Name Poll, Barf Bugs and the stuff of life

First off, thanks to all of you who voted in the Baby Name Poll. We have decided to combine two of the middle names on the list to come up with the name for our baby. :) And we'll tell you what that name is when she is born! LOL (Sorry)

THE EVIL BARF BUG!

Life has been interesting here lately. One Wednesday morning a few weeks ago, I was doing laundry, and suddenly felt very sick to my stomach. I was sick (and it wasn't morning sickness!) All that day I was weak and dizzy and felt miserable.

That night, our oldest son was up all night throwing up and - well, experiencing other gastrointestinal ailments. The next day he had a high fever and was in bed all day.

A couple days later, our youngest daughter started throwing up. She couldn't even keep down a sip of water or ice chips. Then the fever came and the diarrhea lasted two weeks!

My friend Kelli, and two of her sons arrived by plane from Texas a couple days later. We felt so bad that they were breathing our air, but we couldn't avoid the inevitable!

Then, there was a lull. No one else got sick. We decided to risk taking our friends to Niagara Falls on Friday. We pulled in the parking lot, got out of the van and Son #2 threw up in the parking lot! He had a fever, and I was so thankful they sell Children's Tylenol in the gift shop (it was an arm and a leg, but it was there!)

We got through the day and had fun (except for the diaper blow outs from the lingering bug... I only had to buy new clothes once! ;)

We hadn't eaten dinner, so decided to stop in Hamburg, NY on the way home to eat at Applebee's. No sooner had we been seated, that Kelli's baby was sick - all over her! (If you've never been pregnant and been thrown up on, you have no idea how horrible this is!) She was so nauseated from the smell that she was nearly sick herself. Mike left and took her and her baby and our youngest who was asleep at this point, to go find a Walmart to buy new clothes, while I stayed with 7 kids at Applebee's. Did you know that not ALL Walmarts are open 24 hours? Not even the 2 they were able to find! (It was a long ride home!)

Her little one was sick all night and over the next several days while various of our other kids started getting various symptoms of this bug (which we had by then determined was a Rotavirus or some such - not a typical 24 hour bug!)

We are now into the 3rd week of this and there are still lingering symptoms... UGH!

Kelli went home and it's going through her family as well. What a mess!

BACK TO SCHOOL - ALREADY?

In the meantime, we've been busy getting ready for our new school year. The kids are whining, "Where'd the Summer go? It CAN'T be time to start school already!", but there is an air of excitement as I bring home school supplies and they put them on the shelves in the school closet. We've decided to take a break from K12 this year and we're doing a year of Calvert to see how it goes.

I will be teaching 1st, 4th, 8th and 10th grade this year and as of December, I will have a newborn and 2 preschoolers to take care of as well! K12 is so time intensive that we just felt we needed to do something different this year. We'll reassess at the end of the year and see where we'll go in the future.

Yesterday, I bought each of the kids their own milk crate (in their own color) to keep their school books and supplies in. They fit nicely under the church pew at the dining room table, so they can have easy access to them as needed.

Our two oldest will be doing Virtual Classroom and will be at their own desks, but I'll be spending more time with the 1st and 4th graders at the dining room table.

Sorry this post is so long, but it's been awhile since I posted anything.

In other news, we are facing the hottest weekend we've had so far this Summer (it's 84 already today) and very muggy. We're in the midst of hay bailing - you have to make hay when the sun shines.

Stay tuned for the next chapter in "the stuff of life"... :)