I am not canned meat.

Apparently, for a few days, I was considered to be a spam blog. Interesting. I can think if nothing, other than the length of my last post, that might make any spam sniffing software think that this was a spam blog. Oh well.

I am busy as can be right now planning a story time program and an outdoor program for kids aged 3 to 7, especially for home schoolers. I am also searching out fresh ideas for Laural & Micah's home school this fall. Putting together two lesson plans plus the 2 programs is a bit of a challenge, but it will be worth it once everything is underway.

A bit about the Nature Program. I want it to be a combination of activities and crafts that put an emphasis on outdoor time. Some of the crafts will include recycled crafts - or crafts using recycled items such as toilet paper tubes, formula cans, milk cartons and soda bottles. Activities will include scavenger hunts and nature walks. During the nature walks, we will focus on a particular subject like birds and their calls or trees identification and leaves.

I haven't started getting into the story time planning quite as much. I need to pick a weekly theme and then pick out some books to go along with that theme. I also need to put together some action rhymes and finger plays to do for each week. Overall, the schedule for that shouldn't take very long to put together.

My homeschool planning is going to take some time. There are so many different methods and curricula that I am learning about that I love! I am definitely going to be an eclectic home schooler. Besides our regular schedule, I am going to include lapbooks, workboxes on a small scale) and a few other gems I have found.

For the summer, I am finishing Laural up on her letters. She recognizes all of her letters and can write most of them. I need to get her caught up so we can start working on phonics and learning to sound out words. She is already starting to get the hang of it. She gets a little hung up on vowel sounds though. She's still pretty advanced for her age though. I am really looking forward to seeing how Micah will do with things. He is, of course only 15 months and will be about 18 months when we start, so I am not expecting miracles, but I hope that he will be as bright as his sister. I haven't spent as much time with him as I did with Laural doing school-like things. I've had him try coloring a couple of times. He did ok with that. He was, of course, more interested in putting the crayons in his mouth. So cute.

I suppose I should get back to my planning for now. I will begin posting some of my schedules as I get them made up.

I am totally disorganized

There. I admitted it. Didn't feel as good as I thought it might. Why, my non-existent readers, would I feel the need to admit to my rampant disorganization? Well, for one thing, I wanted to use this blog as a regular spot to write about my days, my thoughts, feelings, etc, but here I am 3 months after my last post, finally writing again. Sigh. I am, once again, a bad, bad blogger.

Sunday was a very good day. It was, of course, Father's Day. This year, I was struck with a unique idea. About 10 days ago, Laural was talking about wanting to go on a train ride. I remembered something about a sight-seeing train up in the Oil City area that my parents had been on before. So, I looked them up on the web - The Oil Creek & Titusville Rail Road - and saw that they had a Father's Day special and immediately decided that I wanted to take Steve and the kids on that trip. I had to call my mom to find out the name of it and she called later to find out why I wanted to know. I told her about our plans and she told me she had been talking about taking my nephews Christian and R.J. to ride the train. She thought maybe they could go too. I thought that would be nice and then thought that perhaps Grandma & Grandpa would like to go. After thinking about it, Grandpa decided he wanted to go. I was happy about this since many times, he doesn't like to go on trips like this since they could be fairly crowded. I decided to ask Brian if he wanted to go too. He did, so this made us a party of 13.

The weather forcasts leading up to Sunday were pretty dreary but Sunday turned out to be a gorgeous, sunny day. We arrived about an hour before the train was to depart to give us plenty of time to buy our tickets and look around at the mini museum & gift shop at the Perry Street Station. R.j. was quite impatient though. He wanted to get on that train. There were a few things there for kids that kept Laural busy for part of the wait. When we were finally able to board, the kids were quite excited. We found some good seats and waited to get on our way. The kids faces were priceless as the train began to move. Christian looked a little nervous due to the initial jerk the train made. Once we were on our way, though, he was fine. Laural was all smiles and R.J. couldn't wait to get up and explore. It was hard to keep him in his seat. Once we were given the ok, we went out to the open air car. It was so neat to be outside and seeing the sights. The total trip lasted 3 hours as we chugged along Oil Creek to Rynd Farm and then back to Perry Street Station. It was a 27 mile trip with stops at Drake Well Station and Petroleum Centre Station in between. The kids had a blast. the only bad part of the trip was that on the way back, the engine was couple directly to the open air car which means that the train whistle was about 10 feet from us instead of at the other end of the train. The loud whistle was quite disturbing to the kids. Laural started crying by the 3rd whistle, R.J. almost did and Christian was scared by it too. They stayed inside for the remainder of the trip. After the train ride, we decided to go out for dinner at Bonanza in nearby Franklin. It was pretty much the same thing as Ponderosa. Very tasty.

Overall, it was a fantastic day. It was great to be able to spend the day with all the important dads in my life - my husband, my Father and Grandfather. It was also nice to have all of the grandchildren (those who are already born, anyhow) together for the event. I think my Grandpa really enjoyed the trip which is especially meaningful to me since he is getting up there in age and I don't know how many more special holidays we will have with him. Hopefully, a lot, but you never know.

In other news, my friend Lynn got married on Saturday to Dan Moyer. It was a lovely & simple wedding. The reception was quite nie. In leiu of gifts, they requested that everyone bring a pot luck dish to share. There was quite a variety of food there! After the recpetion, we were invited back to Lynn's to toast with some wine that her brother had brought. We had a good time takling and laughing. It was a very nice and full day.

Thursday was mine and Steve's 15th wedding anniversary. We celebrated by dropping the kids off at my Grandparent's for a few hours and going out to dinner and a movie. We went to KFC to finally satiate Steve's craving for fried chicken he's been having for more than a week. Then, we went to see Night at the Museum: Battle for the Smithsonian. It was rather cute. It was pretty good for a sequel. The scene with Brandon/Brundon was rather funny. Our date had to be short, though, since Steve had to get a little sleep before heading out to work so we headed back for the kids right after the movie. Though brief, it was quite nice to get out as just the two of us.

Thursday was also a day with a first for us. The Sandy Lake library started it's summer reading program on Thursday morning. Instead of the typical read books, fill out a journal and turn it in for prizes type of program, they have a two hour program each week where the kids have stories, do crafts, sing and other activities. So, for the first time ever, we dropped our daughter off for an activity. It was so tough to leave her there. I know I come off sounding like a paranoid, over-protective mom, but this was the first time I have ever left my daughter anywhere besides with family or a very close friend. Like I said, it was difficult for me, even though I was only about two miles from the church where it is held. In my head swirled a million things that could possibly go wrong. In the end, she was fine, of course, and she loved it. She didn't even notice we were gone. She was very excited to see me coming for her and couldn't wait to tell us everything and ask us what we did while she was there. It turns out she missed us afterall. It was a tad bittersweet overall - my baby is growing up to the point where we have to let go a little here and there.

I think that is all I have to say right now. I had planned on looking for homeschool ideas tonight, but I ended up blogging for the past hour. Oh well, it's supposed to be summer vacation anyhow.

Our Day In Pittsburgh

We went to Pittsburgh this morning for Micah's 1 year checkup with Dr. Schneider and a development evaluation as part of the BARC study. While micah was very socially engaged and outgoing, he didn't do too well with the tests. The cognitive test showed that he was slightly delayed because his motor skills are significantly delayed. This wasn't entirely unexpected but it did sting a bit to get it in writing. The testing took about 40 minutes. They used blocks and toys but he isn't to the point where he can stack things or drop them into the cup. He got a huge kick out of the sound of the blocks falling into the cup. I've never heard him laugh so hard over something like that. It was too cute. After the testing, we went to lunch at Primanti Brothers. It was good but I don't remember the coleslaw being so peppery last time. After lunch, we walked back to the hospital to get ready for the doctor's appointment & interview portion of the appointment. The nurses started with length, weight, head circumference, bp, spo2, temp and attempting to collect a urine sample. He weighs 17lb 14oz, is 29.5 inches long and his head circumference is 44.3 cm. I am a little concerned about the fact that he has only gained about 6 oz in the past 3 months. I wish I knew hy he isn't gaining weight. He did grow 3.5 inches since his last visit to Pittsburgh though. that is pretty cool. Before we were all done with the initial measurements, Dr. Schneider came in and gave Micah a physical exam. Everything seemed to be in good order. I had a bunch of questions for the doctor. I asked about his previous blood work results (they were normal), the hemangioma in his liver (they usually calcify but he said he would order an ultrasound to check on it. It was only about 1/2 a centimeter to begin with), the possibility of liver issues down the line (he said probably not) and I also asked about the bone survery and how his time of no growth might affect him in the future (he said it would probably have no major effect but we can't be sure). I also asked for a reccommendation for a pediatric urologist so we can Micah circumcised. He gave me the name of a doctor but I can't think of it right now - it's on the CHP website. I also asked about whether any other information was available about the virus that could have caused all these problems since they did find parvovirus antibodies in his blood but it turned out that those were not acute and that the presence of the antibodies were due to them being passed from me. Dr. Schneider called what Micah had "neonatal hepatitis" which is just a generic name for some sort of infection that affected his liver and caused all this stuff. After answering Bev's questions, they took blood for labs and also for the study. Steve held him this time and he did pretty good. He cried at first, then calmed down as the nurses and Steve sang "Jeremiah was a Bullfrog" to him. He started crying again after they took the needle out of his arm and held pressure on it. As long as his liver enzymes come back normal again, he is released from Dr. Schneider's care and from the BARC study. Bev was upset about us being released from the study - she told the doctor that he needed to keep us in the study since she really like us. I'll kind of miss it too.

After we finished, stopped in the NICU for a visit. Since it will be the last time we will be going to the hospital, I wanted to stop to see if there were any nurses that had Micah. This time there were three there! Usually, they are all at lunch when we stop in. This time Wilma, Tracy & Sarah were there. They spent some time chatting and playing with Micah. They couldn't believe he was already a year old. Sarah even remembered that Micah was in bed 9. It was nice to chat with them. It brought back a lot of memories. Kind of bittersweet for obvious reasons but also because in 38 days, that building will be closed and they will be in the new building. My 1st 3 weeks with my little boy were there and I will never be going back there. I also spent 3 days there with Laural. It's just a little sad.

After leaving the hospital, we went to Trader Joe's and I got some lovely organic groceries. It was kind of a neat place. I like it. We will have to make a point of going there on a regular basis. Then we headed home. Not long after we got on the road, Laural had to pee - really bad. So we stopped at Home Depot off I-279. By the time we got home, it was 5:30PM. I tried to get Steve to call off work since he hardly slept yesterday either. He refused. I wish he would have since I am feeling rather sad and a little depressed about the outcome of some of the tests. It would have been nice to have somebody in the house for a little support.

Overall, the appointments were good and the day was good. I wish that Micah was a little further along developmentally, but I am certain he will be fine. While we were at the hospital, I saw several kids with a variety of illnesses and issues and I couldn't help but think how blessed we are. Things could have been much worse for Micah. At one point we were talking about the possibility of a liver transplant and possible death before the age of five. Now, he is being released from the study and is doing fine. Gos is so good. As are all the people who have been praying for him. He truly is our little miracle.

A Birthday Party

I am taking a little flack from some relatives about the theme of Micah's 1st birthday party. I guess people figure things should be all sweet and cuddly for a baby's birthday. I initially planned a more baby-ish theme but after thinking about it, I changed the theme from Hugs & Stitches to Party Like A Rock Star. I don't have a problem with the baby type themes. I just thought that since he won't really have much of a clue what is going on, I would have the party for the party goers. I am going to dress him up as a baby rock star, complete with tatoos! LOL I think it will be fun and should be fun for everyone involved. Too heck with the naysayers!

I just remembered the name of the woman I wrote about in my holocaust post. Her name was Lena.

My baby, in glasses.

This is going to sound a little dumb, but it just breaks my heart that Laural has to wear glasses now. It's been a few weeks now and I am getting used to seeing her little face with frames, but when I look at pictures of her before the glasses, I miss seeing her plain little face. She looks absolutely adorable in her glasses. I don't know. Maybe part of me feels like something I did caused her problems - maybe my genes weren't good enough or something. I know she needs them. I wish she didn't. I knew that at some point she would need glasses anyhow. Steve and I are both near-sighted, so it's likely that our kids will be too. But this is different. I don't know if I could ever explain the disappointment I have over this. Not in my daughter. I could never be disappointed with her. I think most of the time, the disappointment is in myself. When something like this happens, it makes me feel a little like a failure. I don't know if I could tell anyone this. I would just get the usual "it's not your fault" and "nothing you could have done would have prevented it" type statements, but knowing that in my head doesn't make it feel that way in my heart. At least I've got it out of me in some way.

In other news, we are preparing for a first birthday! Micah will be a year old in a little over a week! Where did a year go already? More on that later.

A discussion I was following on one of the chat boards I belong to triggered the memory of a woman I hadn't thought about in quite some time. The discussion was about whether the Holocaust was real or not. It seems that there is a Catholic Bishop who denies that it ever happened. His reasons and the details of why he is in the news really don't matter, at least not for the purposes of my written meanderings. It makes me rather sad to think that there are people who believe that the entire Holocaust was made up, especially when I think about one of the patients I had when I worked at a nursing home. I can't remember her name, but she is part of a memory that I will likely always have. She wasn't really coherent anymore. She had to have total care. Age had taken away her ability to sit up on her own, feed herself and communicate with those around her. When I first met her, the first thing I noticed was her very straight, snowy white hair. It looked so very lovely for a woman who was bedridden. The second thing I noticed was the bluish line of numbers tattooed on her forearm. It wasn't the first time I had seen somebody with one of these tattoos, but it was the first time I had ever interacted with a survivor of the Holocaust. I was warned that when it was time to perform daily care activities with her, that she got very upset. I was prepared. Or at least I thought I was. She didn't fight, or try to hit me like some of my patients with dementia did. Instead, she trembled and repeated the same phrase over and over. "I will listen. I will listen." She would repeat this as I washed her, turned her in bed, or whatever care I was giving her. I would try to talk gently to her and reassure her that I wasn't going to hurt her and she would say something like "Yes, ma'am" or "okay" or "I'm sorry." She would try to be quiet for a while, but a moment later she was trembling again and repeating "I will listen. I will listen." It broke my heart. I wanted so much for her to know that she was okay and that the horrors that she must have been reliving in her head were a thing of the distant past, that she was safe and that no more harm would come to her. But age can play a nasty trick on the mind. Things that were far in the past can come back so terribly vivid. I will never doubt for a moment that the Holocaust was real. As the last of the survivors are coming to their ends of life, it will be easier and easier for people to blithely say it never happened. The truth is getting harder to find. For me though, I will never forget the pitiful sight of a woman who, more than half a lifetime after the fact, still shrank in submission because memories of life in a concentration camp still played on in her head. It's been seven years and this woman has probably passed on by now. I pray that she knew God and that she finally found the lasting peace that escaped her in her final years.

I'm not much of a blogger.

Ok, so much for my attempt to keep a blog. LOL Maybe I will try to keep up with this now. Who knows. It's rough to keep up with anything when you have 2 young children. Laural is closing in on her 4th birthday and the bean I was pregnant with in my last post (also my first and only other post as I type this) is now a nearly 10 month old baby boy named Micah. They are keeping me pretty busy now days. Laural no longer naps on most days. Right after Micah ws born, she was still napping and a lot of days, I could arrange it so the 2 were napping at the same time. It was a great break for me during the day. Now, I am going all day long. I'm not complaining though. I love my life. We are even thinking about trying for another baby soon! We're not getting any younger after all! Well, I think I will end this post. I will have to try to keep up with this better so I have a record of things going on in my world. :-)

My First Time

Ok, dig your brain out of the gutter. I'm talking about my first blog here. I've attempted a blog before, but I frequently forget to go back to it. Maybe I'll do better this time.

Today was an interesting day. Around noon, I was starting to feel a little freaked out. It's still so early in my pregnancy that there isn't really a way to know day to day whether the baby is still ok. After losing Alexander at 22 weeks, I just don't have any notions that a pregnancy will be successful anymore. Anyhow, I'm 15 weeks now but it's still early enough that the baby's movements are still too light to feel for the most part. I have been feeling some movement but it's not regular or predictable. So, after a bit of waffling, I decided to call the doctor's office and see if I could get in today to check on the baby. I kind of played up the cramps I've been having but not the pressure I've been feeling. So, they took me at 1:45PM. The nurse spent about 5 minutes looking for the heartbeat and couldn't find it. I started to get upset. I was sure that my worst fears had become reality again.

The nurse left and sent the doctor in. I was seeing Dr. McFadden today. He asked a couple questions and then brought the Doppler back over. In less than a minute, he found our bean's heartbeat! I almost started crying - again. I was so relieved. I've been feeling so scared and depressed for a while now. Our bean's heart was beating at about 145bpm. I was so happy! I still am. After the Doppler, he asked a few questions about the cramping and I answered. He said the cramping and pressure can be normal in subsequent pregnancies. I was relieved to hear that too. I wasn't so relieved, however, to hear that he was going to do an internal. The good news is that my cervix is high, tight and thick. Just as it should be. You didn't know that there was going to be this much personal info in here, did you?