NotSheep

Those who’ve been reading a while might remember when Jack was ill back in April. He came home from the hospital with an inhaler, to be used as needed. He came off it fairly quickly – within a couple of days, he didn’t need it at all – but he has used it again periodically since, and has been using it almost every day since October. I had to get a repeat prescription for it in late October, and when he continued to use it almost daily, I made an appointment with the asthma clinic. The appointment was this morning.

I’d really been hoping we’d go in and they’d say “oh no, this isn’t asthma, it’s just an infection and it will clear up” – but I didn’t actually think they would, and I was right. His peak-flow wasn’t great, but he’s never used a peak-flow meter before, and it takes a bit of practice to get the technique – and peak flow measurement is a bit of a hit-and-miss measurement in a child anyway. But his second inhaler was empty (I’d thought it was low, but not empty), which means he’d gone through it in about six weeks. She felt he needed to be on a maintenance inhaler (which means corticosteroids) as well. I’ve now downgraded my optimism to hoping he’ll only need it for a short while to stabilise things.

(Edit – have re-upgraded optimism a little – he managed to blow 150 on the peak-flow meter this evening, which is very nearly average for his size.)

It was, believe it or not, Jack’s first medical appointment ever. He’s been to Casualty a couple of times, but has never seen a GP before (or yet, because the asthma clinic is run by a nurse). You would never have known it was his first time though. First he sat in the waiting-room examining a book on cake-decorating, exclaiming over the multi-tier wedding cake (I don’t think he’d ever seen one before) and asking if we could borrow the book (heh, can you tell we’re regulars at the library?) Then, when it was his turn, he bounced down the corridor, following the signs for Room 5, found the room, opened the door and bounced in, talked to the nurse, inspected her printer, got measured and weighed, pulled a chair over so he could stand on it to push the bar right to the top of the height-chart, peered at a stethoscope and asked what it was (he knew what it was, he was really asking permission to play with it), played with it, found and listened to his own heart, found and listened to Louie’s heart, told us it was a little bit faster than his own, found and listened to my heart, allowed the nurse to listen to his chest, read the posters on the wall, bounced back down the corridor, bounced around the waiting-room while we waited for the nurse to get the prescription signed, inspected the small model skeleton that was hanging up on the wall, made a scary-grin face and asked why skeletons always do that…

He came home this afternoon and spent some time writing numbers on a bit of paper before coming to tell me which ones were multiples of three. I didn’t even know he knew what “multiples” meant. Then he set about teaching Louie to count. At dinner, when he coughed, Barney said, “Sick boy alert! Sick boy alert!” – to which Jack replied in a reassuring voice, “It’s okay! I have a brown inhaler and a blue inhaler!” I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry.

Xmas preparations continue apace (whatever that means). All the cards have been written and posted, except for the few that will be hand-delivered and the one for friends whose address I can’t find. All gifts have been purchased and, apart from those which have yet to be delivered, wrapped. I’ve been ebaying for pyjamas for the boys – if I get them all some in time, they’ll get them as one of their gifts. The Xmas tree has been chosen, delivered, lit (my least favourite bit of Xmas has to be getting the lights to work) and decorated. Other decorations have been put up around the house (although the star-lights in the front hall keep falling down – must find something more effective than white blu-tak for them!) I’ve even bought more plates and bowls, of various sizes, so we once again have enough dishes for us all to eat off the one kind. I bought the set in Canada, and have only recently found a supplier in the UK, so we’ve been running out of plates mid-way through the day on a regular basis – but no more!

The tree was delivered on Friday evening, and on Saturday, we started off our Xmas celebrations by doing our own version of a St Nicholas thingy, in which the children left their shoes at the ends of their beds and woke up to find chocolate in them. There was much attempted bribery going on on Friday evening, as some of them tried to convince Barney to lend them his shoes It was a silly thing but a fun thing, and a nice way to start the season, and then later in the day we decorated the tree.

On Sunday, we had my mum and step-father here for the afternoon and for dinner, and made most of a proper Xmas dinner, largely because Scratchy had bought a frozen turkey crown that was not going to be big enough for our actual Xmas dinner (he still hasn’t quite grasped the number of people we’re feeding here), and I’m trying to empty the freezer to defrost it before doing a large pre-Xmas shop. I looked on it as a practice run, and it was all good. Scratchy and my step-father had spent the afternoon putting down a new floor in our main bathroom. It had a carpet in there when we moved in, and I said then it would be one of the first things I changed – well, I haven’t changed all that much, but I would have liked to get rid of it a bit sooner! There’s now a laminate floor in there; I’m not sure how well it will withstand the splashes and abuse from the boys, but it came to us via freecycle, so even if it only lasts a couple of years, I won’t complain. It certainly looks much, much better. And while they did that, I cooked dinner (with some help from my mum and George, both of whom peeled the potatoes) and Jack taught Granny how to draw the earth and the solar system. I think she felt she got a glimpse of how home-education works

I’ve been planning Xmas food – I had a great recipe for stuffing last year, but didn’t think I’d saved it anywhere, and couldn’t remember where it came from, or even what it was called. But I knew it was on a website somewhere, and a couple of minutes of detective-work – or rather, trying to follow the same train of thought I’d have followed last year when I was looking for a recipe – found it. So we’re set for this year. Definitely making home-made cranberry sauce too (I did remember to save that recipe!) I will post the recipes (or at least links to them) shortly.

The boys have advent calendars with chocolates in them – not very good chocolate, it must be said. Next year I might splurge for calendars from Thorntons, just so that when I get given a bit of chocolate, it doesn’t make me go “bleurgh”. I’m using the advent calendars to, I hope, instil in Toby the habit of getting dressed after breakfast. He’s been refusing to get dressed recently – any request for him to put clothes on has been met with his stroppy-teenager impression and him stomping out of the room with his shoulders hunched and his head dropped down to his chest. Cute, but annoying. And so I’ve implemented a routine of breakfast, teeth-cleaning etc, clothes on, then advent calendars. So far it has worked.

And it might only be Monday, but there’s already a Line of the Week. This one is from Freddy, telling me how “looking after children is really hard work.” Brief, thoughtful pause, then, “But you make it look easy.”

One son at Air Cadets, two others at ju-jitsu, and three more going to sleep soon (I hope). G’night.