40pm Change shirt and go to bathroom as preparation for attending middle school open house. When someone calls my name while in the bathroom, yell, "I'm in the bathroom!" and think with annoyance that I can't have literally one minute of peace.

6:40 and 30 seconds: Hear bloodcurdling shrieks emanating from the other room. Try not to hurt myself scrambling to pull up shorts and race out of bathroom. Run by 12 year old D who is on the computer and apparently oblivious to whatever emergency has just occurred--he hasn't even looked up.

When I arrived in the kitchen/family room area, 1 year old K was crying, picked him up and realized he wasn't the one hurt, just scared by all the screaming. Hand him to 10 year old J who is not screaming, but talking really fast in a voice an octave higher than normal, telling me what happend.

Go around kitchen island and couch and see 7 year old I screaming her head off, as though she was being murdered, and flapping her arms really hard. Next to her is 4 year old T, dripping blood off of her hands, her shirt front half soaked. I escort her to bathroom to wash her off and assess damage. I runs from the room at this point. While washing her hands I realize that they are not injured, and see blood pouring from her right temple, where there is a 1.5 inch laceration, maybe 2mm wide and deep. After a few minutes of pressure, the bleeding subsides and I am pretty sure that it needs stitches, though not 100% positive, I wish D was here, he would know for sure, and I call him but he doesn't answer--is teaching an evening class.

7:00pm--I inform T and her siblings that she needs to have a doctor look at her injury (carefully not mentioning the word hospital or emergency room so as not to alarm the patient). Amazingly, she agrees without protest, but does refuse to change her shirt. We drive 15 minutes to a nearby community hospital, where there is no wait, and she is stitched up, using that amazing numbing gel instead of the painful numbing shot. Somehow this all takes almost 2 hours, including drive time, even though they are not busy--hospital time is different from real time I have discovered previously, and this experience only corroborates that theory. Meanwhile I attempt to call D every 15 minutes or so, and do call home every 15 minutes or so in an attempt to movitate my other children to finish homework, do chores and get ready for bed.

9:00pm--we arrive home. T proudly shows off her hospital bracelet and the stuffed animal she received. The other kids are mostly ready for bed.

Fretting and Worrying

This pregnancy, although going absolutely fine, has had me worried from the beginning. I have had a normal ultrasound, and declined any other tests. I am worrying about everything ranging from a genetic defect, cord accident, emergency during the birth, cleft palate, etc. I guess it is my age and the closeness of these 2 pregnancies that is preying on my mind.

Last week a friend who was 2 weeks before me had her baby via c-section at 30 weeks, 2.5 lbs. but breathing on his own and doing OK for now. She had HELLP syndrome, which is a severe form of preeclampsia. I just got a message today about a mother who delivered a stillborn 31 week old baby needing advice about drying up her milk. I am 30 weeks, 4 days today. I guess I need to just keep praying, both for a healthy baby and for peace of mind.

I am considering hiring a doula for the birth. Perhaps that will be a calming influence.

Meanwhile, I posted to this blog last night but it wouldn't publish for some reason, so I lost it. The entry was titled "The End of Summer" and basically said that we had an OK Labor Day weekend. It was too hot for me, and I spent Sunday not feeling well and very grouchy, but Monday D. and I planned a family end of summer celebration, which included lots of swimming, a badminton tournament, cookout, music and junk food. It was supposed to also include leftover fireworks and a bonfire with somemores, but it rained in the evening. The best part was, at the end of the day we covered the pool! Less worry for me, and less work for all of us, and less money being spent on chemicals! The pool is surrounded by trees and literally hundreds of leaves per day were falling into it--there is no way we can keep up with the vacuuming this time of year.

Summer is Over

Labor Day weekend was uneventful. We just hung around the house Sat., in the evening went to some friends' house to visit and swim. Their pool was blue! Ours is green. They have no children and spend a lot of time on gardening and home maintenance so everything always looks great. Sunday I felt very tired, and it was SO HOT! I HATE to be hot, and was pouting. I wanted to escape my life--messy house, husband involved in outdoor project so not helping me supervise kids, who were pretty unwilling to do any chores, and green pool. After K was in bed, we left the big kids in charge and went out to my favorite restaurant, the Common Grill, where we had calamari with citrus aioli, caesar salad, lobster ravioli in a saffron cream sauce, and warm chocolate croissant bread pudding. We shared everything and it was scrumptious. Monday we planned together a family "end of summer" party. We swam all day in the green pool, bbqed and ate lots of junk food, listened to music and had a family badminton tournament. It was a lot of fun.

First Day of School

School started yesterday--half day only. It was so exciting!! It's not that I wanted to get rid of my dear children--I love having them home, but I also love the first day of school, the newness and freshness of it. It is part of the yearly cycle, a season unto itself. I think I feel that way because I spent SO many years in school and D is now a professor, so that cycle remains an important part of our lives.

The kids enjoyed their first day also. My oldest is now in middle school--and I continue to not be ready for them to grow up.

It has been a busy week. Monday I finally got around to the task I've been avoiding all summer--sorting out clothes in kids' dressers and removing outgrown ones. Then I had to go to the store and buy more totes to store the outgrown ones in, along with groceries and a number of school supplies that we didn't know we needed when we did our school shopping a month ago. $300 later I emerged, hot, tired and having to go to the bathroom. This was a trip to my least favorite store, Meijer, where they had a LARGE sign out front advertising "New curbside service--just ask!" So ask I did, only to be greeted with an eye roll from the cashier, who said, "I'll check--I don't know if there's anyone here to do that." If a largely pregnant woman pushing a cart with 2 kids and merchandise mounded up high on top doesn't need curbside service, then who does? Luckily for me, the 3 giant totes I bought wouldn't fit on the cart in any way, and I couldn't carry them, so a customer service person HAD to carry them out to the car for me, and then she did help me unload the rest of the bags into the car. Not curbside, but acceptable.