Getting Ready for College

I would have never imagined it would take this much time, effort, and money to prepare a child for his first year of college. Well, I sort of suspected the money part, although there sure are a lot of additional costs besides the tuition and room/board. The paperwork, though, did surprise me. And the sheer amount of stuff necessary to equip a dorm room and the child moving into it! Here's just a portion of what has consumed my July:

A Health Form to be filled out by David, myself, and then his doctor, which meant an appointment with said doctor. This took two trips to the doctor's office, one for the physical and one for the follow-up on the TB test that the college required. It also took two phone calls to the college to find out for sure that a medical waiver was possible for the required tetanus shot.

Medical Waiver stating David did not need health insurance from the college, that he was covered by our medical insurance policy.

The paperwork to set up the automatic payment plan for David's tuition.

Checking with BlueCross to make sure David will be still covered by our health insurance plan while he is in college.

Getting the final transcript sent in to UE.

Checking to see if our homeowner's insurance will cover David's dorm room items in case of fire or theft.

Making a list of all the items he needs for his room and then finding all those items. These include things like trash cans, desk lamp, laundry detergent, clothes basket (he has to wash his own clothes!), and any food items he might want for snacking purposes.

Ditto for clothes. Most of his are a bit threadbare out, so it's practically a complete new wardrobe for him, down to swimming trunks and sneakers!

New sheets, blankets, pillows, and bath towels.

Rental of the Bedloft, which will free up some floor space in his small dorm room.

Rental of the MicroFridge that seems to be an essential part of dorm life these days.

Make sure his computer is ready to go.

Got the battery for the laptop.

Still need to find a printer/scanner/copier for his room, although he does have access to printers in the computer lab and is allotted 200 printed pages each semester.

You might ask what is left for the month of August? He still needs to get his driver's license, if we can get that done sometime in the next couple of weeks. And we still need school supplies (notebooks, pencils, printer paper, that sort of thing), along with personal supplies (manicure set, vitamin C, shampoo, etc.). I believe he'll have to find a winter coat up there in Indiana sometime before the snow flies. Oh, and the most important thing for August? Cleaning out David's bedroom!!! He is so looking forward to doing that!

THE Most Difficult Subject to Teach

We just finished a decade of homeschooling, which included first through twelfth grade. And I have come to the conclusion that THE most difficult subject I have had to "teach" over the last ten years has been Driver's Ed!

You might think it would get easier with time. I mean, I survived Kat's learning to drive. So it should be easier the second time around with David, right?. NOT! Yesterday David drove to Birmingham and back, his first real experience in big city driving and also his first time driving a long stretch of interstate. The drive home wasn't too bad … the drive down as not too good!

Partly the problem is that I just do not like riding with any other driver. And partly it's that I greatly value my life! I wrote about this experience a few years back when Kat was learning to drive.

Trust and Learning to Drive

Surely I can find someone else to ride with Charles when he gets his learner's permit?

Busy Days

Has it really been a week since I last posted here? Wow! I've been so busy with office duties and running kids here and there. My desk is a lot cleaner! And the bills are all current! So some things have been accomplished! Unfortunately, updating my website was not included in that list of accomplishments. That was July's agenda, but somehow here it is the 25th and I've not even begun. And boy, do I have a lot of updates.

Yesterday Charles met with Dr. Debra Gilliam from Alternative Medicine Associates. She seemed pretty sure she would be able to help Charles and I sure hope so! It was an expensive visit and none of it covered by our medical insurance. He now has several supplements and homeopathic remedies to take over the next 12 weeks, along with some dietary changes to make. And then on October 16 he return to see if all this has helped any. She also suggested that Charles keep a food diary, but I don't see that happening! The most difficult dietary change is no gluten, no wheat. I bought some oat flour and some spelt flour, both of which the naturopath suggested would be better for Charles than wheat.

David has his college physical tomorrow. Which reminds me, I still need to double check with the college that a letter from his doctor will be all that is needed for a medical waiver on the tetanus shot. My mom wrote me last week to tell me that she had suffered from an allergic reaction to a tetanus shot about fifteen years ago and her doctor told her then not to ever have another tetanus shot or it might be fatal. She thought she had told me that before, but mentioned it again after reading my blog entry about Charles' latest "episode." I sure don’t' remember hearing about that before, but I'm glad to know it now. Perhaps it will provide added incentive for the doctor tomorrow to provide that medical waiver.

The kittens are getting cuter every day! Today the one's here in my office finally got brave enough to escape from their box, or at least I discovered one of them out this morning when I came in to check my e-mail. I think it's just about time to move them outside, as I do not want to have a litter box in here. The other kittens in the living room just have their eyes open, but I may have to find another spot for them. The mama kitty seems to be disrupting the wires back there that are hooked to the TV and receiver and our TV reception has been disappearing. Somewhere there's a cord loose!

Well, time to wake up some boys and begin working on the website updates. People are e-mailing me asking me when I'm going to make the changes that they sent me weeks ago!

To sleep, perchance to dream

Another night of interrupted sleep, another day of hiding yawns and thinking of a nap! Normally the cause is the occasional bout of night sweats or the more frequent waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep. But not last night, or rather, early this morning. This morning at 3:45 my cell phone rings and I know instantly that it has to be Charles. Which means that he's having troubles again with his "funny feelings" in his head that preclude full blown episodes of violence. Luckily this time he woke up before it had reached the full-blown stage, so a dose of antihistamine, some talk about how he was feeling, how long he had been awake and how long he had been asleep prior to awakening, and then he went back to sleep. But I didn't! I was wide-awake from then until Bill's alarm went off at 6. And only then did I begin to doze off for a few minutes before I had to get up and made Bill's breakfast.

I had been worried about the possibility of Charles having another episode. Sunday we went over to Kat's and mowed her lawn. Bill got into the kudzu on the edge of the property with the weedeater and had Charles go behind him with the push mower. Unfortunately, Charles found a bee's nest and got stung on his legs several times. He seemed fine yesterday, but still, I wasn't surprised when that phone rang this morning. The episodes seem to hit when his immune system is working hard to overcome illness and so I thought bee stings have the same effect as a fever.

May 26th was the last time Charles needed the antihistamine to ward of an episode, so it's been less than two months. Prior to that he went just about three months. I had hoped that the time between would have lengthened, not shortened. That would have fed my hope that this whole nightmare would just eventually fade away, that his body would recover on his own from the tetanus vaccination. But it doesn't appear as though that is happening. Time to make that appointment with the naturopath, since both his pediatrician and the neurologist he was referred to were not able to find anything wrong. And I'm hoping that the pediatrician will agree with me that David doesn't need a tetanus vaccination for his college physical. The college indicated that they might accept a letter of medical waiver from the doctor. I've got to double check next week when the person in charge at the college's health department is back from vacation. But I am very leery of unnecessarily exposing another child to that vaccination! It certainly has wreaked havoc upon Charles' body.

Kittens and more Kittens!

Well, it took a bit longer than I thought, but we now have more kittens. I had thought Friday morning that the other Fluffy was going to have her kittens. She had crawled in under our bed and was there most of the morning, but then she came out and wanted to go outside. So I then closed my bedroom door for the rest of the day, not really wanting kittens under my bed. That night Bill and I got home from dancing, David informed us that the TV was now making strange noises. Mewing noises. Fluffy 2 had crawled in behind a bookcase that is next to the dresser where the TV sits and had her kittens on the floor there. Not a lot of room and rather awkward to get to, but obviously she felt protected there. Fluffy 2 hasn't left her kittens alone for very long, but we have been able to peek behind the bookcase with a flashlight and determine that there are three kittens there.

Finally today Fluffy 2 went outside for a bit longer than she has the last couple of days, long enough so that I had time to slide the bookcase out a bit and put a box back behind there. So now at least I can change the towel in the box every few days. While I was doing that, I got a nice look at the newest kittens and they look amazingly like the first batch of three kittens! Two gray with white feet and one dark tiger, almost a calico, with some gold mixed in with the black and gray stripes. No wonder they look alike, though, since I can't tell the mother cats apart and I believe the father was the same tomcat.

The first litter of kittens is now beginning to move around some. I played with them a bit on Saturday and Sunday so they can begin to get used to being handled by people. At least they no longer hiss and spit when I walk into the room.

So, six kittens to find homes for in the coming weeks. And I still haven't seen Silkie in several weeks now. I guess something must have happened to her, which figures since she was the more adventurous one. And she was also my favorite. Maybe I'll have to adopt one of these new kittens to replace her. Do I really need more cats???

Jujitsu Black Belt!

Last night was Graduation and Charles received his Jujitsu Black Belt. Quite an achievement! Charles worked so hard the past several days, helping teach classes because his instructor had hurt his hip, and also helping prepare for graduation. I think he was too tired to really get the full joy of graduating and receiving that black belt. But he did look pretty happy.

On the extreme left is Honshi Rawls, a 10th Degree Black Belt in something, maybe Jujitsu? I can never keep it straight. And then Charles is to the right of Honshi Rawls. And then to the right of Charles is his instructor, Donnie Chappell, who is a 4th Degree Black Belt in Karate and 3rd Degree Black Belt in Jujitsu. And to his right is his daughter (Charles' girl friend) Rebecca, who also received her 3rd Degree Karate Black Belt last night. Not a bunch to pick a fight with!

So, now Charles has two black belts, one in Jujitsu and one in Karate. And he is about halfway to being ready to test for his second level karate black belt. It's a three-year process, so another year and a half to go. Amazing what a can happen when a sibling wins a month's free lessons in something! That's how our karate adventures began. Kat won a month's free lessons at a homeschool seminar in 1999, I think it was. Charles watched Kat that month and immediately wanted to sign up! Ever since, his first love, basketball, has paled in comparison to martial arts.

Oh, for time to crochet!

It must be summer. I've had barely any time to crochet lately. I almost miss having to drive David to his dual enrollment college classes at Calhoun each morning. At least then I had an hour, some days almost two hours, solely devoted to either reading or crocheting. Or maybe I should begin to go sit at karate again in the evenings, waiting for Charles to get finished with classes, instead of just dropping him off and letting Bill pick him on his way home. I got a lot of crocheting done there. But here at home it seems like there's always something else I have to be or should be doing. Dishes, laundry, e-mail, playing with Miss Munchkin, playing Mah-Jong, paying bills, working on webpages, etc., etc., etc. No time for crocheting. And this month the Nextel Cup races are on cable stations, so I can't even plan on a Sunday afternoon of race watching and crocheting.

I'm currently working on an afghan for David for college, but at the rate I'm going with it, there is no way I'll have it done by the time he heads of to Evansville. He'll be lucky if he gets it by the time the snow flies up there. And then I've several projects I want to work on. Each day, Annie's Attic has a free pattern on their website:

http://www.anniesattic.com/free_pattern_day/index.html

So now, in addition to the dozens of books and pamphlets I have with crochet patterns, I've been saving many of the patterns from Annie's Attic. I'll never have enough time to crochet them all. It's like books … so many to crochet, so little time!

I do need to begin planning Christmas presents, if I'm going to crochet anything for Christmas. There's a lion I'd love to make for Miss Munchkin. And my niece Chelsea graduates from high school next year, so I need to think of what afghan to make for that present. Oh, and I know of a new baby that'll be making his/her way into the world around the first of the year, so I'll have to make a baby blanket. Lots of projects! Guess I better quit blogging and get to work crocheting!

The day after the day after …

So, what did we do to celebrate our anniversary? About the same as usual, went out to dinner. Neither Bill nor I felt very energetic yesterday. I'm not sure if it was the weather or just Saturday or jet lag from the short week following the July 4th holiday. In any case, I didn't feel like a movie and neither of us really even had any clear idea of where we wanted to eat. We did agree that neither of us wanted seafood. All I could think about on Friday was seafood, but by Saturday it was about the last thing I wanted to eat. David was no help. I asked him where we should go and his only comment was, "where there's take-out," presumably to bring food home to him! So we went to the local steakhouse, had a nice rib-eye and stuffed mushrooms, and came home and watched a Disney movie on TV until it was time to go pick up Charles from karate. Do we know how to live it up or what?!

I did make some nice muffins yesterday. Honey Peach Muffins. Almost as tasty as peach pie and probably a lot better for us. Of course, I modified it just a wee bit. Here's the original recipe from Pillsbury's Fast and Healthy Magazine, "good-for-you muffins!" article:

Honey Peach Muffins

• 3/4 cup Pillsbury BEST All Purpose Flour
• 3/4 cup cornmeal
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup reduced-calorie margarine, softened
• 1 (8-oz.) container low-fat peach yogurt
• 1 egg white
• 1/2 cup coarsely chopped drained canned peaches in light syrup.

1. Heat oven to 375. Spray bottoms only of 12 muffin cups with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup; level off. In large bowl, combine flour, cornmeal, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; mix well.
3. In medium bowl, combine margarine, honey and yogurt; beat at low speed until well blended. Add egg white; beat well. Add to flour mixture; stir just until dry ingredients are moistened. Gently stir in peaches. Spoon batter evenly into sprayed muffin cups.
4. Bake at 375 for 17 to 23 minutes or until tops are golden brown and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Immediately remove from pan. Serve warm. 12 muffins. Okay, now for my recipe. It's for double the amount, 24 muffins (if I'm going to heat my oven up this time of year, it's going to be for more than 12 muffins!):

• 1 cup all purpose unbleached flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1 cup oatmeal
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup organic unsweetened applesauce
• 1/2 cup honey
• 1 (8 oz.) container organic peach yogurt
• 8 oz. organic plain yogurt
• 1 egg
• 1 cup fresh peaches, peeled, and coarsely chopped
• 1 cup chopped walnuts (or pecans)
• other fruits as desired, such as dried cherries, fresh cherries, raisins, etc.

I use coconut oil for the muffin cups, coating the whole cup, not just the bottom. I don't use a blender to mix, using a wire whisk and wooden spoon instead (uses more calories on my part!). Otherwise, follow above directions.

I made twenty-four muffins yesterday afternoon and there were only ten left this morning when Bill and I got up. We each had two yesterday, so Charles and David ate five each yesterday. I've got some fresh cherries that need using up today, so I think I'll pit them and add them to the next batch of muffins. And I also have a lot of zucchini that needs using. I tried a zucchini muffin recipe last week that I found online, but wasn't extremely happy with it. If anyone has a favorite zucchini muffin recipe, I'd sure appreciate receiving a copy of it!

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Twenty-seven years ago today Bill and I tied the knot. Twenty-seven years! Wow. I'm not sure whether I'm amazed that we've made it this far or amazed at how quickly the years have flown by.

July 7, 1979 was a picture perfect day; sunny with a brilliant blue sky filled with fluffy white clouds. You couldn't have asked for a more lovely July day. The day went smoothly, no major hitches in all the proceedings, and all the various branches of the families got along well for the day. Or at least, I never heard of any problems afterwards!

So, what will we do today to celebrate? Let's see … hubby went to work. I stayed home and ran my IRC homeschool chat all morning, played with Miss Munchkin, washed some dishes, boned out some chicken, the usual stuff. And tonight we will do our regular Friday night square dancing. Maybe we'll do something special tomorrow night to celebrate, like go to a movie or dinner out, or maybe we won't. The company Bill works for is having their annual summer "do" at the local water park, which includes a bar-be-que dinner and water rides. Somehow I'm underwhelmed at the thought!

Now's the time to plan something big for our 30th! If I begin saving now, a dollar a day, let's see ... that would come to $1095.00 in three years. Wow! That would certainly cover more than a movie and dinner out! Think big! We could travel to the coast and have seafood, although the south coast is a bit warm this time of year. Maybe Maine and lobster!

Miss Munchkin is 4 months old today. I took a lot of pictures of her and Kat and Shawn yesterday. Now to find the time to sort through them and get some actually printed for family members. I've not had any printed since she was a week old. She sure has changed since then!

Making a Correction

It has been brought to my attention by someone … not to mention any names, David … that yesterday's post had an inaccuracy in it. I did not discover the MindMap program. David discovered it and showed it to me. I apologize for getting old and having a faulty memory!!!

Crossing Things Off My Lists

The last several days have been busy around here! Bill and the boys built new steps to the entrance off our living room over the July Fourth holiday. We rarely use that entrance and haven't been able to for quite a while now due to the steps having rotted out. But it's good to have it fixed and be able to use it, just in case we have an emergency and need another exit. That project has been on the "to do" list for quite some time now. At one time we had planned to greatly expand that small deck entrance area, turning it into a screened-in covered porch, but whenever funds get set aside for the project, they get diverted for some emergency expense. Probably it'll be one of those things we do just to fix it up around here when we finally get ready to move and sell the place.

I finally finished David's high school transcript over the long weekend and yesterday mailed it to our church school administrator. It was already mostly done, since he had to have one in January for college applications, so all I really had to do was add this last half of his senior year to it and get it in the proper format. But I had to wait for his last grades at Calhoun Community College to get posted, which was done mid-May. By then I had gotten out of the "school" mode and just never quite found the time to sit down and finish the transcript. Now it is done. The last thing I needed to do for David as homeschool mom and teacher. Now I can just be college mom!

And yesterday I set up a brokerage account with E*Trade. We knew we were going to have to cash in some stocks for David's college tuition and the first payment is due August 1. Somehow I didn't think it would be a huge deal to set up an account and get the stocks traded and cash into a money market fund. I also didn't think doing it locally with a broker would be as expensive as it turned out to be when I called for quotes. So instead of going the easy way with lots of hand holding and someone else doing the grunt work, we went the cheaper route and I will get plenty of new learning experiences! Isn't that what you get when you don't get what you wanted? Experience?!

So three things done off my lists . . . and hundreds more to go, or so it seems. Last weekend I had David set up FreeMind on my computer. It's a mindmapping program I discovered last winter and showed to David. He took right to it and uses it all the time. I am not so sure it will be as helpful to me, but I'm willing to try it. One good thing about it is that I am much better organized on my computer than I am on my desk or with my filing cabinets. So instead of many paper lists floating around and never where I remember putting them, I simply have to open FreeMind and there my lists are, ready to be shortened or ignored, whichever the case may be!

Here's the link to FreeMind: http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

Miss Munchkin - Almost 4 months!

Miss Munchkin visited with us last week and again yesterday. She's trying to figure out this crawling thing to the point of having rug burns on her knees. But she hasn't quite got the hand action going yet for crawling, just the bottom leg action. Funny to watch her scoot herself across the floor, but rather frustrating for her and she begins to voice her frustration before very long.

Miss Munchkin has discovered that she can actually grab things with her own hands and now find her mouth when she wants. So nothing is safe anymore!

Yesterday she had her second solid food, Grandma's homemade applesauce. I wish I had gotten a picture of that! Her daddy had fed her a finger scoop of spaghetti sauce the previous night, thinking that would show her that she really didn't want his plateful of food. Was he mistaken! She wanted more!

Here's a pic from last week, June 30. She'll be 4 months on July 7th, our 27th anniversary! She's 20 pounds now ... I think her mother is not feeding her well enough!

You'll notice that Miss Munchkin does not wear any plastic pants (or wraps, as they call them these days) nor is she using safety pins with her cloth diapers. Kat has been practicing EC (Elimination Communication) for about two months now. It's working very well. When at home or here at Grandma's, she might wet one or two diapers all day long and rarely does Kat have to change a stinky diaper. Both Kat and I have learned Miss Munchkin's cues and habits pretty well. If she's not teething and not hungry, it seems like the only time she gets upset and cries is when she has to go potty or when she has wet her diapers (she hates, hates, hates being in wet diapers).

I have to admit I was skeptical at first when Kat mentioned she wanted to try EC. But it really does work! Here's are some links if you want to learn more about it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elimination_communication

http://www.natural-wisdom.com/

http://www.goddessunplugged.com/articles/diapers.htm