Fire.

The last several days have been even busier than usual. I’m trying to get everything in order before I go in for surgery on Thursday. I will be completely incapacitated for a few weeks and at least partially incapacitated for the remainder of my six-week recovery period. In addition to getting the household and animal care stuff taken care of, I’ve been trying to get some of the xmas shopping done. I won’t be moving well and don’t think I’ll be up for shopping anytime before xmas.

Friday night we took the kids to the library (we had Hunter for the majority of the weekend), so I could load up on reading material to keep me busy while I’m lying worthlessly in bed. While I combed through the science sections to find the books on my long list of desired titles/authors, M. was helping the kids find their desired books. Since the checkout period for our library is three weeks with one renewal allowed (for another three weeks), I try to limit the number of books the kids get to a realistic number that they can get through in three weeks. M. does not share my philosophy. I had a completely full basket and so did each of the kids. We did not have the foresight to bring a canvas carrying bag. That left us with the task of figuring out how to get 44 books out to the car. We each took as big of a stack as we could carry and managed to make it out to the car and get them dumped into the trunk without any droppage. Whew! Now we have mountainous stacks of books all over the house, though. I am so looking forward to reading these awesome books. I’m making myself wait until after the surgery, even though I want to jump in right now.

Saturday night I was able to get a little xmas shopping done by attending an open house for Jinja Jewelry (at Rotary Gardens). Jinja Jewelry is made by the women in Uganda and all money goes directly to them. The majority of the people of Jinja live in poverty, and I love that they are able to use their amazing talents to their direct benefit. It was the highlight of my weekend to be able to knock off some shopping, get absolutely gorgeous, high-quality jewelry, and help some wonderful people in need. There were so many beautiful pieces—all handmade and all completely unique. It was really, really hard to choose just a few and even harder not to buy all the pieces that I wanted for myself. I did cheat a bit by buying myself a pair of earrings. It took all of the self-discipline I had to walk away from the rest. The website is on the link above. Having seen the stuff in person, I can assure you that the photos on the website don’t begin to do justice to the beauty and variety of merchandise they have. It’s a great way to do xmas shopping!

Sunday, in between chores and errands, we had our Petland protest. It was cold. Really cold. We were not dressed appropriately for the weather and suffered greatly. I really hate to be cold. L. spent the last half hour of the protest in our running car, as she was so cold and miserable she couldn’t take it anymore. We had 15 people show up, which was shocking considering the nasty weather. We had so much positive feedback! The entire time we were out there we had horns honking and thumbs up from cars passing by. It was pretty exciting. Our undercover spy let us know that the business is doing quite poorly. We are so thrilled! I think they are finally on their way out!

L. has been struggling a lot lately with my upcoming surgery. She is afraid I’m going to die. She doesn’t want me to be away in the hospital for so long. We do our best to comfort her and make her feel better, but there isn’t too much we can do other than remain positive and never let her know of the risks. She has been talking for the last week about wanting to go see Madagascar 2 with the four of us—Mark and me, and my parents. That is really unusual for her. She usual designates a person that she wants to go with, sometimes it’s both Mark and me, but she has never asked to go with the four of us. She has been extremely insistent about it. I think it provides her with some comfort to do something with the four most important people in her life. Because of her stress lately, the four of us went with her yesterday, spending money we really didn’t have to see a movie we didn’t particularly want to see. She was so happy and laughed her earth-brightening laugh through the whole movie. It was worth it to go, just to see her so relaxed and happy.

Then we left the movie and it all went to hell. M. and I noticed that the car didn’t sound or feel right. He pulled over by Home Depot, which had just closed. This becomes important, because I had to pee when we left the theater but didn’t want to hold everyone up and decided I could make it home. It would’ve been fine, except for the flat tire. All the businesses around had closed and I was in desperate need of a bathroom. M. and my dad, for reasons unknown to me, decided not to try the can of fix-a-flat that was in my trunk and started to change the tire. I sat in the car wishing I had just gone at the damn theater. At least we got to sit in the warm car, though. The poor guys were freezing outside. They got the spare on and we made it to my parents’ house (closer than mine) without any accidents (on my part). Whew. That whole experience sucked. We still have to get the tire in and hopefully repaired rather than replaced. We got home in time to finish up the rest of our chores and get the little one to bed.

We ran L. to the doctor after I got back in town tonight. She was complaining of a sore throat, headache and said it hurt to breathe. She had a strange bump in her throat as well. Given that I will be going into the hospital for a while this week, I wanted to get her looked at right away. I can't worry about my baby being sick and deal with surgery. Her regular ped didn't have openings, so we took her to our friend, another ped. in the same practice. He's a very good doctor and took lots of time with her. The bump in her throat is overactive lymph tissue, due to the virus she has. She should be fine in a few days. My voice is coming and going randomly, and I'm hoping it's due to sinus issues but is realistically most likely the same virus she has.

We got snow today, and it actually stayed. It's only about 1/10 of an inch, but it's still too much, too soon. We're having our first fire of the season tonight, so it's time for me to turn off the computer, enjoy the fire, and cuddle my girl.

She insisted that I take a pic of her that looks like she's holding fire in her bare hands. Here it is.