Happiness for A Buck

I keep hearing people say that a dollar doesn't go as far as it used to. While this may be true, one dollar has given immense pleasure to my little girl.

I found a pink dress-up skirt in the dollar bin at Target -- I snagged it. It had Miss K's name all over it: two different pinks, sparklies, and enough material to be "froofroo" girly.

Sure enough, the next morning when I gave it to her, she LOVED it. K promptly dubbed it her "ballerina skirt" and has worn it pretty much non-stop now for the last two weeks. And I do mean non-stop. We wear it to the bus stop to drop off and pick up big brother...much to the amusement of the other mothers and the drivers on the road that pass us. We wear it to the store....we wear it to sleep in...the only thing we can't do it take a bath in it or wear it to church, but K would do it in a heartbeat if we'd let her.

She is also getting plenty of exercise, because she is dancing through the house. She solemnly informed her daddy the other day, "I don't know what it is....but I have just got...to...dance!" And started jumping and twirling around, smiling so big I thought her cheeks were going to pop off.

Here she is, with the $1 skirt, over her jammies:

Pensive:


Dancing for joy after a busy morning of rearranging all the movies in the entertainment center:


And, cheesing it:

Refocus

A lot of my posts lately have chronicled the craziness that is the H-- household, and its various stresses. Some triumphs, some continued challenges. There is a distinct lack of acknowledgement of the huge amounts of blessings that present themselves in the midst of the chaos, though, so I thought I'd take some time today to list a few:

The sun is out today. It may be 4 degrees, with a windchill of -12, but the sun is shining for the first time in weeks. We have had clouds with or without precipitation since just after Christmas, so an actual sunny day is fabulous!

We have a vehicle that still works and gets us whereever we need to be.

I have a wonderful husband who works hard and deals with a lot of junk at work to provide for his family. He is also a good Christian man who has his responsibilities and priorities in order and acts in his family's best interests, even if it means some sacrifice on his part. This in and of itself is probably the biggest blessing I have been given.

I have two great kids -- both of which present their own challenges to the job of parenthood -- but both of which really are good kids. My son is very sweet, and my daughter is too, when she's not being mischievous. They make me laugh several times a day at something they say or do.

I have a great dog, with blue eyes who is nice and big and fluffy. He has the absolute softest ears, and I love to rub them. It's a great partnership, because Mischa loves for me to rub his ears too.

We have a fairly snug house that keeps the elements outside and us comfortable on the inside.

I have a bathroom that works, inside the house. I know people that live out in the country that still use an outhouse.

I have a piano, and have been enjoying writing more music. I have five more songs that are in various stages of completion, and it's always a joy to tinker around and discover new possibilities.

Dr. Pepper. God Bless whoever invented the stuff! That is my one vice, I have a can nearly every day if it's available. And since my husband likes it too, it generally is in the house.

My picture window in the living room -- it's like an ever-changing art display, with its own frame. I can see the mountains and watch the seasons change on them. They start fall and winter just before we do, and you can see the colors changing gradually down the hill before our trees start changing. Then it reverses in spring and summer, and while we're enjoying full-fledged spring the new leaves are just starting to creep back up the mountains. Fascinating!

We live in a small community -- which brings with it a nice, old-fashioned style Fourth of July celebration and a very low crime rate. Yet we're within 10 minutes of any amenities we would want, in a larger town of about 70,000+.

We have a fantastic church family, which have been (and still are) a support base for us mentally, emotionally, and at times fiscally and physically when the need has arisen.

I have the ability to pick up a $3 bunch of flowers at the grocery store when we have a little extra. That seems like such a little thing....but how amazing is it that we can get fresh flowers when it's 4 degrees outside with snow on the ground? I'm glad we live in modern times and in the country that I do, to have this ability.

Speaking of, I am also blessed to live in the U S of A. Despite all its current problems, it is still one of the best places to live out there. I have enjoyed living in other countries, too, but I'm glad this is my home.

There are other things, of course. Every day brings its own special highlights and joys, woven in the middle of the normal chaos. But these are just a few.

Morning Surprise!

We have had quite the morning of surprises today.

First, it snowed enough that all the schools were closed. Snow Day! When I was out early this morning, I noticed that the car tires had left interesting tracks over our rocky driveway. This looks like a floor from a childhood home in Florida; tile with bits of other stuff thrown in, minus the ridges of course.



Unfortunately for my son, he is not going to be able to enjoy it because he started having a stomach bug in the wee hours of the morning....which I didn't realize until he came into my room, upset, and climbed into my bed under the covers with me. I sleepily reached out to give him a hug and snuggle with him and woke up in a hurry. Yuck. Gotta love mothers; no one else would touch throw-up, poo poo panties, or places where the dog has gotten sick.



Speaking of, our dog has a vet visit today. He was also sick overnight, and it doesn't look really good. We are praying that it's just a reaction to some medication he was put on recently, but we'll find out.

Miss K is loving it; every "sick day" or "snow day" we have movie time in the morning, and she gets to sit on the couch with her (dry) Cheerios and munch while we watch TV. It's a special treat, and keeps her from harrassing her brother too much when he's not feeling well.

I Got One!

A couple of posts ago I lamented that my camera batteries had died, so I didn't get any pictures of the iced trees. I didn't even bother to check the camera, so imagine my surprise today when I turned it on and it said I had a picture in the archives.

Apparently my camera had just enough juice in it the other day to snag this shot before it protested and shut itself off...it's not great, but it's something! You can enlarge it by clicking on the picture; I like how the woods look behind our house, minus the unfortunate sun spot.

A Plug for Polly

Z and I are very fond of Polly Jones' artwork. Polly was a member of a church we attended some years ago, and we purchased a piece of her artwork shortly after Z and I got married. My family has since moved to Maryland, and she and her husband (who is also an outstanding artist) have moved to TX -- but she has a site on Etsy.com where she puts her fabulous pieces up for sale.

Please note that I am not an art critic, neither do I have a good working knowledge of the art world's lingo. This is just something that I like and wanted to share it with the rest of you, in my own words.

Polly specializes in contemporary still life paintings. She uses a variety of media, techniques, and subjects -- but all of her pieces are unique and fantastic. I like her extravagant use of vibrant colors. I also personally really enjoy her works that employ water and how it refracts and alters the appearance of ordinary objects -- and she seems to like to use water in a lot of her projects. Some of her works are subtly 3-Dimensional, adding visual punch to already beautiful pieces.

Here is the first piece that Z and I bought from her, a while ago (the tan around the edges is from the wall, not the painting):



And this is the second piece that we will acquire in March (it's already paid for):



I have had her site posted on one of my sidebars for some time now. If you haven't already done so, I encourage you to check out her Etsy store here: PollyPainting

The Branch Ranch

I'm contemplating a new profession....tree branch farmer. It would seem that I'm a natural, because my yard is absolutely covered in large and small branches this morning.

Of course, the ice storm that came through over the last couple of days probably had more to do with the proliferation of woody stems scattered across my lawn, than anything I did. My camera has dead batteries, else I would have gotten some beautiful shots of the crystalline trees and grass before Mr. Soleil melted it all away. My dog is thrilled, you could almost see the thoughts bouncing around in his brain as he tore around the dog pen. "All these things to chew on and throw about? They fell from the sky? Yayyyy!"

The ice wasn't too bad, the roads weren't too slick, but it was enough to build a coating of ice on everything -- and it was thick enough that our maples lost a lot of big and little branches. We were awakened in the middle of the night to the sound of things hitting the roof, and at 2 in the morning when you're not fully awake yet the noise seemed like something was trying to claw through the ceiling. Blessedly, Miss K slept through it all. She is very loud, as most 2-yr-olds are, when she freaks out. As it was, she saw white all over the ground when she got up and wanted to go play in the "snow", and was most disgruntled when we told her it was ice, and she couldn't go make snow angels in it. So she stuck out her bottom lip, jammed her hat on her head and milled around the house for a while in her mittens and her green frog wellies, hoping daddy and mommy would change their minds. We persuaded her to stay indoors with the Tinkerbell movie, and then all was right with the world. (We even got the hat and mittens off of her, but the boots stayed on).

As a result of the weather, A had no school for the last two days. Normally any change in his routine would send him into a negative behavior pattern, but since we had just come off of Christmas Break he wasn't fully into the school routine again. He was getting antsy, though, and was definitely ready to go back to pre-K on Thursday. Somehow, doing the same activities at home just don't quite hit the mark.

We still went to his therapy appointments on those days, so at least he had some continuity. A is still working on fine motor skills, and we're focusing on putting pressure on writing utensils. A has gotten fork usage down pretty well, and has the basic motions to write, he just can't put enough pressure down on the pencil or crayon to make it very visible. He does much better with markers -- they don't require as much pressure, but we are discontinuing the use of those until we are getting consistent pressure with the other writing instruments. Much to his frustration. He threw a small fit for his occupational therapist on Tuesday when they were working with pencils, because he wanted the markers and she told him, "No."

But, in a terrific little section of Wednesday, he did read the first half of Dr. Seuss's "Fox in Socks" to me! By himself! We had a little trouble with the word "Knox", but we got it figured out. This is a great activity to encourage his speech development, so we're running with it. He has come so far from the animal grunts we were getting just a couple of years ago.

I also got him to spell words using the letter magnets on the fridge, I'd give him a word and make him find the letters to spell it, like "jump" or "top". We must have done this for 30 minutes before he got tired of it, so yay! Good for him! It is thrilling to see his intelligence shining through, to a point that others notice. He really is a smart little guy.

I was hoping that with all the time off for the holidays we might venture a little closer to victory in the Toilet Bowl arena, but it just isn't there yet. He did go a few times, though, and voluntarily went by himself one time, so we're still making some progress at least. The average age for potty training autistic kids is between 5 and 6, so we're right on target I suppose....A turned 5 in November. We are nearly there with Miss K, though, we go back and forth. One day she'll be dry all day, and then the next she has accident after accident....she still doesn't understand why she has to go in the potty when her big brother doesn't. *sigh* Soon. If I say that enough times, one day it has to be true, right?

Well, Crap

We had a whiz-bang start to the New Year! Our septic tank backed up into our house! While my husband was away, working his last all-night shift! Isn't that exciting?

It was exciting to call a friend to come into my stinky house to watch my kids and make sure they didn't eat or drink anything they weren't supposed to while I went outside. Holidays are all about family and friends, right?

It was exciting for me to go out in the back yard, in the dark, and try to dig up where the blasted tank was, to check the level per the directions of the septic guy -- only to discover after an hour of digging that the tank was located on the other side of the gate from where the directions on the deed seemed to indicate.

It was exciting to dig around for another hour in the backyard on the other side of the gate! The neighbor's Pomeranian was excited, too, judging from all the yapping coming from their yard. I'm pretty sure that if my neighbors had seen me out there muttering and throwing mud and rocks around they would have thought I was off my cracker and was burying a body or something. But isn't that a great New Year's resolution -- to get more exercise and make the neighbors think you're crazy? Cheap home security. So after I found what I needed, I called the septic guy back and relayed the pertinent information.

It was exciting for the septic guy and the RotoRooter guy, both of which got extra pay, to come out and fix the problem on a weekend so we didn't have nastiness coming up out of the tub drain or the sinks anymore, and so we could actually use the toilet. And that nasty sulfur smell that we've always had? Turns out it was the byproduct gas in the tank making its way into the house. We just thought it was the well water, which is what two long-time residents had told us.

Our septic tank was so full, that it was trying to ooze out the top hatch when the septic guy came. Let's all say it together: "Ewwwwwwww!" It was pumped out in August of last year, and is a 1,000 gallon tank, so we shouldn't have had any problems for at least another year, maybe two. But full it was, so we had to have that remedied. Then he noticed that when we flushed, there was only a very tiny trickle coming out of the house. Because the septic tank was so full, it covered the main line from the house....and stuff backed up and caused a clog. Enter the RotoRooter guy, stage right. He zipped the snake up in there, broke through some mineral deposits, and presto chango we're back in business so we can do our business.

Or, are we? The septic guy came back on Tuesday to check out the tank and see if the outlet into the yard was blocked somehow (he couldn't see it last week because the temperature differential was too great and his mirror kept fogging up). He looked for 15 minutes trying to find the outlet and the baffle, and couldn't see any pipes leading out, which is strange. He did see a ribbed hose lying in the bottom, though, like what he uses to schlepp all the, well, you know, out. And, our tank is halfway full again. That's 500 gallons of water and other materials, in a matter of 3 days. I must have goggled at him like he had onions for eyeballs, because he took the lid off and showed me. Sure enough, it's halfway back up again.

Diagnosis: we have a blockage leading to our drain field. Which ain't cheap to fix. So Z and I are tied for the time being, hoping that mystically and magically everything will start working again but knowing that we have to do something about it -- soon. We can call the RotoRooter guy out again once we have the funds to do so, but he has to have someplace to RotoRoot, and we don't know what to tell him. Or her, as the case may be. We were told to go ahead and dig the whole area behind the house up, because that will save us some money and time -- they won't have to try to locate it and do it themselves. Where are Snow White's dwarves when you need them? I could use seven strong men with shovels and pick-axes about now.

Then. Then -- after looking around in our half-full tank for a while, the septic guy noticed our new well pump site, which was put in several years before we bought the house. He scratched his head, turned and looked at me, and said, "Um, ma'am, where exactly is your drain field located?" I have no idea, my husband was here with the house inspector. The septic guy just kind of shook his head, and told me that normally you wouldn't put a well pump in within 100 feet of a drain field, just in case of leakage, and did we have our water tested? That we had, and everything tests normally. We have one of those ultraviolet light purifier things, which zaps everything. But I have to admit I've been looking a little askance at the tap water ever since. Hasn't made us sick or anything, so it's probably fine, but....well, crap!