Whenever Josh and I have several unrelated things to relate to one another during the day, we often send each other an e-mail with the subject "Odds and Ends" and then list the items we want to communicate. It wasn't something that we decided on ahead of time. I just titled a message with that subject line and it just stuck and became a common communication tool for us. It keeps me from forgetting to tell him things, but it also keeps me from having to call him every hour. Tonight, I feel like everything I have to communicate is just "odds and ends".
1. I took Elias to the ENT to have his 6 month check-up. It seems that the Singular, Zyrtec, and Albutirol regimen he is on isn't controlling his allergy/asthma symptoms enough. He also has now lost both his ear tubes that had been put back in when his tonsils and adenoids were removed when he was 4. Now both ears have fluid in them. The right ear, which is the one that recently lost the tube is extremely full. The left ear, which had lost the tube only a few months after being replaced in the ear, has just has a tiny bit of fluid. The left ear seems like it will be fine without further tubes or medical intervention. The jury is still out about the right one. So now, Elias' Albutirol inhaler has been replaced with Pulmicort (again). Pulmicort works really well for him, but it is a bit more bothersome to administer, since it has to be inhaled as a mist from a nebullizer. He also got put on an antibiotic to assure that the fluid in his ears and the congestion in his lungs doesn't turn into an infection. So when I went to the pharmacy, the bill was around $150 after insurance - and that was just for the anti-biotic and Pulmicort. If we are going to have to pay that much every month, it is going to require some major budget adjustments! I just pray that maybe he will be able to go back off the Pulmicort after allergy season dies down a little.
2. Josh recently finished getting the swing set painted and new chains put on the swings. It looks much better, but still feels a bit unsteady. The kids love having it, despite its flaws.
3. Elias went out to play and then came into the warm house. His nose started bleeding uncontrollably. It took us over 30 minutes to get it stopped and we pulled out every first aid trick we ever had learned to get it to finally slow enough to clot. He has frequent nose bleeds (thanks to Josh who also has a long history of nose bleeds - as recent as last week when he had a horrible one at work), but this was by far his worst one. Elias is so used to them, that he is great about knowing what he needs to do to get it to stop, but after the first 15 to 20 minutes, he was getting so frustrated and antsy. We all breathed a sigh of relief when it was finally done.
4. I have decided that I am going to keep Elias home tomorrow from school. I just feel like we all need a day to rest and recuperate. His nose is still pretty tentative and I wouldn't want him to have to deal with a nose bleed like that at the school.
5. I dropped a can of soda today and I had a major mess to clean up. The floor still feels sticky after a thorough mopping. I will have to mop it again tomorrow. It is amazing how far and wide an exploding can of soda can reach and just how sticky it makes everything. And to think all of that ends up in our stomachs. Hmmm....
6. I booked my flight to Florida to meet up with the team going to Peru. Even though I have flown many times, I don't really enjoy to fly. I have just watched too many movies about crashing planes. I know the statistics of how much safer plane travel is than car travel, but I cannot feel 100% comfortable about being suspended in thin air on a plane that weighs several tons. The feeling of the take off is especially nerve-racking. I don't think I breath the entire time the plane is making its ascent. When we finally reach altitude, I remove my fingernails from the arm rests and finally take my first deep breath.
7. Elias has recently asked us to tell him stories at bed time about our lives before he was born. At first, I couldn't think of any stories to tell him, but now I have found that if I take something that happened during our day (like an exploding can of soda) and recall a time when something similar happened to me in the past, it becomes easy and fun. It feels good to be telling these stories about the unimpressive, non-monumental times of our lives. It makes me feel like I live in a past time when all traditions and stories were passed to the next generation through stories, since there was not much written or documented history. The uneventful times shape us just as much as the life-changing circumstances.
8. We became members of Netflix again recently. We used to be members, but we just didn't have the time to watch movies and the Red Box was there when we did want to watch something. But the problem with Red Box is that you only have a very small selection of movies to choose from and if you don't get a movie within a few weeks of it being out on DVD your chances of getting to see it are slim. Also, since Josh and I are extremely choosy about the movies we watch anyway, most of the content of the movies in the Red Box don't really fit into our criteria. So we have been watching a lot of movies that have never been block busters or even talked about from Hollywood, but have really been enjoyable movies. Also, there is so much more selection for kids movies. And this is great because we are just as choosy about what we want them watching.
9. This leads me into the next line item. We recently ordered and received, free with our netflix membership, a disc that we put in our Wii and it lets us stream 100s of movies and television shows instantly to our t.v.. Now this is very cool, but really troublesome at the same time. It is great because when the kids say, "I want to watch a movie.", we can go in and in minutes they can be watching movies that we feel good about them seeing. It is troublesome for two reasons. First, there is no filter on this disc, so there are some very trashy movies that appear right beside decent titles. Second, we have wasted about 3-4 hours in the last week watching things just because we can. In the past week, we have watched things like "The Greatest American Hero", "Quantum Leap", and the beginning of the original movie "Hairspray". All of these at one time were some of my favorites. Now as I watch them, it makes me feel nostalgic, but the nostalgia wears off fast as I realize just how poorly made and corny they are. And then I realize that the time I am using to watch these things could be better used in so many other ways - like Bible study or exercising or talking to Josh, etc.
10. Every night I feel like I didn't get enough accomplished in my day and that I would be much more effective if I just got more sleep. Then, I stay up anyway and kick myself again in the morning!
And with that, I am signing off!
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