Daddy was a Drag Queen!

Let me start by saying that my husband is a very good sport! Once he decides to do something, no matter how ridiculous, he is an all or nothing kind of guy....or in this case gal!Our church does a lot of really fun FUNdraisers and one of our favorites is the Mz. Good Shepherd pageant. When we first heard about it, we misheard that it was the Mrs. Good Shepherd pageant and we were trying to get our beautiful married friend Kelly to compete. Boy were we surprised when we saw that year's competitors!

This year it was PJ's turn to participate. I told him he had to create a character (the biography is one of the three rounds) and he told me he was the "All American Girl Next Door"! So cleaver! We decided to play up his manly features and turn him into Helga Schwartzenager, Arnold's cousin who immigrated and embraced all things American.

Helga is into Rhythmic Gymnastics! How funny is that for the talent portion! PJ/Helga warmed up by lifting a car engine over his/her head and then frolicked around the parish hall waiving a ribbon in the air.

Finally, it was the question and answer portion. We decided Helga should wear an evening gown. I just happened to have an American flag inspired ball gown in my costume bin. ( I must admit, it is a pretty good costume collection!) It needed a few alterations to make it big enough for Helga, so it counted as one of my Things a Day that I made. I also made Helga's gymnastics outfit. It was originally a really large polyester gown, so I just cut off the skirt and added several of those pleated patriotic banners that normally hang in a half circle on porches. That project was a little more involved and counted as Thing a Day #2. But enough about me and my creations......

Back to Helga! She seemed to enjoy herself! And Lydia laughed SO hard each time Drag Queen Daddy took to the stage. OK, so did I!

Valentine's Day Preparations

I don't decorate my house for Valentine's Day, but I do try to make Lydia's Valentines. I am sure some day she will protest and beg for cheap store bought cards, but for now she has no say in the matter, so away I go. I saw this cute idea on Craftzine, one of my favorite crafty idea websites. Luckily i saw it right around the time left over Christmas merchandise was discounted 90%These are white chocolate, candy cane valentine pops! I think they are SO cute and the best news is, they were SO easy. I bought a few overhead projector plastic sheets a few years ago because if you put melted chocolate on it, the chocolate can be peeled off easily once it cools. So all I did was lay the canes on the plastic in a heart shape, melt the chocolate in a zip lock baggie, snip the end so it pours out and fill the middle of the heart. I sprinkled them before they cooled, but plain white looked nice too.
Luckily I made them last weekend, figuring that I would have this weekend to wrap and tag them, because Thursday morning daycare informed me that the party would be FRIDAY. So after work, and after book club I bagged and tagged and counted and packed 12 for Lydia to take in the morning. I didn't know where any thick paper was to make a tag, but I had a deck of cards, so I used one of the fancy Stampin' Up paper punches to make a little tag. I had to position the punch pretty carefully, but I was just able to get 12 tags that each have a heart on them. Here's hoping no one wants to play poker any time soon!

Thing-A-Day

A while back, I signed up to do this Thing-A-Day thing. It is a creative deal and designed to get people committed to make one new thing each day of February. They have a website where people post their creations each day. So, apparently, there were around 700 members on February 1. I know this because right before February started, my e-mail inbox exploded. Apparently the default setting on the membership was to have EVERYTHING emailed to you. Every post (from each of the 700 members) about each item on each day, PLUS every comment that 700 people could make on 700 other peoples creations. I went in numerous times to reset to NO emails, NEVER EVER and I would have 50 more emails in the next few minutes. So, I unsubscribed and decided to share my creations daily on Face Book and weekly on the blog.

Of course, with so much time spent making stuff recently, I have not found a lot of time for picture taking or blogging about what I have been making. So here is a little bit of a recap. One of my classes at school is making sock sculptures, so I decided to join in on the fun. These two little birdies were easy enough that I could finish one a day, hence thing 1 and thing 2 for February 1 and 2. I found the basic idea on this website.

I had a day or so where I had to claim "making dinner" for my thing I made each day. At that point I wised up and decided that making progress on something that I was interested in was better than finishing something just to be able to have something finished. So this sock skeleton took several days to complete. I think he was worth the effort and am happy with the way he turned out. The basic directions for a sock skeleton can be found at this website.

Finally, I have been working a little bit on a painting that I started a LONG time ago. This was started after a workshop with Anna Maria Horner. In fact, those are a few of her fabrics glued to the canvas. The general idea is that you glue fabric to a canvas and use that to create background textures and patterns behind your painting. I have made several paintings using this technique. You can use just one fabric or several. They can be in abstract patterns, like this background, or cut out to make specific objects, like that tree. I think it is a really great way to start a work of art, but if you are feeling less creative you can just paint a simple shape on top of the fabric. Such a great idea it earned Anna Maria a spot on Martha! So JEALOUS!

Uninvited Guest Part 2

I am happy to report that Friday's head check revealed only one nit. Saturday I only found one thing and I am not even sure it was a nit. Today I had my first "no nit day!" Yippee. I want to celebrate, but I have learned that these things can be very hard to see and if even two tiny nits get missed, we will be back where we started in a few weeks. So, I said in my last post that taking care of the effected person is the first step. We have done that for a week and we will continue checking Lydia diligently over the next few weeks and then periodically as long as she is around other kids who could have gotten "it" (so pretty much the rest of her childhood).

In addition to taking care of Lydia through all this, we simultaneously have needed to check ourselves and deal with our home so that we don't pass this around. PJ and I both got our heads checked the night we discovered it on Lydia. We also covered our heads in olive oil. It's one of those old fashioned home remedies we heard about. (Mayo seemed to work under the same idea of suffocating the "its", but sounded way more disgusting and harder to remove.) Olive oil wasn't that bad. I doused my head, wrapped it in plastic and went on to cleaning the house. I have to say, my hair has been SUPER conditioned ever since. PJ and I made jokes about keeping the aliens from reading our minds, and generally laughed at how ridiculous it all seemed. (keep in mind I am usually in bed by 10 and at this point it was nearing 2am). Other than that one oil treatment, I have settled for a twice weekly head check for family members who are in contact with Lydia. Thankfully no one has found anything, but once you even hear the word lice, you can't help but feel itchy and start wondering. So we keep checking ourselves and treating our clothing and bedding as if we have been exposed.

While the olive oil was soaking into my scalp, we started stripping the beds and changing out the sheets. This is standard procedure in my house whenever anyone gets an illness. Lydia still spends some time in our bed and we still end up in hers, so everything went into the wash. I read that a hot water wash cycle and about 40 minutes in the dryer would kill any bugs, including bed bugs if you are concerned about that too. Lydia has been getting clean pillow cases every night and any article of clothing that has been worn recently has now been washed. We have instituted a single use only policy with towels and even clothing that has only been lightly worn and still is basically clean. (I can't wait to see this month's water and electric bill) Everything has been washed after any contact with any of us. We have smooth leather couches, and hardwood floors, so they are getting wiped down more frequently. Any upholstery or carpet should be vacuumed frequently as well. A live "it" supposedly only lives for 24 hours if it isn't on a person, but the eggs can live longer. Most of what I read says that "it" can't jump and they cling pretty tightly to the head. You have to work to get a nit loose, so the idea that they won't just fall off on clothing, carpeting, or upholstery is plausible. This line of thinking says kids only pass it through direct head to head contact and that even sharing hats and combs shouldn't pass "it". A comforting thought if you are worried about one family member spreading it to others, but I am not taking any chances! I will continue washing like a mad woman for a while now.

So that brings me to my last thought on fighting "it", should "it" happen to you (and let's face it, "it" happens!). I believe you HAVE to TELL people!!! It is NOT fun to alert the public to something that you are embarrassed about. However, if I had known that a kid who comes into regular contact with Lydia had been fighting "it" for more than a month I would have been watching for "it", I could have done some initial research into what to do if you get "it", I wouldn't have let Lydia sleep in our bed as much as she did this past month. I wouldn't have done anything different regarding the kid that was fighting "it" and I hope no one is treating Lydia any differently right now, but I could have been a little more watchful and a lot more prepared.

I started calling close friends the morning after I discovered it, anyone who Lydia had been in contact with over the past week or so got a call. I hope I didn't miss anyone and I know it is easier right now because she is too little to know what is going on or to be worried about her friends finding out or making fun. So if your kid is school-aged and fighting "it", things might be a little different. School friends are probably safe from head to head contact and your kid is old enough to understand what to do and not do to protect friends from getting "it" from them. I have been putting Lydia's hair up in ponytail holders to keep what is happening on her head contained and what might be happening on other kid's heads away. (I have heard that hair product can help create an extra barrier to keep "it" out.) I do, however, feel that any kid who comes into your home and any household that you send your kid to while dealing with "it" needs to be informed. In my book, this means you also tell the school.

Most schools have changed there policy from the "no nits" policy of my childhood. No nits means an effected student stays home until there are no nits. That's why schools used to do head checks periodically. I feel like we did everything we were supposed to do and it took us a week of constant picking to get to our first no nit day. The kid that Lydia got "it" from is still fighting nits over a month later. Most schools have decided that is just too long to keep kids out of school when they are healthy and getting treatment. (keep in mind that other than being gross and somewhat contagious, "it" does not harm a child in any way)

I understand why schools aren't sending kids home, but I strongly believe that they should notify parents when someone in the class is dealing with "it". They can keep it anonymous, they can just tell the parents what is going on, they can offer facts on what to watch for and information on treatment. Of course, before the school can notify parents, the parents must notify the school that their kid has "it". I know that is tough to think about when your kid is older and you are concerned someone will find out. Keep in mind that if your kid got it, they got it from someone around them, so a little extra public notice on the subject may help that kid finally get rid of "it". Also, if your kid has it, not only is there someone else who gave it to your kid, but there may be someone else (or several someone elses) who have also contracted "it". The more kids who have "it" in a group, the harder it is to get rid of. So we are sort of all in this together. If you read this blog, there is a good chance that your kid plays with my kid. So if I promise to do all that I can to get rid of "it, and to check to make sure "it" hasn't come back, to get rid of "it" from our home, to be sure no one else in our house gets "it", to tell you if we do have "it", can you promise to do the same? Thanks!

An Uninvited Guest

We have had an uninvited guest in our house this week. I live in the country, teach public school, and have a toddler (read germ magnet) so we get plenty of real and viral "bugs" in our home. But this week we have been dealing the bug whose name shall not be named! I hesitate to even write about it here, but I know I am not the only mom to go through this and hope that I can lend a little advice from our experiences that can help someone else.

Lydia contracted lice. There I have said it, and now I will go back to referring to it as "it"! She didn't invent "it" and neither did the kid who gave it to her. Apparently "it" has been found on mummies in Egypt and just keeps getting spread from person to person. It never really occurred to me that Lydia could get "it". I remember there being spot checks sometimes in elementary school, but haven't thought about "it" since then.

I never had it, that I know of, as a child. But as a teacher and through various jobs working with young children, you get warned what to look for enough that when Lydia started scratching her head last week, I checked and after a few seconds saw something move. YUCK!!

So I began searching the Internet about what to do. In my mind there are 3 major areas to take care of when you are dealing with any contagious situation. First you deal with the person immediately effected. For us that meant running to the pharmacy late at night to buy what ever shampoo they sold to get rid of "it". (We ended up with RID) The directions call for an immediate wash in the medicated shampoo, followed by a session of combing out what ever remains, followed by a re treatment with the shampoo in 7-10 days. As if that is ALL it takes!

Just the idea that people are so freaked out about getting "it" should tell you it is NOT that simple. First of all, the RID did not kill all the living "its" there were. I found five on my post wash combing. YUCK! There is a theory that "it", like many conditions in our over medicated world, may have drug resistant strains. FUN! Apparently if you continue to have recurrences your doctor can proscribe stronger medications with different pesticides.

That can be a big concern. It is pesticide that you are putting on your child's head! So many people resort to home remedies. I was told to try mayonnaise, olive oil, and Listerine to get rid of it. For now I am sticking with the RID, but with one exception. That business about combing the hair just that one time after the shampoo is ridiculous! What you are doing ins sectioning off the hair and going through it with a FINE toothed comb. According to the directions, the tiny metal comb that came with the medicated shampoo can be used to pull the nits, the eggs, off of the hair. (momma "its" glue eggs to individual hairs near the scalp) If your kid gets "it" you will recognize these as small dots about the size of a fleck of pepper (finely ground). The good news is it is just an egg and it is not going anywhere. If your child is cooperative, you can spend an hour or two going through their hair, one hair at a time and pulling out the nits. Keep in mind, the comb they tell you will do all the work for you, will go right over the nit and not do anything. I recommend ordering a better nit comb (available over the Internet, so not very likely to be available when "it" strikes your house) or using your finger nails to pull out the nit....or the hair what ever works!

So I do the initial nit pick for two hours, from 10pm to midnight. My child is mostly cooperative, but she is two. Thankfully at some point she fell asleep, so it got MUCH easier then. Even with a motionless patient, how likely is it that I got EVERY nit? With the chance of drug resistance, how likely is it that any remaining nits are dead? Considering that one adult female can lay 8-10 eggs a DAY, I am not about to take that chance. So I recommend comb and pick EVERY DAY. I have gotten it down to about a 30 minute process now, so it isn't terrible (except for the whole picking bug eggs off my kid's head part!). Up until 5 days into the process, I was still getting too many to count. 2 days ago I got 12, time to celebrate except that 2 were the size of a nit but they MOVED! They were too small to even see legs, but they MOVED! So I assume that some missed nits have hatched. The next day I only found 9, but most of them were the nits that move. I am now thankful for nits that stay glued in place!

Nits hatch about a week after being laid and I doubt they were all laid on the day I discovered the problem, so obviously we have more than I am finding and they were not all killed by the shampoo. I am not to use the shampoo again until a week after the first dose, so I am putting all of my hope in the daily pick and in my understanding of insect life cycles.

According to my research, the eggs hatch after 7 days. Every couple of days they get successively bigger until they are mature. Then they can mate and lay eggs and more eggs and more and that is where you get a new outbreak. I am hopeful that each day I am finding a few that I missed the previous day and that eventually we will have a no nit day. My plan is to check daily until I have 3 days in a row with no nits. Then I will move to every other day combing and eventually to a once a week check, that probably won't end until middle school. Maybe high school. Maybe college.

So this is what I have been doing with my time lately with regards to caring for the person who was immediately effected. In addition, you have to deal with anyone who has been exposed to "it" as well as dealing with any physical item those effected have come into contact with.

I am tired and needing to go check Lydia again before our evening plans begin. Wish me luck and hope for a nit number lower than NINE! More later on checking family members, notifying friends, and getting "it" out of clothing, furniture, car upholstery, etc.

We will miss you J.R.

Lydia,

Your papaw passed away this week. No one knows for sure what happened, he went to his barn to work and did not come home for supper. It appears to have been quick and we hope it was painless, but for those of us left behind there is pain that he is gone and the healing will certainly not be quick.

Your papaw was a good man. Your daddy practically grew up at the house he built for your mamaw. JR was your daddy's best man when we got married. I don't know many men who consider their grandfather their best friend, but your daddy did.

JR stood for Johnny (not John or Jonathon ..... he was always Johnny apparently) and Rufus. No offense, but with a name like Rufus I can understand the use of the initials. Apparently that is a family tradition too. JR's dad had gone by his initials (EG or EW I think) and your daddy was always called by his initials, too. (Even though I think Peter Joshua is a beautiful name wasted on a child who was to be PJ from birth!)

Losing loved ones in inevitable, but I hope you will not loose many, that they will not go too soon, that the old will go before the young, that in the end it will be quick and painless, and that we will not be truly saying "goodbye", but "see you later"

Momma Got a New Phone!

Dear Lydia:

As I write this you are playing Angry Birds on my new phone... all by yourself. I think you will learn how to work my new phone quicker than I will and I am frightened to think about how soon you will have a phone of your own and what form it will take. (I think in a decade or two they will just be implanted in your teeth!) Anyway, I wanted to tell you about technology in 2011. Future you will probably read this and laugh. And that is why I am putting it down in writing. I would LOVE to hear from my parents about their first TV, their first color TV, etc. (Mom and Dad, feel free to comment!) For now, let me tell you about my first smart phone.

I am amazed because my new phone (which was free with a 2 year contract and an applicable data plan) is really a computer. I have been e-mailing and checking websites on it as much (OK more) than using it as a phone. That makes me thing, not only about my first phone, but my first e-mail account, first computer, etc.

Let me preface this by saying that I am not overly technological. I left home for college with a word processor that would show me 4 lines of text at a time. I wrote all of my college papers on that thing up until I was almost a senior! I don't remember much about buying my first computer. I know I had it to write my thesis and kept it for a LONG time after that. I do remember not having a computer, but it not mattering much. I used the library computers and the UTC Honors Program computers for e-mail and projects and I am sure a day came when I was using them so much that getting my own made sense.

I distinctly remember my brother introducing me to e-mail. I remember him explaining over and over how great it was and me NOT getting it at first. Everyone I knew was at UTC with me or available by phone (from the wall phone in my dorm, for 10 cents a minute... no cell phone yet!) I think at that point e-mail was rare enough that I had to go to some one's office at UTC and ask to be given an account. Within a year or so, they were automatically assigning freshman an e-mail address upon arrival, which also seems weird today because everyone has an e-mail account, so I doubt colleges have to assign them anymore. I remember that it was a big enough deal to have free e-mail access that a young teacher at my mom's school borrowed mine (with my permission) for a short period of time to e-mail his girlfriend back home. I promised not to read his e-mails and he promised not to read mine. It seems so strange as I write this, because today free e-mail is pretty easy to find. It makes me wonder what else we struggle to pay for today, that might be free and easy in the future. I hope energy, education, and sweetened condensed milk are so plentiful in the future that you will laugh at us struggling to pay for them!

So, I got e-mail and eventually my own computer, graduated from college, got a job, moved to Washington DC with my fiance (um... more on that when you are older!) and did not have a cell phone. I knew people who had them, but most of those people had busy live or well paying jobs. I had a home phone and payed for long distance and now I could e-mail people too! (but only from home or from a bank of 5 computers in the school library that I shared with ALL the teachers at my school... not computer in my classroom in 1999!) Then one day a guy decided to jump off the I495 bridge connecting DC and Maryland. I lived in Virgina and took a different bridge home, but this one event slowed traffic to the point that my 20 minute commute took 4 hours. During that time I listened to my car radio, thanked God that I had a full tank of gas, and decided I was going to get a cell phone. It was huge and it lasted longer than any phone I have had since. It only struggled to work one day, September 11, when I and several of my students joined the rest of the DC population in trying to contact loved ones working in or near the Pentagon (more on that when you are older too!)

Since then there have been a string of new phones, new computers, and new programs to run on those devices. And now I sit with a phone that does most of the things I use my computer for. It probably does more things than that first computer could do. And it makes me wonder, how amazing will the advances in your lifetime be? I hope that more advancement will make difficult and expensive services inexpensive and easily accessible for you. And yet, as I write this blog and think about older technologies that have become obsolete, the cassette tape, the VHS tape, etc. I hope you will be able to access this blog and read what I write to you, for you, about you. In the back of my mind, I wonder if I should also invest in a low tech backup and have some of this printed on good old fashioned paper. Just in case!