I really hate Influenza...

My poor little guy is fighting a nasty bug. It's been diagnosed as Influenza pending the test results. Shawn and I decided to forgo the flu shots this year. I didn't really like getting them last year but I did it because he was such a little thing and I felt it was best. I'm not anti-vaccinations, my kiddos are all up to date on them but we do follow our own schedule as I don't care for the whole 5 in one thing. Too many things for a little one's immune system to take on at once in my humble opinion. I feel so bad that he is feeling awful, his temps have reached 104 at the highest. We've done a lot of tubbies and a lot of Tylenol. He is doing a little better today but my little man who usually shovels the food in is not really eating much of anything. I hate feeling helpless as a Mom, it's the worst feeling. The past two nights he has been in our bed with us and crying out and squirming in discomfort, the only thing I could do for him was rock, sing softly and pray. God answered my prayers both nights and allowed my son to fall into a peaceful sleep, snuggled against my chest. If anyone out there is reading this, can you please pray for my little guy? Thank you,

Alicia

Merry Christmas-a little late

Merry Christmas!! Better late then never I like to say! It was a good Christmas, a little stressful at times, but good. Sometimes I really forget to look at all I have and realize just how blessed I am. A wonderful husband who loves our children and is loved back fiercely by them. FOUR healthy, beautiful, wonderful, amazing children that I adore. A roof over my head, a reliable car to drive, good, healthy food on our table and nice clothes on our backs. Sometimes I get so caught up in the whirlwind of our society telling us we should have bigger houses, nicer clothes, better cars etc, etc that I forget to look at what I do have and feel blessed. That is something that every Christmas I get reminded of. Something about the beauty and magic and spirit of that day make me stop and shed tears in utter amazement of what I have been blessed with. This Christmas it was even more prevalent as I stood by my father-in-laws bedside and watched him painstakingly open his gifts. The cancer is taking away the once strong, healthly man and replacing it with a thin, frail, weak man. It is so hard to watch, it is breaking our oldest daughters heart and our oldest nephews heart. But we have all learned different things from this journey, things that we never would have learned. My husband is learning to lean on God more, to have more faith in Him. His relationship with the Lord is growing, God is drawing him closer. It's one of the things I read about in other people's blogs, and experienced myself after my miscarriages but I've never witnessed it through someone else so close to me. Through our trials and tribulations come blessings and lessons, and how very blessed I am this Christmas season!!

A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

This week my husband had to go away for some business training. He left Sunday afternoon and will return Thursday night. The last time he went away was when Landon was about 2 months old. It was a little scary at first to be on my own with four little ones for a few days, but we managed and everything went fine. I was again a little nervous this time, Landon is mobile now which makes the evening routine a little more challenging but I've got it down. The few things I expected to be a challenge have been fine, it was the few things I was not expecting that became big challenges for me this week.. Like the snow storm that I didn't see coming, bikes still in the yard, wheel borrow still in the yard, lawn mower still out.....you get the idea. I didn't even know where my scraper was, let alone how I was going to get the driveway cleaned. My husband suggested a friend to call and come snow blow but let's face it everyone is busy these days with their own families. My Dad just had a plow installed on his truck this summer so I figured he would probably come do the driveway. I forgot however that there is a learning curve, as with anything, to plowing driveways. Hopefully he didn't scrape up too much of my lawn..... Then there was the pellet stove that began misbehaving the day after my hubby left. It started with my stove doors becoming pitch black with creosote, a small "explosion" inside the stove, a 911 call placed and ended with the pellet stove company sending out a repair technician only to tell me it was clogged up and the pipes needing cleaning. My husband was not impressed to say the least and we had a few not so pleasant conversations. Then I discovered another problem with another area in my life that I'm not even going to get into here. UGH!!!! Seriously, I wanted to climb into my bed, pull the covers over my head and pretend the day hadn't happened. But God knows better because he blessed me with four children to keep me too busy to crawl into bed and wallow in self pity. So I fed my blessings, bathed them, read the girls a book while my baby drank his milk. I kissed the little man goodnight, said prayers with my girls and tucked them all in for the night. After a glass of wine, a calmer conversation with my husband and a heartwarming conversation with my Mom I went to bed and ended that terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day!

Tuesdays

So Tuesday is my busy day, and I say busy but really it's more like I'm running around all day. First thing, I get the big girls on the school bus, then I finish getting Charlotte and Landon ready and we head off to preschool drop off, kiss Charlotte, off we go. Landon and I head to the gym, where I take my fav new class right now, BodyFlow. I LOVE that class, it is full of yoga and Tai Chi and at the end there is the meditation, oh how I love the meditation...... It just starts my day off oh so right. I just wish I could sneak it in before my kiddos wake up! Then I head to my big girls school where I do lunch duty for Kindergarten and then Second grade, with a break in between for the first grade lunch. The break gives me just enough time to feed Landon his lunch. From there we usually head to a store to grocery shop or pick up a few forgotten items. We pick Charlotte up at 2:30, then on to the big girls at 2:55 and then FINALLY home! Whew, that was a lot just typing it! It's funny I started this post on Wednesday morning and it is now Friday afternoon. I guess that's why I don't post as much as I would like. Anyway, another super, busy day in my week has come and past. Thursday..... it's even busier then Tuesday! Thursday morning starts out much like Tuesday does, put big girls on bus, drop off Charlotte at school, and then head out to grocery shop or run some other errand. Charlotte gets picked up at 11:45 on Thursdays, so I pick her up after errands, head home, have lunch. Then I put Landon down for a nap and Charlotte in room time and attempt to tidy up the house, throw together dinner and pack snacks. At roughly 2:30 we leave to pick up the big girls from school and head to Gymnastics, a thirty minute drive away. The girls shovel in snack on the way and then rush into class with barely enough time to change into leotards. After Gymnastics we rush home and eat dinner and every other Thursday night I run Ava to Girlscouts after dinner. Let's not forget about dinner clean up and bath and bedtime of course too!! It's Friday and I'm tired and I'm glad it's almost the weekend........