Germ Attack

Wow.  Toad is already sick.  I picked to girls up from school today after hanging out at JoAnne Fabrics and of course the first thing Toad says is "mom, my head hurts".  So I proceed to question her in an attempt to diagnose what may be causing this, normal questions like "when did it start? where does it hurt? DID YOU GO TO THE NURSE? is anything else bothering you, or has anything else been bothering you? She answers everything and then tells me that she didn't got to the nurse, so I ask why and she says it was because her teacher would not let her.  Now I completely understand that teachers may have to say no about kids going to the nurse if they are "frequent flyers" but there are some children that SHOULD go to the nurse.  Toad has to take a fair few medications to get through the day, there is quite the array of uppers and the downer she takes at night, so when she says she has a headache there is a little more going on than just a simple wish to get out of class.  When a child (you know) takes meds to get through the day complains of a headache, dizzyness, chest pains, or serious fatigue that SHOULD be a red flag to say "HEY, send that kid to the nurse, where in turn the nurse will check the child's blood pressure.  Maybe I am just over cautious or over protective.  Luckily this seems to be nothing more serious than possibly the flu i.e. fever, chills, headache, tired, loss of appetite, general crappy feeling. So we will all hope for Toad to get better quick and in the meantime I am going to have a little chat with the school nurse (who will hopefully talk to her teachers) about this whole "not sending kids to the nurse thing".
In other news I have a headache from today's mess, the dog is barking at nothing, the weather is cold, and I am heading to bed. Goodbye Tuesday!

This is how our dog says goodbye to rough days.
(that REALLY is our dog)

Goblins, Ghosts, and Pretty Kitties?!

What happened to the good old days when costumes were simple?  We took the kids shopping for Halloween costumes yesterday and oh boy is all I have to say...   We stopped by walmart, which of course did not have anything they were remotely interested in. Toad has decided she wants to be Hermione Granger from Harry Potter and that stayed as firm as cement, Monkey on the other hand wanted to be a cheerleader, then changed her mind while we were at walmart.  I thought I had her convinced to be something scary and gross, but that changed too.  We left walmart, grabbed Crankybear and headed to Party City.  Toad found the items she needed to pull off the hermione costume very quickly(robe, wand, tie, scarf) I have to find her a white button down shirt, but I have time.  Monkey found a Zombie Doctor costume that would have been AWESOME except it only came in 2 sizes med and large.  She is too tiny to pull off a medium so we kept looking. She tried on almost every mask in there and scared herself a few times, and then asked if we could go look at the wall of costume pictures again.  So we wondered through the maze of parents with children running crazy back to the wall. First monkey points to a cute sailor outfit, NO. She has a sailor costume she could wear from her last dance recital. They had a tap routine for "The Good Ship Lollipop" so I told her if she wanted to be a sailor she could wear her old costume. She promptly said no she didn't want to be a sailor and pointed to a Pretty Kitty costume.  Something went very wrong. Somehow we went from guts and gore to cheap black velvet and pink feather boa.  I am confused.  We found a person working and asked if she could bring us out a small(4-6) for Monkey to try on.  We wait and get in the dressing room, put the top and bottoms on her and she runs off to show Crankbear and Toad. She comes running back a few minutes later saying something about the headband and sure enough there on the floor of the dressing room is a small plastic bag with a headband and choker.  She is absolutely adorable. I think I am going to have to head to party city alone and pick up a costume for me.  The kids are getting big enough that I can dress up and in something hideous.  This should be awesome, I saw a great werewolf costume.  We will see how funds are when we get a little closer to Halloween.  The kid's cotumes tapped me out.....almost 2 hours and $60 later they are happy and ready for the holiday and I can't wait to get pictures.

Fall Flavor!

The weather has been chilly and windy (with some insane rain), the leaves are turning colors, and during my trip to the store today I found out that pumpkin pie spice is a HOT commodity.  Don't get me wrong, I can bake but when it comes to pies I leave that to experts. I needed the spice for making Pumpkin Pie Fudge.  I had no idea fudge could be so good. It is like eating pumpkin pie heaven, smooth, creamy, perfect pumpkin pie flavor, and super easy to make.  The kids did most of the work on this one....I had Monkey greasing pans for me and Toad stirring the mixture while it boiled, really all I did was time things and say when to put stuff in, and the stirring after we added the marshmallows(the mixture got insanely thick and hard to stir at that point).  I think for the next batch I am either going to pick up some candy molds and line them with plastic wrap or use ice cube trays lined with plastic wrap.  I think we have 4 or 5 ice cube trays that NEVER get used. 
I will have to see what I can find, I have a coupon for 50% off of one regular priced item at A.C. Moore for tomorrow so I think I will stop in and see what kind of candy molds they have.  It would be cute if I could find little pumpkins or "punkins" as the kids say.
Toad also decided tonight that for Halloween she wants to dress up as Hermione Granger from Harry Potter. Sounds like a better plan than the puppy dog with the bloody stump of an ear.  Monkey wants to be a cheerleader. I have to start looking for costumes.  Hopefully tomorrow I can steal away to Party City to see what they have.  The kids also have swim lessons tomorrow....YAY.  Only their second week in class but I am sure it will be a great class, these kids are fish and this will be the one time a week they get to swim until next summer.  Well I am off to the kitchen to finish up a few things and then off to bed to dream of pumpkin pie/pumpkin pie fudge.
BTW- here is a link to the recipe I used for the Pumpkin Pie Fudge