Sick kids

Jessie was sick with a real bad cold last week. She was well enough to participate in Thanksgiving but she lost her voice. She is so funny trying to read a story out loud with her squeaky voice. Now Brandon has the cold. We thought it might be strep at first but I don't think so. He is so bad that he had trouble breathing and then gets scared because he feels like he is suffocating. I hate that there isn't more that I can do for him. Jess stayed home today also even though she is not really sick any more but I was to tired to argue with her. She doesn't like riding the bus by herself, so if he is sick, I have to take her to school or she freaks out or makes herself sick. Hopefully I can get them both well and no one else will get this since we have so many Christmas stuff coming up and I am supposed to work the Santa shop at school all next week. Wish us luck and prayers that everyone gets well and stays well. I hope everyone else is doing okay also.

Halloween

The kids were Indiana Jones and a vampire princess this year. Jess decided she wanted to be scary this year. They had their school parties and parade. This year they were both in the afternoon so we only had to go once this time. We came home and spent a few minutes with the dogs then left again to go see GG. They got some treats there and then we went to Chris's neighborhood. It was kind of hit and miss there but they got enough and then we went to Chris' house and ordered pizza for dinner. We went to Rachel's Aunt's house after dinner because they really decorate and have a small spook house. They did a few houses over there but by that time they were getting tired and since it was a school night we called it quits. They still got enough and had fun going around the houses. There were some beautiful houses in Chris's neighborhood.  The kids also had a family reading night that we went to the school and had dinner and learned different things to help with reading. The got perfect attendance certificates at their end of quarter awards ceremony and Brandon made honor roll. He is doing better most of the time. It is kind of hit and miss, one week he does great and the next week he flips cards, forgets homework, does bad on tests. At least it is not a constant bad and we were very proud of him for making honor roll. Jessie is doing really well also and is excelling in class especially reading. So we are very proud of both of them.

Dad's surgery again

Dad just got out of the hospital again. He formed a blood clot from the previous surgery and they had to put him on major meds to dissolve it. He is now home and doing okay. He is on blood thinners for at least awhile. Dad thinks they will keep him on for the rest of his life. We will see I guess. It is kind of scary because they tell you if you bruise or hit any part of your body hard you should have it checked out to make sure you don't bleed to death. Plus you have to watch the foods you eat because you can't have too much vitamin K. Hopefully this will be the end for quite awhile now. He was pretty much told he can't fight fires anymore. He was thinking of giving it up anyway but you never like to be told you can't. It would have been nice if it was his idea. He is a little sad about that and is disappointed because he was going to dress up while he drove the SRDA van today and now he isn't working and doesn't even feel like going out with the kids tonite. Keep him in your prayers.

Brandon's imagination

Last night Brandon was trying to keep me in his room instead of going to sleep. We were sitting there talking about what we were going to do today. The kids were already hyped up because we went to the airport museum yesterday and they loved looking at all the old planes. Especially Brandon.  Anyway we were talking about chores and he said his chores for today were to milk the cow, feed the chickens, grind up pumpkin for the pigs and plow the fields. Then he said that he had to fix the buggy. I asked him what was wrong with the buggy and he said the wheel broke off. He needs the buggy to pick up rocks because he is making a fence out of rock to keep the cows in. He also needs to buy a new rope. Now by this time I'm thinking he is asleep and dreaming, which he has been known to do, but then he looked over at me and said what are you doing, patting Socks? He also remembers it this morning so he was awake. I don't know where he got all of that from, especially when we were looking at old planes not farming equipment. His imagination will take him far one day if I can just get him through school first.  Doing homework with him is a major drain on my patience. Being ten does not help his focus issues at all. I swear his brain disappeared. It took him about forty minutes to do his math homework the other day, and he got several of them wrong. This is math that he did last year so it is not even new to him. Simple mistakes that he should know better.  One problem he was supposed to find the perimeter of the two inch sided square. He added 6+5. He doesn't even know where he got those numbers. But then I asked him how he got the measurements for a rectangle he was supposed to measure and find the periemter on and he said he guessed. When I made him measure with the ruler, he was right. Go figure. He also had no problems with finding the radius of a circle, which was a new concept for him, so I am thinking he does much better with geometry because there are pictures so it is more visual than just numbers. Sometimes I am not sure we are going to survive school. At least he has his imagination.

Dad's surgery

Dad had his surgery on his leg last week. He had to have the artery replaced so he is in much more pain than with just the shunts. This time he was in the hospital for four days and came home Tuesday. The doctor said he had a good pulse in his leg and is doing fine. He is all bruised up and his whole leg is swollen. He is just glad to be out of the hospital. Who said you can rest there? He said he could do a better job taking care of himself than they did. One time he had to wait three hours for his pain meds when he asked for them and if you need to use the bathroom forget it.  He is using a walker a little bit around the house mainly outside. Mom stayed home yesterday just to keep him in line because when he came home on Tuesday he wouldn't sit down and was really hurting by night time. If you read this Uncle Jim, Dad was actually wearing those crazy pants you got him for Christmas one year.

He said they were very comfortable. He is due to go back to the doctor on the 12th to see if he can go back to work etc. Slow recovery but he is doing fine.

School and my birthday

School started last week for the kids. Brandon is in 4th and Jessie is in 1st this year. They both got the teachers they wanted so that was good. Jessie is having a little trouble dealing with all day. Not because she can't handle it but because she misses the mother daughter quality time we had while Brandon was in school. She enjoys it otherwise. She is such a social butterfly that she thrives and she is a good student so it is pretty easy for her. Her only problem is going to be to make her do her homework but so far she has done it without a problem. Brandon has already forgotten his homework once and got into trouble for talking twice and we are only a week and a half into it. The medication the doctor put him on to help with his ADD isn't working so we are trying something else out. We'll see what happens.

The kids wanted to pick out their own presents for my birthday so Mom took the kids shopping after doing GG's hair on Sat. Brandon wanted to get me flowers so Mom talked him into fake flowers so they would last. He was very picky on which flowers and what vase and then they bought some of those glass rocks to put in it. When they were wrapping it up, Jessie put some flowers in and the vase shattered. Mom said they were both ready to cry. So while they cleaned up the mess, Scott ran out and bought another vase.Of course I didn't hear about all this until afterward. Jessie bought me two candles and two statues. One of a little girl holding  flowers and the other was a bird. Mom said the pickings were slim but Jessie said I would like them and that I would like anything they got me anyway. She was all excited because she thought she found a dolphin statue but it turned out to be a shark. Mom said she loves taking them shopping because they have such strong takes on what they want and don't want. You can't talk them into anything once their minds are set. She loves to see what they are going to pick out. It was a good birthday I got lots of things I needed and we took the kids to the city park rides because we got rained out the last time we went so we tried it again. This time it was really nice weather and it wasn't as crowded since it was a Sunday evening. Everyone had a good time.

Brandon's last baseball game

Brandon had his last baseball game last week. Mom took a vacation week since it was the last week before school started. We did lots of swimming, had a campout and bbq in our back yard. We went to the riverwalk and rode the boat and rented paddle boats then got ice cream. The last baseball game was supposed to be the week before but it was rained out so they postponed it. I was going to video tape it but forgot the camera. It was a really good game despite the fact that some of the players couldn't make it.

Brandon got a hit three times and was able to run home every time. He really likes it and is already talking about doing it next year. I am hoping to find a cheap pitching machine some time because I can't pitch very well so he can practice batting.