The kids love to hike! They particularly like to hike with their daddy and we have a great park, Reedy Creek, that has some great trails. There is one trail that leads to the ruins of a old stone house. Nolan thinks it is cool. I think he sees it as an adventure with a destination. It is not much to see when you get there, but it is something to get to. On there way there are a lot of great photo places and I thought I would share some of the cute pictures of the kids Levi got! I love them perched on the top of the ruins.
Jovie's hair was getting a little long and stringy. It was time for her 2nd haircut. Her first haircut went bad. I don't think I ever posted it here (I think I shared it though Shutterfly), but to re-cap she cried the whole time... tears, snot, a hair coated sucker... the whole sha-bang. But lately she seems to understand the saying "big girl" and she wants to be a "big girl"! She was throwing a fit about going to nursery until we told her she was going to "class" like brothers and sisters and she was such a "big girl", she get to go to "class"! So, Jovie does not go to "nursery", she goes to "class"!
So, back on the subject... Here is the shabby hair:
Here is the front. The bangs are not crooked, it just got swept to the side funny before the picture. I got the best hair lady at Great Clips. Most of the time they want to give Lettie & Jovie a bob and that is it. They never want to cut it very short in the back. But she really went for it and gave her the cutest little A-line cut:
Here is Callie's hair in all it's glory. It is so curly, it does not look very long, but when it is wet it goes all the way down to her shoulder blades. So now it is finally long enough...
To put in a pony tail! The problem though is it slowly starts to fall out one curl at a time. But it still stays in enough to hold a lot of the "poof" down!
Look at her go!
Trying to pull it out! She was not used to it yet! But then she left it alone!
Look at the curly curly pony tail! So fun!
Note: I started to write in the comment section a response to Christie about her not wanting to hear about me over-doing it or anything. Then as I was writing, I realized I had basically wrote a whole new post! So, I just cut and pasted it and decided to make it a post instead!!
Yes mame ;-)! I will do my best to take it easy! I know, I know! Everyone keeps telling me the same thing because I am notorious. And it is so hard to not want to go-go-go because that is the type of person I am. Pain pills help and hurt. I take them and they mask the pain, but then when they wear off... then I realize... ooops, I am still hurting. I called the doctor to get more meds and something not so strong. Just something a little more than Ibuprofen. The nurse called back and said it was too soon. Like I was some drug addict trying to horde pills. I told her it was not too soon, I was taking the medicine as it was labeled, and actually less often than it said, and I ran out. I only had 30 pills and it said to take 1-2 every 4-6 hours as needed for pain. Most of the time I took just 1, but in the morning and before bed I would take 2. So, that is 6 pills a day, most the time only 5, so some on... it had been a week... I needed more meds! And my regular doctor was out so this new doctor probably had no clue what I had been through. Anyway, they gave me some more stuff today, not as hard (which is what I requested) but just something with a little more oomph than the over the counter stuff.
So, as far as me over doing it. I was so stir crazy, the kids were sitir crazy, I needed to get out of the house. So, I had a good day the day before yesterday so I went a bunch of places with my kids and my mom. I did not mean for it to be so many places, but we went to McDonalds with a playground and I even went early do there would be no long line to stand in and it would be easy to keep track of the kids. Well, they have JUST done their monthly sanitation and it had to be closed till 1pm. They were so dissapointed. We went ahead and ate (because getting them out of the car is the worst part), then I brought the 5 oldest into the $1 store to pick out 1 thing (which is right there), then since it was by Hobby Lobby where I needed to pick up more letters to make Ruby's princess shirt, I thought, let me stop and get it now and save some gas. So only I ran in... well, maybe I should say I stumbled in... and of course what I needed was ALL THE WAY in the back. But I did not feel too bad until the walk back and it is a large store, so as I am paying I am crouched over the counter just panting and wincing and feeling like I have been kicked in the rear by a mule. The guy must have thought I was nuts so I sheepishly just told him I had surgery. Then we went to a park because I had promised the kids once McDs playground was closed. It was nice because while I was there the older ones and mom looked after the babies. The older ones are terrific about looking after the babies and they love them. You will often find Jovie leaning against Yonas watching TV. Anyway, by the end of the park I was spent. But I still did not feel too terrible, but the next day... hoooo buddy, I felt terrible, tired, and achy. I tried my best to take it easy, but everything just hurt worse yesterday and it did not help that I did not have the "good stuff" to take. I think that was probably my worst issue. But I made sure I took it easy because I knew I needed to take Yonas to the health department today. He has to be on medicine for latent TB. In other words he has been exposed to TB. He has either had the vacinnation and that makes him positive for it, or he has it and it is just dormant. So they treat it for like 6 months and he has to come in every month and they weigh him and give him more pills. Well, his appointment for it was the week after my surgery, which I probably could have made it if it were not for the complications. But since they went to the mountains with my mom and they forgot to pack the medicine he had enough pills to last him until today. So, they just told me to come in. And boy did I come in. With 7 kids in tow. And when she saw me all bent over and breathless she brought me right back so I did not have to wait with 7 kids and in pain. Then they stick us in a room designed for 3 people max, so we were like sardines. It was funny. But we sang songs until it was our turn and she made sure she got us out quick.
Then Levi needed some fish for his classroom and there is a great pet store on the way back (the Health Department is on the other side of Charlotte). The kids loved it because it is the old school type pet store. They have puppies, a ton of birds, bunnies, ferrets, a ton of lizards and snakes, lots of fish. And a worker went and got a baby conyer out and let all the kids pet it. They had never been to a per store like that where the animals are more in-your-face, so they LOVED it! We found 3 really cool fish for Levi's class.
Then I had some last minute school supplies to buy because their open house is tonight and there is nothing that they just need for just themselves. There are just general classroom supplies (tissues, hand sanitizer, non-fancy pencils, markers, paper towels) that the teachers just keep in a bin. I wanted to buy it all and have them bring it in today so they do not have to lug it around on the first day of school and not have me there to explain that they need to hand it over and it does not come back. Plus, Ruby HAD to have some new hair product. I had run out and there is nothing worse than a white momma with a black girl with dry, non-combed hair. Hair is very important in the AA culture, and I need to at least keep it moisturized. So, we did Wal-mart, and it was chaos, and I was going to pick up some of the supplies from Sam's club, but by the end of the trip I hurt so bad. I had forgotten to take my pain meds. So I grabbed the paper towels and tissues I was going to get at Sam's and went ahead and called it a day. I tried one more time to get more paid meds from my doctor with success! WOO HOO!!! So that will help a lot!
Anyway, so that is my day of over-doing it today! Luckily my friend who was going to help me at lunch time is coming at 2:45 to watch the kids so I only have to take the 3 going to Clear Creek with me to meet their teacher and not try to keep track of 7 kids! So that is a relief.
As far as overdoing it with this house, we are bacially contacting a lot of it out. A lot of what it needs is more than what we can do ourselves and we have a friend who is awesome with all that stuff! So, if I blog about painting walls and tearing out carpet, you are allowed to fuss at me!
Oh... and by the way, Silas & Lettie are going to 3-day a week pre-school. I called everyone from the priciplal up to the superintendent of CMS Dr. Gorman to the State Dept. of Education, to the State Dept. of Justice trying to get Silas in school. His Ethiopian birth certificate is COMPLETELY wrong. By 1 year, so they will not enroll him in school. Ruby is off by 1-2 years and Yonas is off by 2 years. That will all be fixed when we get their American birth certificates, but that takes 6-9 months. But they will at least enroll the older 2 and they need to start in the lower grades anyway and work their way up to their appropriate age group. Yonas will be in 1st and Ruby in K! So, after finally exhausting ALL my options I raised the white flag and gave up. I have been fighting this for 2 months, but this was my last-ditch effort. So Silas will be going with Lettie but they will be in seperate classes and I think they will love it!
Well, I better get ready for the open house!!! Just wanted to blog about nothing in particular since I am sitting on the couch resting my bum!
