Saturday, January 28, 2006

Updates- after several returns, I found two pairs of very expensive sandals that fit. I plan to never buy new ones again.

A has teeth numbers 5 and 6 coming in, to help excuse her completely sleepless nights. She's refusing to eat anything other than pancakes and Oatios, and she doesn't consume a lot of them, either.

I've been offered a temporary part-time paying job at the food co-op where I currently volunteer for a discount, filling in for someone going on maternity leave. It'll make a nice income supplement this spring/ summer.

I got the stomach thing just when I thought I was in the clear, on Wednesday night. Having two years' worth of practice in not-vomiting through pregnancy, I avoided that route, which meant it progressed to my lower intestinal track, which wasn't pretty either. Luckily it was indeed "only" a 24-hour thing, and Dan and I didn't get it simultaneously.

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

"happy"

A's newest and perhaps cutest word... to hear a brief audio file (requires Windows Media Player or some equivalent) download from this location: http://home.nycap.rr.com/rootsandshoots/happy.wav

Well, Paco's better-

Dan and the kids were up vomiting all night. I expect my turn will begin this evening. I'm hoping it's just a 24-hour thing rather than last winter's stomach virus, which knocked C and me out for over week-

But Paco's eye is mostly better, and he doesn't have to wear the plastic collar anymore! We have a fairly complicated schedule of drugs to continue for a few weeks, but he's much happier.

And fatter. The conehead was slimming, apparently. Now that it's off, he's looking pretty chunky. I don't know if the drugs caused weight gain, if the dozens of treats he gets at every vet's visit added up, or if he just hasn't been exercising as much, but he definitely needs to do some running!

Tuesday, January 17, 2006


2 kids in the snow Posted by Picasa


conehead dog in the snow Posted by Picasa


At Kathy's open house Posted by Picasa


baby in the snow Posted by Picasa

I just ordered $350 worth of shoes from Zappos in the hope that just ONE (well, two, technically) will fit. I hate hate hate my extra-wide feet-

Well, at today's vet visit, Paco's eye looked much better. Apparently the new-cell-formation is weak, so it's possible that one scrape could wipe out all the improvement and set him back to square one, but we're (obviously) hoping to avoid that. For meds, we're down to just three drops a day. Maybe we should send him to Marley's house to have them done.

Thursday, January 12, 2006

Paco update

The vet clinic's eye specialist finally returned today (why he thought his knee surgery was higher priority than my Paco, I'll never understand) and Dan took him in (again). Paco now has a fairly serious corneal abrasion, which wasn't there before; he must have managed to do it to himself since his last appointment (perhaps the night he managed to wrestle his way out of the conehead). So now they're treating the corneal abrasion and hoping that whatever the other problem was has resolved itself. The steroid drops we had been giving him have also apparently been preventing the abrasion from healing, so he now gets different drops, an ointment, and remains on the oral painkiller/ anti-inflammation drug (which thankfully he likes). Wrestling him down and prying his eye open several times a day is wearing thin on all of us.

We had to cut his conehead down because he couldn't function with it at all; he stood in the middle of the room crying the first night he had it until Dan finally gave up trying to sleep and reduced it to a more reasonable size. (Paco refused to lie down, eat, sniff, pee, do ANYTHING with it on.) We're glad we were able to help him a little bit, but wish we knew when we'll be able to finally take it off him.

Friday, January 06, 2006


 Posted by Picasa


Conehead dog Posted by Picasa


Happy baby Posted by Picasa


Climbing baby Posted by Picasa


C and marble-run blocks Posted by Picasa


C's gift to Nana Posted by Picasa


We eventually convinced A to go through the tunnel by leaving a trail of Oatios through it Posted by Picasa


A likes platforms Posted by Picasa


there's a boy in the bucket Posted by Picasa


New castles; revamped pirate ship Posted by Picasa

Our holiday celebrations were just sooo exciting and numerous that we haven't had a chance to write about them! Dan, C, A, and I exchaned presents on the 23rd. Highlights included homemade Playmobil castles for C, a renovations of his Playmobil pirate ship, a set of locks and keys, and a bucket for hauling things up and down from his playhouse. He was really excited about all his presents; we realized that if that had been his whole Christmas, it would have been enough.

But wait! There's more! We spent Christmas Eve through the 26th with Nana, Ye-ye, and Uncle Shannon, where buckeye-making, puzzle-piecing, food, family, and many more gifts abounded. Then we were home for a day to pack before going to Oma and Opa's, with more more more! The kids had a blast, and we all enjoyed the long vacation, but the grown-ups were ready to get things back to normal. (Well, I say that, but now I'm desperately anticipating our trip to Florida, which is more than a month away.)

New this week? Well, a substitute busdriver just blew right by me this afternoon while I was waiting to get C off the bus; it eventually turned around after I ran after it waving and shouting for a block (dragging A, natch) and C told someone they missed his stop. (He said it was someone's grandmother riding the bus. Who knows who it really was, but at least she got the busdriver to turn around.)

(Incidentally, I'd figured that they eventually switched his bus route because they realized it was ridiculous to have kindergarteners sitting on the bus for so long. Nope! They switched it because it was annoying for them to have to wait for his bus to get back to the bus garage so late. Should've known.)

We've spent $175 this week to turn Paco into a conehead. He has some horrible eye problem that they still haven't been able to diagnose. We don't want to think about how much more we're going to have to spend, and how much more pain and irritation Paco is going to be subjected to, before they actually diagnose and treat the problem. He's miserable enough from the pain and swelling (despite painkillers), and now he can't even sniff the ground without bashing into a snowbank or lie down without having plastic dig into his head. (And A wants to play with the plastic.)