Boy Wonder has rejoined the land of the living. Back to his smiling, laughing, mischievous self. A tad droopy, slept until 11:00 this morning, but fever-free.
A benign condition that causes him to run a fever every seven to eight weeks doesn't seem quite so benign when it starts hitting every seventeen days, lasts four days, involves 104 degree fevers, and includes all-night bouts of vomiting. We need wisdom and direction, and we covet your prayers in these areas.
2. Do you know there are crooks on the Internet? Well, I now do. I can't share all the details at present, but I have encountered all manner of money-grabbing schemes in the last few days, and I am shocked. I don't know why I am shocked, but I am.
3. So all that time I was supposed to have on my hands once school started? WHERE IS IT, I ASK YOU, WHERE IS IT? Not happening yet. See item #1 involving 104 degree fevers and all-night bouts of vomiting to understand the key reasons why. We have thirty-four weeks of school to go, so I'm just sure time is coming my way any minute now. Any minute now.
4. I've always known my fashion sense slouched toward the conservative if not the boring. Now it's official. I was perusing the sale pages of Lands' End and stumbled upon a cute skirt for Ainsey -- kind of a classic style, clean lines, tasteful. Turns out I bought the girl a school uniform. Yes, a school uniform. She already wears a uniform five days a week, and now her mother has bought her yet another one.
And then there's the shorts. Do you know it's hard to find shorts of a decent length for a five-year-old.? Do you know there are crooks on the Internet? Yes, it's true. I have an astonishing grasp of the obvious. So I find khaki Bermuda shorts at Walmart and pick them up for Ainsley to wear next summer. And as I'm headed home, I suddenly think, "I bet they're boys' shorts." And sure enough, they are.
Crazy.
I may keep the school uniform, but the boys' shorts (not to be confused with boy shorts) are back at Walmart.
5. I would like to poll parents of adolescents on a perplexing housekeeping dilemna. Scenario: A nameless child's room could just about make the tabloids. Do you:
a. Ensure the door is securely closed and spray a little air freshener in the hallway?
b. Confiscate all electronic devices and place the culprit(s) under house arrest until the room meets minimum specs?
c. Grab a large trash bag and a pitch fork and do the job yourself?
d. Combine the above three?
6. Do you know which job is hardest to accomplish when everyone is home? The floors. It's funny, but I find washing floors rather soothing. But it rarely happens during the summer. The other day I walked through the kitchen and nearly lost a shoe in some wide-spread glob of ick. So this morning in the silence of my home, I will mop. I'm looking forward to it.
This combined with the fact that I outfit my daughter in school uniforms and think she looks cute? I'm scaring myself. Really, I am.
7. I am on day five of Jillian Michael's Thirty Day Shred. In the interest of full disclosure, I should rebrand this program the Thirty Month Shred because my ambitious timetable looks something like this:
January 2012 - Purchase Thirty Day Shred
May 2013 - Remove shrink wrap
September 2014 - Begin program
Just a little bloggy hyperbole you say? Sadly, no. The actual timetable give or take a month or two.
Head over to Jen's to add your Quick Takes.
7 comments:
So glad John is feeling better! I had one teenager who couldn't keep the room to minimum standards. I'm not picky - I just like a reasonably made bed and stuff off the floor. I'm willing to overlook crowded dresser tops, but at least make it look reasonably neat. So my approach was this - clean your room or MOM will clean your room. And then do it. Take a trash bag, as you said and trash everything that isn't clothes. But I also threw in there that if I had to do it, they would lose privileges and I also would take away the next month's allowance, so that they were "paying" me to clean their room for them. One time of trashing all my daughter's things and she got the message.
That is a scary continuing illness. We had HFM this summer for the first time and it's arrival was confusing, but not repetitive I don't think. Will pray.
Glad to hear John is feeling better. I will keep his continued good health in my prayers!
Thanks for all your prayers and concern. HE's doing much better.
Karen - What is HFM?
Kris - I'm with you. Not looking for perfection, but slovenly makes me crazy. John and Kolbe share a small room which is hard to keep in order. I'm trying to come up with some system that they can manage. Tim has the least cluttered room and it definitely helps. Of course, he's sixteen and doesn't play with toys.
Joel and Jamie share a room also and it was a disaster. They went away one weekend with Jim for a father/son retreat and I took the weekend to clean and purge. I threw out two giant trash bags of old toys and donated a huge bin of stuff to Goodwill. The each now have one dresser, one large storage box that lives under each bed - this is where they can keep ANYTHING that they want, as long as it fits in the bin. Boys need some "treasures". My only rule is that when the bin gets full, they have to purge before they can put anything else in there. Then I also bought a cubical shelf from Target - I think it has 6 or 8 cubes? I'm not up there right now.... I bought the corresponding bins that slide in and use it for storage - a bin for hats, a bin for stuffed animals that aren't on the bed, a bin for Magic/Pokémon/Yugi-Oh cards, etc. I found it was easier to do the major clean and purge when they were gone. Once it was done, they have done a pretty good job of keeping it up. Hope that helps!
I would say to go in and "clean up" ANYTHING they WANT and ONLY those things.....like electronics, favorite books anything (of course include computer time). They they "earn" them back by cleaning but then keeping the room clean. SLOWLY add things back as a sort of Pavlov's dogs thing. If the room slides, then things get taken away. Repeat, Repeat, Repeat. And I really mean all the good stuff taken away every time and earned back slowly every time.
Yeah, I agree that John's fever thing is scary....maybe another dr opinion is due?
Kris - I clean out when the kids are gone, too. Easier all around. I like your bin system. Really, that's how it works in the rest of the house. When the bookshelves get full, I purge. When the dresser gets full, I purge. And kids need space for their treasures, no matter how loose an interpretation of the word "treasure" is applied.
Roxanna - I agree that I need to up the ante with at least one child. I have one who is fine if I consign toys to the attic. Clearly, they can live without some of this stuff.
We're trying to figure out the next step with John. Thanks for your prayers and concern.
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