Busy, Busy, Dreadfully Busy

It’s summertime! We’re not supposed to be this busy!! But we are. Here’s what we’ve been up to in the past week or so:

Friday 6/6 – Went to a Nashville Sounds baseball game to celebrate DB’s birthday. We combined our Frozen Friday treat with the game by getting the kids ice cream served in little baseball hats. We stayed the entire game (Sounds won!) and through the fireworks at the end. The kids were SO tired and they both ended up crying during the fireworks! It was the GMan’s first experience with fireworks and JBelle was just tired and cranky and didn’t like how loud it was.

Saturday 6/7 – DB’s birthday. Went to IHOP for breakfast/lunch. Ran some errands which included a stop at J. Barleycorn’s for DB’s birthday present, two bottles of Chimay Ale, our new favorite beer. That evening we headed to Hendersonville to have dinner at the of home some longtime friends from high school & college days. They have children similar in age to ours and the kids seems to always have fun when they are together. We got to swim with them at their neighborhood pool which had a diving board! JBelle worked up her courage and gave it a try. She, of course, loved it! I had such nostalgia watching her jump off the board, come up out of the water, get out of the pool and head directly back to the line to wait for another turn. I remember doing the same thing when I was her age!

6/9-12 – DB had to go to Houston on a business trip. I took the kids swimming a couple of days. We went to the zoo on Tuesday. JBelle did some testing for the “gifted” program for Metro schools. We ran lots of errands and I attempted to start getting some things cleaned up around here. (I wasn’t very successful!)

Tuesday night (6/10) – I got to hang out with some of my blogger buddies!! I was very grateful that my niece was able to babysit for me because I was in desperate need of some adult drinks and conversations! It was lots of fun and I got to finally meet Holly!

Thursday 6/12 – DB came home from his trip and said the words I love to hear, “Where do you want to go for dinner?” We chose Carrabba’s because we still had a gift certificate from the benefit that we attended last month. It was yummy! And I could tell that the kids had really missed their dad because they both couldn’t seem to get close enough to him! GMan kept trying to sit on his lap and JBelle kept scooting closer and closer to him.

Yesterday we hung out at home all morning while DB and I tried (always trying, rarely succeeding!) to get some things done around here. Then after lunch I headed out with the kids to run more errands and do Frozen Friday, which was at Cold Stone Creamery! The YMCA holds Friday night pool parties and we had planned on attending this one but we got a bunch of storms Friday afternoon. They did re-open the pool at 5pm but did not do the party. We went anyway and swam and Emily joined us for awhile, too.

I don’t usually like doing these kinds of posts but I realized it’s been over a week since I posted anything and I was thinking about all the things we’ve been up to so I just decided to write about it! It’s been awhile since DB’s been out of town on business. The kids and I had a rough time with it, too. They were testing their limits with me and I ran out of patience entirely too soon! I even had a “mom tantrum” on Thursday which was not pretty. I’m really, really, really trying to enjoy this time with them. Really, I am!

Well…there’s no rest for the weary around here. Laundry is piling up at an alarming rate. The refrigerator practically echoes from the emptiness when it’s opened and those dishes in the sink aren’t going to clean themselves, unfortunately! Oh, and did I mention errands? Yeah, there’s more of those today as well! Guess I’ll be back in a week or so to update again!

The Family Zone

The CMA Music Festival aka “Fan Fair” is going on right now here in beautiful Nashville. As a general rule, we locals know to avoid downtown like the plague as it is overrun with country music fans from all over the world. However…I heard about something called “Family Zone” that was free to anyone and everyone and I decided to take the kids there as one of our “summer distractions”. I thought I was certainly deranged for even thinking about doing it but I decided to give it a go anyway.

Much to my surprise it was not at all horrible or frustrating to be downtown in the thick of all things “Fan Fair”. We found parking in a garage for $10 (which was $5 less than I was expecting to pay). The “Family Zone” was located in a park directly above the garage we parked in, so we had a very short walk. The area was clean and set-up very well. It wasn’t too big and you could see, with a few exceptions, the whole area of the event from any vantage point (which is crucial when trying to keep up with children!) They had inflatables that the kids could play on and they were staffed by teenagers who did a good job keeping the numbers under control. There were several tented areas, including the “Main Stage” where you could get out of the sun.

JBelle visited the Girl Scout tent twice and learned how to do two different knots. The GMan was all about jumping in the bouncy castle! We watched a family group called Kid Fiddlers aka The Jackson Family Band perform on the “Main Stage”. They were good and very entertaining. JBelle was very impressed with their musical skills, especially with the seven-year-old girl who had quite a command of the fiddle! (She kept saying, “She doesn’t even use a colored finger board!” JBelle has a cousin, her same age, who is taking violin lessons and currently uses a colored finger board for learning purposes.) The “Wolf” from television’s American Gladiators read a story, about a sheep, and the kids got free copies of the book he read. Wolf even signed JBelle’s copy. McDonald’s was handing out free apple slices with caramel dip and cookies which made a nice snack and Dr. Pepper was handing out samples of well, Dr. Pepper (Diet, too). Ronald McDonald did a magic show and 10-year-old “singing sensation”, Katie Chance, performed a few songs.

Near the end of our time there, a guy showed up with a funny balloon hat and started making balloon creations for the kids.

I only had my phone with me so this was the only picture I could get. I wish you could see the “balloon man’s” hat. It’s a guy playing the banjo! (I wish we could see less of the woman behind GMan!) The GMan is holding a tiger hat and JBelle has a dalmation (she didn’t want a hat).

We had a fun time and I was very pleased with the event. Kudos to CMA Music Fest! It’s open all weekend, go check it out! For more info on the Family Zone, go here.

Sunscream and Stones

At the pool the other day, our first official pool day of the season, I was slathering sunscreen on the kids and the GMan kept calling it “sunscream”!

That same day when we arrived home after pool time and errands, I was a bit of a mess. I had overdone it physically and was hurting. I told DB that all I wanted to do was take a shower and rest for awhile. He was encouraging and accommodating* and he took over emptying the grocery bags while I headed to shower. Awhile later, when I emerged from our bedroom clean and refreshed, I saw DB and the GMan in the kitchen putting something onto a cookie sheet. When the GMan saw me his said, “Mommy! We’re making stones!” Now with a geologist for a dad, you just never know about these things! As it turns out, they were making scones. Blueberry scones to be precise and when they were done, I whipped up some homemade whipped cream to go with them. Yummy!

One more GMan tidbit:

We went to Nashville Shores last weekend and within 30 minutes of arriving home that afternoon, this is how we found the GMan. He was exhausted!

*Can I just take a moment to brag on my wonderful husband! I felt really bad about coming home from a day of frivolity and fun in the sun only to dump grocery bags and kids at his feet while I fled for some solitude and relaxation. But he’s such a generous and loving guy that it didn’t seem to phase him one bit. If the situation had been reversed, would I have been as encouraging and accommodating for him as he was for me? I don’t know but I sure hope so.

Want!

I don’t do this very often but I saw a contest, via Sassy Housewife, for a free Dyson and I just can’t help myself. I WANT! a Dyson! It’s selfish, it’s corny, it’s greedy but I just can’t help it. Go check out the contest…there’s also a cute little “button” on the side bar you can click on to get you there, too.

Observations Regarding Health Care In America

So, for reasons that are rather uninteresting and slightly confusing, I did not have the correct insurance card with me when I arrived at the emergency room last weekend. The admitting people were unable to verify that I was indeed insured and marked me down as an uninsured patient. That was an eye-opening experience. Of course, I could be wrong in my analysis of the situation but here is what transpired from my perspective.

• I saw the doctor once for about three minutes.
• I had to request pain medication and when it finally arrived it was in pill form which I refused to take. (I was still in that object of torture C Spin collar thingamajig and frankly, it scared me to think of trying to swallow pills with that contraption around my neck.) They eventually gave me a shot of Demerol.
• I had abrasions on my head and face yet no treatment was given to those areas. (My brother-in-law cleaned those up once they got me back home.)
• Every time we asked about something, no one could give us an immediate response.
• When the CT scans came back and showed that nothing was broken, they removed the object of torture C Spin collar thingamajig but I was not offered any other support brace to aid in healing.
• I had to ask for water…which I never got.

Basically, in my opinion, the hospital did only what was immediately medically necessary. Of course, this could just be the way things happen in an emergency room. Maybe all the medical dramas on television have warped my perception of what is supposed to happen at a hospital? I have limited experience with emergency rooms and hospitals in general. I’ve been to an ER once before and hospitalized twice (when I had my babies). Maybe it was the hospital I was at? Others, who are more familiar with these sorts of things, swear that some hospital ERs are better than others. I don’t really know. All I know is what I experienced and it seemed to me that the hospital was making sure that minimal time and effort was given to me based on my insurance status. They didn’t know whether or not they would get paid for the services rendered. The less they did for me, the less I would have to pay and the less they would possibly lose if I couldn’t pay.

As much as despise the thought of universal health care and as much as despise the current insurance system, I have to wonder if there’s some way to make sure that when you go to the hospital, you get the treatment you need regardless of your insurance status. But then who decides what you need? In my opinion, I needed pain medication and I needed my abrasions treated. but the in the hospital’s opinion, I did not. Who’s right?

I don’t know. I do know that I will be requesting and getting the correct insurance card!