Beautiful Boring!

Life has been anything BUT boring for me lately!  My lack of frequency in posting has been a direct result of that.  It all started this past weekend when we decided to have a garage sale.  Actually the neighborhood was sponsoring it so the timing was perfect - it didn't cost us a penny, and we made a cool $1,000 dollars!!!  Um yeah!  I'll never question the value of doing a garage sale again!  We didn't even have any "big ticket" items.  We sold my son's electric gator for $50, and a John Deere wagon for $50, and the rest of the stuff was toys, books, clothes, and household items we didn't need or use anymore!  Crazy right!  We sold almost everything - except 3 small boxes of miscellaneous stuff that we'll take to goodwill.  We even sold vegetables from our garden and one of my friend's made chocolate chip cookies.  We had a blast!  So much fun visiting with people, cleaning out the house, and making money!  I'm definitely going to keep that in mind for next year.  The neighborhood does it every summer!

Needless to say with the heat and being out in the garage we were in desperate need of cooling off Saturday afternoon so we decided to take the kids to the pool.  We had the best time ever!  The kids have really gotten independent in their swimming - except they still want one of us in the water when they go down the slides or diving boards - just in case!  The slides are not that bad since the water there is just  5 & 1/2 feet, so I can stand on my tippy toes if I need a break from treading water - the diving pool is a totally different story though.  The country club has 3 different pools - a youth pool that's only 18 inches, a lap pool that goes from 3 ft and then down to 6 foot in the middle and back up to 3 foot, and the diving pool is a 12 ft circular pool.  This was the first time we ventured over to the diving pool.  Chloe went first - she's so fearless!  Colby was next, and finally Madeline gave in.  She reminds me so much of myself at her age - so shy and timid.  After an HOUR, yes HOUR, of treading water "catching kids", Momma had all I could handle and we called it quits.  I wish I could print out the pictures I have in my head of seeing the HUGE grins on the kids faces as they jumped to me.  Priceless!  We ate dinner at the pool and headed home to relax after a long day.  I remember thinking my legs felt like jell-o. 

We got home, got the kids ice cream and I went in to get cleaned up.  The next thing I know, Colby comes running in screaming that Madeline is crying because she got a bite.  After we calm her down, she tells us it was from a black spider.  Jarred quickly pulled up the pictures of the black widows and other spiders we've taught the kids about on the internet and she points to the black widow.  We went back out to where she was sitting and sure enough there was a black widow in her web right by where she was.  UGH!  My heart broke.  By this time Madeline's knee had turned bright red and was swollen.  My next door neighbors are both nurses and we're having a party (of which Jarred and I were getting ready to go to) where a lot of doctors and other medical professionals were at.  I sent her a text and the next thing I know there is about 6 people standing with us in my driveway "assessing" Madeline.  Talk about a blessing!!!  They all decided we should take her to the emergency room.  Keep in mind Jarred and I had been up since 5:30 am, had a garage sale all day, and gone swimming for 2 hours - can you say EXHAUSTED!?!?!?  Amazing though how when one of your babies is in trouble you get an extraordinary amount of energy! 

Daddy & Madeline passing the time in the ER with a little "electronic entertainment".  Madeline was a little dazed from the pain medication.

For those of you who have black widows in your area - just in case you want to know - here's what you look for:

• 
  
  redness, and a "pusle-sating" at the bite site
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  stomach cramps or vomitting & diarreah
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  trouble breathing
• 
  
  fever

We'll never be 100% sure what bit Madeline because we didn't see it.  She only experienced the redness & swelling, but they were able to give her antibiotics within 30 minutes of the bite so that may have helped the symptoms from progressing.  Madeline also said the spider was smaller so I'm not sure if it was fully mature and if that had any impact on how much venom it was able to inject - the doctors thought it might have been a brown recluse from her description and bite presentation too.  She had an allergic reaction to whatever it was because her whole leg flared up in a rash as well.  She's doing much better now, and we got home a little after 1 am - they admitted her at 9 pm.  She's on antibiotics for the next 10 days to help prevent further infection too.  Madeline was so brave the whole time.  She  did everything they asked of her and took all the medicines - even the nasty ones - without complaining.  She completely surprised me too when she said, "Mommy, I'm not even mad at God for making spiders either, because they eat other nasty bugs."  So cute!

The absolute sweetest thing was Colby's concern during the whole ordeal.  Every time we'd call the house for an update (Jarred's mom & Darryl were thankfully visiting us this past weekend so they stayed home with Colby & Chloe), Colby would answer the phone.  He was so cute.  He'd say things like, "Ok, and be careful - especially if you get stuck in traffic."  LOL!  Sweet boy!  I think we saw one other car the whole way to the hospital and back - Abilene is far from a "metroplex"! LOL!  But the most priceless thing was when we finally got home and found him asleep on the couch holding Madeline's blanket and pjs.  He told Jarred's mom he wanted to wait up for us.  Precious!  Brought tears to my eyes!  Those two are so close!!!  I LOVE IT!!   All Madeline wanted to do was hug Colby and tell him all about her hospital visit.  Times like these make every hard moment surviving that difficult toddler/infant stage when they were younger.  18 months apart CAN be a beautiful thing!  They are the best of friends!

Sunday we were all exhausted and Jarred left for a meeting for the week.  The girls & I napped and Colby went and played with the neighbor boys.  It was beautifully boring!  Yesterday - not so much!  I had the worst migraine of my life!!!!  I've had a handful in the past 10 years, but none have ever been this bad.  At one point I was holding the phone considering calling 911.  Seriously ... it was THAT bad!  But then I was wondering what would happen to the kids and set the phone back down.  I kept thinking of friends to come and sit with the kids, but just thinking of the logistics of all that made it worse.  I think it's just cruel that you can have a headache so painful you can't see straight and then throw up too.  It's just not fair!  Jarred happened to call and check in and all I could do was cry and hand the phone to the kids.  I guess he gave them a "pep talk" because they left me alone most of the day/night.  Thankfully we've raised the kids to be "independent"  (age appropriately of course! LOL!).  I'm pretty sure I drifted in and out of consciousness and when it finally subsided about 10:15 last night I got up to find that the kids were all in their beds sleeping, and they had made themselves peanut butter & jelly sandwiches for dinner right there on the table.  I suppose the sweet things were trying to save me dishes as plates and napkins were apparently "optional"!  I cleaned up only what was necessary - took more aleve and went back to bed.  I woke up this morning feeling ok - still had a headache, but it was managable.  This afternoon I feel fantastic!  It's amazing how good "normal" feels after you've felt that bad!  I'm praying the rest of our week is just plain ol' beautifully boring!!!