Step By Step

 It's too bad Jason didn't have a mid-winter break last week, like the kids did. Luckily, he did manage to get a good deal done on Saturday. We kept the day less busy so he could. The rest of the break last week was full of art class for Karissa and working on her science fair project with a friend, roller skating, more sledding for Victoria, and a few play dates. We were busy! So, by Saturday, which included the usual dance and ice hockey, we needed to be home more! The weather turned out to feel more like spring break by Saturday, though, so we did have to take a walk to the park to take advantage, but Jason got some solid work time in since there were no big activities for him to help with.

We weren't planning on putting up the new wall for the extra room, but decided since it was already a mess, we might as well do it now! So, Jason built this wall.

Note the freezer at the far left in the doorway.

Note the freezer has been moved.

The other side will be a guest room, eventually, and the girls' doll room. They always like to have a big set-up for their American Girl dolls, undisturbed, and there's just not enough space in their bedrooms for it. The wall is now completely dry walled, but I can't display those pictures because for some reason they aren't downloading onto the computer- grrrr! I also took pictures of the windows which are posing a new challenge for Jason, extending the project, but he's figuring it out and getting it done, step by step.

He finished the back of the shelving unit with the melamine, which was the main reason for this whole project; nice shelving space.

 The other reason for putting the new wall up now is so that when we sand, the dust won't get all over our stuff in that little guest room. We can hang a tarp over the doorway and not worry about cleaning all that mess up off the piles of stuff stored there. We did, however, sand the corner where the freezer goes and painted it so we could put the freezer back. It was in the doorway of our new wall. Once Jason put the drywall up, we weren't going to get into that room!

Voila! Something is back in it's place!

Valentine's

I liked Valentine's Day on a Sunday. I got to spend the whole day with my valentine! We had to go out to eat the day before, but I don't think we ever actually go out on Valentine's Day because I don't like to fight the crowds. It sure is nice leaving Victoria in charge. She does well babysitting her siblings and they respond well to her. Since Erik doesn't like many "other" people to be in charge of him, still, this is a great arrangement!

Each of my mini valentines celebrated with their classes at some point during the week. When Austin had put on his clothes for his party, I commented on his red shirt that he remembered to put on, without me asking him to do so, and he said very seriously, "It's too bad they don't make pink shirts with hearts on them for boys." I had to agree and smile at the same time!

At Erik's Valentine party. He helped me decorate his yellow box.

My mini Valentines before church.

Erik had to take a picture before he would be in one, so he took the last one and had to make a face in this one.

Around here, we have that good ol' mid-winter break. So, here we are at day 2. Yesterday we had a very successful sledding outing, The last time we went was on Erik's birthday when he first became independent at sledding and enjoyed it! He just assumed that yesterday was his birthday again since he associates it with his birthday. It was a much bigger hill, but he still went down by himself and walked up the hill with his sled, most of the time.

Today, I got the kids out of the house early to go the the hands-on science museum in Ann Arbor. I wanted to get ahead of the crowds and make it back in time for their dentist appointments. At the dentist, they have a new learning program for kids. They taught them about sugar consumption and how plaque forms. They also gave them some colored plaque locators so they could see the plaque on their teeth and know where to brush better. It was very enlightening to them! Now, they are asking me about how many grams of sugar are in what foods. It's good after all that Valentine candy we just got!

Building at the museum.

Compliments of Victoria's phone.

The ambulance is always a must at the museum.

What the Strep?!

Strep throat has recently been a big mystery to me. My sister's family of 9 had about 29 cases of it in 9 months (for real). They're way out in Utah, so we're not directly involved in any of it, though her youngest got his tonsils out last summer when we were there. I hear about most of the times someone gets it, usually someone who has already had their tonsils taken out, and think it's a crazy weird ailment they've dealt with. Well, our family has finally gotten to experience strep throat. We never have before this January. Jason doesn't think he ever had it. I think I might have had it one time when I was little, even though my sister had it quite a lot, even way back when.

The first week back at school after winter break, Austin developed a rash. When he said his throat hurt and then developed a fever, I knew something was up. He had scarlet fever, strep throat with a rash. I actually didn't realize what scarlet fever was until then. I also have always looked for the white spots in the tonsils that I've always heard about with strep. He didn't have any. While he was sick, I worked very hard to keep everyone else healthy with essential oils. Jason and I even started taking Airborne, something that doesn't surprise me about him, but about myself. I was feeling extra tired and could feel my body trying to fight all the winter sick germs that go around here.

About 10 days later, Jason came down with strep throat. It was going around at Ford, according to the rumors. The girls had slight fevers and sore throats that one weekend, but the never had strep. Jason had it pretty bad, with a temperature getting up to past 103 at one point, higher than I' even seen him have since we've been married. He had the white spots and was shivering like crazy. As he was recovering from that, he got slammed with a cold. So he was congested and coughing like crazy until just recently. All this was after he had finally gotten over his cold from Thanksgiving!

I was relieved when they were better and Erik and I still hadn't gotten sick yet. He kept thinking he was sick, since everyone else had been. I can't blame him, I felt like I should have been too. the two of us would drag around the house when everyone else was back at school and work, tired. The weather is always gray outside this time of year, so that never helped. I kept wanting to blog about their being sick, but never felt ready to do it. I think it's because we weren't done yet! Last week, I enjoyed the sunshine with my friend as we went for a couple walks a few different days. On Wednesday after coming inside from our walk, it was an unusual 52 degrees outside, but I felt cold. Well, turns out I had strep 2 1/2 weeks after Jason!

The mystery to me is, how did I really get it? The doctor says I didn't get it from Jason, since it's only contagious 24 hours after being on antibiotics. I had scoured our house for the second time, after Jason recovered. The doctor said I got from someone else really close to me, but there isn't anyone else! I don't go to work or school. I thought maybe the grocery store, but since coughing and sneezing aren't signs of strep, something I didn't think about until I had it, how would strep germs get on a grocery cart handle? Plus, there's the fact that I use hand sanitizer immediately after getting in the car. I do know that it's still going around at schools here. I couldn't even get an appointment for Thursday because they had none that day by 10am! I had to go Friday! The weather being like spring one week and winter the next, doesn't help either, but I still don't see how I got it, nor how someone in my sister's family always gets it, even though they use the same precautions that I do.

Maybe a I should do a study on it...

Daddy Daughter

Victoria has enjoyed the Daddy Daughter Dance at Miller Elementary since she was in kindergarten. This being her last year there, she was very excited to go! All week she was talking about what she was going to wear, about who was going, and about dancing to "Whip Nae Nae" (a new popular song).

Karissa's school, Gallimore, didn't plan any dance for this year. She could have gone with Jason and Victoria, but she and Jason were invited to go to the Butterfly Ball (Daddy daughter dance) at the Summit by our friend and his daughter. We decided that would work well so Victoria could enjoy her last dance with her dad alone and Karissa could enjoy some special time alone too. Turned out, her friend couldn't go to the same dance (they had three different times), but she enjoyed it with Jason anyhow. Miller's is always great, but at the Summit they had a balloon drop at the end and the girls got to bring home little canvas backpacks with goodies in them, so it sounded pretty good too!

Her curls turned out really good!

Notice, she is wearing her baptism dress and shawl. It's great that it still fits her, 3 1/2 years later, and that Karissa let her wear it, since she wore it to her baptism last.

We had braided Karissa's hair so she could just take out the braids real quick after the activity at the church. It was a matinee dance. 

Karissa has loved this dress for years! This is the next size up (6X) from the one she used to wear all the time (size 4), which we finally gave away. Dresses are good for lasting through many sizes. 

The Bad Horse

Since we've had most of the toys up from the basement in random parts of the house while Jason continues to work on it (sick with strep throat and then a bad cold immediately afterwards, crossed out two weekends of work), Erik has enjoyed playing with all these toys that are lying around. One of his favorites is Karissa's Barbie horse, who he calls "Bad Guy Horse". He also really enjoys playing with Shopkins, a popular collection of little toys that my girls got into and the boys couldn't resist wanting to collect some of their own. The Shopkins are often attacked by the bad guy horse. I can't stop laughing how boys can make anything scary or a weapon or a vehicle.

These are Shopkins, in case you haven't seen them yet. Annoyingly small.

I'm surprised he smiled for this pic.

That's more like it. Bad guy horse in action, though in these particular shots, it is not attacking the Shopkins.

Victoria was home sick one day last week, but had recovered towards the end of the school day enough to watch Erik while I picked up Austin from school. She wasn't really excited about watching him, but he didn't want to come with me either. I told her that she could play Shopkins with him, something she didn't realize he was so good at doing. The biggest smile formed on her face at the prospect of playing some of her favorite toys with her 4-year-old brother, who she normally just likes to tease. When I returned, I could tell they both enjoyed their time together. It made me happy!