I have a cold (at least, I think it's a cold -- I'm not willing to believe that I suddenly acquired an allergy at the age of 35, after having spent my entire life allergy-free) so my head is foggy, my ears are rivaling the Grand Canyon's echo ("Bobby! Cindy!"), and my neck is stiff -- although that's probably not from my cold but rather having slept in a crazy position. No blogging of any depth today ...
Yesterday was a day of great successes on many fronts -- one of those days where you tackle totally random things, all in a 12 hour period. We started the day by hitting a few garage sales in town and while my search for a bike for Aidan still has not come to fruition, I did hit a jackpot for him in another department: winter coats. I realized the other day that he cannot get one more year out of his current winter coat, but finding money to buy him a new one was just not going to happen. Don found an ad on Craigslist for a sale in town, featuring children's clothes among other things, so we hopped in the car. Jackpot! Two winter coats (one heavy, one a little lighter and more versatile) for a mere $8. Love it.
Next, we faced the challenge of doing something about Jack's strong "doggie smell" which has lately been lingering in our living room. It's not that I mind the smell so much, but it's just ... well, a smell, and I don't want my house to smell like anything. I borrowePublish Postd a can of carpet refresher -- the white powdery stuff you sprinkle on the carpet and then vacuum up -- but it left my house smelling, not like a dog, but ... well, just smelling fake. I think this smell, which hasn't ever been quite like this in 8 years, is from a combination of things: our first home with wall-to-wall carpet, Jack's getting up in years, he has allergies, it's been hot and quite humid. I have a feeling it will die down as the weather gets colder, but for now we have to deal with it. So yesterday afternoon, while Grace was napping, we gave Jack his first bath. Well, it's not his first bath -- rather, his third or fourth (he never needed them much in the past) -- but it was definitely a first for us. We borrowed some dog shampoo from my sister-in-law, filled up the tub with lukewarm water, and set to work. We left his collar on for a good handle, anticipating the worst since Jack is absolutely terrified of water. Don picked him up and gently placed him in the tub, and after a few seconds of fierce and desperate scramblings, he settled down, stood very quietly, and gave us the most forlorn look you could ever get from a Beagle. In about 7 minutes we were done, and we had the fluffiest, puffiest beagle we have ever seen. I can't say he smelled like the lovely shampoo -- he smelled faintly like the wet dog that he was -- but at least he was clean. And interestingly, he hasn't been licking or biting his feet as much, which is what I had been hoping for, so perhaps we have found a solution (that, plus doubling up on his Benadryl dosing). As for the lingering smell, I vacuumed like crazy and purchased a supposed odor eliminator spray from Kmart (which smells like nothing, thank goodness) so we'll see what happens after repeated applications. I had read online about some vitamin supplement you can give a dog to tackle the odor from the inside, but I think I'll call the vet first about that one.
With Jack bathed and fluffy, we later tackled a big dilemma plaguing us, something that has been demanding our attention now that cooler weather is slowly settling upon us: shoes for Grace. Our girl has run barefoot practically all summer, partly because of her clubfoot, partly because of ill-fitting shoes, and partly because ... well, she's Grace. We have had an awful time finding shoes that fit her, because not only are her feet over a full size different, but they -- and especially her clubfoot -- are exceptionally wide and pudgy. While we expected the pudginess -- a characteristic of clubfoot -- it makes shoe-shopping rather difficult. A few days ago I bought two darling pairs of Mary Jane's at Target, but even in that larger size of 8 (eeks!) they were still very tight. Target doesn't seem to sell wide widths, and I was dreading a trip to Stride-Rite or some other better-shoe-but-costs-more kind of store, until we discovered in Kmart yesterday that they sell an abundance of wide width shoes! PLUS, they were having a killer sale, mimicking the BOGO sales of Payless, so we walked away with black (and cutely decorated) Mary Jane's, brown (and even more cutely decorated) Mary Jane's, and -- at Grace's demand -- a pair of pink leather semi-high-top sneakers (so she doesn't have to wear her brother's very boyish sneakers anymore) ... all of which came to the price of one Stride-Rite shoe, and all of which fit perfectly. Phew!
Now, the highlight of the day involved a new adventure for Aidan, one that he is not soon likely to forget. Earlier that morning my oldest brother Steve called, inviting Aidan along on their family outing to a living history farm. Their son, who is almost 4, likes Aidan's company, and vice versa, so off they went at 9:30 a.m. I didn't see my boy until 4:30 p.m., but with telephone check-ins periodically throughout the day, I knew he was fine and all were enjoying their time together. They learned how a farm was run in "old-fashioned times," they talked with costumed farmers and toured barns and outbuildings and the farmhouse. Aidan's two spectacular experiences involved grinding the corn himself and feeding the pigs, and churning butter in the farmhouse. Did you eat the butter? I asked my Little Boy Blue? "No way!" he said. "It wasn't done being maked yet." (Maked?) He so very rarely uses improper grammar, but I guess he had no idea what word to use with the process of making butter. He absolutely loved his experience on the farm -- and spending time with his aunt, uncle, and cousin -- that he cried sad, bitter tears when they dropped him off. "I want to move in with Uncle Steve," he declared. The one down side to his great outdoorsy adventure was that it wreaked havoc with his new developing allergies. He had been doing fairly well for the last few days, but then after dinner -- right before bed -- he couldn't breathe, and the Claritin he took at dinnertime wasn't kicking in yet. Poor, miserable kid. He went to bed crying, and woke up crying, terribly cranky and miserable with congestion. Poor guy.
So now it's Sunday and we're back after a good service, although in all honesty one that was, for me, very hard to listen to. The sermon was about listening to God, and at one point Andy spoke about the possibility of God's calling to ministry. That brought up a bucketful of bad feelings, bad memories, and painful questions: OK, fine, but what if you listened to God's calling, did what He asked, but then got kicked in the gut? What do you do what that? Do the "evil intentions" of individuals make God's calling thus null and void? What do you do with that??!! Ugh ... too much to think about right now. It's nap time for the kids, and for this big kid as well. It will feel good to pass out for awhile, to recoup after a busy day yesterday and a challenging service today ...
(Note on Grace ... She wore her new shoes to church today and looked absolutely picture-perfect: a red-checked sun-dress covered with tiny black Scottie dogs, a white sweater, cute white socks, her new black Mary Jane's, and little black clip in her hair. When I went to the nursery to pick her up, the sweater was discarded, the shoes and socks were off, the clip was gone, and she was running around like a fiend in just the sun-dress. Why am I not surprised ...)
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