July Chit Chat - Page 5 « Back to Group Discussions

[Jaimee]

Katie... dh will be gone for 5 days, home for 4, and then gone again for another 5 days.  Super crappy.

The electrician finally found the problem... a hidden GFI unit in a closet, buried behind stuff.  Who puts a GFI receptacle in a closet?  And furthermore, who connects it to another GFI unit so that when one trips, the entire upstairs shorts out?  Crazy.  Anyway, that's fixed and the ceiling is patched, but I hardly slept at all last night b/c of my cold plus Austin got up a million times, Avery got up a million times, and now both appear to have my cold.  So AWESOME!

Becky, glad to hear Levi is much better.  Maybe our trashed houses can get together and commiserate. 

[Jaimee]

Bravado sale!

[LunaLady]

I hope everything goes smoothly for you, Jaimee! Hugs!

Glad Levi is better, Becky.

[Jaimee]

Thank you Christina!  I hope things are going better for you as well. 

[Becky Wheeler]

Originally Posted by Jaimee 

Becky, glad to hear Levi is much better.  Maybe our trashed houses can get together and commiserate. 

Probably. LOL I think if I complain enough, my AP group will form a cleaning party for me. LOL We did that for another mama who has 4 kids and newly pregnant with number 5. She was wiped out.

[CDsMom1031]

Jaimee- I can't wait until I'm a professional home owner like you, LOL. I suck so bad at this stuff. Like I was saying the other day, my house is completely empty, my puppy chewed THREE holes in our new $100 Craigslist couch, and I'm just so overwhelmed with what I COULD do, I have no idea where to start. We had a small electrical problem in our inspection, too. The outlet we were going to plug our turtle tank into had a short so we had the seller fix it. I didn't want to come home to turtle soup one day because the outlet shorted, LOL. I wish we had more money. I'd totally hire a decorator to come in and decorate my house... Or even come and CONSULT me. FML!!!

Conner eliminated his morning naps by sleeping through them. LOL He used to get up at 7, then nap from 9-11. Now he sleeps until 11, then he'll take a solid 2-hour nap from 2-4 or longer, then he's back in bed at 9. It makes it easier to go places, but I can't start my day until damn near noon now. He's not one of those babies that's okay if he gets woken up early. He's the DEVIL so we try our hardest to hold off on anything until he wakes up on his own.

[birdhappy85]

Sora has the stomach flu.  I was so scared this morning because she could.not.stop.puking and became so lethargic. My usually spirited baby was limp and pale, lying on my shoulder passing out and not even crying. I was like - this is not normal!  Vomit EVERYWHERE... omg I've never had such a mess... At first I thought it was just a one-time puke so I bathed her and re-dressed her. Then of course the second she was all clean again, she started vomiting again and kept going off and on for a half hour. I had it all over me, blankets, the floor...  she was lying on my shoulder with puke all over her head, and I had to wake up DH for help. I called the doctor and she said it sounds like stomach flu. So we're monitoring Sora and giving her fluids as she tolerates. She just woke up a little bit ago and seems to already be feeling a bit better thank goodness. As much as I hate seeing her sick, it was the greatest thing getting to just snuggle her to sleep for once. 

This girl is having bad luck. Yesterday Sora was trying to pull herself up using my parents' grand piano leg and she lost her grip, totally smashing her head into the corner. Scared me half to death... Of course I rushed her to my dad asking him to examine her (he's a doctor). Seeing as how he's been through the hematoma thing recently, I trusted him even more to make sure her head was okay. Ha! Somehow she managed to hit it in one of the better spots above the temple and not right in the top front like we thought she had. She has a huge bump. I suppose I should expect her to hurt herself more in the future as she learns to walk... *sigh* I am so not prepared for my baby getting bumps and bruises! 

[seraf]

Joanie, the learning to walk thing stinks.  Shay had 3 cuts and 2 bruises on his face at one point last month. *sigh*

[Jaimee]

I'm so sorry Joanie!  Vomit is never fun, but I think especially alarming the first time your first child truly empties their stomach.  If no one else gets sick, you might consider that she ate something that didn't agree with her.  Also not fun... the first time your baby bleeds.

Nicole... paint is an excellent way to change your house, spruce it up and define spaces without spending too much money.  Many paint sites have virtual rooms you can choose colors for to see how things might look.  You can also get creative with paint, painting accent walls or designs like stripes or blocks of different colors.

[jbk21]

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Edited by jbk21 - 10/6/12 at 10:21pm

[Mal85]

Joanie, dd1 had the stomach flu for the first time when she was 7 months old. It sucked! She obviously had no idea what was happening and couldn't aim at all. We spent that day snuggling with a bowl within reach. The moment she would start to stir I would grab the bowl to catch the mess. It really sucks when your baby is sick. But I always try to appreciate the extra snuggle and extra quiet that comes with it. I hope sora is feeling better.

[Becky Wheeler]

So I guess Levi had a bad case of a 24 hr bug and not a UTI. He's now passed it on to his brother and sister. Awesome.

[Abraisme]

Sickness is going around in our DDC.  Coralie has spent the last 2 days with a high fever and some serious malaise.  She spent the entire day in the carrier, that is until the diarrhea set it and it got covered in poop.   I hope that she feels better tomorrow, because I couldn't get much done today and we're leaving on the 19th!

[KaliShanti]

Enoch had a fever yesterday too. Noticed another tooth pop in.. That makes 7.

[CDsMom1031]

No sickness over here, *crosses fingers*. He did run a slight fever while teeth 3 and 4 were popping through, but it went away as soon as they broke through skin.

[Jaimee]

Wow, a lot of sickies!  Austin was snotty and whiny all yesterday and woke up 6 times last night.  I finally dosed him to knock him out it was ridiculous.  Parenting solo sucks.  Avery slept pretty well the first half of the night, but then was up multiple times the latter half... of course when Austin was sleeping.  So basically I got maybe an hour or two of very broken sleep.  Awesome.  Both are still sneezy today, but in fine spirits.  I'm feeling better, but not 100% obviously since I didn't get any sleep.

So, here's a totally unrelated question... what do you ladies do with your older children's art work?  Avalon must make about 10 pieces of "art" every day and when she's at camp or school that number increases as does the size and bulk of the art (like 3D items).  Over the past couple of years, I have shoved everything into an art bin and weeded through it periodically to get rid of stuff that doesn't seem special enough to save.  But this is an awful process.  I have to do it when Avalon is not in the house b/c otherwise there are many, many tears.  If she doesn't know I've done it, she doesn't usually notice things are gone.  Sometimes she has, though, and that is pretty terrible.  She thinks that I've thrown away her most special item.  A couple of times, dh has been able to go through a weeded down pile with her and let her choose what to keep and what to toss, but it's painstaking and not always successful.  It's not like you can easily explain to a 4 or 5 year old that not everything she creates is a masterpiece worth saving.  I try to reiterate that some things were just fun to make, we displayed them (on the mantel, hanging on her art line, up on the magnet board, etc.) or played with them for a while, and now it's time to recycle its components and get rid of the rest.  I keep a LOT, really I do... much has been saved in a notebook and in the bin from the last 3 years, but if I kept everything this entire house would be coated in artwork.  What do you ladies do?

[Abraisme]

I pretty much do what you do, only I'm generally honest about it with my DS.  It doesn't generally end in tears, but sometimes he pulls things out of the recycling pile.  He went through a phase last year where he made origami.  I mean, he made like 50 little folded things a day!  Basically I had to convince him that he was only allowed to keep one of each kind.  Other than that I have one pile of the best stuff that I put in a keepsake box. 

Originally Posted by Jaimee 

So, here's a totally unrelated question... what do you ladies do with your older children's art work?  Avalon must make about 10 pieces of "art" every day and when she's at camp or school that number increases as does the size and bulk of the art (like 3D items).  Over the past couple of years, I have shoved everything into an art bin and weeded through it periodically to get rid of stuff that doesn't seem special enough to save.  But this is an awful process.  I have to do it when Avalon is not in the house b/c otherwise there are many, many tears.  If she doesn't know I've done it, she doesn't usually notice things are gone.  Sometimes she has, though, and that is pretty terrible.  She thinks that I've thrown away her most special item.  A couple of times, dh has been able to go through a weeded down pile with her and let her choose what to keep and what to toss, but it's painstaking and not always successful.  It's not like you can easily explain to a 4 or 5 year old that not everything she creates is a masterpiece worth saving.  I try to reiterate that some things were just fun to make, we displayed them (on the mantel, hanging on her art line, up on the magnet board, etc.) or played with them for a while, and now it's time to recycle its components and get rid of the rest.  I keep a LOT, really I do... much has been saved in a notebook and in the bin from the last 3 years, but if I kept everything this entire house would be coated in artwork.  What do you ladies do?

[jbk21]

a

Edited by jbk21 - 10/6/12 at 10:20pm

[Becky Wheeler]

We have a tooth! I can't see it, but when I feel, it's above the gum! 

[Jaimee]

We do give quite a bit as gifts, but the thing is, she will go crazy when drawing things for other people.  So if I said, hey let's send this to grandma, she would go up in her room for an hour and make a million other things to send to grandma.  Seriously, for my birthday and for mother's day I received boxes... BOXES of things from her.  Random drawings, three dimensional items like necklaces and bracelets made out of beads and pipe cleaners, collages from magazines, card after card after card.  It never ends!!  My entire dresser was covered in artwork and I finally had to go through it and just toss most of it.  How many necklaces can I keep?  Plus she uses her wooden bead kits that are meant to be played with and taken apart- reused- and she giving to me as gifts like I should keep them.  So I took them apart when she was at camp and put them back.  I'm not sure how she'll feel when she notices.

I would prefer to be honest, but every time I do, the tears are crazy... I feel like I'm hurting her spirit.  I figure it all has to slow down eventually, right?