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Condessa

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Everything posted by Condessa

  1. Sunny’s biopsy results finally came back! They say it’s benign and they don’t expect any more issues! I am so grateful.
  2. My brother and sil were married in a small religious ceremony where sil grew up in the morning and had a large reception in the evening, with a second backyard reception where my brother grew up a few months later. Each set of parents was mostly paying for their “own” reception. My parents offered to also pay for the families to have a nice lunch at a restaurant together at 2o’clock in between the ceremony and reception. Sil’s parents gave them a list of 78 family members coming to the lunch. When my parents tried to clarify that they had meant immediate families, just parents, siblings, and siblings’ spouses and children, they insisted that because they have a very close extended family they couldn’t possibly leave anyone out of a family event, and 78 people was the absolute fewest they could invite without mortally offending anyone. My parents wound up paying for them all because they were worried about getting new family relationships off to a bad start. That family luncheon cost them more than my entire wedding. Incidentally, sil’s parents decided there really was no need to have food at the evening reception from 5-9pm. There was a dessert crepe bar, and a very small cake that the bride and groom cut together, and that was it.
  3. I guess we need to make use of the fireplaces and wood heat this winter. It’s kind of a pain, but lucky for us we have the option.
  4. A while ago my go-to store for eggs was still 8.49 for 5 dozen medium eggs way lower than anywhere else around, and I bought two. Then it went up to 14.95, and I went through all we had and was just doing without for about a week before they dropped back down to 9.79 last week. I bought a pack, and now wish I had gotten two again, because they are now 12.98. If eggs are still nuts like this next spring, I will try to buy chickens from the hatchery. I have heard that they sell off many of their layers for a good price after the big chick season in the spring. I expect that demand might make them hard to get, though.
  5. My dog Sunny had her surgery on Tuesday. The incision was huge—apparently the masses to remove were much more extensive on the inside than we could feel beforehand. The vet is being noncommittal until the biopsy results come back, but she sounds pessimistic. We’ve explained to the kids as best we can while trying to avoid using the vocabulary we used concerning ds8’s surgery prior to his diagnosis. Along the lines of, “The doctor did a procedure to remove some extra tissue she had growing here, and they’re doing some tests to see why it was growing like that.” The younger kids seemed to accept this explanation fine. Dd13 picked up on the gravity of the situation more. Sunny seems to be feeling much better now, though, and missing her walks that the vet said she can’t go back to for two weeks. I was really hoping we would hear back on the biopsy by the end of the week, but no news yet.
  6. My husband and I built this gate together last week, and I sewed the screen today. Some practical safety crafting for the baby.
  7. I picked up some mung beans last week from the bulk section of Winco to try sprouting. They are a big success! My kids love sprouts, and this is much cheaper than buying fresh sprouts. I think they will be a great addition to our emergency food supplies, too, as fresh greens are the greatest lack on an emergency food storage diet. Also, the sprouts make a great snack that the baby can feed himself.
  8. The pandemic store policies were terrible for this. We couldn’t try anything on at the store, but had to buy everything, take home to try on, and then return the items that didn’t fit. My foster daughter K had an incredible raging meltdown at the idea of returning the items that didn’t fit her. Despite having a complete new wardrobe for her that we were keeping, and explaining beforehand in the store that we were taking home extras temporarily so we could make sure we got the right sizes, her past trauma and loss made the idea of returning anything a huge trigger point. In all the screaming she said, “I’m just going to color on all of them with sharpies so you can’t take them back!” I took the items that didn’t fit and locked them in the trunk of dh’s car so she couldn’t ruin them before we had a chance to return them.
  9. Found a large lumpy mass on my dog’s chest that was hidden by fur. I took her in to the vet, who was unable to determine exactly what it is, but most likely some kind of less-common tumor. She’s having surgery on Tuesday to remove it, and then it will be biopsied to find out if it is something malignant that is likely to come back or not. We haven’t talked to the kids about it yet. I don’t know what we’re going to say to them. I have never lied to my children in their lives, but with ds8’s situation, I think it would be more terrible for them to have their dog die of cancer than any other cause. In any case, vet bills are going to mean less progress than I had hoped for this month on rebuilding the emergency fund. I also need to figure out birthday presents for my former foster daughter D, dd11, and the baby in the next few weeks. Then I can start to plan Christmas.
  10. The stir fry was delicious. I tried a few greens raw, and thought they would be fine in a salad for me but would probably be too strong to be able to get the kids to eat like that. But in the stir fry, they were very mildly flavored. The leaves absorbed all the flavor from the sauce, while the stems tasted similarly to asparagus. I harvested a huge armful of vines and thought it would be way too much for one meal, but they cooked down so much that it turned out to be just about perfect.
  11. I was looking up new recipe ideas this morning and learned that the leaves of sweet potatoes are edible. We have a massive sweet potato vine in our front yard from a sweet potato that the kids planted after it sprouted in the cupboard. Sweet potato greens stir fry for dinner tonight!
  12. I’m quite pleased with how we are doing this month. We’ve been very careful and are looking like coming in a bit under budget for food for the month (budget is $900 for 7 people, which includes eating out and groceries plus cleaning products and baby diapers). We’ve got everything paid from the unexpected costs from last month that went well beyond our emergency fund, and are ready to start refilling the emergency fund next month.
  13. My public-schooled nephew wants to take Hebrew instead of the foreign languages his school offers. He has been learning casually with an online tutor for about a year now, but my sister is hoping to find a more formal class he can learn from if it is going to replace a high school foreign language course. She would prefer something accredited, but is interested in all options. Do you know of any online Modern Hebrew classes (not biblical)?
  14. The 5 dozen package of medium eggs at the cheapest store was 5.99 a year ago, and is 8.99 now—for which I am still grateful, because the same thing is 14.89 at the next cheapest store (there they were 8.49 a year ago). Least expensive milk option was 2.59, now 3.19. The cheap bread at the bakery outlet was 5 loaves for $4 pre-pandemic, 4 for $5 a year ago, and is 2 for $3 now. Everything has risen, but the most basic staple items have risen the most, so that those who are on tighter budgets are likely to have seen greater rises in their costs.
  15. Thank you all for your input. Dh and I have talked it over, and our plan is to take some time to see if I can get my blood pressure into a good range and then revisit it. I am going to see what I can do with lifestyle changes first for three or four weeks and then try the pregnancy-safe medication first if those things aren’t making a big difference yet at that point. In any case, I want to see my blood pressure staying consistently in a good range for a few months before trying to get pregnant, so probably at least four months or so before we revisit having another one. In the meantime, I am eating tons of greens, lots of potassium and low sodium, taking magnesium and dark chocolate, upping my exercise to 6-7 days a week with at least three of those being intense, sustained exercise, and getting serious about weight loss again. (I have been losing weight, but was making much faster progress at it when I first started working at it a few months ago.)
  16. I was only diagnosed with preeclampsia after my last one.
  17. I totally didn’t realize it was an old thread until after I’d posted. 🙂
  18. I am not concerned about this for my situation.
  19. It would stink, but yes. My mom would come and help if necessary.
  20. I think that sounds like a good idea.
  21. It probably would. Although the doctor said which bp medication she would prescribe would depend on whether we decided to try for another one now. So I don’t know if it would help to reassure him if it weren’t the same medication they would want me to use during a pregnancy.
  22. He is torn between also wanting one more and his worry for me. I think he is probably more leaning toward not trying again because of the blood pressure concern, but not really decided yet.
  23. It’s encouraging to hear changes can have quick effects. I would welcome specific advice on changes to make. It is frustrating to me that most websites I have looked at give only general advice that is all things I feel like I’m already doing. Exercise, loose weight, eat fruits and vegetables, cut down on salty snacks, alcohol and caffeine! Um, I’ve never had alcohol or caffeine in my life, rarely have salty snacks, eat fruits and vegetables at every meal, walk several miles about 4 or 5 times a week, and have recently lost 35 lbs. 6+ servings of low starch green vegetables daily is specific enough to be much more helpful. That’s a change I can make. I also found a study that said intense exercise, sustained for at least 40 minutes straight at least three times a week, is significantly more effective at lowering blood pressure than moderate exercise for longer periods. So I got some running shorts today so I can up the intensity of my exercise.
  24. I want another baby. I have been having vivid dreams about baby girls like the dreams I had of ds10months after ds8 was born. All of my babies were induced for blood pressure concerns. I was advised by a midwife not to have any more after ds8. She said we would wind up having to induce a premature baby to prevent stroke if I had another, and ds8 had so many health issues being born at 37 weeks. Ds10m was a surprise, and we were very worried, but things went much better than expected, and we made it 5 days longer than with ds8. I was treated for preeclampsia the day after he was born. I met with my OBGYN to discuss the possibility of having another and to have some tests done to check for any long-term effects of the preeclampsia. To my surprise, she was quite positive about the possibility. A much more unpleasant surprise was that my blood pressure was high. Outside of pregnancy and the postpartum period, it has never been high before. At my postpartum check after ds10m it seemed to be following its prior pattern of gradually coming down, so they told me to just finish the BP prescription I had at that time and then stop. But apparently it did not continue to come down. My other tests came back fine. The OBGYN says she would put me on bp medication and watch my pregnancy very closely, but that she would not consider it too risky for me to have another one. Dh is pretty anxious about it now, though. We had agreed that if the doctor said it was alright and the tests came back right, we would try for another, but now he’s worried because of the blood pressure. Do you have any advice for me? Right now I’m just stewing in my own thoughts. I need to be here for the kids I already have. The midwife scared us on that count pretty well eight years ago, but I assume it makes more sense to rely on the opinion of the OBGYN.
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