Words From The Sick Ward

Maybe all of us are finally well. Mike seems to finally be over the flu. It really hit him hard, and he was down and out for over a week. The girls and I had to take Tamiflu to hopefully keep from catching it too. Don't just get this stuff on a whim, it is expensive!! I guessed it worked though, because despite the fact that all of us girls have had a fever, sore throat, cough, or a combination thereof , in the last week, none of us felt bad for more than a day or so. Leah missed two days of school with a fever, Rachel missed one and Allison missed one. Unfortunately, I don't get to miss days! I never really felt too bad though, just a little achy and sore throat.


Hopefully everyone will stay well, because I am heading out of here on Thursday to go to Texas to visit with some friends. That means Mike is on his own for five days. The girls are a little concerned. The scary thing is that he has to get the girls to school three days. I hope he can do it. He was asking me if he could just let Rachel stay all day at school so that he could just pick up all the girls at the same time. I said that that sounds like a god idea, but , "remember, the girls do not go to the same school!" "oh, yeah, " he said. Be afraid!! He is already telling me to leave lots of notes! I am really looking forward to the trip. I will get to visit with two friends that I met in the Florida Keys twenty years ago, and I will also get to hang out with the bunch of friends that I worked with for several years in Texas. It will be a lot of fun. Going without the kids will be a nice (and NEEDED) break.


Here is a picture of the girls that was taken last week when Leah lost her tooth. This is the pose the girls wanted to do. Goofy is the only word that comes to mind here.

It Happened!!

Well, Leah lost her first tooth! She somehow knocked out her loose tooth playing in the pool. She is so excited and is looking forward to the tooh fairy visit. I am having to remind her that the tooth fairy is sometimes running a little behind and does not always make it the first night....well, not at our house anyway.

Growing Up

It seems that despite my constant attempt at denial, I have to admit that the girls are growing up. Last night, we found out that Leah has a bottom tooth coming in behind her baby teeth. Her top tooth is still loose, but is only slowly getting more loose. Now she has the new bottom tooth. It is just a matter of time before she will lose that baby toothed smile. She has an appointment with the dentist for a check up in a few weeks, so we will just wait until then to see if the dentist wants to do anything about the baby teeth. This same thing happened to Allison and the dentist pulled her four front teeth on the bottom. I think I was more worked up over that than Allison was!

Another indication that the kids are growing up involves Halloween. This weekend, we stopped by a Halloween store and bought costumes. After all the years of Teletubbies, Tigger, Snow White, fairy costumes, etc., I was a little sad to see that the girls wanted to be "scary" this year. Allison got an alien costume and Leah got a witch's outfit. She has been a witch before, but this time she wants white face paint and black lips. Rachel still lets me pick her costumes, so she will be a cheerleader. She already has a little outfit with pom-poms, so all I will have to do is put her hair in ponytails. She is not one to want a costume that is too confining, so maybe she will be okay with wearing this, and she will be happy that there are no accessories to wear. In the past she has hated the fairy wings, the witch's hat, and the lion hood. Just as I am getting the hang of the Halloween costumes, i.e. sparkle hair paint is okay, but black hair paint is a no no, styling gel on dry hair is even a bigger no no, etc., I will have kids too big to want to dress up. What a waste of valuable knowledge.

Horseback Riding 101

Hope all is well with everyone. Hope all my friends in Texas are safe and dry. We are getting by here. Last week Mike came down with a "cold" and has been getting worse each day. Today he finally gave up and went to the doctor and was diagnosed with the FLU! Leah woke up this morning complaining of a sore throat and headache and was running a low grade fever. Rachel has had gooey eyes for the last several days and woke up with a crusty nose this morning. I am pretty sure Leah has the flu, hopefully Rachel doesn't. Mike's doctor wrote a prescription for me to get Tamiflu and told him to contact the pediatrician and get the girls on it too. I have called the pedi and am waiting on her to call back. Hopefully the meds will keep those of us that are well, well, and it will get those that are sick well quicker.

On another note, Rachel started horseback riding this past weekend. There is a horse riding facility for the handicapped here in Melbourne. I found out earlier this year that Rachel is now old enough to take part. They put the kids on the horses and get them to do all kinds of activities that help strengthen their muscles. Rachel's first lesson was Saturday. She was on a smaller horse, but still looked so tiny up there. She had on a helmet that could have served as an umbrella for her......she was so cute. Most of the time, it is hard to tell if Rachel liked something, because she doesn't really show much emotion, but when they took her off the horse Saturday, Rachel said "No!" and reached to get back up. I guess all little girls love horses. Speaking of all little girls, Allison and Leah are thrilled that Rachel is going to the "horse place" too. They cannot ride the horses, but they are so excited just to get to see the horses and pet them. They cannot stop talking about the horses, and they claim to know all 15 horses by name already. I argue that point, but they tell me that they do.

We are finally starting to get into a routine for school. It seemed to take forever because the first week was literally washed out with the tropical storm, and then I took the girls out the following Friday and Tuesday to make the trip up to Alabama. Leah is breezing through. It is all so easy for her so far. Leah is the epitome of the middle child. She is just cruising along under the radar.

Allison is.......well, Allison. She is better about getting her homework done-if she remembered what it was and remembered to bring it home. She is supposed to be practicing math on a certain computer site. The first time she told me this, she did not know what the site name was. About a week later, I finally got her to get home with the site name, only to find out that she need a password. The teacher states the password should be in the student's assignment folder. Guess where Allison's assignment folder was? Yep, school. And dog gone it, it was Friday. Maybe she will get home with all the info today. She is required to do two book reports a month this year and has started reading several books, but has only completed one so far. Allison brings home what appears to be homework and states she does not know what it is for, but she is certain it is not homework. It is going to be a long year.

Rachel seems to be doing well in school. She has a new teacher this year that is all about routine. Each morning Rachel goes into the class, she has to unpack her backpack, putting her lunch box and folder away, and then she has to find her name on the board and circle it. The teacher tries to get the kids to trace their names on the board, but so far, most of the kids are only able to circle their names. The teacher really seems to be working to get the kids to interact with each other in the classroom and during play times. That is good, because Rachel is much happier to go off to a quiet place and play with the dolls. Last year I think the teacher let her do that a little too often. She and the teacher's aide thought Rachel was too cute and really let her get away with anything she wanted!

Below are a few pictures of Rachel riding Gypsie.

Those Were the Days

Okay, I found the picture. I was mistaken, though, because Lexie actually made it into this picture. Wow, how time flies. It seems like just last year we were all getting married, and now we are swamped with kids. Kids that have reached and are about to reach the teenage years!

The Whole Gang

I love this picture. Here's the gang together last weekend in Alabama. Look at all those kids! The last time we had a picture taken of all of us together, it was Jeff and Michele's wedding. There were no kids in the picture-if you don't count Hughston who was about two months from arriving-and we were all dressed up. What a difference a decade or so can make.

Sweet Home Alabama

This holiday weekend we actually took a family to trip. This past Friday, we pulled the kids out of school, loaded up the family van, and headed to Huntsville, AL for a little family vacation. It is not such a terrible trip, even though it does take 12 hours each way. We were able to get together with lots of friends, their spouses, and their kids. This made for a total of 22 people at times. Saturday we all got together for the Alabama vs. Clemson game. Sunday all 22 of us headed out to Lake Guntersville on three boats (and a floating condo) for a day tubing, skiing, and just hanging out. It was a great trip! The girls and I arrived home around 5:30pm, but Mike had to be dropped off at the Orlando airport on the way home so that he could be in Boston at 8:00am Wednesday morning. I know he is so tired about now. After missing two days of school, the girls were none too happy to get out of bed this morning and get back to the routine. I am not quite back to the routine either. I have lots of laundry to catch up on, but maybe I will do that tomorrow.