Bubble Wrap Fun

Otherwise known as "Poppy Paper" at my house. Yesterday I got a birthday gift in the mail. It was wrapped in a ton of industrial strength bubble wrap. Anyone that knows me well, knows that I LOVE poppy paper!! My mother fondly recounts walking out into the garage to find me stomping on bubble wrap because the concrete made it so much better. So anyway, I digress. Apparently my love of the bubble wrap is genetic because both of my boys love it. Back to the story...I left the bubble wrap sitting out in the kitchen last night hoping to keep myself from going crazy with it. This morning the boys finished their breakfast when I suddenly heard a loud clamour from the kitchen. This is what I walked in to find:



The first video is where the boys figure out that they have been discovered with mommy's bubble wrap. The second is the continuation of the fun. :-)



And the last one that will just make you laugh!

Queue manical laughter

She let me have posting rights! Woohoo! The evil I can do! I will take over the world, one blog at a time!

Right, power trip done. I wanted to post that the boys got to experience their first MRE last night. That's Meal, Ready-to-Eat for you non military people out there. When we were at Ryan's BBQ (good times had, great food cooked and enjoyed, and tasty tasty beer) for Memorial day, we met one of his friends and neighbors, who is active service in the Army, who very generously gave the boys each an MRE he had spare.

So, I didn't feel like cooking last night, and we had these MREs that the boys have been dying to try, so... we cracked them open last night. Nathan had the meatloaf, while Grayson had the Pot Roast. Nathan loved his, eating every bit, and as per his usual, hunting around for more food afterwards. Grayson loved the _idea_ of eating an MRE but the reality seems to have differed to his expectations.

I tried both MREs, and I have to say I was very impressed. Both were tasty, and while not 5star gourmet, I could easily live on those for a while. Though with only 24 menu items, and easily 1/2 of those being things I won't eat, I can imagine they would get old after a while if I had to subsist on them for any real length of time. But I'm glad to see we're feeding our service men and women decently when they're in the field. Apparently, this has not always been the case.

Halloween!

I just wanted to share the latest pictures of the boys. They had a great night of trick-or-treating. They both got tons of loot, and yes, it was all checked. :-)


Grayson had two costumes this year. To shorten the long story, we got the costume for Nathan in the wrong size (their fault not ours), but by the time we realized it was a few weeks later. A funny mistake, it just happened to be Grayson's size! With a dress-up birthday party and festival to do before the actual Halloween night, I decided that having two costumes for him was not a bad idea. We went and got Nathan a new costume and he was happy. So there are two pictures of Grayson with two different costumes. He looked so darn cute in the Robin costume!

Sometimes, Life gets Crazy

Last week was a whirlwind to say the least. This week was a full-forced slowdown for me.

To back track a little:
Last week we had the genetics appointment for Nathan. It went fine. The doctor asked that we get a few things done before she would decide to do the genetics test for the albinism. My concern was the vision change and all the signs that I had mentioned before, so she wants us to take him to the ophthalmologist again to have him specifically checked for the ocular albinism. If the ophthalmologist thinks it could be a possibility, then she will run the test. The other issue she was concerned about was Waardenburg's Syndrome. It too has to do with low pigmentation, but it affects the ears rather than the eyes. Something we haven't had formally checked yet. Hooray! Two more appointments to make.

I was able to get the hearing done on Friday. Basically the child has fine hearing...he just chooses not to listen. Apparently that is not uncommon in the male species. But, again she really just tested his hearing range and loudness. With my hearing issue unresolved...he could theoretically have the same issue with time delay that I do and thus has an understanding problem rather than a hearing problem. Anyway, that is another issue for another day. So with hearing checked and okayed...no Waardenburg's Syndrome to worry about.

All day Friday I started to feel just awful. I got worse as the day went on. Even my coworkers were concerned...as they found me face down on my folded up sweater sleeping on the pull-out of my desk during my break time. Which, honestly, I NEVER do. The fever started Saturday and continued through the evening. At 102, Randy sent me to bed (about 7 PM) when I could barely lift my head to eat something. Sunday was a little less of a fever but man I was exhausted. I had a very general feeling of yuck, a cough and a fever. I am a definitely not a "cold" person, meaning I don't get colds. I usually get bronchitis or pharyngitis or laryngitis...or one of those "itis" illnesses. I would get up to take laundry out of the washer, put it in the dryer, hang up a few clothes, and fold a few and be totally tired. So very unlike me. I thought for sure that I would be feeling better by Monday. Holy crap was a I wrong!! I woke up with 101.5 fever and a terrible cough. I called in sick to say the least. I got dressed and took Nathan to school (since I usually do anyway). On my way back, I called the doctor's office and made the appointment. I took Tylenol at 7 AM, and by the time I got the doctor for my 8:30 appointment it should have kicked in totally. I still had a temp of 99.9! Ugh. So I have walking pneumonia...like I said, I don't get colds. When I get sick, I really get sick! It is no wonder that I felt so miserable. I have had bronchitis enough to know that this did not feel anyting like what I felt before. The antibiotics have done wonders, along with my "liquid gold" cough medicine. It sort of tastes like banana...but not really. I love it though. Randy calls it my liquid crack. It works really, really well...I do advise being where you are for a while after you take it...it is good stuff apparently. :-) If you want to know what it is, email me and I will tell you. I am at least feeling better.

Nathan is officially 10!

Today is Nathan's birthday. I can't believe that he has been around for an entire decade...though there were times that we thought he might not make it that far...just kidding. He had his party this morning at the bowling place. Bowling places have certainly come a LONG way from when I was a kid. The party was terrific. He got a really cool real pin that everyone signed along with the opportunity for all 12 of them to bowl a few games. Some of the kids seemed like naturals! The adults partook of the fun a little too. I just couldn't resist one game. Nathan seemed to have a blast right along with Grayson. He bowled a game and then was done. He mostly hung out with another boy who came along with his older brother too. It was well worth the money spent. :-)

Tonight we are bravely taking three boys for a spend-the-night session. They will probably have hours of fun on the Wii playing Mario Party or even guitar hero. There will be games and chicken from Chik-fil-A. I want a party too darn it! I am thinking that for my birthday we will get the VIP room at the 300 ) the new name of the bowling place...do they still call them alleys? Oh no kids...only adults for some awesome rockin' bowling fun where they put on the black lights and fun disco decor.

An Eventful Day!

Today we had lots to do! Randy took Nathan to the local Ace Hardware to sell popcorn for the scouts. Apparently they did a marvelous job. Nathan is very good at being cute when he wants to be, so he just smiles and bats the long eyelashes. They spent about 2 hours selling and they sold quite a bit. While they were doing that, Grayson and I were at the Atlanta Parent Magazine annual Family Block Party. We were there to volunteer. I received a message this morning saying that they were going to be short-handed at the Camp Fire Boys and Girls booth (Camp Toccoa to be precise). It was right around the corner, so I decided to stop in and help out. I am so happy that I did. I got to make things out of clay with children while Grayson went from table to table grinning and getting all sorts of attention. It was pretty cool how he would walk off, but always come back to home base (me) about every 10 minutes. I was very happy with him today. Neely was there...she was my counselor-in-training when I was a counselor at Camp Toccoa back in 1993. She was with me in my cabin in Yoki for the summer. We had such fun back then. It was such a great experience for me and I met a few life-long friends there as well. I made picture to put on a button (on Facebook it is known as Flair).

Catching up with us!

Wow.

I didn't realize how much time could go by. Since I last posted we have been through the gammut of stuff. School, work, boy scouts, neighborhood gatherings, field trips, birthday parties...so much and too little time! That and I have to confess, I found Facebook. I know what you might be thinking and let me say, it is all true. I signed on because of my desire to get back in touch with my past students. Another teacher was talking about all of the students that she found from our school on Facebook, so I thought it would be interesting to see just who and what they were saying. Little did I realize just how much I would enjoy the darn thing. I have found students from my second year of teaching, that are now adults with families and real jobs!! Yes, I have been teaching for a really long time!

Most recently the boys and I did our yearly visits to the allergist. She filled out all the 504 paperwork for Nathan for school, which was good. I have the final meeting with the teachers tomorrow. The latex allergy is really difficult to control, not because people don't care necessarily, but we use so many products in every day life that are rubber that we don't even think twice about. I went out to the gym with the PE teachers last week to look at all of their equipment. I basically went through and told them what was fine for Nathan to touch and what wasn't. The easiest way for me to know usually is to touch the items. I have years of experience touching, calling, and investigating this substance. Our house is literally latex free. I have no idea if Grayson has the allergy because he is not exposed to it enough to ever know. We are cautious with him, but he has never experienced symptoms that I know of and therefore I won't make a big deal of it for him yet. He likes to tell people that he is allergic to latex because Nathan and I are. It really is cute the way he says it. But, back to the gym equipment. After touching many items I began to realize that my finger was hurting to look down and notice that I had welted and was having a reaction...that fast with so little effort. The PE teachers got a small taste of what could happen with Nathan. He now has an Epi-Pen because the allergy is one that builds over time and exposure. He is way more allergic to it than I am; imagine what would have happened if it had been him instead of me? Needless to say I went quickly to wash my hands and within minutes had taken Benadryl. The welting went down after about 30 minutes and I was a jumpy mess the rest of the day from the medication. It was an interesting day to say the least. I would rather it had been me than my child. Any day of the week! The allergist went ahead and put me on the Epi-pen as well. I am glad that she did. It was only a week after seeing her that I had that reaction. For me, that was the worst reaction I have had. But again the reactions get worse over time. Fun.

Joiner update: Three of us are sick!

You know, life around our house is never dull.

Last Friday, Randy came to my work to bring me lunch. It was then that we noticed his eye was red. In asking he said he didn't know what was going on. By Monday he said his eye was hurting, so on Tuesday he went to the doctor to get it checked. He was promptly referred to an ophthalmologist. Wednesday, the ophthalmologist told him that he had conjunctivitis caused by a virus, but that he also had iritis. Apparently, there was a secondary bacterial infection in his iris, which is what was causing the pain in his eye. So for the next 10 days he needed to use antibiotic drops and a dilator drop to make the iris dilate so it wouldn't bind to the lens.

All the while, Nathan told me Monday morning that his throat was a little sore. No other symptoms...no fever...no I gave him some Tylenol to help with the pain and he was good to go. He was fine until about mid-morning when his teachers sent him to me because he was shivering. I sent him to the office to get his temperature checked. It was elevated, but no feverish. So I got him my sweater and sent him back to class. An hour or so later, I went to check on him and he said he felt sleepy and he was starting to get a headache. I gave him some motrin and told him if he didn't feel any better to let me know and I would get daddy to come get him and take him home. He never came to me, and after school he actually seemed fine. All night I checked him for pain and/or fever, neither of which he had. Tuesday morning when I went to wake him up, he was flushed and had a fever of 102. Hooray! Randy volunteered to stay home with him and I took Grayson to school. As soon as the doctor's office was open, he took Nathan to see the pediatrician. The child had ACUTE tonsillitis. How do you get that overnight? So two days out of school, and by Thursday he still wasn't 100 percent, but he went to school. Finally by yesterday he seemed almost back to his old self.

All the while, I was not feeling great. Last weekend my sinuses were burning and I felt a little off. I assumed that I was probably getting a sinus infection. I felt this way pretty much until Tuesday. Then Wednesday I started feeling as though I was losing my voice. I have been feeling tired and heavy-chested which is usually a sign that my asthma is flaring. I think perhaps I have what Nathan had, but I don't have tonsils. And of course, it is a long holiday weekend. So by the time Tuesday rolls around I will probably absolutely miserable. I am keeping my fingers crossed that if I get enough rest and take my vitamins that perhaps I can stave off whatever is ailing me.

Thus far, Grayson has only complained that his head was hurting a little. Otherwise, no other symptoms from him. Let's hope he doesn't start too. It is so difficult living in a house full of sickies.

Nathan's Allergist Appointment

Yesterday morning we went to the allergist for Nathan's appointment. Usually we go altogether, but with three people it is really difficult to schedule them without doing it way far in advance. So I scheduled his sooner than the rest of us because we had school papers to get filled out by the doctor. Nathan has a latex "sensitivity" that we found out about when he was 3 months old. Back in the day, they still wore latex gloves to change the babies' diapers at the daycare. The first day was fine. The second I picked him up and he had welts on his arms and legs; everywhere they touched him with the gloves. The child looked like he was being abused! Poor thing. Ever since then I have done everything I can to make sure that our house and his surroundings are latex-free. This includes toys and school supplies, etc. It is amazing to find out the amount of items that have latex in them or on them! There is a really good article that was published by a teacher about her adventures with a latex allergy student (click on the word to read the article). Here is the latest list of items identified by the spina bifida foundation as containing latex along with latex-free alternatives. We decided to start 504 paperwork for him this year since I can no longer control who he comes in contact with. In the past, I would just have to worry about a few teachers needing to know and keep in close contact with them about items that they used in class. This year, for the first time, he is going to come in contact with 10- 15 different teachers on a daily basis. Having the 504 will make it easier to make sure that he is as safe as he can be when he is away from home. He is 9 and even though he has lived with this his whole life, he still forgets and touches stuff that he doesn't know for sure about whether it is latex or not. (This especially happens when it comes to a cool or neat object he has never seen before.) So now he has an epi-pen just in case. The doctor told us that there is really no reliable test for the allergy to assess just how allergic he is to it. Also, there is speculation that latex sensitivity becomes compounded over time and exposure, so the epi-pen is more as a precaution than anything. I am usually really good about checking with the company for any product that I am unsure about. I recently contacted the Bic company to find out if their pens had latex in the grip. The guy responded with, "I am pretty sure it is not latex based." Well, hopefully it is not. The fun of allergies!

First Day of School

Today was the first day of school for three of us! Nathan and I set off early for school this morning with binder (that is too big to fit in the book bag), book bag, and supplies. Nathan seems to really like his teacher and even found a few new friends today. Tomorrow he will get more in the swing of things by changing classes for the first time. It should be an interesting experience for him. Every year we have a few criers on the first day of school. I am proud to report that Nathan was not one of them! He really did go with the flow.

Grayson and Daddy set off later to head to his first day of Pre-K. He too has a new book bag. There really isn't much in it, but it is new all the same. He was really excited about his teacher, he knew her before and really likes her. I hope that he grows exponentially this year. He is such a bright kid.

I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off...though I was dressed nicely. I was very busy for the first half of the day and then things slowed down enough that I could sit and eat. I finally got my computer up and running. It was more of a "had to" rather than had time to set it up. I am happy that it is done though. I hope that I can take some time to finish unpacking some of the boxes and find all my stuff. I still don't know where half of my stuff is at the moment and the rest of the office would probably appreciate my cleaning up my junk!

All in all we had a really great first day.

Update on the Foyer

Nathan and Grayson helped me work on the front foyer yesterday. We got the primer/sealer coat on all of the walls and trim. Boy does it look so much cleaner in there! Nathan did most of the helping though. Grayson thought it would be fun to help but quickly realized that it was messy and he suddenly decided he needed to be doing something else in another room. Randy helped him clean up from the mess while Nathan and I continued to work. Nathan soon found that painting wasn't as easy as he once thought. He did seem to enjoy helping me so that was nice. Unfortunately for him, I am a perfectionist when it comes to painting. There must be paint in every nook and cranny and it must be smooth with no drips or lumps. The way I see it is this: do it right the first time so there doesn't have to be a second. I would rather it be done right the first time than to ever have to do it again. I am priming and sealing, which was never done. I am caulking and filling holes, which was never done. I am putting on the best paint I can...the eggshell kind that is as tough as high gloss, but it is matte finish. I have it in the boys' rooms and I love it! I will hopefully have the walls done so I can get the fixtures up. My MIL is coming on Tuesday, a little earlier than I thought, so I won't have the darn thing finished before I go back to school. I will have to finish the trim (the high gloss paint) another time.

Check-ups!

Nathan and Grayson went for their annual check-ups yesterday. Both of them got shots...and both of them did very well. Nathan cried more before he got the shots than during. Go figure. Poor Grayson had 5 of them! He agreed to only two, and when the others came on the left arm he was not happy. But they both got ice cream for their pain and they were happy.

Both boys are being sent to a geneticist. Nathan for the fact that he has many signs of Albinism. We visited this issue two years ago when the eye doctor said that he had a very light retina (more pink than red). We went to a pediatric ophthalmologist who said he didn't think Nathan had it. After we did the eye exam last week and it was such a dramatic change I decided to revisit the Albinism information. Nathan has many signs, that could be just coincidence of course, but too many to be ignored at this point. The only real way of knowing is to do a genetic test. He has patches of white hair on his head near his temples and one at the back. It is funny because my cousin's son had the same thing but his hair is actually brown so it shows more. Anyway, the patches are called poliosis. If you would like to, there is a great article on the subject. Apparently, the patches can be an indication of an underlying condition, not an actual condition themselves. So this is on tick on the possible Albinism scale. He has the "blonde fundus" which is tick two on the Albinism scale. He now has at least the minimum visual impairment for tick three on that scale. So I just really really want to be sure that he does or does not have Albinism. Apparently there are different types, and the one we are looking for is not your typical Albino disease that you know about with bleached skin, pink eyes etc. The one we are looking into is called Ocular Albinism. If you are interested in learning more here is a link that can give you good information.
Nathan's "spot"

Grayson is being sent to be tested for the markers of hemachromatosis. The pediatrician agreed that is something that we don't want to wait to see if he has. Whatever we can do to prevent organ damage, the better off he will be if he has it. Just knowing will be half of the battle and knowing early will be so good for him. Basically we can watch his iron levels, and when he gets old enough he can begin giving blood once a month as a way to get rid of high iron stores. Heavy metals don't leave the body in easy ways...he would have to bleed it out. If he were a girl we wouldn't have to worry about it until he reached menopause because women "bleed" every month naturally. Apparently too much iron is toxic just like lead or mercury. So it is important to get this information as soon as we can so we can avoid major problems in the future.

Both boys are lean. Nathan is now 51 and 1/4 inches tall (about 4'3") and weighs 57 pounds. That puts him in the 16th percentile...which for him is about his normal...except for when he was a baby and in the 75th percentile! Now the boy eats and eats and who knows where it all goes. Grayson is 39 and 1/4 inches tall (about 3'3") and weighs 33 pounds. He is in the 3rd percentile for weight and the 10th percentile for height. The medicine for the eating has definitely increased his appetite, but omigosh is he hyper! The pediatrician was in awe of his movement and overall activity during the visit yesterday as opposed to all the other times we have been there...and that is saying a LOT. She told us to back down the periactin to only once a day. Apparently he is having some adverse effects! Now I know what an ADD child really looks like. I am so thankful that he is not normally like this, holy moley am I glad! It seems to me that while he is eating more, he is definitely burning more off by running at full speed all the time. In three weeks he has gained a half a pound. So we are only going to give him the medicine once a day instead and see how he does.

Full-Time Glasses for Nathan

Nathan and I had our eyes checked today for our yearly eye exams. It seems that Nathan did a HUGE leap this year in his lack of vision. I noticed it a few weeks ago that he was squinting when looking far away. Last year, they took him off of full-time glasses to just wearing them when he needed to see up close, like in class to read and write. It seems that his vision has changed drastically in the other direction. So instead of being farsighted, he is now way nearsighted. His eyes went from seeing fine to being almost as bad as mine. Good grief! My prescription didn't change at all, so I just got my glasses cleaned and tightened. Nathan's will have to be redone on July first, because that is the start point for the insurance to allow us to do that. Fun. For now he will just have to wait. Here is what he will look like in his "new" glasses. He will even have them transition...meaning they will turn into sunglasses when he gets in the sun. I feel that this is so important since we had the "blond fundus" scare. Apparently his retina is very, very pale and they were afraid that it was indicative of vision issues (way more critical than just needing glasses). We took him to be evaluated and the ophthalmologist said he should be fine. I hope we don't have to revisit that issue in light of the new drastic change in vision. We'll see how he does with the glasses. I suppose that it is one MORE thing to talk to the pediatrician about.