Strep Throat

I am so upset by the fact that Bria and I have strep throat once again that I had to blog about it.  I cannot believe that our family has been so sick all year and we somehow keep getting this nasty bug over and over again.  All of us, except for Chadd have been affected by this illness and I have had quite enough of it! 

Growing up, I got strep throat a lot.  I feel like it was pretty much constant in my younger years.  I remember having the sore throat, headache, tummy ache, sometimes vomiting and feeling downright terrible over and over again.  Lying on my mom's lap and having her scratch my back always made me feel better.  She had these awesome nails that were perfect for this type of TLC.  When we had ear infections, I can still picture this burnt orange Tupperware container that she would fill with steaming water to let us lay on.  We always took baths as they too have magical healing powers.

Now that I am an adult with children of my own, I find that I am the mommy filling up that water bottle(heating a fleece rice bag), scratching my kids backs and giving them snuggles and baths when they are feeling under the weather.  The only bad part?  Having the illness as well.  Where is my back scratcher? Bath giver? Water bottle filler?  Oh yeah, she has a life of her own and lives an hour away so coming over to scratch my back isn't necessarily on her list of top priorities.  In all honesty, if I asked her I bet she would come.  Sometimes being an adult stinks!

I ended up with strep throat for the first time in my adult life last summer.  Since then, I have had it four additional times.  What is with that?  You would think that my body would say, "Oh you again, yeah, well I recognize you and I am going to kick your ass right on out of here."  Wishful thinking, I know.  I wash my hands and use sanitizer like crazy and yet I still get sick.  Blast it all!

I am going to heat up my own hot pack, watch some movies and snuggle with my kids on the couch.  If you have had strep throat as an adult, you know how badly it can make you feel.  Too bad I still have kiddo's to hang with otherwise I would be lying down resting right now.  I feel badly for Bennett who has been building Lego's all day long.  I finally let him make some Jello instant pudding because the guilt of allowing him to watch movies and play Lego's essentially by himself all day long was too much for me to handle.  Ah, such is life.

Training

It is official ladies and gentleman, training for my Triathlon has begun.  I am very very excited for this years Tri and cannot wait until August to hopefully beat last years time.  I have all of these lofty ideas to get a road bike that will help speed up my time, take a masters swim class at my gym and run longer race distances to hopefully improve my running time.  But, with numerous weddings, engagements, camping trips, dance, karate etc....I just think that I will try to stick to training my butt off on my own and leave the gear upgrade until the end of the season...or next year :)

The tri that I participate in is called the YWCA Women's Triathlon, and it is a sprint distance.  They have awesome staff who are always there to assist with any questions or concerns that you may have.  They even email out a training program if you want one.  I used it last year and it was awesome.  This year, I had it emailed to me again but I have increased most of the workout times and distances since I am no longer a beginner.  Yesterday was officially a rest day.  Now, I am not sure about most of you but when it comes to rest days, I struggle.  I felt like I was just itching all day long to do something...anything that didn't make me feel like a lazy fool.  From everything I have read about racing, rest days are as important to your body and race as days where you are doing an activity.  Mentally, I just cannot seem to process that thought!  So, I managed to hold off on all types of exercise until after dinner when we went on a family bike ride.  I made sure not to push it too much, after all I do have three little ones following along.

Today's training consisted of swimming 500 meters.  I normally take a strength training class on Tuesday mornings so I kept with my routine saving swimming for afterwards.  It has been since last August that I have attempted lap swimming and it took everything I had to make it those 500 meters today.  I struggled, a lot!  It took me over 15 minutes and I had to rest literally every lap.  Sometimes I feel like such an idiot in the pool...no, make that every time I am in the pool.  I never feel like my form is correct.  I know it isn't because my lower back and neck ache all over after a few laps.   Clearly, I am plowing through the water instead of gliding on top of it.  I get tired about halfway back on each lap and either look like a caught fish flailing in the water or change my stroke because its either that or drown.  Ugh!  Swimming is rough.  I am still considering the masters swim class.  Especially after today's fiasco. 

I feel completely exhausted after today's swim.  I want to crawl into bed and take a nap, but two little honey's prevent me from doing so.  I am going to suck it up and read them some stories...maybe they will fall asleep :)

Mastering Skills

Lately I have felt like such a bad mommy.  When your oldest child masters new skills you get every stinking moment of it on video, plus you take thousands of the exact same picture just for good measure.  After you have more than one child, pictures and video's somehow show up less and less.  In my house, it is to the point that I feel badly that I never got professional photo's of the twins taken save for 3 months and 1 year.  You really have to try a lot harder to be on top of things when you have two other kids running around.  Sometimes life just passes you by and you realize that you missed a lot of great moments because you were not Johnny on the Spot this week. 

In an effort to document some newly mastered skills I whipped out my trusty old camera that takes short video clips and got the twins riding their bikes without training wheels for the very first time.  In all reality, Bria rode hers without training wheels last year when she was 3, but after a few spills she demanded they be put back on.  This spring, they both blew out their back tires so Chadd ordered them new ones.  When they came in the mail 3 weeks ago, the twins were so excited to ditch their scooters and hop on their bikes to ride.  Since they were the back wheels, the training wheels had to be removed.  I will never forget the look in Chadd's eyes when he asked if we should just keep them off.  Yep, lets go for it...after all they are 4!  So, they hopped on and much to our surprise both of them rode like the wind!  It is amazing!

These video's were taken yesterday.  So, they have been riding for a few weeks now...but, the point is that I got it on video :)  Even if it wasn't the very first time that they did it!  Go Bennett and Bria!!!

The other newly perfected skill in our house comes from Avery who in Kindergarten and age 5 can finally read a level 2 chapter book.  I was pretty shocked.  Each time I try to read a story with her, I point at words and she will sound out/read a few of them and act all frustrated and say, "You read it Mom."  So, I thought it was just not going to be a skill that she mastered this year. 

Now, let me preface this story by saying that I am the parent who gets annoyed with people who brag about their uber intelligent kids as if intelligence alone will get them anywhere in this world.  People bragging about how their kindergartner can read perfectly and isn't it oh so amazing were especially bothersome to me.  Why?  Because reading is a skill that ALL kids will master by the end of 1st grade.  Just because your kid could read while wearing diapers will not make him/her any better at reading.  It just makes your ability to discuss private matters by spelling out words no longer an option!

In lieu of not being a braggart, I will simply say that I am incredibly proud of my darling 5 year old who can read her favorite stories to me at bedtime instead of me reading them to her.  Lap time is important and it is so fun to have your child do all the talking while you get to do all of the cuddling.  Way to go Avery!  You are my Fly Girl!

(after four attempts at uploading video of her reading, I continue to get an error message).  A photo will have to do :)

Ticketmaster rant

I have had the craziest morning.  It was late start at school so I had Avery and her friend Madi here until 10:40 this morning.  What is with all of these last starts?  I don't ever remember having them when I went to school.  There is truly nothing like two free hours of non scheduled activity when you are 5 years old. Truly. Nothing. Like it.  That is all I'm going to say :)

Anyway, today is the day that I get to buy tickets for Avery's dance recital.  I decided rather than go to the box office two hours early and wait in line with a bunch of frantic women that I would order the tickets through Ticketmaster online.  Kudos to my friend Gretchen who waited in line and scored some rock star seats.

The girls finally got on the bus, the twins were parked in front of the T.V. so that I had zero distractions and I waited.  It was 10:47 and my heart was pounding.  The adrenaline was rushing through my system and my stomach was filled with that awful butterfly feeling.  I despise the fact that purchasing tickets has to be so stressful.  Note to self; my attempt at not being one of those "frantic" women waiting in line for two hours was not completely successful.  Yes, I didn't wait for two hours but come 10:57 I was definitely frantic.  

I had been told that you could call an 800 number as well to order tickets.  So, just as a backup I dialed the number at 10:57 and was put into the phone system.  The clock turned 11 and I clicked the link to purchase tickets.  The screen pops up with all of these drop downs.  How many tickets, which type of seating, child or adult, handicapped or regular...ARGH!!!!!  So, I entered 5, best available.  Then, a screen pops up that asks you to type in the magic words separated by a comma.  OMG!  I have zero time for this Ticketmaster!  Someone else is swiping my amazing row C tickets because I am having to decipher your effing magic words that are barely legible.  I type the words in, click enter and boom!  I score my tickets...I think.  Then, up pops the next page which asks how you would like to receive your tickets.  There are a bunch of ridiculously overpriced options(I mean seriously?  A $5 charge to print them now?)and way at the bottom is the "standard mail" choice at no extra charge.  Click.  Enter.  The next thing I see is a warning message stating, "An Error occurred with your purchase.  We apologize.  If you were in the middle of an order, please check your account to see if it went through.  Otherwise, try again."  You have got to be kidding me.

Meanwhile, I am listening to the automated voice(kind of)and asking it to repeat itself since I have no idea what is happening  now.  Back to the computer, I start over.  I go through the whole process again, now I am at Row F and the freaking error message comes up again.  Finally I pay attention to the voice on the phone and get to our event.  I started over on the computer while actually paying attention to the phone call as it has become a priority now.  The computer comes back with Row J, the phone comes back with the same Row F tickets I had on the second try with the computer.  If I thought I was frantic at 10:57, I certainly was frantic now.  I logged out of the computer.  I got my awesome Row F tickets on the phone.  Hung up and just stared at the computer.  That was a complete mind bender and something has to be done about Ticketmaster's computer system.  That was horrible!

Deep breaths have been taken and I am so excited that I got Row F.  They are amazing tickets directly in the center of the auditorium at the perfect viewing level.  The videographer is even in our row(which means it must be the best one :)).  Phew!

I will never attempt purchasing tickets on Ticketmaster.com again.  The phone system, even though it  is frustrating to speak to a non-human proved to be the best option for me.     The only other time I purchased tickets on the website was for Taylor Swift and I clicked in exactly at 10am and it processed for 12 minutes before I was able to view my tickets which were mediocre at best.  Talk about frustrating!  Has anyone else had a similar experience?

May Day

We had a very busy and productive day today.  It is May 1st, also known as "May Day."  I have read that depending on where you live, the traditions surrounding this day and how you celebrate it can vastly differ.  I grew up creating a little basket of goodies for a neighbor or two.   We would make flowers, add candy, make a card and then go leave it on a door step.  Sometimes we would ring the bell and run.  Other times, we would knock and hand the person the basket.  I also remember simply leaving a basket on a door step and waiting for the person to notice it.  I think it is a beautiful way to show a neighbor your appreciation or just simply brighten someones day. 

The kids and I planned on participating in the MS Walk at Minnehaha Park this morning.  Avery woke up not feeling so well, so I bundled the twins up and we hit the road.  Before I left, I asked Chadd if he could help Avery come up with a May Day basket so that she could drop it off at the neighbor's house.   We met some friends at the walk and had a great time doing our part to raise money for this great cause.  We were invited back to the friends house for a celebration and a thank you luncheon.  The twins had a really great time playing with their friend and I had a great time hanging with my friend.

When we got home, Avery was very excited to show us the basket and flowers that she picked out for our neighbors.  The kids each made their own card and then they dropped it off at the neighbors house.  I loved watching how excited they were to give their basket away.

We recently talked about charity in our ECFE class.  I had never given much thought to this concept before and I was a bit embarrassed that I hadn't even thought about the little things I could do to teach my kids about giving.  I loved the idea about chores and piggy banks.  You give each child three piggy banks labeled: Saving, Giving, Keeping.  This way you can make your allowance divisible by three and they put equal parts into each piggy bank.  Then, you choose when you want to donate the money to a charity of the kids choice and they can learn about giving.  I am trying to do my part to raise money conscious children who also know what it means to GIVE.  I feel like charity often falls by the wayside in these tough economic times.  I want to instill the idea of giving to my kids early so that they will always feel like giving throughout their lives. 

Today we were able to give in various ways.  We gave our time by attending the MS Walk and showing our support for our friends and family members who battle this disease daily.  We gave money towards this cause as well as others this year in hopes that it will help fund research towards a cure.  We showed our appreciation for our neighbors who have helped us out many times by assembling a little basket of flowers, candy and cards and hopefully put a smile on their faces.  Giving is so rewarding and I am going to try to keep it on our weekly to do list from now on.