Oil and Water

Being pregnant has some physical quirks. Having gallstones has some physical issues, as well. Both are tolerable, but together they are not a good mix.

For example, when I'm feeling a little queasy from the pregnancy, I would normally go for a ginger ale or maybe even a Coke, but those are about the worst things you can drink when you have gallstones. One of the best things you can drink when you're suffering from a gallstone attack is apple juice with a bit of apple cider vinegar mixed in, but just the thought of that makes me want to puke now that I'm pregnant.

Since I started having gallstone attacks (this past summer, finally diagnosed in October), I have severely changed my diet. It was absolutely atrocious...I ate junk food most of the day, with rarely anything healthy thrown in there, so I definitely deserved some kind of bodily protest. I now regularly eat fruits and vegetables, I no longer drink soda of any kind, and I avoid foods high in sugar and fat, so really, having gallstones was a blessing (in a serious disguise).

I thought it would be the candy (chocolate!) that I would miss, but really it's been fatty foods, like pizza, that I've missed the most. And especially the past couple of weeks, I've REALLY wanted pizza! I have cheated a couple of times; for example, I brought my friend a couple of pizzas for lunch when I went to visit her on Monday (she just moved back after being gone for 11 years). I tried to limit myself to one slice, but Shaya left most of a second slice that I finished off for her. And then, for my birthday dinner on Tuesday, I decided that I wanted pizza. We made a healthier kind, on whole wheat english muffin halves. I piled mine high with onions, tomatoes, and mushrooms, but I also put quite a bit of mozzarella cheese on top. They were so good that I ended up eating four of them (stuffing yourself is also bad when you have gallstones), along with a lot of fresh fruit that Robert bought for me. So, sure, relatively healthy, but way too much.

I spent the last three hours of my birthday (and into the next morning) suffering from a gallstone attack. Oh, and because I'm pregnant, I can't take the pain medication that was subscribed to me. Tylenol just doesn't cut it...it takes the edge off, but the pain is still there. It's so not fun. I am hoping that whatever cravings my pregnant body decides to have in the future, that they coincide with a good, healthy, non-gallstone-attack-inducing diet. Like cucumbers. I hope I crave cucumbers.

***

What a nice week this has been! My kids have been home all week from school. I've pretty much been in my PJs for the past three days. We've all just been lazing around, spending a bit of time playing in the snow, but also watching movies, reading books, and playing computer games. I have become a homebody, because I really like being lazy these days.

There wasn't any school on Monday, due to President's Day. On Tuesday we woke up to quite a bit of snow on the ground, with messages from the district delaying school for a couple of hours and only having buses on limited transportation. Limited transportation is a huge pain for us...the regular bus stop is right in front of our house; the 'emergency bus stop' is 2 miles away. Two miles of un-plowed, limited use, twisty, hilly roads. Neither Robert nor I feel all that comfortable driving in snow in the first place, but our road is always difficult to drive on when there's any snow at all. Limited transportation means 4 trips on our road, and since more snow was being forecasted, we just decided to let the kids have a snow day. Wednesday and today were both officially school closed (due to snow) days. I'm thinking tomorrow might just be a stay-at-home day, too, even if it isn't official...we'll just round off the week and have some more relaxing family time :-)

Guilty Little Secret

Whenever anyone mentions something they've seen on TV, I usually have no idea what they're talking about, especially if it's a newer show. I usually shrug and piously reply with, "Oh, we don't have TV at our house." When we moved out to the boonies (almost three years ago now), we made the decision to not get TV. The kids watched the occasional cartoon or after school sitcom, but Robert and I rarely watched any during the past several years that we lived in Marysville. So, we decided to spend the savings from not having TV on Netflix and Hi-speed internet. The kids can get their cartoons and sitcoms via Netflix and we can watch whatever movies we feel like watching.

It's normally a win-win, but occasionally I do miss having television. Football, for example. I actually enjoy watching it when I can watch it regularly and follow the teams and specific players that I like. Just looking up stats isn't the same so I have missed out on the past three seasons of the game. Seattle made it to the play-offs this year, and if they had made it to the Super Bowl (I know, I know, not likely), I would really have missed having a TV. Arriah and Braelen say the thing they miss the most is the commercials. And no, I don't mean the Super Bowl commercials. They miss seeing the every day commercials, because their friends talk about these new products or places to go and my kids don't have any idea what they're talking about.

Now, I have to admit to my guilty little secret. I have become a fan of American Idol. Prior to last season, I may have seen one or two episodes, so I knew what the show was about, but I never cared. Last season, however, I started watching American Idol via YouTube clips the morning after the show was aired. And I got hooked. My favorite last season was Lee Dewyze, so I was thrilled that he made it all the way through. Oh, and I also liked one of the kids that didn't even make it to the top 12, so that was kinda sad.

I'm hooked again this season. Since it's on Wednesday and Thursday evenings, I now spend Thursday and Friday morning trying to piece together the show on YouTube. I suppose it must be illegal to be upload the clips, because the YouTube police are good about deleting posts. I have to get to them quick (or wait a few days for repostings) and still sometimes end up only being able to watch parts of the episode. But, that's okay, I still enjoy it.

My favorites so far this season are Jacee Badeaux, Robbie Rosen, and Chris Medina. There's a girl that hasn't received much air time, but I've really liked her voice when she's sang; Ashton something (Jones, I think). I couldn't tell if she was in the 'right' room, but I saw that all of 'my boys' made it through. I'll get to watch them again next week! And yes, there are definitely better singers than the guys I have become fans of, but I don't care about that. I'm looking forward to next Thursday morning. Now, if only they'd extend the call-in deadline until the next morning, I might actually vote...

A lil' bit of insanity and a whole lotta fun!

Khasia had a slumber party last night for her 10th birthday party. For some reason, even though I know better, I go by the old adage of expecting about half of the invited guests to actually attend. So, if we want six girls, we invite 12, right? Nah, we had 9 girls last night, not to mention my own 4 darlings, so it was a pretty full house. (In the past, we have had instances of 100% of invites showing up, so I really should learn!).

My philosophy on parties is to keep them busy with activities, as that generally cuts down on the run-around-screaming-and-wreaking-havoc wildness that otherwise ensues, especially with the pre-teen age group. It worked to an extent, but they were still pretty rowdy in between activities. Our schedule went something like this:

6:00 Arrival: We had a painting ceramics craft set up for the girls to do as they arrived, so they started out the evening by sitting down, chatting quietly, and painting figurines.
6:30 Dinner: We had Little Caesar's Pizza, chips, and pop for dinner.
7:00 Cupcakes: For Khasia's actual birthday (on the 7th), she got a 'real' cupcake maker, so as each child arrived, they chose a cake flavor. Robert then made up the cake batter, cooked them in the maker, and had them cooling, so that by 7:00 they were ready to decorate. We set out a variety of frostings and sprinkles and let them go at it. After about 15 minutes of that, we put candles in Khasia's cupcake and sang Happy Birthday to her. We then added a scoop of ice cream to everyone's plate and they all ate their dessert (although a lot of the girls didn't really eat much of their cake...I've noticed that's fairly normal at birthday parties).
7:30 Presents: Once the dessert was cleaned up, we had Khasia open her gifts. She's good about taking her time to make the 'fun' last a little longer. She got some great presents, which is surprising, since it's so hard to know what to get pre-teens.
8:00 Crafts: The girls made bracelets out of beads while I called two at a time over to the kitchen counter to tie dye t-shirts. This was a fairly long process, but we got everyone through eventually. And I'm pretty sure we were able to do it without anyone getting any dye on the clothes they were wearing.
9:30 Nail Polish: Everyone painted their own nails or partnered up to paint each others. We had bought a selection of new polishes, so once the painting was done, I let everyone choose a color and those polishes went into their take-home gift bags. (Oh, and one of the girls who was not spending the night went home at this time).
10:30 Movies: We made big batches of popcorn and sent all the girls upstairs to spread out sleeping bags and start watching the first of several movies we had rented for them. (The other girl who didn't spend the night went home a few minutes after the movie got started; the rest stayed the night).
11:00: I went to bed around this time. Everyone was still watching the movie and enjoying their popcorn.
2:00am: Robert said he stayed up until about 2:00 and that the girls were all still awake and pretty wild, so the movie watching must have been getting old by that point.
5:00am: I woke up (this is my normal time to wake up to get Arriah to her religion class, so it's habit). There were huge piles of toilet paper around the house, so they had tried to TP the inside of our house, but I guess one of the girls kept tearing it down...they made it into piles instead). I used this time to finish up the tie dye shirts, meaning I took off all the rubber bands and put them into the washing machine. It was about 6:00 when I got back in bed. There were two girls asleep at that time, but the rest were either playing computer games, playing with toys (Barbies?) in Shaya's room, or just sitting around chatting. I put on another movie before I went back to bed.
8:30am: I meant to get back up at 8:00, but my alarm wasn't set properly, so I got up a little later than I should have. First, I put the shirts in the dryer, then I went and woke everyone up. Braelen and one of the girls who was asleep at 5:00 were awake; everyone else was sleeping and they were not easy to wake up. Eventually, though, they all got up and put their stuff by the front door. Some ate cinnamon rolls or donuts for breakfast, while the others just sat in a tired daze.
9:00am: Pick up was supposed to be at 9:00, but it took a good 30 or 40 minutes for all the parents to arrive and get their girls out the door. Leah, my niece, left closer to 10:00.

And no, it wasn't as smooth running as my schedule makes it sound. In between each activity the girls were all up, running around and screaming. At one point they played freeze tag, which definitely got wild. At another point, they were all royalty, or servants of, and pretending various things. Another time, one girl was stealing everyone's socks and being chased around the house. They also played one of the board games that was given as a gift to Khasia earlier.

It was a bit crazy at times, but I think it was overall a fun-filled night :-)

P.S. I need to figure out how to add pictures!

Service Auction

Our women's church activity this month was a service auction. Our first task was to think of a service we were willing to donate. We then wrote our idea down on a card. There were quite a variety of services: dinners, all kinds of baked goods, jams and other goodies, a car detail, closet organizing, house cleaning, sign language lessons, party planning, a hand-made quilt, a knitted baby hat, etc. I volunteered 4 to 6 hours of babysitting at my house. I thought that would be common, but I was the only one that volunteered the babysitting.

We then had to fill out a survey of things we've done. Some of the questions were religious based (did you say your prayers this morning), but most were general (have you ever checked your car's oil). Each item on the survey was worth a certain number of points. We used those points to bid on the services. I got an embarrassingly low number :-)

The first part of the activity was a potato bar, where we all brought a topping. It was yummy! I am pretty sure I'm one of the few that went back for seconds. Because of my diet restrictions, I haven't been having potatoes lately, because I normally eat them covered in butter, sour cream, cheese, and bacon bits...none of which I can have now. But, I topped mine in broccoli and green onions and it was really good!

We then had the auction. One of the women, Janelle, was our auctioneer. She first read off all of the services, so we had an idea of what was available. I wrote down the things I was interested in, but the thing I really wanted was the sign language lessons. My daughter, Shaya, has really been interested in learning sign language lately...When I was little, one of my friends was deaf, so I actually knew quite a bit of sign language then, but it's been a long time. Shaya knows her letters now, and I've been teaching her a few phrases, but I knew she'd love the lessons. Fortunately, those were auctioned off near the end, so most people had spent their points already and I was able to get them! Ironically, the person that does the lessons won the bid on my babysitting... I told her we should make behind-the-scenes arrangements to swap for future lessons and babysitting (although, she teaches professionally and charges quite a bit more than I would to babysit).

I have heard of service auctions, of course, but that was the first one I have attended. It was a very fun and creative activity that I was fortunate enough to be able to attend. Not to mention, the socializing! Our church has a lot of really good people in it, and I've enjoyed getting to know them and becoming friends with many of them.

Our Home School Situation - Part 2

I wrote up our history of education in my last post, so I can focus on our current year in this post.

Even though Arriah really enjoyed her two years of home schooling, she wanted to see what 'regular' high school was like and decided that 9th grade would be a good year to do that. She started out the year at GFHS and loved it. She came home with energy and enthusiasm every day, enjoying almost every aspect of school. Unfortunately, as the year went on, she became less and less excited about going. The hardest part for her was dealing with the constant swearing and low morals of those around her. Her group of friends knew not to swear around her, but it was impossible to avoid otherwise. In December she was so depressed that she wanted to quit school and never go back. I took her in to see one of the HS counsellors, and we had a good discussion about options and future possibilities. Arriah eventually decided to finish out the first semester of school, which ended Jan 29th, and then drop all but two classes for the rest of the school year.

She ended the first semester with A's in the four classes she has since dropped (science, technology, health, and yearbook). She ended up with a B+ in Geometry (mostly due to missing assignments), and an A- in Honors English. It's ironic to me that the classes she had a harder time in are the ones she's most interested in sticking with.

She will still be going to early morning seminary (a religion class), then will come home and do home schooling, then will head back for Geometry and Honors English, and will then take the bus home after school. She'll have about 3 hours at home in the mornings. One of the classes she would have had at school this semester is P.E. so our plan is to go on a walk or do some other form of exercise for at least 30 minutes/day. She will continue working in her science text book, taking notes, completing chapter reviews and tests, and doing any lab work that is possible for her to do at home (without spending a lot of money). Technology won't really be a separate class at home, because she's already so comfortable with a computer and the programs she would have been taught; instead, she'll just use technology as part of completing other tasks. The one area that she didn't have at GFHS was social studies, so we will be incorporating that into her home studies for the remainder of the year. Hopefully, this will be a better situation for her.

Braelen also goes to 5th and 6th period, but at the middle school. He started out the year doing that, as a compromise to wanting to home school full time and still wanting to regularly see the friends he made in 5th grade. He doesn't share any classes with his two best friends from 5th grade, but does have other friends in both classes, so it's working out pretty well. His 5th period class is science (which was something I insisted on, knowing myself from the past two years...science was the area that got the least hands-on work, and rather had a lot of boring text book reading). His 6th period class is the elective period, which changes each quarter. He started in art, then had technology, and is now in study skills.

One of his weaknesses last year was math. Part of that is because he went from a normal 4th grade to a Hi-Cap 5th grade, which means he missed some aspects, which made it harder for him to grasp what was being taught. I really wanted him home this year so that I could help him build up a solid foundation of basic math skills and get him back to being ahead of the game. We usually spend 45 to 60 minutes a day on math, and I do think his basic skills are much stronger now. We've started into some pre-algebra and there are some concepts he's struggling with, but I think he's a lot further ahead than he would have been, had he been enrolled in a normal math class with 25+ other kids. We also do reading, writing, social studies, art, and some PE (we started out the year going on daily walks, but got lazy about it during the cold wet months. We plan to get back on track now, though).

Khasia is in public school full time. The main reason is that in the summer, when I was making my final decision on whether or not to homeschool, she was in a stage that was hard for me to deal with. She argued about doing everything and I was pretty sure it wouldn't be a good thing to have to fight over every single assignment. Instead, I put her in a multi-age program at the other GFs elementary school (Monte Cristo), where she has thrived and is doing great. It's a group of two classes of kids, with two wonderful teachers, of kids from 4th, 5th, and 6th grade. They do a lot of work-at-their-own-pace assignments, which has been helpful for Khasia, as she has been able to fill in some gaps from previous years. The teachers also emphasize individual effort, especially since there are three grade levels worth of kids. Khasia plans on staying in that for all three years of the program, and then wants to start home schooling in 7th grade. I'm fine with that. For now, I volunteer in her class every Friday morning.

Shaya is home with me, full time. We go to Sky Valley in Monroe, one day a week, where she takes Wood-Working, Gymnastics, Legos, and Art. It's a different district, so their schedule is off from the local schools, which make things kind of tricky sometimes, but that's okay. Next week is the new semester in Monroe, and Shaya will continue in gymnastics, but will be dropping the other classes and instead be taking a choir class. A few weeks ago, she wanted to just take one semester of art, woodworking, and legos, but she has since come to really enjoy those classes and wished she could continue in all of them. Unfortunately, they're now full, so unless something opens up, she's out of luck. I'm glad gymnastics is a year-long class, because she's really doing well in that.

We spend a lot of time on basic skills, especially in math. We also do a lot of reading together. Her science the past few months has been the study of animals, the life cycle, the food chain, etc. with a culminating project on scorpions. We'll be starting earth studies next, with weather and seasons, and then some astronomy for the rest of the year. She's really enjoyable to work with. I feel that her self-esteem has gotten much better this year, now that she's not around a daily dose of unsatisfying social situations. She's much happier and seems to be more confident in herself and her abilities. I am very glad that she's home this year.

And that's it. We are a mix and match of the public and home school systems. I know I'm fortunate in that I am able to offer these choices to my children, to help them find what works best for each of them individually. Hopefully, even with a new baby coming along in a few months, I'll continue to be able to do that.