Eight Mile Walk

My husband and I went on a walk today.   There’s an eight mile loop around the park that, once committed, is hard to do much other than turn around or finish off.   We weren’t certain what we were planning on doing, but after a few miles in we decided to complete the full loop.

Everything went well with the walk other than a phone call from the plumber asking if we’d be in early because he was done with his earlier appointment.   We were over an hour from home, in a wooded park so we had to ask him to hold until we got back.

I did it.  It was hard.  Here’s the thing, my muscles are trained to run which would make walking sound easier, but it was in fact harder after a point.   I told my husband at about six miles in I was going to have to run for a bit to get some muscles worked out that had been cramping badly.   He ran with me for a while, listening me yell out, “this feels so much better!”  

Walking was fun and we got a lot of time talking, something we do on a regular basis, but time that’s typically spent discussing family/house/children things with regular interruptions from one child or the other (or both).  Today we had a chance to talk at length about whatever we wanted, with no laundry to fold, no beds to make up and no computer work to be done.   It was nice.

The Big Boy Update: My son’s vision is just fine.  He can see things from far away quite well.   From the back seat he saw a song come on and noticed the logo was one similar to the shape of Mickey Mouse’s head.   He told his sister, “I like this song.   It’s called, “Deadmau5”.   He was right, the song was by the artist Deadmau5.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter was at my parent’s house the other day.  She was reclining my father’s chair back and forth for a while.   She tried the same thing with my mother’s chair next, but was dismayed when it didn’t recline.  My mother told her her chair was an older model and it didn’t recline.   My daughter asked, “do you think when your chair is older it will recline all the way back?”

Non-run:  eight miles with my husband around the park today.

Euthymic

I like words, particularly learning a new word.  I get this from my mother, who frequently brings me word quizzes from magazines she reads.   When I was growing up I hated language, english class, writing and anything having to do with all things written.   As an adult, I’ve found I like language, words, grammar and writing quite a lot.

My best friend was talking about something the other day and used the word, “euthymic”.  I stopped her and asked her what the word meant.  It was clear from the context it was based on mental state.  I was familiar with “euphoric” and “dysphoric”, but not “euthymic”.  

It means a normal, non-depressed, reasonably stable mood.   I’ve said about myself that I think I’m, “baseline happy” meaning when nothing depressive is acting on me, I’m a relatively happy person.   Now I have a word to go alone with the description.

The Big Boy Update:  My son got his hair cut today.   He’s on and off about wanting to get it cut.   When he got there today he told Hasan, “I just want ten pieces of hair coming off.”   Then, when we got home he said, “I want my hair to grow again!”  All that being said, I think he likes his shorter hair because it’s not in his eyes any more.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter has gotten more interested in braille lately,  especially if it’s something she can “read” at night when it’s story time before bed.   Today she came home with a book she made with her Visual Impairment teacher with a single line of braille on each page.   I would bet she can read her book faster than her brother can read the first readers.   But that’s mostly because she has an excellent memory and remembers what she wrote when she created the book.

Helpful Friend

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I call my children, “friends”.   It’s a Montessori thing, I think.   I say, “friends, it’s time to do <insert thing here>” or, “friends, I see there’s a mess in the bonus room”.   It works well because if there are other children over at the house, the “hey friends” phrase works just as well.   Today, I talked to my “friends” and asked if they could help with some of the housework I needed to get done.

My daughter decided she was up for the challenge and took the first load of laundry, comprised of only white cloths from the house cleaning on Friday.  She took them into the bedroom and shut the door, telling me she was working on a surprise for me.  

The surprise took a long time, probably because she was patched on her left eye meaning she was almost completely blind and trying to fold laundry.    We’re not sure what she can see with the right eye, but she’s pretty vocal in saying it’s only light, dark and colors from time to time.

When she finally let me in, this is what she’d done:

This is exactly how we fold the cloths when we give them to the children for a meal.   It’s how we have the cloths in the bathroom when they need one to wipe their faces.   She was accurate and careful in making every single fold—blinded with a patch on.   

She never ceases to amaze me. 

The Big Boy Update:  My son turned into a monster sometimes when he has too much screen time.   Today, however, he was good both on and off-screen.   He finished a video game his father got him a while back and came downstairs to tell me about it.    He’s back online now, but it’s Sunday, so the screen time for the week is almost over.  

Fitness Update:  I exercise so little I forget to write what happens sometimes.   My best friend and I ran twenty miles yesterday in preparation for an upcoming marathon.   Great day, good run.   Nice to get out and do something physical.  

Frozen Experiment

My son has gotten interested in doing experiments lately.   We had some apple cider he wasn’t particularly interested in drinking last week, but he said he might be more inclined if it were frozen like a popsicle.   I suggested putting the whole cup into the freezer to see what happened.

About two days later he remembered the apple cider and was interested in the cup full of frozen juice.   It turned out to be more complicated to eat than he anticipated though.   And from an adult perspective, a spoon jabbing into sticky apple juice, splattering all over the place, wasn’t my idea of good eating.   He didn’t mind eating it outside though, so problem solved.

Tonight I found out about another one of his science experiments.   He wanted to freeze an apple.   He put the apple in yesterday and after dinner tonight he went to check on it.   He tried to bite it, but it was too hard.   He dropped it onto the garage floor, and it bounced with an interesting sound.   He slammed it into the garage floor and it made a sound a lot like a pool cue hitting another ball.

He wasn’t sure what to do with the apple (and neither was I) so we put it back into the freezer until we come up with another experiment to do on it.

The Big Boy Update:  My son was over at my best friend’s house several days ago.   Apparently he wanted to do math with her, asking her all sorts of addition and subtraction questions.   She said he knew all the answers, he was just testing her to see if she did too.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Last night one of our friends over for Movie Night told me my daughter said to her, “when I become a mom and the baby comes out, it’s gonna hurt at least a little bit, but that’s gonna be until I’m older, so that’s good.”

Patching

We’ve started a daily patching regime for my daughter.   She’s willing to do it, which has been a big help.   On week days we only do it once since the time after school until bed doesn’t give enough window for more than one session.   On the weekends, we’ll try to do one longer session or two.

She has always asked how much longer she has to have the patch on.   Initially, she was terrified of the patch because it left completely blind.   I’m not sure she’s any less-blind now, but she has more skills and has had time to adjust to a her low-vision world.

Yesterday I was watching the time and she went a full forty minutes before asking if she could take the patch off.   That was unexpected, to say the least.   Today, she has the patch on now and it’s several hours before movie night but she’s said she wants to keep the patch on until Dylan arrives for movie night and so Dr. Trese will be happy she’s patching.  

We’ll see if any progress is made visually with her brain, or if the eye is non-functional and will likely remain that way.

The Big Boy Update:  My son told me mater of factly yesterday, “mom, I want to buy a plane.”   I told him he was going to have to start saving his money now.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  The other day in a conversation with her brother I heard my daughter say, “that’s okay, we’re not dead.”  I have no idea what game they were playing.

The Lawn Mower Maze

I grew up in a house just one off from the corner of our street.   One of my best friend’s back yard backed up to the side of our lot and from the point I was in elementary school all the way up until high school, she and I were friends. 

The lots weren’t big, but they were wooded enough that it took adult intervention to get our side and back yards connected so Veda and I could meet together and play in the little tree houses our parents had built us. 

The connection involved cutting a section of the fence down and making a trail through the overgrown underbrush.    For years this trail would be cleared out once per year and we’d go back and forth, usually as children, sometimes with out parents, to each other’s houses.   It never got old, we always had fun together. 

Then one year, Tucker, the father, decided to clear out more of the underbrush.  I’m not sure why, but he decided to do so by mowing a path with the lawnmower in rather a maze-like fashion through their back yard.    It was a little eccentric perhaps, but as children we loved it.    We worked it into our imaginative play, we chased each other, we played games out there. 

The next year I think we were hoping Tucker would mow his maze again, but I think the inspiration only struck him once.   I haven’t forgotten it though. 

The Big Boy Update:  The children were taking a bath tonight with various toys, one being a baby without a head (they didn’t want the head, they said).   I was working on emails when I heard my son giggle and yell out from the tub, “oh!  The baby’s bot soap in it’s butt!”   This was funny for at least two minutes.   It was funny from around the corner until I came in to find they’d added Mr. Bubbles to the tub and there were bubbles everywhere. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter was leaning into the wall this past weekend.  I couldn’t figure out what she was doing so she explained, “I’m listening to hear the power coming in from the wall to charge the iPad.”   

Family Soup

My mother and I made our traditional family vegetable soup today.   I’ve written about this soup before, mentioning that it’s vegetable soup only so far as it has vegetables in it.   The name implies it is only a vegetable soup, which isn’t true as we like to put as much ham into it as we can cram.

We make it every year about this time, using the bone from the holiday ham and surrounding ham remnants as part of the recipe.   We use a pressure cooker to make the overall soup making time shortened significantly.    It used to take a lot longer with an older, less-efficient pressure cooker and different ingredients that took more time to prepare.    These days it’s a fairly quick process, but the end product still tastes the same as I remember from my childhood.

My children typically want to have nothing to do with the soup until they try it, remember it, and then ask for two more bowls.   That was the situation tonight.     We have a lot left over, which is the plan from the start.   It will be a popular item until it’s gone in a few days.

The Big Boy Update:  My son said tonight after finishing his second bowl of soup, “I reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee<deep breath>eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally like this soup.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My son is in a Lego after school enrichment class.   We didn’t sign my daughter up for it because of her vision impairment and also because she hasn’t shown the Lego obsession my son has in the past.   But she wanted to do some Legos today and after school I went and we selected, “girl Legos” (something she didn’t realize they had).   I explained there were some sets she might like.   We found an Elsa and Anna Frozen set and a Little Mermaid set.   She and dad worked on one while I was out and had finished it when I got home.   She was very proud of it and spent lots of time playing with it with her brother when he got home.