We are finally free of Hand Foot and Mouth Disease from last month, and just in time to start school, harvest our honey, take a final trip up north for the season and spend time with my sister and my college roommate while they were in town.
There was a small hiccup in our wellness when Emma puked in her sleep one night and not only covered herself, the top bunk where she sleeps, but also projectiled the vomit onto her sister's bed below her, and her other sister's bed below and beside her. You know you live in a small house when... you puke and it covers three people. When Will and I went to bed we smelled the unmistakable scent and when we went to investigate, the horror could hardly be put into words. How do you remove a child from the top bunk without making a trail of disgustingness? It's moments like this that I am so very grateful to have a partner on this parenting journey! Two hours later, in which Will and I cleaned with three adult arms (the fourth arm was holding Opal who woke up in the commotion and refused to be set down without screaming) we were all finally tucked back in - one kid on an air mattress in our room as her mattress looked to be bound for the trash, another kid in our bed, and the last two kids on makeshift beds with afghans and couch pillows. Fortunately the next day was Sunday, as we spent the entire day doing laundry, cleaning the carpet, and - salvaging Emma's mattress - turns out the entire mattress cover could come off of the mattress, leaving exposed latex foam, but a completely machine washable outer cover and in the end, it was IKEA mattress for the win!
There are only three things that could have made the great Puke Fest of '18 worse in retrospect - first, if the ceiling fan inches from Emma's bed had been on, second if anyone else had caught the bug Emma had, and third, if we hadn't figured out just a week before the stomach bug hit Emma that the laundry detergent that we had bought in a pinch (ours is usually delivered by Amazon and so we've never actually had to search it out in a store) was in fact fabric whitener, and not soap of any kind. For weeks prior to this discovery, Will and I kept getting wiffs of dank laundry and after so many instances of wondering where that funky smell was coming from, we were beginning to realize that it may in fact, be coming from us. Of course this realization came slowly, and in the most awkward scenarios - at work, or talking about honey bees at a bee event. Multiple times we asked one another to sniff various parts on our clothes to verify if that smell was coming from us. Then one day as I was filling up the washer, I noticed that there were no soap suds in the drum. I put the soap in again, thinking that I had maybe forgotten to put the soap in the first time and then I realized that the box I was holding was not laundry detergent but laundry whitener. What a relief that this was figured out before all of the puke almost hit the fan!
Life is never dull here, and I suppose if it was dull, I would worry that I was missing something! Below are the girls on their first day of school with our traditional "all of your school books for the year on the couch" photo. All three of the older girls are in dance this year, and Violet is really enjoying it. What a difference a year can make as last year Violet had a hard time in class and we ended up taking a break with her for the rest of the year. Opal has plans to keep her sisters distracted from schoolwork by being cute, noisy and demanding. Lucy and Emma would much prefer playing with Opal over doing schoolwork, and sometimes I need them to help with Opal so it is a constant balance between each member of the family getting what they need done while passing Opal between us. Most school days I end up strapping Opal to me in a carrier so no sister is tempted to play with her, and so that Opal can take a nap.
I've implemented several new things for our school year this year which brought some resistance at first but as I type this, we are already in our eighth week of school and I can say with great relief that we have all adjusted. I am very pleased with the new goals I have created for each child, and I think this year will result in all three of the older girls growing and learning by leaps and bounds. Photos below in clockwise order from top left: the girls putting on a show complete with lighting, Violet having "special time" with me doing one of her favorite things - making designs with math manipulatives, our red ride on donkey caught trampling Violet's baby doll named Bonnie Bee late one night when I was up with Opal (I knew that red donkey was no good!), Will with his four little ladies, Violet showing me a drawing she made - she has been doing so much art this past month!, and Violet playing Alphabet Go Fish with me.
My sister and her boyfriend came to town for her annual end of summer visit and great memories were made by all. We taught them to watercolor with us, and they taught us a card game or two.
We went apple picking with my family...
...and had fun using human ladders to reach the best apples.
I really like the below humans in front of some real ladders. Sisters and sisters! Two different generations!
Which seems to lead nicely into the below photos of me and my middle sister in the left hand photo below and my daughters in the right hand photo below in the exact same gazebo about twenty-five years apart.
We had a very small honey harvest this past month. The weather was not ideal this past season for honey, and it was also a learning curve for Will managing the bees completely on his own now that I am officially allergic to honey bees. I ordered way too many honey jars, and Will is about done with the work involved now that he has gone from enthusiastic supporter of something I love, to doing it all. Some decisions will have to be made on how to move forward with (or without) honey bees for next year as things are just not the same and it has become hard for me to not be afraid of the insects that I love so much. This is very emotional for me as I feel like I have been forced into something that I would have never chosen myself. *me shaking my fist at my honey bee allergy* However, I have to believe that when one door closes, another one will surely open and so I am trying to keep an open mind while grieving this change.
Besides some honey, our little suburban farm produced some great Michigan Famous Pastie Pies which we made in bulk and froze, some delicious bruschetta with basil and tomatoes from our own garden, and Lucy who helped me to make a giant tray of jello for Will who had a kidney procedure and mistakenly thought he couldn't eat the entire day prior. Let's just say we had a lot of extra jello when he found out the day before his procedure that he could eat regular food until midnight!
And finally, our suburban farm seemed to specialize in State Prize winning spiders - one that Will and the girls caught in our garden (and released back into the wild) and one that I found after my hand brushed across it's web when I reached my hand into my old mail box and it's new home.
This past month we also enjoyed time playing in the local creek by our house, time at the playground for a picnic with Will's parents, and a weekend with my college roommate where we enjoyed catching up on life, touring our farmer's market and another picnic park afternoon. I am bummed that I didn't get any photos of my roommate in town, but I can promise you that the image of her and I standing on top of a park bench while a rabid behaving squirrel tried to jump from the ground to the bench to bite us is forever engrained in both of our minds! It didn't help my fears when my friend told me in no uncertain terms how terrible rabies shots are and how they are administered straight into your stomach! We ended up calling the non emergency police number after calling animal control and the park office only to hear a recording that they were each closed for the weekend. When the officer who got the call showed up, I thought for sure Will was going to be arrested when he told the officer that the perpetrator had brown eyes and was about 8 inches long. Fortunately the crazy squirrel showed it's true colors, distracting the highly annoyed officer from Will's poorly timed joke, but in the end, the officer ended up telling us to just get away from the squirrel as he couldn't do anything unless it actually bit someone. What is the world coming to I ask you!?
I think the important thing to remember here is that you must maintain a sense of humor, no matter what! Through puke, stinky clothes and rabid squirrels, I wouldn't trade this life in for any other and despite Will's brush with the law, I'm so glad my life mate is there to laugh right along with me. Stay tuned for our up north trip in the following blog post!
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