"Broken" Home For The Holidays...

I feel like our house had a major surgery... piece by piece, scar by scar, laughter begetting more laughter... we are becoming WHOLE again...

Christmas was good to us, in the sense that we had one...

However, my 2014 would not be complete without a sickness for my planned vacation...

Oh ye gods!  Thank you!

I call bullshit... every time we have tried to plan time together for any length of time I get something wrong with me...  Sick, ill, call it what you will... it sucks.  I did get through the entire SERIES of How I Met Your Mother...  Ithankyou...

It was, in fact, legen-wait-for-it...DARY!

I have been yelled at for years about not watching the show, and now I can tell you all to suck it cause I watched it, it was wonderful, and now we're moving on to other things...because not only does it now remind me of the great flood/renovation of 2014, it reminds me of how I was sick on Christmas, AGAIN...

You know, sometimes, change is a really good thing folks.

We had our company christmas party and might I say, it was great.  I was just great to sit in the front Lobby, phones off... but ringing that initial ring that takes them to voicemail in such a way that you would swear it was Howie chiming in... "That could be an order!", he would say if he were here...  and he was...

We had a great weekend considering... we had a nice night Friday the 19th, Saturday was nice, Sunday was Christmas with Gma and it was lovely... Then I woke up Monday to the ever dreaded sore throat/swollen glands... I felt feverish and chilled... I went down drastically in a matter of hours and had to go home.  Tuesday, stayed home and went to the dr.  Got two doses of anti-viral in me and went to work Wednesday for our ever appreciated and fantastic half day for Christmas Eve, went home and we had a Turkey dinner!  Our first ever Turkey Dinner for our family on Christmas Eve when it was JUST US FOUR!  Actually, come to think of it, it was our first ever dinner on Christmas Eve with just me n Choni.  It's always been Christmas Eve at the In Laws, Christmas Day at my Ma's...  Funny... talk about breaking free from tradition, that was holding strong 14 years!  Hah!

Anyhoo, woke up Christmas Day after the neighbors decided to party ALL NIGHT...  and into some of the morning... Until I picked up my handy phone with the handy list of contacts...one in particular being our County Sheriffs... Yeah!  I'm THAT CHICK! SO WHAT!!  I'm ALL FOR parties man, and I know Christmas Eve is a biggie for some people... BUT REALLY?!?  3AM!!!  And I don't mean the song!  I shut that fucker down@!@#%#$@%$#@

Christmas Day I woke up sicker...  I stayed on the couch while the kids ripped open their second batch of gifts, I saw awe and wonderment in what was probably the "smallest" Christmas ever and I felt great afterwards (emotionally).  We got up our things together and made the trek to Noni's for third Christmas and had another great time, more yummy food stuffs and we even got to take some home :)  My sis and bro in law and their (combined) 4 childrens were there, a houseful of kids.  What my Ma always wanted!  As the day went on, I was feeling less awesome.

I woke up Friday to the ickiest of ickinesses and I called my dr's office.  Told them how I was feeling and what was new and was gone and they called me in a Rx.  I then proceeded to have a couch bound Christmas break/ New Year's.  I STILL don't feel 100%.

I feel like I need to sleep a few more days.  I over do it the second I feel well.  That's a big problem for me.  But I can't help it, I feel like such a slug when I'm sick!!  I hate that feeling... that there are things to do and I'm not doing them.

But here we are, new year, new gear.  I am thinking that I am much more accepting already of the new year than ever.  I wanted to be done with 2014 so badly.  Generally there is a time frame that I go through where things need to be gotten used...  Happy to report, writing out that 2015 comes much more naturally than any year ever!  2015...FLOWS LIKE A RIVER FROM MY PENS!!  Wonderful...  I had a busy busy busy super busy Monday and today was much more doable... I had much more coffee too, so I'm sure that had NOTHING to do with it!  hehe...

Well, it's that time kids...gotta warsh out my mug and make the trip to the loo before my long trip home...  I need to write a note to myself to tell you about the great Purge... no not that mediocre movie...  we did our own purging during the great renovation and it felt great!  Loved it!

**Knock, Knock...***

Oh, HI!  Fancy seeing you here... Like there's anybody there...

I seriously want to learn how to post something thought provoking enough to make people leave comments...  but until then.. you get this:

I am busy as hell at work... My entire dynamic has changed. For the better really, but there are things I am unable to make room for in my day and it's just so much different than before that the new reality is this:  I have time for Facebook throughout the day, but really just to keep up with other people not so much to comment. I found myself about to comment the other day and all that happened was that I was about to send a paragraph into the void...and I told myself when the Facebook posts get to be about a paragraph, that's when I should really choose to blog... fine..  I don't really care about making sure I get on and comment on Facebook these days... It mostly just turns into more like a tweet... small short concise post with a pic attached.  Usually it's an IG with a sentence that I auto post to FB and Twitter...  GAWD that just sounds boring writing that...

The catch up game will take a while so I don't know which is better... one long giant post or a few over the next few days??  I'm going to try the latter and see what happens... again, not like anyone reads this god forsaken thing...

I have decided to change the name of the blog if you have noticed...if not, no matter.

When I got our new phones in Spring I got an unbelievable deal that included 2 7" Samsung Galaxy Tab 3's... I seriously didn't even know what I would do with these things, but they quite literally GAVE them to me...so I thought, hey... party, bonus.  I took them home and Choni was reticent about them at first... 6 months later he wouldn't know what do without it!  I bought cases on Amazon that came with bluetooth keyboards.  Great investment, might I add!  The charging chord to the keyboards fits the galaxy, so I basically always have the charger for it... doesn't sound important to some I bet, but it's SO important when you're lugging stuff for people.

When these things fell in our laps, I had been contemplating a laptop purchase...but wasn't sure...then I read an article about 10 Top Dying Techs.  On that list were laptops.  Simply stating that with desktop PCs doing incredible things that you pretty much would want to NOT do on a subway and tablets coming with expandable memory and keyboards...why?!?  So I thought, yeah why?!?  My mission then became to use the SHIT out of my tablet...and I do.  I game on it, I'm addicted to Hey Day.. shut up.  I have a few little life regenerating games to fill in the 1 minutes holes of down time I have throughout the day and that's about it... Thing 2 still requires I sit with her while she plays, but she doesn't want me to play with her because she doesn't want me touching her stuff...so I will sit there and video her playing and play a game and show her video and pictures of her set ups... it's all about presentation for her right now.. "See what I did?!?"  Yep, that's her in a nutshell...

My big idea is to use the tablet for those few minutes between when I brush my teeth at night and then choni goes to brush his teeth and I sit there waiting for him to be done...in those moments I can do one of two things: 1) sum up my moments and thoughts of the day Doogie Howser style on my tablet or 2) map out something a little more interesting to say when I have more time...Either way, that's my new personal goal...writing with pen and paper still hurts even with the wrist support and typing this now in my Icelandic office (don't get me wrong if it's hot in here my nose bleeds end of story), I have finger-less gloves on and wrist supports but I'm covered...I'm A-OK.

I got really busy over the summer...in my head... I was over thinking the idea behind the blog, whether anybody cares and whether it's worth it, and whether I have time and my new tasks at work...my tasks at home... making sure I'm "present" all the time... getting called out about being on my phone when I was like "I'm only on MY phone... when YOU are on YOURS..."  some eye opening developments in my relationships with people that are not Choni...

Summer went by slow...  No softball I think did that.  I had a break to myself that I spent sick...again...and I got this WEIRD skin thing that itched like a spider bite and scarred like one too.  I think it was a brown recluse bite because those tend to turn into cellulitis if not caught ASAP.  It's fine now.  My TMJ something something disorder is in cahoots with my neck and shoulder tension and makes my teeth hurt.  I had my extensive dental work done and hopefully that's the end of that...I don't think it is.  I'm lucky to have any teeth with my family history.  Allergies are still in full swing... All of that compacted toghether equals me being in some form of pain everyday at some point in the day..  If I am busy with enough things I don't notice so that's nice.  My plantar fasciitis is somewhat more under control than in the two years I've had it so that's good...  $40 insoles later and a new pair of shoes and some exercises later...  But it's better than what it was at the beginning...it's not completely gone away and I'm supposed to go in for a cortisone shot the foot to calm down the muscle next month.. Can you guess how exciting I find that?  Can you?!?

I joined GoodReads and have been reading up a storm thanks to 1 minute intervals in the day and lunches and waiting for things... I put forth a challenge for myself.. I am almost done :)

I have been using the HELL out of Coconut Oil for all of it's benefits, I am very into at home remedy mostly because I already have all that stuff at home most of the time.  Because of the DRY ASS winters, I have switched to a Cleansing Conditioner because I am prone to dry scalp in winter more so than any other time of year.  Last year was HELL on my hair because I cut my hair OFF and as much as I loved the cut I jacked up my pH balance on my head and then even with a pseudo winter we had...I itched...and itched...and itched. No amount of OTC head stuffs worked.  So I suffered.  Then it got warmer and it stopped.  Now it's cooler and it's starting...not as badly as last year, but it was this time of year I cut my hair OFF...and it's growing back at lightning speed.  This time next year I'll be like "What short hair?"    I think I'll stop there because this is just rambling now and who cares?

I'll start the smaller blogs with more to say in the next few days.  Mister is working an off season job but I'll get into that later!

If a flea bites a tree in the woods, does it itch?

When in Doubt, Back To The Drawing Board...

I have been saying that ALOT lately...

Back to the drawing board...and of course, I say it in my head in the fashion of Wyle E. Coyote... Cause it's funny...

I got a book from my Guria for my birthday...and with that book (cause she knows me) was another book... blank pages of an unwritten confession..so she says... and she's not wrong.  I miss it.  I do.  I miss my daily entries... and I told myself, I would return to them when I was ready. My hiatus is nearly to an end.  My carpel tunnel, however...is not...thank Jebus for wrist supports...

I almost gave into a version of myself that takes up about 4% real estate of my brain...  that version of myself thinks that they can take a Smash journal and use it over a nice long span of time...  when in reality, the MOST of my brain would probably finish that damn thing in a week...  or less...  less is more likely...

Fuck me... even typing hurts now...and since I can't win...I'm just going to go back to writing...

After being in Michaels and seeing all those beautiful journals in all their various allowance glory... I realized something...I had it down... I had it down to my personality already.  I didn't need glitz, and tabs, and stickers, (well maybe stickers) and labels and shit... basically a scrapbook...  I don't like scrapbooks... I find myself taking them too seriously...and then they don't get finished...or they DO get finished, but then they mean as much to me as that paper I wrote three hours before it was due, receiving a mediocrely deserved A- in the process...

I was crocheting yet ANOTHER late entry into my Christmas list of giving, dug deep to fish a pencil out of my awesome Owl Tote Ma got me as a early Christmas-present-just-cause-I-got-a-killer-ass-deal-at-Old-navy kind of thing...  I found the pencil..inside the awesome, blue embossed covered journal my Guria got me for my bday..still empty...and it didn't bother me that it was empty before...but it bothered me today...and just today I had all these things come up... with seeing the Smash journals at Hobby Lobby and then again at Michael's...had a chat about my bajillion journals at the foot of my closet...and then finding something I hadn't seen in 5 months... probably because I subconsciously hid it so I wouldn't feel it's eyes boring into the back of my skull...  So, since typing kills me anyways, and I think maybe some of my inspriations I had when I started doing this might come back to me in the process...I think it's time to end my hiatus from the journaling. It's too coincidental, don't you think?  I think so too... 

Speaking of back to the drawing board...I think I finally found a liquid homemade laundry soap that goes well with cold water recipe for us to try.  We are both on board with the experiment, and with a half bottle of brand soap to go, it's time to fish or cut bait... or insert your own decision making analogy here... 

On the list of DIY's...  No Poo...yes I know... I'm gonna try it.  I have a need for head n shoulders and I'm wondering if I perpetuate the need because of all the crap in the shampoo and conditioner ... so I'm gonna try the homemade stuff and see what happens.  It's winter, it's the perfect time to try it because I can wear hats during the Dirty Thirty Day trial period that I have been reassured is going to happen.  I have organic coconut oil at hand for dryness...  I'm excited to try this.  if it works for me and I can get it down to a science, I will be introducing it to Choners and the Things...  yay!!  Got to see my bestie from Sin City today and not for long enough... *sad face*...  but she'll never move back here and I'll NEVER EVER move my ass there...  so it's one of those things that I gotta get over... and I'm over it. Doesn't mean I can't be sad about it once it awhile, right? Right!  Christmas countdown is underweigh and for the slimness of the giving and receiving, it's gonna be an awesome Christmas. I can already feel it being one mostly of the reason of the season and less about the commercializing of the season...  wa-hoo. 

In a nutshell...feeling very "back to the drawing board"...but ... in the BEST way possible.  Super uber refreshing way possible...even Fallon and Timberlake are taking it back to the drawing board. I must be on to something... Next obsession on my list... my new camera lens.. My lil cuz is amazing and I'm DYING to get my lens. I might even get a flash...  with a dome diffuser...  but that's...another story...

One Month in One Day....

... because that's what I feel like...

I have no excuses for myself to not have posted ANYTHING in just over a month...  We have been knee deep in life and since I am not a person who gets paid for this, I have had no good reason TO post anything either.

Thing 1's softball season is in FULL swing and we have her coach from her first season back which is good.  The whole family is on board with her coaches which makes it easier to sit there and watch Thing 1...and the REST of the team because there are no favorites... getting talked at and talked to and told to run laps, to the fence and back, do calisthenics and what have you and do this extra because you messed up and blahblahblahblah... 

Thing 2...TEETH... oy-to-the-vay...  The first set of molars all came in at ONCE... now it's EYE TEETH!!  One at a time, and they're killing us ALL...  a week on and a week off and now 3 days on, 4 days off, 7 days on and vacation...  that's daddy's schedule... that's awesome....  the team had a winning streak on the road and it made it such a great vibe when he went back to work last night...  Practice runs LATE, games run LATE... it's ALL LATE... fine.. we signed up for it and it doesn't even last that long... one more month and that's it...that's IT!!  Amazing... I just got the softball team picture... Harley said she thinks her picture gets better and better every year...

Well who am I to argue??  Of course she's right...cause she's the most beautifullest thing in the world :) 

Work has kept me running ragged, on my toes and constant state of OHMYGODOHMYGOD!!  Another reason for the silence... of course it always seems that when I found a moment to myself to jot anything down, I got sidetracked... such is life.

C'est la vie...

Fine fine fine...  Things are good though... pretty darn sweet if you ask me. 

Choni has a possible partner in crime to work with on possible short film projects which is fantastic for him.  Might even get into his videography business...  still waiting and seeing on that.  Fine fine fine. 

We had a super busy fun family filled weekend that I can't believe just happened...  I'm tired from it...really...but it was super awesome :)    I used a gift card from Christmas which is always a great accomplishment..  I got home from work one day last week and Choni had the whole garage cleaned out...  and now everything minus the yuck is back in it and it's so clean you can walk around in there now!

I almost got internet at home, but Verizon kept that from happening.. bastards...

Probably a good thing because it's the one thing keeping me as the only person I know without a tablet.  Oddly enough something my almost-8-year-old likes to point out on an almost daily basis... Hard to raise children in this technobabble world...
Really...

So many things coming up and happening I can't wait.  CAN'T.WAIT!

My bestie, her woman, and my merry band of miscreants are planning an amazing trip to NY..  No city for us, I have gone enough for two lifetimes and my honey has seen and edited enough footage to last him... so we're good on that...  I want to lounge on Lake George...  if I can do that holding my main squeeze's hand with my kids splashing in crisp clean lake water... I'll be a happy camper!!

I have been forced to abandon the Nail Polish challenge for a short period of time.  As a result of my stressball-loseriness, I have chewed my nails to nubs and am in the process of de-uglifying them.  Until that has passed, no news on that front. 

There is a two day trek to the Emerald City on which we stop halfway and see some kin folk, a possible stay from Kid Sister, a possible stay from my niece...  but we'll see... still ALOT of summer to go.  Thing 1 just got out of school and she is already ready to go back...

And since our dog was put down, she has been asking for a low maintenance pet of somekind...so there is THAT to look forward to.  I am a little curious myself to see how that will play out...

Our little one has proven to be such an amazing addition to our family, she makes us laugh and smile everyday..sometimes, just sometimes, we want to pull our hair out. But that's MOSTLY to do with the damned teeth...DAMMIT!! 

Not a day, NOT ONE DAY, goes by where, if we are in public, someone comments on the cuteness of the wee one...and then immediately on the big sister... 

I got some answers on my foot pain and now that I know what it is and it has a name, the healing can begin... any time now... ANY TIME...  It's not going to fix itself over night, there are things I need to do to ease the pain and help correct it, but I have had more good days than bad days in three months, so I can't really complain...

I need to take Thing 1 to do the dentist this summer, and after I have been there and dropped way too much money on MY mouth, I am totally not going to forget to do that with her!!  damn teeth....

Allergies are rampant this year already... no sooner I read an article about how bad it's going to be I start to feel the beginnings of discomfort...I have already bought a new fresh bottle of Benadryl for Thing 1 and I to share. 

I am getting a cut AND a color before I got on vacation which I couldn't be MORE excited about if I tried because I never get to do both at once between MY schedule and the hair chicks' schedule... My new rule of thumb, if I can put my hair in a rubberband, it's too long!

The way things have gone lately, I'm just glad we have cars that run and a house... and food.  food is always good.  unless it's tofu... I fucking hate tofu...

I'm Just Over Here In My Corner, Sticking To What Works...

I'm in the mood to clarify something...

Not that I'm NOT all for trying new things.  I LOVE to try new things.  I'm actually pretty adventurous... It's just that sometimes you gotta stick to what works...  Like for instance, since I AM a Mom person, I will use diapers for example.  I used diapers from Wal-Mart... Parent's Choice to be exact.  They weren't around when Thing 1 was born so we used Huggies because they didn't give her a rash and for some reason everyone bought ALL the Pampers...LUVS=RASH... White Cloud=RASH... What used to be the Target brand=RASH.  Now Target has UP and UP, but same problem, size always seems swiped. 

That being said, when I had exhausted the plethora of diapers I received from friends and relatives (not for about 6months...eeeeeeee!!!) I was bound and determined to just stick to what worked, but I wanted to atleast TRY the Paren'ts Choice and TRY the UP and UP...so I bought their little mini trial packs (I know right? Trial size diaper packs=genius) and found NO rash... YAY!!! So now, we get the cheapies cause they work and why change?  Even when we have a few extra bucks or if one of our mom's buys diapers for their houses... Wal-mart or Target brand...  boom.done.

So THAT being said...  I DO like to stick to what works, but when someone raves about something that sounds like something I would like try, especially where products are concerned, who ISN'T looking for something that works GREAT????  WHO!!!!

Right now I use Suave on my hair.  I know, I know...  cheap shit... but I must say; I have used them ALL.  I have USED THEM ALL!!!  My hair is fantastic, but you feed it something it doesn't like and it goes on a hungerstrike and says "FUCK YOU!!!"  and it does.. I know you don't think that hair can't swear...come over to MY house some time...

I guess I was feeling a little silly that I seemed to be spending so much time and attention on my hair that I thought, "Oh come one, you need to use something better..."  so I changed from Loreal to Pantene to Garnier and I found I had problem with each one.  And even all those shampoos, I STILL have to use Head and Shoulders between Shampoos because I flakes. Deal with it...  Garnier was too dry, I tried them all...I ended up with either really crispy hair or really greasy hair...  Moving on, I found the problem with Pantene that everyone else I know that used it found...  it COATS your hair with this FILM... GROSS!!!  No bueno... the Loreal... well I know this sounds like crap but my hair requires a little more shampoo and conditioner than the average bear... it SUCKS up moisturizers... **SLURP** gone...  when something says dime size, I go half dollar.

The last time I messed with my "formula" I paid with it for two days between hair washings and I WON"T DO THAT AGAIN!  Returning back to what works I am now just sticking with :

I use the color care keratin Suave... It smells awesome and my hair LOVES this shit...  When I'm done in the shower, I use a leave in conditioner... I HAVE to... and I have used everything in the aisles of the Target and WalMart.  I even went to Walgreens to get something a woman at work uses (she has completely different hair than me and what was I thinking cause that never works out well in my direction)...I paid for that...I really did...That's when I decided to go BACK to this here:  

Suave Keratin leave-in... I swear by it.  I put that on my hair at the ends...it LOVES me for it...  and now that my hair is short again, I am able to blow dry it in just under 30 minutes! Yay!  It's short, it's not suddenly UNTHICK... work with me here...  After I blow dry it, it gets a little dried out feeling and I usually take baby oil, dimesize, (ba-dum-ch) and spread it in my palms, then I work it into the ends...

Usually all of this happens before I go to bed and when I wake up, I have fabulous hair... or Fabu-hair if you will. 

I was at the Target on my lunch looking around and I was looking for a finishing oil spray that smelled good, didn't cost a small GD fortune and something I could really get into...  I ALMOST got the Suave moraccan oil, but they were out... Instead, I turned around and staring me RIGHT in the face was THIS:

There are SO MANY things I LOVE about this product!  It smells like summer, and according my other half, it smells like a delicious cake my Mom makes and it makes him hungry... haha...  But it's great!  It's a spray so I don't have to get my hands oily and the application is more precise.  I can target my "trouble" areas which are the ends of course. 

Funny thing, to look at me you probably wouldn't believe I take this kind of care of myself.  And I really don't care what other people think I look like, or my hands look like or my hair look like... But I want my hair soft cause I'm not the only one that has to touch it... and I'm not the only one that feels my skin... and I like that Thing 1 looks at my face and notices that there aren't any fine lines or wrinkles... of course when Thing 2 hits the same age, that will more than likely be inevitable!!!  I will take a healthy dose of pride in the fact that I have been called the "youngest" in a group of people I know...but I'm not...hehehe...

There you have it...the hair products I use and will continue to use until they end up on the clearance shelf... and why?? Because... I stick with what works...until the bastards discontinue whatever "it" is...then the cycle starts all over again.  Hey, I have THAT to look forward to...

Twelve Minutes 'Til The Bell Rings...

Some of my best ideas come out of me at the last minutes of the day... let's see if this is a testament to as much, shall we?

Probably not, probably going to be gobble-di-gook...but hey...what is to be expected from someone in my predicament?

I have been locked in a Bio Hazard called "Home" for about 5 days...and man is it good to be out. 

I came back to work to a mole hill, but it's gone now.  All gone...bye bye...

I sit and I wonder just how much "better" Choni feels now that he is on day 5 of Flu Watch 2013...

He hasn't been sick like this in about 5 years I would say.  He used to get the Flu shots every year and he would get deathly ill right after.  Call it what you want, it's the truth...He was that 1%.  Trust and believe I kindly requested he STOP getting the damned things and just let himself get sick like a normal person.  Well, he didn't sick after that...and life was good.  Thing 1 must have the immune system of Bubble Boy because she just can't seem to shake the sick.  She has gotten sick every year since she started school which the statistcs say is normal and American as Apple Pie...Thanks though... But no thanks just the same...

The worst thing in the whole world is when your kids get sick.  You can put bandaids on a scraped knee and a pricked finger, you can pull out frikkin splinters, you can even put salves on burns, but you just can't get them better from the flu... It sucks and it's belittling as a parent.  I took her to the Pediatrician and he said she was teetering between viral and bacterial infection...so wait and see...  $30 bucks to get "wait and see"... Oh great...so we did... I got a presription just in case the worst hit over the weekend, but after being sick ALL week...her whole vacation from school down the tubes...she was better.  It's a miracle!! Not so fast ya'll.... Then HE gets it....

I stayed home from work on Wednesday, went in for two hours on Thursday and went in from 8 to 2 on Friday all so I wouldn't drown in a mountain of paperwork and phone calls today...and I'm glad I was able too...Thanks Ma :)  I didn't really see him Thursday, Friday or Saturday... except for a trip to the Urgent Care Saturday morning and then the CVS for medication of awesome sorts...  Sunday afternoon, much to my surprise, he emerged :)  Shaved, showered, and less death-like hue to the skin!!  Yay!!! 

I have done more laundry and dishes and meal preparation than I probably have in a year...  We haven't had a whole weekend to ourselves in a long time and it's been even longer since I have had such domestic duties thrust upon me... Weird to sit there and have to wonder how many pairs of jeans and how many towels you can fit in your own washer...because that's how long it's been since you've done serious laundry...  Funny to sit there and wonder what setting to wash the dishes on again cause it's been so long since you've had to do more than just load the thing up with dishes...  Funny....

But not really all that funny... There was a time I knew all these things.  A very different space and time when we both had jobs and Harley was the only Thing and we dropped her off for the night at Gma and Gpa's... It's "funny" how different your life gets...and not even because you "wanted" it to... but because it HAD to be different.  It was forced to be different...and pretty soon you wonder... How did I do this before??  And the answer is simple... You didn't...  I didn't have to clean a house and juggle a baby... I didn't have to figure that part out myself....  A crash course wasn't necessarily what I had in mind but I am now glad that I had it, and I'm glad it's over.  I'm glad I got reminded I'm the Mom I'm the Wife I'm part of the equation...I'm not just here to keep the lights on and keep the water running...  I'm sorry that everyone was sick... but now I'm thinking it all happened for a reason... We all got something out of it...  If you want a silver lining of course...maybe I want one, because maybe I NEED one... Maybe I NEED one after seeing my poor girl lethargic on the couch for a week, after seeing the piles of paperwork on my desk, after seeing how much Choni does and how much he could use a break no matter what form it came in.... 

And now it's all over and I can go back to the most annoying thing being that Amazon just shipped my camera and I won't have it until next week...  damn Amazon...

This Time Last Year...

Wow, you know what? I really should start a series called ,"This Time Last Year..."  I did the birthday story for Marysu...and now I get to do the pneumonia story with HarleyQ...

More like March 5th of last year, but still...This time last year HQ was recovering from a nasty bout of bronchitis.  I can't believe she got it.  It was just a little cough...cough syrup wasn't helping and my home remedies were getting kicked in the ass so to the dr. she went and she had bronchitis.  Antibiotics and a plastic bubble later, she slowly recovered.  Always having this phantom cough and sniffling ALL the time.  If you don't like nails on a chalk board then I don't recommend listening to a 6 and a half year old sniffle for months...  makes me shudder...truly.

Then there was the maternity leave which was awesome family time at it's greatest.  Went by like a flash.  On the EVE of my returning to work HQ's cough was coupling a fever that had gone on for 48 hours and was getting higher and less compromising by the hour...at 5:30pm I decided to take action and to the ER we go where we find out after 6 hours that it was walking pneumonia.  Shots and antibiotics later she was a new HQ after 24 hours.  She had weezing in her chest and I couldn't handle listening to that I wanted to crawl into a hole and die.  My poor Harleymunser was so sick...  We took her to the dr for a follow up.  I am not a fan of that dr.s office.  And we don't go there anymore and we have been happy since we changed back to her old dr.  Insurance.  Sucks.  Anyway, I started to feel a sinus infection coming on and I told MY dr. about her being sick so much and I couldn't stand the thought that she could be asthmatic like I was and my husband REALLY was...  But he said it didn't sound like that to HIM...so GUESS what he said? 

Just GUESS???

After all the problem and the sick and the holy shit...  He told me to give her Benadryl... Just one dose of old school Benadryl, even generic CVS, Equate, UP and UP, whatever is fine... Just one dose before bed... see what happens...

AND DON'T THAT BEAT ALL?!?!  IT FUCKIN WORKED!!!

Yep, it was THAT exciting.  After one week, her cough was gone...

And, not to forget to mention.  He was telling me that I should be doing the same thing!?!?! 

Love. My. PA.

Not even a Dr.  A PA...  Love him...  I tried it on my and I will tell you what... I have taken them ALL!  Everything that ends in D... all of it.  I have taken shit I can't even PRONOUNCE!  I can feel the sinus infections come on and they come on like a bastard.  The only time I haven't had any sinus flux is when I'm pregnant (so not a reason to do it again on purpose and not possible anymore anyways hehehe).

Harley was doing SO well in fact that I was down to honing in on the symptoms so early I would give her a Benadryl the night I would notice SOMETHING and then POW!!!  Muhfucker's HISTORY!! 

It's horrible when something is so simple and so wrong with your kids and when someone gives you a simple answer for what you feel is a simple question it's exciting!  Especially when I used the same advice for me and I am able to knock out my symptoms now with a simple pink and white pill that I can get OTC for 4.99 a bottle for the generic shit,...  Harley started to get a cough and I thought "Oh, that doens't sound allergy related"... silly me.  Cough syrup didn't work for shit and when I gave her the Benadryl what the hell do you think happened?  I got so used to her being ok over the past few months.. MONTHS!! that I forgot about the Benadryl... 

Lesson learned:  This Time Last Year I was learning how awesome old school Benadryl can really be !!!

Harley has surely escaped more horribly sicknesses due to her allergies NOT getting out of hand and I am so loving my Dr for it!!!

Which reminds me, I need to add Benadryl to my shopping list!