Just a Few Tidbits

Nothing all that new here. Just a few memories that are in desperate need of being recorded.

- Rhode now loves to answer the phone. He is very perturbed at me if I get to the house phone before he does. He will pick up the receiver, hold it to his ear in silence while the person on the other line hears me shouting from the distance, "Rhode, say hi!", which he will rarely do. He usually waits for the person to start talking to him. He then will utter his only phone conversation sentence, "Do you want me to sing you a song?" Whether the person answers in the affirmative or not, they are usually presented with whatever tune is in his heart at the moment. It varies from the ABC's to twinkle twinkle little star to Poker Face (don't judge me). But lately he has added a new favorite to his turntable.

- Scarlet is sick and has been off and on for about two weeks. Fever, coughing, runny nose and lots of clogginess which, in Scarlet's case, always leads to throwing up. Fun times. She wakes up in a constant state of absolute misery, feeling the weight of the world on her sinuses and burning with radiating heat. But, once the ibuprofin kicks in, she is instantly back to her old kicks and begging to leave the house.

She was devastated when I wouldn't let her go to church today. I was a bit devastated myself. Today was going to be her first opportunity to give a talk in church. We have been practicing, she even gave her talk to her uncle Brad (who was in town for the weekend) and we were all set. But with extra sickness and a round of antibiotics began, it just wasn't going to happen.

- When she gets sick like this, Scarlet very frequently gets so clogged up she has trouble breathing and usually vomits. It is a lot of fun. So, as last night was exceptionally bad, I crashed on a mat on her floor to make sure all was well. Beyond a few requests for nose blowings and drinks of water, she did well. But about halfway through the night, I woke up to find myself drenched from the waist down. What? In my half dazed state I was so not capable of coming up with a good solution to the problem. Obviously I had not wet the bed but maybe Scarlet came down on my tiny mat, peed, and then went back in her bed? It was all not making sense. Then I noticed the bottom of my sheet had made its way into the tub of her humidifier. You know how water tends to travel up fabric? Well it did quite rapidly and efficiently in my case. All of my bedding was soaked. But even with the realization, the best I could do was throw my top blanket underneath me and wrap up like a burrito, just centimeters from the wetness.

For so many reasons, I really hope she gets better quickly.

- Because of my germy house, we had to skip out on brunch yesterday at a friend's house. Yes, you heard me right, brunch. How fun is that? It was heartbreaking for me to have to cancel that morning, not only was Scarlet still feverish but she had gone back to bed at 9:00 that morning, but Suzanne had a better idea. Instead, she cooked up some fantastic food and brought it to us. Scarlet (now post medicine kick in) Rhode and I gorged ourselves on blueberry pancakes and the fixings. It was a million degrees of deliciousness. Not to brag, but I really have the best friends ever. The likeliness that any of us will be in the same place we are now in the next 1 - 5 years is incredibly slim, but I am going to try to enjoy this time as much as possible because there really are few better groups of women in the world than the ones I get to associate with weekly if not daily.

- Scarlet and I read chapter books together before she goes down for a nap. It is a lot of fun. I am going to start listing the titles that we have read on the side bar because finding a book can be kind of difficult. It is best if the chapters aren't too long, if there are the occasional pictures to look at, and if the story line is one a four year old can actually grasp. So the ones listed are my successes. But I am running low on options, any suggestions?

- Speaking of successes, about once a week we get a chance to watch a movie as a family. We try to mix it up and not just watch cartoons. A few weeks ago we got "The Secretariat". Jon was very doubtful but the kids loved it. I made popcorn during the slow middle but once the races were going regularly, my kids were enthralled. We have also watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (the old one) after Scarlet and I read the book and that was a big hit. It has also inspired Rhode's new song of choice. But our best movie night to date was this weekend when we all watched "Swiss Family Robinson." I had never seen it before and it was fantastic. I was into it as much as the kids. The amount of wild animals and all the crazy stunts they do (this must have been made pre "no animals were harmed in the making of this film" days) are just so fun. I was only going to let them watch half of it because of the late hour but we enjoyed ourselves so much we couldn't turn it off.

And now, as my children are asleep and I have a few hours until dinner needs to be started, I think I will join them in a short nap. It is amazing how unrestful a thin, wet mat can be.