Forgot to post about prom and graduation, oops!

In all of the chaos about MIL, I forgot to post anything about prom or graduation.  Middle DD went to her Sr. prom early in May (don't even remember the date, LOL) and looked sooo pretty!  She found the dress in our local mall and it was pretty cheap as prom dresses go.  I splurged and got her sparkly shoes and a handbag too.  She went with a group of girl friends, no dates and had a great time. 

 

Then the first weekend in June, she graduated, hooray!  It was a beautiful day and we had a terrific party on the deck - just a simple cookout with family and some of her friends.  There was a lot of painting and cleaning going on outside the house to get ready though!  And Marci was a huge help because the boyfriend got to come to the party too, and it was her first chance to introduce him to the extended family .  All in all it was a wonderful day and I think we all had a great time.

 

 Marci gave every single piece of lawn furniture a fresh coat of red paint, well, in between texts to Collin of course, LOL

Aunt Colleen used deck cleaner to freshen up the deck so we could paint it, but we ran out of rain-free days to paint it, so it was clean and pretty but not painted for the party.

 

We painted the insets of the front porch columns red to see if it would be nice and it was pretty sharp looking so we kept it.  I really wasn't certain at first and almost painted the first one white again!

 

We had a simple buffet of hot dogs and burgers, Marci's bean dip, baked beans, potato salad, and chips.  And of course, cake from Aunt Colleen!  (gee, the siding on the house looks filthy!  I don't think it was really that bad in real life?)

Glad we got this family shot, so often we get busy at these special day events and forget to get a picture of all of us together.  Especially if I'm taking the pix, I forget to give the camera to someone else and let them get all 5 of us (well, plus gr'ma and gr'pa in this photo). 

These are Ellen's friends, actually, not a very good pix, but it's kind of neat because you can see Robert, the one looking at her.  Turns out he likes her, and they have even gone on a few dates as of the writing of this post.  They worked together at Chuck E Cheese and he was the first one to arrive at the party - even was about 10 minutes early, I think he likes her :)

 

This was Ellen looking at her hope chest after the boys carried it up to the deck from the barn - thank you Chad, Collin, Robert & Leelynn!  The front panel slides over and reveals padded, hanging storage for necklaces.  In the background (L to R) are Gr'ma Bobbie, Robert, Collin & Marci.

 

Her pretty cakes, with her diploma and an awesome pix of her marching her freshman year.  She didn't have senior pix taken, but this one was from family pix done in January.

Our graduate, mostly she's glad the graduation is done and the hanging out could start!

A little bumpy at first . . . .

All seemed to go well when we dropped off middle DD at college.  Got her moved in and went out to a late lunch, even bought a few things at the big WM that we forgot to bring.  Interestingly, DH pointed out that DD shouldn't be surprised to become an odd man out.  Her two suitemates were black and she is not.  He said he just got a feeling that those girls were going to hang out and DD would be left out.

When I got up on Saturday AM, I found a text from 4:15am that pretty much confirmed that DH had been correct and that he had perceived a bad situation before any of us could even imagine it.  Her text said, "If they keep making me feel bad about myself, I'm coming home.  I don't want to have to hide under my blankets afraid to sleep every night while that Kayla girl parades her friends in and out and shit talks me.  She didn't even bother to learn my name, mom.  I'm "That little white girl."  *sigh*  By Saturday evening she was begging to come home and enroll in the local community college.  From the texts my mom and sister were getting it was clear that DD was afraid for her safety and her belongings.  The two suite mates had been drinking and partying in the shared living room the night before with several friends over - strangers to DD.  She over heard them admitting to wanting to get her out of the room so that they could get one of their friends as their roommate instead.  I talked to the Campus Police and the Asst. Director of her dorm - who was a very nice fellow and he took care of it.  I told him that she was being bullied and was afraid for her safety and he managed to get her moved into a new room on a different wing in less than 30 minutes! 

But, that meant we drove back down there (2.5 hours!) on Sunday to be sure she was settled back in ok and feeling better.  We got her bed lofted and situated her furniture.  Her 2 suite mates seem very nice and everyone who was involved (RA's etc.) were astonished at the level of racism that was being aimed at DD.  They were glad to get her out of there and really glad they could turn this experience around.  If we had brought her home Saturday night, I'm certain that her college career would have been over.  She was so traumatized that she would never have gone on a campus for school again.

Two interesting things that let me know that God was in control of the whole thing:  When I wrote her address down Thursday at work, I wrote it down wrong, transposed some of the numbers.  So when I mailed the package on Saturday I mailed it to the wrong room.  I figured it out Saturday afternoon and figured I'd tell her on Monday to let the mail folks know to be watching for it by name, not room number.  When she text her sister the new room . . . . . it was 207 A - yep, the room I'd mailed the box to and the room I'd written down for all the family members, on Thursday.  God knew all along that she wouldn't' be in 270A, he had his hand on her protecting her and guiding the journey.  Also, even though I looked and looked in the van on Friday, I couldn't find my camera.  So we had no pix of her first day at college.  But when we went back on Sunday, it was right there in the van.  So we took pix and we all decided that Sunday was her first day at college, the previous two days were just a bad horror movie, LOL!

She has had a great first week.  Classes going well and no retaliation from the other girls.  She is even hanging out with my friend's daughter (who is having roommate trouble too - hers is drinking and getting into her stuff without permission, ugh.)  They are headed to a movie night on campus tonight so that should be fun, and she should be starting her campus job next week.  I'd say she's off and rolling! 

 

 

And now for the good stuff!!

We are taking the middle child to college tomorrow, wow!  It's about a 2.5 hour drive, so we are leaving about 6am.  Tonight we'll finish packing up the car.  She has about half of her stuff packed because it came from Gr'ma's when she moved out yesterday. But all the things I've been amassing for her (hamper, sheets, towels, cleaning stuff, food, etc.) still needs loaded up. 

It's been a long week.  My friend Angie is on vacation and I'm cleaning the dialysis clinic for her while she's gone.  But that has made each day jam packed and scheduled to the minute.  Last night is a good example - Mom & Jim wanted to take us out to celebrate DD going to college.  So I worked from 8-4, then drove to MIL's and DD loaded all her moving out boxes up and we went home.  She unloaded a couple that are not going to college, and we got back in the car with littlest one and made it to the restaurant right at 5:30pm.  Left there at 7pm to go to mom's and we visited for a half hour, then I took both DD's home and switched out of my work clothes and made it to the clinic by 8:35 - just 5 minutes late to meet Jerrod who is cleaning with me.  Home from that by 10:30 pm.

Now here is where it got interesting.  I hadn't fed or watered the chickens in cages inside the coop for several days - just kept forgetting because I'm so busy.  So I thought I'd better do that before I shut the coop up for the night.  I prepared the bottles for their cages and grabbed a flashlight.  As I got close to the coop and fluffy animal, a cat maybe?  Waddled into the coop -- WAIT, is that a white tail?  OH, and is the kitty mostly black????   UM, YIKES~ that would be what you call a Skunk, not a cat!!  So needless to say, the birdies had to wait until this AM to get water and food, and they slept with the coop door open as well, LOL!  Luckily, the coop doesn't smell like it had a skunk visitor last night, phew!

I have a great quilt on the frame, Dresden plates in 1930's fabrics, it's just so cute!  And I have a great quilting plan too.  So wouldn't you know it, my front handle switch went out, UGH!  DH is going to swap it for the back handle switch (hopefully today) because it has to be soldered, and that is beyond my capabilities.  He's going to drive down to the college tomorrow so I can work on some embroidery for a commissioned baby quilt.  I'd like to get it onto the frame and quilted next weekend after hopefully finishing the Dresden plates this weekend.  Delivering those will give our propane fund a big boost!

Work is mostly the same, although it's worth pointing out that I've been here 10 years on the 18th!  Wow, that went quickly.  I'm glad for all the special people I've met here and I do think that working here played a role in getting DH into a church and all of us to where we are today in our new church.  God had a plan all along, as he always does!

But the Mother-in-law might be crazy :0)

Started this post July 17:

Well, we made one more trip to the ER on Friday, May 30th - middle of the night again of course.  Turns out the water pill that she was to take "as needed" and when I'd ask if she didn't think she should take one - she'd say no, she was just fine - ----- well, she needed to be taking it.  She was retaining fluid and it was getting on her lungs causing her to be short of breath.  There was a fight in the exam room between her and the daughter when we discovered that she should have been taking it but wasn't.  The daughter had been pointing out her swelling feet and suggesting she was retaining fluid too.  So of course, MIL was defensive and arguing that "that's fine, I just won't call or bother any of you anymore" and again saying we were to stay away from her doctor visits, she wants to be in the office alone with the Dr. (she thinks we are conspiring with him I guess.)

SO, we headed home and had an appointment with family doctor &; the heart Dr. on Monday June 2nd.  I expected her to fuss about me going in but she acted like nothing ever had happened or been said about it.  We just waltzed in there like normal.  She was happy that he told her she could stop taking the bladder pill (she'd not taken it since April or so?) and the tummy pill (that she hadn't taken since MARCH!) so she feels like she got a victory.  But he said the water pill is a must and all the others are too.  He gave her prescriptions for the ones that didn't have refills left  - that was cool, I wish my Dr. looked at all my Rx's on my visit and wrote new scripts for those that needed them.  inevitably, I discover that I'm out of refills and need more meds, a week or so after a visit!  Murphy's law!

Finished the post August 14:

Ended up having a big blow up with MIL the last Saturday in June.  I had gone over to pick up DD for work, but MIL & her daughter were already fussing (I'd already been called a name by MIL even!)  We ended up discussing lots of stuff that has been going on, trying to clear the air.  But it became apparent to me that MIL was just being combative.  She has been "off" the last few weeks.  I brought up that she's been difficult and cranky towards me for the last two weeks but she wouldn't admit it or give me a reason.  The daughter went into MIL's room to look for some paper RX's and MIL followed her.   MIL was trying to grab daughter and daughter was swatting her away.  There was no physical "altercation" but some swatting of hands.  Also, in the Living room, MIL got up from her seat to attack a couple times and daughter stood up to her and kept her hands up defensively.  One of the times MIL was going to hit me, and I didn't even realize it later until I was told.  There was shouting and the whole confrontation was bad.  MIL used her emergency device to call for help, saying "These girls are here and they are being mean to me and some one needs to come and make them leave."  It was sad and kinda pathetic.  The Sherriff's deputy arrived and we stepped outside.  He talked to MIL and she said that she was doing just fine, keeping up with her chores and the animals, but we are trying to put her in a home and she doesn't want to go.  We told him that she had been irrational of late and displaying temper and anger that are not normal.  Many of the things she is saying are not true, but we are not able to discern if she is lying or delusional.  He had us leave because she wanted us to, and she doesn't want either of us back in her home.  *sigh*  She will ask her neighbor to take her to town today, and I guess she'll lean on her for errands from now on.

UPDATE: Since I "got fired" by MIL, as I'm calling it.  I have only returned into the house twice, to help my DD take something in or out, and once to use the phone (ours was out.)  I've spoken to the neighbor and indeed, MIL asked her to be her caregiver, BUT, neighbor said "No, I have a house and a job, I can't do that, but I will take you to town for errands and doctor appts. when I can"  But MIL is telling everyone that the neighbor is her caregiver.  The day I was there to use the phone, MI L took the truck out of the garage and headed to town.  I said, "I didn't know the Doctor released you to drive" and she responded that she could do anything she wants  now.  It is worth noting that she didn't say "The doctor said I can do anything I want"  She is doing anything she wants because no one is supervising her anymore.  My dd was still there up until last night when she moved out for college, and she was keeping an eye on her.  But now, MIL has it just the way she wanted it - no one caretaking and she is in complete control.  Unfortunately, that means she is taking risks she shouldn't (mowing the yard, going up and down stairs -- with laundry baskets in her hands even, driving, and not taking meds if she doesn't think she needs them., etc.)  I can pray for her safety and health, but that's it.  I'm sure she will get herself into a medical crisis (my money is on her stopping her water pill AMA) and end up in the ER, then we can step back in and hopefully the Doctors can get her to understand that her health and mental status don't support her being alone any more.

I'm not crazy!

If I am honest, I'd admit that I have been a little concerned about my memory lately.  For years now, I've had a problem with forgetting the key word in a sentence, usually nouns.  I will start to say the wrong word and usually catch myself, but the really strange thing is -- the wrong word will nearly always start with the same letter -- go figure, LOL.  I've gotten used to it, and even joke about it.  But then there have been a few other oddities.  Here at work, I was working on the newsletter in Publisher and forgot how to delete extra pages.  This is something that I've done many, many times.  But on that particular morning, I couldn't for the life of me remember how to do it.  It took about 15 minutes to stumble across how it's done.  Gotta say, that was a little unnerving.  Then I showed up to work one morning an hour late - just lost an hour.  I was proud of myself for being on time - but then looked at the clock in the car as I pulled in, and saw it was NINE o'clock, not eight o'clock!  No idea what happened.  I mean, I didn't go driving off in a blackout or anything, just somehow I wasn't in the timeframe I thought I was.  It was disconcerting to be sure.  The other big thing was when I travelled to Ohio to pick up Ellen's hope chest and got lost.  I was misplaced for 2 hours.  I stopped for directions after the first misstep, and when told to turn Left, I took a right and didn't realize it.  I just kept getting further off track.  I wasn't afraid, but once I got home, I was concerned that I could get so lost even with help/directions.

But today, I took an online test and it looks ok.  So it must just be normal 47 year old brain fade, LOL!  Of course, that's what everyone has been saying, but still it feels good to find out "for sure."  I guess I'll just have to do all the normal healthy things -- eat well, get good sleep, try not to stress out over the MIL stuff.

Speaking of which, the MIL headed to the ER a week after Max's bday, at about midnight. She'd been short of breath, dizzy and headache for days.  The doctor said all these were symptoms of her AFib. They gave her a new Rx to try to control her AFib and regulate her heart rate.  We headed home about 3 am.  And by Sunday morning, she was sure that the new med was causing her all kinds of trouble!  "They make me tired, they give me a headache, they "work" on my stomach"  etc.!  At her Monday heart Dr. appt. the nurse practitioner changed her med.  On Wednesday, as I was getting home with the groceries, I got a call from Ellen at MIL's (half day of school) she was short of breath and thought she should go to ER again.  This time they admitted her.  She had a urinary tract infection, and the Dr. wanted to look more at her heart function because her kidney function numbers weren't good.  The next day the Dr. said her heart was good (still AFib, but not having Cardiac failure, heart attack or anything like that.) and they think the UTI was causing the problems.  So they kept her on the IV antibiotics and the new Rx for her AFib. 

She got out on Friday, and was able to attend G'son's graduation.  It sure wore her out though!  Her pills have been troublesome though since they added two and changed the time they want her taking the blood pressure pill.  I got her to use the pill box, setting it up on Saturday, but still having trouble getting her to take the BP pill at 5pm, she keeps taking it at noon.  She fussed at me one day after I  asked if she took her meds, and now is saying she doesn't want anyone going into the office with her when she sees her Dr.  That's a bad, bad idea.  The Dr. won't get accurate info about what is going on with her, and we will never get accurate info about what course of treatment the Dr. wants her to follow.  When I came in on Monday she said she hadn't slept well because her tummy was upset all night.  I asked if it was something she ate and her reply was "No, I know exactly what caused it and I'm going to be talking to my Dr. about it and get this fixed up once and for all."  Translation:  She thinks the pill she took before bed (her blood thinner) caused her upset tummy so she's going to try to quit taking it.  If she goes to the appt. without anyone in the room with her, she is likely to come out and tell us the Dr. said she didn't have to take it anymore - lie right to our faces and stop taking her most important pill just because she "believes" it is causing trouble. *sigh*  But I'm doing my best to encourage her, and monitor her pills unobserved, without getting completely tangled up in stress and worry.  I can not work harder at keeping her on track than she is willing to work at it herself. 

Our first fight *sigh*

I jinxed myself!  I was looking at the calendar last Monday night and kinda patting myself on the back that it had been 10 weeks of taking care of the mother-in-law, and it's gone well.  Sure enough!  The very next day we she and I got into a humdinger of a fight, our first biggie!  And of course, it was over medicine.

We had gone to do her grocery shopping, and she picked up a bottle of Aleve to put in the cart.  I took it out of her hands and reminded her that she couldn't take that, the Dr. specified Aleve as a no-no when they went over her discharge instructions.  I remember her daughter getting right in her face and telling her "Now Mom, you can't take Aleve anymore because of you new medicine."  And when they got home, the daughter threw out any bottles of Aleve in the house.  After a heated discussion, I gave in and let her put it in the cart.  I figured that when I loaded the groceries in the car, I'd pull the bottle out of her sack and put it in one of mine.  Unfortunately, she must have smelled that plan on me, because when we got to the car she began rummaging through the sacks and found the Aleve and put it in her jacket pocket.  *sigh*

I was mad because she just wasn't doing what she was supposed to do.  When I got in the car, I turned to her and said, why don't you just call the doctor and tell him that you are in pain! And the Tylonal they are telling you to take isn't cutting it, so what can you take?  Ask the doctor, that's why you have him, and he knows best.  She said she had called the doctor, and I said that's BS!  You know you didn't call him because he wouldn't have said this was ok.  She then accused me of calling the doctors behind her back.  That floored me!  I told her I haven't done that EVER.  I know how she felt about that and haven't once done it!!  She insisted that I had.  I started crying because I couldn't believe she'd tell a lie like that.  We fussed, and she got out of the car, so I scurried around to her door to keep her from wandering off (She tells the story that I "yanked" her out of the car and she said I was trying to make her fall - *sigh*) So we're in the parking lot, I'm crying and we're both fussing at each other.  I finally tell her to get in the car and I took her walking cane and put it in there (she says I took it from her and tried to make her fall, *sigh again*)  She finally did.  I said if she wasn't going to listen to me, I'd just tell her daughter about the Aleve and let HER get it through to MIL.  She said, "You just do that, you call her all the time behind my back and tell her everything anyway!"  Another lie I couldn't believe she'd say!  I came around and got in and she fussed at me "Shut up and take me home, and just shut up, don't talk to me the way home."  I was SOBBING!  My teeth were chattering I was crying so hard.  I told her that I hadn't spoken to her daughter since we took over her care, except for the one time they came to visit at her house and I was there.  That's it!  She said I'd talked to the Son-in-Law just the day before, "Yes, I answered the phone, and then passed it to you!  I didn't TALK about anything!"  So that was our ride home - 10 miles, me sobbing and asking her why she would tell lies about me and telling her that I've put keeping her in her home as my number one priority.  Her saying "Just keep crying like a baby, throw your little fit like a crybaby, go on!"  The logical part of my brain knew that she was just keeping up a diversion to throw me off the real issue, the bottle of Aleve in her pocket.  Twice I even said "Heck, I can promise you I never called your daughter because I DON'T EVEN LIKE HER!  Why would I call her?"  Before I said it a third time, my logical part of the brain said, "Hey dummy, all she's going to remember about this car ride is that you don't like her daughter - -that's not good!  Shut up!"

So, we get to my house and I go in and take my one sack of groceries, leaving her in the car.  I wake up DH and say between sobs, "You need to get up, get dressed and take your mom to her house right now!"  Poor fellow, he was sleeping peacefully, and then this!  And of all things to say, he sits up and says "Why?"  I kicked off my shoes across the room as I screamed "Because I F*ING said so!"  Yeah, he didn't mumble another word! 

I stripped and crawled into bed and kept sobbing.  Really, the force of this cry almost scared me.  I couldn't believe it.  But I"m sure 10 weeks of stress built up and this was a bit of a release.  By the time DH got home, about a half hour later, I was in the shower and finally not crying.  I gave him just the bare bones, not wanting to really drag him into it, or give it any more attention than it needed. 

Now, it's a week and a half later, I've talked with the niece a bit and given her some of my side, to offset some of MIL's inaccuracies.  And I figure I'll just go on as if nothing ever happened.  However, I now know that she has some paranoia (thinking I'm calling doctors and family behind her back) and does a fair amount of lying (either intentional, or just out of old age or confusion?)  So I will no longer take what she says at face value.  Also, I'm of the opinion that I'm not going to work harder to keep her healthy than she is working.  So like the Aleve, if she's going to buy it and take it, I'll let her, I'll make notes to let the Doctor's know at her next appointment, but I won't tattle to anyone and I won't try to stop her.  DH has said all along that she will try to do stupid things and we can't stop her. I was of the opinion it was our job to do just that.  And now, I agree with DH.  I'll remind her of things (Like you can't take that Aleve, or go down the stairs by yourself) but when she does it, then that's her choice and I'm not interfering. 

She has started asking Sam to take her places and calling her daughter at least once about some doctor thing.  But I'll just be acting like nothing happened and moving on. I plan to take her to the appointments I know about, if only to be sure I and the doctor are both getting full and first-hand information.

*sigh*  at least it's not MY mom, that would add a whole other emotional, button-pushing level to the "fun" LOL

Going ok, I guess

Three weeks since the last post, and it's going ok with the MIL.  We had one more problem, well a fight almost.  She decided to stop using her pill box (where she sets the pills up for a week) and take her meds from the bottles instead, AND instead of taking them in the morning all together, and the blood thinner at night -- she (with her infinite medical wisdom and background *cough cough*) has decided to take them spaced out through the day.  I was trying to get her to call the doctor and just confirm that this would be ok -- I mean, he may want the blood pressure pill to be first thing in the morning, not in the afternoon.  She got mad and even raised her voice, so I raised my voice back and in the end, *big surprise* she is going to do it her way.  I however, am going to count her pills in her pill bottles to try to keep track of whether they are being taken properly.  It all boiled down to control really.  She doesn't want anyone else in charge of her medicine or telling her how to do them.  Not even her doctors it seems.  As of the day of the fight, it looks like she has missed two or three blood thinners over the last month, and maybe one of her other pills.  But the remaining two looked to be spot on.  Let's see where it is in a week or so.

The good news is, we got her a medical alert pendant and she seems to be wearing it whenever I come in.  That's great!  We're going to get a phone line run in the hallway so the monitoring box can be more centrally located.  But for now it's in the living room.  When we called to test it, DD said, "have her turn the tv down so they can hear her!"  and I said, "Nope, when she really has an emergency the tv will probably be blaring, so let's see if it works with that as background noise"  LOL.  And it did, hurray!

As far as quilting, yeah, what quilting.  I took the Charm Stars off the frame and will be picking out the quilting.  I really do want to custom quilt it, and may have an idea that won't involve ten thousand thread colors!  So it's worth giving it a try.  In the meantime, I have Alexa's wedding gift, a table runner on the frame. It's going really well.  I used wool batting so the stitches are showing up really well. 

The four patches in the center are getting feathered swirls and curved cross-hatching (above) and the setting triangles are my very first attempt at curved cross-hatching ;)  (below)

 



My favorite though, is the feathered hearts in the diamonds..  There is still some blue wash-out marker visible, but they are still looking beautiful.  You can't go wrong with hearts on a wedding gift!  I'm going to put the bride and grooms names around the outside in the sashing and the wedding date.

The wedding colors are mustard and mint, so I didn't use those exact colors, but hopefully the yellow and greens will remind her of the wedding and make this a treasured keepsake.  So I'd better take this little bit of free time I have and get some more quilting done, the weddig is at the end of the month and that's getting closer and closer each day.