Sale meat, pustules and poison ivy...

When I started this blog just a little over a year ago I imagined that I would blog a lot about home decorating and thrift stores. I had no idea how much of this blog would be about pus and misery.

First the good news:

I haven't used the dryer in over a week! Take that NStar! My umbrella clothes line has completely revolutionized my life. I can now do all of the wash in one day. I just wait for a day of sun and start washing and hanging. By the end of the day everything is dry. The children have been complaining about stiff towels, but I am teaching them to appreciate the exfoliating benefits of towels which have a faintly cardboard consistency to them.

In other news I have become a little old lady in my grocery shopping habits. Each week I scour the grocery ads for which store has the best sales on meat and produce. Lately I have been going to the Stop and Shop, which is generally a store I hate because the employees all seem to be suffering from major depression. I avoided the store for years, but have recently returned because they have personal scanner guns. I love these little machines. You scan each item and bag it right in your cart. Easy peasy and no getting sucked into a conversion with the grocery checker about why life is futile. Anyway, the Stop and Shop also puts $2 off coupons on meat the day before the "sell by" date. That is how I bought six chickens for $12 and twelve pork chops for $8. That's right recession! Who's laughing now?

The bad news:

David spent about a week in complete poison ivy induced misery. He was nearly completely covered. I say nearly, because I know that you are all wondering if the poison ivy affected his other injury. It did not, thank you gods of scrotal sanctity. David's poison ivy did provide us with some entertainment in the form of a rousing game of "Would You Rather?"

"Would you rather lose a testicle or have poison ivy for a month?"
"Would you rather have poison ivy for year or be impotent?"
"Would you agree to a year of poison ivy in exchange for one million dollars?"

Once he started a prescription for steroids we had to stop playing "Would You Rather?" because the roid rage set in and we just avoided him until it wore off.

Now that you know all about David's agony, we can play "Who's Got Pus?" Usually you can bet on Lily because she likes to play in dirt, however this time the bad boy of bacteria is Pugsley who has acute dermatitis. His little arms, legs and belly are covered in weepy pus filled blisters. Bless his sweet pug heart, he is now getting daily baths and an antibiotic. No roid rage though, and so for that I am grateful.

How not to paint.

This is not a tutorial. This is not how Martha would paint her child's room.

Let me start this story by saying that predisone is sort of messing me up a bit. The poison ivy is no longer oozing and not as itchy. However, when my doctor mentioned that the side affects included difficulty sleeping I wasn't too worried, because people, I was tired. And while it took me a bit longer to fall asleep, it wasn't unbearable. What was unbearable was waking up at 3am and being *Up*. I laid there for a while. Wrote a snarky comment on TJIC's blog. Checked my email. Read a bit on the kindle iphone app. I think I finally fell back to sleep around 4:30. Then at 6:30 I was up and dealing with the dogs and kids and all the fun that goes along with getting everyone out of the house.

At some point in my day I realized that I was walking around only half engaged in my world. That is the only explanation I have for what happened when the children and I got home from school.

Internet, I invited my children, ages 7 and 10, to prime the walls of Rebecca's room with me. Lily was assigned the bottom portion of the wall, Rebecca the middle portion of the wall and I did the top. Did we tape the woodwork you ask? No. Too boring and time consuming- it's easier to just touch up the woodwork afterwards. Did we use a dropcloth? Nope. Did we wear gloves? That would be no.

The walls are primed. As is most of the floor. Except for the parts of the floor that got the white paint scratched off. So pretty much the room is a disaster, but a very manageable disaster. Mothers know a lot about manageable disasters. The best part about this project was how much fun we all had. The kids were blissed out to be allowed to do such an adult job and they worked hard, didn't bicker and did their best. We also chatted the entire time about this and that and a bit of nonsense too. They enjoyed the work, the kind of physical work that leaves you tired and satisfied.

When it became obvious that we had accomplished all that was going to be accomplished, I sent them to the tub to scrub the paint off of each other. I wish I had taken a picture of them before the bath. They were very, very pink.

Here are some pictures of the floor- including the part of the floor that I never painted because that's where the gigantic bed with drawers goes.


This is what the bathtub looked like after the kids scrubbed the paint off of themselves.

And here are Rebecca's legs after the bath.


Hope to post less disasterous photos tomorrow. Until then, please steroid gods let me sleep.

Itchy oozy gross, but a good day none the less!

Prepare yourselves for a lame blog post today. Today has been crazy busy with some real high points. These high points would include getting a prescription for prednisone from my doctor so that this horrible oozy gross leperous poison ivy will heal. I wish I were exaggerating. I did take a picture of just how disgusting it looks and I know you are all desperate to see it, however I must spare your vision. It is that bad.

On a happier note, I expanded my meager horizons by doing something crazy. I had my prescription filled at Target. It felt so wrong to buy drugs at the same place I buy cute dresses and housewares. I worried that the pharmacist was going to be wearing one of those red shirts and a radio so that he could announce to the store, "I have a guest with an itchy oozy rash. Who will respond to our guest with the itchy oozy rash?" Believe it or not, it turned out that they have real pharmacists who are very helpful. Not as helpful as Pierre who is my regular pharmacist as Walgreens. I love Pierre. He understands me like no other. He knows that if I come in with a child he should fill that kids prescription stat! He's a little sweet on me I think. Anyway, I love him.

Other highlights of the day included eating two, yes internet you read that right, two cupcakes. Because I am a grown-up and I can. I love being a grown-up. Being a kid is all about cupcake deprivation. I also got some great painting done in Rebecca's room. We decided to use Benjamin Moore's "Marshmallow Bunny". I love that name. That's what I will name my next dog.

The kids were amazing tonight. We all hung out playing and organizing. Rebecca even decluttered! So awesome. I even sniffed them when they were awake today. I found them that irresistible.

Will definitely post some room pictures, but in the meantime know that I have given you a great gift- the gift of *not* seeing my itchy oozy rash.