Happiness Week 7

What Made Me Happy - Week 7

02/13 Adrian Home From School

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It's funny. Some days I get so excited when it's time for Adrian to come home on the school bus, the doorbell rings and I open the door to this adorable kid.  He always says "Hi Mommy." and gives me a hug. How lucky am I?!

02/14 Chinese Food on Valentine's Day

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Steve brought home Chinese food (my favorite) for Valentine's Day and we had a nice meal together as a family. It was so cute to see the kids trying to eat with chopsticks. Even Ainsley. She loves soy sauce and had a great time tasting Chinese. Then she put some of her chocolates in her mouth. It was great. Adrian's box of chocolates said "Love Stinks" and had a picture of a skunk which he got a real kick out of. Earlier in the day I had an appointment with an ENT. This time for me, not Ainsley. My ears check out fine, my hearing is good, there is no pressure in the eustachian tubes. All this is good....except then we don't have a reason for the constant dizziness that I've had for nearly 2 months. The doctor did determine that apparently I have a deviated septum and since I have a lot of sinus headaches he is sending me in for a CT of my sinuses on Tuesday.

02/15 Hallway Bowling

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My Happiness Project "area of focus" for the month of February is organization.  Just like "you can never be too thin" I think "you can never be too organized". My house looks pretty organized at first glance but there is always room for improvement, especially in the hidden areas like the cupboards. Since we moved in I found places for the kids' toys but I've been feeling it wasn't "working". The days have a way of going by rather quickly without me making as much progress as I'd like on my monthly goals, so I was glad to get some organizing to the garage and laundry room toy shelves done. As a result I found the foam bowling set and the missing 10th pin. It made me happy to see the kids having fun bowling in the hallway both because it was fun but also it is something for them to like about the new house(they still wish we lived in the other house). 

02/16 Good Hips and AFOs

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When I called to schedule Ainsley's orthopedic follow-up appointment I found out that the surgeon just up and left to take a high level position at another hospital in California.  Since he'd done a very complex hip and leg surgery on Ainsley I was very concerned, especially since Dr. S's notes and reports were always VERY brief. I think he kept a lot of information in his head. Today we had our appointment with the new doc and he was very nice and attentive. The great news is that Ainsley's hip x-rays look good. The reconstruction seems to have been a success and it is very unlikely that she will need any further hip surgery.  There is a pretty firm shelf and the hip is at a much better angle and the coverage over the femur is pretty good (though it could be a tiny bit wider). After 5 years Ainsley still isn't walking and though I'm rather anti-AFO for several reasons too complex to go into here without boring you I've decided it's worth a shot trying them again (these will be taller and firmer than the last ones). Although the new ortho doc agreed with the previous doc about them being unlikely to help he did agree to write a prescription. We agreed that it is worth trying (it's possible that having a more stable foot base will free her attention up to focus on balance which is the real problem) and of course if they don't help we don't have to use them. They were able to squeeze us in the same day for casting which I was happy about even though it made for a long exhausting day. Sadly after this picture of Ainsley picking out the style (butterflies) it went downhill in a hurry. She was etremely traumatized by the experience and I think the poor guy doing the casts was too. He probably needed a good stiff drink afterward. It was one of the harder things I've had to do with her, and that says a LOT. When we get the AFO's I'll have to write a post and elaborate.

02/17 De-cluttering the Garage

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After the yard sale last summer we had a lot of stuff left over cluttering up the garage. Steve and I planned to spend part of the long weekend gathering it all up and donating it to charity. There were a lot of the kids old clothes and I found the process of parting with them rather emotional. I did have to pull out a couple pairs of pajamas. I've got to make a trip to the consignment store and then I think I'll actually be able to get to my gardening cabinet so I can fertilize the garden. 

02/18 Spam Head

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It was Evie's 11th birthday today. Her birthday day wasn't too exciting because we have a lot of party planning to do for this upcoming "Percy Jackson Camp Half-Blood" sleep over party. In the evening we picked up a neighbor friend and all went to the Rainforest Cafe for dinner. Since there is always a very long wait we killed some time at the mall. It was weird to see Evie at the mall with a friend and I'm pretty sure it won't be long before she'll want to do that for fun. She was able to spend some birthday money. She decided on a purple dalmatian fedora which is cuter than it sounds. I love this photo! But I'm sure glad she didn't come home with the Spam hat.

02/19 Medusa Skeleton

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Somehow I've managed to get myself into a position of throwing elaborate parties for the kids. Some more than others, because Evie is relentlessly persistent.  After the Harry Potter Party I said NEVER again. But Evie insisted that this time she would do all the decorations and planning for the Percy Jackson Camp Half-Blood party and so I agreed when we found some cheap foam swords that we just couldn't pass up (and then later decided weren't good enough) but then we started adding ideas and now here I am again. I've been stressing over one particular aspect of the party, the full size Medusa pinata that I have to construct myself (nobody sells Medusa pinatas). Why-oh-why do I do this to myself?! So I was very happy today when Steve was able to execute my idea for the skeleton. After I finish this post I need to get busy making the body.

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Have a great week everybody! To view a slideshow of the entire Happiness Photo Project click here. For more about what this is all about click here.