And We're Back!

Caroline and I are back from visiting my family this past week. We had a wonderful time and enjoyed being pampered by my mom and Gene (aka Nana and Papa). As you all know, we got hit by a snowstorm so that delayed our trip by a night. Caroline and I traveled to Nashville and then spent the night in a hotel. We had so much fun...a girl's night!

Caroline was spoiled rotten by Nana and Papa. She had a constant play companion and had everyone 'on call'. I was able to spend time learning/working my mom's new embroidery and sewing machine. Unfortunately, I am taking it to the repair center because something is wrong with the computer screen. I can't wait to start monogramming all her ribbons and shirts, after all, a girl can't live in the South without monogramming!

Since I have been back home, I have hit the ground running. I have a super busy week with a HUGE consignment sale (I'm working 12 hours), a tennis match, the teacher appreciation luncheon (postponed) on Friday and dogsitting my sister's two dogs. I am also trying to get my coupons organized for the Publix Italian Days Sale. We will be stocking up on Progresso Soup, Pillsbury Bread, and Whole Wheat Pasta. At 15cents a box (after coupon), I urge you to buy several boxes and donate them to the Food Pantry!!! Of course, once I get my coupons in order and shop, it will be time to gather the next batch.

I am trying a new recipe this week and I can't wait to post the recipe. My mom fixed it for us and it was YUMMY! I have most of the ingredients in my stockpile, but will be buying a few needed items. I'm also substituting turkey breast for hamburger meat. Since my week is so busy, I'm trying to cook as much ahead of time, to help reduce stress. Tonight, I cooked a honey glazed spiral sliced ham and veggies. It made enough for sandwiches and dinner tomorrow night. It was my first time to cook a ham and I must say, I was quite pleased (not to mention the fact I only paid $8 for a 10 pound ham at Kroger, just made it better).

We celebrated Valentine's Day with Caroline and just loved on her! We gave her some DVD's, candy, cookies, puzzles, and a new furry hat/mitten set. She was so sweet when she opened her gifts. I told her it was "I Love You Day" and these were 'just because we loved you'. She grabbed me and hugged me so tight. So SWEET!

Okay, enough rambling...pictures of Caroline soon!! I promise!

What is it?

Something must be wrong with me....I'm cleaning and washing dishes! If you know me, you know that this IS something I HATE doing. I must be pregnant??? Just joking!

OUT OF COFFEE!!! Kinda...

I am a lover of coffee! Always have been and probably always will! It helps me get up in the morning and nothing beats the smell of brewing coffee filtering into the bedroom from the kitchen! When I was teaching, my students used to know "don't talk to Mrs. Rose until she finishes her coffee" and I even had one kindergarten student ask "Mrs. Rose, did you have your coffee this morning because you are awfully crabby!" Yep, I am COFFEE LOVER! I ALWAYS have plenty of coffee in stock and I don't know if I've ever been out.

This morning, Caroline and I woke up at 10:15. My eyes are super swollen and my body is aching. It was a ROUGH night and I think we went to sleep when normal people were getting up. :( Anyway, Tim had a tennis match this morning and I knew I could count on him to have the coffee made (he almost always does!). I ventured into the kitchen to find the filter in the pot, nothing on and 6 bags of unopened coffee on the counter. WHAT? Why did he do this? Is this some sick joke?? I walked closer to find all the bags were whole bean and not ground. Why is this a problem??? Well, I don't have a grinder!! YIKES!!!!! My body is so tired, eyes swollen, I survived a hellacious night and now I CAN'T HAVE MY COFFEE!!!!!

I bet I know what I buy today at the store! Do you??

It's 9:05 PM

Okay, my dear blogger friends, it's 9:05 PM and I am sitting in my bed watching Lost (my FAVORITE show!), snacking on free popcorn, and listening to Caroline cry in her room. It's been one of those weeks. Caroline has been sick since last Wednesday and is on some major medicine. We've been doing breathing treatments every 4 hours around the clock, an inhaler for her seasonal asthma twice a day, and is now taking an oral steroid for five days. Yep, you read all that right...'little one' is super sick.

So, in order to help Caroline get better, I ventured into the Herbal Planet to pick up some herbal meds. I am now giving her probiotics (which I highly recommend), silver shield (seems to be over priced and not effective), and ivy leaf syrup (somewhat soothing) for her cough. I honestly haven't noticed a huge difference with the herbal meds, other than the probiotics. I have been mixing the probiotics in her milk, juice, or applesauce for the last several days. Her bowels are regularly moving (HUGE improvement) and I am sold on the benefits!

In other news, I've been putting Caroline to bed around 8ish and it seems to be helping. Ondrea, you were right about the 'getting up at the same time'. It's been hard this past week since she's been majorly coughing, but she does seem to 'go to sleep' a bit earlier; I AM SUPER thankful!

I am asking you to pray for Caroline's health. She's been so sick and the medicine is not seeming to help and is changing her little personality. I definitely don't like the 'new personality'. She's becoming quite the sassafrass and her emotions are highly sensitive. One "Mommy Look" will send her over the edge and then I am in my room crying due to the temper tantrum.

I must go now as the new Lost is coming on and I MUST concentrate. ;)

Ramblings

Once again, I am here to apologize for my lack of posting. I promise, promise, promise to be better! Instead of writing everything that's been going on, I thought I would share some stories and some pictures.

Story 1:

We survived the HUGE (note sarcasm) snowstorm of 2010. Here in Georgia we managed to get a dusting of snow. I eagerly woke Caroline up from her sleep to let her play in the falling snow. Hey...don't judge me...it only snows every two years here! ;) You can also tell that we aren't really 'snow friendly' by looking at her wonderful snow outfit we threw together at 10:30 PM.

Caroline was so excited to go outside in the snow and build a snowman. Unfortunately, 1/16th of an inch isn't enough to build one. :(

What is this? This doesn't look like the snow on tv!

Now here's the part where you can judge me. Caroline had been dealing with a cough, runny nose and congestion for several days. It was bad enough for me to call the doctor's office and make an appointment. I am good friends with Caroline's doctor, so there's no need to see anyone else in the office, right? I called on Thursday morning and they had an opening. With another doctor. I politely explained to the nurse that we had only seen Dr. Y and though I'm sure the other doctors are quite nice, we would wait until the next day. The nurse then asked me, "Are you willing to let your child suffer just so she can see Dr. Y?" After I recovered from the slap across the face via telephone, I simply said, "Yes."

So, the snow came and we went outside for about two minutes. At midnight, Caroline woke up coughing. I checked on her, she must have had a broken fever because she was soaked. At 2:30, a blood curling scream (the one that sends you into a full run) woke me up. I met Caroline in the hallway who was having a panic attack. It turns out that she was coughing so much that she threw up. Note to everyone....if you are having coughing fits, blueberries are NOT the best choice for food. Ya'll it was EVERYWHERE! I cleaned her up and brought her to our bed, where Tim was snoring.

At 8:15, the phone rang. It was the nurse telling me that the doctor's office was closed due to the ice storm and I would have to call on Monday for an appointment. SERIOUSLY? Yep, the slap was now leaving a big bruise across my face! So what does one do? I call her doctor on her cell phone and she calls in breathing treatments prescriptions. Oh yeah, you gotta love being friends with a pediatrician!

We just finished up our major breathing treatment medicine and now we are down to two a day. According to Caroline, the medicine is "BAD"!

Story 2:

Apparently I have been feeding our two cats rather well lately. How do I know this? Check out this picture!
If your cats are feeling grateful to their owners, they bring you little sacrfices. This beauty was left at the back door. Needless to say, it stayed here until Tim threw it over the fence.

Story 3:

Caroline is going through the TERRIBLE two's and it has been VERY evident this past week. Let's just say that I know why mothers have mental breakdowns and become frequent visitors to bars! (Just joking!!) Take Exhibit A (picture 1). Who would have thought this sweet, innocent princess would look like this in 2.1 seconds (picture 2) when asked why she made this mess (picture 3).

Picture 1

Picture 3

After a few minutes of pure silence, I realized that Caroline was up to no good! I started walking down the hall to find her quietly closing her door. I must have startled her because she then had a look of terror come over her face. When I opened the door, I found that she had dumped all her clothes (except for her socks/tights) into the floor. Not to mention that she had thrown all her puzzle pieces, babies, wipes, and books all over the room. It looked like a giant tornado had touched down in her room. When asked why she made such a mess? "I dunno know Mommy. Why?"

I have lots more stories from the week, but I'll have to save them until later. I am having difficulty with the spacing and picture importing. But, we have vaseline and liquid hand soap stories later! Get a box of popcorn and come back soon!

A New Year means new thoughts and plans

Do you ever sit down at the computer with tons of stuff to blog about, but then immediately get writer's block? I swear this has been happening to me for the last month! I sit down and then realize that I have nothing worthwhile to say! So, I'm just going to start typing and praying that this post makes a bit of sense. :)

Wow! Can you believe it's actually 2010? I vividly remember when it was 1999 and everyone thought the world was going to end!! LOL! Since it is a new year, I decided to update the look of my blog and type up a few thoughts/plans for 2010.

• Last year, I promised that I would type up our adoption story, and for the most part, I did. I will finish the story soon.
• I need to do better on my couponing. I have fallen off the wagon a bit and need to get back on it! Unfortunately, a Sunday has already passed and I didn't buy a paper. Not off to a good start...
• I plan on tracking my savings this year. I started doing this last year and found my calendar where I wrote down the numbers. It was quite an impressive start and I would like to do it again. Maybe I can last three months this year...
• Each week I would like to cook something in my crockpot. I have already used my crockpot once so I'm actually off to a great start! However, the verdict is still out on the tastiness....we'll see tonight.
• Reading books. Oh, how I used to be an avid reader. I would sit down with a book and finish it before the sun came up the next day. Yes, I am a freakishly fast reader. However, since I started working and then having Caroline, reading has been put on the backburner. I would love to see myself reading at least thirty new books this year. I guess since we are on a budget, that would mean getting a library card...anyone have an idea on how to get one of those???
• Running....yes, I said running. I started out doing awesome with this, but then I got sick right before Christmas. I didn't even have the strength to get out of bed much less run in the frigid weather. So, I need to get back. I would like to find a small (very short) race to participate in this spring. It would help with the accountability.
• Turning off the television more....this is a big one for us. We are horrible at leaving the television on, even when we aren't watching it. It's like we need the background noise. So, I plan on being more aware of this and just exactly how much tv Caroline watches. She doesn't watch tons, but I definitely know she could cut back.

Okay, if you are still here after all of the randomness, thank you! These were just some thoughts that were circling around in my brain and I thought I should at least try to type them up. I hope you guys have a wonderful new year and I would love to hear some of ya'll's (can you tell I'm from the South?) thoughts for the upcoming year.