Susan - I hope your back starts to feel better soon. (Get to a chiropracter!)

Andi & Dan are too cute!

connie - I hope your husband gets well very soon!

IOmeN, I just started a new "diet" that eliminates all salt & simple sugars from the diet. I eat more often with smaller portions to regulate my insulin levels, but I've been getting horrible withdrawl headaches in the afternoons. I hope the pain is worth the hoped-for outcome.

Susan, when things happened to me (premature labor with Julia, general exhaustion with Chris, neck problems at various times) that limited my physicality, Scott, my mum, and I started teaching the kids how to do some things on their own.

Ben wasn't completely trained before I had Julia. So we taught him to climb up on his bed, so that I could change him. We taught him how to get in and out of the high chair, car, and car seat, and other stuff like that, too. When I was pregnant with Chris, once Julia could walk, we taught her similar things. Ditto Chris, when I was having neck problems. There might be some things you can change while you're injured to help you avoid reinjury.

eta....

Oh beth, I hope it passes quickly.

thanks, cindy. It has passed for now -- I think I am still under shock from what we paid the IRS. and know that I will be spendig over the next couple of months.

in better news. I took the "I hate chang and the vet most of all" cat to the vert for shots this morning. he was better behaved than usual - he even stopped growling long enough for the vet to listen to his heart. and he didn't try and swat me until after he was back in his box. yay - today's real trauma is over.

ooo - jelly bellies. that sounds so yummy...

there was something else I wanted to say but the jelly bellies took over my brain.

Cindy is wise.

Do you have a door-sized baby gate? Once our kids got to the climby-out-of-crib stage, we started having them sleep on the crib mattress on the floor of their bedrooms, with a gate on the door. If you did this temporarily for Annabel, you wouldn't have to lift her in and out of bed.

Annabel doesn't have her own bedroom, since we still live in a tiny house (cue guilt script about how I should be earning more and we should be better with money). Her crib is in our room, and the living room is the only room childproofed enough just to turn her loose, and even there I wouldn't want to leave her without anyone capable of picking her up.

Cindy's very smart.

A friend of mine taught her daughter to do things as soon as she thought her daughter was ready. She also kept the diapers and wipes, etc in a low cabinet so her daughter could get them herself and also to carry the wet diapers to the trash,when she was a bit older and scared of dark rooms EJ showed her daughter how to carry her plastic chair in the room, stand on it and turn on the light. Her daughter's 3 and helps with the dishes -- she puts the dishwasher solid detergent in and then closes the door. She loves being a big girl and doing all these things.

All the tubes are out of Hubby, and he's on Prednizone for the residual pain. He says it hurts worse than the kidney stones. At the moment, though, he's still in CCE with a stuffed wolf clutched in his hand. I'm glad the hospital doesn't quibble about grownups and their stuffed critters. When I was in the hospital, I had a stuffed Cthulhu that I tucked against me.

He's stood up and wobbled in place a bit, he's managed to get a bit of solid food down him and have it stay. They're saying I should be able to take him home today. In a couple of days he should be back to normal, but there's still those couple of days to live through. Joy.

How old is Annabel?

That sounds like a really fast recovery, connie. Though not, I suspect, when you are living through it. I hope this does the job of preventing further problems.