Isn't our country great...

The 1% (Wall Street owned Capital Hill) can't even agree upon how much they are going to screw our children and generations to come.... Not to mention all of us in the near term.  I don't think this is what our service men and women have fought for all these centuries.

Jesse

Family Outing–Louisberg Ciderfest

Today was a beautiful day and we headed south about 20 miles to hit up a local cider mill.

It rained yesterday, so it was a little muddy out, and it was pretty crowded.

Oliver wanted to check out some of the tractors they had sitting out.

But honestly the first thing we did was high tail it over to the food stand to get their famous apple cider donuts.  No pictures of those, we very quickly scarfed those down.

I’m not a huge fan of festivals/carnivals where every little thing for kids to do costs money.  They had bounce houses set up, and each one was $2 to get in.  Now if we knew Oliver would actually participate, we would have let him choose one.  But we weren’t sure he would actually do much once he was in.  Bella would have liked it, but I’m sure it would have been a liability to let her in one with strange kids bouncing around.

Bella was still having a good time enjoying the great weather and being around all the people.

In the end Oliver/we choose the pony ride for him.  He loves horses and this was his first experience on one.  He took his ride very serious.

Mom and dad were on opposite sides of the fence, so Dad was in most of my shots, and I was in his.

As close to a smile as I got.

Then we headed over to their little pumpkin patch area.  They had a larger one with a corn maze you had to pay to enter….we choose not to do that this year.

Bella having a blast being upside down in the pumpkin patch.

According to Oliver the pumpkins were too big.  He couldn’t carry them around, apparently that is a requirement when we actually buy our own pumpkins for the house.

Tried to get a quick shot of me and the kids.  Bella wasn’t looking of course, and Oliver kept trying to scoot away from me.

I guess you just get me.

Both kids seemed to have a good morning.  Oliver said his favorite part was the pony ride.

Big Boy Bed

We dabbled with the toddler bed (his crib converts to one) arrangement for a whopping 5 days.  Needless to say I think someone wasn't quite ready for that transition... And that someone is all of us, Oliver included.  He got to make the call tonight and he chose his old crib... So Oliver and I put the crib back together.  Mom and I were happy with his decision after the previous two nights of having him wake up and try to leave his room.  Not quite ready for that phase yet.... But fingerpainting is sure fun!

What defines you?

I really tried to hold off as long as I could.  I feel like half the time on this blog I am talking about sickness (in my defense more than half the time someone is sick), but I really didn’t want to keep having to bring it up.

Jesse mentioned last week that Oliver was sick.  And boy was Oliver sick.  I would say this was the first time in his life he really battled something stronger than a weak cold.  He was out of service for 8 days, out of school for 5 1/2 days, had a fever for 6 days, went to the doctor twice and the hospital once (for a chest x-ray – came out inconclusive).  We had plans to head to Nebraska last weekend for some fun Mom and Dad time while the kids stayed with grandma.  Except everyone was still too sick to go.

I waited all week and finally last Friday at noon came the dreaded call from Bella’s school, the one that said “Bella’s sick she needs to go home”.  And then Friday night I started to get a fever.  The weekend was alright, kids were still sick, we took it easy and they napped a lot.  But for the past 10 days Jesse and I have not been getting much sleep as it’s a constant rotation to help the child that can’t stop coughing, crying, or has a temperature.

Oliver’s first full day back at school was today.  Bella was out of school yesterday and ended up coming home early again today.  And again tonight, I am getting a fever and burning up.

So I’m tired, sick, feverish, emotional, and my body just aches.  I need help.  Isn’t that what we are supposed to do…ask God when we need help.  When we get to the point we throw up our arms because we can’t fight anymore…and ask for help.  This is me asking for help.

I started reading a new book today.  It’s a young adult fiction book, and I am finding it a great read.  They are turning it into a movie soon.   It’s called "The Fault in Our Stars".

I’m not sure if it’s because I am emotional and tired right now, but I am finding that this book is bringing me to tears at points, and I am finding similarities between the main character and myself.

The main character is a 16 year old girl who is fighting/surviving cancer.  It was thyroid cancer but had moved to her lungs and now she has to carry around an oxygen machine everywhere she goes.  She is not able to go to normal school anymore because she is too sick.  She feels that she can’t have her same “normal” friends anymore because they don’t know what to say, and her cancer is always there.  She feels that everyone always stares at her because she always has the oxygen machine with her, the visible sign of cancer.

And in a weird way today I felt that having a special need’s child like Bella, is similar to having cancer.  It might be a strange and bold statement, but the parallels are there.

As soon as Bella was born, my life revolved around her.  Just like cancer would sweep in and take over, Bella takes over my world. 

I do not, nor can I ever have what I would consider a “normal” life, or even what I dreamed/aspired to do when I was young. 

We can’t do “normal” activities as a family because Bella can not participate. 

We have friends, “normal” friends, but it can be hard to keep up the friendship when either you always have to go out without your kids, you try not to bring up your kids because it’s a downer, or if you do an activity with your kids you are always the outcast.  As in we are always easily spotted as being different and dealing with a special needs child. 

We don’t want to stay home and be recluses, but you can see how the tendency might creep up when doing any activity takes twice to three times the amount of work.  Just like cancer it’s one of the labels you are always stuck with and always judged by.

I often think when I walk into a room people are thinking – “Oh there comes that mom, you know, the one with the special needs daughter that can’t walk or talk or do anything”.  The child who is over there making strange noises in public, with her head down and to the side.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying people are mean.  In fact most people are wonderful and nice.  But let’s be honest….it’s still a label I will live with for the rest of my life and Bella will define me for the rest of my life.

It’s up to me to not let what defines me bring me down.  And most times I can do that.  But there are times when it gets hard, when I do feel sorry for myself, when I do allow myself to wallow in pity.

I should probably take this hot bod to bed (because I have a temperature and am burning up, not because I think I am good looking), and get some precious few moments of rest before the coughing in the house begins again.

Happy 6th Birthday Bella

Bella turned 6 this week.  It was a very sick household this week, so luckily we had celebrated Bella’s birthday earlier.

The previous weekend we headed to the planetarium to check out a show.  I thought Bella might like being able to recline in her chair and watch a show all around her.

She did a good job watching the show.  It was hard to tell if she enjoyed it, but she certainly paid attention.

The weekend before that we actually made her a cake and sang happy birthday, plus opened some gifts.

For Bella’s birthday we finally bit the bullet and bought her a special needs stroller.  We haven’t taken any pictures of her in it yet, but it seems to be a little more comfortable ride for her.  It should hopefully last her quite a few years, but even with the very high price tag, it’s actually not made that well.

School picked up the slack for us on her actual birthday.  She got to celebrate twice, once in her kindergarten class and once in her FOCUS room.  Her kindergarten classmates made her a picture book of her favorite things to do.  They used a collage I had sent in for inspiration.  Most of the pictures involved Bella being in the water, either the pool or on a boat.  It’s definitely something we will have to save to remember.

Sicky Sucky

Jesse here...

Oliver is sick with fevers and coughing for the third day now.  I would like to find those parents that choose to send their kids to daycare because its inconvenient for them (the parents) to stay home when their kids are sick and give them a piece of my mind.  I'm fairly confident that is where he picked it up since Bella hasn't got it (yet) and I wasn't aware of anyone at work with 103+ fevers.  Fricken people. And to think that Bella had managed to sleep thru the night the past couple nights... What a blessing!... Only to be awake even more with poor Oliver.

 "When it rains, it pours"... Should be the website title.  So it's off to bed for another night.

Weekend spent in the basement

Jesse and I took a couple of days off of work to get some projects done around the house.  Specifically the basement.

After spending almost 4 days in the basement, it doesn’t look like much work got done, but I assure you progress is happening.

I’ll provide you with some pictures, but basement pictures are extremely boring, look at your own risk.

At the start of our weekend.

After 4 days of work, which mainly consisted of changing around electrical lighting and outlets, organizing basement storage, tearing down a couple of walls, and putting up a few more walls.

It should really start looking different once we get more drywall up!