Life, or something like it.

I've been silent for a while on this blog. I've added to my knitting blog several times but to write here has been difficult. I still like our little place here in our new town. I love that whenever the weather is decent that we walk half a block to the riverwalk and feed the ducks and just enjoy the scenery. Plus, with the library being a block away I've been catching up on all my favorite authors. (On that note check out Alan Bradley's Flava de Luce series. The first book is The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie. I love this series and the latest installment is waiting for me at the library) Henry is adjusting to the school, although he had a difficult day last Friday. I'm hoping that isn't going to become a new thing. He is trying the hot lunch today at school and was excited about it. Irene is doing well at school and is learning sign language.

I do miss things about our old town. I miss having the beaches to drive to and the downtown. I miss my MOPS group and the friends I had there. Not knowing anyone here besides family means I can't make playdates at the parks. Our new town does have some Christmas festivals coming up. In a couple of weeks they have a craft festival and on December 3rd they have a Santa parade, craft fair, and meeting/pictures with Santa on the Showboat. There are things to look forward to.

I guess my big disappointment is that being poor in the Grand Rapids area means that you're treated as sub-human. We've been trying to get doctors for the kids. We've been to the emergency room twice since moving here. Once when Henry cut open his eyebrow and again two weeks ago when both Henry and Irene were crying in pain over ear infections. We tried a walk-in clinic for the ear infections but we were turned away because they did not take medicaid. Since we did not have a cell phone we had no way of finding another clinic and headed for the ER. For that visit we've been verbally "spanked" by the health plan for not seeing the doctor. NO EXCUSES was blazoned across the letter in angry red. Apparently, even if your child is crying in pain on a Sunday morning, you are suppose to wait until Monday to see a doctor.

Ah, but the new doctor saga is just so much fun! We called the medicaid health plan that the children are on asked that they send a booklet with all the doctors in Kent County that take the plan. It arrived and we went through it. Not a single pediatrician in the book was taking new patients. Not a single Family Practice doctor was taking new patients. And in our town? No doctors at all participated in this health plan. None.

We called the health plan again and asked if they could list any doctors in the area that were taking patients. They gave us two. One is a practice in the worst section of Grand Rapids. We're talking crack baby central. My mother-in-law just said "No, don't go down there." The other doctor did not work with the hospital in Grand Rapids...even though he was a Grand Rapids doctor. What? We decided to look online using the health plan's website. Their online search brought up different doctors. We got excited. Could there be a glimmer of hope? Yeah, right. None of those doctors were taking patients with our health plan. We called the health plan back and this time not even the doctor in crack baby central was taking patients. There was a new doctor available, but he isn't affiliated with the local hospital and...he doesn't speak English.

Finally we called a doctor in Grandville. She would be a 20/30 minute ride for us BUT she was in a good area, took our insurance and worked with the local hospital. Great! Hahahaha! After setting up appointments for the children they called back the next day to say they've cancelled us because they were no longer taking patients with our health plan.

You must understand, none of these doctors (and we called a lot!) would take us because we have a medicaid health plan and they are only required to take so many and then they can turn the rest away. Most were taking new patients until you told them your health plan. That is when they would say "Sorry, we're not taking any more medicaid patients."

Back online, at the health plan website, we searched the four counties around here. We found a doctor that is an hour and a half away. Of course, she cannot get the children in until a month and a half from now. AND she only works two days a week. Mark made appointments even though I am against it. The children are still patients of the pediatric clinic in Traverse City and they have office hours every day and belong to a top 100 hospital. I can't see driving an hour and a half to go to some two-bit doctor when we could drive an extra half hour/45 minutes and see their good doctors. Of course, all of this is moot since we have no money. All the doctors might as well be on Mars since there is no way we could afford the gas to get there.

Have I mentioned this? The weekend we moved here Mark was kicked off unemployment. His former company asked him to turn in his truck, keys, etc. when they found out he was being treated for high blood pressure. His doctor sent numerous reports to the company as well as unemployment saying that he was fully capable of working. This got him unemployment, at first. Then every week the former employer would try a new tactic to get him removed. Each week we would fax more paperwork, doctor forms. They must have tried five different things until they finally got through.

We've now been two and a half months without income of any kind. Mark is filling out at least three applications a day for any kind of job available. The very last of my jewelry has been sold just to keep us in gas money. Recently we sold a ring of my mother's and that money went to buy winter jackets and boots for the children. It also bought toilet paper, female necessities, and dog food. We are now down to our last $20. I have my wedding earrings, and a small diamond heart pendant of my mothers that has very special memories associated with it. These things are the last of the "good" jewelry I own and I am about to say goodbye to them. What will I get for them? Perhaps $65...if I'm lucky.

So, why share all this with people I don't know? I guess I am feeling rather depressed and now the holidays are coming up fast. When we first moved we thought the unemployment would help give us a small but happy holiday. Now, I don't know what my three children will find under the tree. My family wants us to drive an hour to visit them for Thanksgiving and to come back again two days later for an early Christmas with the brother that lives out of state. I have repeatedly told them that we have no money. There is no way we could put that much gas in the car and if we could we certainly couldn't waste it to make a two hour round trip. Sometimes I think our families think that we are playing at being poor. People, we are really there.

One good thing we happened to find is a cell phone company that gives you a free tracfone and one year of free service if you qualify. We qualify and we now have 250 minutes a month and a phone. The minutes don't roll over but who cares! We finally have a phone! I cannot tell you how much not having a phone is a huge worry when having three kids. If someone got hurt how would we contact help? Thankfully, now we can.

I'm trying, trying, trying to have a positive outlook. I'm trying to have faith.

Hope Is Patience With The Lamp Lit

Pictures from the first day of school. After fretting about Henry in my last post, today he had a good day at school. In fact, he is ready to try all day on Thursday. I am hopeful and faithful that he will have another good day, and it will be his birthday. He wants to take treats in to class.

A New Town

We've made the move. Unfortunately, we did it three days before school started which is what I've been saying all summer long that I did not want to do. Irene has made an easy transition into school but Henry is having a difficult time. I'm still not sure what to do about the school situation. Should I ask for a teacher change? Should I pull him out and homeschool? Of course, I can't afford a homeschooling program so that is not really an option. I am not happy that my child, who used to love school, now begs to stay home. That is just not right and I don't know how to fix it.

My sweet Henry turns six this week. We are having his party at Klackles Orchard again. He is looking forward to that. Last week he was playing in a big box in his room when he fell out. He sliced his eyebrow open on the dresser. That is when we discovered that this new town of ours does not have a walk-in med center. We had to drive 25 minutes into Grand Rapids to the children's hospital. The hospital was great but Henry did not want stitches and let's just say that it was a horrible experience that I never want to go through again. It was bad enough that we decided not to repeat it for the stitch removal. I took them out at Grandma Pat's house last night. He was very stressed out about it but it went much better than it would have if we'd gone to a med center. Plus, Grandma promised him a Lego and a slushie.

The pictures above are from the downtown area of our new town. We live two blocks from it. As I sit in my chair I can see the water, I believe that is the Flat River. I can also see the back of the library which is great because every time I want I book it takes me two minutes to walk there. We did have to downsize a lot to move into this new place. However, my mother-in-law did a lot of painting and fixing before we moved in and I've enjoyed hanging my pictures and making this place into our home. The children's room did not get painted nor did their bathroom but that is on the list of things to do. I now have laundry on the first floor which is such a treat! No more scary, spider filled basement to contend with. And we now have a huge back yard and we live on a one-way street so we can even play in the front without worrying about the crazies driving 90 miles an hour past us.

The move was difficult and I'm worried about Henry and school, but I am happy with our new place and trying to get used to the new town. I'm trying to have a more positive attitude about life.

A Year Ago...

A year ago today my mother passed away. It was very sudden and unexpected. The past year has been...well, it has been difficult. Today I wanted to be a day of calm. No crazy scenes of crying and wailing, no laying of a single rose on a grave, instead I wanted it to be a quiet day.

I was pleasantly surprised by a message I got from one of my mother's friends and co-workers. My mom had been a reference librarian at our public library and she loved working there and the people she worked with. They decided to put together a memorial table with a picture of my mom and her beloved Dachshund, Heinz. Also on the table were some of the books that had been purchased in her name by memorial contributions. They made a point to purchase new books by her favorite authors plus books on knitting and counted cross stitch (she did both). They also included a copy of her obituary.

What a sweet and kind gesture and it showed how much she meant to the people there. I was so very touched by it. My husband and I made a point to go see the display today with our children.

After the library we went for a walk on the pier. It was so sunny out and lots of boats were heading out to fish. Several people were fishing off the pier as well.

I took a picture of the kids next to the lighthouse. As usual, Irene is striking a pose!

Walking back toward the beach we could see at least 20 feet down through the water. lots of huge rocks and fish. The kids loved that. When we got to the end the Coast Guard boat was coming in and the men aboard waved to us.

From the pier we walked over to the playground at the beach. We let the kids run around in the sunshine and sand.

One the merry-go-round Irene held unto Gavin until he was steady enough to sit and stand on his own. They even helped him go down the slide.

It was a truly beautiful day. Instead of being a sad day it was filled with happiness and love.

Summer is Here!

Irene turned 4 in June and we celebrated by having her birthday at The Binder Park Zoo in Battle Creek. My dad made sandwiches and brought a picnic lunch for us all. My mother-in-law brought a Toy Story 3 cake.

After lunch we headed into the zoo. They cousins had to pose with the giant ant :-)

Irene was very excited about the giraffes at the zoo. Grandma got her face painted as a giraffe.

The zoo had a giraffe feeding section. We spent a lot of time here but it was so much fun to be up close to them!

It was a great birthday party and the kids loved it. Oh, in case you like the top Irene is wearing, I made that for her. I finished it late the night before the party.

As for the summer so far...two emergency room trips, vacation bible school, 4th of July, several Grand Rapids trips, two bank card numbers being stolen, packing, more VBS, another illness, lots of time spent at the beach and so much more!

Sunshine

We've been having a lot of hot days here on Lake Michigan. Sunday we made a stop at the beach to put our feet in the water. It is still cold but my kids do not care. They want to swim! I love living on the Lake.

Irene was thrilled to be running around and making sand castles.

Henry showed that he lacks listening skills and got more than his feet wet. We actually ended up leaving earlier then planned because he continually went back into the water after I said no more.

Gavin likes digging holes and filling the bucket up with sand. It is supposed to be 82 degrees out tomorrow...I think we may end up at the beach tomorrow, in swimsuits.

I wasn't planning to cook that...

Two weeks ago I was starting dinner and waiting for Mark to come into town. Mark would be home after dinner so I was planning on feeding and bathing the kids before his arrival. I had my mixing bowl out and was getting ingredients together for meatloaf. Henry came into the kitchen to chat and keep me company. He wanted to stir the glop in the bowl. As he did that, I sauteed some chopped onions and garlic. Once I added that to the bowl I got the meat out and started squishing it together with my hands. Henry was still chatting away. The stove had been off for about 3 minutes, but with a glass top stove it seems to stay hot for an extra long time. Doesn't take much time to place two fingers onto the burner of the stove but the pain sure lasts. As Henry started screaming I was frantically trying to get a look at his hand while raw meatloaf mixture dripped onto the floor. I finally had to go wash my hands, all the while saying soothing things to him. Even before my hands were clean I was shouting for Irene to get her shoes on. I knew that this wasn't going to be good. Thankfully, she listened and had her shoes on quickly. Gavin held up the works for a few minutes while I cleaned his dirty diaper. Then we dashed to the car, Henry crying all the way.

While driving to the Emergency Room I called Mark. Thankfully, he was in Michigan by this time and within two and a half hours from home. At the ER we were taken right into registration and then back into a room. I admit to having one very brief moment of panic when we headed toward the area where my mom had been. I didn't want to be in there while my child was in need. If it had been me then no worries but I couldn't do it when it was my son. It only took a moment to realize that that area was occupied. We were taken to a small room that had Finding Nemo fish on the wall. Our doctor was the talented husband of one of the ladies I knit with. I tried comforting Henry by telling him we've been to the doctor's house and that he was the one with the blow-up bounce house in his basement. The doctor was great with Henry, the nurse was fantastic. Henry had two fingers with 2nd degree burns. His middle finger was by far the worse with the burn crossing the crease of the finger. He was given pain medication and a diet coke. Diet coke? Yes, he asked for it to help with the pain. I figured that if having it made him feel less pain then it was fine with me. Irene got one, too. When we were finished, the kids wanted to walk down the hallway to check out the cafeteria. They've remodeled since the last time I had been that way. It looks quite nice now.

We left the hospital with a prescription for pain medicine, gauze, burn goo and instructions to call Henry's doctor on Monday. Called Mark and gave him the details then headed to K-mart to fill the prescription. The pharmacist was fast and we decided to walk through the toy section. By that time the pain medication from the hospital had really set in. Henry was jibber-jabbering like crazy. We walked over to Subway to get a juice and wait for Mark to get there (Mark parks his truck in the big parking lot by K-mart/Subway).

In the two weeks since, we've been to Henry's doctor twice. Once for the initial visit and check up. It is a bit nerve wracking when the nurse tells you over the phone to make sure you give out pain medication before the appointment. That visit went well. The goal was to keep the blisters intact for as long as possible. Since the burn crossed the crease any scarring could impede the movement of that finger. We went to the doctor again this week because the blister had broken. Both fingers look great and there is no trouble with movement.

Did I mention that I'm going to make meatloaf for dinner tomorrow? Henry will not be allowed in the kitchen.