Meanwhile I immensely enjoyed PEACE and QUIET for several days at home with Baby Love. I missed my other babies, but I sure enjoyed the peace, too, and the cleanliness. And I loved spending time with just my Baby Love. That was nice for both of us.
Elizabeth's and my week...
Cardinal
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| Indigo bunting |
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| American bluebird |
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| Summer tanager |
Blowing bubbles for her to chase
Pushing Sister's dump truck and more bubbles
Climbing in the sycamore tree
Playing in the sandbox (I've got precious video, too.)
Hiding from Momma and popping out to surprise me, funny baby
A chicken pooped on a step, and I caught her displeasure with my camera
Then she went to play in the sandbox.
Nathan needed to buy some new clothes, and Elizabeth and I waited in the truck at Kohl's. He surprised his Chubs with a monkey, and you can see how happy she was.
I finally did Elizabeth's hand prints with the canvas kit we got in a Citrus Lane box months ago. I messed up on the first one, quickly realized my error, and did what I think is a good job with the left hand.
William's catch (at this time he was pescatarian, which is vegetarian, except fish)
We went down to get the kids and found that whatever had been wrong with William and me (and really Nathan even before me, though it's obvious his lungs were given super-protection, because the whole pertussis ordeal affected Nathan only two or three nights!) was contagious, much to my dismay, because Trust and Liv were coughing. Someone at church had said something about a bacterial bronchitis going around that you could get by drinking after someone, so we figured we must have bronchitis. So when the kids got home I started treating them with garlic poultices, oregano oil capsules, and then cinnamon and honey to help with cough and fight inflammation.
They had already begun to enter the paroxysmal (coughing fit) stage of the whooping cough/pertussis infection, and I was later to learn that antibiotic action that late does nothing to change the course o the illness. The bacteria has already consumed your cilia. However it does finish killing off the bacteria more quickly so that you don't spread it to others.
Sick babies...
If only I'd have given Elizabeth a garlic poultice when I did the others, she may have escaped the whole ordeal. But she did eventually get the poultice treatment.
There were a lot of naps for the girls for two or three weeks, especially for Elizabeth. I wish I could have napped, but it didn't work out that way, especially when I can't just fall asleep on demand. But I stayed so sleep-deprived for over a month because of the coughing fits throughout the night.
There was probably an almost two-week span of time where we stopped going for walks altogether and went outside minimally, because if the kids did too much activity, it came at a cost. But they were mainly normal during the day, except for during the coughing fits and right afterward. So there was a span of time where we were all very moody. We were sleep-deprived, they were activity-deprived, so then there were a lot of behavior problems. We somehow survived it all together! But we were going crazy!
But we most definitely did do some walking and enjoying the outdoors.
Walks and flowers...
White daisies, in my teens, were my very favorite flower, and they still remain as one of my favorites, so it has been a blessing to me over the past few years to live on land with daisies and just down the road from a field that always brings forth a plethora of the lovely flowers.
William doesn't understand why they'd ever be one of my favorite flowers, but I told him I guess it's just the beauty in their simplicity and the purity of the white. He was a sweet boy and went to pick me a nice bouquet of them.
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| Bee balm |
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| Red star |
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| Ohio spiderwort |
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| Caterpillar...nope, not sure what kind right now. |
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| Field mustard |
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| A jewel of common vetch among a patch of wild oats |
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| I didn't take video to share, but I've got it stored in my brain. The breeze was lightly blowing, causing the grasses to sway and the leaves in the trees to whisper. It was WONDERFUL. |
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| Does this need words? |
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I love spring! I love nature! That phlox is on one of our hillsides
(facing the road). Lovely phacelia, cinquefoil, blackberry, and moss.
Snakes and other creatures...
Ring-necked prairie snake (one of several William caught within a few days' time)
Baby bluejay. That boy...I TOLD him I didn't want him climbing juniper trees, anymore, but it must have slipped his mind, as he just HAD to go see those birds. So then I oversaw his returning the birds to the nest (somehow they all came out).
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| Salamander! |
Sabbath drive and exploration...
We enjoyed a nice walk down a creek we hadn't been to in a long time, and I collected rocks for us to paint at some time. This is the kind of thing that makes me thankful to be alive!
I think this is goat's beard, but I'm not sure. It looks like a huge dandelion seeded out.
Star-spangled fritillaries love butterfly weed.
Anyone know what these gorgeous blue flowers are? Look a bit like larkspur.
I think this is evening primrose.
Trusten's birthday...
Trusten's birthday was at the end of May, and that is when Elizabeth was in her worst stage of sickness, and perhaps all of them were contagious, so the only place we went was down dirt roads nearby, searching for geocaches. It's the first time we drove by a certain cemetery, an the area was beautiful. I snapped a photo of Albert Brumley's tombstone. He was a gospel music composer and publisher of over 800 songs, including the famous "I'll Fly Away" and "If We Ever Meet Again." (The geocache for which we were looking was supposed to be outside the cemetery gates somewhere, but it looked as if the place where it likely was had been recently disturbed, and there was no cache.)
We didn't find a single cache! I think people had taken them when the weeds starting growing. It certainly made it more difficult.
Girls' help in kitchen...
I love my funny baby girls!
I had to refill my jar for wheat berries, and the girls love to dig their hands in the storage bucket.
Food we ate...
William's pick for Sabbath dessert one week was red raspberry cheesecake with red raspberries to top, as he loves red raspberries
Taco salad; I think this one might have been with meat, which would be the last for me
Miscellaneous...
In case anyone wonders, Elizabeth still likes to look out the windows. She's like her momma in that when she's not outside, she wishes she was.
The one bouquet is of the white daisies my sweet William picked for me, and the red roses are those Nathan bought me one of weeks he went to do the grocery shopping by himself. What a wonderful surprise they were!
One of the roses' stem was broken, so I cut it and put it in my master bathroom.
And I got my sociology grade after I finished the course. There was no bonus, and I still managed to make more points than the max. Over a 100%. I got nothing but perfect scores on the numerous essay questions, both video analysis writing projects, quizzes, and the discussion boards. I missed four or five questions on the four main tests, but they were all curved, which is how I got the extra points. I was very pleased. I guess I will take another class in the fall.
The kids have been enjoying a lot of free time (and so have I). I intend to work with the boys on math and spelling with Jaden (not going to start that with Trusten until next year) during the summer and encourage them to write, but it's mostly free learning. Oh! And to work with Olivia with learning to read (about which she's very enthusiastic and ready). Then of course my main focus with Elizabeth is talking.
We just had a new moon, and the last month was overall great! I will soon post about it. :-)
Until next time...
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