Entering the fourth quarter

Since we started school the end of August, I have been planning to wrap things up on May 6. This would mean that we are now 3/4 of the way through our school year. So I thought it was time to stop and write a synopsis of where we are right now.

Math - Nadia finished her 2nd grade math textbook about two weeks ago, and I decided at that point to also give Ian a break from his math textbook. He had completed about 1/3 of his 1st grade textbook. The last couple of weeks I have been focusing on three things - money, time, and addition/subtraction facts. One day a week we work with coins together, another day we work on the clock together (telling time by the quarter hour), and the other days Ian and Nadia have been using iPad apps to work on learning addition and subtraction facts. Oliver likes to join us for the money and time activities so I try to find ways to include him.

Handwriting - Nadia is half way through her first cursive handwriting book. She will finish it by the time our school year ends. Ian has been drawing and writing in a journal during the last couple of months, and for the last ten weeks of the school year I would like to have him work through some Draw Write Now pages, which also will help with his drawing skills. I also have been having Ian do another book to work on his cutting and folding skills. He loves the Kumon craft book, and his scissor skills have improved greatly over this school year.

Science - Nadia finished her 2nd grade science book about two weeks ago, and since that point she has been working on her keyboarding skills or Spanish instead of science. Ian will finish his 1st grade science textbook in March, and I have not decided whether or not I will substitute something else for that subject for the last several weeks of the school year.

Spelling - Ian is about 1/5 of the way through the 2nd grade spelling book, and Nadia is about 1/3 of the way through the 4th grade spelling book. We will keep plugging along, and I don't expect either of them to finish either textbook in the next ten weeks.

Social Studies - We are finishing Africa this week and then will spend eight weeks on Asia and one week on Australia. Nadia will start working on learning to identify the countries of Asia on a map with Paul in the near future like she has already done with North America, South America, Europe, and Africa. We read three 200+ page missionary biographies for Africa (David Livingstone, Mary Slessor, and Lillian Trasher) and five other chapter books for Africa.

Music - Nadia has only one song left to learn to finish the two books for Level 1A. I plan to start Level 1B with her next week and keep on going with piano even after we end our school year. The kids will continue to participate in the Soul Patrol kids' choir until the middle of May and then will start the summer musical on Wednesday nights when AWANA comes to a close.

P.E. - The kids have been enjoying homeschool gym class (basketball, field hockey, dodgeball, soccer, etc.), and this will continue until the first week of April. The ice skating class will conclude next week. The basketball season will wrap up on March 19, and soccer will start around that same time. Over these next ten weeks of school we should get back into the habit of walking to the playground, riding bikes outside, etc. Yesterday the weather was GORGEOUS (in the 60's in February!). I was able to RUN four miles (my legs objected!) for the first time in 2 months, and the kids were outside riding bikes without any coats on! Today it wasn't quite as warm (high of 51), but it was sunny and so I took the kids to the playground for the first time in 2016. Yahoo!

Reading - Ian will finish the Level four reading curriculum in March (Return of the Jedi here we come!), and then I want to start easing him into chapter books. Hopefully we will find a series that he will really enjoy. Nadia reads from chapter books every day. She is almost done reading all of the books about Henry Huggins. These books are each around 200 pages long. Next she wants to read the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books that I read to the kids a couple of years ago.

I do love homeschooling the kids, and I am hoping it will work out for us to homeschool again next year. That is uncertain right now with me applying for jobs. We shall see.

Ian's first basket!

Ian scored his first basket in his game today, and we happened to be sitting right behind that basketball hoop so I had a great view of watching him score his first points. I was so excited and screaming after he made it, and Ian at first had a look of confusion on his face as if he couldn't believe what had happened. It took Nadia three years to score her first basket in a game (she made one last week), but Ian scored one in his first season. I hope Nadia scores another one this season because I didn't see her first one due to Oliver's hospitalization. I saw her first (and thus far only) soccer goal two years ago. I missed Ian's very first soccer goal last spring, but I saw him score at least eight goals last fall. Because one game was rescheduled due to snow, we still have three basketball games left in the season, and then we will be switching gears from basketball back to soccer. Hopefully it will warm up in the next few weeks, as it seems too cold for soccer right now! Paul agreed to be an assistant coach for Nadia's soccer team for the first part of her season. He can't help the last month of the spring season once he's working at KCI full-time. The kids have one more ice skating lesson and then an ice skating pizza party the week after that and that will conclude the ten week ice skating session.

I usually get a haircut every three months, but with the craziness of the past two months, it had been a little over four months since my last haircut. After dinner this evening we headed up to the mall so I could get a haircut, the kids could each use one of their free ice cream cone Valentine coupons at Friendly's (we got cups instead of cones because I am simply not that brave), and the kids could shop using some money Grandma Kennedy gave them a few days ago. Nadia got a new pair of sneakers (her feet are growing very fast these days) at Payless and the boys each picked out a Lego set at Target. Paul took them into a bookstore and let them ride the carousel one time while I got my haircut.

Home Sweet Home

There is just nothing like your own bed, especially when you have a back that is very particular about what you sleep on. I became particular about what I slept on eight years ago. Oliver needed to be on oxygen during his nap on Monday afternoon, but he was able to stay on "room air" during the night on Monday night so we were given our discharge papers around 9:15 on Tuesday morning. Walking to the car was almost more than Oliver could handle, but thankfully he made it (with a lot of coughing) because with a suitcase, purse, and a bag of toys I would have hard a very hard time trying to carry him at the same time. I drove to Paul's parent's house and picked up Nadia and Ian and then drove back home. After lunch Oliver threw up then I gave him a breathing treatment before he took a three hour nap. At first in the hospital they were giving him 12 breathing treatments a day, but they eventually weaned him down to 4 treatments a day (8am, 12pm, 4pm, and 8pm). The first time we gave him his oral steroids this morning he threw up all over the place. I talked to a nurse and she said to try again, and this time we got half of what he was supposed to have today down him without incident. I am taking him to the Pediatrician on Friday and the Pulmonologist on March 7. Yesterday I did schoolwork with Nadia and Ian in the afternoon (usually we do it in the morning) and then vacuumed, mopped the kitchen floor, did a load of laundry, did a load of dishes, cooked dinner, and did some general straightening up around the house. I went to bed at 9pm and had the best night of sleep I had in 11 days as I was only awakened once (at 3am by Oliver) between 9pm and 7am. Today we were back in our usual routine (except for the fact that Oliver isn't his normal self).

My mom had outpatient surgery this morning to insert a catheter below the other lung so that fluid can be drained as needed without poking any more needles into her. We are hoping this will help her breathe more easily and that in turn will give her more energy to work on her PT and OT exercises and such.

Last year I gave the kids each a puzzle for Valentine's Day. This year I gave them books. Oliver and Ian each received one of the bedtime math books (I HIGHLY recommend those three books - the kids LOVE them and they are doing math problems and they have different questions for different ability levels which means all of my kids can participate), and Nadia received a boxed set of four Amelia Bedelia chapter books (#5-8). She finished the last book last night, which means today she is back to reading Henry books (by Beverly Cleary) from the library. The library only had books #1-4 of the Amelia Bedelia chapter books, which is why I got those for her instead of the third bedtime math book (although I do want to get that third book at some point along the way). We had gotten the bedtime math books from the library, but I knew they'd be ones we'd use again and again and again so I wanted to own our own copies.  I also promised to buy them some candy after it went on sale so I got them a bag of conversation hearts after I returned from Maryland.

So close......

On Saturday the doctor said Oliver might be discharged on Sunday and thus my hopes were up for a discharge on Sunday or Monday. This morning the doctor said we would likely be going home at 3pm if his numbers were good on room air. He did fine until 1pm and the pharmacy delivered his steroids that he was to take at home. But during his nap his numbers were between 87-89, and they were supposed to stay at 90 or higher. The resident checked on him at 2pm and said she thought he could still be discharged, but she had to check with her attending physician, and he said no we needed  to stay another day. I had already packed our suitcase and turned the bed back into a couch. I could not bring myself to do that again so I am just sleeping on the couch tonight. When I told Paul the news, he came to spend a little time with Oliver while I spent a little time with Nadia and Ian whom I had not seen since Thursday. Then he took them to his parents house so his mom could watch them for 24 hours. Praying that Oliver will do well with his breathing tonight, and we can be discharged tomorrow.

I am overdue for a thankful list so here goes....

1. Nadia scored her first basket during her game on Saturday! Hopefully she scores at least one more this season so I can witness the long awaited event.

2. Nadia's game was early enough on Sarurday for Paul to be able to take Nadia and Ian to Toys R Us for a free Lego build.

3. The hospital got iPads for each room since we were here last. You can have it show on the tv whatever is on your iPad if you want. We put our Amazon Prime membership to good use so Oliver could watch Curious George, Sesame Street, etc. whenever he wanted.

4. I did not pack enough clothes at 1:30am on Friday morning. I always have this struggle to admit at the onset that we will probably be gone more than a couple of days. Thankfully they have a washer and dryer that are free to use and I took advantage of that in Sunday morning. Paul brought more clothes this afternoon so I can wear something different tomorrow.

5. Nadia and Ian sang in the kid's choir on Sunday morning which I missed, but people posted videos on FB for both services which was a blessing for me.

6. We thought my mom was doing very poorly, but when the paramedics showed up, they figured out part of the problem was her oxygen machine was not functioning properly. This meant she could stay at home sweet home, Praying she can have a simple procedure done to drain more fluid from the cavities around her lungs this week.

7. Heather watched Nadia and Ian for about 5 hours on Friday, and Paul's mom is helping us out tonight and tomorrow.

8. We enjoyed going to the children's museum on the 10th. I had planned to take them to Snow Fest on the 14th after church for snow mobile rides and such, but Paul was not interested in taking them without me. I gave the kids their valentines gifts two days early because of my trip to MD. I skipped the crafts this year and usually I cook special heart shaped meals, but it was all different this year. Nadia did surprise me with a hand made card upon my return which was appreciated as Paul and I did not exchange cards or gifts, and we have not been on a date for 6 months. My parents gave the kids cute cards (Star Wars for Ian, Frozen for Nadia, etc) and enclosed gift cards to places like Wendy's and Dunkin Donuts that we will all greatly enjoy using in the coming months.

In the hospital again

I had high hopes that we could avoid any hospitalizations this year. This hope was based on the facts that the boys' urological surgeries are done and because Oliver didn't need to be hospitalized last May when he had pneumonia. I was wrong. When I checked his saturation at 1:15 am on Friday it was 83, and I knew that meant we needed to pack a bag and drive straight to the ER. I knew the  pediatrician would expect that we would go to the hospital where he works, but I chose to go to the bigger hospital which has a Children's Hospital within it.  We had no wait in the ER and within a few minutes Oliver was on 6 liters of oxygen.  ER and hospital were very full. We stayed in her room in the emergency department in which several patients were  in the same room for the first four hours, and then we spent the next five hours is a private room in the emergency department.  Then when there was a bed available on one of the children's floors, we were moved up to the room where we still are now. This room is much nicer than the one in the ER or the ones in the PICU  because there's a bathroom in the room which has a shower I can use, and there's a couch that can be pulled out to become a bed for me to use.  Thursday night I only got three hours of sleep because I went to bed at 10 PM and got up at 1 AM and was up the rest of the day. Last night I was horizontal for more hours than usual, But I got a lot less sleep than usual because Oliver's alarm was going off most of the night.  On Friday during the day he was on 4 L of oxygen, but last night he was on 5 L and his saturations were still too low.  The nurse who came on duty this morning at 7 AM was very helpful is doing chest PT and cleaning out his nose. Doing this greatly improved his saturation, And he was for a large part of the day on only one liter of oxygen.  Then towards the evening he needed to be on 2 L and now that he's asleep he is on 3 L. They have started to decrease the frequency of his breathing treatments which were given every two hours  at first. He does not have RSV this time, but rather he has human menopneumo virus.  Because it's viral they discontinued the antibiotic the pediatrician had started him on on Thursday evening.  They have him on a steroid.  So far he has no appetite, but he is drinking apple juice, water, and chocolate milk so they did not put an IV in him.

 I contacted three homeschooling moms by Facebook early on Friday morning asking if any of them could watch Nadia and in from 11:30 to 4:30 that same day.  All three moms have children in the home school gym class that they are in from 10 to 11:30 on Fridays.  Thankfully one mom agreed to take them home with her, and Paul was able to take the kids to gym class at 10 and pick them up at her house after his lap was done on Friday afternoon. Paul took them to their basketball games and a free Lego build at Toys "R" Us today.  I was disappointed to miss not his game today because I had missed her last couple of games, and I was even sorrier to miss it when I found out that she scored her very first basket today.  During her first season of basketball she never made any baskets, and during her second season she made baskets during practice but never during the games. The hoop is higher now that she's on a second and third grade team, but she was finally able to score her first basket during a game, and Paul said it was a buzzer beater no less.  I am very happy for her, and I wish I had seen it in person. Hopefully she'll make another basket the season that I can witness. And her first seasons of soccer she only scored one goal. I hope that isn't the case for basketball.

 Earlier today when Oliver was doing so well on 1 L and actually did well on a brief room air trial I had my hopes up that we could be discharged on Sunday, but now that he's requiring 3 L this evening I am thinking  A Monday discharge is more feasible. Please pray that is discharged by Monday at the latest, because Paul teaches all day on Tuesday starting at 8 AM. Oliver really needs me to be here with him.  When I stepped out to get some food from the cafetorium he is in the room by himself, and the nurses are responsible for several children at the same time. I do not think Oliver would understand the concept of pushing a button to call for a nurse when he has to go to the bathroom. It is an ordeal to take him to the bathroom because I have to disconnect  four wires, and then I have to transfer his oxygen to a portable tank which I to take into the bathroom with him.  I hate to see him going through all this, and I really miss Nadia and Ian because I only saw them on two of the past eight days between my trip to Maryland and now my stay in the hospital with Oliver.  So I ask for prayer that Oliver will get better quickly so we can all be at home together again.  I also ask for prayer for my mother who is also having some breathing difficulties.

Pneumonia again

Sometimes I wish I had some medical training under my belt. I never aspired to a career in a medical field; education is definitely my niche (if I had to pick something else maybe I'd pick travel agent). Sometimes when I've been caring for my mom (like when she had a 102 degree fever on Sunday) or my kids, I've wished I was a nurse or a doctor. I certainly have more medical knowledge now than I did 15 years ago after going through various infertility treatments (giving myself hundreds of shots for one thing), having three babies spend time in the NICU, Ian's eosinophilic esophagitis, both boys' urological surgeries, etc. Anyhow Oliver came down sick on Monday with my in-laws (bless their hearts I was not intending to give them three sick children to care for in my absence!), but today he really took a turn for the worse. He was sleeping almost the whole day (as seen in these pics), not eating anything, throwing up, high fever, etc. He registered a fever of 103.6 at the doctor's office, and the pediatrician said he has pneumonia. His respiration rate was very high, and his saturation level fluxuated between 92-93 (earlier at home it had been at 95%). He gave me a Rx for an antibiotic and told me to push fluids (or foods like jello and applesauce that contain a lot of water) and keep checking him with the pulse oximeter at home (we have certainly gotten our money out of that thing!).

The doctor said he is on call this evening and can see Oliver at the hospital tonight if he's admitted. He said if his saturation level drops below 92 (when awake) we are to call him. It did register lower than that shortly after we got home, but we gave it some time and it came back up. I was thankful that Paul was able to come home in time to take Nadia and Ian to ice skating lessons while I took Oliver to the doctor and CVS. After they got home, I went to the grocery store and bought jello, apple juice, applesauce, etc. in the hopes of enticing Oliver to consume more fluids.

Oliver had pneumonia last May (over Memorial Day weekend), and he was border line that time over needing to be hospitalized and put on oxygen, but he did avoid a hospitalization that time, and I am hoping the same will be true this time, although I will certainly take him there if it's needed. Please pray he responds quickly to the antibiotics and that it will be very clear to me whether or not I need to take him to the ER. I have asked Paul to take Nadia and Ian to homeschool gym class tomorrow morning, and I will pick them up at the end; this way Oliver can stay home during most of the class, although usually he loves playing in the play land during their class. The doctor was assuming it's a bacterial infection, but just in case it's viral, I don't want to spread any of his germs with the other kids in the play land! In other medical news, I am very happy to report that my mom (after a 2 week delay) was able to have her second chemo treatment today (yay!) and it went very smoothly (PTL!). Please be praying that she will have as few side effects as possible in the coming days and can also stay out of the hospital.

The realtor called today for the first time in almost 2 months to set up a showing for tomorrow. When the people said they were ONLY able to come at 2:00 tomorrow, I said we'd have to pass because that's Oliver's nap time. I figured they can't really be that interested in the house if they are being that inflexible. I said he naps from 1-3, and they could come any other time during the day aside from 1-3. I told the realtor he was sick, and I really wasn't going to have him skip his nap when he was sick. She was fine with my turning it down. I've never turned a showing down before. After I found out Oliver had pneumonia, I knew I made the right call. We aren't in a rush to sell the house anyhow.

Although the kids were sick, Nadia and Ian did enjoy sledding at Grandma and Pop Pop's house on Monday. Since they live on a mountain, they have a MUCH bigger hill in their back yard than we do. Here is a video of Ian sledding down their hill.

Ian's glasses

Paul picked up Ian's glasses today. Hopefully he will have a smooth transition, and I'm hoping these glasses will last for awhile as they were not cheap. I think he still looks very cute. Now to see when or if the other two might end up wearing glasses. I got my first pair when I was about Ian's age, but Paul didn't get his first pair until his late 20's. Maybe Oliver and Nadia will take after Paul and not have glasses for a long time. I recently purchased my first pair of reading glasses. I just need them to read small print.

Nadia had commented recently that we hadn't been on any field trips lately. They only went on one in January (to an animal hospital). So today I took them to the Children's Museum. The homeschool hangout activities today focused on forces and motion. They had fun, and we left early enough that Oliver was still able to take his nap at home. It meant he took a nap in his bed two days in a row, which was a relief to me as he hadn't done well with his naps over the past week. Below you will find the video of Nadia identifying the countries of Africa. Good job, Nadia! I didn't learn the countries of Africa until I was in college taking a 3 credit course titled "Geography of Africa." Sadly I have forgotten many of them, but Paul has an excellent memory when it comes to geography so he helped her learn the countries. Only one more continent to go - Asia!

Thankful Tuesday

1. Paul's 7.5 year old desktop computer died on Friday. Thankfully he had many files backed up on an external hard drive so he's probably not going to invest any more time trying to revive his computer one last time to retrieve more files. I had a laptop on my wish list for Christmas instead of something for my camera because my 6 year old laptop computer has been acting up more and more. I am very grateful my parents gave me a laptop for Christmas. It arrived at our house today. My laptop hasn't totally died yet, but when it does I am sure we will be fine with sharing the laptop because once Paul is done with Bucknell (3 months from now) he won't be on the computer at home very often, and we do have an iPad and a smart phone which can be used for going online. I will use the laptop for blogging, editing photographs, and using Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. I wouldn't have picked such a big laptop if it was just for me, but Paul likes a bigger screen so we got one with a 17 inch monitor. It doesn't have a touch screen, which seems to be standard these days, but we can do without that.

2. It snowed a little during the night last night and has continued to snow today. In December when it snowed the first time I had the kids do their schoolwork first thinking that they would play in the snow after lunch, but it melted before
we had lunch. Oops! I felt awful about that and promised the next time it snowed they could play in the snow FIRST. I was in Maryland the last time it snowed, so this morning I let them play in the snow first although in this instance it would have been fine to wait because the snow has definitely not melted but rather has gotten deeper as it hasn't stopped snowing yet, but I felt it was important to keep my promise. I love the flexibility of home schooling.

3. Nadia has come a LONG way with playing the piano over the last two weeks. The light bulb has finally clicked, and she is enjoying it a lot more. She is doing much better at reading the music. She finished one of her two books yesterday, and once she learns the last three songs in the other book, we will be headed to Bonanza for dinner to use the gift card my parents gave Paul for his birthday. They love that restaurant, so everyone is pulling for Nadia to achieve the goal. I took a video of the song that is currently her favorite. The next video I will be taking is of Nadia identifying 52 countries in Africa on a map.

4. Ian is working on level four reading to earn the privilege of seeing the movie "Return of the
Jedi." In a little over two weeks he did 23 lessons of the curriculum! If he keeps at this pace, he will be watching the movie in about four weeks. Yesterday's lesson was on "gn" words (a gnat and gnu were two of the main characters in the story).

5. Ian didn't do very well in his basketball game on Saturday (he looked totally clueless out there to be honest), but he did dribble the ball some and made one attempt at making a basket. Nadia showed a lot of improvement in her game and made three attempts at making a basket. We all attended Ian's game, but the boys and I stayed home during her game on Saturday so that Oliver could take a nap.

6. Ian now enjoys eating clementines and baby carrots with ranch dressing. YAY! He eats both of those much faster than a banana, which is such a relief. All five of us like baby carrots (I don't use dip) and clementines.

7. The kids enjoyed playing dodgeball in gym class on Friday, Oliver enjoyed playing in the playland, and I enjoyed talking to another homeschool mom.

8. Nadia has been tearing through chapter books that are about 200 pages long. She finished the Ramona series and now is reading the Henry Huggins series. I told her if she reads 150 books this year I will give her $10. She is on pace to achieve that goal. In the van we've been listening to Twenty One Balloons, and I have been

alternating at home between Larry Boy books and biographies of missionaries in Africa. First we read one on David Livingstone, and now we are reading one about Lillan Trasher, who established an orphanage in Egypt around the time of WWI. During her lifetime she cared for almost 10,000 widows and orphans in Egypt. I had never heard of her before, but we are all enjoying her biography.

9. Nadia and Ian are making good progress in their ice skating lessons. They are learning how to swizzle.

10. I prefer exegetical sermons (rather than topical) and it had been awhile since our pastor had done an exegetical series. I have been enjoying the series on 1&2 Thessalonians. At the start of each sermon a woman (who is a veterinarian) recites from memory the passage that sermon is focused on (sometimes more than one chapter). She has memorized quite a few books of the Bible in their entirety. She recites the passage with a lot of expression. I memorized those two books of the Bible when I was in 9th grade, but I couldn't recite them from memory now. I missed a few of the sermons due to being in Maryland, but I was able to watch them online, which was nice. This past Sunday was actually the first time I had sung with the choir on a Sunday morning in 2016, and I loved the anthem we sang. "In Pastures Green" was a very majestic piece. I also loved that we sang "How Great thou art" on Sunday as they sing more choruses than hymns, and I love that hymn.

11. I saved the best for last. After 21 days in the hospital, my mom is going HOME this evening. WOOHOO! Please pray for a smooth transition.

3 1/2 years old!

My baby will turn four six years old months from today. Here are some ways he has changed over the last three months:

1. He has gotten MUCH better about not spilling his milk. Thank heavens. Now if we could get him to feed himself more consistently. This doesn't actually bother me, but it does bother Paul.

2. Although he has had a rough time over the past week with his nap, he still takes a nap from 1-3 most days, and in fact some days I have to wake him up after he has slept a full three hours. Here's to hoping and praying he doesn't give up his nap any time soon, although I know he'll most likely give it up before the end of 2016.

3. He's starting to learn his alphabet and numbers. He always identifies the letter "O" and the number "3" correctly, and he is usually able to identify a few other letters such as P, N, and M.

4. He's still a fabulous eater who eats almost every single thing he is offered. I even got him to eat eggs for the first time recently (during our study of Holland). Previously the only two things he would consistently reject were bananas and eggs. He keeps adding more fruits to the

list of foods he enjoys. A recent addition would be clementines. For example, he enjoyed the pita bread and hummus we ate last week during our study of Egypt, and Nadia, Ian, and I were not keen on the hummus.

5. He always says the correct age when someone asks him how old he is. Now we shall see whether he starts saying three and a half or not.

6. He has shown a lot of improvement with controlling his temper. Yay!

7. He's starting to outgrow some size 3T clothing. Say it isn't so! He weighs 35 pounds.

8. If he doesn't remember what his lesson was about in Sunday School, he says it was about "Jesus dying on the cross." Evidently they study that most weeks. Not really. Several weeks ago when Grandma and Pop Pop took the kids to church (when I was in Maryland), Oliver told them that his lesson was about "Peter jumping into the water." I am guessing it was on Peter walking on the water. His favorite song that he sings at church is "I'm in the Lord's Army." I'll have to take a video of him singing that song. He sang it for Grandma on the phone recently.