Homebound weekend

It is incredible how productive a person can be when they are stuck at home. That would be me this past weekend.

Friday night Skadi fell asleep early saying she wasn't feeling well. By 11:30pm, she was up. Every 30 minutes she was up. Until 4am.

We would just start to fall asleep when she would yell again, "MOMMY I FREWUP!"

And AB and I would start the routine all over, AB swapping out towels under her head or changing sheets as necessary, me pulling off her jammies, wiping off her face, getting her a drink of water and comforting her. It was a long night.

We aren't used to this routine. My daughter, like me, gets carsick. But viral stomach stuff isn't a common visitor in our house. I read on Facebook updates from friends whose kids are sick, once again, with the stomach flu and I give thanks that it isn't us. Now, viral respiratory crud knows our address well.

I felt awful for my daughter, but figured I might as well make the most of the weekend stuck at home by actually doing some of the things I have been talking about tackling.

My October goal is to organize spaces. Namely, the kids' drawers and closets, their toys (I am itching to get rid of lots of plastic things that reside in the bottoms of toy buckets - I can't watch Toy Story right now, it might ruin my mojo). I also have stacks upon stacks of things to go back into the pretty play room. I need to go through all that stuff first. I refuse to put things back that we won't use or will just be clutter. I am not getting rid of the kids' Geotrax, the play kitchen and play food or the Little People things. Those items got a free pass back into the playroom. Everything else has had to prove its worthiness. Also on the reorg list is the garage... AB and his sister have been working that.

Accomplished? Skadi's dresser, her closet, her bedroom toys and 80% of the toys sorted for the playroom. Four large Rubbermaid bins were filled with size 2T clothes and baby/toddler toys. Not to mention the garage was worked to the just over 50% point. (Can you tell I am in earned value mode? Percent completes. I deem this project to be on schedule with a positive cost variance... I haven't spent any money on this project... yet.)

On top of the reorg going on in the house we also tackled spaghetti sauce this weekend and ended Saturday with 19 containers of fresh (now frozen) sauce. AB and I started this ritual either before or after Leif was born. We can't really remember. But in the 6 or so years we have perfected our recipe and even the kids don't care for the bottled stuff. We eat a lot of spaghetti sauce throughout the year - this should last us about 6 months we figure. I like knowing that this staple of ours all fresh at the peak vegies and no sugar.

I think it was Alice Waters who said, "if you have to add sugar to your spaghetti sauce then make pesto".

On Sunday we started the morning with homemade pumpkin pie (described yesterday) and load after load of laundry.

Of course the downside to this extreme productivity in a germ laden house is that come Monday night child #2 started vomiting. AB and I felt the nausea worm over us that evening and both woke up and told respective employers we would see them Wednesday.

As I am feeling much better I am thinking I can attempt continued organization efforts upstairs.

Or I could just go watch Glee instead.

Boredom

I don't remember the last time I could say I was bored. It surely wasn't in the last four years. Even before that, though I barely remember what life before kids was like, I am pretty sure I didn't get bored. There was always something to cook, a cross stitch to work on, gardening to do, a computer game to play, a book to read, a room to paint... The list goes one. I am routinely surprised when I hear someone say they get bored.

That said, I actually did recently have my first (in a very long time) brush with boredom.

Try spending two days in the hospital with a preschooler. Boredom was setting in.

By the second day I had a routine:

Movie of his choice (which turned out to be either the full length Scooby Doo cartoon or the Buzz Lightyear of Star Command cartoon VHS cassettes we found in the pediatric ward movie closet. Lovely. Cannot.stand.Scooby.Doo. Never thought I would find a day when I would be pushing for the Buzz cartoon.) During the movies I read magazines and let my brain melt for an hour and a half.

After the movie was over we would walk to the fish tank down the hall remembering each time how far he could walk without setting off the "escaped child" warning system linked to his house arrest ankle bracelet. It only happened once. I would also take this time to bug the nurses with questions like, "when will we see the doctor", "can you check his IV" and "does he really need the fluids?" They were happy to see us leave. Can't say I wasn't happy to be rid of them either.

We would go back to the room, stopping on the way by the toy room to see if anything had changed in there. Nope, still lots of toys without batteries.

Back to the room where mommy would invent a game to play. We perfected "hide the exam glove" (whereby Leif would announce where he was going to hide it, then he would hide it, and tell me where he hid it). Then giggle like crazy when I would go looking for it. My turn was harder since I refused to tell him where I put it. (And I think it is still left in the freezer section of the little fridge in the room now that I think about it.)

Coloring with crayons, Color Wonder markers or playing with Leapster. Yes, some of the Alaska trip surprises made early debuts. Good thing too... I discovered that the color wonder sets I bought had inappropriate colors for the topics. Seriously - Toy Story has orange, blue, purple and brown. How about green for Buzz and the chillies? Does T-Rex really get no respect at all? (Must buy a set of Color Wonder markers before the trip.)

A quick game of toss the stuffed snake (4" long snake I found in the gift shop) at the butterfly balloon. (Sorry Cate... it was a daunting target.) Once his arm started to get powerful and aim started to dwindle out of excitement, it was time for redirection. (I did retrieve the snake off the top of the TV before we left.)

Time to order some food. Thank you cafeteria delivery of many snacks, juices, chocolate milk and we learned you can even get mac and cheese for breakfast.

Call grandma. Tell her she is a "Sullivan" - still no idea why he calls people "little Sullivan".

Sit back down for another movie after food arrives and start the cycle over again.

Day two? I had read four magazines and I don't even want to think about how many times I heard "Scoooooby Doooo!" or "to infinity and beyond!"

Though I suppose I shouldn't *really* be complaining though. I wasn't the one who got to spend the night in the hospital room with Leif. AB got that sentence. And he got a cot with every three hour interruptions to his sleep when the nurses came in. Had I been the one in that position I have to admit I would have probably crawled in bed with Leif - that cot was way uncomfortable.

I guess it was good practice for confining him on the trip to Alaska in a mere 6 days.

Something to be thankful for

Leif was admitted to the hospital Wednesday morning for what was declared in the ER to be a "severe asthma attack". Tuesday evening in the bathtub he started wheezing, so I nebulized him. He had a little bit of a cold and had been complaining of a sore throat that day and the day prior.

At about 2am he woke up wheezing and asked for his "fertilizer". At 2am nothing much makes sense. Talking to a preschooler at that time of morning doesn't make it easier. Finally it dawned on me how much coughing he was doing. So I fertilized him. I started to get concerned as well and hauled him to bed with us where AB and I debated a trip to the ER right then. At 4am it was evident that things were not right, his breathing was labored. A little while later he woke up and said, "I can't breathe".

AB had just left for work (I knew this as I was not sleeping and instead watching Leif sleep). I called AB on his cell phone and he turned around, came inside and ran him off to the ER. I felt helpless and scared as I sat around the house at 5:30am waiting for Skadi to wake up so that I could get her ready and take her to daycare.

By the time I arrived at the hospital the decision to admit him had been made.

We walked down the halls of the pediatric ward and I was hit with how thankful I was.

My son was by far and away the healthiest child in the ward. Rooms with signs controlling exposure were everywhere. Rooms with children laying in beds.

I was thankful it was a chore to keep my son in bed.

Truly, I don't know how parents of sick children do it. I truly don't. My prayers are with them all.