New Puppy

Yesterday JB was checking the free listings on Craigslist and found an ad for a puppy. A 6 week old Great Pyrenees Lab mix. The owner had gotten her while out of town and when she got back her landlord said she had to get rid of the puppy or move out. JB and Arianna went to meet the puppy last night and of course, brought her home. She came with the name Bella. She is mostly house broken already too. She is a very good puppy so far. Very sweet and playful. She is not intimidated by Jenny either, our 7 month old West Highland Terrier and Corgi mix. We do have to watch the dogs when they are out together. Jenny and Bella want to play but Jenny has 20 lbs on Bella so we have to make sure it doesn't get too rough. Since Jenny is Elijah's dog, Bella is supposed to be Arianna's dog. I am encouraging Arianna to take Bella out to potty and to play with her. I told Arianna that these activities will her her and Bella form that bond that Elijah and Jenny have. I am not trying to make her totally responsible for Bella, that seems unreasonable since she is only 5, but she can help. Bella might not have to sleep in the crate like Jenny. Jenny won't calm down and sleep with someone at night, she just wants to play. Last night when I finally took Bella out of her crate and put her in our bed she finally calmed down and slept better, instead of constantly waking me and JB up. I can't wait until Bella grows enough to be able to play freely with Jenny.

Snake Bite

We had a very traumatic night the Wednesday night. Elijah my 10 yr old autistic child got bit by a venomous snake. We never saw the snake, he never saw the snake and didn't know what bit him. He was in the backyard at dusk and something bit him. I was in the kitchen finishing up cooking dinner when I heard him through the open window. He was standing there crying and asked me to find the "enemy" that got him. Once I got him inside I saw that it was a snake bite and knew we had to go to the ER. JB made a last look around for the snake, I grabbed his Medicaid card and Arianna got her shoes on. I made sure everything in the kitchen was off, threw Jenny in the crate and we force Elijah into the truck to go. Elijah did not want to go and didn't understand how important it was that he go to the doctor. After we got to the hospital and finally got him to the exam room I had to keep him there. All he wanted to do was go home. The doctors got a good enough look to verify that it was a snake bite. They ended up giving him a sedative so that they could really examine him and do a blood draw for labs. The sedative didn't work very well, Elijah fought it. But I helped hold him still in a chair while they quickly drew the blood. After that Elijah finally calmed down and started to understand what was going on. I think the pain was getting to him. He willing started laying in the bed. He started talking to us and told jokes with Arianna. Elijah's blood work finally came back and was clear. They said that it was a mild bite and he got only a little venom, but not a dry bite. We had to stay a little longer after that because poison control said the bite area had to be monitored for 5 hours for change. Elijah's foot and ankle were swollen and red, he was bit on the top of his foot near his ankle. But it wasn't spreading and there wasn't any other discoloration. The biggest success was Elijah willingly lat the doctors look at his foot. He didn't even really fight getting his tetanus booster shot before we left. Elijah was so happy to leave when he was finally released, he even thanked the doctors for helping him feel better. On the way home JB and I were talking about how we think it was a defensive bite from the snake because it didn't hang around, bit and fled. Elijah then told us that the snake said it was sorry. After we got back in the house Elijah thanked us for taking him to the doctor. Thinking about that still makes me want to cry. It makes me feel so good.
Yesterday Elijah spent most of the day in the recliner elevating his foot, as he is supposed to. He does get up for small stretches, depending on how much his foot is hurting him he has also been using JB's wheelchair or my crutches. He has also been walking on it. His foot is not getting worse. We are so thankful that it wasn't any worse than it was. Elijah should recover well and doesn't seem to have become afraid of snakes. Arianna has expressed interest in now having pet snakes. I did have to explain why she can't have a king cobra, but that non-venomous snakes are ok.

Monday April 18, 2011

When the DirecTV supervisor came out he said that where we wanted to move our dish to was a great location. He rescheduled for a tech to come back out, and Wednesday it happened. The reception is so much better now. All the channels are coming in and there are no more frame slips.
Our front door had started to occasionally get stuck. The problem was that the door knob wasn't always working right. JB bought a set of 2 door knobs and deadbolts that use the same key. I already replaced the the ones on the main front door. I need to replace the set on the other front door that goes into the room I turned into my pantry. JB said that later he will get another set for the back door, one that we can key to match the front doors. I want to do the same when we replace the sliding glass door with french doors too. This is all important to me because when we purchased the house we only received keys to the front door. When we moved in, I drove up from San Marcos with the kids while JB wrapped up everything. Finish loading the u-haul, cleaning, and turning everything back over to the landlord. He didn't have to do all the work himself, because he could only help me so much we did hire a cleaning company and they had movers we hired too. It was a really good service for us. Anyways, we got here really early in the morning. I went to unlock the front door so we could go in and the deadbolt wouldn't turn and my key broke in the lock. My only key to the house was broken in a lock that wasn't working. I had to call a locksmith to get me in, he was able to make me a new key too. That morning I learned that if you don't use a lock it will freeze up, but WD-40 will fix it. I also learned it is way better to have a key to more than one door. I think it would be a good idea to have a spare hidden somewhere outside too, no where obvious though.
On April 7th or 8th my oven's baking element broke while we were cooking dinner. Atleast the roast was done when it happened. Had to rethink our meals, we use our oven a lot. Plus I try to bake our bread instead of buying it, plus muffins, cookies, brownies and such. We couldn't find a replacement part locally or a free to cheap working stove on craigslist. I broke down last Sunday and ordered the part. It wasn't supposed to come in until today, but we got it last Friday. It was so exciting to get my oven back this weekend. We had company and had already planned meals for the grill so didn't actually use it until last night.
Our friend and her kids came out and visited over the weekend. We all had a great time. Elijah was a lot more social than he has ever been with her kids. Between the 4 kids, they kept the dog too busy to get into trouble too, lol. My friend helped me out in the garden area for a while too. It was great to catch up and hang out. I also think it was funny that her kids wanted to stay. She's in the reserves and last year her kids lived with us for few months while she was away at a training school, she was able to come visit on weekends. The kids want to them all to come back to live here. :) It warms my heart to know that they did enjoy their time here with us. We have come to love them very much. It's hard for us to go visit them because of daily pet care needs and not having someone who can do it for us. We really look forward to their visits.
Over the weekend I walked down to see how the wild blackberries were coming along. I'm really glad I did, I didn't expect them to be so close to ready to pick. I think they should start ripening by the end of this week. I am really hoping to get a lot more this year. Last year when I found them they were in full swing, maybe towards the end. I only got to pick them for a week or 2 and it was so dry that towards the end I just stopped. I could tell that the dry weather was affecting the berries and they weren't as juicy as they should be. Still, it wasn't bad. It was my first experience with blackberries, and we got a good amount. We used them fresh in muffins and pancakes as well as just snacking on them and I made jam. We love the jam and have been looking forward to making more.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Yesterday we worked hard. I cleaned all the brush and leaves out of the area for the pole mount for the satellite dish. We dug the hole and put in the post and concrete. Today JB started working on the trench and conduit for the cable run to the house. He wasn't that far into it when the satellite tech came. The satellite tech looked around and said that there was nothing he could do, too many trees. So, it looks like we can't avoid it and have to take out some trees. I think we agreed to move it to a different spot so we don't have to worry about the big oak. That huge oak is the only one I'm really attached to. The tech's supervisor is coming out tomorrow to review and give us a second opinion. Standard. If nothing else we will talk more about what we need to do to make the situation work for us. Regroup and re-plan. Since the local channels are the only one's affected right now we are ok. Sucks, but it's not what we mostly watch. I'm not even upset about all the work we did for nothing. A small part of the yard looks better and I could always put a bird house or something on the pole, ooh, maybe a bat house!

Today my plastic pots I ordered came in. I feel better having them. I don't mind having spent money on them. I found the best deal I could and plan to use them over and over again for years. So far I have 45 tomatoes sprouted. No peppers yet, but soon I hope.

Home schooling has been going really well with Arianna. We have been working a little everyday. Since it is so new to her, Kindergarten, I am really letting her set her limits. Yesterday, she did 9 pages in her Math workbook. She's a little frustrated with the review in the Writing workbook. She doesn't want to practice writing her letters, "It's boring." She needs the practice with some of the letters, not all, and mostly lower case. Elijah is starting to show signs of being ready to start. I haven't pushed it on him, between the negative attitude towards school and being autistic, it seems better to me this way. I think it's working. He's learning about other things though, and he has been more curious since I withdrew him from school. He's starting to ask more questions and to do more for himself. Elijah still has a long way to go, but it is a start.

After all the cold weather and this last cold front today felt really hot. With the temperature achieved in the house, we would have usually turned on the AC. We are trying to hold off on it this year. We want to keep the electric bill down as much as possible. I can't wait until we can start on producing some of our own electricity. We have so many plans, but limited funds. We are trying to do the easier, less upfront costs, money saving projects first. Everything in due time.

Wednesday April 6, 2011

Seems like I was busy all day. Between the regular stuff and all the project type stuff. There was cooking everyone breakfast, washing laundry and dishes, watering my seeds, and my turn to cook dinner, JB usually cooks, oh and taking care of the kids and pets. The kids' workbooks for home schooling came in. Arianna was ready to get started, she did 2 subjects today. I also fought with the computer for a while because it didn't want to print for me. JB made a batch of cranberry sauce and I canned it. We still have a lot of cranberries from when they went on sale at the beginning of the year. JB has perfected his cranberry sauce so he makes it, but he has been feeling so bad that he hasn't been up to it.
Then this evening we realized that the big oak in the backyard that shades most of the house grew enough to block reception of local channels on the satellite. We don't want to trim the tree because the shade really helps in the summertime. So we decided we want to move the dish and do a pole mount in the yard. We picked a spot and started clearing that area of the small trees and vines. Tomorrow JB is going to go get the stuff for mounting the dish while I clean up all the leaves and brush. We are going to put up the pole and bury conduit for the cable ourselves. Since I worked for DirecTV as an install tech I know what needs to be done and that it is considered a custom install and costs a lot of extra money if the tech does it. Since we don't have a ladder tall enough I will have to have a tech come out and actually move the dish from the 2nd story roof to the pole, but that is just a relocate. We are going to later landscape around the pole to keep the kids away from it, and I have some cute little picket fence looking garden border to use with it too.
At last count today, 25 of the tomatoes have sprouted. I am looking forward to fresh produce. And my plastic pots shipped yesterday, so they will be here soon.

Sunday, April 03, 2011

It's been an unusual few days. There has been the normal beginning of the month errands to run. Also some crazy insomnia that has messed up my whole sleep schedule. I have canned more beans, we are loving those. My shopping included buying ingredients for more canning this month. I started getting some stuff for home schooling the kids, I just pulled them out of public school a couple weeks ago. I ended up having to order the workbooks I picked out to use off the internet. I did get some cool stuff locally though. I haven't had a chance to start anymore seeds yet. Hopefully, I'll make some time in the next couple days. I did buy another set of shelves for the pantry. I added those and put the groceries away on them. I am very happy with how the pantry is turning out. I didn't start it until the beginning of this year. I now have a convenient place to store my canning supplies as well as small appliances that are used left often, and of course food. This has really helped with space in the kitchen. This year I am trying to organize our lives. I'm not worried about finally unpacking all the moving boxes, I'm not in a hurry, we aren't moving ever again. Every thing eventually happen.