Summer Weeks 4 and 5 - Quick Recap

Heeeeeeeyyyyyy.  

I have so much to do today. We are preparing to go on vacation and I forgot how much stuff there is too pack and prep. 

But I also really want to update the blog because if I don't do it now, well it definite won't get done when I'm home with a billion vacation photos. So this is going to be quick and maybe short. 

Derrick has become very motivated to be potty trained at night. YAY. He told me that if he was dry at night he wanted a Remote Control Spider Man Car. I was thrilled that this was his idea. We made a chart with 20 squares. When he is dry he will get the car. 

We've tried things like this in the past and he usually gets discouraged by how long it takes to earn the prize. So I added a small prize every 5 times he is dry. First he'd get rootbeer, then ice cream, then the DVD Abominable (which I was going to buy anyway, but Hey he said he wanted it as a prize so that's great) and finally the Spider Man Car. 

On Monday June 15th Derrick came into my room at about 6:30 in the morning and announced. "MOM I"M DRY." This was the 5th time he'd been dry and he knew he'd earned rootbeer. He was so proud of what he'd done. I got dressed and we walked to Smith's and bought a case of rootbeer. We came back and he let everyone have a can. 

We'd watched Singing in the Rain the week before and the kids LOVED it. Derrick and Veronica liked to act out one of the scenes.  Here they are doing that.

I went to work in the morning and then the kids and I went swimming in the afternoon. The water was sort of cold and I spent the whole time nearly shivering. After we left the day got colder and by Tuesday we were back in the 60's. 

Charlotte and Lydia are super lucky to be twins. They play Barbies together all day long. They have Frozen Barbies and base a lot of their stories off of the Anya and Elsya youtube channel. (Basically Anya and Elsya are cousins and their mom's are Anna and Elsa.) In Charlotte and Lydia's word Anya and Elsya have baby sisters.  Well they decided to say those babies had grown up a little and started using some other dolls to represent those siblings.  Then they pretended Anna was pregnant with another baby.  They spent a lot of time rearranging their doll house to make room for the new baby.

This is the new babies room.

The now little girls room.

The pet area.

This is Anna in bed with the new baby.

Everyone is crowded around to see the baby.

This next part might have too much TMI for the male readers.  Just giving you a heads up.

I hadn't been feeling well for a few days. I'd feel fine for work, but as soon as work was over I'd feel tired. Sometimes I'd feel dizzy. Other times my arms would feel heavy. It was really strange.

In addition to not feeling well, I realized I had no idea when my last period had been. I've never had a regular cycle, but it's generally every 35 days. I haven't had to track it for years so I haven't really paid attention to what day it starts or what day it should start. I just kind of think back to what was going on the last time I had a period and when it's been about 5 weeks I expect my period to start.

Only this time I can't remember when my last period was because so much of the last three months just blends together. I'm pretty certain I had one in March. And maybe one at the end of April/Beginning of May? But if I did, I cannot remember when it was.

So here we were in the middle of June and I wasn't feeling well and I was tired, and I was beginning to suspect my period was late.

I think you can see where this is going.

I didn't think I was pregnant, but honestly with my track record it wouldn't be outside of the possible universe. Mostly I just wanted to rule out pregnancy as a reason I wasn't feeling well.

So when Derrick and I went to the store to buy a rootbeer we also looked for a pregnancy test. The only ones at Smiths were like $13 and I thought, "Nope, I'm not that curious."

Later that day I went grocery shopping and bought a test for $3 at Winco. On Tuesday morning I took the test. It was negative.  Whew.  I'm not pregnant.

So what's up?

I really don't know. I spent the rest of the week feeling fine in the morning and then crashing in the afternoon. The muscles in my neck got real stiff for a few days.

I started to feel better by the weekend. And now I'm almost back to normal. (I'm still taking naps in the afternoon, but that's more because I choose to and not because my body is crying out for sleep.)

But it's nearly two weeks later and my period still hasn't started. My best guess is that all the stress from the last few months has affected my hormones and that's why my period is late. If it hasn't started by the time we are back from vacation I'm going to make an appointment with my doctor to see if there is anything else going on.

Okay TMI over

When I was at the store on Monday I found a new dish draining rack thingy. We've needed a new and bigger one for a while. So I was happy to see this.

At work our new receptionist came in for some training with me.  She had to give her two weeks notice at her old job so she wasn't able to start for officially for a few weeks. But she was able to come in on Tuesdays to start to see what we do. 

After work I stopped by our new office to mark where on my new desk I wanted my monitor. I knew my boss had talked about repainting the office before we moved in, but I hadn't realized he'd already done it.  It was so fun to walk in and see the bright walls with art hanging on them. 

Our new office has three office rooms.  Each one was painted a really pretty color. One was blue, another orange, and another purple. This is going to be such a great place for our clients - especially the children. 

There were also business cards on my desk. I didn't realize I was going to have my own cards. This is also how I learned that I have been promoted from Administrative Assistant to Office Administrator. 

Brandon's new work is one mile away from my new office. So after leaving my office the kids and I drove over to visit Brandon for a minute.  We met his boss and another co-worker.  Brandon LOVES the people he works with.  He's had very few jobs where he actually liked going to work.  But now he comes home and tells us all about the funny things people say or the good conversations he's had. One day his boss even replied with the correct line when Brandon used a quote from Apollo 13.

While we were there the kids were jumping on top of an old RV couch that was sitting on the floor of the shop. Brandon's boss, Bill, said, "Do you guys want that? It's free."

It took me about 5 seconds to realize it would make a great outdoor couch on our patio and it took me about 30 more seconds to figure out how to fit it in the car along with four kids and a dog.  Brandon put it in the car and we drove home all squished.

When Brandon got home he helped put it in place on the patio.  We covered it with a sheet I'd brought for another outdoor project.  It needed some sort of box underneath to make it higher, but it was good enough to start with.

Here's where it is in relation to the rest of the patio.

I was feeling weak again so I sat on the couch and soon everyone was out there crowded around me.  It was nice to have somewhere comfy to sit. You can't tell, but it was actually pretty cold outside. We had several small blankets keeping us warm. 

Wednesday was another cold day. We'd been scheduled to go swimming at 4:00 so Brandon could meet up with us after work, but it was too cold.  That was fine because I wasn't feeling well. I think this is the day I was dizzy and didn't even trust myself to walk down the stairs. This is how I spent most of my afternoon.

Since the evening was so chilly we borrowed the last two Harry Potter movies from our neighbors and watched the first one for an early movie night. It was actually pleasantly surprised by how well done the movie was. Characters introduced themselves. And people gave important dialogue while facing the camera. I'm sure the move would still have been incomprehensible to someone who hadn't seen the other movies, but it did a decent job of explaining the plot.

On Thursday I realized I was feeling better than I had all week. Brandon and I have noticed that watching action movies somehow usually makes us feel better.  We call it the "Action Movie Cure." I guess that's what worked this time.

Thursday was my last day in the old office. My boss had been taking care of moving everything so there wasn't much I had to do.  I made sure all my office supplies were in my filing cabinet and he took care of the rest.

When Brandon came home from work I took the Honda to get a rock chip repaired. Then I swung by Walmart and Lowes to pick up some things for the house and the garden.

Thursday evening I went out and did some work in the garden.  Our lettuce was nearing the end of it's life and kept trying to go to seed. And despite my best efforts, I couldn't eat it all. I knew it would completely bolt while we were on vacation so it was time to take it out and give it away.

First I took picture to document how well everything is going.

Her's the lettuce. Remember when these were just tiny sprouts?

The forest of peas.

Tomatoes.

Pumpkins. I bought these Furring Stakes at Lowes earlier.  The plan is to train the vines up the stakes and support the fruit with slings.  We'll see how that works.

Onions.  Some of them are developing flower tops.

Beans.

Side View.

Berry Patch.

The raspberry stick that is coming out of dormancy.

Strawberries.

I cut out about 2 and half rows of lettuce. And two rows of green onions.  I spent the evening sorting and washing the leafs. On Friday I put together 7 bags of lettuce and onions to take to some friends who'd said they wanted some.  The kids came with me. They love delivering things to people.  They take turns being the ones to run up to the door.  When they run back to the car they try to jump in through the passenger windows.  Charlotte and Lydia can do it really well.

Friday afternoon we were able to go to the pool again. The day was hot and so getting in the water felt really really good.  It also helped my sore neck feel less stiff.

Derrick wanted me to take a picture of him underwater.

Here are the other kids in the water.  I actually really like the reservation system at the pool this year.  It never feels crowded.  (More people are allowed in the water than this, we were just some of the first people in the water at 4:00.)

Brandon met us at the pool around 4:20. He'd said he was kind of tired and was thinking about not coming, but then he was so hot at work that he was looking forward to jumping in the pool.  The kids were so excited to see him.

We had a good time swimming.  This reminded me so much of all the good times we had swimming as a family in Fort Rucker.

I'd been super proactive and had sloppy joes cooking in the crock pot. So when we got home we just had to change and then we could eat. We decided to eat on the patio. (We eat out there at least twice a week.)

Here are Charlotte and Lydia enjoying plain buns and laying on the couch.

I planted cucumbers in the spot where I took out the lettuce.  Here's a picture of that.

And I'd forgotten to take a picture of the sunflowers so here they are.

After dinner we watched the final Harry Potter Movie. It was really good. The kids loved it.  It took us less than a year to read and watch all the Harry Potter books and movies.

On Saturday we were finally able to turn in the Twin's entries for the Art and Soul art competition. This was supposed to happen in April, but was moved to June.

Here's Charlotte with her house made from Perler Beads (She calls them Fuse Beads).

And Lydia with her pencil drawing.

Here they are together.  We dropped them off at the mall where they will be on display for two weeks.

On our way home we passed a church rummage sale.  I really really really wanted to go check it out. But right now the only thing I really need is patio furniture.  And we could see from the road that they didn't have anything like that.

As we drove through our neighborhood we passed a house that had a big black cupboard out on the side of the road.  It had a FREE sign on it.  I said, "Oh my gosh. That would be perfect to put the couch on!"  So we pulled over and figured out how to shove the heavy cabnet into the jeep.  It stuck out the back about a foot and we couldn't shut the back at all, but we were only a few blocks from home so I didn't mind driving with the back open.

We brought it home and Brandon was skeptical at first.  But after I got it cleaned up and showed him that it was only a few inches shorter than the couch he saw the potential.  He helped me get it into place and put the couch on top. It's a little taller than we want it, but I'm not complaining.

Brandon also made a cute little tent for Charlotte and Lydia's barbie family's to use on camping trips. They took these blurry pictures.

Here's the tent.

Marcia.

Camping Family.

More tent.

Derrick still loves to call people.  On Saturday night he was going through the contacts in the kids phone and asking, "Where's Mrs Fish? I want to call Mrs Fish?"  He could not understand why we didn't have her number and why he couldn't call her. This isn't the first time he's asked for Mrs Fish. The problem is that I'm not sure who this lady is.  She's not one of his teachers or one of the paras that I met. 

So I got on Facebook and looked up anyone with the last name Fish.  I found one that lived in Twin Falls and had a few mutual friends.  I sent her a message saying that I was trying to find a Mrs Fish that worked at Morningside.  She replied that she was who I was looking for.  YAY.  She gave me her number.

On Sunday I told Derrick that I had Mrs Fish's number.  He was so happy!  He called her and talked to her for maybe 30 seconds. He told her about Marcia and later sent her this picture. We also tracked down "Mrs D" on Facebook and he talked to her later in the day.  That was another short conversation, but it meant the world to Derrick that he was able to get in contact with some of his friends.

Veronica has spent a lot of time playing with her magnets.  She's rearranged them into so many different designs for her little bears to live in.

Monday was my first day in our new office. It's so nice to be in a bigger space. Our last place was fine, but it was just a place holder until the practice grew. It's exciting that we are growing enough to have a bigger office.  

Back at home we had plans to go swimming, but first the kids needed to do their job for the day which was clean the bathroom. They were kind of dragging their feet on that until I suggested that we use the time lapse feature on the kids Gabb phone.  They were so excited.  

First we cleaned the kids bathroom, but I didn't have settings right so it didn't record very well.  Which is a shame because Derrick and Veronica worked alongside Charlotte and Lydia.  The twins wanted to try to get a better video so they volunteered to clean my bathroom. That video turned out better.  (Even if their cleaning wasn't as good.) 

We went swimming and had a great time. It was a really hot day so the water felt great.

That evening we made another video of the kids cleaning up dinner. We've done this for nearly three years so they are all really good at doing dinner dishes.  The secret to our success is at the end of the movie.  You can see all of them get a treat out of the treat bucket when they are done. 

On Tuesday the girls had their first church girls activity in a long time. It was a water party at one of the leaders houses. It was at the same time as Derrick's Speech Therapy.  The leader was nice and let Veronica tag along to the activity so I didn't have to find a babysitter for her.

On Wednesday the kids cleaned their rooms. Charlotte and Lydia pretended to shove everything under their bed.

But really they had it all empty under there and set up Charlotte's party light so the dolls could have a dance party.

We were trying to go to the pool at 4:00 to meet Brandon again. But when we got there no one was in the water. There were dark clouds rolling in and the pool was on lightning watch.  So we went home and just turned on the sprinkler.  Derrick was NOT happy.

But the three girls had fun.

Wednesday evening I went grocery shopping for all our vacation food.  That was really fun.  Then Brandon and I stayed up late and I watched him while he replaced the audio adapter to make the DVD sound work in the Honda again. This picture was so I'd remember what station the DVD audio played over.

Watching Brandon work was amazing.  He's like a brain surgeon. He'd already worked on this on Saturday so he'd already figured out all the wires and things. He'd just had to have the part before he could fix it.  (Apparently this is super old technology. The clerk at the car audio store wasn't even sure they had this part, and the package was covered in dust when they found it.) 

Brandon has lots of fun tools like really snips for cutting wires. My job was to hold the flashlight. He got everything fixed and put back together.

I got my desk all organized the way I want it on Thursday. I'm thrilled about the size of my desk. 

I spent a little bit of time in the garden getting things ready for me to neglect it for a few days. I noticed that someone had already wrapped one of the pumpkin vines up a pole.  It was Charlotte.  I had her come take a picture with her handy work.

Our tart cherry tree made four cherries this year.  We picked them.  They were so SOUR!

The peas have turned into a jungle.

They are taller than Charlotte.

The sunflowers are getting taller.

So are the tomatoes.

The beans are starting to climb the strings.

Here's a side view.

There are little strawberries on the plants. 

The raspberry sticks are mostly out of dormancy.

The black berries also seem ready to start some vertical growth.

And look!  Cucumber sprouts.

We spend all Thursday evening packing. Clothes are packed, gear is packed. Food is packed.  It's all sitting in the car and we are going to leave when Brandon gets home from work.

We are going to Washington. We'll visit several different places, but our primary goal is the San Juan Islands. 

This trip has been tricky to plan.  Three parts of our original plan have been cancelled and I had to figure out new plans. One was even cancelled this week. I started out with no reservations at the state parks and now I have 5 nights scheduled at the state parks.  I called San Juan County and Washington State Parks to make sure that they are going to be open.  So far it looks like they will. But the state is requiring everyone to wear a mask in public. 

No matter what, I'm sure this vacation will be memorable.

And I'll definitely tell you all about it when I'm back.