I Am Broken

I'm sure there are many people out there who would agree with that statement, but I don't just mean mentally now. ;)

On Thursday, I posted a blog about taking the kids sledding, and how much fun we had, but how, ultimately, I got hurt. Well, after trying to stand up enough to put a pillow under my bum, and nearly bursting into tears from the pain, I decided to call Nick He was on his way home, I just wanted him to come home NOW.

He got here, and I got out of the PJ's I was in (excruciating, but necessary, since I had no desire to be seen in anything less than clean panties for x-rays), and he took me to the ER. Boy, am I glad Raegan is old enough to watch the kids for emergencies like this.

Anyway, they confirmed it- I broke my tailbone. The tip is separated from the rest. Ouch! I'm confined to some bloody uncomfortable sitting positions so that I don't put weight back on my tailbone. They had me pick up an inflatable donut, but honestly, I found that to be highly painful both last night and today, so instead, I sit leaning forward. It hurts my upper back, but keeps the weight from my tailbone.

I'm to take it easy, and rest for several days. The kids didn't have school today, so at least I didn't have to walk to the bus stop with Gilly. The bus stop is 8 houses down, and I almost always have to wait a good 15 minutes before the bus shows up. Walking actually doesn't bother me at all. Going up steps hurts. Down doesn't. But, just the thought of walking there makes me cringe.

However, taking her to school and sitting in the car? That DOES make me wanna yarf all over. So, bus stop it is. Nick is going to try and switch shifts next week. There is a mid-shift, which is from 9-6 instead of 8-5 (early shift) or 10-7 (late shift). If he can, then he'll be able to get Gilly on the bus in the morning, so I can rest for a few days. I'll also call the bus garage and make arrangements for them to let my older daughter pick her up in the afternoons next week, as well.

When school started, Gilly was 7, and the bus garage requires all children 7 or younger to be picked up by a parent or adult care giver. However, she just turned 8, and while I still want her picked up at all times, I think the bus garage will be all right with it. Then again, I did throw a massive hissy fit at the begining of the school year, so... who knows.

Should I explain the hissy fit? Man, that's a whole nother post. Maybe tomorrow.

Anyway, while I might make some posts occasionally over the next few days, I probably won't be sitting on my hard craft chair to do any crafts. I did find a cute idea for Valentine's Day bracelets, though, so I might do that in bed.

Speaking of bed... it's 2am, and I should get back in it. Tomorrow, I plan to rig up some way to take a long bath, without my tailbone resting on the bottom of the tub. Nick suggested submerging a towel, so I may have to try that.

Frugal Snowy Fun

Today, we got hit with snow, but the weather was actually pretty mild at about 30 degrees. Just cold enough to freeze, but not bitter cold. Perfect for sledding. The kids each got a new sled for Christmas, and this was actually only the 2nd time I've taken the kids sledding.

When we lived up north, we didn't live near a hill of any sort. When we moved down here, we lived in an apartment, so sleds weren't a priority for storage space, but we were only there for a year. When all 3 kids were home, we had a snack, and bundled up. Or, some of us did- apparently, my son didn't put new socks on. He had a pair of ankle socks on, with holes in them. -sigh- More on that later.

We live right near the hill, but I knew walking would mean crabby kids, and a tired mama, so we drove. The hill was steep, and today's snowfall has been slick. I fell multiple times just getting up the hill. Then, because it was so thick with fresh snow, it took us quite a while to get paths cut in the snow so we could get down without running and jumping on the sleds.

I took a few turns down the hill, then took photos, then took one last, disastrous trip down the hill. Why was it a disaster? Ooh, well... the sled took off before I could sit down, so I chased it, and jumped. Oh, big mistake, Heather. Big, huge mistake.

I missed the sled, landed on my tail bone, and I can't stand up or sit down without a LOT of pain right now. Yes, I have a pain in the butt, and for once, it's not my kids or husband. OMG, it hurts a LOT. I took a few motrin and a naproxen, but just moving around really hurts.

By this time, Chris was in near hysterics over being cold (at this point, I didn't know about the socks, or lack there of). He has severe ADHD, and tends to highly over react to a lot of things. He's having a bad day, so he really over reacted to epic proportions. Screaming fit proportions.

Raegan went down one last time, while Chris walked to the car. Gilly kept coming back up the hill, despite me telling her it was time to go. My rear end hurt very much badly walking down that hill, especially since I tried very hard not to fall on the way down. I had wiped out about 7 or 8 times before, and with a sore bum, had no intention of doing so again. I'd have slid down on my bum if it didn't hurt so bad.

When we got towards the car, I could hear it. Chris was having a global meltdown. People were staring, he was going all out, acting like he had broken an arm or something, screaming about the pain. This is one of those things I normally deal with by taking a deep breath, and talking to him. I was in pain, though, and had to sit down to start the car, then stand up to scrap the car off (and man, does THAT hurt, the sitting then standing thing, it apparently puts a LOT of pressure on the tailbone). Anyway, I asked, then yelled for everyone to knock it off, cause Gilly was screaming at Chris to stop screaming (I know- horrible Mom award- telling them not to do something by doing it myself).

Anyway, we're home, I'm in pain, and waiting for my meds to kick in, and sincerely hoping I didn't do something really bad, like fracture it.

Nick's on his way home. I had Raegan just get me a pillow to sit on, and man... I almost couldn't stand. I think my next post will be post-ER. -sigh-

It's Snowing

I love how snow looks, all pretty, and fluffy, and white, when we are getting a good snowfall. I hate how cold it is, how slushy it gets, how dirty it gets, how bad the roads get... I dislike winter.

Today, it looks gorgeous out. Big fluffy white flakes littering the sky, and coating the Earth in a pretty white blanket. It's supposed to keep up all day and night, resulting in the first major snowstorm of the season for us. We've had a few others, but no real accumulation. Today, they are saying 4-6" by dinner. I'd say we've already gotten close to an inch.

Gillian and I walk through the yard, to the road every morning and every afternoon on our way to and from the bus stop. I stomp out the exact same path every morning, to make sure we have a path. That path is now covered already. Once the snow gets deeper than about 2 inches on the ground, we walk around, but because the weather hasn't been as cold as it should, our dirt road has been a quagmire of mud, so I have avoided it thus far. Hopefully, it'll freeze over soon.

In the meantime, my fingers are numb. I went out to put some mail in the mailbox, and stopped to shovel. However, I did so sans gloves. Oops.

And in other news- I've been featured today by Dollar Store Crafts for my handmade fuzzy socks!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow...

Yesterday, Nick came home, and we decided to run into Lansing for a last minute (to us) Christmas shopping trip. Nick had a video game he had been wanting to pick up at Gamestop, and they finally had a great deal on trading games in. Nick took in 5 games to trade in- 4 were for PS3, which came with a deal. If the trade in value was $2 or higher, you got an extra $5 with it. One of the PS3 games was only worth $1, though. In the end, he got his new $60 game, plus a $20 gift card for our son for Christmas (all 3 are getting one, but we already had 2), and we only paid $5 out of pocket. Score!

Anyway, about the time we left, it was barely snowing. It had snowed on and off through out the day, but the ground was wet, so it just kept melting. Flash forward. We were leaving Michael's (what, you thought I could go into Lansing without a craft store stop?), and the snow was coming down really hard.

The highway was slick, so I stuck to 45-50 mph the whole drive home (yes, I drive- I'm a driver, I love to drive, and Nick has a rotten sense of direction, so it just works for us), with snow coming down horrible. We stopped in at the grocery store real quick, because we were out of milk. In the short time we were in the store, our tire tracks in the parking lot were gone.

-sigh- We were under a severe weather warning from midnight until 9am with high winds, snow, and rain. I did go out last night after we got home around 9, and it was really coming down! Check out these photos!

Do you see the foot steps in that picture? This was taken about 10 minutes after we made those foot prints!

 

 

...yes, I still have pumpkins out. Don't judge, you've all done it. I'll be doing good if these lil guys don't sprout leaves in the spring.

 

I think perhaps I should have re thought the "Let it Snow" ornament on my wreath...

This was taken at night- it shines and sparkles so nicely, the photos don't do it justice!

 

So... yeah. Next year, I'm going for the "Let it Sunshine" ornament for the wreath.

The point of this story? We had no power for at least part of early morning. It was off when Nick got up at 5:30, and was chilly, so it had been off for a bit at least. We scrambled around to figure out if there was school, which we could not get from our cells. Raegan woke up to her DS alarm clock before we could find out. Of course, she then woke both Gillian and Chris.

Power came back around 6am, and from there, we were able to ascertain that our very school happy super had decided to cancel school. This is only the 3rd time in the 2 school years we have lived here. She hates to cancel school, and lived in Alaska, so bad weather is part & parcel to living in the North, and no excuse to close school.

We have a strong feeling at least one of the school buildings was without power today, otherwise there would have been school. Almost no other area schools were closed, where as usually, it's all the other area schools closed, with us being the lonely town that sends em to school still.

My Front Door

This year, I decorated up my front door for Christmas. I love crafts, and I love houses that are decorated nicely. However, I have neither the money, or the patience to do so myself. Every time I try, the kids are one step behind me, messing it up, breaking things, or hanging off from things. I've just accepted that it will be another 8 years before I can truly decorate my house. At that point, Gillian, my youngest, will be headed off to college.

Anyway, last week I went to JoAnn's, and found 9 foot pine garland (not the fullest of full, but not bad) for only $1.99. I picked up two with the intentions of decorating my doorway outside.

Today while I was on the phone with my step-mom, I got motivated. I hung it, added ribbon that matches my wreath, and hung ornaments from it. I love how it looks, but I do need to go through and straighten the garland a bit. I only wish I had thought to wrap it with clear lights first. Maybe tomorrow?

Here is the wreath I made last week. I made an all green and silver one for my mom a few weeks ago, and liked it. Then last week, I saw an all silver and pink one, and liked it. I went in to Walmart and took a few minutes to peruse the ornaments. I saw the large, glitter covered pink "Let It Snow", and thought it would be perfect for the wreath. I picked up all pink and silver, then reconsidered, and added green in.

I love how it turned out! I had picked up both lime green and white sheer ribbon, but hated how both looked on it. I had a premade silver bow in the closet that I found for $.29 at Goodwill, so I used that for the bow on this one. I attempted to attach the "Let it Snow" by hot glue on the ends to hold it in place, but if you look close, you can see the spot where it was glued, and came free. Ah well!

Because I went with 3 colors, I had several ornaments of each color left over. When I set about putting the garland up (or, as my 7 year old calls it, "Garlic"), I brought out the left over ornaments, as well as some iridescent icicle ornaments to hang from the garland. I also grabbed the sheer green ribbon I hadn't used for the wreath.

I used light clips to hang the garland. They slid between the frame and siding nice and snug, and each has a clip on it that I slide the wire from the garland under, to clip it into place. There are 3 clips on top, so I could swag it, and 2 clips on each side, to hold it in place.

Once it was hung, I added the bow first, which wasn't long. I only did a simple 2-loop bow in the middle, and barely had enough ribbon to swag and hang over the sides.

From there, I used pipe cleaners to attach the ornaments to the garland. Some flopped badly, so I used the garland pine and wired it around a bit to support the ornaments from underneath to place them better.

I hung the icicles from the top swag, and then took my last pink ornament, a silver ornament, and a green ornament and hung them together, and hung them from the bow in the center.

I really like how it looks, and counting all the small things, I spent $21 for it. $15 for the wreath, with $5 total spent on the garland & icicle ornaments. The ribbon is barely noticeable, but I still like it there.

 

My Snowflake Candle Holder

Recently, I've been posting a lot of craft posts. In several of them, you may or may not have noticed that my nice round Snowflake candle holder makes it's way into a lot of my photos.

I found the holder about a month ago at Goodwill for just $.99 (it was $1.99, but half off). It's pretty, with a pearlized white enamel base, and a star shaped cut out in the middle, with an opaque screen. It's just so darn pretty! I had picked it up to use as a Christmas gift, but I have a feeling, it'll be staying with me now.