A Little Celebration!!

Tonight we had a little celebration in honor of a few things around the Ruwe house.

1.  Matt is done with his contract at his current client. He had been there for about 2 1/2 years and was not having such a positive experience the last six months or so.  He was counting down until today!! He is now off for the next 6 weeks. Nice!!

2.  The girls are FINALLY done with school. Courtney took her final today in math and Megan took her final in English. Courtney scored a 97%, which isn't bad for 5th grade math! I haven't graded Megan's English test yet. It was 8 pages long! I let her do it open-book because it is summer, and I want to be done just as much as they do!

3. Matt must have mentioned to Courtney today that it is his 20th anniversary of working in the technology field. Matt started his first "real" job on June 20th, 1997! This was the summer when he moved to Omaha from Kansas City. We were dating at the time, so I remember it well.

In honor of all this, we  made our usual celebration dinner tonight, which consisted of ham balls, cheesy potatoes, and sparkling grape juice. We had to change a few things up because I messed up. I left a few bags at the store this afternoon. I paid for them, but they did not make it home. UGH!! Matt ended up going back to the store after I had all the groceries put away, and seeing if I left them there. Unfortunately, nobody had turned my items in, so he had to go back through the entire store and get everything again. In the meantime though, I had to revamp my plans to get dinner going! In the end, it all turned out well, and we all had food to eat!

The girls and I wanted to buy him a lemon meringue pie because that is his favorite, but we figured he would eat a piece or two, and then it would sit in the fridge all week. Our plan b was to use some gift cards and to go out for ice cream at Dairy Queen.  Well, plan b didn't work either becase we didn't get done with dinner until around 8. Plan c was to eat some ice cream we bought earlier. Perfect!!

Now that school and work are over, we are working full force on getting ready for our trip! Here we go!

(One of my goals for today was to reserve our campsites for some of the time that we are in Canada. I got five nights reserved today. For our campground near Ottawa, I actually had to call them, and make our reservations. That was quite fun; I need to learn some French!!)

And the countdown is on!

We have a little over a week until we leave on our trip! YIKES!!! There is soooo much to do!

I finally got everything with my eyes taken care of. Since I had such a drastic change of prescription, I ended up ordering new contacts. I got another box of 90 daily wear contacts; hopefully these will last me two years again. I also got a brand new pair of glasses. I found a pair on the clearance rack and just got plastic lenses. I didn't think it was worth it to get the anti-glare since I don't wear them all the time. I am just waiting for my contacts to come in and then that is all done. I picked up my new glasses yesterday and things are so much clearer! Funny how that works!!

This week Courtney has been attending a basketball camp in the mornings, so I have not been able to do much around the house to get ready. It is only for a 1 1/2 hours in the mornings, so I usually find some errands to run. Today she has basketball camp in the morning, and then she has a birthday party in the afternoon at the same time that Megan is taking a knitting class at the library. These two events were not on the same day when I signed them up! They are both at the same time, but about 20 miles apart. I think I am going to be doing some driving today and hopefully it doesn't storm!

In regards to the trip, I have been doing a lot of research online on campgrounds in Canada since that is towards the beginning of our trip.  I have it nailed down to three campgrounds in the Ottawa area. They are each about 20 kilometers (not miles!) outside of Ottawa. We aren't going to be there until about two weeks into our trip, but we will be there on a weekend, so I would like to get some sites reserved.  We have the first two weeks reserved already.  I don't want to reserve sites too far ahead of time either and then we don't have any "wiggle room" incase we want to stay somewhere longer or leave earlier! I might get those booked tonight.

The boys' birth certificates came the other day, so that is taken care of too! They can officially get back into the United States! Now we just can't forget to take them! HAHA! That would ruin the entire trip!!!

As for school, Courtney finished her current chapter in English the other day, so she is done there. There are two chapters left in the book, but we just need to be done. She took a chapter test in math yesterday and scored a 100%. All she has left to do is her final math test on Friday, and she is done with the 5th grade book! I keep telling her the 6th grade book is VERY challenging. She is going to have to put her thinking cap on!

Megan finished her 7th grade math book about a week ago. I thought we would get through some material in the 8th grade book, but that isn't going to happen. We got through a few lessons, but not as much as I wanted. She will just start in prealgebra in the fall.  She took a chapter test in English yesterday, and she also has two chapters left that we need to skip. There is an eight page final for English that I would like to have her do on Friday. I will probably let her do it open book and skip all the items on there that are in the last two chapters. Honestly, she could probably figure it all out though! 

With this all done, I will officially declare us done with school. We all need a break!

Ok, time to get the crew out of bed and ready for the day!

2nd day and venting time!

Micah did not ask for "milk" again this morning, so I think for certain we are done! I brought him downstairs and snuggled with him while I checked my email, but he didn't ask again, so therefore I didn't offer!

Because we are pretty much done, I want to vent a little bit!

I had somebody say to me once, not too long ago, that I wasn't weaning him because I was the one who "wanted to hold on." I felt that they were insinuating that I was the one that was causing him to nurse so long. Apparently they didn't approve of me nursing over a year. :( I replied to this person that if he wants to wean, I will let him wean and not stop him (I don't know how I would stop him anyway.)   I stated that all my other kids weaned on their own and he will too. I felt I had to defend my decision to nurse past a year.  

I saw an article about this all the other day and wanted to post it here because it states my thoughts exactly.

http://www.scarymommy.com/breastfeeding-kids-through-toddlerhood/?utm_source=FB
(If you want to check out the very first sentence in the article, you will see why I love it so much! Sorry about the picture, I have no control over it.)

This article pretty much comes from a mom's perspective and how even though her toddler still wanted to nurse, she let him for the toddler's sake. The mom said she wasn't doing it for her sake, but rather the toddler's. She stated that by weaning the toddler before he was ready, it was sort of like taking a security blanket away. That is exactly it! I know that Micah found comfort in nursing and when he was ready to move on, he would.

No matter what people told me, I knew this approach would be the best for us and it was!!

I think nursing is a very personal matter and each mom can do what they feel is best for their baby. I know some of my friends who nursed their toddlers until after 3. I know some who quit at a year and I even know a mom who nursed her son until he was 5. You really have to do what works for you.

Now if Micah got to age 2 and wanted to keep going, would have I? Probably. Would there be a point though where I would have had to just cut him off and be done? Maybe. I was really hoping we weren't going to get there and we didn't.

I just think sometimes that mom's need to keep their judgmental comments to themselves and encourage each other instead!!! Why didn't this person say to me, "Wow, you are doing a great job! Micah is so lucky that he gets to have breastmilk as long as he can, especially with all his allergies. That stuff is gold! I know breastfeeding takes so much time and is a huge commitment, but wow, you are doing a great job!"  That would have been better to say to me instead of making a judgmental comment!!

And apparently this person doesn't know that you can't force a baby to nurse when he says no! Even if I was the one trying to hold on, if Micah told me he didn't want to nurse anymore, I would have to stop. You know the saying, "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink." Same concept, especially if they are over a year!

And then there was none!

We were down to one last feeding for Micah. When he asked for "milk" in the morning, I would feed him. My rule was that once he didn't ask for it, I wasn't going to offer it. It took him about ten minutes yesterday to ask for it, so I knew we were coming to an end.

Today it happened. I saw down in the chair as usual and turned the news on. Matt got him out of bed, so he snuggled with him a little bit and then gave him to me. He then snuggled with me awhile, but did not ask for "milk." I kept waiting. He wanted to read a few books, so we did and when it was obvious he wasn't going to ask, I asked him if he wanted something to eat. He shook his head "yes" and we got up and went into the kitchen. I put him in his chair and got him something to eat.

I have mixed emotions about it. We were pretty much done anyway, but knowing we are finally done, is something else! Nursing is such an incredible journey and we had a great one! I didn't have any trouble with supply at all! I even went to Cabo for four days and when I came back, he continued nursing like a champ! Even with all his food sensitivities and allergies, we did it!

 I am glad though that he is weaned before we go on our trip (even if we were just nursing in the morning.)

So I think we are officially done! 19 1/2 months of mama's milk!!! He weaned himself, just like I wanted him to!

(Now let's see if he asks for it tomorrow!)

Who needs to see anyway??

With my family leaving for an extended trip in about two weeks, I want to make sure I have enough contacts to take along to last that long. I have daily contacts (even though I wear them at least two days), but not enough to last me for as long as we will be gone.

In order to get new contacts, I needed to get my eyes examined. I made an appointment and got that done today.  Last year when I got my eyes checked, my eyes only changed a little bit, and the eye doctor recommended changing my prescription in my glasses, but I never did. I figure that it was just a minor change, so I didn't want to deal with it. I also didn't need contacts last year, so I skipped that whole part.

This year was a completely different story!! I was kind of bummed because I found out today that now my right eye has astigmatism. My left eye has always had it, so I was used to paying more for contacts for that eye, but now I have to pay more for my right eye too! The doctor said I had a little bit last year, but not enough to warrant a prescription, but it must have gotten worse, and he added it in there. In addition to the astigmatism, my right eye got a little bit worse and my left eye got a little bit better.

After the eye exam, the doctor had me put my glasses back on and cover my left eye. I think he was trying to make a point of how much my vision had changed in my right eye. I couldn't even read the top letter! Point well taken!! When I uncovered my left eye, everything became clear again.  He said once I get into a new prescription, my eyes will work better together and won't strain them so bad.

My next step was to deal with contacts. Usually it costs me around $35 for a contact lens exam; today it cost me $80!! Thanks to my astigmatism again!! This fee is for the additional doctor visits, sample contact lenses, and extra fittings that are involved when you order new contacts. I totally forgot about this fee until today, and of course, insurance does not cover it because contacts are cosmetic.

In addition to the $80 today, I also need to purchase contacts. Last time I ordered a box of 90 and it lasted me two years. I don't wear my contacts every day and sometime I wear them for two days at a time.  Before I got my eyes examined, the technician looked up the price of my current brand. My left eye (astigmatism) was $96 for 90 contacts and my right eye was about $60 for 90 of them. But now I have to buy two boxes for astigmatism, so now they will be $95 per box!

Luckily I didn't order them today. I am debating whether to order them somewhere else, but honestly, I think they are usually around $90 a box.. Unfortunately, insurance gives us nothing for contacts. :(

In the end, I had to pay $80 for the contact lens fitting fee, probably around $200 for new contacts, and  I will need a new pair of glasses, in which our insurance only gives us a 20% discount. I am sure a new pair of glasses will cost at least $100-$200.

Seriously, who needs to see anyway?? I am soooo glad none of our children need glasses yet!!!!

All Gone!

Micah and I are very near to the end of our breastfeeding journey. I have never nursed a kid this long and he is really holding out. The only time he nurses is right away in the morning. This is a habit because every morning I get him out of bed and we sit and nurse while I watch the morning news. This works for me too because I usually need some time to wake up.

But I only nurse him if he asks. He stopped asking for "milk" at all the other times of the day, so I stopped offering it and therefore, he stopped nursing throughout the day. If he does sign "milk," I usually distract him with a drink or a snack, and he is fine. But every single morning, he still asks for "milk". One of these days, he is not going to sign "milk," and we will be done.

Yesterday I was cleaning out our freezer and found my stash of frozen breastmilk from over a year ago. What do you do with milk this old?? Nothing except throw it out. I dumped 38 ounces of milk down the drain. :(  This was my emergency stash that I never needed. I was pretty bummed that I had to throw all of that away. Even if I would have defrosted it, it would have been bad.

Today I left for about an hour to get my eyes examined and when I got home, Micah acted like he hadn't seen all day  and signed "milk" like crazy! I kept telling him that the milk was all gone and he just kept getting madder! He signed it over and over and over!  I think he still wants it for comfort, but we are done during the day. I am totally ok with it too! Now, when he is completely done, I may be a little sad.

Schoolwork done yet?

Something is going to happen this year that has never happened before with my kids and their schoolwork. For some reason, we are not going to finish our English books! (I know, it's a pity, right?)

Every year, we have worked hard through the summer and we have gotten through our entire English book. I don't know what happened this year, but both girls have at least two chapters left! We somehow got behind during the school year and were not able to catch back up.

Time is running out too. We have about 2 1/2 weeks left until we leave on our trip, and I will not take school work along on our trip. This only means one thing; we will have to quit where we are and not finish.  My kids are so sad. NOT!!!

Megan is finishing up a chapter and I told her when we are done with this chapter, then we are done with English for the year, even though she still has a chapter on punctuation and then reference books. She LOVES (I'm being sarcastic!) the reference book chapter because there is always a lesson on a Bible concordance\ dictionary. One year, I had her do her assignment using a concordance online, but it didn't work so well, so the next year, I went to the library and checked her out a huge Bible concordance. She loved me for that!! She thinks it is kind of funny that we won't get to that lesson this year!

As for Courtney, we just finished a chapter on adverbs and there are two chapters I would like to touch base on with her. The first one is on punctuation. I still see her making punctuation mistakes in her writing, so I feel we need to review those rules. I am going over two lessons a day and she isn't too fond of me for that! After this chapter is done, I want to hit the chapter on prepositions.  This is important in the 5th grade book, so I want to give her a little bit of information on them. We will then skip the reference book chapter and be done with her book.

As for math, Courtney is almost done with her 5th grade book. We are on the 2nd to last chapter, and the last chapter is all review. We will complete this book within the next two weeks.

Megan finished her 7th grade book last week, so we are hitting some lessons in the 8th grade book that have new information. We are going to start prealgebra in the fall with a different curriculum.

Christian actually finished his math book today! He learned so much this year in math. I am going to start him in 2nd grade math in the fall. He will do the same curriculum as the girls have done. It will be weird teaching through this whole series again!

Even though I have these great plans to finish everything within two weeks, things like a sick baby and a water fight happens between the kids, so I don't get to my plans. What do I do?? It is summer and I want them to enjoy it, but I also want to finish what we have started!

Got Diesel?

Since we are going on another very long road trip this summer, Matt had a few concerns about fuel.  With our old truck, Matt was constantly looking for a gas station. Once it hit half a tank, he started to get serious about finding a place to stop. We got 8 miles to the gallon, so gas was at the back of his mind almost all the time. Our last truck had a 21 gallon tank, so we went through a lot of gas and stopped quite often!!

Our new truck is a diesel, so we will get about 10 miles to the gallon. It also has a larger gas tank; this one is 26 gallons. 

Even though we get a little bit better gas mileage and the tank is slightly larger, Matt is still concerned about stopping for gas.  Not only would we need to find a gas station that we can get into with the camper, we will also need one that sells diesel. According to Matt, not every gas station sells diesel! He thinks that we will need to find a truck stop to fill up with diesel.

Because of this, he decided to buy a 60 gallon tank that sits in the back of his truck.  This tank got delivered last Wednesday and he put it in today. 

Now we will have 86 gallons of diesel at one time!! He says we can go about 1500 miles on one tank of gas. :)

Now we don't have an excuse to stop every two hours!!

Still hunting for Birth Certificates!

I have been on a mission lately. I need to find the boys' birth certificates in less than three weeks. I think our plan is to leave on our trip around the 7th of July and about two weeks later, we are going to be entering Canada!! In order to get back into the good old USA, the boys will need their birth certificates. Luckily, the girls' birth certificates are accounted for.

This last week, I cleaned my sitting room/ office area. The girls have turned this into their homework area, but I thought they MIGHT be in there somewhere. They are technically supposed to be in the fireproof safe, but for some reason, they are NOT there.

I spent every afternoon this week cleaning that room, and I did not find them. :(  The only other option is in Matt's office or somewhere in the basement. Matt said he cleaned his office awhile back and didn't find them.  We have looked through the fireproof safe twice now and they are not there.

If we don't find them soon, I will need to order new ones. This will cost $17 a piece, so a total of $34, which I already paid a year ago!!! This will take 7-10 days to get them, so I need to figure this out soon.

I know I have them too because I had to send Christian's in to the state of Nebraska education department when we filed to homeschool him last year.

If you were a very important birth certificate, where would you be???

Up too Early!

Do you know what happens when a little toddler goes to bed about 10:30 pm?? He is up at 5:55 am!!

Why is it that if kids go to bed late that they are usually up early?? I got to bed later than Micah, so I wanted to sleep in a little bit. I guess he had different ideas. Hopefully we will take a nap today!

On a bright note though, he has been going to sleep ALL BY HIMSELF for the last few nights. We will read books, sing, and pray and then I put him in his bed. I have been sitting down beside his crib until he goes to sleep, otherwise I know he will scream because he does not like to be by himself. After about 10-15 minutes, he is sound asleep. I am thrilled!!! I tried to put him down for a nap yesterday the same way, but he didn't go to sleep.  We will keep trying.

We are also down to one nursing session a day, which is right away in the morning. I don't know how long he will hold onto this one. Sometimes during the day when he is hungry and tired, he will sign me "milk." I just tell him that the milk is all gone and offer him something else. This usually works! He understands me very clearly. :) I am glad this weaning process is going well!

Yay!!! He did it!

For the last 19 months, we have struggled with Micah and sleep. We have been up many hours at night, he has not wanted to take naps, and he refused to go to sleep by himself in his crib.  I always nursed him to sleep because I knew he would scream for hours on end. :(  Many people said I should just let him cry it out, but I can not do that! He would scream for HOURS!!

Anyway, we had a huge break through last night and I was soooo happy!! Usually at bedtime, he will do his sign for "milk" and we will sit down in the recliner and I will nurse him to sleep (As I catch up on the news at night.)  The last two nights, he did not give me the "milk" sign, so I didn't offer it. (We are down to two feedings during the day and once we drop the night one, we are just down to the morning feeding. I want him to wean himself, and would really like to be done before we leave for our trip in a month.)

Anyway, two nights ago when he didn't ask for milk, I got him some water and we sat in the living room and read books for a very long time! Eventually he just fell asleep in my lap. I put him in his bed and he was out for the night.

Last night, he didn't ask again, so I thought we would try to read books in his bedroom and do a bedtime routine like we do with the other girls. I picked out four books, which we read, and then we sang a couple of songs and prayed. I told him we were going to go to his bed and he needed to go to sleep. I really didn't want him to fall asleep on me. I want to get him into his bed and get him to go to sleep on his own.

I laid him down, shut the lights off, turned the white noise on, and sat down right beside his bed and sang a couple songs to him. He kept picking his head up to see if I was still there. :)  After about ten minutes, he was sound asleep!! I could hardly believe it!! I felt like jumping up and down right there in his bedroom!! He went to sleep all by himself in his bed!!

This opens up some new possibilities, like Matt putting him to bed! And I can be out at night and not worry about putting him to bed.

Now to get him to stop screaming the moment he wakes up in the morning!

Yay Micah!!!

Party Fail?

Matt and I went to a little get-together hosted by one of his co-workers last night and obviously, this man (and his wife) do not know how to host a party! I kind of caught onto these things as the night went on, but didn't say anything to Matt. He actually brought it up on the way home.  I guess we can all learn from him.

Lesson #1: Make enough food. There was about 10-15 people there last night and the host made about eight cheeseburgers and a plate full of chicken.  Of course, the burgers looked yummy, so by the time Matt had his turn to go through the line, they were gone. He was kind of disappointed. He said the chicken was still good though.

Lesson #2: Buy sturdy plates. If you are going to serve food on paper plates, then buy sturdy ones! The host had set out the cheapest paper plates from the store. I know this because I have bought them before and I don't anymore! The grease soaked through the plates and they were very hard to handle.

Lesson #3: Have a table to sit by (especially if you have your guests eating off of flimsy paper plates!).  After everybody had gotten their food, the adults all went outside. The host had some patio furniture for everybody to sit on. These were chairs and there were no tables. Everybody had to eat off of their laps, which is usually fine, but it was hard to do with these paper plates! Matt actually ended up eating while standing up! He said it was kind of a challenge.

Lesson #4. Have enough chairs for your guests to sit. Enough said.

Lesson #5. The host goes through the line last. Usually a host sets all the food out and lets his/ her guests go first. Guess who went through the line first last night?? The host! I had never seen that before!!

Lesson #6  If you invite children over and they need to eat, at least have SOME idea where they can sit. Remember, no table, not enough chairs, and poor quality paper plates. I stood there with Micah and looked around. Again, usually the host will help you find a place. But nope. I had to figure it out myself. 

I also had another problem is that the host had two big dogs, which I was fine with, but I didn't want to put Micah on the floor to eat in his chair with a tray (remember, no chairs anywhere) and then have the dogs eat all his food. I graciously asked the host if I could just put Micah on the floor inside the house and the dogs could stay outside. They nodded their approval, so that is what we did. I sat inside with Micah while everybody else sat outside. It was sooo odd.

Lesson #7 If you have nothing for the kids to do, at least know how to work your TV! Christian had been outside for awhile and he needed to come into the house to cool off. I thought he could watch some TV (this couple had no kids, so therefore, there were no toys or anything kid-friendly in the house.) I asked the host how to work the TV and he had no idea. He said his wife always watches TV down there. He eventually figured it out for us.

Christian loves the Weather Channel lately, so I found that for him. We watched "Why Airplanes Crash" until we left.  The host mentioned maybe we could watch Disney or something like that. I said those shows don't interest Christian at all! He loves these scientific ones!

I am hosting a party next Sunday for Christian's birthday. I hope I have enough food, provide quality plates, and have enough seats for everybody!!! :)