Croup, Coughing, and Crying

I’m pretty sure it happened on the trip to the pediatrician, I just don’t know if it was in the pediatrician’s office or in the play area the kid’s visited afterward. Either way, Child #4 caught a respiratory illness that meant croup for him. He’s had croup two other times and this was the worst, I think.

He was out of sorts, clingy, and crabby on Day 1 (about five days after the routine trip to the doctor’s for well-baby checks). That night, he had a cough that sounded somewhat whoopy to me but was able to sleep. Day 2 was coughy, clingy, and really crabby. That night, he woke up early with a fever. Later, he couldn’t breath well and was barking like a seal. We did all the usual treatments – steamy bathroom, five minutes outside in the cool/clear air, humidifier, warm tea (with some honey in it), and sitting up with him in a chair to keep him calm and upright.

By the time the doctor’s office opened the next morning, he was almost normal except for the on-going seal-like bark and light fever (100.4°F). The nurse wanted to see him anyway. He ended up with a prescription for a steroid anti-inflammatory that was VERY bitter.

We are now on Day 6 and our last day of the medicine. We have one more dosage to try to get him to swallow. (This is where the “crying” comes in from the title of the post.) The fever broke yesterday after hovering between 102-103 for 12-18 hours. He still has a cough, but he is definitely acting normal today.

Now, we wait to see if the other kids caught something from him. It might not show up as croup for them. More likely, it’ll start with a sore throat and end up with a fever, cough, and maybe a runny nose.

It hasn’t been easy on anyone. I don’t know how moms of multiples or single moms do it. It seemed that I was either dealing with the croupy toddler or the hungry baby most nights with lots of handwashing in between.

Translation Help

We recently opened a box of Cheerios® that had a children’s book in it. We’ve gotten these before, although it has been awhile. The kids look forward to this and we’ve found quite a few that have become favorites. The books in the cereal box don’t keep up well with the frequent handling and we’ve had to replace many of them with sturdier purchased ‘board book’ or soft cover.

Anyway, my oldest asked me why this one came in both English and Spanish. I explained that it was so people who speak Spanish can also read the book. She pondered this for a minute or so and came back to ask, “But what if you only speak Latin or French or Algebra?”

Singapore Math Problem

I saw a post on another blog (check the entry for December 29th) asking for help on a math problem. As a “regular” math problem, it is fairly straight forward and easy to solve. However, Singapore throws a curve into it by asking for it to be solved using a bar graph. Here’s the story problem:

“Albert had $16.10 less than Peter. After Peter gave $2.50 to Albert, he had 4 times as much money as Albert. How much money did Peter have at first?”

First, the algebraic way to set it up, just to get it out of my system. One sets up two simultaneous equations where A is the amount Albert had at first and P is how much Peter had at the beginning. One then solves for P.

A = P – $16.10
(P-$2.50) = 4*(A+$2.5)

But, as I said, Singapore wants this solved using a bar graph. That gets a bit trickier, but I’m assuming since Singapore also likes mental math that my solution is somewhat acceptable. Let me lay it out.

To rephrase the problem, Peter has $16.10 more than Al. That’s my first bar on my graph. Then, Peter gives $2.50 of his money to Al and the resulting amount that Peter has is four times how much Al has. So, Peter has four times Al’s original amount plus four times $2.50 plus another $2.50 that he subtracted from his amount.

When drawn graphically, one realizes quickly that if one cuts the original “P” bar down by an “A,” it is equal to the $16.10 from the original problem. Here are my two (not to scale) bars:

That leaves just some mental math to finish out the problem. 5*2.5 = 12.5 (as indicated on the side of the graph). $16.10 - $12.5 = $3.6 = three times Al’s original amount. Al’s amount is $1.20. That makes Peter’s original amount $17.30.

A double check of the solution of the simultaneous equation solution from above reveals the same amounts.

Do I know my solution is the one Singapore is looking for? No.

Does it get one there? Yes.

Carry on.

ER visit

I am not one who panics easily. I’m not one of those moms who takes their kids to the Emergency Room without a Darn Good Reason. One of those happened today, IMO.

It was lunch time and I had water heating up on the stove for some pasta. The kids were playing, including some hide & seek in the basement. I happened to be in the basement as well when suddenly Child #2 started screaming. This isn’t necessarily unusual, but the type of screaming was clearly that of a “pain” incident. I looked over to see her sitting down in the process of bringing a blanket over her head to hide under. Her hands were frozen near her head, her neck was semi-contorted, and she continued to scream while her eyes looked frantic.

I got her calmed down just enough to get her to tell me what was hurting. She said it felt like her heart was bursting. I ended up laying her down (no idea if that was a good idea or not) while I sent the other kids upstairs to get their shoes & socks on. I carried Child #2 upstairs. She was no longer screaming, but said her heart still hurt “a lot” and felt like it had flipped over. She had another incident while she was laying on the couch. She had a finger motion and a sound to show the flipping she thought her heart did. After her heart didn’t hurt as much, she said the pain went into her spine.

I had Child #1 watch #2 while I ran #3 & #4 across the street to a neighbor’s house. Children #1, 2, & 5 came with me to the local Emergency Room (ER) where they did a chest X-ray, EKG, blood work, and other monitoring. Her heart rate was okay and they couldn’t find anything that showed what happened. We were sent home with the request that we note any further incidents (date, time, what she was doing at the time) and to follow-up with our pediatrician in a couple of weeks. If she has frequent occurences, we are to follow-up sooner. Depending on how things go, she might get a monitor to try to catch an incident or be referred to a pediatric cardiologist. Or, we just might never know what happened.

I am glad everything checked out okay. I did some praying on the drive to the ER. I didn’t want to be thought of as someone who brings their kids into the ER for small cuts and bruises, but I would never forgive myself if I hadn’t taken her in and something ended up happening that could have been prevented. The nurses & physicians assistant that we saw were professional, very caring, thorough, and gentle with my young child. The physicians assistant called to consult with our non-local pediatrician. It all worked very well.

Thank goodness for our wonderful health system!

Drifting Snow

After the plow had gone a few times and the shoveling was done, we had quite the pile of snow at our mailbox. We get spotty mail delivery during the bad snowy weather. I can’t imagine trying to deliver under these conditions.

Side story: I used to be a newspaper carrier and I still have nightmares that involve me forgetting my “list” of who to deliver to. My whole family remember the blizzard of ‘87 when we delivered the Sunday papers using sleds because of the heavy snow. We were late – but they were all delivered by 1 p.m. (We took a break to attend Church and then headed back out to finish delivering.)
Looking out our back door, there is quite a drift. It reaches up to the ledge on the grill. It was quite a storm.

Christmas Eve Night / Christmas Day

It was cold, dark, & snowy. All the children headed to bed, some to read, some to actually sleep. I found two in the same (twin-size) bed, but decided to let them stay that way.

I wrapped the one present we have for each child from us and placed them around the base of the Christmas tree. I left the Christmas lights on when I went to bed, so St. Nicholas could find the chocolate chunk cookies & milk the children left out for him. I fed the baby, told Child #1 to turn out her light, and went to sleep myself.

The baby woke at 2 a.m. for a feeding. I checked the living room. Baby Jesus had arrived in our little creche scene. St. Nicholas had not yet arrived.

The baby was up again at 4 until around 4:30 (diaper change, food, burping, more food). Soon after, Child #2 appeared in my room to request that Child #3 be removed from her small bed. Transfer was completed and I assume St. Nicholas had arrived at the house by this point. I did not check the living room at this point because I figure Child #2 would have followed me and probably never gone back to sleep.

Child #1 was the first one up. Spouse’s work called at 7 a.m. to see if he could come in as one of the other guys couldn’t get out in the blizzard-like conditions. Spouse spent an hour attempting to get out onto a main road from our house. After digging himself out three times within two blocks, he returned in time to get ready to head to Mass. He called to let them know he couldn’t get out either, but they’d found two others that were going to try to make it in.

I confirmed with the phone message on our Church’s answering machine that services were still going to take place. It only took about thirty minutes to get everyone ready in all their snow gear and another ten to fifteen to walk the four blocks. During the time we were bundling up, the plow cleared half of our route. That was great since the stinging snow was hitting directly in our faces during that half of our trek. Children #1 & 2 walked. Children #3 & 4 were pulled in a sled. Child #5 was wrapped in one blanket and ’slung’ in my ring-sling. Then, I wrapped another warm blanket completely around said child to keep his head out of the blowing snow and wind.

We have a little more than a foot on the ground over the top of ice. More is coming down every hour. I’m glad we don’t have to go out.

Snow Days

Within the last few weeks, we’ve had several days of ice & snow that have caused the local schools to shut down. In fact, there was one week when we had mail delivery only three days out of six.

We continued to have school here on all those days. We had to reschedule a field trip because the place we were planning on going was closed due to the weather. So, we did a complete day of school that day, too.

We’re doing half-days this week and next (not including Christmas Eve, Christmas, and New Years). Math is every other day. Spelling is every day, although a shorter lesson each day. Science is every day (since we need to get through more lessons in that than any other subject).

Speaking of Science, we’ve had some fun experiments lately in our God’s Design for Chemistry book. We made whipped cream and butter one day when we were studying milk. We dissolved LifeSavers (TM) yesterday (cold water vs. room temperature water vs. hot water, crushed vs. whole, and still/moving tongue around in our mouths) as part of our lesson on ’solutions.’ We made mayonnaise today as part of our lesson on ’suspensions.’

The two kids took a quiz on Monday on mixtures, elements, and compounds. After they tried it by themselves, we used it as a review activity instead of a ‘grading opportunity.’ So they both got all the questions correct after going over everything three times.

The kids have gotten plenty of opportunity to go outside to play in the snow. They climb snowdrifts, throw snowballs, slide down various hills, play with the neighbor kids (who are out of school either on a snow day or for Christmas break), and get themselves cold & wet on a regular basis.

I found some snow pants for the older two at a local resale shop and had some just the right size for Child #3 already. Only Child #4 lacks them although he tends to stay out just as long no matter how cold & wet he is. The only time he comes to complain is if he lost a glove. It appears to be his Achilles ‘hand’ (so to speak).

Science . . . Again

As I continue in our science studies this year, I can’t help but think about next year. I already know I’m not going to continue to use God’s Design, even with the new (full color) design because the Physics level texts are too high level for my youngsters. (The Chemistry ones are too high level, IMO, and that was a mistake.) I was leaning toward Science in a Nutshell kits or TOPS. Then, I thought maybe I might just go ahead and break the bank with NOEO.

I revisited my curriculum post from almost a year ago. It reminded me of Pandia Press. I’m relooking at their Chemistry curriculum and wondering if it is too late to start over with their course. (I’m only slightly joking.) I’m not ready to switch (yet), but I saw a sample page on their website about explaining states of matter and it seems to do a better job of speaking to my kid’s level. (It is designed for Grades 2+. God’s Design for Chemistry is designed for Grades 3+.)

But while I was there, I checked out the blog of Pandia’s owner. This blog piece caught my eye. It is a brief review of a speech given at a homeschool convention.

Many homeschool moms and I have discussed this topic. One of the homeschooling Yahoo groups I am on is currently discussing the problem of selecting a “good” science curriculum, especially for the high school level. I agree, in principle, with what she is saying. (I don’t agree with everything she says in the blog piece. I do agree with the basic premise.) It is hard to find a science (or history) curriculum that doesn’t have an “agenda.” I, too, would rather the agenda be front & center so I can either steer clear of it, embrace it (if that is what I wish), or Sharpie it out.

Three States of (what) Matter

At the beginning of a recent science class, I was reviewing what we have learned recently. I started with, “The three most common states of matter on the earth are . . . ” I paused, waiting for the kids to chime in.

My #2 child piped up, “Solid, liquid, and gratitude!”

Science Quiz

After much deliberation, I choose to purchase Answers In Genesis’s God’s Design for Chemistry series for our science this year. As it is designed for Grades 3-8, it is a bit of a stretch for our young family. I figured my (young-for-her-grade) 3rd grader would grasp most of it and my first grader would be along for the ride. They both love experiments and the texts (Properties of Matter & Properties of Atoms & Molecules) have a fun activity or experiment almost every single lesson.

Both have really struggled grasping the concepts. I didn’t realize how much trouble they would have. The first quiz (Lessons 1-4 in Properties of Matter book) didn’t go the greatest. But the second was really dismal. The older child grasp the concepts as shown in the short answer portion of the quiz but doesn’t have a clue on the terminology. The younger child can figure out the terminology as shown by her fairly decent score in the matching portion of the quiz but doesn’t get the underlying concept.

But that’s not why I’m posting about this. I just wanted to share Child #2’s answer on one of the “short answer” questions because it had me rolling with laughter. I must set this up by saying that 1) we studied astronomy last year and 2) the chemistry text discussed the concept of buoyancy with examples of swimming in a pool filled with rubbing alcohol (where we would likely have issues staying afloat) and a pool filled with mercury (which would be a bad idea, obviously, but where we would easily stay afloat) due to the different material densities.

Quiz question: “If an object floats in one liquid but sinks in another, what does that tell you about the densities of the two liquids?”

Child #2 answer, “The one that sinks is probably rubbing alcohol and the other is probably Saturn or Uranus or something you can float on.”

[Obviously, she was trying to think of the word "mercury" and substituted names of two other planets instead.] Is this funny to anyone else or is it one of those “you had to be there” moments?