I know it has been quite some time since my last post. I had promised to write more posts on topics regarding health. Man…we had some crazy times here in our household. I don’t think I realized just how tired I would be with 4 littles in the house. But, that is not a good excuse. I actually had written down several ideas and even started writing several blog posts. I just never saw them to completion or even tried to type them out. Some I decided were way to technical and not quite what I wanted. Some just never felt like what I wanted to say. Then I just got off track. Has that ever happened to you? You have all these amazing plans and something happens and you just don’t do it. That happened to me. SO.MANY.PLANS. Then they just went to the pooper.
We hit February which was American Heart Awareness month and I had a million things I wanted to share on my blog. I was asked to be part of a community outreach and to share some heart facts. I put all my energy into that and was so excited to share important information on BMI, high blood pressure, diabetes and their association with heart risks. I made posters, a flip book, printed flyers, made ribbons to measure waist circumference to measure BMI risk. Offering education on health is one of my passions and it was so great to get out and SHARE the information IN PERSON! We had not 1 but 2 snowstorms in Texas. It was downright COLD (at least for this lifelong Texan). It was the beautiful kind of snow: light, fluffy, powdery. Great for snowball fights and building snowmen. The kids (and this adult) had so much fun. What wasn’t fun was losing power on the coldest night of the storm. We lost power the night it dropped below 0. We moved to our room with a fireplace and closed off the rest of the house. The “fireplace room” has a door closing from the rest of the house luckily. I don’t know how cold the house got. I checked the temperature 2 hours after we lost power and it was already 60 degrees in the house. I couldn’t bring myself to check after that as temperatures dropped. We grabbed all the blankets, pillows, and clothes we could find and “camped” out together by the fireplace. My husband tended the fire all night and i stayed up praying we would make it through the night. We did. We set out to my father-in-law’s house at 7:30 am. He still had power! We warmed up there and had a warm meal. In case you don’t know…everything shuts down in Texas when it snows (snow in Texas usually actually = ice, not snow). Luckily Target (also without power) was open with only their backup power. We were able to find a loaf of bread and tortillas and some extra peanut butter for PB sandwiches. We were lucky and only lost power for about 24 hours. We had friends without power for 7 days…in the city. In the country, that’s to be expected although my parents (in the country) never lost power. The snowstorms brought to light some very serious issues in Texas and sadly there were too many people who lost their lives. The kids lost a week of school due to the storms.
Then we made it to March. March is Multiple Sclerosis Awareness Month, National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, National Nutrition Month, and National Traumatic Brain Injury Awareness Month (just to name a few). March would usually bring our annual race that we do with some family. Due to COVID it was moved to May. We continued training (and slacked off a little). We had Spring Break in March and took a little of that time to go visit Mimi and Papa (my parents) while we had some work done on our house. We visited a few parks while we were there. Mimi and Papa took us to a beautiful park with a waterfall. We ventured into another town and had a delicious burger from NacBurger. I love NacBurger because the owner was very kind and mindful of my need for gluten free due to health issues the first time we went. He was honest and I truly appreciated that. Every time we visit Mimi and Papa we have to take a venture into Nacogdoches to get some NacBurger! We showed the kids Stephen F. Austin University where Mommy went to school for her first degree. We took time to SLOW down. After Spring Break we made the decision to have our 2 bigs return to in person learning. My daughter was SO excited to return, until she actually returned to school. When they did school at home we would spend the mornings getting all the school work done, have lunch and quiet time, and then spend the afternoon playing at the parks around town. When they returned to in person learning once school was over it was time to come home, cook dinner (kids played outside), eat, go or a quick walk or bike ride, shower, and then to bed. My son was excited to be at school. He has always been my independent kiddo. He didn’t want me to walk him up to the doors. He wanted me to just let him out and go on his own. Proud Mama, yet sad Mama. I really love his hugs and kisses. They really are the best. He was loving school but due to his sensory issues it wasn’t always perfect or easy.
We made it through March and into April. April has so many good Awareness causes. It is Alcohol Awareness Month, IBS Awareness Month, National Autism Awareness Month, National Child Abuse Prevention Month, National Minority Health Month, National Parkinson’s Awareness Month, Occupational Therapy Month, Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month, Stress Awareness Month, Testicular Cancer Awareness Month, and so many more! We had Easter and we ACTUALLY HAD EASTER! Easter isn’t about the egg hunt, but we got to do an Easter Egg Hunt this year with some of our neighbors and their grandchildren. We had a zoo trip with the neighbor’s grandchildren. We had playdates with them. It was so much fun. We provided the food for the Celebration of Life for our neighbor’s mother. It was such a blessing to provide the food for them. I love to be a blessing to others. I don’t tell you this for recognition, though I know some will assume that is why I mention it. I tell you to try to encourage you to reach out and be a blessing to your neighbors. We said “Until next time” to new friends as they returned home.
Somehow we were in May. May is Brain Cancer Awareness Month, American Stroke Awareness Month, Cystic Fibrosis Awareness Month, Lupus Awareness Month, Mental Health Awareness Month, National Celiac Disease Awareness Month, and National Asthma and Allergy Awareness Month to name a few. Don’t forget May also has Teacher Appreciation Week as well as Nurse Appreciation Week and School Nurse’s Day! May brings the end of school. As I mentioned, the kids returned to school in March and it wasn’t always perfect. My son was coming home with yellows in one of his classes. Because of COVID they didn’t get to do a lot of the things they would normally do in PreK. It was A LOT of sitting in one place all the time. I know this because I did have a parent/teacher conference to discuss my concerns with him always seeming to get in trouble in one of his classes. I wanted to talk with them with regards to what exactly he was getting in trouble for, if the sensory plan was working, what wasn’t working, what could be improved on, how he was doing academically, and what we could do to keep the momentum going through the summer. His teachers explained that there isn’t much moving around in the morning so all the kids were struggling but due to my son’s issues, he was having a little bit of a harder time with the staying in one place all the time. We have some really amazing teachers at our school. They were really encouraging, addressed my concerns, gave me feedback, provided me with resources to use during summer, and even printed out books, worksheets, etc. to help us through the summer. I am so thankful for our school and the teachers we have. The kids had Field Day at school. Sadly parents were not allowed for Field Day due to COVID restrictions. The kids had graduation (I’ve posted about them on Insta and FB). Then we started Summer! I made lesson plans for the whole duration of the summer and we are trying to stick to them! Check out our YouTube channel below to keep up with our science experiments and different things we do! It’s not a professional channel, it is just us being our crazy family self! We laugh, we have fun, and we make memories together!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsr7zkhh9TOVQDAMZJKbkPA
I promise I will do my best to keep up with posts and provide more ideas on things to do.