Diamonds are forever - so are true friends

During my single-mom years, I had a group of friends that were my safety, my sanity, my world. We were all single mothers and we took turns taking all of the kids and giving each other free weekends.

It was a mommie co-op... and we did it all. Picking them up from daycare, feeding them, getting to them to softball/baseball/soccer/basketball practices, making sure homework was done... the whole deal. For us, it was just as easy to take care of 6 as it was to mother 2. If one of us had to work late, we called each other. If someone was sick, we could send the kids to each other's house. And it was also great therapy because we had each other to talk to about problems with the kids, the x, dating and just normal life.

After I met Tom and we started living together, my life and routine changed, but my friendship with these incredible ladies didn't stop.

After breaking my big engagement news to my friends, Robin presented me with a gift – an engagement ring keychain. Just a small reminder to Tom and I that I was her wife first.

Robin, I love you and we could NEVER forget you. I have your keychain with me always, but I think Tom is suffering from a little stone envy.

Look who's riding now!

Saturday afternoon at lunch I asked Princess if she would like to go bike riding. The conversation quickly degraded into her wanting to get rid of her bike... forever. Her comment was that she was, "just not a bike kind of girl." Somehow this is not the way I thought this conversation would turn out.

We talked, we cried and finally I suggested we go to Shelby Farms and bike in the grass. Rena wasn't exactly on board, but Tom and I let her know that this was a stepping stone to driving. No biking = no driving. That struck a cord with her.

Despite her initial hesitation to get on the bike while I pushed her along the bike path, we did make it to a large grassy hill. And to my surprise, she did coast down the hill without a fight. Better yet, she didn't get off the bike, start crying and push the bike into the lake.

Prince caught this moment on video, not just riding down the hill but she was turning and stopping without falling over.



How awesome, right? She loved riding down the hill and exclaimed, "it's like a rollercoaster!" This helped her realize how much fun bike riding can be. From here we progressed to riding on the pavement and she rode 1.5 miles all the way around the lake.

It didn't stop there, she also rode across a bridge because I told her it sounded cool. And now the big girl LOVES riding. Just look at her showing off for Tom.

After dinner that night, she informed me that she was now ready to start driving because she had learned all about biking. If it just wasn't for that darn law about being 16 first, hun.

Medical discrimination tactics of public schools.

If private schools ever need a story to sell parents on why they will always be better than public, just hit control p now.

Because I gave Princess ibuprofen for the pain in her throat so she could attend school, she has to wait 2 weeks for her tonsillectomy. Shelby county schools have strict rules about NOT administering medicine (note that page 23 has nothing to do with the list of obstacles that I have had to address in the past 24 hours) and the below is a list of the transactions it took to make sure that Princes can have a pain killer and a throat lozenge should her throat hurt during the school day. Remember that this isn't required, this is just IN CASE her throat hurts.

Phone call 1 with school nurse from elementary school:

• I couldn't downloaded the medical release form so fill it out note with all of the information and send medicine to school with Princess. However, all medicine must be hand delivered by the parent and the forms must be filled out while in the office and can not be faxed in.
• They didn't like the kind of pain killer my doctor prescribed because it might cause drowsiness. School nurse suggested I keep Princess home for a month until she no longer required medication
• They also needed a note from the doctor stating that it was medically necessary for this medicine to be given to Princess while at school
• School nurse additionally needed the Health Director's permission
• School nurse needs Princess to sit in the office the entire time she has the lozenge in her mouth

I quickly realized that in this first phone call, the school nurse IS the obstacle. Let's be real. A full time school nurse who can't administer medication and looks for reasons to send kids home. What is the ROI of that job?

Phone call 2 with health director:

• Needs doctor's permission, could be faxed, but her fax isn't working.
• Says giving her the medicine isn't a problem, as long as I give her my doctor's contact information
• Says I need to pack a soft lunch (which we have been doing for two weeks already) and that sending yogurt will go a long way to help her with the pain.

Phone call 3 with doctor:

• I request the doctor fax over the prescription

Phone call 4 with health director:

• She now requires I call the doctor to give the doctor permission to share Princess's medical information with the health director

Phone call 5 with doctor:

• give friggin permission

Phone call 6 with health director:

• Says doctor only gave permission to administer tylenol.

Phone call 7 with doctor:

• What the friggin hell?

Next day, phone call 8 with health director who is now at the elementary school:

• Wants to know when I will show up at the school to fill out the permission forms
• Wants my doctor to fax the forms to the school now
• Suggests I send a water bottle with Princess so that she can keep her throat moist during the day and hopefully keep it from hurting

In the past two weeks, I have seen an ER doctor, the family physician and an ear, nose and throat specialist and you know what? NONE of these doctors suggested that water and yogurt for lunch was the solution to pain! Where did this woman get her medical degree?

So I go up to the school, fill out two forms (one for tylenol and one for a throat lozenge) with seemingly no problems. But this experience really has me counting my blessings. My children don't have chronic illnesses. I can only image what parents with real issues must face. What hope does a child that requires any kind of medical attention have of getting an education in a system set up like this? They would have absolutely no chance of having a "normal" school day.

And how do these parents stay employed? None of the effort taken on behalf of the school nurse or the "health director" improved the quality of my daughter's experience at school. None of it was done with her best interest in mind. The system is set up to deter parents from sending their children to school. My choices are let my little girl hurt during the day or take my lunch breaks to race to the school, check her out, give her medicine and check her back in. Which, by the way, is ok with the school.

Good bye tonsils.

Even after 12 days of antibiotics, Princess's tonsils are still swollen. We went back to the doctor last week and are scheduled for a tonsillectomy on April 20th. We just have to make it two more weeks.















Soft foods, tylenol, throat lozenges. We have two more days of antibiotics left. Sigh. Just look at those things. They are HUGE! There is no way we are going to make it.

Gaga in da house

Just jamming to a little Lady Gaga while I clean the dishes after dinner. Amazingly enough she is dancing like they do in the video. Hmm. I better check the parental controls on their tv one more time.

Note her majesty's crown. I refer to her as "princess" for a reason.

The best alarm clocks don't have snooze.

Callie has absolutely no respect for anyone sleeping. This proves useful when it comes to waking the kids up. Not only will she dance on their heads, pounce on their stomachs, and lick their ears, but put your hands under the covers and scratch the sheets and Callie will dig the covers off the kids in seconds searching for source of the noise.



And she's cute enough they don't stay mad at her for long.

Who needs Batman when we have ROBIN!

So I guilted myself into volunteering to be the Girl Scout Cookie Manager... AGAIN. I know I swore I would never do this again, but this is all about me wanting to participate in something that Princess enjoys because there are times when I don't feel like I hang out and support Princess as much as our little Prince. I drag her to all of prince's karate practices and he never has to sit through hers. She begged for me to be the troop leader (isn't going to happen.) So I figured I could do this for her, one more time.

For those of you who only eat the cookies and don't have to see the ugly side, let me help bring this picture into focus. Girl Scout Cookie Manager translates into designating a room in your home for Girl Scout cookie storage and acting as the accountant for the transactions of each girl. I am the warehouse manager that signs cookies out to you and then comes knocking on your door one day to collect the cash.

Nothing says "Welcome to my home" than 1000 boxes of cookies in the dining room.

Oh, we also did a cookie booth. We stood outside of Kroger's and heckled customers. Of course, we spent most of the two hours doing cheers....

Rena had to do a four hour shift because well, I was the cookie manager and I had to be there for four hours. Poor thing, right?

Rena's goal was to sell 300 boxes of cookies. She collected about 100 in pre-order and needed to sell another 200. We did some door knocking, I took some to work, but it was my dear friend Robin was the one who brought it all home. Robin sold more than 60 boxes of cookies for Rena.

Friend, mother, Girl Scout cookie saleswoman extraordinaire... Super Robin is here to save the day. We can't thank you enough for all you do, Robin. We love you!