Spiders Revisited: Part 2

Speaking of spiders, winter is coming. The best part of winter in Minnesota is that if, no, when the kids leave a cup full of milk out in the car, you don't have to worry about your stomach lurching when you find it days later completely curdled. As a matter of fact, in winter, the milk would still be good! Did you accidentally leave in your car the two gallons of milk that you just bought at the store? No problem! (Although you might have to defrost it...oh, and for the record, I learned yesterday that we have not yet hit this point....)

So, although the spiders and other creatures start coming in to avoid the cold, we no longer have to worry about those crazy (scary) black widow spiders in California. We are no longer keeping count of how many we get rid of in and around our house. Instead, we have a new count: mice.

I told Kurt a few weeks back that I had found some mice droppings on my laundry folding table UNDER OUR CLEAN CLOTHES! (Ewww.) So, we put out two traps in the basement laundry room. Later that evening, Kurt and I were sitting downstairs, watching some telly, when he paused the program and said:

"Hey, listen. Do you hear that?"

Silence. Then, scratch, scratch, clink, clink, scratch.

"Uh, yeah," I said, getting up and heading into the laundry room. One of the traps was sitting there, not sprung, and the other trap WAS MISSING!

We followed the sound until we found a poor little mouse trapped behind the dryer, its tail stuck in the trap dragging behind him and rendering him completely incapable of getting out from behind the machines. No telling how he got there to begin with.

Now, despite the story my brother could tell about me as a teenager and the fish tank I left outside, letting the water completely evaporate and discovering firsthand about the phrase "fish out of water", I am a big animal lover. (Hey, those fish were kind of sickly looking anyway. No one can prove that they didn't die of natural causes....although I would personally put my money on cause of death being no water...) But I am the one who wants to plant lettuce in my yard in order to feed the bunnies. You know those pesky little chipmunks that other people try to get rid of? Yeah, we name them and then throw stuff out to feed them. When I was 8 years old, I tried to save a nest full of featherless baby birds that had been abandoned when we moved our trailer out of reach of their mom. (They all died but I tried hard until the very end, syringe full of milk in hand....Ok, so no one told me they didn't drink milk or eat mashed up cheese! Sheesh!)

So, my heart sank when I saw the two beady little mouse eyes looking into our flashlight. Thoughts of cages and rehabilitation fluttered into my head. Afterall, the kids really do want a pet...

Kurt on the other hand, had other plans. He ran upstairs and got a coat hanger. He stretched it out making it as long as could be and then I took on the task of climbing onto the machines and fishing the little guy out. Although I had the wise idea of just letting him go in the park down the street, I was vetoed and he ended up in a bag in our trashcan (and my stomach in knots...) Poor little thing...

It was after the next mouse stuffed himself under my washing machine, apparently having not been killed by the trap initially either, that Kurt went out and bought some new, fancier traps. When the kids noticed, they got very excited.

"Do we get to keep the mice?" Lily asked when we explained we were "catching" them. She started talking cages and names...Argh!

We have caught 10 mice in the last 3 weeks. And winter has yet to begin. (Thank goodness these aren't protected under the Animal Welfare Act I suppose...) I have to admit though, I kind of prefer deadly spiders....there's less PETA guilt involved anyway...

Spiders Revisited: Part 1

Last night, as I was putting the girls to bed, Madeline noticed a spider crawling on the ceiling above her.

"Mom, look! A SPIDER!" she said, quite composed given the circumstances. (Perhaps it has not occurred to her just yet that spiders can fall.)

"Oh, let me grab a glass to catch it in. Pull your covers over your head so it doesn't fall on you," I said. (I just love how wide her eyes can get!)

I got the glass, came back and climbed up on her bed. (She has the upper loft of the girls' bedroom set so I can pretty much touch the ceiling when standing on her bed.) The spider fell pretty quickly into the glass. That is when I noticed there was just a little bit of water on the bottom of the glass in which the spider took a swim.

I carefully climbed down from Madeline's bed, onto Lily's bed. Lily was watching intently, covers pulled close to her chin. (She apparently understands the full potential of falling spiders!)

"Hey Lily, do you want me to pour this spider on you?" I teased.

"NOOOOOO!" she screeched, pulling the covers a little tighter.

"I'm just teasing, " I assured her. And then, as if on cue, the spider JUMPED OUT OF THE WATER, OUT OF THE GLASS and right onto Lily's covers!

"EEEEEEEEEK!" she screamed.

Doh. Didn't see that comin'!

If the Shirt Fits....

Hee hee,

if the shirt fits....

This and That

Lembas-a special, extra nutritious bread made by the elves that is often used as sustenance on long journeys. For the hobbits, one bite could keep them full for hours.


Said the neurologist to Liam: "What a happy little elf you are!" (Ok, that's a paraphrase.) "What brings you to see me?"

"Well, he has had growth issues and developmental delays so our doctor is sending us all over to see if we can better figure it out," I explained.

She proceeded to weigh and measure Liam and, after deciding she is not comfortable with the tininess of his head, ordered a sedated brain MRI (scheduled for the day before Thanksgiving) in order to rule out any possible malformations. Good times.

We also discussed the possibility of going to the special Feeding Clinic here in order to figure out how we can enhance Liam's diet to help him grow better. I am guessing they will simply tell us to stop feeding him the lembas and instead, replace it with homemade chocolate frosted chocolate cupcakes which he so eagerly inhaled at Madeline's 5th birthday party....so much for keeping in touch with those elfin roots but hey, we found something the kid will eat...finally!

Speaking of Madeline's birthday, she had a wonderful weekend filled with family visiting from Florida and a party with about a dozen little preschool girls. At the beginning of her party we had all the girls color fairy posters to use as place mats. One of the girls walked in, saw the others coloring and announced:

"I don't want to color because I don't really like coloring."

"Oh, you don't like coloring?" I questioned.

"No," she said. "I like roosters."

"Uh, what did you say?" I asked.

"I like roosters!" she said again before running off to color.

"Oooooooh," I said, thinking 'because THAT makes sense...but it's totally making the blog!'

Liam, Like a Chicken

At first, when I saw him eating with his hands behind his back I laughed because it was as if he were practicing for a pie eating contest. But on second thought, it looked exactly like a chicken, pecking his feed off the ground. That's Liam, like a chicken.

Speaking of Liam, he was recently seen by a Pediatric Gastroenterologist for his growth issues. They basically took one glance at him, asked a few questions and told me there is nothing more to look at as far as they are concerned. "He doesn't look sick, he doesn't act sick, he's most likely not sick" was their basic assessment. That said, their expert opinion was that he needs more calories so they gave me a handout with High-Calorie, High Protein food ideas to try to beef up his growth a little. It included things like eating fried foods, rather than baked, adding cake frosting to bagels and dipping fruit in marshmallow cream. That lucky little devil! Anyway, being a bit on the health-nut-ish side myself, I have to admit he will probably wither into nothingness before I start adding cool whip to his sandwiches.

This week, the school system's early childhood specialists finished up their assessments of Liam as well. We met a few days ago so that they could give me the evaluation.

"So, we have found that Liam basically qualifies for all of our special ed services," she said. "I basically found that he is below the curve in all areas of Social skills and development."

"Hmmm, Liam is behind in social behavior? You will have to explain. I mean, he is always interacting with everyone, always makes eye contact and does things so that others will interact back with him as well," I said.

"Well, it isn't just social skills but adaptive behavior too," she explained. "For example, when I pointed to some socks on the couch and told Liam to look at the socks he looked at them and smiled; but when I told him to go get the socks and bring them to me, he laughed but didn't go get them." (Sounds about right...) "We like to see them follow commands."

Holding back a little snicker, I answered, "Hmmm, sounds a little like ALL my kids but ok, I see what you mean."

She continued, "And also, we would like him to be a little bit more organized in his play."

"Rrrright, organized. Perhaps you can work with my other kids on that skill, too," I joked.

"Oh, I hear ya. But what I mean is, he likes to take out a toy from my bag but instead of playing with it, he just puts it back and gets out another one and then puts that back and gets out another and well, we would like him to focus more on playing with just one toy at a time."

"Gotcha," I said, holding back my amusement. I mean, I don't want to bite the hand that feeds me or anything but really? Organized? Perhaps the play to Liam IS in the taking out and putting back. And as far as I can tell, that would make him super organized because after all, he is making it very easy to clean up and put away! What a good kid!

Then we got to the Physical Therapist and the motor skills section of his evaluation. Ironically, if it weren't for his delays everywhere else, the PT wouldn't even be able to come help him with his lack of walking, the very issue we had him evaluated for in the first place! Apparently, his fine motor skills are so good that it offset the fact that he isn't walking and thus, he passed the motor skills evaluation. But of course, because he isn't walking and he qualifies for services from the speech therapist and early childhood specialist, the PT can come as well. All for free. And if he lags behind just a tiny bit for the next year he will then qualify for FREE preschool and even busing to and from preschool! Woo hoo! Go Liam! (Something about cheering for that just doesn't seem quite right.) But really, free preschool! Woo hoo!

Finally, they asked me:

"As part of our write up, we need to know what your goals are," she said.

Hmmm, goals. There's the first problem I suppose, hee hee.

"Really, for some reason, I'm not very worried about all this," I said. "I mean quite honestly, if it weren't for all the other people worrying about it, I probably wouldn't have had him assessed in the first place, although, I am certainly glad we did. So, I guess we just want him to get caught up to his peer group and maybe you can give us some ideas of what we can do on our own to help him in that pursuit."

And then, they said the thing any mom of four is thrilled to hear:

"Well, we will be giving you all sorts of ideas, like pulling pillows off the couch and having him climb over them, and moving furniture around for him to walk between, so don't think we are just trying to totally destroy your tidy house but it may feel that way with all the things we will want to do...."

I stopped listening because WOO HOO! I have permission to let the house go! I can hear the conversations now:

(Kurt) "Um, Karen, why does the house look like a tornado hit?"

(Me) "Oh silly husband! It isn't that I didn't clean today but you know how those early childhood specialists are; this is what will help Liam! It's all for Liam's sake, really it is!"

Rrrright.

Up next week: Neurology! Woo hoo!

Have a Happy Halloween. Be safe and watch out for those chickens crossing the road!

Sick Chicks

Spanish Flu of 1918- This 1918-1920 flu pandemic, was an unusually severe (i.e. deadly) strain of avian influenza (sometimes called bird or chicken flu) that killed some 50-100 million people worldwide. It is thought to be one of the most deadly pandemics in human history. The unusually high number of deaths has been attributed to cytokine storm in the body (which, in short, is basically when a healthy immune system works overtime and produces TOO much of a good thing and the over-exaggerated immune response ends up damaging healthy tissues and organs, or something like that....) Nevertheless, the current strains of H5N1 bird flu (think SARS) has a similar effect. (Thanks Wikipedia for such great breakfast time reading!)

Forget the pigs; watch out for those chickens!

So, last week, we had two sick chicks roaming the house. Madeline and Lily were down for the count: low grade fevers, dry, unproductive coughs, intermittent urges to roll in mud, and the sudden cravings for pelleted feed mixed with ground corn and supplements. Seriously though, I am not fully convinced it was in fact the H1N1 (swine flu) as we never actually took them in to see a doctor (who apparently doesn't want to see and swab the kids anyway) and it almost seemed TOO short and easy to be something that has generated so much hysteria in the news and general public. But rest assured, I gave the little bug numerous compliments and fed it all sorts of warm fuzzies, making it feel as welcome and loved as possible. I mean shoot, compared to our last household epidemic, this was a walk on the farm.

Then again, I was only playing nurse mom and not sick piggy chick. And of course, after reading up on the different flu strains, I am just thankful the urge was to oink and not cluck!

The Chicken Costume

Before I get to today's point, here is a little girl talk:

On the way to school the other day Madeline and Lily struck up their backup conversation about what they want to be when they grow up. Somehow, this one never gets old.

"I want to be a princess when I grow up," Madeline told Lily, as to be expected.

"Well, when I grow up, I want to be a Canadian," Lily announced.

Hey, at least she is going for something a little more human, right?

***

So, we were in Target the other day and happened to be browsing the costume aisle when I noticed the gigantic, yet overpriced, adult chicken costume hanging there. While Madeline was telling me how beautiful I would look if I bought the matching Snow Queen costume to go with her Snow Princess costume, I was admiring the enormity of the chicken directly across the aisle.

"I think I will try that chicken costume on," I finally announced.

The girls looked at me excitedly.

"Right here in the store?" Aidan asked, looking around at the very EMPTY aisle.

"Yeah, right here," I said, pulling the costume down from the wall.

"You can't be serious," he said, as if I might just kill him first in order to spare him from such humiliation.

"Uh, yeah, I am pretty sure I am serious," I said, pulling the chicken legs over my clothes and zipping myself up to the sounds of little girl and Liam giggles. Right as I was fully chickened, someone turned down the aisle and smiled broadly as Aidan looked at me in utter dismay. (You know he secretly loved it.)

Which brings me to my point: I can't wait until they are teenagers....hee hee hee.