Teen Dreams of iPhone

My 13-year-old is asking for an iPhone because a few of her friends have them.  I'd be worried about the dog chewing it up or her losing it.  Do you know how many times I have to call her cell phone so we can find it?  I'd need to find insurance for iphones to set my mind at ease.  Maybe when she's older and can help pay for it, I'll google iphone 4 insurance and see what we can do about insuring an expensive item like that if she'll help pay for it.

It doesn't help that I have an iPod Touch that looks like her friends' iPhones.  I got my iPod as a gift for a job well done.  Considering a need a crow bar to even get her out of bed in the morning, or by noon, she's not earned anything!

How to tell if a child or adult is drowning - very surprising information!!

Do you know the drowning you see on television isn't usually the way drownings occur?  Every parent should read this article here.  I had no idea.

Another important article to read, about dry drowning, can be read here.

Baby Walker for Baby Shower Gift

My husband's second cousin (or is it cousin once removed?) has a baby shower next week that she invited me to.  I can't attend but I'd like to send a gift so I am looking at a baby walker.  We used them safely for our children on the lowest level (do not use them around stairs) when they were developed enough and they loved it! 

I remember my daughter had an activity walker but I don't remember what brand it was.  It looked like this Chicco Activity Baby Walker.  That one was a favorite.  Then there is the Disney Botanical Baby Walker that is just too cute.  What child doesn't like Tigger and Winnie the Pooh?  My stepson carried his Winnie the Pooh with him everywhere when he was a baby! 

Choices, choices.  I know whichever I decide, it will definitely get put to good use.  They're great for entertaining the little ones.

How did Father's Day go?

I hope everybody's Father's Day went well.  I'm sure there were dads everywhere getting big ticket items like a LCD TV, fishing gear, golf gear, etc. My husband got a new guitar and our four kids adoring him (his older two children didn't bother to contact him).

Bikes and guitars are his thing so we went with a Yamaha acoustic guitar.  He's been trying to get me to give up my Yamaha acoustic to him for months now so now he has his own! You would think that would stop him from wanting mine but, of course, it hasn't.  He always wants what he can't have until he gets it.  It drives me crazy.

Gift Ideas for In-Laws

We are going to visit the in-laws next month and I am looking for outdoor gift ideas for them.  We've bought them garden fairies and made homemade stepping stones with all of our kids' handprints in them.  They have statues and a water fountain already.  I am looking for other ideas for their rural setting like perhaps garden windmills or something like that. They come in different colors so it'd be easy to match their house. 

I have no idea.  Gift ideas for the in-laws are getting more difficult each year because they buy what they need when they need it.

Forgetting the Woman You Were

The weight scale is starting to come down again.  Since having my fourth child, it's been impossible to get the weight off because of my thyroid disease so it's been nice to see the weight come off now with my new thyroid medicine.  It makes me feel better in my clothes and revving up interest again in finding some pretty lingerie to sleep in again.

Between four children, two stepchildren, work and my health, it becomes too easy to forget to feel pretty about myself sometimes.  Losing weight is helping me feel like me again.  I used to be a fun "me" so it's nice to remember she still exists underneath all the daily "mom" needs that can sometimes swamp a mother.

Pecked to Death by a Duck

I saw this little sign in a country store and couldn't resist buying it and hanging it in my house.  Of course, my kids don't appreciate it but they will...when they have their own kids. 

It's amazing how much love you can feel for these little people and in the next minute, they're frustrating the heck out of ya.  It's enough to send me to prototype 37c in fear of wrinkles!

We have about nine weeks together and I'm trying to figure out how to keep things fun but organized, interesting without major frustration.  It's the last summer before my littlest one goes off to school.  Then she turns into one of THEM and she's no longer my baby anymore.

"Before" Fat Picture

I forgot to tell a little tidbit one of my kids did today when I was talking about weight in my previous post...

My oldest daughter snapped a picture of me today, unexpectedly, in my pajamas.  I was horrified!  I can't stand the way I look in pictures.  I guess they tell the truth and I can't stand seeing how much more weight I still have left to lose.  I looked like I needed to find diet pills that work. It took me all of three seconds to delete that picture to ensure it never showed up on facebook or anywhere else. 

What I should do is take a "before" picture of me now in the hopes that eventually I will have an "after" picture to compare it too.  I've thought about doing that before but I'd be really horrified actually.

Picking a Weight Loss Supplement

How do you pick a weight loss supplement?  Do you just pick up something off the store shelf and hope for the best?  Do you talk to your doctor?  Do you research online with the company?  Do you look for scams?  For instance, if I was considering Apidexin, I'd want to look up reviews from real people as was as google apidexin scam and make sure it was a legitimate supplement.

I would also talk to my doctor because I take medication for asthma and thyroid disease. It would be very important to me to make sure there wouldn't be any dangerous interactions, especially because of my thyroid medication.

Rent a Fetal Doppler

When I was pregnant, we had to wait for doctor appointments to hear our baby's heartbeat.  Now I hear that you can rent your own fetal doppler!  You can set your mind at ease or share with anybody and everybody as you wish of your little's one beating heart, especially the first few months when assurances seem more necessary (and appreciated) than after that worrisome three-month point.  How cool is that? 

I always loved hearing the heartbeat and then seeing the ultrasounds for a little preview of the little one.  Plus, I always wanted to know whether we were having a boy or girl so we always found out. 

Things have advanced so much in the five years since I gave birth to our youngest child.  I wish losing that extra baby weight naturally or with a weight loss dietary supplement would advance just as quickly!  They say nursing helps you lose weight and I nursed for two years.  Because of my thyroid, all that weight that was supposed to drop off...let's just say I'm still carrying too much of it five years later.

Am I Infertile?

I am contemplating whether I should make an appointment now with my gynecologist to see if my illness made me infertile or just wait until my normal appointment in August.  Part of me thinks it would be ok if I was but there is a part of me that doesn't like the fact that the choice may have been taken away from me.  I guess I'm a control freak that way. 

We talked about being done having children but to make it "permanently" done with no chance whatsoever (because, let's face it, there's always a chance with two fertile people), I didn't plan for my choice to be taken from me like that.  We have six children total (two "his" and four "ours") and that is a lot of kids!  Our youngest is getting ready to start kindergarten and if ever there was a time when I'd start feeling the urge for another baby, it'd be when I put my last baby on the bus the first time.  Was I really done with diapers, breastfeeding, personalized baby gifts, and soft baby skin and smells? 

I won't know until I have more tests done.  The question is do I get my answer now no matter what it is or wait so I don't have to know yet?  I am not sure if I am ready to hear the answer to that yet.

Might Be Infertile Now

I was looking for one of my posts about car insurance (should just go to carinsurancelist.com instead of wandering through one of my dozen blogs looking for my notes) when I realized I was posting about my illness on here, and my stay at the hospital, and yet I never wrote what I was in the hospital for. Big duh!

I was hospitalized with Pelvic Inflammatory Disease due to bacterial vaginosis.  Usually it is STD related but in our case, as all the hospital tests proved to the disbelieving doctors, that was not the case for us.  I can't believe how unbelieveable people (doctors in our case) find it that married couples are actually faithful to each other!  They were seriously irritating to both myself and my husband for the entire time I was in the hospital.

Doctor to me:  "Are you married?"

Me:  "Yes."

Doctor:  "Do you have multiple partners?"

Me (thinking didn't I just answer that when I said I was married):  "Of course not, I'm married."

Doctor:  "Does your husband have multiple partners?"

Me:  "Not if he knows what is good for him.  No, he wouldn't do that to me or to us."

I received these questions throughought my 2-1/2 day stay at the hospital.  I was horribly sick from the antibiotics and even hallucinating (those were seriously freaky) from them and then to have irritating doctors asking these repeated questions...ugh!  The test results, which took a few days, shut those questions up thankfully.

So I was hospitalized for several days and given major antibiotics through the IV.  I was so bad, they were worried about abcesses and the need for surgerty.  I may be infertile now but I won't know more until I see my gynecologist for further testing to see if there is scarring and how bad. 

Pictures of Burned Little Boy So Sad

I saw a picture of the little boy I posted about yesterday who fell into a campfire while with his grandparents.  It is so very sad.  He's so little and wrapped up like a mummy.  I feel so bad for him. 

I'm not sure what those picture were doing posted on somebody's facebook - I can't imagine doing that!  That's just too horrific and too private.

If this happened to one of my kids while my kids were in the care of one of their grandparents, I'm not sure what I'd do, or not do.  I'd have to walk away or have them wishing they had a good life insurance rate because I'd want to strike out at them.

I know accidents happen but what business does a three-year-old child have around a campfire without an adult hanging onto him dearly?  It's like leaving a child on the edge of a pool unattended.  You just don't do it!

Best Blackhead Removal

Can somebody tell me what is the best way to get rid of a blackhead?  I've had this little bugger forever and no matter what I use on it, it stays underneath the skin.  I've tried over-the-counter acne treatments and different types of cleansers.  I've read that pronexin is supposed to be good but I don't have major acne problems so I'm not sure if this would be overkill for one tiny blemish. I have the occasional acne problem and one stubborn blackhead.

Anybody have any suggestions?

Always Ask for copies of Medical Reports and Labs

I found out after going back to the hospital to ask for copies of my lab results that the CT scan they'd done to check my appendix showed diverticulosis AND gallstones.  The bad thing is (like that's not bad enough), neither the ER doctor or my floor doctor while I was in the hospital mentioned those findings to me.  I would never have known about it had I not gone and asked for those records! 

I think it was sorta important for them to tell me.  There are things I can to do (diet, medical care) to try to ward off a gallstone attack, forming more gallstones for blockage, or my diverticulosis turning into diverticulitis.  I see a little bit of pain in my future and some changes in my diet.  Another benefit to that would probably be weight loss.  Hey, some people use ephedra diet pills and I use illnesses to lose weight. *sigh* Not really...just trying to find humor in a situation I don't see much humor in.

My Stay at the Hospital

Today has been the first time in awhile that I've been able to post.  I was really sick and hospitalized for awhile.  I missed my kids while in the hospital, even though my husband brought up our littlest one in the morning and then all of them in the evenings to see me.  It's not the same - being away from them and missing things.

Even though I felt horrible, I was ecstatic when they discharged me from the hospital.  I took a good look in the mirror the morning I was to be discharged and was shocked to see the zits I'd accumulated around my nose.  I looked like I needed the best acne products instead of antibiotics for my infection. Ha ha. Plus, when you can smell yourself, you know the desperate need of a shower! 

My "private" room wasn't so private in terms of bathroom needs.  It was more like a prison cell.  The toilet was IN the room across from my bed with just a curtain to pull around for privacy.  I am a very private person (married 14.5 years and still have never gone to the bathroom in front of my husband before) so having the toilet IN my room was just plain weird.

Be Cautious with Fire This Summer

With summer here, many people are enjoying the outdoors with campfires.  We have a fire pit in our yard as well, which my husband enjoys (me, not so much).  It makes me nervous even though my kids are starting to get old enough to know better.  Accidents can still happen.  We just heard of a friend of a friend whose three-year-old fell INTO a campfire over the weekend.  How horribly sad for the little child who had to be airlifted out.  Was the three-year-old not holding an adult's hand around that fire?  It's scary!  Avoidable accidents where young children are hurt like this make me very sad.

I'd probably be nervous to even use a fireplace around younger children that age.  I'd be more apt to try an electric fireplace insert instead.  I am overly cautious when it comes to safety with my kids, even though I know it drives them crazy.  Whether it is a fireplace, campfire, or enclosed fire pit, please watch young children.  They have no business close enough to fire to risk being hurt!