I’ve been ok. Nothing really new to report. Aaron has been feeling a bit depressed lately, but his med seems to maybe be kicking in. But he had his 46th birthday. D11 and M8 decorated a Cthulu cake.
This is pretty much how I felt all week:
D11 went to an Escape Room with the Scouts BSA and came back high anxiety. They got out with 50 seconds to spare. She loved it, despite the anxiety. She also went shoe shopping and office chair shopping with her own money (and money from Aunt Eleanor’s Christmas gift). She got all dressed up and we went to Nordstrom’s clearance. And she went snowboarding with Scouts BSA.
M8 has a Pine Wood Derby race on Saturday, and worked hard on his car.
IL2 began potty training again. This time, I will try not to get burnt out putting him on the pot every 2 hours. And the pediatrician told me to give him prune juice to encourage him to poop comfortably. He’s pooped in the potty twice and peed once already!
Dad is doing well. He finally got his annuity back! He feels rich now. J16 got his phone stolen for the second time. The first was a couple months ago – some guy jumped out of a car, punched him in the face, and grabbed the phone. This time, the same guy pulled up with a gun, and demanded his phone. This time was at gunpoint. J16 says he THINKS he knows the guy from elementary school, but isn’t quite sure it’s the same guy. Clearly, he’s being targeted. I also suspect he isn’t telling the complete truth about what’s going on. His story keeps changing.
IL2 was busy this week. He started Saturday by spreading flour all over the baby safe area. He pulled it down off a counter, probably with the tippy-tips of his fingers.
It fell to 21 degrees Fahrenheit below zero over the weekend. But I took IL2 out to mall walk dad, anyway.
On Thursday, he went pee-pee in the potty! I didn’t realize kids that young could actually potty train. I’ll have to do a better job of letting him sit on the potty every two hours. But that sounds like a LOT of work.
On Friday, I called AIG about dad’s annuity. No news from “processing.” On Tuesday, no news from processing. Dad yelled. I asked for processing’s phone number. No, they can’t give that. Then processing’s email? Nope. Dad yelled some more. We got through to a supervisor later in the day. She “expedited” the process. (What does that mean? 3 more months instead of 5? Probably.) I hired a lawyer. Dad filed a fraud complaint with the State of MN.
In case you’re wondering what happened to my cross-stitch, apparently I got knock-off floss. It just dissolves and breaks if I separate it, and is too thick if I don’t. 😐 I have the real stuff now, and it works great!
D11 had a difficult week. It was supposed to be a 6 day weekend, but we found out on Tuesday that D11 hadn’t completed a whole bunch of homework problems over the first half of the semester. We started working on them, only to find out on Thursday that she also hadn’t turned in a major project that had apparently been assigned weeks ago. She had hardly started it at all. I am struggling between feeling like we should drop it because it’s plague year, or make her do it because she needs accountability. But she learns by strict rules of “action/consequence” so she’ll learn so she’d definitely learn the wrong lesson if we dropped it.
When my mom died in September, AIG, the company that manages dad’s annuity, canceled the payments because mom (who was the beneficiary if dad died) had passed. They didn’t pay him, and sent out a snail mail that took 3 weeks to arrive saying why they didn’t pay him. They said they needed the death certificate and forms to be filled out. He mailed those back. 4 weeks later, he still hadn’t received his money, and dad had didn’t have the patience to keep calling them without cussing them out, so I took over. They told me that he had filled out the paperwork incorrectly, that he needed to put the Jr after his name. They insisted they’d sent out a snail mail a week prior to my call. Dad filled out the forms again the “right” way, and sent them in. Two weeks later, I called. They claimed they hadn’t received the new forms. We sent them again via certified mail. I waited till they were delivered. Called. I was told that the documents weren’t in the system. Perhaps they hadn’t been scanned in yet? Anyway, to shorten the story, we STILL don’t have the money. And the person who I talked to several times simply doesn’t care. He says this is just how the system works. If you have any choice, don’t use AIG.
Dad got his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Tuesday. I had to check into his medical portal every 30 minutes for an entire day, but I snatched one up! He was so tired after the first dose that he missed two meals. I, too, got my first dose (Moderna) on Thursday. Now we just need to get Aaron and J16 vaccinated.
D11 rode horses with the Girl Scouts on Saturday. She loved it, even though all they did was ride around inside a barn. She worked on her Cyber Chip over a BSA Zoom meeting on Tuesday – it taught her how to be safe and kind on the internet – and worked on her Citizenship in the Nation merit badge in a BSA Zoom meeting on Wednesday. Her homework is to read the news 5 days in a row and do two virtual tours of historical sites. The virtual tours weren’t very informative, so I’ll go though them with her myself.
M8 went to Cub Scout Polar Camp on Saturday with his mom. He enjoyed tuning and spare time with his mom.
Our business is doing well. We’ve been selling books, and have made $9 one week after shipping the books (after all the fees). This makes me more confident that this is going to work.
The kids started in-person school on Thursday. D11 and M8 said their favorite part of the first day was school ending. 🤣😂 I imagine in-person school is hard after being able to do it at home. I’m having difficulty adjusting, too. I forgot on Wednesday evening to pack M8’s bag, and on Friday I slept in because I forgot there was school. Luckily, it wasn’t too late to get them out. M8 just wanted to get up an hour early to pack his lunch (apparently he thought it was a monumental task).
Hi all! This week was stressful as it had a lot of events that just piled together.
Monday, I had an 8am doctor appointment, and needed to pick up some medicine (as well as milk and juice, which we were out of). I didn’t have enough time to pick it up till after my work ended at 11pm, though. So I had to make a midnight run to the pharmacy. Normally, I would have just slept in the next day, but the Minnesota Department of Health had a 1-day lottery for a vaccine for 65+ residents, so I got up at 5am to sign dad up for it (only a 1 hour wait in queue).
Wednesday was dad’s dementia assessment. I didn’t realize how much I was dreading it until it happened. Sitting there in front of him telling the doctor why I was worried about dad’s worsening behaviors since his TIA four years ago was hard. Dad does not agree with my assessment of his behavior. But he was diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment in the end, so it could have been worse. We’re hoping this is a single drop from the TIA and not a continuous decline.
Aaron was very understanding of my difficulties this week, and got some important work for the book-selling business completed without me, which was kind of him.
Thursday, one of the major healthcare systems in Minnesota opened COVID vaccination appointments for people over 75, so I’m checking about once an hour to see if any are open. Something tells me it’s futile to keep checking, but I would really like dad to get a vaccination.
This week, D11 started Scouts BSA (they went to Base Camp for wall climbing and archery) and swim team. She had so much fun getting out of the house!
M8 is doing a fantastic job of taking his liquid medicine! We are so proud of him. This has been such a struggle for him.
Hi all! I hope you had a good week! We did in this neck of the woods.
This week Aaron finished reading Keys to the Demon Prison by Brandon Mull to me and the kids. It is the 5th book in Mull’s Fablehaven series, in which a sister and brother must save the world after discovering that their grandparents run a preserve for fantastic creatures. It was a fantastic completion to the series.
I also finished listening to Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo. This is a coming-of-age story of a Latina teen who struggles with how her sexuality fits in the world and in her family’s religion. It was all beautifully composed in slam poetry. I highly suggest the audiobook. This book has been sitting in my Audible library for a while, and I decided to try it out since I’m planning on focusing on BIPOC books this year.
I am currently reading Ring, Shout by P. Djeli Clark and listening to Lakewood by Megan Giddings. Aaron is reading The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan to us. And Aaron and I are listening to 1984 by George Orwell.
Family Life
Over the weekend, I picked up an extra job as a PCA for a woman with ALS. It makes my schedule even busier, but gives us that extra financial oomph we’ll need to get through the startup of our book-selling business.
We are really enjoying the business so far. We shipped out our first major load of books this week, and bought plenty more for resale. Now we’ll see what kind of money we can draw in.
I made the (?) mistake of looking into BSA for Deirdre. Mostly, I thought that it would be more goal-oriented and activity-focused than I’ve noticed Girl Scouts being. I’ve been going through a Journey with D11 and her cousin O11, but and it’s positively boring! No wonder her troop hasn’t completed any Journies or gotten any badges! Anyway, her Girl Scout troop is dissolving at the end of the year, so I suggested D11 think about BSA instead. She is very goal-oriented, and gets a lot of pleasure out of achieving her goals – being in a group that provides many opportunities for earning merit badges would be enjoyable to her.
I told her I’d look in to BSA if she’d like to try it out. She sounded interested in earning badges, so I found a troop. The activities sounded really fun – they went skiing this week, but invited D11 to join them in rock-climbing and archery at Base Camp next week. I hadn’t meant for her to start right away when I looked into it, and now we have to figure out how to pay for BSA if she wants to join. Oops.
As I’ve mentioned, we have been considering building an ADU for dad to live in when he is unable to live alone. Now that I have an estimate from an architect, I’m wondering if the same amount of money could be spent on buying a larger house in our same school district, and what that would entail. I just want to look at all the available options, which habit is the bane of my existence. I contacted a couple of realtors to see if I could find one who was willing to give me honest answers to my questions on the topic. One of them did a beautiful job of answering my questions, and she will be coming to look at the house next Monday to see what she thinks.
Hi all! Hope you had a great week. Due to politics it was a stressful one for us. Aaron and I had a hard time concentrating on things that needed to be done. I was feeling so sick with a headache and other symptoms over the weekend, that I was almost worried I was coming down with something nasty. But in the end we survived.
I finished listening to Invisible Man Got the Whole World Watching, by Mychal Denzel Smith. In this memoir about what it’s like to become a black man in the age of Obama, Smith confronts issues about gender, sexuality, patriarchy, and mental illness through the lens of black America. I felt his discussion was well-articulated and was a good book for people who are unfamiliar with the topic, but his arguments about race weren’t particularly new for a well-read individual.
Family Life
Well, I gave up on my first cross-stitch attempt under an onslaught of criticism. There were two major problems that I’m aware of. D11 pointed out that she didn’t think there was enough space for the entire pattern. I was going to try anyway because it was a close call, and I HAD measured. Second problem was separating the floss. In theory, DMC floss separates into 6 strands but I could only get it to separate into 2 strands. If I separated it more, it just turned into fluff. So I used the entire piece since the pattern said to use two strands. Apparently that was the wrong choice. So I’m going to retry with one of the strands (which is, in theory, actually 3 smaller strands. Here’s where I surrendered project attempt 1:
The kids were not impacted by the attempted coup on the 6th. I did explain what happened the next morning, and by an hour later D11 had forgotten we’d talked about it. The kids ended up starting school 18 minutes late the next day (I was out for a moment and expected their alarms to alert them of the time.) I jokingly told the kids to tell their teachers that their dad was distracted by the attempted coup, and M8 actually did that! 🤣😂
On Friday night, we decided to destress by having a movie night. We watched Die Hard and Terminator 2. M8 loved Die Hard and D11 loved T2. M8 used an oven for the first time that night. He wanted more baked fries, and I told him he could have them if he baked them on his own. So he did (with a little assistance). I wasn’t even tempted to run up behind him and yell “DON’T BURN YOURSELF!!!” unexpectedly, as I am when D11 sticks something into the oven. (Mind you, I’ve never done this, I just feel tempted to sometimes.)
I have mixed feelings about the impeachment. I like the idea of him losing his ability to run again, but I feel that if it’s just a token impeachment, it’s a waste of taxpayer dollars. However, we celebrated the potential downfall of Trump’s aspirations at a second term with s’mores and a movie night. We watched Encino Man.
Found this on the livingroom floor the next morning:
Apparently someone was eating floor crumbs?
D11 had her very first babysitting job this week. 4 hours at $7/hour. She enjoyed herself, and was really excited. She also has two other people interested. Maybe $7 was too little of a charge? We’ll work with it until she has some references, though.
This week I finished Mexican Gothic by Sylvia Moreno-Garcia. In it, a flirtatious socialite visits her cousin, who claims her husband is trying to kill her. Moreno-Garcia keeps the reader on her toes with a creepy gothic vibe and a relatable protagonist.
Reason for reading: This was for a book club that I never ended up joining. But it fits well with my desire to read BIPOC books this year.
I also finished Trapped, by Kevin Hearne. In this fifth book of the Iron Druid Chronicles, Atticus works desperately to bind Granuaile to the earth as he struggles with interruptions. It wasn’t as great as the first four books. It continued the storyline, but at a slow pace, and had very little action.
Reason for Reading: This series was first suggested by my friend Nora. I started listening to the first book with Aaron 3 years ago, and have continued since then.
I finished reading Underground Railroad, by Colson Whitehead, in which a slave named Cora escapes Georgia on a locomotive in a literal underground railroad. It was very creative and interesting, but I was left wondering why Whitehead chose a locomotive for his story. There was one rather obvious hint (and I probably missed others along the way):
“Lumbly’s words returned to her: If you want to see what this nation is all about, you have to ride the rails. Look outside as you speed through and you’ll find the true face of America. It was a joke, then, from the start. There was only darkness outside the windows on her journeys, and only ever would be darkness.”
Reason for reading: I have wanted to read this book since it came out. This year, I am trying to focus on reading BIPOC books.
I also read the board book Nerdy Babies Rocks, by Emmy Kastner. It was cute. I really like the series.
Right now, I am listening to 1984, by George Orwell with Aaron. I’m reading Evicted, by Matthew Desmond. I’m listening to Invisible Man Got the Whole World Watching, by Mychal Denzel Smith. Aaron is reading Keys to the Demon Prison, by Brandon Mull to the kids.
Family Life
New year’s eve started out well, with M8 cleaning the kitchen because he left his socks on the table, and D11 cleaning the livingroom because she left her socks on the floor. Then, they both left for their mom’s. Aaron and I stayed up till midnight. We listened to Trapped, and watched Supernatural. I also cleaned purple crayon off the walls, gift of IL2. A wet rag dipped in baking soda works wonders. My favorite part of the night was when IL2 joined me in cleaning the walls. He ran to the kitchen, grabbed a wash rag, dipped it in my bowl of baking soda and rubbed it on the wall. 🤣😂
Once 2021 hit, we could start making purchases for our Amazon reseller’s startup: Hibernator’s Library. (We wanted to wait for 2021 for tax purposes.) Our startup is running!
I decided to take up cross-stitching as a hobby, mainly only for use while I’m listening to Aaron read to the kids or to the audiobook I’m listening to with Aaron. And maybe when my Monday client is watching TV. It’s not something I’ve ever tried before, so hopefully I’ll enjoy it. Here’s what my first project is supposed to end up looking like:
Here’s the progress I’ve made so far:
I also found some old CDs of pictures of J16 when he was a kid in my mom’s stuff. I think I’ll make a scrapbook for him some day. Here’s my favorite so far:
D11 took her Red Cross babysitting class last Thursday, and I immediately found someone on a Facebook mom’s group who was willing to pay $7/hr for an 11 year old to watch her 3 and 6 year old girls. It’s not a lot, but I figure once she gets a reference or two we should be fine.
On the night of the attempted coup, D11 made a cake. That’s her unsure face, but she did a really good job. Apparently the gigantic bottles of alcohol I bought when I was stressing about the coup is in the background. Oops. 🤣😂 I have a mess to clean up this morning.
This has been a tough year for everyone. But our family, for the most part, ended up doing well.
IL2 learned to walk, talk (sort of), and now sits on the potty.
M8 graduated into the 3rd grade, learned to program (a little) at Code Ninjas, and passed two levels in swimming. He is now a Bear Scout. He was diagnosed with an eating disorder, ARFID, which explains why he didn’t respond to standard eating therapy methods (they don’t work with ARFID, and actually make things worse). Now that we have switched to feeding him 6 times a day he went up from 3rd percentile in BMI at 6 to 47th at 8! Yay! I’m so proud of both him and us.
D11 graduated into the 5th grade, passed two levels in swimming, joined a swim team, and joined band (flute). She was diagnosed with a learning disorder, and will FINALLY get the help she needs in her writing. She really blossomed this year, learning how to control her anxiety and really maturing emotionally.
I read a total of 50 books, including a whopping total of 19 books that weren’t board books. I plan on getting that up to 75 next year by adding in graphic novels. My mother passed in September of a fall off the front stoop. I worked most of the year as a PCA for a quadriplegic man.
Aaron taught himself to knit and did an amazing job of tearing down our retaining wall and building a new one. It is beautiful.
Wow, already New Year’s eve! I hope everyone has a good one!
This blogging week began with Christmas on Friday, which was very relaxed. The kids were at their mom’s this year, and since IL2 had no idea when Christmas was, we didn’t bother doing anything special for him. We had roast and potatoes for dinner.
We opened presents with the kids on Sunday. M8 got some footie pajamas and a Swiss Army knife that he was thrilled with. D11 got a doll dress sewing kit that she loved. And IL2 got some Duplos train tracks, among other toys he loved.
IL2 has begun his potty training by being put on the potty a few times a day. He hasn’t peed yet, but he seems to enjoy sitting on it, and tells me when he’s all done. On Christmas, I opened his long-legged, long-armed onesie to discover he had no diaper on under it. We looked and looked for the ditched diaper, but no luck. Finally, I asked IL2 where it was and promised I wouldn’t put the dirty one back on. IL2 got up, walked to the TV, and pulled it out from behind. He must have hidden it there intentionally!
M8 has told me (not for the first time) that he no longer believes in the “Jesus-God” because he believes in the Greek gods after having Percy Jackson read to him. I suspect this is more about interest than belief (he went through a period of interest in Jesus, too). I suggested that if he was going to learn about pagan pantheons and explore his own spirituality, he should try learning about some of the other pantheons, too. I have ordered him a book about Norse gods, and decided the next book we’ll read together after Fablehaven is Riordon’s Magnus Chase books.
Aaron finished his crocheted Cthulu, and has started on a unicorn for Deirdre.
D11 finally got her first set of high heels – ordered for her birthday by her mom, but not arriving until this week. She’s been waiting impatiently for them to arrive. She got two pairs from her aunt Eleanor for Christmas, but she grew a foot size since the beginning of the school year already, and they were ordered in the wrong size. (I had no idea D11 had only been wearing over-sized snow boots for weeks and that we’d missed a leap in shoe size.)
Aaron and I discussed building an ADU for my dad with an architect. I’d formerly contacted 3 architects – one never responded, one turned me off right away, and the third (this one) has been pretty good so far. We discussed putting the ADU behind the garage or under the deck. It kind of puts the shed in an awkward spot, and I guess it’s movable. The architect is now drawing up rough scetches of his ideas.
Hi everyone! This was a good Christmas week for the family. I hope everyone who is celebrating a holiday around this time of year is having a wonderful season.
As I mentioned in the last post, IL2 has learned to take off his own diaper as well as his pants. This week, he managed to draw on the wall with the contents of his diaper. We put him in a long-armed, long-legged onesie (specifically bought to foil him), and he managed to get the diaper off anyway! Through the leg? We don’t know! I’ve decided to go ahead and see if he’s ready to be potty trained. No pressure, of course, I think he’s a little too young and not communicative enough. But it doesn’t hurt to put him him pull-ups, talk about going potty, and put him on the potty every couple of hours just to see.
We have great news about M8. His BMI is up to 47th percentile! He was around 3rd percentile when we first started working on his weight at 6.5 years old. I count that as a huge success, mainly due to feeding him 6 times a day and not worrying about his lack of variety (as suggested by his eating disorder doctor). We have to do a few tweaks to his diet in order to improve his digestive health. We hope to maintain his weight where it is.
M8 also got his new expander from his orthodontist this week. He was pretty excited about it. He wasn’t so excited once they put the gross-tasting glue in, though. Now he can’t talk quite right and is having a little difficulty eating. But he’ll get used to it.
D11 had a virtual birthday party that she attended on Sunday. They all played Roblox together.
Aaron has been learning how to crochet. He’s currently working on a Cthulu.
On Saturday night we went to see Christmas lights as a family. That was a lot of fun. 🙂 This house literally had about a hundred inflatables in the front and back yard.
Sunday night, we watched Nightmare Before Christmas. We were going to watch Die Hard, but the kids simply weren’t interested.
