Gas! Gas! Gas!

Yesterday while the kids were playing together a compact fluorescent light bulb broke at their feet. Buddy scooped them up and took them outside. Luckily they were still mostly dressed from our walk earlier. I covered my nose and mouth and threw out some additional clothes. It took some time to clean up because I was trying to be pretty thorough. It broke near the play kitchen. They were frozen by the time they came back in. Buddy had already been disappointed with the CFLs prior to this incident but this really sealed the deal. The mercury vapor I think is even more dangerous than injected mercury. The light bulbs just don't live up to their long life promise. Our electricity bill doesn't reflect any savings. From our standpoint they're starting to become a dangerous scam.

Nyla and I went out to the grocery store early yesterday morning in the hopes of beating the rush. Instead I joined the crush of people who were doing Thanksgiving shopping. I couldn't get near the meat because the line was too long to enter that area. The checkout line snaked around the bread aisle. It was so busy. I had less than 20 items so I used the much faster self checkout. We're not going to have a big Thanksgiving this year. How much turkey and stuffing can the 4 of us eat. Instead we'll donate the money we would have used in creating a large feast to a food bank.

We're still all a little sick here. Well Buddy more so since he is in the middle of it. I can't believe what a long cold this has been. Nyla feels the best so far. She has a little bit of a runny nose. Bohdin has a bit of a cough. I have congestion and a cough. I don't think colds can last forever. Surely I'm in the home stretch by now.

Whatever It Takes

I read the book Whatever It Takes a few weeks ago about the Harlem Children's Zone. I learned about the book after hearing a story on NPR that brought tears to my eyes. If you have 30 minutes you can hear it here: Going Big

The Harlem Children's Zone is operating in a poor area of Harlem and is trying to follow a child from birth to help break the poverty cycle. Even before these children enter kindergarten they are at a disadvantage academically. It's a disadvantage that is difficult to impossible to overcome. One of the features of the program is teaching parenting skills. They don't know that they are supposed to talk to their child and not hit a 2 year old that asks why. It's an interesting read and I recommend it.

I had been discussing an article from the newspaper with Bohdin to just expand his horizons a bit more. I've slacked off here the past couple of days. We've talked about things like living next to a stinky landfill to saving race horses from the meat factory. Sometimes it is hard to find appropriate stories in the paper. In just the past few days there has been a quadruple shooting in town and another armed robbery at the mall.

We went tot he library yesterday to return some books and videos. Bohdin and I ended up with a relapse in our colds. He looked so sick at the library while Nyla was running around. I had horrendous sinus pressure upon returning home. Today we'll stay inside yet again. Buddy is getting sick now. I hope he's better by Thanksgiving. The severity of his illnesses seem to be the worst of the four of us. I hope that isn't true this time.

Bad Influence

I'm finally on the mend today although still feeling sick. It's taking longer to recover from this than the flu. I hope Buddy doesn't catch it. Nyla took advantage of me being out of commission. She's emptied almost every drawer and shelf within her reach. I'm running out of pantry space because she can now reach the bottom three shelves. Nothing in the pantry is Nyla proof. There are ripped tea bags, flour, and beer everywhere. The real bummer is I can't put stuff too high because the stool is banned also. Well we have less than a year here so perhaps it's time to start emptying those shelves anyway. This morning I found socks in Bohdin's cup drawer. I haven't found the cups yet. I should check the sock drawer I suppose.

It hasn't just been emptying drawers. She's also been unrolling toilet paper and emptying tissue boxes. Bohdin thinks this is genius. She's been teaching him so much. It goes both ways though. Bohdin has been sticking his hands into cups and sucking the liquid from his fingers. Now Nyla does also. I've lost my train of thought because I started writing this about 15 minutes ago. Since then I've made more popsicles, put Nyla to sleep, and found Bohdin a cartoon(Tom & Jerry - he thinks it's hilarious).

Bohdin and his toilet paper pyramid.
 

Nyla eating dinner last night. I took the camera out after she put her whole face in the plate as if she was in an eating contest that forbid the use of hands. She didn't repeat it for the camera.
 

Nyla cleaning the table with her tea and hands.
 

I went through the toy box this morning to find toys that weren't played with anymore. My list was longer than Bohdin's list. I still managed to get rid of a handful of toys. I told him we need to make room for birthday and Christmas toys. Going through the toys is a messy endeavor. I put some of those toys away 3 times while going through the box.
 

Still sick

This has been such a long cold. I wonder how much of that can be attributed to the lack of rest. This is my first time being sick while having to take care of two small children that hardly nap. Bohdin rarely takes naps anymore and Nyla is just an hour per day usually. I just want to lay in bed all day and sleep. Unfortunately I can't. This morning we went to Pizza Hut with the local mom's group (they also do the playgroup). I couldn't really cancel because we were part of the group count. I also didn't feel bad going sick since these were the same people that were responsible for our sickness. They've already had it or were exposed last week. The girl sitting across from Bohdin had giant yellow streams of snot coming out of her nose. Bohdin's nose is no longer runny and Nyla has a bit of clear snot.

The tour was okay. The manager was really nice but his voice wasn't loud enough. Or maybe that was just me. I felt like my ears were stuffed with cotton balls. He showed the kids the walk in refrigerator, walk in proofer and computer system. Then they were allowed to make their own small pizzas. I thought Bohdin would put together a nice pizza since we do it at home but he didn't put enough cheese. It was mostly crust. I had to put more cheese on for him at the employees request. Nyla made one also. She would take a bite of pepperoni and then pound it into the dough. Then she would take another pepperoni and repeat. She put some cheese on her pizza but I had to help also.

I was not in the socializing mood. I couldn't hear well and my eyes were hardly open. I just followed Nyla around. Bohdin had a great time sitting near N-. I don't know what they were laughing about. Later the manager came out and demonstrated throwing the pizza dough. He did an amazing job and that was my favorite part. I could see Bodhin's face and he was mesmerized. I forgot to mention it in the car so I don't know what he thought about it. I do know that one of his favorite things was the number they gave him so he knew which pizza was his. He made sure to bring it home.

When everybody was getting ready to go Bohdin and N- got out of their seats. Bohdin wanted to hop while N- wanted to run. For whatever reason Bohdin didn't want to run. I'm glad since it was not the best place for running. N- was getting a little mad but Bohdin held his ground. Bohdin suggested something else and they did that for a while but soon started running anyway.

I forgot to mention an incident at playgroup last week. At one point Bohdin and N- were fighting over the same ball. N- was holding it tight and Bodhin was trying to pry it out of his arms. The ball didn't belong to either of them. After a few seconds, N-'s mom took the ball away for a time out. Without missing a beat Bohdin asks N- if he wants to play chase. The mom next to me thought it was funny. He wasn't sad for even a second. They happily moved on to running around.

Since we were out I stopped to get some tissue. I now have the nice lotion ones which will hopefully make my red nose happier. My cheap toilet paper was not made for sensitive noses.

Trapped

Stupid playgroup. I'm sick. Bohdin is sick. Nyla is sick. How can we get sick every single time we attend? The weather for this week is described as blustery cold. We can't go outside. We can't meet with others. We're trapped indoors for the winter. I hate living in an area where we can't go outside for long amounts of time for the weather. I knew that it would be colder here than Colorado but I wasn't prepared for how much colder. This is our last winter here and hopefully it is warmer than average and passes quickly. The worst part of this is that we are out of tissue. Nyla's nose is running like a hose. Perhaps we'll go back to the old fashioned handkerchiefs so we don't have to go out into cold and cough all over people at the store.

Color Slide

Friday morning, N-'s mom called me to say she was going to playgroup. There is a playgroup biweekly in the community center just down the street from us. We had gone twice in the past. Both times resulted in sickness. In addition, Bohdin hated the crowded loud room and spent a majority of the time on my lap asking to leave. I decided to give it another try. When we arrived, Bohdin started playing with N- right away. Nyla went off and played. I met some great new moms who just moved to the area. It was a pleasant surprise. I'll go back again.

Yesterday we went to the mall to use a coupon I had. I thought I could stock up on more socks now that they were on sale and I had a 30% coupon. It has been raining for days and the rain finally let up in the afternoon. On the way there we saw a rainbow. There are not many rainbows around here since it remains overcast after raining. In fact it's overcast this morning. We pointed out the rainbow and Bohdin said "It looks like a color slide." I love that description.

When we arrived at the busy parking lot Bohidn said he needed to poop. I dropped him and Buddy off and we were supposed to meet inside. We couldn't. There were zero parking spots. There were cars going around waiting for somebody to exit but there were more cars waiting than people leaving. No sign of recession around here unless people just had fewer shopping bags than usual. There has also been 5 armed robberies there in the past month. That didn't deter anybody either. I could not find a parking spot anywhere. I circled the mall and finally just gave up. Those cheap socks just aren't worth it anymore.

More teeth and another word

I realized after I wrote yesterday's post that I have been in the same cleaning/admitting defeat cycle before. Apparently every so often I get grand ideas forgetting my formidable foes. In another few months I'll try again I'm sure.

Nobody has asked what Nyla's first word was although several already know. Around here we call breastmilk la la (boring story). Nyla's first word was "wa ha, wa la, la ha". Although her pronunciation was a little off the intent was clear. Last night she came up to me put her arms up and said "up, up up".

Two bottom teeth are just beginning to break through the surface. These are #11 and #12. Again she has skipped a spot on each side.