Goodbye Inez

After a weekend of severe declining health, we had to say goodbye to Inez this morning. She was in pain and it was the right thing to do, but I have still cried all morning. Normally, she is anti-social and terrified of anyone other than family--but she purred throughout the entire vet visit.  Will said it was because she was ready and she was thanking me for 13 years of love and spoiling.
I am thankful that I had my fur baby for so long and appreciate how she made our family happier.

After she passed on, a rainbow came out--made us cry even harder-- but a lovely way to remember the day.

Thanksgiving 2011

We are very fortunate that our immediate families live close together.  We were able to have Thanksgiving lunch with the Linthicum side of the family and then have dinner with the Wright side.

Spencer's Pumpkin Pie was a  highlight of this year's dinner. I gave him a recipe and laid all his tools and ingredients on the counter and he had follow the directions and make the entire pie by himself.  He did, and it was very yummy!

The rest of the weekend was dedicated to decorating and shopping.Will camped out all night for a Black Friday deal on a new TV for our bedroom.
Not only do we have a big tree in our living room, but we also have a small tree upstairs in the hallway and a full sized tree in the game room full of "house divided" ornaments.  To give some neutral ornaments to the State/Carolina House Divided tree, we made Shrinky Dink ornaments together-- It was awesome!

Whine and Design

Tonight, Pam, Lesley and I went to a Wine and Design class.  It was supposed to "uncork our creativity"... yeah how about that.
The evening started out with a fantastic dinner at Southern Roots where I had the best roasted okra of my life.
Next, the painting class started and we enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine. Then we started painting blue skies and making Bob Ross jokes. Happy and having fun.
Then we had to paint in some clouds.  Sounds easy, right?  Uhhmmm...no.  We ended up with white turds messing up our pretty blue sky.  And painting in those waves? Fuggedabout it! It was all downhill from there.  We ended up laughing A LOT and lowering our expectations to the point where we actually walked out of  the place holding the pictures we had previously decided to bury in the backyard.

A weekend in Savannah

We got up early on Friday, 11-11-11, and headed to Savannah.  We had beautiful weather and even remembered to make a wish at 11:11 a.m.  We met up with Doug and Val at the Marriott Fairfield Inn then headed to the Riverfront for dinner.

 After a delicious dinner at Rocks at the Riverfront at the Bohemian Hotel, we walked along the River and enjoyed the sites, shopping and memorials.
Then we were ready for our Ghosts and Gravestones tour. I researched to find us the best tour and all I can say is people need to be ashamed for lying on the review sections of these websites. This tour was a colossal waste of money and the most boring thing we did all weekend.  Our tour guide had trouble delivering her "script" and even messed up a few stories. She sounded like a bad actress and in no way provided the thrill of storytelling we have experienced in the past with other tours. The trolley left the plastic blinds down the entire time--which were scratched and blurry.  We couldn't see anything!  When they would pull up to a house to tell a story-- 99% of the time there was ANOTHER trolley or bus in front of the building obstructing our view.  I have never been so pissed at spending $60!

Later that evening, we returned to the hotel and had some nightcaps. Somewhere around midnight, we finally pulled down the covers and there was a huge turd in our bed. Yeah, you read that right-- a freaking piece of doodie.  We were both grossed out and gagging.  Will (bless his heart) inspected it to see if it was a melted chocolate bar.
It.  Was.  Not.
He used tissues and picked up the nasty steamer and flushed it, leaving a big ol' Shitler's Mustache on the sheets.  I called down to the front desk--and guess what--- they didn't have ANYONE from housekeeping there that night.  I was instructed to take the sheets to the front desk and they would give us clean sheets.
Will took the sheets down as I wondered if we should have used our 11/11/11 at 11:11 wish on poop-free linens.  Will brought up clean linens and said the front desk said to talk to the manager the next morning.  So we made our bed and laughed about the "lin-cident." And we made "crappy" jokes about making a "stink" with the manager about the "sheety" service a soon as he was on "duty" ...  If you can't laugh about things like this, then it will ruin your vacation...

The manager apologized and comped one night. I was going to be very mature about talking with him, then he walked up and introduced himself as the "manager on duty"....sigh.

We spent Saturday morning with a fantastic tour of downtown Savannah and then stopped at the Riverfront for lunch at Spanky's.

 We spent the rest of the day/evening at the City Market shopping, touring and had apps/drinks while watching the Alabama football game and listening to a decent cover band. It was a wonderfully relaxing night out!

We returned to the hotel late Saturday night and luckily, we had clean linens. Sunday morning, we left for Tybee Island.  Our first stop was the lighthouse. This lighthouse was not as impressive as the NC Lighthouses and we decided not to do the tour because of the mean and nasty woman working there yelling at everyone.  I bet as soon as we left she amused herself by tripping blind kids or something.  We are glad we can check this off as "been there seen that" but we will never go back.

After we left the witches lair lighthouse, we went to Fort Pulaski and enjoyed seeing the history, memorials and beautiful landscaping.

We closed out our vacation with a big lunch at Uncle Bubba's (Paula Deen's brother).  We nearly wobbled out swearing we won't eat again for 2 months. We hugged goodbye and made our way back through the city to begin our trip home.

Reading this post, I feel like did too much bitchin about the Ghost Tour, the Dirty Sanchez sheets and the heifer at the lighthouse. That was only three mehs in a weekend of wows.  It was a FANTASTIC vacation filled with fun, awesome weather, so many laughs my sides were sore, good drinks, shopping and hanging out with wonderful friends. We can't wait to plan our next adventure together.

P.S  OOH!! check out our souvenirs and goodies!

Spencer's Wild Ride

Before I give a blog update about our WONDERFUL vacation in Savannah with Val and Doug, let me first update what happened when we came home Sunday night.
We got home and put Spencer to bed--a few hours later Spencer woke up SCREAMING in pain.  He could not be calmed down.  We immediately went to High Point Regional Hospital and he was evaluated, pumped full of morphine and nausea medications--then sent for a CT scan.  The scan showed infection and an enlarged appendix.  The physician there arranged for a transfer to Brenner's Children Hospital at Baptist in Winston Salem and prep for surgery.
With all pediatric surgery referrals, a second opinion is required.  The second opinion said his scans and labs were not 100% conclusive so a third opinion--a head honcho whom everyone there was very impressed with-- was called in.  This "God of Surgeons" said it was NOT an enlarged and infected appendix but an intestinal disorder.  Intestinal infection and spasms can be treated and do NOT require a surgical intervention.  We are Very Happy about that---but I was pissed to be told at one ER that he had appendicitis and be transferred for surgery only to be told it was a more "vague" diagnosis.
The important end result is that Spencer isn't in pain anymore and is no longer so sick he can't stand up.
As I write this, he is snacking on a pomegranate and considering a little XBOX playtime-- so yeah, he is better :-)
He will follow up with his pediatrician in a few days and they will decide how to manage his current medications/antibiotic changes.  He should be back to normal in a day!

Halloween Weekend

We started our Halloween weekend with dinner at Carraba's with Jimmy, Melissa, Dana, Jason and the kids. We celebrated Jordan's birthday and then went to Proehlific Park for his big party. The kids had a blast!

Saturday we had soccer and then decorated the house for our Tastefully Simple Halloween party on Sunday.

The party was fun-- it might be a new tradition for us.  Well that was the TREAT portion of the weekend.  Now for the TRICK.  As soon as the party was over, we both crashed-- thinking we were just tired from all the cooking, cleaning, decorating, etc.  But in the wee hours of Monday morning....the stomach flu hit.
IT.  WAS.  HORRIBLE.  Nothing says "the honeymoon is over" quite like sharing a stomach flu...

But how sweet is it that my NC State guy is all curled up with a UNC blanket??? haha  Yep-- this will be my desktop background throughout basketball season AND next week's State/Carolina football game!

The stomach flu was so bad that we TOTALLY missed Halloween.  Luckily my Dad took Spencer to Fall Festival/Trick or Treating-- but it broke my heart to miss this with him.  I couldn't even finish his costume.  He was going as a beat up Soccer Referee--wanted a black eye and a fake cut on his cheek---but I couldn't do his face paint.  He still looked adorable though.

So..... hello November---and as I flipped the calendar over it dawned on me we have 54 days until Christmas!

Hey Thursday-- Quit acting like Monday!

What a day.

I had my Mobile Meals route this morning with my mom.   The direction sheet had five (yes 5!) navigational errors. By the grace of GPS we managed to get through the route...only about 30 minutes later than normal.
The instruction sheet had other errors, too--not just with directions.  They told me one client was blind.  Okay.  So I take him his food...carefully describe his meal and everything being delivered only for him to blankly stare at me and LOUDLY yell that he was partially deaf and didn't hear a thing I said.  It was then that I noticed he was NOT blind. Awkward-- but at least he didn't hear me babble on and on.....

A few houses later I was told the client was hard of hearing and I needed to speak loudly.  So I go to the door and boom in my loudest voice....only to be asked to keep my voice down that I was scaring his cats. Yeah... I think they got that note attached to the wrong address.

So..after Mobile Meals, I make my way through work.  At 5:00 I put on the batch of chicken and dumplings I made last night.  While it started to heat I went to get the swiffer...and the phone rang...all hell broke loose on a project at work.  About 20 minutes later I get off the call and smell this:

Scorched my dadburn chicken and dumplings!  All that work slow cooking the chicken -- cleaned , cooked, cubed...even made my own chicken stock and damn if I didn't burn it while reheating it.  I may have ruined my pan, too.  And the burned smell...ughh!

I think it is time to call it a day.....and have sandwiches for dinner....and break out a Lush bath bomb and a glass of wine.

Treats from Down Under

I received the most wonderful care package today from my beautiful friend, Paula.  Paula lives in Australia and is one of the most creative people I know.  She sent an awesome assortment of Aussie goodies. We cut most of them up into bite sized tastes and the entire family gathered to have a Down Under Confectionery Tasting.
We each had our favorites:  Spencer's favorite is the Red Skins, Joe liked the Wagon Wheel the best,  Will likes the Cherry Ripe the best and my favorite was the Choo Choo bar!  My goodness we have fun tasting and ranking the candies-- Thanks Paula, YOU ARE AWESOME!

Wrecklica Night!

Laura and I went to Concord Mills this past Thursday for the Cake Wrecks tour.  It was a great girls night out!
Laura and I both made wrecklica cupcakes. Mine was an easy one-- I did the mice and cheese.  The chocolate sprinkles are a nice touch, eh?
Laura made the infamous Dora head in the box-- and it was FABULOUS.  How fabulous? Well she won the contest!

x

We spent the rest of the evening having drinks and snacks at Dave and Busters while playing all kinds of silly games and celebrating Laura's win!

Where did October go?

How did it get this far into October already?
Oh that's right...every weekend involves this:

If it weren't for Spencer's soccer schedule...we wouldn't have much of a social life. Good thing we enjoy hanging out with the other parents/families of the soccer team. Fall soccer has been very exciting so far-- the team is 6-2 and all the boys are having fun!
After today's game, we all went back to Nana and Boppa's house for a team ice cream social...YUMMY!

Fair Weather Friends

Monday night, Will, Spencer and I met the Knickerbockers and Nana and Boppa at the Greensboro Fair.
Jimmy got us VIP passes (parking, admission, ride coupons) but IV had a bad, hive breakout so they stayed at home.
The boys used up 16 ride coupons pretty quickly; Dad, Will and Dana tried out some Fair foods; we all enjoyed the wonderful weather--- and then we met at Ghassons for dinner...and laughs!

World's Ugliest Finger Puppet

Last week, my sweet husband was bragging about his new, sharp Leatherman.
Yesterday, I got a text that he was headed from work to Urgent Care:

Now, we need to figure out what the stitching on his finger means in Japanese!
I already looks up OOPS and Klutz....it's neither of those :-)

9-11-11

Our Patriot's Day weekend ended up being a weekend of rest-- which was greatly needed.  We went to Spencer's soccer game Saturday morning and enjoyed watching the team have a fantastic game and a solid win.

I was sick all weekend with a head/chest cold so we skipped the Bush Hill festival (sadly) and came home and watched football all afternoon and rested. Will and Joe went to The Flaming lips concert on Saturday night---again I stayed home and slept.  (Codeine based cough syrup is a helluva mistress....)

Sunday, we missed the 9-11 tribute concert because again, I just stayed home and slept, snotted, coughed and complained....but we managed to see Nana and Boppa for a little while so Spence could celebrate Grandparent's Day.

Lastly, we celebrated Bowser's third birthday. Each year, we celebrate with an ice cream cone.  Lacie doesn't tolerate non-doggie food well, so she got a tiny ice cream.  Bowser wolfed his down quickly and then went to each person begging for their's! He also got a smoked meat knuckle (gross, right?) earlier in the week for his birthday.

Tank and Tummy Night

Tank and Tummy night here at the Linthicum/Alderin house means going to dinner and then the aquarium store. Apparently that is a big deal of fun for Will and Spencer -- me...not so much.
BUT...I had to tag along this time....because I wanted to control the $$ spent at the fish store.  However, I am pretty sure Spencer and Will talked idiots at the pet store into taking the snakes out of the cages SEVERAL times just to make me run to the front of the store in a panic. Trying to make me not want to go with them next time, right?
They spent over an hour looking at fish...seriously...I spent less time picking out my new car.
Then they decided on sharks.  Spencer got a red-tail black shark (he named Kenny) and Will got a Black shark...that's albino...so yeah, his black shark is white.  And quite ugly. We call Will's shark "ABS" for albino black shark or possibly A Buttugly Shark...not sure which. (I guess "Powder" wouldn't have been a nice name?)

Spencer was so excited about his new fish, we let him sleep on the living room couch so he could fall asleep looking at the aquarium. .

Loo Loo Again

This weekend was a Girls Crafting weekend-- filled with scrapbooking, sewing, jewelry making, card-making and of course, Hurricane Irene tracking.  We had a couple of great dinners out, went to see The Help, raided the craft section of Mighty Dollar, planned Julie's baby shower, giggled through Jen's Zumba demo and Dee learned a valuable lesson...ALWAYS lock the bathroom door. (my poor Dad is STILL embarrassed!)

While I had a girls weekend away, Will and the boys took a break from their weekend of eating junk and playing video games to tour the HPU campus to see where Will is now working.

First Day!

Today is Spencer's first day of 5th grade.  And his last "first day" of elementary school.  How did my baby grow up so fast??
I remember when I took him to his first day of Kindergarten and I thought the 5th graders looked HUGE--way too big to be bustling down the hallways with our wittle kindergartners.  Now I am wondering if other Kindergarten parents sat this morning thinking the same thing looking at Spencer and his friends going into school, high-fiving over weekend soccer goals and plans at recess later....

And yes, Spencer picked out his own first day clothes.  The boy, will NOT wear anything other than soccer clothes!

Today is also Will's first day on the job at HPU.  The middle picture is him showing his new work ID badge and he is making the same face as in his ID picture--- it looks like he had to poop really bad and then a four year old drew a straight line across with a sharpie for his mouth...quite unfortunate.  He could fake he lost his ID and get another one...but there is a $50 replacement charge--- so I say he has to keep the poop/sharpie mouth picture!

5 months later....

What's the 5th month anniversary?  Jewelry?   Furniture Pads!
Will and I have been married for 5 months but he has still been working in Raleigh and commuting each weekend. But as of this past Friday, he is an official resident of Trinity. After a wonderful career at NC State Athletics, he is ready for his new challenge at High Point University. (If you mix Carolina Blue and State Red you get purple anyway, right? So HPU is a good blend of our "house divided" marriage.)

Of course, moving is never fun.  Jimmy backed the truck and trailer into the front yard and missed a tree by mere millimeters! You couldn't fit a packet of kool aid in between the trailer and the tree---but there was no damage!
The house is a mess, we have boxes and furniture everywhere!  Hopefully we can celebrate our 6th month anniversary all settled in! But I am not complaining-- I FINALLY have my husband home all week instead of just weekends!

Fit for a Queen

Back in May, for either her Birthday or Mother's Day (I forget...) I gave Mom a gift certificate to The Lexington Tea House for a British Tea Luncheon.
Then I proceeded to work 70 hour weeks on a huge project and we haven't been able to go...until today.  I actually took a lunch break for the first time in months!


Our tea luncheon was...OH MY GOODNESS....

The British tea included: 
May Flower Tea Sandwiches • Cucumber Tea Sandwiches• Chicken Salad Croissants • Fresh Fruit • Cheese Straws • Pastries, Cakes and Scones with Devonshire Cream and jam• Pot of Hot Tea and Iced Tea of the Day
There was twice as much food as we have EVER gotten at a normal tea house. We ate our fill and had a huge takeout container full for Spencer!

Not too many Dicks around

Have you noticed that fewer and fewer kids have nicknames?
I am talking real nicknames--not ones like Scooter, Skippy, Fartface, etc.
When was the last time you met someone under 60 named Dick (for Richard)?
Almost everyone at Spencer's school goes by full name such as Michael (not Mike) or Stephen (not Steve) or Jeffrey (not Jeff).

Traditional names that customarily got nicknames (Robert, William, Joseph, Richard, etc.) are not as popular anymore and somehow it became vogue NOT to shorten a child's name.
"This is my son, Alexander."
"Hi Alex!" 
'No! It is Alexander!!!"

So why do I care?  I don't.
I just happened to overhear a kid snap at another kid's grandparent at a soccer game when the grandpa cheered for "Chris" and was immediately corrected to "Christopher."  I am sure the Grandpa's generation shortened Christopher to Chris without any implied insult.
Geez!

Sugar High!

How happy do my boys look?

After an evening of visiting Nana Linthicum, dinner and a little shopping-- we decided to end our Friday night with a trip to Krispy Kreme,  The "Hot and Now" sign was on so we HAD to stop.  Sometimes it is the simple things that make family time memorable.

The Phone Call Every Parent Dreads

Today started out nicely.  I received not one BUT TWO very happy letters from Spencer.  The envelopes were still all hosed up, but the letters were happy and said he was having fun---made my heart feel good!

Then I got a call from a camp counselor.  Spencer was throwing up and had severe ear pain. He either had an ear infection, something in the ear or swimmer's ear.  They recommended I come get him (the camp is only 30 minutes away) and take him to the pediatrician for evaluation and then bring him back to camp assuming he only needed an antibiotic.

So I got coverage for my meetings and headed out.  About a mile or so from the house...I got the dreaded phone call.
Spencer had gotten severely sick, near passing out, dizzy, lost feeling in his extremities, blurred vision and the camp director said he LOOKED "very wrong"- so she had to call emergency services. The Fire Chief had just gotten there and an ambulance was 3 minutes out.
Then she said she would call me back when she knew more.
So I drove.    FAST.    And cried.     And called my mom.     And cried some more.
And made my poor 4 cylinder Honda CR-V whine and shake at 90 mph.  And I thought-- we have two freakin muscle cars at home -- I am pretty sure the 69 Mach I (with a big ass 351 Windsor V8) would have no problems passing this stupid Mountain Dew truck on a double yellow line....but oh yeah, it doesn't have AC. Never mind.
I whipped my little (non muscle car) Honda into Quaker Lake Camp in record time pretty much on two wheels Dukes of Hazzard style and fish tailed through the driveway landing in the parking lot in a cloud of dust and gravel like Dale Jr. on meth.
I ran (or my version of running. shut up.) to the infirmary just as the EMT team were finishing their work up on Spencer.  They suggested that either I take him to the doctor or transport him to the hospital.  I called his pediatrician and they said they would be ready for him so I chose to take him on.  They had gotten some fluids in him and he was talking but was still having cramping, headache, nausea, etc.
As I signed the release and was getting him ready to go, my brother and my mom came barreling up in mom's Honda Pilot...in their own version of a redneck gravel cloud.
Jimmy got Spencer in Mom's car with me--and then he drove my car back home and Mom took me and Spence to the pediatrician's office. Spencer was evaluated and it was a classic case of heat exhaustion and dehydration but it was magnified with swimmer's ear AND an ear infection.  That's a recipe for a biological implosion in a 78 pound 10 year old.
Fluids, a big shot to the thigh and SEVERAL prescriptions later, Spencer came home, rested up for a few hours and as soon as he re-hydrated and the meds kicked in, he was BEGGING to return to camp.
So... we took him back to camp. The director will keep him on modified activity and lots of fluids with his new meds.
I will keep myself on some Xanax tonight.  It was a day I hope I never have to relive--but I am VERY thankful it wasn't anything worse and I am so glad Spencer was able to bounce back to quickly!

Second Verse..Same as the First

I got another letter from Camp today.  The good news is that Spencer AT LEAST signed this one.  The bad news is that "envelope addressing skills" is obviously not on the punch card of camp activities. Spencer sounds a few degrees above morosely homesick but still...for the amount of $$$ I am paying for this camp would it hurt the little bugger to even hint that he is having fun??

I checked the agenda and tonight is their camp-out.  Just the boys, their sleeping bags, a campfire and the wide, starry night sky -- no tents, all nature. That should be punishment enough for improper envelope addressing, right?
(Obviously I am NOT a go-camping Mommy!)


Most of you know I work from home.  As I was dialing into to an important conference call, I could hear Bowser rooting around in the dirty clothes basket I had placed at the steps to take down to the laundry room.  The next thing I know, his little snout pushed through the door and he was carrying Spencer's dirty Star Wars T-shirt.  
He brought it to me and laid it in my lap.  I had to hit the mute button on my headset and take a deep breath to keep from tearing up.  
Poor lil' Bowser misses his boy, too.  
For the next few hours, Bowser slept with the T-shirt.  How sweet is that?  He looks really angry in this picture but I had just woken him up with my flash (ooops!)

Sealed With a Lick Cause a Kiss Won't Stick!

In an age like ours, which is not given to letter-writing, we forget what an important part it used to play in people's lives.  ~Anatole Broyard

Spencer is at his first full week away at"Big Boy" camp.  He, along with IV and Jordan, are at Quaker Lake Camp this week. It is a traditional summer camp--filled with activities to help the kids learn, mature, gain confidence, etc.  It will be good for them....hopefully.


I got my first letter from Spencer today.  And it was painfully obvious that correspondence through letter writing is a dying art to my son's generation.  He can text and whip out an email....but check out his first addressed envelope:

All those years of addressing thank you cards for him, I never really taught him to address an envelope by himself. And I guess I have not taught him to spell my new married name either.  That could be rather important, huh? And I know he knows his zip code--but it looks like someone else wrote the zip on here---and it is the wrong one!
As we say here in the south.....oh bless his heart. 


Once I got past the initial shock of how the envelope was addressed, next up was the letter inside.  And I use the term "letter" loosely.

Sigh.  My little man didn't even sign it.  Just drew a picture of a crying and quite swollen looking caricature of what I assume is himself.  I'm not sure if I am more concerned about the sadness or the fluid retention.  I miss him like crazy and it breaks my heart to see the little sad face drawn on this letter...but c'mon...I just had to laugh a little.  I mean, THIS was his first letter home from camp.  And it is PRICELESS!