Another Day, Another Cast

Today we went back to the ortho doctor. Igor's red cast was removed and he was x-rayed. The doc said that the pins could be removed which had been the plan so that was good news. Igor was fine through the cast removal, actually giggling because the cast would vibrate as the the cutter went through it and it tickled him. He was a little concerned to see the pins sticking out of his leg (as was I) but other than a little aprehension was fine up until the time of the actual pin removal. Prevously I had asked how painful this procedure would be, as honestly I couldn't imagine pulling metal wires out bone to be anything but pretty painful. The doctor had said it's painful but not night-marish so I had prepared by giving Igor a dose of heavy pain meds before we left for the doctor. I think it helped, he was nervous, but I think the drugs helped him relax and recover quicker from the pin removal. I stayed right in his face rattling nonsense to distract him. He did cry and let everybody know that "That HURTS" but all in all did really well and settled down quickly for the actual recasting procedure. This time Igor has a green cast and wants me to paint yellow on it so it can be a "Green Bay Packer" cast. I must start looking for some yellow duct tape as I don't think most paint will stick to that fiberglass. The good news is that Igor can now bear weight on the leg and has little velcro sandal. Yay!!! In the house his mobility wasn't too much of a problem, he really just crawled wherever he wanted to go with the exception of the last four days. Igor had taken up hopping on his good foot and was getting quite good getting around that way. The problem you ask? Well we live in a 120 year old house, a child constantly jumping around on one foot rattling everything is enough to drive even the most calm person insane. The cast walking isn't up to speed yet and I don't expect it to be for several days as he's lost so much muscle. His little leg looked pretty withered. However he seems to be a pretty resiliant kid and I imagine it won't be long before I'm telling to quit running. The plan is to be in this cast for three more weeks and then he'll be fitted for some sort of boot size ankle/foot brace to help with his pronation. I don't know if he'll be fitted for that immediately or if some time will be give to build a little muscle before fitting the braces.

We have now officially hit the out of pocket expense for the year with our insurance for the year and it's only mid-February. I guess if your gonna hit it, much better to do it now instead of November.

All the togetherness with Igor and being house bound has driven me to the brink. After much thinking I determined that I would join the big gym here in town. It's a nice place with pool, all the exercise equipent you could ever want, an variety of classes, basketball courts, racketball court (not that I'll be playing ball) and most importantly a daycare that Igor can hang out in for a couple of hours while I excercise. I have to pay a little extra for the daycare but it's pretty minimal and I conserve it and go when Hubby is home sometimes. The excercise will be good for me. I've gained ALL the weight and then some I lost when we were in Ukraine and frankly I huff and puff doing some of the simplest stuff now. It's time, I'm edging closer to the big 4-0 and after that momma always said it was 'patch, patch, patch.

Sonny Boy is doing well. Hubby snuck in the school yesterday early to deliver cupcakes I had baked for the class Valentine's party (every realize you can't carry a 35 lb kid and a tray of cupcakes all at once?) and spoke with Sonny Boy's teacher. Sonny Boy had been having to finish work at a later time, sometimes missing recess and we were concerned. Mrs. D said things are getting better in the last couple of weeks and she thinks it was just a matter of him learning to use his time better. Easier said than done for a kid with ADHD but we are getting better reports.

Tonight Sonny Boy's cub scout den toured the local radio station that is part of the high school. The teacher that gave the tour let the boys record themselves in the production studio. He pretended that they were a new band and asked the name of their band, Sonny Boy leaned over to kid at the mic and whispered, the kid replied "Sausage" tour guide then went on with usual DJ banter and asked about "Sausage's" newest single and what it was called "Awesome Sausage" then Sonny Boy without a moments hesitation started singing the song " Awesome Sausage" now in case you don't know, this is totally made up 7 year old boy silliness. I must have been beet red because I didn't know if I should be proud that my kid had NO FEAR of talking into that microphone and singing a tuneless version of "Awesome Sausage" or embarressed because it was such a tuneless version of anything. Anyway it was quite funny and I'm sure "Awesome Sausage" will be loaded term for many years to come.

I may be speaking a little soon but we are having warm-up and it's giving everyone spring fever. The snow drifts are shrinking and I am no longer taking my life into my hands backing out of the driveway because I can't see for the snow berms. I know it will be cold again, and we'll likely be shoveling again, but springs in on the way, I can even see the beginning of little buds on some of the trees!

Well it's late and of course the kids have no mercy on me in the morning.

Fess Up!

Ok, I write all this drivel and never have any comments. I know "the Litter's" events are pretty standard family fare. We really are quite the average boring family but I'd really like some comments so I can see who's reading!

I'll allow anonymous comments but leave me a clue to who you are if you don't link me back to your blog or if you don't have a blog.

The little map in the corner shows me who most of my visitors are and from that I can deduce who most of you are. Mrs M.M. and Miss M.G. I believe are a couple of my log-ins, my mother-in-law, maybe Ms. KLB in Nebraska? If that's not you tell me who you are!

However the most curious person following the blog along lives in Ecuador. I don't have a clue who that is. Would you leave me a message? Mostly curious if we have a connection somehow or if you just like to read my rambling. If you don't write English (like you use a translate for the blog) write it in Spanish, I can use translate too.

SNOW! and other adventures

On Tuesday afternoon we received an e-mail stating that school would be cancelled on Wed due to the weather. Sure it was snowing on Tuesday, but no big deal for Wisconsin, we had gotten 2-3 inches during the day. Blizzard warnings were to go into effect at 3 pm and I think mother nature was watching her clock as that is when the winds started picking up. At 11:00 pm I could not see my neighbor's house across the street. We woke up to around 2 FEET of snow. The official tally in our town was 17 inches, however that only started from midnight Wed and it was impossible to measure accurately due to drifting. Some drifts were well over 5 feet.

This was our driveway on Wed morning. Yes that is a full size mini-van buried over the hood.

You can see here the snow did some strange vortex effects around the van & house and the pavement was bare.

Sonny Boy had a hard time getting down the back door stairs before we shoveled. He got stuck in a drift 2-3 times and gave up and went inside. The rest of the day was spent cleaning up by Hubby and I.

That's me pushing the snow blower (yes there really is one in the picture) through the driveway snow berm.

A different angle of the same motion. You see there is still several inches of snow on the ground where I had been already, it took two passes to get it cleared to the pavement.

It probably took Hubby and I a good 2-3 hours to clear our driveway and sidewalks - a thirty minute job with snow blower in a moderate 4-6 inch snow. We then went over and helped out a couple of neighbors who don't have blowers and I drove/pushed the snow blower a couple of blocks down to a friend's whose husband was out of town and her car was completely snowed over. In total the snow blower ran about 6 hours on Wed. School was still dismissed Thursday as rumour had tell it that there was still 8 ft drifts in the high school parking lot. Today I drove to town and still saw some clean up going here and there. Things are a real mess. Even though it IS Wisconsin and we are well equipped for snow, 2 feet in an 8 hour period is quite the rare event.

Last week Sonny Boy had Friday off for Teacher Work Day or something similar. Igor stayed home with Hubby and we went to Discovery World in Milwaukee. It's pretty cool, but a little pricey. I'm glad I didn't take Igor along for the extra admission price. This is Sonny Boy running the "nuclear reactor" I couldn't help but think of Homer Simpson.

At Discovery World Sonny Boy also lay on a bed of nails. Pretty cool. My apologies to the girl running the exhibit, I'm lazy and don't feel like cropping the picture. I'm sure she wouldn't be thrilled with that picture of herself.

Back View of the dress cake I made to play around. I'm thinking of entering a local cake decorating contest in March and thought I'd give this one a whirl.

It has some rough edges but I don't think it's too bad for a first try at this form, and I was doing it on the fly and cheap so I didn't use some of the same materials I would have for the contest cake.

Igor officially got a big boy bed. This was his first night sleeping in it. He is one proud kid! He had previously been sleeping in a crib with one side removed. He pretty much filled it end to end. We are still in the process of moving clothes from dresser to the drawers under the bed and figuring out what to do with the old furniture. Still some decorating and arranging to do in his room but it has decidedly lost the nursery feel it had.