What a Dreary Week...

The kids had the day off from school on Monday and we didn’t do a whole lot, which was nice. I did get a lot done around the house and the kids got to have fun cleaning, vacuuming and dusting their rooms. Then we made cookies and Jackson and Ellie helped me with those. That evening we went out to eat at Colton’s for Tom’s 77^th birthday. When we got home, I decided to get out the new tv we got to put in our bedroom. I was happy with the deal I got on it through Amazon Warehouse, but then when I was showing it to Andrew, I noticed the screen was actually coming loose on the top. So I immediately boxed it back up and set up a return. I decided to go ahead and look at WalMart online to see if they happened to have anything in-store and I found one that wasn’t a well-known brand but the reviews on Wal-Mart and several other sites were good plus it was a few dollars cheaper than the one I got through Amazon, so I decided to go for it. I picked up a few grocery items and then went to get the TV, but couldn’t find it. So, I asked an employee and she helped me find what was actually the last one in the store and it was marked 10% off, plus it must have been marked down even more before that because it was $86 cheaper than it was online. I was pretty pleased.

Tuesday was back to school. I did another ride on Zwift and then picked up the twins from school. I had plans to get the new TV mounted and got it all measured out. Andrew came home early to do a ride, so he helped me get the TV up and we moved the bike so we could connect the computer to the TV. Then after I picked up the kids from school, I got the pictures back up on the walls and cleaned up. Jackson also helped me take Andrew’s old dresser down to the basement to store away until one of our kids need it when they move out. Ellie had basketball after school and was excited to learn that she would actually get a uniform and could play in some games. We were leery of letting her play as we didn’t want to take any play time away from the girls who were supposed to actually be on the team, but Brett insisted it would be fine. And being a fourth grader, her time would be limited anyways. The problem was that their games are on Tuesdays and Thursdays and she has dance on Thursdays and won’t be able to be at those games. Everyone was okay with that though.  Ellie got a ride home with Brett and then we had some excited kids since we were having lemon chicken for dinner that night. After dinner, they were helping clean up and I told Jackson and Ellie that when we were done, we were going to take all the trash and recycling to the curb. And I have to brag on Jackson because he told Ellie and I that he would take care of it and we didn’t have to do anything…good kid!

Wednesday I got a swim in and cleaned the bathrooms before a guy came from Dish to switch up our boxes for the new setup in our bedroom. Andrew had a big hearing where his client made a plea deal that turned out well for him. So, Andrew didn’t have to be in court the next several days. The twins spent a lot of the afternoon acting like dogs while playing in their “cage” that consisted of all the stools turned upside down in a circle stacked with pillows, blankets and random toys. They also did Star War Lego battles.

I finally got our new laptop and it actually worked, so I spent a lot of time transferring files and downloading programs onto it, transferring files to a new external hard drive since one of mine was oing bad and cleaning up the old hard drive and laptop. Then it was time to patch up some holes from the Dish wiring in our room and paint those and finish cleaning up the hosue. And I also made a new cake, Kentucky Butter Cake, for our first day back to bible study the next day. Jackson had basketball practice after school and Andrew picked up the kids and dropped him off, which was nice. We ended up having a later dinner and then Jackson wanted to give Zwift a go. So Andrew started working on setting that up for him while I finished cleaning up after dinner. Well, something wasn’t connecting right, so I went to work on that and Miles came to inform me that Buddy tried to eat the cake…actually he got a bite out of it. I was so frustrated and also couldn’t figure what was wrong with Zwift. Andrew sensed it and offered several solutions, including going to Hy-Vee to get something else to replace the cake. I told him not to worry about that but he did have the kids work on some of the cleaning I still needed to get done-they made sure the basement was clean, vacuumed upstairs and mopped the floor. And I was finally able to figure out what was wrong with Zwift and we got it going for Jackson. It was tough for him, but I think he had fun with it. Ellie decided to try it out to, but the bike was definitely too big for her. Miles was busy making “cookies” and he tried to offer some to Jackson while he was riding.

And the twins finally decided they wanted to wear their Nacho costumes and they were perfect J.

Thursday morning I started back with my bible study. We just met to discuss what study we wanted to do next. I got a surprise for all of them to brighten things up during the dreary days of winter and got them all bottles of the beach-scented hand lotion my mom got for all of us girls for Christmas. Little K started up again that afternoon. Lincoln went but Ellie wanted to go to basketball practice because she said she needed to work on some plays. So we dropped her off there after school and I picked her up when she was done and brought her some pizza to eat for dinner before she had to get to dance class. She also really wanted to a piece of the cake and she said she could just “shove it in her mouth quickly”. Andrew was able to pick Lincoln up for me, since they had to be picked up at the same time. Ellie got to start a new jazz dance that she was excited about. My dad ended up having a procedure done to stretch his esophagus to help with some swallowing issues he has been having. So, I ended up heading to the hospital and hung out with my mom for a bit while he was back in surgery. When he was done, the surgeon said everything looked good and he wasn’t quite sure why he keeps having these issues. It was nice to hear it wasn’t anything to serious and after a bit, he was released and they went home.

Friday, my mom went to Columbia with the twins and I. The dreariness and fog continued for most of the day. We went to Sam’s, I made some returns at Kohls, stopped by Hobby Lobby and then we ate at Chick Fil A so the boys could play in the play area. My mom was live-streaming the inauguration because she didn’t really want to miss it. We made a couple more stops, let the boys play at the mall and then made our way home. We got home by 2:30 and I was able to unload everything and get it put away before Andrew came home with the kids. Jackson actually had his small group changed to Friday after school, so he went there and then Andrew picked him up later and went to the office for a bit. We had a new dresser for Andrew delivered that afternoon and after we got that, we took the kids to La Fuente for dinner. They had been asking to go for a while. We got there earlier and were able to get in and out pretty quickly. Then we ran by Red Box and picked up a movie to watch that night. But first, when we got home, Andrew and I worked on getting the dresser into the bedroom and getting some holes drilled to run cords through and got everything set up. Then Jackson turned on the movie for our family movie night.

Saturday morning, Andrew took the kids to the ranch. Then they decided to get breakfast for themselves-Fruit Loops without milk in coffee filters.

I rode in a virtual London and then we ended up going to my parents because Andy and his family had come into town. First, Jackson and Ellie had to let Daisy out since they were in charge of her while the LaBeths were out of town. So we spent the afternoon over there with the kids playing and then came back home that evening. I got my grocery shopping done that evening and then we didn’t do much else except make sure Daisy was let out a couple more times. The dreariness continued on through Sunday. We went to church then I got to work with some finishing touches in our bathroom. I recaulked an area between the backsplash of the vanity and the bottom of the mirror so that I could actually paint it since the caulk that was on there couldn’t be painted and some green still peeked through. I also put up a print we got from Autumn for our wedding that I put in a different frame I found at Hobby Lobby and spray painted. The newly caulked area got a couple coats of paint and I think that was the end of the minor renovation of our bedroom/bathroom.

Jackson had hitting camp and Andrew went to the office for a little bit and then we all went to Leisure World for Noah’s birthday party. The kids were excited about getting to skate again. We were only there around 20 minutes when I walked over to the rink to watch the kids and got there just in time to see Lincoln bite it and he face planted. He got up and was holding his mouth, crying as he came over to me. His nose was bleeding pretty well and he was freaking out. Jonathan and Leslie tried to look in his mouth with their phone flashlights and we couldn’t see anything that looked bad, so we assumed it was just his nose. Andrew was trying to get him to calm down, but I think his nose was really hurting. We got him some water to drink but then he started complaining of his stomach hurting quite a bit and was writhing around. Then he started acting odd. We thought he was going to throw up but then he acted like he was going to pass out. He became a bit incoherent, got limp and kept trying to close his eyes. I tried putting the ice pack on his head to wake him up and Leslie got him a wet towel to put on his forehead. It was at that point that Leslie thought that maybe we should meet my dad at the emergency room. I called my dad as I tried to get the kids out of their skates and out of the skating rink since Andrew had already taken Lincoln outside. By the time we got outside, Lincoln seemed to be a little bit more alert, so we called my dad back and decided to just meet him at the office. He did a neuro assessment and everything checked out fine. He thinks he just had a vasovagal response to the pain which led to the passing out and stomach pain (and some of that from swallowing blood). So we headed home and I set him up with some clear Gatorade, a dose of ibuprofen and a movie on his Kindle. Soon, Ty came over and they watched a movie together and he seemed much better. He was definitely better by the end of the day, it was just kind of scary watching him start acting that way.

Ellie got to spend the rest of the afternoon with a friend who has had to miss school for several weeks because she ended up with a tumor on her jaw and they are trying to figure out everything as far as having it removed (it is benign) and I guess her skin is pretty thin and fragile around the tumor, so they don’t want her in school or activities until it is removed. So they spent the afternoon hanging out and doing crafts. Andrew did a bike ride and I planned to, but spent the evening making dinner, cleaning up and doing some work for the office.