Sorry I've been out of the bloggy loop lately. We've had A Week.

Have you ever had A Week? We get them every 18 months or so... you know, when the car dies, the washer breaks, and you cat goes missing just as your five year old's goldfish dies, causing an elementary school existential crisis?

Yeah. One of those.

Fortunately, it is being weathered by heavy doses of leftover birthday cake and Baby C's charm.

Sunday, we finally made it to church - after missing 5 weeks in a row. (Four of those weeks were due to various maladies, including colds, coughs, stomach bugs, and blood pressure crises. Week 3 out of the 5, our priest was sick and cancelled Mass).

Sunday was also the day the time changed - weeks earlier than usual. I thought we were 15 minutes early. We were actually 45 minutes late. The kids were very well behaved for Mass though - all 20 minutes of it!

We learned our little chapel is having a crisis. It is a very small church, just a few families. It is also perfect for us, in part because the pastor used to work with counseling and testing patients and prisoners for the exact disorder that my son has. He "gets" Mr. R is a way that not many other adults do, especially not authority figures, and I like that I can go to him for advice and knowledge, especially since most mental health providers aren't always Christian-friendly.

Right now Mass is held in a donated trailer that has been converted, but our chapel is growing, slowly but surely (an adult baptism in November, a wedding in December, another wedding in May, plus 3 more babies this spring!). And so a Presbyterian church was purchased in the next town over, and renovations commenced.

In January, the pastor AND the driving force behind the renovations and great benefactor of our church were both in (separate) car accidents. The number of able bodied men at my church is very few; almost all have full time jobs and families, so it was really these two that were making a go of it. Work on the new church ground to a halt.

However, it was not in the budget to have two buildings, utility bills, etc. at the same time for months on end. We've lost some financial benefactors as well. We might have to close the doors to the chapel.

The stove went out Monday. Luckily, our landlord is a retired Sears appliance repairman, so I just needed to wait until he could come over and fix it. Actually, that wasn't too big a deal - I've lived in hotel rooms for weeks and can turn out almost any meal with a microwave and a crockpot.

I lost my shoes. That was a big deal, because I can't walk without them. Luckily, they were found, eventually, about 12 hours later. Unfortunately, my blood sugar monitor is nowhere to be found - I probably should be checking it more frequently in light of all that leftover birthday cake.

I discovered that our hallway used to be painted yellow. Don't ask, and I won't tell... but involved multimedia art projects.

While taking advantage of the killer deal Life in A Shoe told me about, OfficeDepot mischarged my card. They fixed the mistake (hopefully, haven't been able to check my bank statement yet) but I did have to suffer through Voice Mail Hell, made all the more pleasant when small people talk to you about important things like the relative heat of volcanoes and sun, while you are straining to hear whether you need to press 1, *, or 9. (I did get my order today though! Next day shipping -for free- rocks!) (If you go to the website to order, search for "clearance". I found several sets of luggage/tote bags/duffel bags for $3-4 each! I ordered a set that is a carryon bag plus tote bag that I'm going to use for the hospital. Also I got a set of 4 dry erase markers for less than a dollar.)

Then husband dear hurt himself. He's been recovering from this nasty cold for a while, and coughing for about two weeks. Monday morning he hurt himself coughing - I thought maybe just pulled a muscle. I knew it was bad this morning when he told me to make him a doctor appointment (which I wanted to do LAST WEEK) and told me he'd call me at 10 am to find out the details. He didn't call, because he forgot our phone number. (Don't laugh too hard. I've done the same thing - I'm home all day long, I never call myself. Why would I have that number memorized?) He did show up around noontime.

A long, last minute doctor's visit ensued, in which I kept all 6 children in the waiting room for an hour and a half while husband dear consulted with the medical establishment.

A woman asked me if all of the children were mine. (No, I just borrowed some because waiting in a doctor's office designed for adults with small children is So. Much. Fun!). Then she asked my how did I keep from going crazy? I didn't answer, as I was busy losing my mind.

An X-Ray, 4 prescriptions, and $186 later (our copay is 50%, so it could have been much worse!) we were on our way... until tomorrow, when we have to consult with a surgeon because husband dear's coughing tore a hole in his diaphragm and there's some internal organs where there shouldn't be. I'm hoping it will be a straightforward, simple procedure involving less hospital stay and more laparoscopy, since I'm having a baby in three weeks, and it just won't do to have BOTH of us laid up and unable to lift anything or anybody.

Not to mention how scary it is when you are a one income family, and the provider's job security depends on face time at the jobsite. He has managed to ingratiate himself a little by selling candy bars and Pepsi out of his tool box. Maybe that will count for something.

The first pharmacy didn't have all of the medications (gotta love the small town life) so I also had to make a stop at Walgreens. $75 later and husband dear seems better. We've got a prescription cough medicine that seems to be working much better than Tussin.

I suppose we'll see what the future holds tomorrow. Thank goodness we got our tax refund in last week. We might be waiting on the carpet cleaner, but at least I'm not selling one of the children on Ebay to pay for the meds!

Labels: Family Life