Funday Monday and Tuesday

Our library has been having Funday Monday at the park every week. We haven't been all summer because Mondays are my days to put my house back together from the weekend. Also the "fun" begins at 9:30 a.m. and well.... 9:30 a.m.  Shall I say more?

Last week we got up a little earlier than normal and the boys asked to go. Normally I give a quick, "not today", but I thought well why not. So we literally all got dressed in less than 30 mins and were out the door. They each ate 3 fig newtons a piece for their breakfast. Umm, yes. That counts as a grain and fruit. Ha

We got to the park and it was cloudy and cool. A perfect park day in my opinion. As soon as they got there they were handed a healthy breakfast. (I didn't know they were doing that). They got Rice Krispies, oranges, and a granola bar. 

After their snack they got to go in the Bookmobile for their first time. 

So many books, so little time!!!!

Funny story about the bookmobile. When it was time to take our books back Josiah was horrified. He thought he got to keep the books he got from the bookmobile. I guess I should have explained it a little better. Ha ha

After the tour of the bookmobile, the local high school cheer team was there to do a demonstration. 

They asked for volunteers and you'll never guess who took off running to join them?

 I thought oh well. 5 minutes ain't gonna kill nobody. 

Then I opened Wednesdaysi paper. 

Well snap!!  Busted!!!  Ha ha

After the cheering/dancing was over, they passed out new books for every kid that was there. 

Each book that each of my children chose describes their personalities to a tee. 

So Funday Monday ended up being pretty cool. Of course, not so cool that I actually wanted to take my kids back this week. You remember what time it started?!?!?

So the next day ended up being a fun day too. Our local inflatable place opened  up for open play instead of the usual party rental. We got our youth group to come play as well as a few other friends. It ended up being a nice little group. We got there at 1 and stayed until 6. 

The Wii on big screen is always fun. 

I spy Titus. 

A slushie break. 

Basketball

Looks like I had way too much fun shooting things in the arcade game. 

Amelia and her little friend from the library had a lot of fun together. 

They also had a fun game of hide and seek. It was the big kids against the little kids. 

The big kids watched where the little kids hid by watching the monitors behind the front desk. Then when it was their turn to hide they hid under the counter there and  no one could ever find them. They are so mean!!!  Ha ha. They had a blast though and so did the employee. She was getting tickled at them. She told me when we left that we had a good bunch of kids and she enjoyed watching them play like they did. 

After we left there we went to McDonalds to meet Ronald McDonald. 

They got their picture taken with him and then got to see a magic show. Then they all had $1.99 Happy Meals. 

It was the perfect finish to a perfect day. 

Then we all went home and collapsed. 

The end. 

The day I had to give up my trusty bobby pin!!

Its true. 

I've given it up. 

Oh the temptation is strong. 

It's a real addiction. 

No more Bobby Pins used for ear cleaning. 

Oh I've heard the dangers of using objects to clean the ears. 

I'm just an ear fanatic. I don't like chunks of ear wax being visible. Or worse than chunks is gold runny ear wax running out the ear. 

Y'all know my obsession with ears. It's not like I haven't blogged about it before. 

Here's my recovery story. Yes, it began with tragedy, but it has a happy ending. 

2 weeks ago Josiah started feeling bad. He was coughing his head off, but didn't complain of anything else hurting. Then at bed time he was in soooo much pain with an earache. He was crying for me to help him. I used to have earaches a lot when I was little so I knew how he felt. I gave him Tylenol and ear drops. Nothing was helping. He begged me to clean his ear. And well, I had a willing victim so a mom had to do what a mom had to do. I checked his ear and he had a big chunk of wax sticking out his ear canal. So I just did a quick scoop to get it out and Josiah jerked and screamed. He cried and said it hurt really bad. So I got frustrated and said, "I'm going to bed. I was trying to help you and you jerked up on me."

So I went on to bed. Of course I couldn't sleep because I felt guilty. So I got up about 10 minutes later to check on him. I wasn't prepared for what I seen. He had blood dripping out his ear. Pools of blood. Not just drops of blood. So I put cotton in his ear and he drifted off to sleep. Said it didn't hurt anymore. I was worried sick and started texting my friend that was a nurse and googling info about ruptured ear drums. I realized it didn't warrant an er visit, but I would have to take him to the DR the next morning. 

I kept checking on him all night and the bleeding never slowed down. I cried and cried all night. 

The next morning the bleeding had finally slowed down, but there was still fresh blood all in his ear. His pillow even had a bloodstain on it. 

We went on to the Dr.

When I get nervous I talk. I talk a lot. Anything you want to know just comes rolling out. So when the Dr asks "What's going on with Josiah today?"......... It just came rolling out. I spilled the beans. I confessed. 

"I did it with a bobby pin."

I might as well tell her. I'd rather it be me than Josiah to rat me out. 

She checked his ear and said, "Yep, it ruptured. It's a mess in there. Full of infection and lots of blood."  She checked his other ear.  

"Oh my!!!  He has a horrible ear infection. This ear drum is about to rupture as well. There's all kinds of blood behind his ear drum pushing up against the drum."

She then rechecked the other ear again and turned to look at me. I was ready for the "never ever put any object in the ear canal, blah, blah, blah. How can you call yourself a mother" and so on. 

But that's not what happened. Maybe what I deserved, but I was spared. 

She began to explain that his ears were really bad infected. Possibly what happened was what I actually thought was wax, was really his ear drum that was inflamed and sticking out of the ear canal. When I touched the wax (which was really the ear drum) it caused it to rupture. That's why he jerked like he did. All the blood that was pouring out was everything behind the ear drum that was causing so much pressure. She then told me I actually did him a favor. Once the ear drum ruptures all that pressure eases off and there's no more pain. I guess that explains why he went on to sleep right after that. Of course I didn't because I layed there thinking I just caused my child to go deaf and I dreaded the drs visit because I was the one who had hurt him.

When the Dr told Josiah his ear would heal on it's own and he would be just fine, he dropped his head and his eyes swelled up with tears. 

He said with a trembling voice, "I thought I was going to have to wear hearing aides like my Papaw."  It made me feel awful. I hadn't realized that he had been worrying about losing his hearing. Even the Dr was about to cry. Ha ha

We left the drs office with prescription ear drops and a strong antibiotic. Also with strict instructions to absolutely get no water in his ears. He wasn't happy about that because it's summer break and they love swimming and playing in the water. 

Well, over 2 weeks has come and gone. We have avoided swimming and the splash pad. We bought ear plugs for him to wear in the tub. 

His ear still had all that dry yucky blood all in his ear. I was dying, literally dying to clean his ear out with peroxide. I knew I couldn't but all that old visible blood was killing me. I refrained and eventually the ear absorbed all the yuckiness. 

Today was his follow up appointment. 

The Dr checked both ears and looked at me and said, "Both ears are fine, Mommy."

I said, "What about his ruptured ear drum?"

The Dr checked again. 

"The ear drum is completely intact.  He is just fine."

I was so relieved. 

Josiah wanted to leave right then and go jump in a pool. Ha ha

I don't think this was a coincidence or the Dr made a mistake. I seen the amount of  blood that dripped out of his ear. Something was wrong. 

God healed him is what happened. Our church had been praying for him as well as others. 

I am so thankful to serve a living God. 

HE DiDN'T HAVE TO DO IT, BUT HE DID!

And that's what has cured me from the ear cleaning craze. 

Now when my kids are bad I threaten to get a bobby pin and they stop dead in their tracks. 

I'm not saying I'm not tempted. I still check their ears. Amelia in Titus have chunks. I've decided to leave them alone. 

For now..............

More Play Dates and a Mad Scientist

There's only so much playing with your brothers until you just need to have a friend of your own to come over. 

I called a little friend of Amelia's, that she doesn't get to see very often, and invited her over for a few hours to play. So far all summer we've had boys over and I thought it would be a nice surprise for her. 

Amelia was beyond excited. She refused to share Myia with Josiah and Titus. I mean she would yell like crazy if they came in her room. Which the boys thought was so unfair because she always plays with them and their friends. She may have even once attacked one of their friends with a tennis racket because he wouldn't play Barbies with her. Luckily his Mom knows Amelia and understands her. Ha ha

After playing at home they decided they wanted to go to craft/story time at the library. 

Storytime

Craft-time. 

Myia is really funny. Like she's bad, but funny. Lol. They were building towers and Amelia turned her head and Myia knocked down Amelia's tower. Then Myia knocked her own tower down and yelled, "Amelia!!!"  Amelia was confused, but I was cracking up. 

Then they had a puppet show, complete with an audience, and I will admit to being a tad nervous on how it would go. Between the two of them I figured it may contain some violence. 

It actually went good until somehow the puppet show turned into a game of tag, which I'm pretty sure is not allowed at the library. 

All too soon it was time to bring Myia home and Amelia was heartbroken. She cried and cried when we dropped her off because it would be too long before she got to see her again. 

The next day we went back to the library to see the Mad Scientist show. I was bored to tears because I'm not into science, but the kids seemed to enjoy it. 

I do have to admit the remote control shark balloon was pretty cool. 

Then they went outside and released a balloon with money attached to it. Something to do with gravity and aerodynamic and helium.... Blah blah blah. 

The next day it was pretty hot and humid outside so I drug out the paint. 

I love to paint. I'm horrible at it, but my kids think I'm pretty awesome. I asked Maynard about what grade my painting looked like and he said 5th grade. Ha ha

By Saturday Josiah was begging for someone to come over and play with them.  So we invited Zackery over. He and Josiah were best buddies when they were small. They rarely see each other, but they always pick up where they left off. 

They enjoyed some PS2 for most of the time. Then they wrestled and wrestled some more. Titus was being the punching bag so I finally had to ban the wrestling before it turned real. 

Then they all sat down and looked at a book for awhile. 

Last week was more of a low key week. We wasn't booked solid everyday and it was kind of nice. This week is different though. Stay tuned next week for all our cram packed fun. Summer is winding down and we are trying to enjoy every day. 

Our 4th July 2014

4th July fell on a Friday this year. Maynard was off work and so it made it even more special. 

I got up and started fixing pancakes and then the very last minute I used a medicine dropper and made Stars and Stripes out of the extra batter.  It's the little things that make my kids happy sometimes. 

We hung around the house all day and Maynard hooked up the play station.  He and the boys played about all afternoon. 

We left around supper and decided to celebrate the 4th by eating at Shiloh's. It's a tad expensive to eat there not during lunchtime, but my kids asked for salad. I love that they are on a salad kick right now.  So we ordered two chicken salads and fed all of us. The salads are huge. Plus, we kept the yeast rolls coming too. 

Our city was hosting a Red White and Boom celebration so I thought I would take the kids by to check it out. The first thing we seen was inflatables. The kids took off a running. Unfortunately, they got scared at the top. 

Amelia would not slide down. She insisted on walking back down. The line continued to grow awaiting other kid's turn to slide. 

This picture cracks me up.  Maynard was pleading with her to hurry up and get down. Ha ha

Titus did go down the next slide. He said it wasn't as steep. 

Then they spotted a bungee jumping line. They begged and begged so we stood in line for 45 mins until it was finally their turn. 

Amelia jumped really high. She loved it. 

Josiah didn't get much higher than that, but he said he couldn't get his feet down far enough to push up. 

Titus was either staring up at what held it all together or down at the trampoline. He was a bit nervous, if you believe that. 

We got us some water and cotton candy and then went to the petting zoo. 

There were lots of other things to do like face painting, zip lines, train rides, but by now it was getting later and getting more crowded. All the lines were long and we had waited forever already for the bungee jumping. Maynard was ready to go. Plus the loud music was wearing on my nerves. We left there and went to find our special parking spot to watch the fireworks. We found a great construction site that included a porta (porter)potty. That is an important detail if you read my last post. 

I put this picture on Instagram asking who people thought the first kid to climb the fence would be. It was Titus and I know that shocks everyone reading this. He didn't cross over, but he did make it almost all the way up. 

Amelia was entertaining herself in my mirror. 

We enjoyed an awesome firework show. I laughed all the way through it because of a 2 yr old girl next to us. Apparently she expected the fireworks to be all pink. I kid you not. The first firework was gold or green and this little girl began to wail and scream, "I want pink. I want pink!!"  Her parents tried to get her to hush the whole time. I think the whole crowd was relieved when there was red fireworks because the parents passed them off as being pink to their little princess. 

I hope everyone had a great 4th!!  I love all holidays and especially the ones where you get to spend time with your family. 

A fun summer weekend

Friday morning the kid's little friend Ethan came over and spent the day with us. We had plans on going to the park, but first I had to go have some bloodwork drawn at the hospital. I'm sure people thought I was crazy to bring 4 kids along with me to the hospital, but you gotta do what you gotta do!!

I love these kids. 

Ethan said he didn't eat breakfast and there was a cooking show on the waiting room tv that was about to starve him to death. When they called me back to draw my blood, I took Amelia with me and left Ethan in charge of the boys. He was the oldest, but definitely not the biggest. I was only in the next room. 

I came back and found them in the exact same spot. So I rewarded them with a lap around the pond outside of the hospital. Isn't it odd what kids really beg to do?

We went to the park to meet up with a friend of Amelia's. They had fun playing at the splashpad. It was a blazing hot day. We hung around a couple hours and then they were begging to go home. 

Ethan got to stay pretty late and then he went home. I was gonna let him stay all night, but Josiah was coughing his head off and I figured it would be best to wait until another time. They had a lot of fun playing together all day and I was amazed how there was no fighting and feuding for me to deal with all day. It was kind of nice. 

Saturday morning me and the kids headed out to our local airport for their annual open house. 

I told y'all!  I'm all about this free stuff in our community. 

When we first got there they had a trolley in the parking lot driving people over to the airport. So we stopped to get a picture before our ride.  

Then I got tickled because after the picture I realized the back of the trolley said RTEC. If y'all been reading my blog for awhile then you will know why that struck me funny. Remember when I rode the RTEC van with my kids to OPAC?(Older Persons Activity Center). Still embarrases me this very day. 

They thought riding the trolley was super cool. 

First stop at the airport was the restrooms. Duh!!  Don't get me started on bathroom breaks. I'll add to that on down. 

We walked around and the kids seen a fire truck that was taking people up and down on the ladder. The kids wanted to ride it so we got in line to wait. As soon as my kids got on it, it came a monsoon of rain. I didn't ride because I wanted to get a good picture of them all the way up. It started raining so hard that I had to run under a nearby food tent to keep from getting soaked. So I didn't get the best picture of them all the way up because I was afraid of tearing my phone up. 

Going up.....

Halfway up...

It went pretty high. I made sure the firefighter made them hold on tight. 

By the time they came back down they were soaked. 

We stayed under the food tent until it quit raining. Then we decided to buy hot dogs since they let us out of the rain. 

We then walked around and looked at all the airplanes, jets, and helicopters. 

They loved this army plane. They got to climb all over it and explore. It's an active plane that is used everyday in the army. 

Then they got to pretend to fly an army helicopter. This soldier showed them how to fly it and move gears. Of course that's with it not being started. God help us if any soldier leaves the helicopter keys laying around for Titus to pick up. Ha ha

Amelia was like,"Hmm. This is neat. Now can we go play on the inflatables?"

The air-medic helicopter was really neat. They let the kids climb into that one too. The medic told Titus he could lay on the stretcher, but he refused. Titus has always been afraid of hospital stretchers ever since he seen an ambulance pick someone up before. I had forgotten about it until then. 

We looked around for awhile and the kids began to scream for dippin' dots. 

$6 for a small bowl. They would have had to share that small bowl between the three of them. What's that? Approximately 2 spoonfuls for each of them? I refused, but did allow them a slush puppie each. They enjoyed that just as well. 

 Deep, deep down, I wanted to ride the air-conditioned trolley back to the vehicle, but the kids decided they wanted to ride the hayride back. So that's what they did. It feels weird to have a hayride in 90' weather. 

We left the airport and then they started begging to go to the Wildcat Harley Davidson  place where they were having a birthday party open to the public. They only wanted to go to jump on the inflatables, but it was pouring the rain again and I told them no, much to their dismay. I did promise them we would go that night to watch the fireworks. 

As soon as Maynard got home he was attacked by 3 kids hollering "when are we going to watch fireworks?"

Finally it was time to go and we headed out to find a good spot to watch them. We sat around for a little over an hour waiting. The kids found some other kids to play with in a big open field. Then it was time for the fireworks. 

The first firework went off and Titus had to pee. He couldn't wait. He had to pee right then. So I found a cup for him to pee in inside the van. He's a boy. Easily done. Until he goes back to watch the fireworks and Amelia claims she has to pee. So out comes the same cup. Keep in mind we are surrounded by other vehicles so we had to be as discreet as possible. So she gets done and here comes Josiah. Now he has to pee. "Oh, puhleeze!!!"  I hadn't seen one firework yet. We been parked for over an hour. Now that it's time to watch the fireworks, everyone has to pee. Josiah decided he could wait until he got home when he seen the look on my face. So basically I got to see the grand finale of the firework display. 

Welcome to motherhood. I couldn't wait until they were pottytrained and now sometimes diapers don't seem so bad after all. Ha ha

We had a good weekend and they already want to know what we are doing next.