Mariposa Academy Homeschool

I fell yesterday. On my stomach.

I was taking my after-lunch walk. The kids and I were walking around the grounds of our condo complex. We were almost done, I was walking quickly, and I tripped over an uneven edge of sidewalk. I went sprawling forward, the same way Zekey does quite often, and landed on my hands, knees, and belly. I don’t know what hit first; it all happened so quickly and I instinctively rolled onto my side as soon as I hit. I called the kids, who were running ahead, and tried not to cry even though I was scared as hell and in some pain. I rested there for a moment, then slowly got up. Didn’t feel any cramps or leaking. Walked slowly back to my apartment and up the stairs. I washed the grit out of my scraped-up hands. Checked for vaginal bleeding. I actually tested my blood sugar before calling my midwives, just because it was time to do that and I knew it would just take a second. Then I called my midwives’ office and left a message that I had fallen. It took them half an hour to call me back, which kind of ticked me off, but once I was talking to them I didn’t care anymore. They told me I had to come in and be checked out, which was perfectly fine with me. I was a nervous wreck, and I could swear I was having more Braxton-Hicks contractions than usual.

Usually Adrian drives to work since his new job is so far, but luckily yesterday he had taken the bus. I called my dad and he came and drove me to the midwives’ office. They did a non-stress test. Everything is okay. What a relief! And then the baby was moving around a lot last night, which pleased me no end.

I can’t believe how difficult this pregnancy has been. Nothing super-serious, thank God, but just one thing after another. It makes me question whether I really want to go through this again, even though I really would love four or five kids. Maybe we’ll look into adoption. In any case, we have plenty of time before we need to think about that.

I’ve been neglecting this blog. I’ve been stressed and depressed and I’ve had a hard time focusing on too many things other than my health.

I have been following my diabetes meal plan for a week or so, and walking after meals (when I can) for exercise. Even so, I have not been able to get my fasting glucose into the acceptable range one single time. Some of my after-meal numbers have been high, too, but the folks at the Diabetes Center are not as concerned with those as with the fasting numbers. So… I am going to start taking insulin. I wanted to avoid it if possible, but I have tried tweaking my evening exercise and food and no matter what I do my number is always high when I test first thing in the morning. At my last appointment, I was given an insulin pen and shown how to use it. They had me do a “practice poke” without pushing the plunger, and it barely hurt at all– less than pricking my fingers, which I’ve been doing four times a day. I have looked up side effects (very rare). I know I have to get my diabetes in control to keep this baby healthy and to avoid a C-section, and I know actually giving myself the shots won’t be bad at all. So I am totally prepared. In a way, I am almost looking forward to starting the insulin, because that will relieve some of my stress about my waking numbers– and my after-breakfast numbers, which are often high as well. I’m going to call the Diabetes Center this afternoon and talk to the person I saw last time, and hopefully she will give me the go-ahead to start the insulin tonight.

Llani’s doing well with school stuff. Today she tried Timez Attack, a multiplication video game, for the first time. She loves it, and she does seem to be learning her times tables (as far as I can tell from observing just one game). I wish they had games for subtraction, too. She’s been practicing that with worksheets and is really bored with that. I’ll have to find a fun way to reinforce it. She understands the concept well, but has yet to memorize the facts. She sits there working on a two-digit subtraction problem with borrowing (or “regrouping,” as they’re calling it these days), and she knows how to do it and why, but she has to count on her fingers for the basic subtraction facts.

Her writing assignment these days is writing thank you cards for her Chanukah and birthday gifts. Again, she says it’s boring, but I am being a bit of a drill sergeant and just forcing her to get it done. I have noticed that she really needs to develop more self-discipline, and I want to work on that with her. I am doing two structured lessons with her in the mornings, and insisting that she finish those before she goes on to play. It’s not that I think she needs the structure to learn; it’s that I think she actually needs to learn to deal with structure. She’s resisting the assignments, but in spite of my love of unschooling and my view that learning can and should be fun, I really feel that it is good for her to have tasks to complete, to learn how to budget her time, set out to accomplish something, and finish the task. We’ll see how it goes.

You’re A Prayer for Owen Meany!
by John Irving
Despite humble and perhaps literally small beginnings, you inspire
faith in almost everyone you know. You are an agent of higher powers, and you manifest
this fact in mysterious and loud ways. A sense of destiny pervades your every waking
moment, and you prepare with great detail for destiny fulfilled. When you speak, IT
SOUNDS LIKE THIS!

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Via six questions, the Book Quiz decided that I am A Prayer for Owen Meany, one of my favorite books of all time. How’d it do that??

I found out today that I did not pass my three-hour glucose test. I have gestational diabetes. It could certainly be worse– the baby is not in danger, I will not need insulin, my pregnancy is not considered high-risk, and the condition will probably go back to normal after I give birth.

The Diabetes Clinic is going to call me tomorrow to set up an appointment. I will have to be on a restricted diet, and I will have to monitor my blood sugar with finger-prick tests. When I am in labor, they will monitor my blood sugar every hour and they won’t be able to give me an IV with sugar, but otherwise this will not affect my labor.

These days, I’ve been feeling so poorly that I’m really trying to take advantage of those moments when I feel okay. I have a horrible head cold which has been lingering for almost two weeks. I also am having hip pain. It is intermittent, but when it’s bad, it’s bad. As in, I can barely walk bad. I’m not sure what it is. Maybe something is misaligned? It feels like my pelvis is cracking into pieces. Sometimes things sort of pop into place and I am fine, but sometimes each step is excruciating. If I drove I think I would go to a chiropractor, but as it is I am just trying to do what I can with stretching, changing my sleeping positions, and Ben-Gay. Hopefully it won’t last long.

Yesterday I had my three-hour glucose test. I should find out the results in a day or two. Meanwhile I am easing up on the restricted diet just a bit. I had sugar in my coffee today, and I have been having some bread (sprouted whole grain bread, and it’s actually quite tasty) and some grapefruit. I also had two bites of chocolate cake last night. Sshhhh, don’t tell!

This morning I was feeling fine and it was beautiful out, so we went to the playground after speech therapy. The kids haven’t gotten much outside play time lately, so that was sorely needed. When we got home we had lunch, I managed to do a little housecleaning (also sorely needed), then babysat a friend’s two little boys for about an hour. The kids are having a snack now, and afterwards we will read some books. We’re basically following the “hey kids, let’s read a book!” homeschool curriculum. Last night at bedtime we read Anno’s Mysterious Multipying Jar, and I might read that one again today. Llani was fascinated by how quickly factorial numbers grow. I’m sure she doesn’t totally understand the concept, but it’s a fun book and a nice introduction.

Saturday is her birthday party, and we are having a horse-themed party at her request. She wrote a three-chapter book (each chapter is about a paragraph long) about horses to give out in the goodie bags. She worked so hard on it and I am duly impressed. She wrote about different breeds, the gaits, what the babies are called, and how to care for horses. She edited for spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. She also drew the cover illustration (a picture of a horse) in the AppleWorks painting program, printed out a copy of the story, and stapled it all together into a book. This is probably the longest project that she stuck with and completed.

Oh, in case you’re keeping track, the two current baby name choices are Luz Noemi (which Adrian absolutely loves) and Matilda Luz. I like Noemi better than any of our previous middle name choices. I still prefer Matilda to Luz, though.