Happy Birthday Gary!

Happy birthday to Gary!

Gary's birthday fell on a Friday night, so we were able to celebrate with a nice dinner without having to run all over for therapy, church, or whatever.  Gary chose his standard - steak, baked potato, salad.  This year, I bought a strawberry cake from Sam's that, unfortunately, looked much tastier than it actually was.  Lesson learned.

Much to Sarah's dismay, we have chosen to only use one candle on our birthday cakes now. It prevents unnecessary fire hazards.

I let the girls come up with gift ideas for Gary this year, rather than guiding their purchases. Their choices are telling of their own preferences.

Sarah was convinced that her dad HAD to have Super Mario Galaxy 2. She nearly flapped herself right off the ground in her excitement over her choice.

Although she doesn't play Wii games, she loves to watch.

Madi chose a Pokedex as the must-have gift. She just knew that he would LOVE it. Unfortunately, she was right. He spends more time playing Pokemon than he cares to admit.



Turns out, both gifts were a huge hit, and both have been put into regular use. I guess it's true - boys never really grow up.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Hope you found YOUR pot of gold today!

Poor Parenting or Sound Economics?

I am not terribly proud of this, but I just successfully bribed my children out of a trip to Chuck E. Cheese.

Back in February, I had promised the girls that I would take them to CEC during spring break.  As children are wont to do, they have forgotten (or ignored) every other utterance I have made since - especially those involving chores and/or homework - but have not forgotten this one.  So today we were scheduled to hang with the mouse.

As I have gone on record as hating everything involving crowds - especially crowds of young, unsupervised children - it goes without saying that I was not looking forward to the adventure.  Especially since I woke with a KILLER headache.

Up to now, spring break has been filled with Sarah doing chores to earn money to buy Barbie movies.  At 25 cents a chore, she's been putting in a lot of work to afford even used copies of the movies she covets.  Simultaneously, Madilyn has been begging me to buy her Pokemon Diamond, but continues to refuse to actually work for it.  Perhaps she's actually got enough math sense to figure out how many 25 cent chores it would take to earn $35.  Either way, both are actively looking for a way to make a quick buck.

So, with thoughts of cheap pizza, loud games, and overpriced plastic junk swirling through my pain-addled brain, I offered them the option of staying home and splitting the money that I would have spent at CEC. After a little pondering, they both decided that they'd take the money.

Hooray!  Mouse bullet dodged, at least for today.

Sleepytime

Last night, Sarah wanted to sleep with ALL her small stuffed animals.  Here is the partial result (I didn't put all of them on the bed, just the ones she already had out.)

Cure for a bad day?

Today when I spoke to Gary, he told me he had a "meeting" that basically involved him being "yelled at" for 90 minutes.  Since he's not prone to exaggeration, I took him at his word.  Here is my solution to turning around his bad day:

Doesn't a smiley face cookie make everything better?

Playing with Fire

So I just spent the last 15 minutes in the bathroom with my youngest, literally playing with fire.  More accurately, I was teaching her the safe way to light a match.  Included were topics like proper lit match angle (anyone who's held a lit match point down for a few seconds knows what I'm talking about...), relative flammability (counter versus tissue - that was a fun demo), and how to properly dispose of hot matches.  She has additional safety concerns with that long hair, so we covered all of that.

Turns out she had experimented a bit on her own, but realized she was in over her head, and asked for help learning how to light a candle.  We talked about how dangerous it can be to try it without an adult, and how she can always come to us if she wants to try.  We would really rather that she not burn the house down.

She's gotten to the point where she doesn't freak out when the match is lit (the first time she successfully lit a match she was so shocked she threw it in the air, at me) and can actually hold the flaming match for a while before blowing it out.

So many parenting things that I just. never. thought. I. would. teach!  But, better me than a fellow 9 year old.

It seems to be working...

So, after initial concerns that the Antivert wasn't having any effect, it actually does seem to work, with a large enough dose.  The prescription is written for 1-2 pills every 4 hours as needed, but the doctor told me that I can go up to 4 pills every 4 hours.

On Friday, I gave her two to start, and after an hour there was no effect, so I gave her a third.  That seemed to do the trick!  Saturday, she took 3 pills in the morning, but didn't need any additional doses throughout the day.  Today, Sunday, she said that there wasn't any dizziness and she didn't need them.  It's the first day she hasn't been lightheaded since early February.

I've definitely noticed an improvement in her cognition; she's able to remember things and function much better.  That's a huge relief!