Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween!! Yay! I can't wait to see Connor in his costume. I'm sure I've mentioned this a dozen times but he's going to be a pirate.

The big news around here is that Connor is going to give up his pacifier tonight. I've explained the whole thing to him. That he is going to put his "fire" in box outside and the Pacifier Fairy is going to come and take them for the new babies. She is also going to leave a present for him because he is such a big boy now! I explain all this and Connor looks excited about it so I asked, "Doesn't that sound like a good idea?" He gets a serious look, thinks for a moment, and then says "No." lol. So I really talked up the present. He got excited about that. He said "Connor get a blue present! Open it with my fingers." So Larry is going to pick up some blue wrapping paper so that he can get the blue present he wants. The fairy will be coming while he is trick or treating so that he knows for sure that his "fires" are gone at bedtime.

So my house will be filled with screams tonight. Which is fitting, being Halloween and all.

Speaking of Halloween, do you feel like it's being ruined by the media? I get so sick of hearing about how dangerous trick or treating is. Gosh. Do you know no child has ever been poisioned by a stranger in their Halloween candy? Never happend! But yet every single Halloween hundrends of thousands of parents pick through bags of candy looking for the razor blade in the apple or arsnic on the snickers. Sad. Last night on the news they did a whole story about how X number of sex offenders don't live at the address they have listed on the registry and how there could be a sex offender in the neighborhood... so watch out! UG It makes me sick. If there is a sex offender in my neighborhood, I'm in no more danger on Halloween than any other day of the year. In fact, I'm probably safer. With dozens of people on the streets and people ringing the bell every 3 minutes. That would be the worst time to attack someone. I'm just sayin'.

Getting ready for Halloween

I picked up some Halloween candy today. It's funny the decision making process that goes into picking out candy to give away. I walked up and down aisles of bagged miniature candy. Was I looking at price? Not really. Was I trying to be the "cool" house on the street? Not at all. I was looking for the candy that is both good, yet resistible. I know I'm going to have this candy laying around my house for at least a week, maybe more. So my first order for this candy was to be good enough that it will get eaten, but gross enough that it won't be me who does the eating.

So what kind of candy fits in this "sweet spot"? Kit Kat bars. Just enough chocolate to tempt others, but not enough to tempt me. Yes, a perfect fit.

Connor is all ready for trick or treating. We've been practicing. He's sooo cute. I think I've mentioned this but he's going to be a pirate. Anything will be better than last year when he had a 104 fever and we ended up in Urgent Care.

Tagged

I got tagged like two weeks ago by Kerri over at Life at number 14. (hi!) But I was at the Grand Canyon when I saw it and couldn't do it right then... and then well... I kinda forgot til just now.

So the rules of this tag are to list 7 weird facts about yourself. And then tag 7 other people. I'm not going to tag anyone because I don't really have any blogging friends. I'm alone out here in the blogsphere. (HELLO!, Hello!, hello, hello.) <---- that is supposed to be echoing in case you didn't get it.

Anyways... here we go.

1. I never thought I would stay home with my kids... but I do.
2. I never thought I would own a minivan... but I do.
3. I never thought I would cook... but I do.
4. I never thought I would have the world's greatest marriage... but I do.
5. I never thought I would attend college at age 31... but I do.
6. I never thought I would wake up every morning before 10... but I do.
7. I never thought I would appreciate being able to take a shower in peace... but I do.

Operation Skinny: Week 7

Hi, it's been another week. Time flies. My big news is that we got an elliptical machine this week. Yay! I love it. I've worked out on it every day. I've been burning 250 calories in 20 minutes. And it's just the right amount hard. It has preprogrammed courses and the first day I did one that I thought looked like the easiest one. haha. No. It pretty much killed me. I felt like my lungs were going to shrivel up and come out of my chest. But now I'm doing one that is just right. I'll work myself up to that other one.

The new work out has caused some problems with my goals however. First off I've gained 2.8 pounds. Which is frustrating! I expected no loss, or even a little gain since I've been working out harder. But 2.8 pounds! yikes. I also had a really bad week eating wise. I averaged 1,699 calories. Which I know didn't help the weight gain, but I was starving. It's easily the hungriest I've been since I started Operation Skinny. I'm assuming it has something to do with the extra calories I've been burning. I will do my best to work on that next week.

And one more problem. The distance I go on the elliptical machine is only like .7 miles. Which isn't really fair considering all the effort I'm putting in. And I would never get to Boston only walking .7 miles. So, I'm going to cheat a little. Here's the thing... if I were to run 8 miles an hour for 20 minutes then I would burn 250 calories. Just like on the elliptical. And if I were to do that I would go about 2.7 miles. I've just been calling it 2.5 miles. Anyways, so that's what I've been recording as my distance. Because .7 miles just isn't fair.

So here is my progress so far.

Weight loss: 2 pounds
Distance travelled: 132 miles

And another big rock!

Ok, things are starting to get back to normal around here. Boy, getting back on track after being gone is tough. It takes longer to prepare for and recoup from a trip than the trip itself.

I had mentioned that I got pretty much no sleep while we were there. The motel was pretty old and not noise resistant at all. And since we put Connor to bed at 7:30 we have to lay there in the dark from that point on. So we just laid there and listened to car doors slam, people laughing, car alarms being set, room doors slamming, muffled and not so muffled voices of people walking by. But the worst was that the ceiling squeaked when the people above us walked. Which I don't know what the heck they were doing up there, but they walked about 100 miles around that tiny motel room. Dang! I was like, just lay down and watch TV or something already! Seriously, how many trips to the bathroom do you need to make?

But the Canyon was great. So beautiful! And the weather couldn't have been better. Just gorgeous. Connor thought it was the Grand Candy, so he was a tad disappointed at first. "What, no candy?" But big rocks to climb around on is almost as good. So he got over it pretty quick. He kept saying "And another big rock!" "Look Daddy! Another big rock!" It was pretty cute. He was very impressed with the whole thing.

I had my heart in my throat pretty much the whole time we were at the rim though. The fences they have are not sufficient in any way. Scared the crap out of me. Besides being so short they are more of a tripping hazard than protection they also have large Connor sized holes under them where rock has worn away since the fence was installed. So I had more than one brain attack where I watched my child falling down a cliff. It's like when you're watching a movie and it changes into some horrible scene and you think "Oh my God! I can't believe that happened!" and then it flashes back to normal and the main character shakes their head and comes back to reality and you realize it was all their imagination. It was like that. I would shake brain back to life and my kids were not tumbling down the rocks, but instead standing there sweetly with gaping mouths and I would take their hands and say "Come on, lets go sit on that bench over there."

Oh and the helicopter tour. How fun was that? It is all Connor has been talking about. He wakes up from every sleep telling me he went on another helicopter ride. And every time we get into the car he asks "Helicopter Grand Canyon?" He tells me all about how we were high over the trees and we wore headphones and listened to music and had a microphone. It was awesome. I think he is going to grow up to be a helicopter pilot.

On the helicopter tour they take you over the forest for about 10 minutes. Just as your brain starts to comprehend that you are flying in a helicopter and your blood pressure begins to return to normal you see the edge of the forest. It gets closer and closer and closer and looks like the end of the earth. All you can see is trees for miles and then nothing. A clean line where life ends. And you are barreling towards it at 100 miles an hour. As you come up on it you draw in all your breath and press yourself into your seat like you are just going to become part of the helicopter. And just when your heart is about to explode the ground falls away and you are hanging unnaturally over the most beautiful scene you've ever laid eyes on.

I've tried to describe the Grand Canyon but really it's indescribable. You will just have to see it for yourself.

Operation Skinny: Week 6

Hello hello! Well, I got 100 hours of sleep last night so I am functioning now.

I had pretty much resigned myself to the fact that this past week was going to be a bad one, diet wise. First off Larry was home on vacation which really throws the routines out of whack. We were off doing things and eating out and not paying attention to calories. Maddy's birthday party was last Saturday which meant we had cake in the house. Then we went to the Grand Canyon so eating out was the only option there.

But despite all that I was able to pull it off and eat an average of 1,523 calories per day. Which totally surprised me and makes me think maybe I should try to lower my average. I go back and forth on it. I don't know. I'll think about it for a while. The walking thing is becoming just a normal part of life, so I do have the head space to work on a new challenge, but I also don't want to push this whole thing since it is working. You know, if it ain't broke don't fix it kinda thing.

Since I was gone for three days I only walked 15 miles last week. Here is my progress so far.

All that to tell you that I lost 2.2 pounds. Wohoo!!! That is so awesome. :)

Totals:
Weight loss: 4.8 pounds. (UG! .2 pounds to goal #1)
Walking: 115 miles

Back from the Grand Canyon

I just wanted to say Hi and let everyone know we are home from the Grand Canyon. I'll probably write something official in a few days about it but right now I am way to tired to think straight.

We had a really good time except for the fact that we barely got any sleep. Who knew that 2 kids in a 50 year old Motel room would mean that rest would be hard to come by? Weird.

Anyways, we're home, the kids were awesome, and no one fell into the canyon. I'd say it was a success.

Another Embarrassing Moment

I went to Target today and embarrassed myself. I seem to have a real knack for it. Remember this.

Well, I turn to go down one of the aisles and this lady had her cart right in the middle so I couldn't get past. She was intently looking at some markers or something and wasn't paying attention. I stood there for a second but she didn't notice me and I didn't feel like saying anything so I was just going to back up and go around. But when I went to back up Maddy had her foot right behind the wheel so the cart wouldn't move. So I said "Would you move!" all harshly. The marker looking lady was all "Oh I'm sorry." and moves her cart over.

OMG! I wanted to die.

"I'm sorry, I was talking to her." I offered sheepishly and scurried away.

So next time you see me at the store you better get the heck out of my way. Who knows what I'll do next!

Dream a little dream

Don't you wonder what your kids dream about? I do. What goes on in their little subconscious brains? Well I got a peek the other day.

Connor woke up from nap talking about climbing the banana tree outside. Climbing up and eating a banana from the banana tree. You know, the one right outside. The banana tree out side his bedroom window. You know which one right? He just climbed right up there and ate a banana.

He was just adamant about it. He didn't believe us that there wasn't a banana tree outside. We had to go to the window and look. "See honey, no banana tree." He was all confused. It was pretty funny.

He had a banana for lunch right before nap. It's the first time we've had bananas in the house for quite awhile. I guess they really made an impression.

Maddy's party

Imagine a picnic table, decorated with twisted streamers looping around and balloons bouncing joyfully at the end of brightly colored ribbons. Parents chat pleasantly as the children run back and forth from the park to grab bites of pizza. They laugh and chase each other. Presents are opened. Then everyone gathers around 7 lit candles on a carefully decorated birthday cake. “Happy birthday to yoooooou.”

Wouldn’t that have been nice?

To say Maddy’s party was a success would be overstating it. I wouldn’t say it was a total disaster, Maddy thought it was great, but it certainly wasn’t what I had in mind. First off, we had 25 mile an hour winds. So instead of balloons bobbing sweetly, they were whipping around violently. Jostling for position with each other and tangling themselves around anything that was unfortunate enough to get in their way. It was so windy the chips were blowing out of the bowl! I couldn’t hang up streamers in the traditional way so I just had them taped flatly to the beams of the gazebo. All you could hear was wind whipping past your ears so we could barely even speak to each other. "I'm sorry. What did you say?!" Eating was a challenge because you couldn't put anything down without a heavy weight. So you had to hold your plate down on the table with one hand, and you couldn't put your fork down or it would blow away. My body was sore after 3 hours of leaning into the wind.

And I was slightly over prepared since only one person showed up, out of the 7 invites that went out. I made 6 goodie bags. I had a huge cake, 4 pizzas, 30 drinks, and two bowls of chips. All for one friend. Sigh.

We couldn’t even light Maddy’s candles because it was so windy. We just pretended. She had to blow out unlit candles! So pathetic.

Operation Skinny: Week 5

Ok, guys… this is so cool! Google has a site where you can put in your walking path and they tell you how many miles it is and how many calories you burn and what not. You can create a path and save it and keep adding to it as you go. So what I’m going to do is walk from my house to Leominster MA (my home town for those that don’t know me). I will update my walking every week, which might be kinda boring to see me go 20 miles further every week, but I’ll mention it when I cross a state line or some other milestone and you can check it out. I’m currently walking along the Bee Line highway and I just passed Payson AZ. I’m out in the middle of the desert, which is beautiful in it’s own way. As you can see in the picture.

Here's my map.

The Bee Line Highway even won an award for Excellence in Highway Design from the FHWA and they had this to say…

This highway traverses the environmentally sensitive Tonto National Forest, home to various cacti, hawks and other birds, bats, rattlesnakes, beetles, and desert tortoises. Working closely with the US Forest Service to preserve vegetation and animal life during the project, the designer managed a major cactus relocation program that included saguaro, barrel, and prickly pear varieties. Other aesthetic measures included sculpting rock faces with explosives and then staining them to blend with existing rock.

I ate an average of 1,486 calories this week and walked 21 miles. No weight change at all.

Totals:
Weight loss: 2.6 pounds
Walking: 100 miles!

Maddy's letter to Santa

Maddy has taken to spending long periods playing in her room alone. Which is cool. Yesterday she came down and told me she had been talking to Santa. I pulled out a metal notepad and imaginary pen, got ready to find out how much Christmas was going to cost me, and said "Oh yeah? What did you say?"

"I told him he should be nicer."

Ah yes. That's my girl right there. Telling Santa to be nicer. Only Maddy could look at Santa with critical eye.

Dear Santa,

In anticipation of the upcoming Christmas season I've been reviewing your past performance. Last year I asked for a pink flying Pterodactyl and it was not received. I know the Christmas tree was over flowing with gifts, but I asked for a present that does not exist in this entire world and you disappointed me. Your lack of caring is inexcusable and I hope it is not repeated again. Please see to it that I receive the rocking horse that has been on my Christmas List for the past two years. I believe this should be within the scope of your abilities.

Also, you should really work on your attitude. I saw you whipping Dasher as you flew out of sight and I felt that was entirely unnecessary. Please refrain from beating your reindeer in front of the children you claim to care about. I know are under tight time constraints but if you can't control your frustrations please find another mode of transportation. May I suggest a hot air balloon as an alternative.

Lastly, I feel coal as a gift to be a bit harsh. It's hard being a child these days, with all our computers and video games. We often don't get the exercise needed to use up all of our energy. This makes us restless and causes us to act out. Please have some more understanding of our situation and refrain from giving coal. While it's true that I've never heard of a child actually receiving coal in their stocking, the idea of it is just down right disturbing.

Thank you,
Madison.

I tried to avoid it... but to the dr we go.

The nurse called again today. Maddy went to the nurse to get a breathing treatment. (Good thing I signed their paperwork!) Anyways, today was the last dose of the steroid medicine they gave her on Friday. While she is better, she clearly isn't 100%. I can hear her "heezing" if I put my hear to her chest.

I called her lung dr and made her an appointment for Thursday. I really want to get her in to see someone before we head out to the Grand Canyon next week. On the Grand Canyon's website it says specifically that people with lung problems or heart conditions (I think it was) tend to have more problems up there if they aren't used to the altitude. Which we're not.

I hate drs. Her lung dr. has three offices he practices at. One close, one far, and one farther. You can guess how often he is at the close office. Umm... hardly ever. This month he is there on the 9th, and the 29th. That's it. So I took the 9th. What choice did I really have? I am grateful that I don't have to drive across the whole damn valley, though. You would think that the million people on this side of the valley might need a Pediatric Plumologist more that twice a month though. I'm just sayin'.

So she missed school on Friday because she was "heezing", and now I'm going to have to pick her up early to take her to her appointment on Thursday. Because I guess the Pediatric part of the job description doesn't mean that you have after school appointments. But I've ranted about that before.

The truck needs batteries

The battery in the truck is dead. Which is extremely upsetting to Connor. Since we don't drive it very much the battery tends to die down and it usually needs a jump when we do decide to drive it. Which is fine, the van is parked right there in the drive way pretty much waiting to do it's jumping duty. Just raise the garage door, hook up the cables, and go.

But it's deader than that... it's dead dead. We took the truck to Costco and it wouldn't start when we tried to leave. So we had someone help us jump it. Not a huge deal. But Connor was traumatized by the whole thing. For the rest of the day it was practically the only thing he talked about. It was getting comical.

"Truck needs batteries!"
"Yes, it does. The truck needs new batteries."
"Daddy fix truck."
"Yeah, it's fine honey."
"Little fire." Which this one took me a few times to understand what he meant. Little fire? But the alarm went off while Larry was trying to jump it at Costco. For some reason the alarm sets its self when the battery dies. Or maybe it was set already and the battery not having any juice made it go off at a weird time... but it does go off at random times when we try to jump it. Anyways, that's what he was trying to say. That the alarm went off for like a second, like a fire truck... but short.
"Yeah, it sounded like a fire truck."
"uh huh... truck needs batteries."
And repeat.

We had that conversation 7,937 times yesterday. Over and over and over. Poor little guy. I was like "Oh my gosh Connor! Yes the truck needs batteries... give it a rest!"

Operation Skinny: Week 4

Before we start on Operation Skinny I just wanted to let you know what happened with Maddy. The drs. office called in a prescription for a steroid medicine for her. I do remember they did that last time she had a bad asthma attack. Which was also in October, so there must be something in the air this time of year that causes her to not be able to breathe.

Ok, so moving on....

I ate an average of 1,491 calories. Which I was shocked to find out. I thought I did so bad. I started out the week just terrible. I had two days over 1,900, but I guess I did great towards the end of the week, cause I was able to pull it off.

I walked the full 21 miles that is my goal. I know I'm not supposed to say this but my butt is getting firm. lol. You know, under the layer of fat, of course. I was leaning up against something the other day with my hands behind me, between my butt and the object and I was all "wow, check out my butt!" Go ahead, feel it... no, really... go ahead... firm right?

And finally, I have some actual weight loss to report. I lost 1.8 pounds. Yay. Which brings my total to...

Weight loss: 2.6 pounds (halfway to goal #1)
Walking: 79 miles

A day of asthma

Maddy woke up with an asthma attack this morning. I gave her a breathing treatment before school. I thought about keeping her home but went ahead and sent her hoping everything would be ok. I thought about sending her inhaler with her, but decided to send the tubing and a tube of albuterol with her instead. I know they have a nebulizer at school and it does seem more effective.

So off she goes....

I get a call about an hour later from the office saying "You can't send medication to school." First off, F.U. if I think my daughter is going to need her rescue inhaler I'm going to send it. Period. Secondly, I distinctly remember last year the nurse telling me I could send her inhaler with her. And third, she wasn't having an asthma attack right then so who cares? No one needs to do anything.

Anyways, so they call and say...

"You can't send medication to school"
"ok." I replied. Apparently this wasn't the response she was looking for because she then felt she needed to continue to chastise me for sending asthma medication to school with my asthmatic daughter. I don't know what she wanted me to say... I said ok. What else am I supposed to do? I'm not going to apologize. I can tell she wants something else from me so I explained that I had to give her a treatment this morning and I thought she might need it.
"Well we can't give it to her unless you sign a paper."
"ok" I say again. But real nice! So my daughter could be having an asthma attack and they have everything they need to help her and they won't. Super!
"Is she having an asthma attack?" I asked. They said no, and I said, "so I don't see what the big deal is then". To which she replied...
"I'll have the nurse call you when she gets in." Why? Is she going to tell me something different, something that this lady isn't telling me? No. "Is that ok?" She asks.
"I guess."
"Ok, bye" Click.

Then about 30 minutes later I get another call, I assume it's the nurse... nope.

"Hi this is so and so from such and such school. Your daughter is having trouble breathing." DUR!
"Well, I sent some medicine with her. Will you please give it to her?"
"I can't."
"So she is sitting there suffering and you have the tools to help her and you won't?"
"I can't for legal reasons."
"Even though I'm on the phone asking you to give her medication?"
"No, sorry"
"You understand how upsetting this is, that my daughter needs medical attention and you are refusing to help her."
"Well she isn't doing that bad. If she was in danger we would call 911"
"I'm on my way." Click.

I get there and sign their papers and bring Maddy home with me. I gave her another treatment. About an hour and half later she was having trouble again. So I called the nurse hotline that my health insurance has. I like them a lot. She talked to Maddy on the phone and could hear her wheezing and of course could hear her coughing so she said to call her plumologist and see if he could get her in today. She said he might suggest the ER. Gulp! She said if I can't get ahold of him to take her to Urgent Care at least. She really sounded like she wanted me to take her to the ER.

So I called and left a message for the dr. If he doesn't call back before Connor wakes up from his nap then I'm just going to take her down to Urgent Care, assuming she isn't better.

I'll let you know how it goes...