One of those moods

You know how one little thing in your life can set your mood for an hour, day, week, month.  Sometimes you don't know what the thing is that set you off for your mood and sometimes you do.  Sometimes you go into a good mood and sometimes a bad mood.  Well The last two days I have been in an exceptionally good mood.  I guess the bad mood has left and the good mood has come it.  I have caught myself doing stupid little jigs here and there and they make me laugh.  Then in the middle of my day, I go and drop a cup of applesauce on the floor and as I'm looking down to see what I just did, (mind you this is a split second from when I dropped it) a drop flew into my eye blinding me for a couple of minutes and desperately hurting my pride for about 3 seconds.  It was one of those things that it happened so fast my brain couldn't process what was going on and my reflexes didn't take over to SHUT MY EYES fast enough.  After I got as much apple out of my eyes as possible I practically died, because I was in the middle of a session and I just wanted to LAUGH my butt off but I had to keep my composure and stay professional. 

You would think this would drain my mood but NOOOOO it's going to take more than boiled, smashed apples in my eye to ruin my day.  I mean really that was Gods way of saying SMILE at least I didn't spit in you eye :)

Before and After

Before I became a mom I had my favorite set of toys that I loved at work.  I loved the Fisher Price farm/zoo, a handful of books, puzzles, and songs.  I had it down to a point where I didn't even need to plan, I just looked at the child's age, grabbed the 5-7 toys that I could make work with their goals and head off to the room.  In came kid, sit and play for 30-35 minutes then talk to the parents and tell them how to do the same at home.

Along came Elijah.  I thought it would be a wonderful idea to allow Elijah to share in the fun of some of my favorite therapy toys at home.

After: I still have all my great ideas and therapy plans with all of my old favorite toys and stuff, however, I hate using them.  Elijah makes us play with his farm, cars, animals, and some books, EVERY WAKING HOUR.  Don't get me wrong, it's great, he does the cutest things, however, when I go off to work I want to cut my hands off instead of play with those darn toys MORE!  I even got Elijah a Mr. Potato head family but I don't want him to play with it because I am currently using it with, ummmm 95% of my clients and the thought of playing it more on my weekends or evenings is just killing me.  Lesson I have learned from this...All my old therapy toys should remain therapy toys.  Any new toys/games should be Elijah's toys and when I get sick of them at home they get put away for a bit and in a year they will reemerge as therapy toys.  :)

P.S. Please understand that I love my job, and I would never change jobs or make the decision to be a stay at home mother.  I still enjoy seeing a wide range of ages, skills and diagnoses over the course of my day and being able to give the kids back at the end of 45 minutes no matter how good or bad they were. 

Fat Kid in a Little Belt

Do you remember those commercials when the people have buttons popping off their paints and shirts and flying across the room to break something.  Or the people sit and break a chair/bench or something.  Today I had my very own fat moment.  We all know, it's not a secret, that since I have had Elijah, my body has not jumped full speed back to my high school size.  However, I have not done nearly as much as I could to get my body back to the way I would want it.  Do I regularly exercise? No.  Do I eat healthy? Some times. Do I eat out? Some times (probably more than I should).  However, my clothes decided to share in telling me I need to get back to the gym. 

I am wearing a cute new sweater today and it came with a nice belt.  Not an expensive belt, but a belt none the less.  I wore it all day long and at 5:30 I hear a soft pop and I feel not as, um, held in?  I stand up and realize my belt is no longer fastened.  I stand up and fix it thinking, "I wonder how that happened?"  I sit back down its all going good until *pop* again.  Really?  At that point my poor kid was laughing so hard and so was I.  I tried one more time and both of us were just dying.  Off came the belt and on went our session.  At the end I had to explain to mom two things, one why I was no longer wearing a belt and two why her daughter couldn't stop laughing for about 10 minutes. 

I GET IT!  I WILL EVENTUALLY GET BACK IN SHAPE!  Just not this week, or next, maybe in March.  Maybe. 

Choo-Choo!

Elijah was such a good boy today.  He got his hair cut, went shopping, napped for about 30-40 minutes in the car, had lunch then went shopping again.  However, the restaurant we went to lunch at was AWESOME. 

It is called Choo-Choo Johnny's.  And some brilliant person out there must have had a boy that was in love with trains because this place is fantastic for kids between 18 months and 6 years.  The overall restaurant, Eh but Elijah loved it and that is what was cool.  There is a suspended train that drives around the entire diner set up with a model train set in the corner with a town and two trains that  when you press the button the trains go.  In the center of the diner are two large oval tracks that have a counter attached to it.  You sit at the counter like a soda shop and you order your food with your engineer.  Then when your food is ready the engineer will blow the really cool train whistle and out comes a freight train with your food on it.  Elijah loved it.  Every time the train whistle would blow his eyes would get as big as saucers and he would make a huge OH face and start searching to see who was going to get their food next. 

Down fall, so many cool trains and things it was real hard to get Elijah to actually eat his lunch.  Plus the food wasn't anything special, just diner food but like I said, Elijah loved the trains and I would eat there again just to see his face when the train whistle would blow again.

New to blogging?? Words of advice.

More and more people are getting into blogging.  The world is going to paperless everything and that is including journal writing.  Me personally, would never keep a journal, never really wanted to, but some of my best cousins always did.  Therefore, when I saw they started a blog it wasn't that surprising.  These blogs/journals are away to look back on your life and remember where you were certain days of your life.  For me I have such bad ADD the things that jump through my head I enjoy looking back on them and laughing. 

As blogging grows so do ways to access blogs.  I read more and more blogs, some who blog daily some weekly, some monthly and some when ever I tend to forget which ones I like and which ones I don't.  I have begun using the infamous GOOGLE READER!!!  It's great, as your blog authors publish they let you know which ones have new blogs, you want to know what else is great?  If someone deletes a post they wrote, it stays in google reader. 

Moral of the story think long and hard about what you write on your blog.  If this really is the "journal of the future" keep in mind there is even less security than the one you kept under your pillow with the two cent lock on the front.  So instead of just worrying about your brother or sister reading your deepest darkest secret, wants, and desires don't go posting it one the World Wide Web.  There is no permanent delete.  Plus it makes face to face time real awkward. 

Stinky

The other day I was minding my own business and sleeping.  I mean what else is there to do at 2:00 am.  Well prior to that day BJ had been stinking up the house with some horrible farts.  I mean, they were bad.  Green gas was coming out of his but and he was trying to kill the rest of the house.  So fast forward to 2:00 am and he let one rip while he was sleeping.  It was silent though so that wasn't what woke me up, but yet the need to roll over.  So over I go and a sniff, sniff, stinkyness creeps out of the nicely sealed sheets and into my noses.  And right there at 2:03 am it hits me, "I wonder how much that stink eater blanket costs?" YES, someone out there made a blanket that absorbs stinky farts so this does not happen to you.  Then a couple of nights later it happened again.  Now I'm seriously look into this blanket.  Something needs to be done BEFORE I DIE!!!!

It's called the Better marriage blanket.  Are you kidding me?  You have to check this out.  https://bettermarriageblanket.com/

That didn't work

In the movies there is always a time when they have a child or an animal chose between one of it's two human parents.  You know they set the child/animal down and the parents walk away in different directions then the child goes toward one of the parents and that parent wins something.  Tonight we tried that with Elijah and it blew up in our face.  It was really funny.  First we put Elijah down and walked away then turned around and told Elijah to come here.  He walked over to us, stood the exact distance from BJ and I that we were from each other so we made an equilateral triangle.  So BJ and I switched positions and squatted down on the floor and told Eli to come here again.  Elijah squatted down just like us.  BJ then patted the floor and Elijah copied.  Elijah then went into downward Dog and rolled around for awhile. Finally he bumped into my leg meaning I had won/lost the privilege to do his bath. Both BJ and I were laughing due the whole monkey see monkey do game we just played. 

Moral of the story, if BJ and I ever separate, this is not the way to determine child custody.  I think name in a hat would work better.

Practice, Practice, Practice (by BJ)

So many of you may know, and many may not, but I have now been prescribed with an Epi pen.  Well, each prescription consisted of two Epi pens and a practice casing.  When I got home with them, I figured that I better know how to use them so that in the event I was dying, I could save myself.  I practiced about ten times on my leg and put it away for training others later.


Two days later...

Kelly tells me in the morning that she has a story for me that will make me laugh.  However she decided that she was going to leave me in suspense until later that night.  So later that night as we are getting ready to go to bed, she shows me three small bruises on her leg.  When I asked her what in the heck she hit, she tells me her story.

Kelly- So you know how you were practicing with the Epi pen?
Me- Yeah
K- Well I decided that it would be a good idea that I know as well.
Me- Yeah, and?
K- Well I was watching you so I thought it was easy and started using it.  However it would never pop out like it did for you. So...
Me- What did you do?
K- I didn't read the directions and...
Me- You forgot to take off the safety cap didn't you?
K- Maybe!?!?!?

Yeah she totally forgot to take the safety cap off and proceded to hit herself in the leg three times before reading the directions!  Like the title says, Practice, Practice, Practice!

If you ever need to use one here are some key parts to an Epi Pen

Slow weekend.

And just another manic Monday.  Not much special happened.  We had a wonderful wine night with the neighbor girls on Friday.  Saw BJ's work and took Elijah to IKEA for the first time this weekend, and had a celebratory dinner at Maggianos for both BJ's and Jon's new/old jobs. 

The End of Life as we Know It!

Many of you have probably heard by now that the Zodiac calender has changed.  There are now 13 astrological signs instead of the 12 that there used to be.  However, from my understanding there have been no new days added to the regular calender therefore, making this new sign a huge line cutter.  Well there are many people around the world calling no cutsies, but I don't think it is listening.  For me personally, I am no longer a Cancer, but have now become a Gemini.  Not real sure what that means and I don't think my life will change much, but some people are very upset about this.  BJ has also changed from Aries to Pisces. To be perfectly honest though I have never followed astrology very much.  I feel that most of the time your horoscope tells you it is a good day, or bad day, your either getting money or losing money, or that you should/or shouldn't lean toward those big decisions in your life.  However, there are many people out there that live and breath by there Zodiac sign.  They only date people that are compatible with their sign, they check their horoscope daily and even get tattoos of their sign.  Uh Oh, guess that permanent drawing across your entire back/stomach/arm/leg/neck is no longer correct.  I can see it now,

"Hey baby what's your sign? Looks like your a Pisces!  Very nice."
"Well actually I was a Pisces, however, when I got this tattoo my horoscope said big changes were on there way and to wait on making any big decisions.  But I didn't listen so I am now a Aries and it doesnt' look like I will be coming into money for at least 3 more years, so I have to wait until then before I can get this one removed and a new one put on to cover it up.  You still want to buy me a drink?"
"No, I can't date an Aries."

Here are the new signs:

Capricorn: Jan. 20 - Feb. 16

Aquarius: Feb. 16 - March 11
Pisces: March 11- April 18
Aries: April 18 - May 13
Taurus: May 13 - June 21
Gemini: June 21 - July 20
Cancer: July 20 - Aug. 10
Leo: Aug. 10 - Sept. 16
Virgo: Sept. 16 - Oct. 30
Libra: Oct. 30 - Nov. 23
Scorpio: Nov. 23 - Nov. 29
Ophiuchus: Nov. 29 - Dec. 17
Sagittarius: Dec. 17 - Jan. 20

Back pain

As I am sitting with my kiddo at work on Friday playing with Mr. Potato Head, he yells out, "AHH, I threw out my back!"  I turn to look at what he was doing and notice he had opened the back portion of the potato head.  He would then close it, open it back up and say it again.  Finally his phrase became, "I threw out my back! I think I will put my eyes in there."

I couldn't help laughing.  What kid says that?  My little guys do.  It's the reason I love my job.

Final Decision

After several years of trying to sell my bedroom furniture from when I was a child we have finally come to an agreement.  Were not selling it!!!! I have to admit (and I'm sure BJ figured this out a looooooooong time ago) I never wanted to get rid of it.  Here's the thing.  This 5 piece bedroom set is made from real wood from real carpenter.  Not glue plus a bunch of sawdust put together by yours truly, but a beautiful set.  It is heavy and a honey oak color.  BJ kept trying to sell it for the cost of our new set.  The problem being that our new set is worth a whole lot less than the set we own.  I told BJ he could keep trying to sell it but I would not take less than our new set would cost.  Every couple of months our favorite store would price cut our set therefore we would have to follow suit.  I was having such a hard time thinking that I would be giving away this beautiful set.  My other deal, I just had a hard time selling it knowing that some day I would want a guest room in our next home and with that I would love a full bedroom set, therefore having to buy a set like what we were trying to sell.  It just didn't make sense to me, why sell this when in 3 years or so we would need it again?  I JUST CAN'T DO IT CAPTAIN!!!

Well every one is happy now because we found someone with a need and it helps us out A LOT.  My dad will be doing some rearranging and need a bedroom set.  We are lending them our set to furnish my brother's old room until we buy a bigger house that has more bed rooms.  We get the set out of random areas in our house and I (after 3 of the 7 years we will live here) can finally start getting our CRAP room into the CRAFT room of my dreams.  The night stand can leave my entryway and we can go down to having 2 (not 4) night stands in our bedroom.   BJ is just happy that he doesn't have to stare at the dresser every day leaving our bedroom. 

1-11-11

Oh happy day of 1!  What did you do today to remember the day.  I went to work and there was no power.  With no power comes no heat.  It was chilly when I got to work.  However, 10 minutes to 9 the power came back on and it was off to work for me.  By noon the heat finally kicked on really high. 

Other than that nothing super special happened.  How about you?

The Big Desisions

Have you ever had those days when you get home all you want to do is have someone else make all the decisions?  These days are especially difficult when your spouse is in the exact same mood.  BJ and I had a contest tonight on who could make a decision first.  I think I lost. 

What do you want to eat? 
I don't know? Bagel dogs, no wait yogurt, no wait eggs, no wait bagel dogs.  I don't know.
How many bagel dogs do you want? 8, 9, 10, I don't know.
They will be done in 7-10 minutes. I need a bowl.
Big one or little one?
I don't know.
What do you want to watch on TV?
I don't know? Not Glee because is started 20 minutes ago. 

I ended up picking the TV show but I'm not enjoying it one bit.

Wild Out Doors

I left work early today because there was a small electrical problem and once the sun went down we could not see (literally) our kiddos any more.  When I walked into the house and went to let Rescue out, there was a surprise on our back patio.  An opossum was sitting there looking back at me like, "What? What do you want?"  He then headed over and hid under the A/C unit.  Not sure why he was hiding there, but I then needed to walk my rodent searching dog in the freezing cold.  Not happy about that.  I was so cold! 

Can I just tell you how gross and ugly opossums are.  They are a cross between a rat, ugly dog, mole, and a bit of mouse.  EWWWWW.  What do opossums do anyway?  What is there functional purpose?  Do they eat bugs?  I just don't know.  And personally I just don't care.  The best part about the whole thing was my neighbor came over to scare him away.  He went running around the poop filled back yard banging a shovel and yelling.  I wish I could have had that on tape.  HA-LAR-I-OUS!!!  The Opossum moved down  2-3 A/C units, which is fine for me because then I don't have to worry about Rescue getting bit by the rodent. 

Here is something cute though, Elijah reading Tigger a book, and Daddy and Elijah chilling before bed.  I love my boys.  They are certainly cute!

Weekend fun!

It has been a fun start to 2011.  So far BJ has been to the doctor 2 times, and Elijah 1 time.  Elijah received a clean bill of health from the doctor and is weighing in at 25.4 pounds. 

In addition to all our doctor visits, BJ and I have also been to a Blackhawks game, and Wicked.  The Hawks game was awesome, a bit chilly but fun.  I have decided that sports games are good for individuals with ADD, because there is always something going on, and if the game isn't enough for you , then you can always people watch.  It was even cooler that the Hawks won in a shoot out. 

On Saturday we headed off to Wicked.  I think we were the only two people left in Chicago that had not seen Wicked yet.  Luckily, BJ received Wicked tickets for a Christmas gift and off we went.  We found the theater quickly and a parking garage soon after that.  However, in between finding the theater and the parking garage we lost the theater.  Yeah I know, we only parked about 1.5 blocks away from the theater but never the less we still lost it.  We were wandering around downtown in 15 degree weather trying to find the big giant sign with lots of shining lights.  We ended up stopping and asking for direction.  We had dinner and then headed off tho the theater.  It was wonderful.  It gives a whole new spin on the Wizard of Oz.  And now I am dieing to see the movie again.  After it was over, I made an observation about dress code in the theater now days.  I saw people dressed in ball gowns to people dressed in jeans and a ripped t-shirt. 

I would highly recommend seeing Wicked if your ever where the show is. Or even better, you can come out to Chicago, stay with us and see the show. 

Most people think that when the are going to be in a weddin they need to get there body looking good for all the pictures. Sure I think about that, espessially since having Elijah, however, it's not the biggest thing on my mind. It's really the shoes I am worried about. Since I have stopped wearing shoes, because I run around in my socks most of the time at work, I don't do well in heels. I am low tone and it takes a lot of energy to wear heals for short periods of time, let alone long periods of time, like all day.

Well the shoes have been picked for the wedding and I have a lot that I need to do to my body before July. Not only are they heels, but they are steilettos and are about 2 inches high. They are cute, don't get me wrong, they are adorible. Pink and sparkly. However, today I tried to see how long I could last in them, 30 minutes. It's going to be a long couple of months until I can last over 6 hours in the shoes

House on Mouse

Mouse number two has just been caught in our kitchen.  Our once good for nothing dog has decided that she is going to hunt mice now.  Apparently since we took Spiders off her hunting list she has needed to fill the hole in her life with a different creepy critter.  Today she was acting all crazy sniffing under the fridge and the sink and her tail was wagging like crazy.  That used to be her sign that she was on to a big spider, know it means she has something else. 

BJ set the traps before we left for work and when we got home, the bait had been eaten out of one of them but no mouse was in it.  We set it after dinner again and...SNAP!  Funny thing is it snapped at the same time as the dishwasher went into it's dry cycle.  Now the mouse is in the back field, dead. 

P.S. 400th blog. 

P.P.S. The second mouse of the night was just caught...by his tail.  HE was not happy about it.  He made sure he let us know he was in there.

Mr. Itchy

Welcome to my home Mr. Itchy.  What might I be able to get for you tonight?  Some Steroids to decrease your inflammation?  Some Benidrile to decrease your itching?  You're crabby you say?  I'm so sorry to hear that.  Please sit down and try not to scratch so much you start to bleed on my couch. 

Poor B.J. he just can't figure out what is making him itch so bad.  he wakes up every day at 2:00am and his feet, hands, knees, elbows, and ankles are burning from whatever is making him itch so much.  After a couple of benidrile he is able to sleep.  Once he gets to work, the itching seems to stop, then he walks in the door and BAM, itching starts again.  The rest of us, no itching. 

I wish...

• I could blog on my phone any time I think of something I want to blog about.
• I could talk and write something different at the same time.
• I could get organized in my house.
• there were 8 days in a week, with three of the days weekend days.  2 weekend days, 2 work days, 1 day off, 3 work days.
• I was magical.
• housework would do it's self.
• bills would pay themselves.
• I could stay warm during the winter.
• Christmas would leave my house.
• I had a bunch of new clothes.

These aren't mine

The last few weeks/days have been real crazy in both my life and other peoples lives around me.  In addition to all the holidays and sickness that has been going my father's washer decided to stop working.  Well when you have three adults in a house they create a bunch of laundry and it grows quickly.  Plus my poor sister was supposed to leave on a road trip with her friend but had no clean laundry.  Thursday when my step-mom came to watch Elijah she asked if she could do some of their laundry while she was here.  I said of course, I mean BJ and I lived there for 3 months and lord knows we did plenty of laundry while we were there, plus she was watching Elijah for free, it's a great way to pay her.  Well fast forward to 7:00 pm on Sunday night, I realize I didn't do any laundry and I need to get cracking.  I start throwing laundry into the washer, 1 out of every 10 pieces misses the washer so I grab all I see and throw it in.  Once it's all washed and dried, BJ and I start folding it.  I find a pair of underwear that looks like mine, but I don't recognize them. 

Me: I don't remember wearing these.
BJ: I don't know?
Me: I don't think these are mine, I mean look the dog hasn't chewed on these ones.
BJ: (faster than a speeding bullet) Don't look at me? Um..Um..Um.. There not mine.  I don't know where they came from.  Uhhhh...Maybe there your sisters.

I was never worried.  I figured I probably wore a pair of undies and didn't remember.  It wouldn't have been the first time I had forgotten something the you would think you shouldn't forget.  And yes, they do belong to my sister.  She thought it was super funny when I told her we had a pair of her undies.

2011: Nothing new yet

The end of 2010 was full of colds, fevers, and other odd, but small ailments in the Okel home.  It is 2011 and we have already made two calls to on call doctors, visited the convenient care, been to the pharmacy 2x and called the mail order pharmacy 1x.  I have probably taken Elijah's temperature close to 100x and Elijah has taken my about 50. 

Common family, lets get our immune systems up and running for the new year.