Busy at Home

On Saturday evening, as we were driving to our church for the annual Mother/Daughter Banquet, it occurred to me that I hadn't gone anywhere the entire week! The last time I'd been in the car had been the Sunday before to go to church. And although I couldn't say our week had been overly busy, I was busy enough not to have a chance to blog until now! So, this morning I wondered where the time had gone and thought back through the week and what had actually happened...

For one thing Kevin's been off and on busy dealing with all the paperwork, details and making multiple trips to Newport, OR to hopefully buy a new boat that's there. Don't worry, once it is all finalized, I will be sure to do a special post about it. In fact, I haven't seen the boat myself and am quite anxious to. :o) The salmon trolling season has also started up, but Kevin hasn't been out much because the fishing is so slow that it really isn't worth it. Last May was the same, so we're hoping the fishing will pick up in June as it did last year.

We also took advantage of when the sun breaks here and there, by playing in the backyard, going for walks, and doing a couple photo shoots of Ben for his 2-year-old pictures. I will post those soon, but I want to do one more shoot as I'm not overly pleased with the pictures I've taken so far - 2-years-old is a tough age to cooperate with pictures!

Toward the beginning of the week, my dad picked up a 100+ days engineering job on ship going from Oakland to Guam to China and back (3 times in all) and had about 24 hours to get everything in order before he had to fly out. Ben had gone shopping with my mom that morning and saw a coffee mug at the store and kept saying, "Grandpa, coffee!" so my mom let him buy it for my dad. Instead of being an early Father's Day present, it ended up being a nice sending off present. :) It's always a bit difficult around here when my dad takes such long jobs, because he's depended on by all of us. And Ben especially has grown attached to him lately. We will miss him a lot while he's gone for the summer.

That night Ben came down with some type of bug with a high fever and vomiting. His rash that had reappeared the week before got worse but thankfully wasn't nearly as bad as the first time around. His hands and feet swelled up again too. I spent many hours working with our insurance and calling dermatologists trying to get a appointment for Ben to no avail (earliest appointments are not until August!!). Thankfully, yesterday his rash started getting better so we'll see what happens. Unfortunately, Abby caught the bug Saturday night and still has a 103+ fever but is no longer throwing up. Also, Ben, Jake and I developed colds yesterday that are much worse today (coughing, sneezing, runny nose, and sore throats). Yuck. It will be nice when we are all healthy again! :o)

Seriously the most precious, easiest and adorable patient ever!

Among other projects, I did the big changeover into the next clothes sizes for Abby and Ben. No matter how much I wish I could keep up with outgrown clothes and new hand-me-downs we are given, I never do. At some point, I realize half of Ben's pants are high-waters and most of Abby's shirts are too short. I also look at the bags of clothes that should be organized in tubs and a mess of piled clothes of varying sizes in the corner of their room and decide that it cannot be put off any longer. So I spend many hours over a couple days and get it all organized, knowing that it will be in complete disarray again in a few more months. Ugh, not the greatest method of organizing, but at this point I guess it's all I'm capable of!

The Mother/Daughter Banquet was definitely the highlight of the week. The men at our church do everything: decorating, cooking, serving and clean-up! The man in charge of it all puts on a fabulous spread. Besides appetizers, salad, soups, and desserts, we had our choice of five entrees including baked chicken with an apricot/pineapple glaze and cedar-plank grilled salmon. Even though I couldn't eat much of the food because of the dairy-free diet I'm on for Jacob, what I was able to eat was delicious!

Abby enjoying her salad topped with pears, almonds, feta cheese and raspberry vinaigrette.

Oh, I just realized that I did leave the house one time during the week! On Tuesday, I was browsing Craigslist and I saw a cheap wooden toddler bed being sold by someone about a mile away from our house. So, I drove over in the pickup and got it. While we girls were at the banquet on Saturday, Kevin and Benny cleaned the bed up and got it situated in the kids' room (I'd purchased the bedding on clearance several months ago). I was a bit worried at how Ben would handle the change from crib to bed, but we've had zero problems with two nights and one nap time down so far! Yay!

The first night - a little unsure about his new bed... :)

We ended the weekend with a visit from Aunt Becky and her new puppy. Ben loved playing with the puppy in the yard and he wasn't a bit scared this time like he had been when his grandparents brought their new puppy by last month.

So, somehow we managed to "do" quite a bit and stay reasonably busy even though we stayed at home nearly the entire week!