Over the hills and thru the woods, puking all the way...

Well, that's how this story begins. This has been the week of Dear Husband's major back surgery and what a week it's been. This will be a trilogy blog entry since there are several stories to tell.

We chose a doctor from Napa. The closest hospital, to our home, that the surgery could be done at, was St. Helena Hospital. We had to go over to the hospital on Thursday for a pre-op appointment to make sure Dear Husband was healthy enough to go under the knife. An EKG, blood tests, urine test, etc. were planned. We decided to take Pirate with us, since we didn't have childcare for him. We traveled over Mark West Springs Rd and Pirate began to complain about being hot. Ah oh! He has a history of getting carsick, so panic began. We did all we could to prevent the vomit. We made it down the hill and onto Hwy 29, headed toward St. Helena. I, of course, opened my big mouth and said, "whew.. he didn't puke. That was a close call" Not 30 seconds after the statement came out of my mouth, Pirate puked and puked all over himself, the car seat, and the back of the driver's seat. It was 8:30 in the morning. We had no change of clothes or towels. (I know, we should know better. Shame on us)

After trying to clean Pirate's face with a baby wipe on the shoulder of the road, while commute traffic whizzing by... we headed on. We knew that Pirate couldn't enter the actual hospital since the H1N1 issue is going on. No children under the age of 16 allowed in the hospital. We were told that Pirate could come to the Pre-Admissions Office though. We arrived and parked the car. We took Pirate's shirt off and put on his sweatshirt that avoided to the puke. Into the building we go with our smelly little boy, who was being such a BIG BOY! (we were so proud of him) I had Dear Husband go up to the 3rd floor, just to be sure Pirate was still invited. Nope! We rec'd miss information. Him and I had to sit in the waiting room chairs at the entrance of the hospital while Dear Husband went ahead with his appointment.

What was I going to do to entertain a 2-year old covered in vomit for an hour? I pulled out my secret 'bag of tricks'... aka 'my purse' and started letting Pirate play with anything that occupied him. Our hour wait for Dear Husband flew by and before I knew it, Dear Husband was coming down in the elevator to meet up with us.

I must have had my guardian angel sitting on my shoulder or my little Pirate turned into an angel for an hour. Whatever it was, I am eternally grateful.

If you can't go Organic, at least try this

I don't think most family and friends realize that our house went "Organic' shortly after Pirate's birth. We only buy organic milk. It is very expensive but we decided that certain things that the kids eat and drink all the time, we would commit to buying organic. This also includes juice, crackers and snacks, and fruits and veggies. It doesn't mean that we don't feed them junk food or processed food because we do that too! Since the kids don't really eat any meat, we haven't committed to organic meat just yet. It is great that Costco and other retailers are really beginning to offer the organic variety now. Since we can't always buy organic fruits and veggies, I have found a fabulous recipe for fruit and veggie cleaner to counteract all the chemicals that is sprayed on our produce before it makes it into our homes.

Here's the list of the "Dirty Dozen". The 12 produce items that you should buy organic. We aren't always that good in our house. Depending on finances, hot sale items, and the store we are at determines if it's organic or not.

http://www.greenthinkers.org/blog/2006/06/organic_dirty_dozen.html

I do clean all our fruit and veggies with the following. I got the recipe from the book, Gorgeously Green by Sophie Uliano. My luck, I will get hit with some copyright crime for reprinting it but it was posted on Oprah's website too!

Ingredients:

1 cup of water

1 cup distilled white vinegar

1 Tbsp. baking soda

20 drops of grapefruit seed extract (available at local health food store)

Combine all ingredients in a large container. Then transfer to a spray bottle with a pump. (Don't mix ingredients right in spray bottle. You will have a science experiment, just like you did in the 5th grade - trust me)

Spray on produce and rinse thoroughly after 5 to 10 minutes.

Just much to do, too little time

I have to admit that the blog has been the least of my priorities as of lately and my biggest guilt. I love to write this blog, I just haven't found the time. I go to bed each night with such guilt that I didn't have the time to add a new entry. I have been too busy catching cats, dealing with plumbers, wrangling a two year old and negotiating outfits with Princess. Then there is Christmas and Dear Husband's back surgery next week. I think my plate is full and spilling over. Oh, and because Dear Husband and my therapist told me I need to start going to the gym to burn off some stress, I am on my 5th week of my 9-week running program. It's kicking my butt yet the butt isn't disappearing.

Though we have been scrambling around trying to get all our Christmas shopping done before the surgery (Dec. 18th), I haven't grasped the holiday spirit just yet. As we get closer to the surgery, I am beginning to get stressed about the severity of the surgery along with the responsibilities that fall on me as of Dec. 18th. I am going to temporarily become a single mom with two small kids and a husband that is useless for the unforeseen future, while he recovers.

I need to find and bring the holiday cheer into our house along with playing Santa Claus on the 24th. You can call me bah-humbug but I did veto a big tree this year. Could you imagine me dealing with the two kids, husband is upstairs in bed after surgery and the two darn indoor cats have knocked over the tree ? (its a guarantee they would to) I had to make the tough decision to go without this year. We have an itty-bitty tree that I will put out instead. When the cats knock it over, at least I will be able to pick it up myself and I won't have water leaking into our laminate flooring.

To Catch a Cat....

We have been battling a feral cat issue in our yard and neighborhood for years. I have mentioned it before in past blog entries. I am ecstatic to announce that we think we have finally capped the issue. We have caught the last known female that was not fixed. She had two litters this past summer that we had to catch and find home for. A total of 5 kittens that we found. This cat, who we call Beauty, has been dodging us for well over one year and has caused a lot of stress in our house. We began trying to trap her last summer and were successful one time until Dear Husband took pity on her and 'dumped' her from the the cat trap to a dog crate so she would be more comfortable for the evening, while she waited to be taken to a spay clinic. Needless to say, Beauty got away and Dear Husband ended up in Urgent Care with a cat bite. Since that day, we have never been able to get her in the cat trap. We have caught everything else in our neighborhood, including a 20lb. possum just last week. In desperation a few days ago, I called Forgotten Felines of Sonoma County to get their advice. They suggested I use a 'Drop Cage' which they were willing to loan me. They said that if we screwed this up, the hopes of every catching her were slim.

Last night I left Dear Husband in charge of the trapping while I took Princess and Pirate out for a few hours. Dear Husband not only was able to trap Beauty but trapped two of the other ferals at the same time. We had been told this might happen and were given instructions on how to just get Beauty in the portable cat trap. I was sweating bullets and stressed out to the max! If this failed, we were screwed. I am happy to say that we successfully transferred Beauty and settled her down in our garage for the night while we figuered out what to do next. I hardly slept a wink last night, knowing that if we didn't find a vet today to spay her... we would most likely have to take her to the animal shelter. She is very wild so she has no chance of being adopted. I called our vet first thing this morning and they were happy to help. Beauty is currently being spayed as I type this email. She will be put back in her cat trap right after surgery so she awakes in the trap. I will pick her up tomorrow morning and release her back into our neighborhood. Whoo Hoo! I am a very happy camper today. Have we finally conquered the ever-expanding feral cat issue in our neighborhood? No thanks to our neighbors either. Nobody helped us financially or physically to resolve this issue.

Please Spay and Neuter your cats, no matter if they are indoors or outdoor cats.