Family Friday :: Empty Backyard

Sorry. No pictures today. I will have a lot for you next week, though, so hang tight.

We have been busy bees this week. Well, Jeffery more than any of us. I told you last week that a few Saturdays ago, Jeff and a couple of friends tore down our back deck. Well, this week, whenever he has had the chance, Jeff has been going out back and tearing every part of our backyard down. He took out the extra patio stones out of the grass, he is doing his best to dig up the fence posts out of the ground. He has taken all the wood from the deck and has been cutting it down into pieces short enough for transport.

On Saturday, Jeff is using my dad's trailer, and he's going to cart all the unwanted wood we have to a friend's place, where he uses the wood for huge bonfires. Our metal gate, stove and dishwasher that was left in the shed by the previous owners are all going to the metal place to get some cash for our metal. We also have some trees in our backyard that we don't want, but we have a couple of people who do. Jeff was hoping to use a bobcat to help with digging out the trees, the fence posts, etc, but alas, no bobcat is available. So Jeff and Paul will be digging out the fence posts and the trees by hand, which will be interesting.

Jeff is able to borrow our friend's rototiller, and he will rototill (?) our backyard so that the ground isn't sloping toward the back of our house anymore. Then we will have a blank slate (almost). We plan to tear down the monstrosity of a shed that is in the back, but we actually do need a place to store our ancient lawn mower and other outside stuff (I think there is a couple of shovels, a rake, a hose and a few small gardening utensils), so it's staying right now.

Each bit of work that Jeff gets done increases the size of our backyard - which is awesome. We hope to use the small landscape stones in the front of the house and make a small fire pit. or a big one. We only need a lid for it so we can obey the city by-laws.

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I hope I'm not speaking too soon when I say that I think the ants are going to die. very soon. Jeff picked up a different ant bait/killer. We put it in the kitchen Wednesday afternoon, and by Wednesday night, there were as many as 10 ants in the thing at a time, eating the bait! Those ants will hopefully carry that bait to the queen and they will all die. That would be awesome!

But we know for sure where the ants were. Last year, we had small black ants living in the wall behind the stove. The carpenter ants apparently had killed all the small black ants and moved in. But these ants were climbing over each other to get at that bait, and they were climbing through the holes in the wall behind the outlet and out from behind the stove, and after they had stocked up on the bait, they climbed right back into those holes. So that's where they were. So the spraying we did in that area last year did nothing to kill the ants. Darn. And I thought it had gone so well...

Anyways. I will keep you appraised on the ant situation.

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Alexander's first speech therapy lesson is on Tuesday. I'm taking the time off work to go, so I can see what the therapist is doing, instead of hearing it secondhand from Jeff. I'm excited to see how we can help Alexander to start learning in a way that works for him, but I'm also very nervous - what if we have been doing everything wrong the entire time? We'll see, I guess.

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Monday was the end of tax season (phew!), and that was when I got sick. I had a sore throat on Sunday night, and all Monday I carried around a Kleenex box. My nose was so red and sore. Then on Tuesday, I could not get out of bed. I was SO sick! I was dizzy, my vision would not clear up or focus. So I emailed my boss, called my carpool, heavily dosed myself with meds, and fell asleep. I slept that entire day. Jeff woke me up for lunch and supper. Other than that, I was sleeping. I was absolutely no good.

Wednesday was a little better, but it was like my mind was in a fog. I felt like I was sleeping, even though my brain knew I was awake. Have you ever gotten that feeling? It's weird. I had gotten ready for work and everything, but about 5 minutes before my carpool came, the dizziness came again. What the heck was wrong with me? I emailed my boss again, told my carpool I wasn't going in to work, and I told Jeff I was staying home again.

He asked me if I felt well enough to come with him and the kids to PFLC. I thought it would be nice to see all the moms with whom I have become friends, so I went. Honestly, I don't remember anything I did that morning. I remember going there. I remember watching the kids. I remember talking to some people, and seeing some women from church come with their kids. But I don't remember what I said to anyone, what anyone said to me. I was in that fog the entire time. When we got home, I slept again. Jeff went outside and worked on the backyard. I slept until around 3:00 p.m. When I woke up (the kids actually woke me up, since they were waking from their naps), I felt a bit of clarity. Finally!

Then on Thursday morning, when I was at work, the fog came back. I don't know what it is! I remember doing my job, but to be honest, I'm really glad I wasn't assembling any tax returns because I would not have been able to focus on reconciling the numbers! All I did was scan and archive documents. That is simple enough. My brain doesn't have to work too hard for that, for which I am thankful. My boss did tell me that I should have gone home, since I was looking pretty bad still. But my brain cleared up at around 2:00 p.m., and I was okay. I really hope this doesn't happen today too...

That's all. Cheerio!