Good Morning!

Oh, how nice it is to sit here and enjoy the morning before the routine has to start.

Memorial Day

Yesterday was a fabulous day! Here is a little glimpse of my favorite part...
She had so much fun and I could have watched her play forever! Well, for a really long time...

for the record...

I do not like 100% polyester!

Potty Talk

Thursdays are my scrubbing days. I scrub the bathroom and the kitchen. (I'm done with the bathroom, haven't started with the kitchen yet - but I've played a lot with E.) Every Thursday when I'm on my knees on the bathroom floor, scrubbing the toilet I have the same thought. Who made this dumb design?! I'm talking about the toilet base. Why do you have to see on the outside how the pipe go? It makes for a lot of crevices (sp?) where dust ends up. Why not just make it a smooth surface, ready to be wiped down? It's not like you go looking for a toilet thinking "I really like the pipe-design, that would look good in my bathroom". I'm all for practical, easy to clean things. Just a thought for all of you toilet designers out there. =)

Sweet prayer

I just put E down for the night. Every night after I say Amen at the end of the prayer she starts praying. Normally it's all babbling and then an Amen, but tonight there were real words mixed in too. She prayed about "slide, skor (shoes), E, mamma" and one more thing that I can't remember. It was so sweet!

Bye bye Bubbles

E has been on Pulmicort since she was just a little baby. It started with four times a day + Xopenex twice a day. That's a lot of nebulizer for a baby. She has not needed the Xopenex (her emergency medicine) in a long time, and she has only gotten Pulmicort in the morning so the doctor suggested that we (or asked if I wanted to) try to take her off the Pulmicort. Yay! It would be great if she doesn't need it every day. A huge blessing. But I must admit that I am nervous. I am nervous for three reasons and I have to write them down or I will just keep thinking about them (my main reason for blogging).

1. What if her asthma gets worse? What if she really needs the Pulmicort? I don't want her to need the Xopenex a lot. (I know, this is why we're trying it. Still makes me nervous.)
2. Both C and I have really bad seasonal allergies. E hasn't shown any symptoms of that. I really hope that she won't develop allergies, but the active ingredient in Pulmicort is the same one that is in my allergy medicine so she has been protected up until now.
   
3. It's part of our morning routine. A ridiculous reason compared to the others, but this is the morning routine she's known most of her life, all of what she can remember. When she wakes up in the morning she asks for a diaper change and for Bubbles (the name of the nebulizer mask). What am I supposed to do now? Give her breakfast right away? (Don't laugh at me. I don't know.) I was able to distract her from Bubbles this morning with the promise of going to the slide, and I gave her breakfast right away. It took forever to get her to start eating.

I will keep you updated on this. Please pray for no allergies, no asthma attacks and finding a new morning routine.

Mwah!

For some reason E woke up at 2:45 am and could not go back to sleep. She tried, she really did. She laid down for a while several times, but could not go back to sleep. So we decided she could snuggle with us for a little bit. She did good, she laid down between us and tried to get comfortable. Every once in a while she sat up, but laid down again. All of a sudden I felt something wet on my lips. I opened my eyes and she was holding her pacifier in her hand while giving me a kiss, saying "mwah". It was really sweet. Then I got a hug and another kiss. I asked if she was ready to go to sleep now. She said "yes", I carried her in to her bed and she fell asleep.

This morning I slept through three alarms and E slept an hour longer than usual.

Yummmmmmmmm!

I planned meals for a week this time. It usually lasts longer, with leftovers that can be used in different ways. Here it is...

1. Lemon Angel Hair w/ Balsamic Chicken
2. Fish Finger, Tartar Sauce, Potato Wedges, Veggies 'n dip
3. Tex-Mex Marinated Chicken with Tex-Mex Salad, Corn Bread
4. Chilequiles
5. Spaghetti & Meatballs, Salad
6. Sesame Chicken Nuggets, Fried Rice (with plenty of veggies in it)
7. Key West Ribs, Corn on the Cob, Asparagus

I found a lot of recipes HERE this time. It's a fun page that changes every month. I always tweak recipes, and sometimes (like in #3) I just use part of it, like the marinade.

Shopping & eating

Today:
I went to the mall and bought three tops, one zippered hoodie and a pair of shorts. If you have or used to have a two year old you know it's not fun to stroll around in stores, looking for something you want to buy for yourself and then spend time in the fitting room trying to decide if you like it. But today I was alone. ALONE! Say it with me... alooooooone! C has every other Friday off so he took her to Home Depot while I went on my little shopping spree. Shopping hasn't been this fun in a long time. Later we met up at a cozy coffee shop where I had an apple danish and an Italian soda. Yum! (I realized when I got back home that that was my breakfast. I must have been so exited about my alone time this morning that I forgot to eat. And I NEVER miss my breakfast.) I remember thinking, while we were at the coffee shop, that it was so nice and relaxing to sit there with my little family that I wished someone would take a picture of us so I could put that moment in a scrapbook. When we got home E and I spent some time drawing with sidewalk chalk in the carport. I had a perfect morning!


Yesterday:
I just have to mention something about dinner last night. I wanted to make something quick and easy and decided to make hot dogs and mac & cheese from a box. C looked at the mac & cheese and asked me what it was. I told him, and had to add, "It's whole wheat". "What's wrong with processed food", he asked with a smile? I must admit I normally enjoy whole wheat pasta and so does he but this wasn't very good. Or as C said: "It's not Kraft". Then he took a bite of the hot dog and asked what kind it was. I told him it was organic. (I figured I could at least try to make this meal healthy.) He said it was chewy. At least he didn't mind the whole wheat rolls. They were pretty good. I told him that the broccoli was just regular broccoli, not organic or anything special. He could have some of that. His reply... "At my age you don't have to eat broccoli". Guess what we're having for dinner tonight... leftovers! =) Hey, there's plenty left and I'm not throwing it out. I'm Swedish - just add ketchup!

Note to self

Remind teenage E that 2-year-old E loved to take over cleaning projects!

Splash

E has always been afraid of the shower so today, after rubbing the gritty poison ivy cream on and rinsing it off (with a small bucket) I decided it was time to change that. She was in the mood for playing in the tub. I put the shower head up-side-down and turned it on and she, carefully at first, started playing with the little "fountain". Then I showed her how to hold it and spray her tummy. She was sold. She played in the tub, with the shower and I was able to clean the bathroom sink and toilet. Then... she was all done and I didn't respond right away... so she took the shower and sprayed down the entire bathroom! And then she pointed to my pants and told me that they were wet. Thanks for the information, kid!

We now have a very clean (and dry) bathroom.

4 (I know my titles lack fantasy lately)

• I started cleaning up after our old tenants. I'm starting to realize that not all people share my obsession for leaving things the way you would like to find it. Why won't they clean up after themselves? We spent 10 hours scrubbing our old apartment the day after we moved out. Our tenants... they didn't even clean out all of their stuff. So of course they didn't scrub anything.

• E's poison ivy rash is getting smaller and she no longer cries when I rinse off the ointment.

• Next week we'll have health insurance. Yay! No need to avoid people or playgrounds for the risk of getting sick or hurt.

• I bought E some barrettes yesterday. The bendy clip kind. And today she wanted to wear them all at the same time. There's 12 of them!

6 things on my mind

• E has poison ivy. At least that's what we think it is. C has it too and he gave her a bath the other night (dumb, I know, but we didn't think) and now she has a rash on her torso and stomach. She is doing so well when I rub the gritty cream on. She just sits there in my lap. But then I have to rinse it off and I can't use warm water. She freaks out. Her cry is so sad. It breaks my heart. Hopefully it will go away soon. Of course something was going to happen just as we are in between health insurances (which we wouldn't be if SS would have just kept their promise instead of breaking the rules, yeah, I'm upset with them!).

• Our non-paying tenants moved out. Or, really-late-paying-after-tons-of-nagging tenants would be more correct. So far they payed almost 1/6 of Aprils rent. And of course they didn't show up again to get their stuff. Not too happy with them either!

• Our new tenants want to move in ASAP and has offered to help getting the place ready so it will happen faster. One of them is working with C right now, doing some electrical work. They have also offered to paint which is so awesome. I am very happy with them! =)

• E has been behaving so well lately. She listens, says "tack tack" (thank you) every time you hand her something, she says "äska dig" (älskar dig - love you) spontaneously and gives us lots of hugs and kisses. I love her so much!

• She is treating her dolls the same way we treat her. Which hasn't been scary yet =). She did put one of them in time out once about a week ago though.

• Tonight after dinner she wanted to blow bubbles. I told her no b/c the bubble solution gives her a rash and she has enough of that right now. I had to use the bathroom, and I told her and she said no and pointed to the bubbles again. And as I went she looked at me and then she calmly, but firmly said " I said no. No kissa." (kissa = pee)