A Wet Wednesday and a Sick Child

S took a trip to the doctor today. The doctor she saw said S was going through the same things his own son was going through and that unfortunately, it is just a string of viruses and that there's nothing much to do but wait it out. He did give her more medicine for the pinkeye that came back with this cold (ah, pinkeye. joy!) and gave me suggestions for helping deal with the symptoms. She seemed to be feeling a bit better tonight. We'll see how she is in the morning and decide then if she gets another day home or not.

S was content to rest on the sofa watching TV again. Normally she'll take breaks to go play with toys or draw pictures but for most of the day she just snuggled under a blanket and was rather lethargic. I was content to keep the TV shows flowing because I wanted to keep making progress on my Solar Flare Shawl.

The shawl is coming along nicely. I've finished off 4 wedges out of 9, which makes me happy. What doesn't make me happy is the sheer amount of ends to weave in. I'll worry about them at the end. I do absolutely love how it is coming out. I'm also really pleased with the colours and how they came out. I am so glad I went with yellow as my first colour and worked my way out to the deep red/purplish colour. Hopefully everyone will agree with me and I'll win the coveted Unique Sheep yarn prize.

We survived the rainfall warning that was issued for today. The only water that came into the garage was the rain that dripped off the cars. The water has deepened the drainage channel down the side of the house so the water goes where it is suppose to. We should be good from now on and soon we'll get someone out to permanently fix the problem.

This rain has melted so much of the snow. Normally when I'd leave our neighbourhood I would have a hard time seeing the oncoming traffic because the snow banks. But this morning I realized I could see traffic and that where there use to be snow was now just grass. And C said he could see our tulips sprouting out front! That makes me happy. I like seeing all the signs of spring. We just need to get through the muddy part of spring and then it will be beautiful here!

Doctors, and Water, Eggs, and a Tooth

This morning when I got up, S came to say good morning to me. I looked down at her beautiful blue eyes and realized they were bloodshot and kind of goopy. I asked her if they itched and she said yes. After checking which walk-in clinics were open, I managed to get her an appointment at our regular one. The doctor confirmed what I suspected - pinkeye. She seems to be the only person in our family who gets pinkeye and I'm grateful for that. I don't know if I could deal with J having pinkeye. For the next 7 days I get to put drops in S's eyes twice a day. And spend lots of time washing my hands and reminding both kids to wash theirs. I really don't want this to spread.

Because S is contagious right now, I had to keep her home today. C took J out to spend his gift cards he got for his birthday. His choice? A WWE wrestling game. He's played it over at his friend's house and enjoys it, so he's happy with his choice. After they finished shopping, they went out to lunch at our favourite curry place. I have to say, I was a bit jealous because I was in the mood for curry. But C was a sweetie and asked the server if he could get an order of chicken korma to go. They normally don't do to go orders, but they did for him. It was good, but not as good as when it comes hot and fresh from the restaurant kitchen. It was a nice chance from the past two days of burgers. :-)

The weather today has been kind of crazy. At times it was sunny and then later it started raining. The rain started to melt the snow pretty quickly and sent water into the garage. I emptied the water out of the drainage pit a few times before C got home. He was able to chip out a channel in the ice and direct the flowing water away from the garage and down the driveway. That, combined with the rain stopping, stopped the water from coming into the garage. As long as it doesn't start raining hard again we should be good for the night.

J had his end of the season hockey party today, so C took him to that while I stayed home with Ms. Pinkeye. C said they had these huge inflatable ball things that the kids climbed inside and bounced around in. He said it was chaos but that the kids had a good time. I'm sad we missed it but I knew I couldn't take S there around other kids and put them at risk of getting pinkeye. She and I decided to work on our Easter eggs instead.

S had a plan to paint her eggs rather than just soak them in the dye. I had her draw out her ideas on paper so I had a better idea of what she wanted to do. She ended up making a bunny, a chick, and a tiger (which is my favourite). She also decided to dip another egg in dye. I did two eggs in a gradient of colours, putting our names on one of them. When C and J got home they worked on their eggs. Both of them made a Creeper egg and they both turned out awesome. C also did a rainbow egg and a Homer Simpson egg. J decided to make his own bunny egg and an Ironman egg. I'll get some pictures of them tomorrow to share because they did turn out really cute.

Our house is going to have two special visitors tonight. The Easter bunny will be bringing the kids goodies and the second visitor will be the Tooth Fairy. J had a wiggly tooth and decided that his hockey party would be a good time to pull it out. He likes to try to trick the Tooth Fairy by hiding the envelope but so far she's been good about finding it. Hopefully this time he decides to put it in an easy place to make it easier for her. Hmm...maybe the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy will work together and leave him his tooth money in an egg, hidden around the house. I think it might be a fun thing for her to do.

I hope the wind doesn't stop our visitors tonight. We're suppose to have wind gusts up to 90 km tonight. Oh, and snow. We managed to avoid the snow last night and just get some rain during the day. Tonight and tomorrow we're suppose to have snow. Not as much as they originally said, but still, snow on Easter. Happy Spring!

Doctors, and Dentists, and Thursdays, Oh My!

S had another rough night with lots of coughing and getting up twice. We decided this morning that it would be best for her to go to the doctor to make sure she didn't have a sinus or respiratory infection. Thankfully she doesn't. The doctor did swab her throat for strep but I expect it to come back negative. Neither one of my kids has ever had strep and they have both been exposed to it. In fact, I can't remember the last time I've had strep (if ever) and I know I have been exposed many times - by the same child. When I used to teach I had one student who would do two weeks of antibiotics for strep, be fine for a day or two, and then wham! come down with strep again. That kept happening for a three month period. I felt so bad for that kid! And yes, they finally found the right antibiotic to get rid of it. So if I was going to get strep, I would have gotten it then. I think my kids are very lucky and resistant to strep. We'll get the results of her throat swab by Saturday morning.

After coming back from the doctor I had a short break before it was time for me to head off to the dentist. C was able to watch S for me so I could go. Yay? I could have rescheduled the appointment but I decided it would be better to just get it over with. So I went and it wasn't as bad as I expected.

They did an incredibly thorough exam - they checked facial muscles, my thyroid, how my jaw opens/closes, and did a visual mouth cancer screening in addition to checking the health of my gums and my teeth. The dentist only found one major problem area - that effing tooth that's had two root canals on it. Apparently the tooth under the crown has broken. He said he had never seen anything like that before. Since there are no nerves left in that tooth, I haven't had any pain from it so I never knew anything was wrong with it.

Between a visual inspection and the x-rays, he decided that there is no way to save the tooth so it's going to come out. Honestly, I've had so many problems with that tooth that I will not miss it. Yeah, I'll be short a tooth but you know what? I'd rather it be gone than causing harm in my mouth. He said I've lost some bone where the tooth has broken and by taking it out it will stop any problems spreading to the tooth in front of it. There are some gum issues related to the tooth but hopefully those will get better once that tooth is gone, gone, gone!

The other thing he noticed is that my bite is effed up - I only use my 8 back molars when I chew instead of all my molars. The ones that aren't crowned are quite worn while the premolars look like practically brand-new teeth. He said that's probably what led to me breaking the tooth under the crown. He's recommended a mouth guard at night to protect my remaining molars from any teeth grinding I may do while I sleep. I doubt there's a way to change my bite easily, so I'll wear the mouth guard and know that probably one day I will have more crowns on those teeth back there.

So now I have a bunch of appointments for April - the extraction, having a couple of fillings redone because they are showing some wear, a cleaning and then a follow-up to the cleaning to make sure problem areas are getting better. I'm sure there will be an appointment for fitting the mouth guard too. Dental fun for me!

All in all, it could have been worse. It is Thursday after all. The dentist said that except for that stupid tooth everything looks pretty good for not having been to the dentist since before we moved. Yeah, yeah, I know. But the staff at the dental office was wonderful and didn't lecture me about anything. They just made me feel like they wanted to do what they can to help me have a healthy mouth. I walked out of there feeling good about how things went, which didn't happen often at the dentist I went to in Virginia.

Today is Thursday, which means tomorrow is Friday. And Fridays mean a new clue for my mystery Snow Queen shawl. I have been waiting all week for the next clue. I have other projects I've been working on but I am enjoying the Snow Queen pattern so much that it's hard to wait for the next clue. If I was hardcore (I'm not btw) I would stay up until midnight and get the clue then. I can wait until I get come from the kids' teacher conferences tomorrow to print it out and get started. But I am definitely looking forward to tomorrow!