Day Off

I got an unexpected day off today. My youngest child woke up in the middle of the night last night with a nasty, croupy cough. Needless to say, we chose to keep him home today and I stayed home with him. It's been a nice quiet day. I did take him into the doctor this morning to make sure that there was nothing else going on. The doctor stated that his lungs sounded good and his ears were nice and clear. The doctor did prescribe a steroid syrup for my son to help with the inflammation in his throat. Hopefully he will sleep better tonight, which will help speed up his recovery and allow the rest of us a good nights sleep.

Girl Scout Cookie Time

Life has been really busy lately, both at work and at home; so I don't have much to say. I can say support your local Girl Scout (which my daughter is a member of). Right now Girl Scout cookies are being sold; at least they are in Iowa. Girl Scout cookies are delicious and freeze very well. Girls who are selling Girl Scout cookies do so in order to earn money towards camp in the summer. So, even if you order just one box from a Girl Scout, you are helping her earn some money towards summer camp.

Proud to be an American

I had the opportunity this morning to watch Barack Obama take the oath of office and become President Barack Obama, our 44th President. I am proud to say that I voted for him back in November and I am extremely happy that he won the election.

I am excited to see what will happen while President Obama is in office and how the United States will change during this time. I am very hopeful that things will change for the better. I just hope that people clearly understand what President Obama stated in his speech this morning: that it will take time for things to improve. Things are not going to improve overnight and that it might even be a painful process at times.

Game Night

Friday night we turned off the TV, stayed away from the computers, and played games as a family. We ended up playing Twister, Guess Who, and Connect Four. We had lots of fun and laughed a lot, especially while playing Twister.

My 7 year old learned to start thinking strategically while playing Connect Four. It was fun to watch his strategic skills improve with each game we played. He learned to start looking at all possible moves and decide which move was the best one to make. In the end, he did win a couple of games, which made him extremely happy.

I think that we have decided that we need to have "game night" more often.

Cold Weather Day?

With the extremely cold temperatures and even colder wind chills, all area schools, including Des Moines Public have decided to cancel school for tomorrow. Technically, this can't be called a snow day since it isn't the snow that is causing school to be cancelled, so I guess that it needs to be called a "cold weather day." While this means that we will have one more day to make up at the end of the school year, I am looking forward to staying home tomorrow with my children. This has seemed like a long week, and it is only Wednesday; so a day off is a nice reprieve from my busy schedule. It also means that I won't have to be out and about in the too cold for man or beast weather tomorrow, traveling between school buildings.

It is also nice that the school districts gave notice this evening that classes were cancelled for tomorrow. This means that my children don't have to set their alarms and will hopefully sleep in in the morning.

Frustrations

My seven year old son has sucked one specific finger since the day he was born; despite numerous attempts to get him hooked on a pacifier as a baby. Over the past several years we have tried almost everything under the sun to try to get him to stop sucking his finger. We have tried the over-the-counter stuff, putting pickle juice on his finger (he now likes pickles!), putting vinegar on his finger, putting a splint on the finger, putting band-aids on it; nothing worked. As a last resort, we took him to the orthodontist last September. The orthodontist attached a thumb guard; which is a device that is hooked to two of his molars on each side of his upper row of teeth. The device then spans the roof of his mouth, preventing any sucking motion when he puts his finger in his mouth.

Just before Christmas, it was decided that my son was doing so well with not putting his finger in his mouth, that the thumb guard could come out. I was really hopefully that he was completely broken of the habit. He started out really well, even saying that he no longer wanted to suck his finger. However, he has again started sucking his finger. With a great sense of frustration, I called the orthodontist this evening and scheduled an appointment to get the thumb guard placed back into his mouth.

Now, I just hope that this will be the last time we have to do this.

Return to Work

Today was the first day back to work, for me, after a two week break. My children actually don't go back to school until Wednesday because Ankeny School teachers have two days of inservice. Despite the fact that my children didn't have to go to school today, they still had to get up at their "normal" time to go to daycare. My children did a nice job of getting up this morning with their alarms and got ready with no problems. I fear, though, that tomorrow will be another story. All three of them are tired and cranky tonight because they had to be up shortly after 6 am (they have been sleeping in until 7:30 or so over break). I will be sending my 3 1/2 year old to bed early, but my son has Cub Scouts and my daughter has Girl Scouts tonight.

I myself had a good first day back to work, although, I will admit that I, too, am tired as I, too, have been sleeping in over break.