"Only call me if you have called 911 first"

I found this post in my 'draft' file. It's from several years ago as my kids (and husband) are at different stages in life and responsibility but I think it's a good story worth still telling. 

Those are my parting words to my husband every time I leave the house for 'adult time, girls time, sanity time, whatever you would like to call it'. I learned many years ago that that statement is necessary because Dear Husband would call me on a whim....to ask where something was, what to feed the kids for dinner, to talk down a tantruming child, just to test me to see if I will answer my cellphone. If I didn't answer the cellphone then he would continue to call to get his point across. When I would finally hear it while buried in my purse, he would forget what he had initially called me for and just chew me out that I wasn't available on his whim. It got old real quick and so it began with my parting words when I dared to leave the house. "Only call me if you have already called 911 first!". 

I learned this past Saturday (many years ago at time of this post) that I have failed in one aspect of being the 'manager' of our house. I had taken it for granted that Dear Husband would know who to call in an emergency and what hospital to head for. I was out getting my hair colored and I was sitting down to let the hair dye ripen on my head on the sofa at the salon. The receptionist walks over to me with the salon phone and hands it to me. First thoughts in my head 'Oh Jeez, Pirate is having a meltdown and I have been called to talk him down. Now I am going to get an earful about not hearing my phone'. Nope that's not what happened. I pick up the phone and the first thing Dear Husband says is "What hospital do I take Princess to?"  What?, What did you just say? What is is wrong?! "What hospital do I take Princess to?" - He states again, ignoring my repeated question. I raise my voice and repeat 'What happened to her?"

He tells me she fell and is bleeding all over the place. I then ask if he needs to call 911. Nope, he just doens't know what hospital to go to. Let me stop my story here and explain the hospital options in our community. They are not complicated or confusing. Actually my Dear Husband has always been quite (or should I say VERY) opinionated about the hospitals in our community. We have three choices, one being a Kaiser and we are not Kaiser members, so that in not an option. That leaves us two options. One is a community hospital that is deserate need of a revamp and tthe other is a privately owned hospital that my Dear Husband, all his siblings and our children were born at. Hmmmm... And he asks which hospital to take Princess to????? Really???? Where did I fail on this information? Did I just assume that he would know that answer. I don't know my point to my story but I think it is kinda ironic and it makes me smile just a bit that my Dear Husband can excel in his professional life yet when the going gets rough in our simple home life, he doesn't think too clearly. Going forward now, when I leave the house for some much needed ME time, I say my typical "Only call me if you have called 911 first, and then I remind him our choice of hospital. Bless his sweet heart. xoxox

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.

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.

One Tall Tale

I have to share a tidbit of my life yesterday. It is just a sampling of what I have to work with everyday.

I had been eyeballing a new cheap haircutting place that was opening yesterday. Princess needed a trim and I just couldn't bring my self to spend $18.00 + tip to a 10 minute haircut. I figured the new haircut place might have a grand opening deal so I called them in the morning. They didn't have a opening deal but the kids haircuts were only $13.00. I couldn't beat that! So off Princess and I went to get her hair cut. We left Dear Husband and Pirate at home napping. The haircut didn't take long (will be going there again too!) so we decided to run over to Kohl's to make a quick exchange on a present for Pirate for Christmas. [That's a whole other blog entry: trying to Christmas shop when you always have at least one kid tagging along]

We didn't even get out of the parking lot into the store and my phone rings. It's Dear Husband in the background of a screaming Pirate. He is trying to get me to calm Pirate down over the phone. Yeah right! Since this has been happening a lot lately, I know the drill.... get home as quickly as possible. More for Dear Husband, not Pirate. Dear Husband is not able to deal with the kids when they cry and tantrum for Mommy so I get these wonderful phone calls while I am trying to get something down by myself or be by myself.

Princess and I rush home and as soon as I walk in Pirate calms down. Dear Husband doesn't even look at me, as if I did something wrong! He tells me Pirate has been like that since Dear Husband went and got him out of the crib after nap. Okay, I was going along with the story for a few minutes and then I discovered the truth. Dear Husband made the slight comment that he was so out of it during his nap (Must be nice!!!), that he slept through the phone ringing. Hummm.. made me start thinking. Pirate had been probably playing in his crib when he woke up and nicely calling out over the baby monitor that he wanted out of his crib. Dear Husband was so crashed he didn't hear Pirate until Pirate became outraged and scared that no one was coming. How long did it really take, I wonder? By the time Dear Husband staggered into the room with only one eye open, Pirate was pissed and Daddy was the last person he wanted to see. Can't I say I blame him. Oh, the joys of motherhood and wifehood!

One sick dog

Yesterday morning I woke up sick as a dog, fever and all. I was putting on as many clothes as possible to stay warm. Even little Pirate came up to me and touched my skin and said "hot". It was truly a miserable day. Dear Husband went off to work (happily, I am sure) and left me home with two kids who had no sympathy for my condition. Princess was scheduled to go to Preschool yet I told her she could stay home. I didn't tell her that Mommy had selfish reasons as to why she could stay home. First one being, then I didn't have to get out of my pajamas and brush my hair and teeth to drive her and walk her into preschool. I was so out of it, I am sure I should not have been driving a motor vehicle anyway. The second selfish reason was that she could play with Pirate and I could try to just lay on the couch.

The kids were good for the most part. I had to break up a few squabbles. We watched way too much kids television. Luckily I was so feverish that I could stand watching Backyardigans for the 6th time in a row. When Pirate's nap time came, I told Princess that I was taking a nap too. She was down with that and let me get all settled into bed and asleep and then she decided she needed my help with something. I never fell asleep again yet she did, just as Pirate was waking up from his nap. I got jipped!! (gosh, is that even a real word or just bad slang?)

Trying to be the noble one and keep my germs to myself as much as possible, I decided to sleep on the couch last night. Note to self for the future: Never disclose to Princess in advance, of my plans to sleep on the couch, because she will take up residence in our bed, on my side, right away. I don't think I really slept all night. I couldn't breath each time I tried to lay down. Pirate kept waking up every 1 1/2 hours because he is cutting his last set of molars. I had to go in each time and sooth him back to sleep. The two cats thought the camp out in the living room was fun and decided to join me on the couch. They seemed to sleep great. Finally, at 3:30 am I went to my bedroom hoping that there was a bit of room for me to squeeze myself into our queen size bed. I found Dear Husband and Princess, snoring and grinding teeth respectively, both oblivious that I had been up countless times with Pirate. There was no room for me. I went back downstairs and sat on the couch and waited until Dear Husband's alarm went off at 4:10 so I could at least claim his side of the bed and try to catch a few zzz's.

The hardest part of being a mom to small children is when I get sick. They don't understand and still expect me to do 'mom things' for them. Dear Husband tries to compensate but there are times when they insist that I do something for them and will stand for nothing less. Oh, how I wish I could check into a hotel room when I am sick and suffer in silence with a bottle of NyQuil and a nice dark room.

Girl Power!

Princess & I caught the kittens. They are cute and we are mighty proud of ourselves.

First, the details on the twins... They are 7 weeks old if I tracked the gestation cycle of their Mama Cat correctly. Two boys. They are identical to the kitten we kept (Sake) earlier this summer from the last batch. It is deja vu. They litter boxed trained within minutes and love to play with the kitty toys Princess gave them. Currently they are shacking up in our downstairs bathroom [aka... the kitten room]. In case you think we are crazy.. we are not keeping them! We are hoping that the Humane Society has room in their adoption area for them. We will find out tomorrow. If not, we will be having to find these two little guys homes ourselves.

We have been trying to find these kittens for weeks but finally began seeing them in our yard this past week. Unfortunately we have a small gap in one section of our double-layer fence that we had never noticed. Well, the little kitties did and they used it as their hideout. We couldn't close up the gap because we never knew if the kittens were in between the fence boards or not. Dear Husband made an attempt earlier in the week to try pull a board off the fence. He wasn't much into the task and, as I was watching, about to destroy a board in the process. Minor issue but I knew I would have to be the one to go get another board cut to fix the fence. Also, we wanted to be able to close the fence up right away in case we didn't catch them.

I racked my brain for days trying to come up with some creative way to block the gap as soon as I saw the kittens in our yard. Each time I went outside, they ran into the gap in the fence. It was starting to stress me out. Dear Husband wasn't helping matters by telling me I was get obsessed. He was starting to bug me. We have such a feral cat problem and no one is doing anything about it other than me. If I didn't catch these little guys, that would be two more male cats to impregnate the one feral female I have not been able to catch and spay. Princess was the only one that seemed interested in my pursuits and tried to help me.

So, Dear Husband went to work on Saturday morning and I began my methodical process of catching them without the 'peanut gallery' criticizing me. I saw them playing in the yard and I went out outside to see them. They ran into the fence as usual. This time I got down and took a little twig and starting poking in the boards and realized they were right there behind a board. I got our my trusty screwdriver and hammer and slowly started trying to lift the nails delicately out of a fence board without damaging the board . It was damn hot! I picked the hottest day of the year in Santa Rosa to do this. Princess came outside to offer me encouragement and also confirmed that she could see the kittens between the fence boards. Finally I was able to pull a board off and, sure enough, the two little kitties were sitting on top of each other. I realized that I hadn't planned very well because they weren't cuddly little guys just yet and didn't want me messing with them. Princess came to the rescue and held the board for me while got the cat carrier and garden gloves.

As soon as we got them settled in our bathroom. Rylan came up to me, gave me a high five and said, "Mom, we did it! Daddy said we couldn't! Girl power!"

As a mother, there is nothing like sharing an experience like this with your daughter when someone had doubted you. She and I were so proud of ourselves and hopefully she will always remember that if something is important to you and you set your mind to it, you will achieve your goal.

Anybody interested in a really cute little kitten?