Your Opinion Matters Okay....I would love to hear your opion...

I am experimenting with a different format. Please view particular post here and then click on the TITLE of this post (it is a link that will take you to the alternate blogsite). Read this same post THERE and then, comment either there or here if you have a preference for either over the other. I am most interested in hearing if either is more user-friendly to your eyes...text, etc...easier to read.

Voice your opinion...let me know!

Thank you for participating in this "survey"!

~Monica

  
   ¶ 9/30/2006 09:57:00 PM 4 comments

  Darcy gets the INSIDE Scoop: Click here for BREAKING NEWS about RAYNA'S INJURY...Darcy's blog scooped mine with all the details!  ¶ 9/29/2006 06:57:00 PM 0 comments

  Conversation with Jean On our way back from the pediatric orthopedic surgeon's office, we stopped off at Buffet Garden for lunch. We were seated at the booth right next to where Amanda and her friend were dining! A little bit later, Amanda called her mom, Jean, to tell her she had run into us. Jean asked to speak with me and the conversation that ensued was quite informative. Jean asked to speak with Darcy...but, Miss Darcy, initially, would not stoop to speaking with Jean on the phone!...so, Jean had to pass her comments to Darcy through me. Jean made the request that Miss Darcy begin including more relevant FACTS in her blog reporting and QUIT WHINING!

There has been long-term, ongoing verbal jousting between Darcy and her daddy's cousin, Jean, as well as between Darcy and Jean's mother, Aunt Ruth...and between Darcy and her Grandpa C....and, now that I think about it, between Darcy and anyone who speaks with her for more than a matter of minutes! But, for once, I think Jean has a very good point...less whining would be very nice! (I think that about evens me up!...Darcy has been getting me good on HER blog!)  ¶ 9/29/2006 11:33:00 AM 0 comments

  More Details on Rayna's Injury Wednesday evening, Doug was pulling on Rayna's arm when the ulnar bone slipped out of place (an injury young children are prone to because their ligaments are so loose). This was the sixth time Rayna has incurred this injury in the past two years. The first time, an adult friend lifted her by her wrists. We took her to the ER and spent $500 for the physcian to spend literally 60 seconds with her...fifty eight seconds explaining the injury to me and two seconds popping it back into place. He explained to me how to pop it back into place because he suspected it might happen again. It did. The next five times it dislocated with the assistance of her brother (sometimes the right arm, sometimes the left). He cannot seem to remember not to pull her by the hands/wrists. The second through fifth times, I was able to pop it back into place myself very easily with INSTANT relief of her pain and inability to pronate her hand. Wednesday night, I did the same manuever that has worked before, but, this time there was no relief of her pain and no improvement in her ability to use the arm. So, I took her into the ER. The ER physician did the same manuever. She FELT the bone pop back into place, but, still there was no improvement in Rayna's pain or inability to pronate her arm. So, the ER doc X-rayed her elbow. Nothing showed up. She had us wait about an hour to see if there would be improvement after Rayna was medicated with some ibuprofen and allowed to relax. No improvement. Rayna continued to complain of pain in her elbow and wrist. We both assumed that the wrist pain was connected with her elbow injury and not a separate injury. The doctor put her into a plaster splint and sling with the instructions for us to leave her in the splint a couple of days, then, take her out of the splint and see how the arm was after that. The ER doctor was confident that Rayna would be completely back to normal after we took the splint off...but, on the outside chance that she wasn't, we were to take her in to see an orthodpedic surgeon for further evaluation and treatment.

This morning I removed the plaster splint. There was very little improvement. The only improvement is that she no longer is having pain in her elbow...but, she still cannot pronate her arm and she has significant guarding and pain in her WRIST, along with a bit of swelling. So, in to the specialist. This time they X-rayed her wrist. There was one possibly questionable area on her X-ray, but, the doctor thinks she probably does not have a fracture. She thinks that maybe Rayna's wrist is just sprained. She put her in a little velcro splint and said to keep her in it during the day, but to take it off at night. She said that if she begins moving the wrist and not having pain, to leave it off. If there is no improvement in 10 days, then I am to bring her back in to the office again and they will re-X-ray the wrist. There is a type of fracture that isn't visable until the body begins healing the fracture...then, the deposits of new bone are visible on an X-ray (usually 10-12 days after the injury). So, that is where we are at. At least she can move her arm freely now at the elbow without any pain. But, she cannot rotate her hand over (pronate it).

Supposedly, children over the age of five do not get this type of injury ("nurse-maid elbow") any more because by that age the ligaments have tightened up adequately. So...maybe in FOUR MORE MONTHS we can quit having this happen...theorectically. (Except...maybe that means "up to age six"? Didn't think of that until just now. Bummer.)

(My current theory is that maybe Doug twisted her wrist as he was pulling her and she had a double injury...the distal ulnar displacement and a sprain in her wrist. I don't see how she could possibly have a fracture from the simple pulling Doug was doing. I hope not, anyway.)  ¶ 9/29/2006 11:04:00 AM 1 comments

  Sporting a New Cast: Click here for THE REST OF THE STORY...   ¶ 9/28/2006 02:14:00 PM 0 comments

       ¶ 9/28/2006 02:05:00 PM 0 comments

  What I Can't Talk About... Well, having Darcy have her own blog SOUNDED like a good idea...but there has been and unforeseen consequence... Late last night, as Rayna and I returned home from the emergency room, Darcy's admonished me NOT to get on the internet before I went to bed. I didn't understand what her point was until she explained, "I want to write about what happened, Mom, so don't put anything about it on YOUR blog!" Oh. So that was her objection!

So, I guess there isn't much more I can write right now. You will have to check Darcy's blog to find out why Rayna is now sporting a little plaster half cast. (Of course Darcy isn't out of bed, yet, this morning...so it might be a little while before she gets the details put into print!)  ¶ 9/28/2006 05:51:00 AM 0 comments

  Costume Changes




(Tonight the little ones are again in costume. Actually, they LIVE in one costume or another every waking moment that they are home...changing costumes ten or twelve times a day. They DO have their FAVORITES, though...so, they tend to be in those costumes the most. In early November, I buy lots of costumes once Target has them down to ninety percent off. Can't beat that deal...costumes for a buck or two apiece! Tonight, they have only gone through three costume changes apiece, since their daddy and older sister left for band practice about an hour ago.)




(This photo was taken a few nights ago. Doug had talked Rayna into dressing up in one of his old Power Ranger costumes. He couldn't wait to bring her down to the supper table to show everyone that she was now a Power Ranger with him! All through supper, he kept begging me to take her picture...so, I finally got the camera out!  ¶ 9/26/2006 04:44:00 PM 5 comments

  postcards from holland: Learning to Love... A year and a half ago I wrote "Learning to Love..." and posted it on the group blog, "Postcards from Holland". I'm not sure when Doug became rooted in my heart as deeply as my daughters are...but it did happen somewhere along the way...some unrecognized day in this past year and half.

I remember how it broke my heart as I wrote then that I would know when my heart loved him, because I would no longer be able to choose. As that realization reverberated through my heart, I remember fearing there might never be a time when I could not choose...but, somewhere along the way it HAS happened. I am completely his mother and he is utterly my child. I want to write another essay for "Postcards from Holland"--an essay from the other side...but, for now, these few lines in this blog will have to do, I guess.  ¶ 9/24/2006 09:20:00 PM 0 comments

  Creative Language... Today, for the forty billionth time, I accidentally called Rayna 'Darcy'. Rayna exclaimed, "MOM! You called me "DARCY"!". I apologized and she quickly replied, "It's okay, Mom. It doesn't mind with me!" (Translation: It doesn't matter to me...OR: I don't mind.)

Later, she was sorting through her candy haul from today's pinata (at Mahaffie) and I overheard her telling her siblings she had a "Peanut-butter-scott candy". That is one flavor I, myself, have never run across before!

A little later, as we were walking through the Great Plains Mall, Doug sniffed and exclaimed excitedly, "I smell deep water, Mom!" (He evidentally thought he could smell a swimming pool!) It is so rare that HE comes out with a complete sentence, that each one seems memorable...but this one struck me as just plain funny!

After that, we had supper at Jack Stack's BBQ (really good!)... Rayna was drawing with her crayons on the children's menu. Presently, she motioned for me to watch her and she proudly proclaimed, "This is how you draw a BIG 'I'" (printed an upper case "I"), "and, this is how you draw a LITTLE KID'S 'i'!" (as she printed a lower case "i"!). I guess when she tried logging the phrase "lower case" in her memory, it turned into the much more sensible "little kid"!

All of which reminds me of something she said the last time we ate out... She had some baked apples on her plate. After her first tenative bite, she exclaimed, "These are delicious! They taste just like peach smell!"  ¶ 9/24/2006 07:20:00 PM 0 comments

  Batgirl's Blog If you aren't a regular reader of Darcy's blog, you ought to click onto"Big Scary Stuffed Horse!"(click here...this is a LINK!) to read her latest adventure!

I am really pleased with how well Darcy has been blogging! She has been totally independent with the blog so far...except I have helped her with posting photos to it. But, I doubt that I will be needed in that capacity, either, much longer!  ¶ 9/22/2006 08:03:00 AM 0 comments

  Remembering, "A Balloon to Chew" Through the day there are so many little things that I think I will write about later on the blog...but, then, by the time I find the time to sit down at the computer, I can no longer recall what it was I had planned to write! There were a whole STRING of "Raynaisms" this morning that I mentally noted so I could replay them here later...but, alas, my memory is quite pitiful!

When Darcy was a toddler, I was quick to correct her grammar and her pronunciation. Along came my youngest...and, somehow KNOWING there will be no more babies, makes you in less of a hurry to grow the youngest one up. Instead of worrying about her poor pronunciation and dismal grammar, I found myself inwardly smiling at it and finding it rather adorable. (Such an unexpected turnabout on my part.) So, it is that I have wound up with a four and a half year old that has very "interesting" use of the English language...unlike her older sister who spoke precisely and with utter accuracy and an amazing vocabulary from about the age two onward....but, also unlike her mostly non-verbal older brother who has PROFOUND language disabilities. Maybe that has dampened my drive to IMPROVE her language skills...she is, afterall, so much further advanced than her older brother that it doesn't strike horror in my heart to hear her funny misappropriation of words and her mangled grammar and her slight mispronunciations. Things go unchallenged, for the most part...like her insistance upon speaking about "Batmaam" when she MEANS "Batman". Or, telling me that "Doug put chapstick on his lips because they were dryed off." DRIED OUT makes no sense at all in her mind...she thinks the rest of the world has it wrong and SHE has it right...lips dry OFF. Just like I cannot convince her that it is proper to say someone has a "cold". She insists on asking, "Do you have a cold nose?", if she thinks someone might be sick. To her, THAT makes a lot more sense. You have to have a cold SOMETHING, afterall!

Lately, though, I have been making a concerted effort to help her fine tune her language usuage. This morning, I found myself correct THREE sentences right in a row that came out of her mouth. She would say something. I would restate it correctly. She would not notice as she stated her NEXT item of business, which, I promptly restated correctly and, she blithely went to the third item of business (equally incorrect gramatically). Maybe she thought I was reflecting things back to her to demonstrate I was LISTENING? At any rate, it doesn't seem to occur to her that I might be wanting her to ROLE MODEL off my revisions of her utterances! She hasn't got time for unnecessary things like that!

It tickles, me though, how eager she always is to appropriate new words. She can hear a word just once and, sure as anything, she will make a POINT of using that word in the course of her own conversing later that day. Almost always, she has totally missed the actual meaning of the word. So, she comes up with some very interesting sentences!

Which, reminds me of a time when DARCY was just a little thing. She wasn't even quite two yet when we went on a roadtrip. As always, we stopped along the way to pick up snacks at a gas convenience store. I was craving bubble gum for some reason. (I hadn't chewed any around Darcy up to that point, nor had her father.) I tried to be discreet with my purchase because I didn't want my toddler daughter asking for some. Kids have that built-in radar thing, though! And Darcy instinctively KNEW I was trying to keep something from her. I saw her zero in on that pink wrapper as the cashier rang up our purchases. On the way to the car, I discreetly removed the gum from the sack and slipped it into my pocket. Once in the car, Darcy began asking for the pink thing. I played dumb. She dug all through the sack of snacks, determined to make me understand what it was she was talking about. But, it was no where to be found (hidden safely in my pocket!). I thought I was a pretty slick parent. A bit later, I carefully slipped a piece into my mouth. All was fine for about fifteen minutes. Then, I slipped and blew a tiny little bubble that I quickly sucked back into my mouth. Being in the front seat, I didn't think Darcy could see that from the back seat...but, she did! She didn't KNOW the word for "gum", much less "bubble gum" and I wasn't about to TEACH her that word, because THEN she would be asking for gum. It was easier just to play dumb. Ever DETERMINED to make herself understood, she tried yet again, this time calling out, "Mom," (she always called me "Mom"...never "Mommy", from the moment she began speaking),"I want a BALLOON TO CHEW!" With that one phrase, my toddler found my achilles heel! She didn't know the word "gum", so she made up her own name for it..."balloon to chew"! I was just so delighted with her creativity and perserverance that I gave the child a piece of bubble gum right then and there. She IMMEDIATELY logged the word "BUBBLE GUM" into her very large vocabulary...realizing at once what a USEFUL word it was! She wound up being one of the few two year olds in the world who could actually BLOW bubbles. But, then she had LOTS of opportunity to PRACTICE now that she knew the magic name of that substance that so tantalized her. There was POWER in words...she instinctively grasped that from a very, very early age!  ¶ 9/21/2006 03:22:00 PM 0 comments

  Darcy grew up so fast...





  ¶ 9/20/2006 03:48:00 PM 2 comments

  The PHOTOS are MISSING! Hmmmm...I've spent the better part of the morning trying to post photos onto my blog. Doesn't appear it is going to happen today, though! Blogger must be experiencing some down-time for some sort of maintenance or the other, I suppose.

Thinking about the band playing at Silver Dollar City got me nostalgic and got me to thinking about how much Darcy has matured and grown since she first started singing with the band (at age four...debuting in front of a large crowd at Silver Dollar City). I dug around and found photos of her very first music endeavor (the fiddle at age two), singing with the band at SDC when she was four (having to stand up on a chair in order to be visible!), her early banjo debuts (and the photo of her and her daddy performing at the Santa Fe Trails festival when she was about six years old...that photo was taken by an actual professional photographer and wound up in a magazine a few years later), and then more recent photos of her engrossed in pickin' on her mandolin or my old guitar just around the house. It just amazes me how MUCH she has grown up...and how quickly. Time really does fly so fast once you have children. Anyway, I FOUND all those various photos (had to scan a few of them from paper copies) and had planned to post them today...but, I've been thwarted in my efforts! Maybe I will be able to post that succession of photos later tonight!  ¶ 9/20/2006 10:49:00 AM 3 comments

  Because Aunt Ruth Always Asks: The band has been quite busy lately. They played September 14th in Lee's Summit at the Life Christian Center...September 15th in NKC at the HABOT Fall Show...and September 16th in Pleasant Hill for Railroad Days. This Saturday will find them in Louisburg playing at the Ciderfest at noon, 2:00pm, & 4:00pm. Sunday they will be playing at Mahaffie at 1:30. Then the following weekend they will be back at Louisburg once more. The Ciderfest is one of the places the guys enjoy playing most. But, of course, everyone's favorite gig is Silver Dollar City in Branson...which will be October 25th, 26th, 27th, and 28th this year.

Other dates this Fall include the G.I.G. Festival in Eldorado Springs on September 30th; the Living History Fall Festival in Harrisonville on October 6th and 7th; The New Theatre Restaurant Picnic in Shawnee Mission on October 9th; and the Church of God in Appleton City on October 29th.

So, now I have dutifully updated everyone!  ¶ 9/19/2006 09:25:00 PM 1 comments

  Photos for YOU, Jean!!!
Rayna and Doug went to Doug's best friend's birthday party Saturday evening. Luke, Doug's best friend, had a fish-fry/pizza party for his birthday this year. Of course, he also had a pinata! (Latin American tradition, I think!) There were twelve or so kids at the party. They had a blast taking turns swinging at the pinata as Luke's dad jerked the other end of the rope to keep it constantly moving up and down, back and forth! The kids also had a blast on the trampoline. (Darcy was invited--she and Luke's older sister are friends, too--but, she decided she needed to go to the band performance with her dad. She sang with the band at Pleasant Hill for RailRoad Days while her siblings and I were at Luke's birthday party.)

Doug watched closely as his buddy opened each birthday present!
Darcy working on her math this morning! She HATES the Dive CDRom that accompanies her Saxon Math curriculum this year...but her MOTHER likes it! She spent most of the lesson talking back to the Dive Instructor...being rather sarcastic with him...something she could NEVER do with her mother, were her MOTHER explaining the lesson to her! (Actually, she had me cracking up with some of her remarks and the falsetto voice in which she carried on her running dialogue with her on screen instructor!)  ¶ 9/18/2006 03:21:00 PM 2 comments

  Breaking News... I would like to announce the auspicious beginnings of a brand-new blog. About a year ago, Darcy abandoned this particular blog address...so, I (her mother!) took it over. But, as a new school year is beginning, Darcy learned that she was going to be required to "journal" this year. Given her choice of whether to do so in a spiral bound notebook (or in a bound journal, etc) or on her computer, she chose the computer. Given the options of just keeping a journal in "Word" that would be private (other than Mom checking spelling, punctuation, form, etc) versus journaling on a blog open for all to see, Darcy chose to blog. Thus, she is returning once more to the world of blogging. She set up her site today, but won't begin writing in earnest until Monday. Anyway, feel free to check in on her site regularly! You can find her at Batgirl's Blog. (Just click on the preceeding highlighted link.)  ¶ 9/17/2006 12:15:00 PM 1 comments

  I-M-N
A-CRO-NYM
...overload!

Say that like you are reading a line from Dr. Seuss!

I have been slammed by a barage of military acronymns in my new mileu...the VA. But, that isn't really what has fried my last remaining brain cells... It is all the PAIRED private sign-on monikers and verify codes that I am having to remember, keep straight, and type flawlessly in to NUMEROUS different applications a bazillion times a day. I can't keep straight which pair to use with what...not to mention which sign-on names go with which verify codes. I like to keep life simple...one code for EVERYTHING in the world...be it my personal computer, my e-mail accounts (there are three of them here at home, in addition to two at work, now), my e-bay code, my Sonlight curriculum ordering code, the site meter codes on both my blogs, etc, etc, etc.

Even at my former workplace, I used my well-worn, used for everything "secret word" to sign on to the software there and sign into the medication vending machine (not its technical name!). They encouraged us to "use at least one number and symbol and a mixture of capital letters and lower case letters to create a SECURE password". Forget it! I am into creating a password I can always remember...which is the one word I have used the last umpteen jillion years for EVERYTHING that requires a password. Simplicity in a world determined to be complicated.

My old workplace's software wasn't smart enough to detect if I chose to ignore the instructions on how to create a more secure password...just as it was also not smart enough to recognize that I used the same password for over six years even though we have to change them every 90 days. (You just change your password (as instructed!), but, then, promptly call the IT Help Desk and ask the technician who answers the phone if you can change your password. He establishes you are who you say you are, and then does something magically on his computer that resets your password to a word like, "happiness"...then you enter back into the system with that word and are immediately prompted to create a new user password...at which point, you can type in the same one you have been using for six years. The system is happy. You changed your password to something different when prompted at the 90 day interval. Then immediately called the Help Desk so you could change it once more. The system doesn't recognize that the FOURTH (and final) password is identical to the FIRST password that it, only moments earlier, insisted you get rid of!) Yes! A simple life. All is well. All is good. Passwords are never forgotten...they become familiar, old friends. Ahhh...those were the days.

And they are passed.

The VA's system KNOWS if I don't use at least 8 characters with symbols and numbers mixed in. I am instructed not to use any words that appear in the dictionary. And, 'lest I simplify my life and try to use one set of characters for EVERYTHING, they construct it so that I can't even use the same USER NAME in my many pairs of User Names/Verify Codes....aarggg! The other morning, on the way into work, I counted it up...I have TWELVE different user names and verify codes JUST FOR WORK, now. I can hardly figure out how to log on to anything (CPRS, KanVISTA, BCMA, PIXIS, Metaframe, the VA Internet Educational site...) because, even if I DO remember my various user names and passwords, I can't remember which ones fit together...and, even after I remember which ones are paired, I can't recall which pair goes with what program! Then, every door on our unit (not to mention every door on the OTHER units I float to) have locks that you must key in numbered squences in order to open...all different from each other, of course! I can understand the MED CARTS being locked...but, why do I have to know a sequential code just to open the door that guards the ICE MACHINE????!!! (There isn't ANYTHING in that closet sized room EXCEPT an ice machine and a water faucett that barely trickles the water out. But, we MUST keep it locked!!! An unathorized person might try to access our ice machine, after all!)

If I lose my hold on sanity, just chalk it up to acronym/password overload!





  ¶ 9/15/2006 07:34:00 PM 1 comments

  Do They Have Salsa in China?: It's a girl, and another girl!!!!!!!!!!!!! Do They Have Salsa in China?: It's a girl, and another girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Click on the link above to see the original referral announcement!!! One of the 517 comments the blog announcement received really interested me...that person observed that there had only been 50 twins referred from China since international adoptions began and, since there were just recently three sets of twins referred, she had been amazed that Mary-Mia and Rod received referrels for twins, too...the fourth set in just the last few months! (Grant and I requested twins when we were adopting Darcy...but, by the time we filled out the paperwork to adopt Rayna, I didn't even THINK of asking for twins until AFTER our paperwork had already been sent off to China (too late!). But, I'm glad for my absent-mindedness...because we NEEDED to get Rayna! (Actually, I am certain that even if we had ASKED for twins, we would have still gotten Rayna...even if she had been the only NON-TWINNER in the bunch! We DID request that our second baby be from JiangXi (like Darcy) and were surprised when the referrals came and one of our acquaintances in our same city, going through the same adoption agency, received a referral for a JiangXi baby the same day we got our referral for an AnHui baby (Rayna!)...the other couple hadn't indicated a geographical preference...yet, they got the JiangXi baby instead of us! And I am SO GLAD THEY DID!!!! Just goes to show me, I usually do not know WHAT to ask for!!!)

Anyway, click on the link above and see the adorable twins that will soon be arriving home in Texas! Then, click on the link in the post beneath this one and watch a video clip of the parents calling the grandparents with the news...that is just too much fun to watch!  ¶ 9/15/2006 07:18:00 PM 0 comments

  Do They Have Salsa in China?: The CNN-like video taping of the referral call Do They Have Salsa in China?: The CNN-like video taping of the referral call is just way too cool to watch! Congratulations Rod and Mary-Mia on the referral of your twin baby girls! May you receive speedy permission to enter China and bring your daughters home!  ¶ 9/15/2006 06:51:00 PM 1 comments

  Good-bye, Ellie... Well, I have been trying to talk Doug into freeing his pet hatchling ornamental box turtle for months now. We have had her since early this Spring. She has lived in a vivarium in Doug's room. She is a worry, though... She is such a persnickety eater that all we can get her to eat are meal worms (which, the literature warns are calcium deficient and a steady diet of them will cause shell deformities). We continue to offer her other little insects and things...but she holds out for those meal worms. I had gotten to where I sprinkled them with reptile vitamins...but, still I worried.

Lately, Ellie had begun refusing to eat the worms we set out for her...probably because the extra meal worms that she didn't eat at previous feedings had taken up residence in her vivarium and were there for her to hunt at her own leisure. (Probably the ones she hunted for herself tasted better since the vitamin powder had had time to wear off them!)

Dear little Ellie has to have a "bath" every day or two to keep her from dehydrating. Lately, I had taken to letting her hang out for a half hour or so in the bathroom sink (with the slightly warmed water only an inch and a half or so deep). Tonight, I put her in the sink with the usual warning to the two little kids, "No one go in the bathroom while Ellie is in there. I don't want anyone bothering her. Stay out of the upstairs bathroom." With that, I went downstairs to make several phone calls. Forty-five minutes later, I came upstairs to take Ellie back to her vivarium. I was horrified to find her swimming in a sink full of cold water...about six inches deep for a little turtle who is about one inch tall. I don't know how long she had been in that predicament. I only knew that she very easily could have tired in the cold water and drowned. Doug admitted to having added to her "bath" water. I told Doug that that was it. (There had been other times he had done things that had the potential of being detrimental to the turtle...doing so against the specific guidelines I had given him. But, this is the first time his actions could have seriously harmed her.) I told Doug he needed to let her go...immediately. He and Rayna took her outside in the dark and let her go in our front yard. No crying, no fussing...just matter of factly. (Well, Rayna tried to interject a little drama into it, but, she was over it two minutes later.) I think Ellie is probably well fed enough that she will weather her hibernation okay. Besides, she still has a while left before it will be time to burrow down for the winter, anyway. Maybe we will see her again one of these days. She has a deformity of first left toe that will make her easily identifiable no matter how much she grows and ages before she comes across our path again. It is a relief to me that we finally let her go. Turtles aren't dogs...they don't love their owners and ENJOY being pets...at least, that is my opinion. Ellie had grown used to us and ceased being fearful of us...but, I have no doubt that she is so much happier to be out in the yard tonight!  ¶ 9/14/2006 07:16:00 PM 1 comments

   
     ¶ 9/11/2006 07:16:00 PM 1 comments

  Sad Farewell... Saturday morning, Darcy led Lightening down our quarter mile private drive for the last time. The horses were taken to their new home...a summer camp for homeless and underpriveledged children run by City Union Mission. The camp, run by the Kansas City organization is located on 500 acres in Warsaw, Missouri by Truman Lake. The grounds were beautiful. In summers past, City Union Mission has borrowed privately owned horses to let the children ride. Lightening and Begins (Shadow) are the first horses to be OWNED by City Union Mission (thanks to Dad C's gift of the horses to them). One of the camp workers who lives on the grounds year round (along with his wife and their four children)came to our home Saturday morning to pick the horses up. I was so impressed with his way with the horses...very calm and patient and extremely knowledgeable. They are in very, very good hands...and they will bring a lot of joy to kids in the years to come who don't have very many opportunies.

Lightening look a little sad, himself, as he peered out of the trailer, just before beginning his journey to Warsaw.



But, oh the joy both horses exploded with at the end of their journey!


Both, clearly, approved of their new digs (just a very large holding corral that they will live in a few days before moving on to the HUGE pasture wating for them). They will REALLY roll and neigh when they see their permanent digs!

...Good-bye, old boys. We love you.  ¶ 9/09/2006 07:49:00 PM 2 comments

  VAMC...not your typical hospital... My orientation continues. As anticipated, the computer charting is TOTALLY different from anywhere else that I have ever worked. (It is always that way when you enter a new hospital system. Until you get familiar with the computer documentation specific to that hospital, it is enough to make your eyes glaze and your head throb! Oh well!)

But, other than my anticipated differences at the VA, (like the charting and, of course, it being the only hospital left of the probably 35-40 hospitals in the greater KC area and surrounding suburbs (both Kansas and Missouri sides) that still allows smoking), there have been a lot of UNEXPECTED differences. ....like, yesterday, when I found myself lost among all the unfamiliar military phrases and acronymns that are the daily lingo of that hospital. Today, I stupidly asked how they scan the bar codes on the supplies they pull to use for patients. In EVERY hospital around, they are downright anal about making sure the employees ALWAYS charge for each and every little thing they remove from the supply room to use for a patient. Not so at the VA...there is no patient specific accounting for the supplies. You just take what you need to care for your patient. No fuss, no muss, no bother!

I was struck by another difference, too.... No matter what hospital you go to, the entire litany of admission questions you must ask each patient is pretty much universal. Except at the VA! Today, as we went through the admission paperwork in our computer class, I was taken completely off guard by one of the questions that is standard to ask each patient..."Do you have any weapons on you? Are you carrying a gun?" In twenty six years of nursing, I don't guess I have ever even THOUGHT to ask any patient that! But, it is one of the required questions to be asked of every patient admitted to the VA. Guess it makes sense! But, it sure made me do a double take today when that question popped up on my admission screen!

I really like the hospital, the staff, the patients... and the equipment is the best I have ever worked with (all sorts of bells and whistles on the IV pumps that I never even KNEW existed!)... but, I HATE the computer documentation. I know it will probably be "nothing" once I am thoroughly familiar with it and used to using it, but, I just have to say, in this moment, in my opinion, it is a confusing quagmire of windows and screens and quite user-unfriendly. I wish every hospital system in the nation could all just use the same computer software! Sigh.
(Actually, OVERWHELMING is the term I think most accurately descibes my present view of the software used by the VA....but, this software can do ALL SORTS of things that I have never seen available in Medi-tech or some of the other hospital softwares that I have used in the past. I will probably love it once I get a handle on it.)
(Surprisingly enough, though, there are some very SIMPLISTIC things that were standard to document electronically other places I have worked that are still only done on paper at the VA....so ironic when their software is lightyears ahead of Meditech overall.) Who knows why!  ¶ 9/06/2006 04:19:00 PM 0 comments

  Beginning a new job... Well, today was my first day of orientation at the Veteran's Administration Medical Center! Definitely a different world! I can see that I will need to get accustomed to an entirely new vocabulary! There are so many military terms and acronymns used for EVERYTHING...makes it a bit more challenging to know WHAT is being said! It is a really FRIENDLY hospital, though, and I think I am going to like it a lot.  ¶ 9/05/2006 08:54:00 PM 0 comments

  Roll Call continues!

Yes, I am putting this entry back at the top of my blog! Those who have already written a comment here, thank you so very much! It has been fun to get to hear who you are! Some of you also have blogs and I have enjoyed getting to see them! (Hope you don't mind that I added them onto the side-bar of my own blog. The side-bar is just such a handy place for ME to keep track of the blogs that I want to follow...rather than trying to remember the addresses or having to go through my "favorites" drop down menu (which is WAY, WAY too cluttered up)!

If you read this blog and you haven't commented yet on this entry, please do so!

THANKS!!!!



(I snapped this photo today. All of our squirrels around here are red, except for this one. We have enjoyed watching this particular squirrel the past three years. At times, during the year, he looks almost ALL black except for his tail. He always looks, at least, like his little head and all four legs got dipped in chocolate! He is a pretty smart little guy. Most squirrels around our yard become dog snacks, but he has reached the ripe old age of three so far. I hope the dogs never catch him.)  ¶ 9/03/2006 05:36:00 PM 13 comments

 

  ¶ 9/02/2006 05:55:00 PM 2 comments

    ¶ 9/02/2006 05:49:00 PM 1 comments

 

Doug, Rayna, and their cousin Audra Jo had fun playing outside at two different parks today. In the frowning photo above, Audra was rebuking a rather large dog outside the fence park that was barking fiercely at Rivendell!  ¶ 9/02/2006 05:42:00 PM 1 comments