Moving!

This blog is moving....

To www.leskent.blogspot.com

I will keep this one here for a while though, so change your google reader, mom!

Chiropractor Praise

Look at this!!

Two posts in as many days!?

What is the world coming to....

Well, I'm on livechat with my budgeting program, Mvelopes and I'm having to wait (sort of like being on "hold") as they look into my issue. So I'm stuck here at the computer. So I might as well blog about another topic I've been meaning to address for a long while.

I didn't grow up going to a chiropractor. In fact, for a number of my adult years, I was one of those skeptical, suspicious believers of all the rumours you hear about chiropractors.

Then I got pregnant with Jairus, and by week 33 was measuring 40 weeks. I had too much amniotic fluid, due to his birth defects and this caused an incredible amount of pain. For about a month I was pretty much couch-ridden and had to quit work earlier than I had planned. It got to the point that I was desperate for any kind of relief. My midwife recommended a chiropractor in the city next to mine and so I went for my first visit.

He was nice, seemed competent, did his thing on my back but couldn't really fix things. Looking back, I don't think anyone could have helped me. This wasn't something out of place or strained--well, my muscles were strained, but there was no way to take that strain off, short of giving birth.

He was pretty 'natural health' oriented (as many chiropractors are) and gave me a book to read about vaccinations. I'm sure you can guess what that was about.

After Jairus was born, he came to see us in the hospital and gave him an adjustment with a teeny-tiny little pogo stick instrument. But shortly after he left the area and the next time I needed a chiropractor, I had to find someone else. Into the picture came Dr. Ferretti.

I don't think I've ever recommended any person, professional or service in my life as much as I have Dr. Ferretti. She's in Dundas and works out of a remodeled house clinic.

I don't remember my first visit with Dr. Ferretti or why. I remember taking at least 2 of my girls to her within 2 weeks of their birth. Now I take all four of my kids and of course, my husband and myself go regularly.

I remember being amazed when taking Verity to her shortly after birth. Verity had gotten a little stuck (just a little, honest) during birth and my midwife had had to step in and give some good tugs on her poor little head.

During your first visit, you'll always have some computer scans of your back and neck done. They can tell, I think with thermal technology, where your problem areas are. Dr. Ferretti doesn't actually need these, but I suppose they're good for the records. No, Dr. Ferretti has always had me lay the babies on my front and lay down on the bench (actually a cool motorized thing like being at the dentist, but the whole thing tilts up and down so you don't have to actually lower yourself). Then she closes her eyes and starts gently squeezing and feeling down the length of the babies body, and over the top of their heads as well.

With Verity, she practically described for me what had happened during birth before I'd even told her or shown her Verity's scan. She could tell just by what she felt in Verity's body, that she'd gotten stuck.

There's rarely any crick-crack with Dr. Ferretti. In fact, I'm not sure I've ever felt any crick-crack. And this isn't just about backs. My goodness no, Dr. Ferretti is about the whole body. Let me expand.

When Jairus was about 2ish or perhaps just before, a regular check at the doctors revealed a click in his hip. We were sent to a specialist in Brantford, and for the next few years had regular check ups. They said that his hip was uneven or something of the like, and was probably the reason why he didn't walk until 2 years of age. It was just slightly within the boundaries of 'not a huge concern'. It could slowly move into the 'concern' area so they kept an eye on him.

When we moved to Hamilton, we transferred specialists. Off we went for our first appointment at Mac, and the Dr. we saw checked him over and promptly started telling us the opposite of what the Brantford specialist had said. He didn't walk because of this problem, it was because he didn't walk that the problem occurred. Sounds like semantics, but it makes a big difference in the conscience of a mother. The dr. furthermore told me that Jairus would require surgery for this 'dysplastic' or malformed hip. I was quite upset.

It so happened that I had an appointment with Dr. Ferretti that afternoon. I told her what we had found out that morning and she very confidently told me to leave Jairus in her hands and not to let them get near him with a scalpel. (or laser?)

I did so and for about 6 months or perhaps a little longer, she saw Jairus regularly. She also began a therapy called Turner's on the bones of his skull. I had already taken Jairus for cranial-sacral therapy so I wasn't freaked out by it. Essentially she made sure that the plates of his head were all in place and encouraged proper blood flow around his brain, especially in the areas concerning speech.

At our next follow up appointment, that specialist had his intern see Jairus first. He carefully checked him over and I could tell by the look on his face that he was wondering what the issue was. When the specialist came in and the intern gave his report, he told him that he couldn't see any signs of the hip problem. The specialist checked himself and concurred, telling me that he didn't know what I was doing, but whatever it was, keep doing it.

By this point, Verity was starting to swing from the rafters--I mean, she was definitely showing signs of her gymnastic skill. I think the first time her elbow popped out of joint, she was about 18 months old.

It would leave her in considerable pain for a number of hours, often crying herself to sleep. By the time she woke up, it would usually be fine. But every 2-3 months, this would happen. The family doctor didn't have much to offer on the subject, just that this was not uncommon, it was just a matter of loose and still forming joints/ligaments/bones and she would grow out of it.

After about a year, my mom thought to mention it to Dr. Ferretti. Right away she knew what the problem was and told my mom to bring her in immediately the next time it happened. She even gave my mom her home number in case it was outside of office hours. Which of course it was the next time we needed her....

It was a Sunday just as our church service was ending. I remember the various nurses and health professionals at our church crowding around offering their advice, but I called up Dr. Ferretti and we headed off to Dundas. She came down and opened her clinic. She explained exactly what was going on and with a quick squeeze, rub and flick of her wrist (with no extra pain to Verity) things started to improve immediately. Within 10 minutes Verity was back to normal and I was amazed. From then on, we ran right over to Dr. Ferretti's whenever that happened. Interestingly, she grew out of it shortly after, which I think was due to the fact that Dr. Ferretti was not only correcting the problem each time it happened, but healing up the scar tissue from the other times, and allowing the arm to fully heal and strengthen.

Verity has continued to be a fairly constant source of pulled muscles, twisted joints and pinched nerves for Dr. Ferretti to ply her trade on, lol. With gymnastics class weekly, she often is complaining a day or two after that something is hurting, usually her legs. Time and time again, Dr. Ferretti will check and find that something has been jarred out of place (not dislocated, just not in the optimal position, and therefore causing pain) and with a few smoothing motions of her hands, puts everything aright once more. This is something I really appreciate about seeing Dr. Ferretti; she gets to the root of the problem. No Tylenol to mask the pain, or 'this is normal, she'll grow out of it'. No, when the girls have tummy troubles, she can tell me that their tummies are in the wrong position (for instance after having the stomach flu--did you know that your actual stomach can be wrenched up too high from vomiting?), or a bit of their intestines are pinched, or some other such malady. And then, she can FIX it. Not tell me it's a virus and it must run its' course, or it's a normal part of childhood and they must grow out of it. I detest band-aid solutions and Dr. Ferretti is really good at getting down to the bottom of things.

One of my favourite Dr. Ferretti accounts occurred when I was 37 weeks pregnant with my last baby, Afton. At 37 weeks, I was getting into bed one night. It was a Sunday. I had spent the day in a lazy fashion, sitting on my moms couch while family was visiting for something, likely Easter. I think that Afton didn't care for my lazy day, because as I tried unsuccessfully to get comfortable that night, I sat up with the strangest thought that something was not right. Sitting in the dark, I felt over my basketball of a belly and realized that I was feeling something rather hard and round at the top of my uterus. Are you getting the picture? Yes indeed, an emergency visit to the midwife the next morning, followed by an ultrasound showed that Afton was now breech. Panic ensued. I wouldn't be able to homebirth if she was breech.

The soonest I could get into Dr. Ferretti was the next morning, so I anxiously awaited that time and tried as many natural techniques to get a baby to turn as possible.

Dr. Ferretti found that my pelvis was not aligned, and things were quite cramped down in my lower right section as a result. She said she wasn't surprised that Afton had gotten herself out of there: babies go where there's room, she said. Sitting on a comfy couch for many hours that Sunday had not been wise. She quickly got things in order and I left with high hopes that all would be well.

By that evening I suspected things had changed. I called my midwife, who got me in for a quick ultrasound in the L&D ward around 10pm that night. It was confirmed; crisis was over.

There have been many other ailments and misalignments that Dr. Ferretti has worked her magic on, but we'd be here all day....

So if you are ever in need of a chiropractor, see this lady here!

Rather Exciting

Of all the things I've thought of to blog about over the last few months, finally, I sit down to say a few words about this topic. I think it's because this is, as my title describes, rather exciting.

For a number of years now, I have dreamed about living "in the country". When I was a kid, I was fairly fascinated by that cheesy low budget set of films called "Wilderness family". Now, I'm not talking about country living like that. No, my friend, I need some semblance of society within a reasonable drive. But to have something more than a postage sized lot with houses farther than a stones-toss away (notice I didn't say throw....I have a pretty good arm, lol) is what I hope for. And I hope for it not just in the distant future, like when I'm retired. No, what I really want is to do it when my children are still young enough to enjoy the wide open space to run and explore and build and create. Young enough that we won't get sulky attitudes for moving out to "the middle of no-where".

About 6-8 years ago, we first spotted a lovely bit of land on the drive out to my parents place. Up on Tapleytown road, there was an old abandoned, ready to fall down farmhouse. But the land with it's mature trees and such, really appealed to me. To make a long story short, we kept tabs on this land: made a couple trips down to city hall to pull public records of it, talked to the real estate agent when it went up for sale, and even wrote the owners a letter last year. A final trip to the land development office a few months ago settled the matter: we couldn't afford the whole property (20 acres) and because of it's Greenbelt status, it couldn't be severed. Time to move on.

MLS searches for property in our area always produced slim pickings. Still, I'd do a search every few weeks.

Then, about a week and a half ago, I found this:

It's about 18 minutes drive south of us. Just under 1 acre. There's a well already drilled and registered, and utilities are ready to hook up at the edge of the property. They want $84, 900, which is the cheapest land I've ever seen around here. There are reasons for that, and I'm not going to go into why, but it's something we've investigated and decided is not going to dissuade us.

We don't want to be hasty or jump into something unprepared however (although there's always that pressure with real estate, that someone else could be considering it right now and make an offer before us. It's been on the market at least since last summer, perhaps longer, so I'm not too worried at the moment) so we've been seeking out advice and opinions from professionals and people we trust. I had gone out and taken panoramic shots of the land, and then showed it to my family. My inlaws came down for a visit early last week and we went out and saw it in person. We sent the pics to my BIL who is a house builder (and who'll be building our house if this goes through). I talked to a couple at church who live close to the property to get some insight about living there. We of course corresponded with both our current real estate agent, and the agent who helped us buy and sell the house before the one we live in now, as this property technically falls into her county.

I've been pretty impressed and encouraged by the responses from nearly all. So far, there appears to be nothing terribly wrong with this venture and no sense that anyone thinks we're unreasonable or nuts to think we could buy land and build our own house.

So later this past week, we contacted a broker and began the process to apply for the financing. I think once we have an idea if the financing will be adequate, we can think about putting in an offer on the land.

Then there's our own house to consider. Hooooo boy. Having just watched a good friend go through the listing of her house (still in the process actually) and have to keep a spotless household with four kids running around (and she's not even homeschooling any of them) while day in and day out, people traipse through and make judgemental comments.....I am NOT looking forward to this, nor all the work I suspect is involved in getting our house market ready.

Not that we haven't been preparing for this and doing a little bit along the way. We laid down new carpet in our bedroom a couple months ago and in our family room last spring. When we moved in, we replaced everything in the kitchen except the sink, painted nearly everywhere, pulled up 30 year old carpet in the combo dining room/living room and laid hardwood and 3 years ago when I was expecting Afton, we redid the upstairs bathroom completely. Still, there remains some large items that might need to be done before market time. The driveway is crumbling away. Our patio sliding doors are currently half in and half out....long story. The kitchen flooring was also not redone with the kitchen job and the linoleum is pretty sad looking....

Then there's all the repainting and cleaning and decluttering....wow...big job. Maybe the girls will start their summer break a little early this year....

Humiliation

Is there any emotion in the human experience more gut wrenching than humiliation?

I am reminded of that classic Christmas movie, It's a Wonderful Life, when George is first seeing the life of the town of Bedford without him. Among many things, he sees Mr. Gower, the druggist he worked for as a lad, whiskery and decrepit, staggering into Nicks tavern in a stupor of damaged brain cells from a likely life of alcohol abuse and hardship in prison. George watches in horror as Nick takes out a bottle of soda water and sprays the old man in the face, while the patrons of the tavern look on in uproarious laughter.

Another favourite movie of mine is Never been Kissed with Drew Barrymore. Scenes of humiliation are common fodder in this flick, the pinnacle being when she is waiting out front her house for her crush to pick her up for prom. As he pulls up in the stretch limo, he rises up out of the skylight with a stunning blond on his arm. He pelts Drews character with raw eggs, while him and the chick snicker crassly. She crumples to the steps, horrified and bawling, and scurries out of sight when her mother opens the door, wondering about the sounds.

I always found it interesting that they wrote the script that way; having her escape her mothers discovery. Was she so humiliated that even a mothers comfort wouldn't suffice?

Of course, a close cousin to humiliation is simple embarrassment. I shouldn't say simple, because embarrassment and the events leading up to it can sometimes be far from simple. For this emotion, I think of Meg Ryan, sitting in an airplane frantically shoving peanuts into her mouth when the woman next to her says, "I just hate flying, don't you?". (Do I even need to say the movie this is from?). Meg, lost in her own tortured conscience responds, "Oh yes, I do, and I just told the worst one to the man I'm about to marry. Do you feel any lie is a betrayal?". To which the now befuddled seatmate says awkwardly, "I said....flying". "Ahhh, ohhhh", says Meg, nodding her head and acting for all the world like this embarrassment rolled right off her back.

And why is it that we are so drawn to other peoples embarrassments or humiliations? Why is it a common staple of teen mags to have a column about "My most embarrassing moment". Is there something cathartic about confessing our most shameful bloopers for the world to read? Or likewise to read about the mortifications of others?

Humiliation and embarrassment are such 'shut down' emotions. That's what they do; they just shut you right down. I don't know if I'm more sensitive to either of these than others, or it's just that we don't commonly talk about them, so I'm only left with the little world of my brain to consider if I overreact.

I was once told as a child that I was sensitive. I'm not sure now if that meant that I felt criticism, judgement and other negative emotions aimed at me quite deeply, or if I was sensitive towards the feelings and situations of others. The latter would be preferable, I suppose. Although inwardly I cringe that that: feeling things deeply is not a handicap, not to be scoffed at or belittled. I suppose alot of guys would feel that it is. Perhaps in macho circles, but in the world of families--wives and children, which most men wish to be a part of, it's definitely fodder for marriage counselling.

Perhaps somewhere along the line I learned that mythological lesson though. I fell for the rhetoric--subconsciously of course. And I stopped putting myself out there. A few people have noticed over the years. My voice teacher was one. When I chose a Cindy Morgan song for one of my recitals she once told me that I wasn't making myself as transparent as her--when I sang the song, she wasn't feeling the same depth of feeling as when Cindy sang it. I was a little offended at the time--of course I thought I was giving it all I had. Maybe not.

I joke about this little idiosyncrasy, but I pretty much refuse to ask a pregnant lady how far she is. The reason of course, is that I may be wrong. She may not be pregnant. And that would be horribly embarrassing.

Another source of painful embarrassment for me is what I call the "TMI attack". Perhaps there's already a label for this argument like those I remember learning about in philosophy--the ad hominem argument, the straw man argument. The TMI attack is used alot these days, and I despise it. You've seen it too, I know you have: two people are talking, joking, when all of a sudden one of them describes something they've recently gone through--perhaps an illness or something. They talk about the details of this illness and how it affected them and suddenly the other person is feeling uncomfortable, maybe grossed out. So what do they do? They chuckle awkwardly and say, "Hey man, that's TMI". Too much information. And what does that accomplish? It embarrasses the other person to death, that's what. They'll think twice about sharing such details again, that's for sure.

And that leads me to one of the worst and most common forms of embarrassment and humiliation to my mind. Think of that above example. Why did the first person feel it was ok to share the details of their illness? Because he had made assumptions about the relationship.

He had made the assumption that the relationship was strong enough, or close enough, or just generally able to withstand the sharing of a somewhat personal account.

It's part of our social conditioning to read the cues, non verbal and otherwise, to determine what level of friendship or relationship we are functioning at with those around us. This is a huge part of lives and I doubt any of us really consider it happening. It just happens. But we certainly do get knocked back off our foundations when we are slapped with the stunning realization that we made a vastly inaccurate read of anothers' cues.

And the shut down begins. The embarrassment and humiliation are the cornerstones of the wall that is quickly built. You determine that you will never go to that place of pain again. You will never put yourself out there. You will never make that assumption of relationship again and take the chance of further humiliation. Maybe that's cowardice. Maybe it's self-preservation.

To me, it's just reality.

It's not a PD Day,

But I'm going to blog anyways.

It's actually a bit of a 'free' afternoon for me, as another little homeschooled girl comes over to play ("socialize". Gotta have that hs'er buzz word in there). The girls race all around the house in fairy princess costumes and leave me to....blog.

The past 7 days or so have left my . This is to say that I've had an on slaught of new and inspiring/stressful ideas to consider and also stressful events to add to it all.

Last week (on the actual PD day) I spent about 2 hours talking with two moms: one a homeschooler like myself and the other a mom who's had some experience with homeschooling, but generally is sending her kids to public school. She's also got a son with a number of challenges beyond the 'norm' so she had a good handle on where I'm coming from with Jairus.

By no means should you picture me having a with two friends. Hoohooo no, my friends. We made the grande error of scheduling this visit at the local . On a PD day. What were we thinking. Well, we weren't; we didn't have a PD day so we didn't think about the rest of Hamilton having one. So it was a . Just keeping an eye on my four while trying to talk was enough of a challenge, busting-at-the-seams full playland or not. About three times I had to take off at a full speed run down the length of the restaurant to snatch Afton from the brink of the parking lot, her giggling wildly all the way and making the drinking their coffee chuckle.

Anyways, it was a very interesting conversation which yielded some ideas I'm going to try or at least look into. One of those ideas was for us to learn sign language to help Jairus. At first I was rather horrified at the thought. We send him to speech therapy every week, and keep his augmentative communication device charged, and search out funding to send him to Tomatis training because....we want him to talk. With his mouth.

But here he is, 9 years old, and....can't really talk. His comm device, small amount of signed english, miming/acting out and inflected murmurs do not always do the trick. There are sometimes when we just don't know what he is trying to say. And those are moments indeed.

So I allowed the thought to for a bit. And it really started to. And I am rather excited at the possibility. Now just to find out where this can be done, how much it will cost and whether 2.5 year olds can learn too. Because if we're going to do this, we're all going to do it.

In comes the stressful event. Now, remembering that Jairus at one time in his life (for 3.5 years) could not even eat through his mouth, that when he did start eating he preferred yogurt and pudding and anything else of that consistency (and still does prefer them to this day; more the pudding), that he's undergone 2 previous x-ray swallow studies (one at about 6 weeks old) and that while he looks "normal", his dentist is still quick to remind me that his jaw is still quite small, Jairus choked on his food the other night.

As usual, I've berated myself for not keeping records on this sort of thing, but it's happened before. The first time was when he was about 9 months old and I was trying to put an ng-tube down his nose. He gagged and brought up phlegm, only to have it block his airway. I'll never forget the terror of that moment.

Jump ahead a number of years. We had bought one of those . Little did we know that hidden among the thin slices of tender beef was one big, thick, gristly piece. Which unbeknownst to us ended up on Jairus' plate. In his bid for independence, Jairus was attempting to take care of his own cutting, and somehow this piece ended up lodged in his throat. He of course managed to clear it and an extremely terse letter to Maple Leaf followed.

The incident repeated this past summer with a piece of chicken skin. And now Tuesday night while we were eating tacos. Tacos?

Yes. The only thing I can figure was that a piece of shell was caught, causing a traffic jam with what was swallowed after. After managing to clear his airway, Jairus spent the rest of the evening huddled on my lap. And I was happy to have him there.

The next morning I launched on my journey to get this looked into. Stop A was with the . Why is it that we can never actually speak to our doctors? The receptionist, seemingly used to parents using urgent language, did not seem at all concerned that I connect with the doctor. She insisted that I'd have to make an appointment and it would like not happen until January. I wanted to pull my hair out. She suggested I talk to my family doctor.

So that was stop B. This included pitstop B1 to call my phone company for the second time to ask them to figure out why suddenly the automated phone system at my doctors clinic does not recognize my phone. I've been racking up long distance charges (my dr. is in Brantford) on my cell phone (which it strangely recognizes) because it doesn't matter if I push 1#, 2# or 3#, nothing happens. I've been assured from both ends that it is not their problem.

Again, the receptionist wouldn't let me talk to my doctor, but I could talk to his . Oh, but wait, better yet, I could talk to her voice mail. At this point I insisted on talking to a real person and gave her a brief explanation of why. With a seemingly sympathetic tone, she connected to me to what I thought would be the nurse. But no. It was her voicemail. I left a message using slightly more buzzwords of an urgent nature then probably necessary and insisted she call me immediately. I heard nothing the rest of the day.

Stop C was to call Jairus' old Occupational Therapist to ask her to look at her notes and determine if we had dealt with this issue before and when. This kind of ammunition is good when heading into doctor territory. Again, I left a voicemail. She only works Wednesday and Thursday mornings but alas, I did not hear from her yesterday or today. Double

Pitstop C1 was to talk to James to see if he could do anything in person from the Mac side of things. He tried calling the pediatricians offices but got the same snippy-snip as I did. He went down to the doctors academic offices and discovered he was at another hospital for the day. Finally, we settled on an email that we knew would be delivered to the doctors blackberry. I wrote it up and James sent it from his Mac address so that it wouldn't be caught by some snippy-snip receptionist. We got a read receipt about 2pm yesterday. As of now, the doctor has not contacted us, and he apparently leaves the country tomorrow. Complete growl of

I called back the family doctor today to have the nurse tell me she tried to call back but got various messages of out of order, not available and other such crap. After I gave the receptionist a piece of my (nicely of course) (sorta) I had to argue my position with said nurse about whether or not a swallow study was in order. She insisted Jairus needed to come in and see the doctor (how much do I hateth that line? Let me count the ways....) but at least she got him in for Monday. I had her call my line directly back which of course worked perfectly.

This morning I had to wake Jairus up. I've probably had to do that, oh, never in his entire nine years of life, so I was understandably concerned. He just would not get out of bed, and said his throat hurt. My mind conjured up visions of an injury in his throat from the choking, or the start of aspiration pneumonia but his temp seemed fine. I was all set to keep him at home when suddenly he was hollering from the bathroom that he didn't like the bubbles Afton had left from her baby wash floating in the bathwater as he was trying to get in. Eewy bubbles.

How many of us truly anticipate the level of fear and stress that await us once we become parents.

Not I, said the .

I do love

PA days.

Ever since realizing a few weeks ago that in a 7 day week I don't have a day off, I was pleasantly surprised to find that today was a PA day. Yes, I realized that before I took Jairus to school. :-P

I think I've used a PA day before to blog....interesting.

I decided that the girls would have a PA day too....although does that mean I need to be professionally improving myself?

But back to the day off thing. With starting the Musikgarten classes on Saturdays, doing the childrens program on Sundays, and choir, homeschooling, gymnastics, highland dancing, etc during the weekdays, this means that I don't have a regular (consistent), full day that I'm not obligated to be doing something. I mean, other then the obvious feeding and caring for my family. Until a PA day or other holiday, I no longer have a day that I can wake up to stretching out before me with no added stress already attached to it. Kinda depressing.

So I can see that it's been a number of months since I've blogged. I actually have a blogpost already composed, sitting on my computer just waiting for me to control C and send it out to ya'll. But somehow I'm not so interested in doing that right now. Maybe later. It was a post all about our summer trip up to Mr. Leeks cottage near Kingston. Fun times.

I have so much going on that I can't even think of where to start blogging about it. I probably shouldn't even be blogging.

I should have made a list of computer jobs before I even sat down, like my home manager coach suggested. But I sat down regardless and got an email that my SNAP Hamilton article and pictures were now published from my August 28th Open House. Cool. You can see them shortly over at my Musikgarten blog. So then I was purchasing the picture files from SNAP and downloading them, and posting them on FB and Twitter.

But before this I got 2 things done from my todo list: getting my license renewed and dropping off a proposal to the preschool at my church about maybe doing some regular Musikgarten classes for them. This was all quite an accomplishment with 4 kids in tow, one refusing to walk on his left foot after tumbling down the stairs this morning. I still think he's being a bit of a drama king.

Honour's hives have all but disappeared. She's got a few little spotties here and there, but I think we're past the worst. Sigh of relief.

This is my church's 20th anniversary this weekend. I should be making a large display about MountainKids to be put up tomorrow....guess I'll do that soon. The nice thing is that I get a week off of doing the kids program. Pretty pathetic to be happy about that when we've only done like 2 weeks of program so far.

An absolute swimming pool of laundry downstairs. Mostly clean. I have to get at least the washing/drying part caught up for tomorrow. I won't say why.

Finally got around to completing the funding application for Jairus to have tomatis therapy. Now just to send it off.

Also finally got some commercial general liability insurance set up for my Musikgarten classes. Blast that you need to have that stuff. It's costing me about 80% of my rent amount per month.

I had to sever my profile from my blogs. So if I comment somewhere, or otherwise make my profile seen, you can't click back to my blog. Hopefully I can change this soon, but it's a long story and for now, I can't have them connected. In case you were wondering. I'm sure you were.

I should be figuring out supper, maybe even starting it. And tidying up because were having friends over tonight. Not that tidying could really even help this place.

Ok, well there's my rambling update.

I do love PA days. :-)

Mountain Musikgarten!

I've started a business. I didn't realize I would be starting a business....but I have. How crazy does that sound!?!

This is just a quick post, because it's freaking 1 o'clock in the morning and my eyes feel like they've been sucking onions (ok, yes, the only illustration coming to me at 1am). I just wanted to make a connection here from my blog. Hubby's been working like a dog getting a new website up for me (www.jksoundstudios.com/mountainmusikgarten.html) and tonight I just added a blog so that I've got a way to easily update things without having to wait for him to get home from work. (!!)

So do pay a visit...right now there's only one post, but take a look and become a 'follower' just so I don't have to keep seeing that "you have no followers yet" message. How depressing!

http://mountainmusikgarten.blogspot.com

Thanks, ya'll..... :-)

~Les

Really, this is an emergency!

So a couple weeks ago, we dug into our newly attained emergency fund for...an emergency. Really.

What you see here, is the screen of our 37 inch LCD TV [that my brother Paul gave us for Christmas 2 or 3 years ago] after Verity flung a toy across the room at it. An accident, of course. The whole screen should be the same light blue as the left side is. The teeny spot of light blue in the midst of the black in the upper right quadrant is the location where the toy hit.

We were pretty upset. We never would have bought something like that for ourselves at that time; in fact the only reason my brother knew we wanted a new TV was because I posted on Facebook, asking if anyone had an old one lying around they wanted to gift to us, because our 15 year old second hand TV was dying. Him splurging on this for us for Christmas that year was a total shock and we were just amazed.

James got on the internet and started researching how to fix a broken LCD screen. The results were not encouraging. Jokes on TV repair forums ran the likes of "Now you've got a huge funky looking conversation piece for your family room". He did finally find a company that sold replacement screens in the States. 2-300$ for the screen and about an equal amount to ship it, plus duty to cross the boarder. Sigh.

So here was where we were faced with our first decision about whether to use our emergency fund. Yes, it's there for such situations where a major appliance breaks and needs to be replaced. But a stove or washer just feels like a more legitimate use of an emergency fund.

It didn't take long though, for James and I to agree that we wanted to replace it--replace it immediately and replace it with roughly what we had there. So we threw the kids in the van and went on over to TigerDirect where we found a Toshiba 40inch LCD for $599. It was discounted a fair bit because it was a web return (buyers remorse I think) and the box was munched during shipping. The TV itself was perfectly fine. We were pleased to get a good deal and a few more inches.

A couple days ago, I was on the Dave Ramsey forum and while asking for advice on a different issue concerning emergency funds, someone there posted a response that called into question our decision. To quote them exactly:

"And, I'm not requesting any information, but I will make a statement: if you used the emergency fund money for a non-emergency, I would look very hard at behavior and priorities. "

I'll admit, this fed a little on my doubts about spending that money. But then I really got thinking about it and talking to James. First of all, this person had no business or place to question our decision. It's our money. We worked hard to save it. If I had been asking for opinions about whether our decision had been reasonable, then they could have spoken up. But I didn't.

Furthermore, I was struck with what we had accomplished in having the money to buy a 500$ TV without going into debt. When I got past the guilt, it was great feeling. The bottom line is that this was completely our decision and we don't have to justify it to anyone except God. Since he owns it all, and we are just the caretakers, the three of us are the only ones involved in the semantics of it.

And we have so been enjoying our TV!

Getting Away

For once I'm going to use my blog to spread the love instead of whining. :-)

Two weeks ago at this moment, I was waking up in a beautiful bed and breakfast at Niagara on the Lake. James and I got away for our 14th anniversary. It was heavenly.

I think I've figured out that this is the first time we've gotten away since we had kids. That would be 9 years! We did go away when I was 8 months pregnant with Verity (5 years ago) but I don't really count that. 8 months pregnant does not make for....well....a very romantic, relaxing time away.

So about a year and a half ago, Jamie's boss at Horizon gave him a Christmas gift of a $100 gift certificate to an organization that lets you choose from a number of Bed and Breakfasts. At the time I thought that was really nice, but not so thrilled about it, as Afton was only about 8 months old and I was still looking at at least a year of nursing. Our certificate would have to be saved for a while--good thing it didn't have an expiry date.

Then about 6 weeks ago James informed me that he had made the arrangements for us to use it for our anniversary. I weaned Afton back in March (as you might remember me triumphantly posting about here) so we were free and clear. I was so excited. I listen to 96.3 a fair bit and hear Libby Zymer with her Zoomer report and I recall one that talked about the excitement of anticipation when it comes to holidays. She said that basically, the anticipation almost becomes better than the holiday itself and makes the results of it last longer. I was happy to take part in

that!

Our actual anniversary date was on the 15th, the Tuesday before we were to go away. James surprised me (really, honestly surprised) with an amazing bouquet of roses.

Two weeks ago yesterday, James took the day off and we packed up some stuff. We got to my parents just before lunch. The four kids were extraordinarily excited to be sleeping over at Nana and Papa's. Then we headed of to NOTL.

An afternoon spend exploring NOTL is something James and I have made a special treat. About once a year we usually take a trip down there and poke in and around the shops for a few hours. Always a stop at Maple Leaf fudge, usually a Christmas ornament purchase at the Christmas Store, a wander through a few galleries. I love to eat at the Shaw Cafe, almost more for the decor than the food (although the food is fantastic too).

When it's just an afternoon though, there's always the subtle pressure that someone else is dealing with my four kids and we should really be getting back. How lovely it was to know that we had not just the afternoon, but the evening, the night and a bit of the next day too!

After our usual prowling up and down the main street, we got back to the van and made the short jaunt over to our B&B, the Duncan-Quinn House. I have to admit, I was a little unsure about what staying in a B&B was going to be like. I rather like the anonymity of a hotel. I worried that staying in a room of someones house, likely next to another couple staying in another room would be....awkward. The last and only time I stayed in a B&B was as a teenager, when my choir went down east and we were billeted in Lunenberg. My billet was a couple who were just about done renovating their house into a B&B. It was quite lovely I remember.

When we arrived, we were greeted by the hostess, Jane. I was a little surprised when she handed us a key to the house and our room---it was more like a hotel then I thought it would be. She showed us up to our room, which James had chosen; the nicest in the house. It had a large four poster bed and a few tables and bureaus and such. There was a sitting chair I believe and a walk in closet. Attached was a beautiful, very large ensuite, with a corner fitting jacuzzi tub. Everything was immaculately neat (a welcome escape from my own house) and clean and beautifully decorated. The bed was sooooo comfy....it started me thinking again about replacing our mattress which is who-knows-how-old and not even comfortable with a padded mattress cover.

Here's a few pictures of the house and our room.

After we registered, James slipped out to get a few things and I spread my scrapbooking stuff on the bed and worked on the choir album I wanted to get updated before the choir BBQ the next evening.

Then it was time to head out to supper. The restaurant James had made an reservation at was within walking distance from the B&B, The Cannery, which is in a resort/hotel type place called The Pillar and the Post. It was a really nice place (nicer than the picture on the website infers--I didn't even see pizza on the menu). They brought us each a little shrimp cocktail after we had ordered, which was really yummy. I had ordered the prime rib and James ordered a steak and both meals were superb. Jane, our host from the B&B, upon hearing where we were going for supper (and that this was our anniversary) gave us a certificate for complimentary deserts. I ordered a chocolate fudge mouse cake and James ordered tiramisu. We ended up taking them back to the room to eat later, as we were full up.

The only glich of the evening was poor James having to drive all the way back into St. Catherines when I needed some decongestant spray and the local pharmacies were all closed. What a man!

Breakfast the next morning was served at 9, and we then met the other guests. A couple from the Cambridge area sat to our left, newly engaged the previous evening out in the gardens at the house. (!!) They were older then us, and the woman talked about her adult daughter. The other 'couple' was a woman in her late forties I'd guess, with her almost elderly mother. The older lady was quite a charmer, with a bit of english accent. She regaled us with a story of how her and her husband were once caught skinny dipping by their daughter (the one present). She was cute (the way older ladies can be, you know).

Again, I hadn't been so keen about the idea of having to get up and eat breakfast with people I didn't know. But I was reminded of how sometimes I need to get out of my little comfortable bubble and interact with the world sometimes.

We were served muffins, lavender tea biscuits and toast by Jane and her husband Peter who went all out with a charming apron. We had a fruit salad, cut into teeny little pieces, which I decided is now my favourite way to eat fruit salad, with yogurt and granola.

The main course was served by plate; a mini baked quiche, a thick strip of bacon, a roasted half tomato topped with toasted bread crumbs, and two elegant looking asparagus stalks with lemon-herb butter.

The lavender tea biscuits, Jane explained, were baked using culinary lavender from The Lavender Boutique down the road from NOTL. She was so enthusiastic about the place that she talked all of us into visiting before we left the area.

So after packing up and saying goodbye, we hit the downtown for a few more trinkets to take back home to the kids, and then headed out to the boutique. As promised, the couple running the place were high energy, very knowledgeable and introduced us to the world of lavender. A quick tour of their greenhouse and a peruse through the various lavender product made for a pleasant morning.

We decided to use the last of our budget to stop for lunch in Grimsby, at the Judge and Jester, a place I've seen lots but never thought about eating at. Very yummy. Highly recommend.

So that was our trip! We decided that we definitely need to do that sort of thing more often and soon!

S-U-P-P-O-R-T-Find-out-what-it-means-to-me...

A continuation of my thoughts of yesterday.

My point is not necessarily that we are wrong in this way of life we've cultivated. Sunday Schools exist, they likely always will. (I've often wondered what they did in the New Testament church....there were no basements to send the kids off to, and if there was another room, then who taught them? Knowing the community spirit, if they did send the kids elsewhere, I'm sure all the parents took turns. Which we dislike nowadays because we want kids to develop a relationship with a Sunday School teacher and you can't do that when they're here one week and not the other. But I think it would have been different in those days--they were more like families) (But again I digress)

Since we generally do accept that it's ok to let others instruct our children in spiritual matters, now begs the question, so then what responsibility should we be taking?

As one who has now been heavily into Children's Ministry for a couple years now, I can say, a heck of alot more than most do.

There's always the exceptions, the ones who are keenly interested in making sure their children are being sensitively and effectively ministered to. And so they're the ones being a part of that ministering. They're the ones taking on the lions share of this mammoth responsibility. But there are many who drop the kids off and rarely give the next hour or two a second thought.

I don't want to sound like a complainer. I'm doing what I'm called to be doing and that's not going to change until the call changes. But Children's Ministry is not like other ministries. We don't expect everyone to take their turn at being on the praise and worship team (after all, if you are benefiting from the singing, you should take your turn at it, right?) because, frankly, we don't want to hear from everyone in the church through a microphone. Many ministries require a specific talent or gifting. And Children's ministries is somewhat similar there...except that as you can read in my previous post, we get so desperate for people to teach that we have to dumb down the requirements to "love God and love kids". We've actually had to issue an ultimatum concerning our children's program; if we don't get 6 teachers by the end of June, there will be no program come September. So far, we've had no-one volunteer to teach for the year and only 2 or 3 who have said they would do a rotating thing "if you were desperate". 2 of those 2 or 3 have already taught with us sometime in the last two years. Oh and one teacher from this year intends to continue, no matter if the rest of the program runs or not. So at least one class of kids might continue getting something on Sunday mornings.

I wonder if any church has tried "co-op Sunday School"? I know that at the wonderful church in Brantford we attended for about 2 years, it was not very long after we started attending--maybe 2-3 months, before a new nursery schedule came out---and we were on it! (I didn't even realize they knew our names!) At that time we had 2 kids in nursery so this wasn't a huge surprise. I was surprised however that no-one had come and actually asked us to be on the rotation. I'll admit, I was slightly annoyed at this. But it seemed a pretty clear and fair concept to me: you use the nursery, you take your turn. Where else in our society do we involve our children in something at no cost to ourselves, and not expect to give back into it in some way? Even Verity's gymnastics, which was far from no cost to us, asked everyone to do some fundraising mid-year.

Even if, ok, you feel completely overwhelmed and uncomfortable with the idea of teaching a class of children (and by class, I mean around 4-6 children. Not 12). There are other things you can do. Allow me to list a few:

• Substitute teach. Be on our list of people willing to take a class for one Sunday when a teacher is sick.
• Buy presents: We like to recognize all our kids with a little something on their birthday. How would you like to go on a shopping spree without a single dent in your wallet? You're, right, it does sound like fun! Be our birthday lady/man.
• Greet children: For 20 minutes every Sunday, you could create lasting and pleasant relationships by simply saying hello. Each child needs to be welcomed and greeted when they arrive for the program. This is a very important foundation for our program--the start of a positive experience at our church. You don't even need to do this every week--we'd be glad to make a rotating schedule.
• Play an instrument or sing: We have a praise and worship time and normally rely on DVD's and CD's. It's really cool though, when someone can add a live instrument. And we always need singers. Again, this doesn't have to be weekly thing--we regularly rotate groups of kids through as junior p&w leaders, we can do the same for adults. It's important for the kids to see that their program matters--what they are experiencing is not a second-rate service just because they are young. Other adults in the church showing an interest and wanting to be involved will convey worth to the children.
• Help technically: We attempt to put together an exciting multi-media component....well, it's not really a component, it's really the backbone of our service. From Powerpoint and Easyworship to Youtube and Yahoo video, we are looking to appeal to today's kids. Right now, one person programs this entire 1/2 hour long set-up. He also, with help from one other person, physically sets up our stage, sound and video system, runs the program and tears down afterwards. There are many parts of this that we could import to someone else:

1. Set up. Come to the children's ministry room and help set up. It takes about 20 minutes before the service.
2. Tear down. Takes slightly less time.
3. Create stuff: Videos, scripture presentations, whatever. We are open to creativity.
4. Fill in: Our tech guy has four kids and they've been known to be ill from time to time. We need people willing to fill in. Spend a Sunday or two observing and learning how our systems work. Then be willing to be on call if by chance he needs to be away on a Sunday.

• Food: We're thinking of having a snack time in the fall. Having someone coordinate that, buy the food, serve it, clean up, whatever. That would be really great.
• Miscellaneous talents: Puppetry? Magic tricks? Know a bunch of funny skits or games? Water glass playing? Breakdancing? We want to make our program fun and exciting. You come to us with some miscellaneous talent, skill or idea and we will find a way to use it.

Perhaps you've looked over this list and for whatever reasons, are still convinced you can't be a part. Alright. There is still a way to support us--those you've entrusted to, as we've established, teach your children the incomparable truths of God.

Be in relationship with us. Be our friend! We choose to miss out on the morning service to minister to the children of our church. We miss out on the before and after chit chatting, the general fellowship of being in an adult service, the sense of community that comes from corporate worship.So don't just gather your kids up and head out to the parking lot. Say hello, how did things go today? You're lookin' good, are you over that head cold? And....dare I say it....

Say thank you.

Last year I had one parent send a thank you card and small gift at the end of the year. In my choir work, out of about 35 kids in each choir, approximately 1/3 to 1/2 give me some token in appreciation for teaching their kids music once a week. Or at least an email.

I'm not looking for this. I'm not expecting this. Recognition is not why I do this.

But this year I didn't hear from any parents. Yes, a few other teachers said some words publically or by mass email. But that's different.

As I did last year, I went out and purchased something nice for each teacher and person who had contributed in a significant way to our program. Even at a modest cost per person, it adds up. I was actually a little scared to submit my receipts for these gifts. (Good thing my dad writes the cheques!)

But in working through this anxiety, the thought occurred to me....why am I scared? Do these people not deserve some token of gratitude for their time and sacrifice this year?

Absolutely they do.

And who is grateful to them? Well, yes, me and my mom, who co-directs with me. But who else?

Yes.....the parents.

But who went out and bought the gifts?

Yes.....me.

Again, I don't begrudge this. I enjoyed it actually. I was really excited about the gift we gave each teacher this year and I think they're all going to enjoy it immensely.

But the point is....not only are myself [and all these teachers] taking responsibility for the spiritual enrichment of these kids, I also took on the job of thanking them....for the families. You see my line of reasoning here?

This past year, we tried to organize a few events beyond the usual weekly program. We did Operation Christmas Child. We did a Christmas play. We had two movie events for missions fundraising--one involving a nice dinner. We did an end of year bbq.

Support our events. If you truly cannot give regular time in some capacity to your children's spiritual education, then show up when something is planned [to add to the Christian education they are already receiving for a short time weekly]. And if you can't come....then at least tell us you're not coming. There's nothing like buying 5 dozen hotdogs and hamburgers and only having 1/2 the expected amount of people show up.

I don't know why being a part of children's ministry is such an issue. I don't know why we don't get people willing to come out and teach the future generation of our churches. Maybe they feel they 'just don't have the gift of teaching'. This may be true. But my usual thoughts when hearing this run along the lines of, if you have kids, you teach. You teach them to drink from a cup, to pee in the toilet, to share their toys, to tie their shoes. Don't kid yourself. If you're a parent, you teach.

Maybe some feel they are too busy.

Need the time in church themselves.

Are involved in another ministry already.

My thoughts again? (and they are, just, my thoughts).

Make time for your children.

Your children need the time in church too.

Your children are your primary ministry.