Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Sir Links-A-Lot + a bee sting

I definitely have time to blog but I'm in a moment of suspended paralyzation due to the fact that I'm speaking this weekend and I feel vvvvvvv inadequately prepared (pray for me?). I'm psyching myself out into thinking that I should be prepping every spare second of the day even when I can't and, thus, I am treating this post as if I had no time to blog even though, probably, in the land of the sane, I do.

So I will just leave you with a few quickie tidbits to munch on.

First, this weekend was crazy busy but super fun. We had our house blessed by our friend Father Jim (who happens to be the son of the late, great Mr Stehly). Father Jim gathered all the kids around and marched them from room to room, blessing our new home. It was surprisingly powerful and wonderful to hear the prayers read... prayers for our guests and our children and our marriage. He made sure to spend extra time dousing the boy's room with holy water which made all the littles crack up. Super sweet. We barbecued with a good amount of his family afterward, including his amazing mother who had ten children of her own. After dinner, she quietly sat on the couch for ages. Father Jim kept leaning in to see if she was ready to leave but she'd shake her head no every time. Finally, Joe burst into tears over something and she looked up and said "I can go now, I've heard one of them cry." (LOL) She is one of those that makes you feel like you're a goddess for mothering small children even though she did it with even more. I want to be that way to young moms when I am old and grey just like her.


Like gluttons for gluttony, we had a few good friends over for drinks later that night which was super fun in our freshly blessed pad. We took care of three bottles of rose, decided we need some poufs for around our coffee table (any rec's on good poufs? Why are poufs so stinking pricey??), and found three raccoons peeping us through the bushes.

Sunday we had the family that bought our old home up for another bbq. We had fun reminiscing about our old place and hearing about their plans for it now that it's theirs. Man, it feels good to pass that kind of torch to people who have become friends.

Yesterday, I hunted down two sets of chairs via Craiglist (as I do). One pair for outside and one for in, but the set for in is seriously messing up my vibe because now I feel despo to finish the space. The chairs are grey and I'm currently eyeing these Target stools for it but I need some color. Maybe these tables instead (I love me some Nate Berkus). Maybe another pouf? (We can all agree that we hate that word, right?)

Today our good buddy sent me a photo of a super cute minimal playhouse and now I'm set on him building it for our kids for us for a group Christmas gift. Wouldn't that be so good? How can I bribe him to do that? But how to hide a construction zone.... Tips?? (Cute playhouse and children whoever's photo this is...)


Hmmmm oh yes, I had my first ever allergic reaction on Friday night!! I stepped on a bee in our backyard and while the girls were playing nurse on my toe (ice pack and bulb syringe... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) the palms of my hands started to itch. At first I thought maybe I had touched a weird plant or something but then the bottoms of my feet started itching, too. And then my legs. It was maddening! I hid in my room and looked up bee stings itchy hands and feet and realized I was having an allergic reaction. Then I started looking up bee string reaction and that made me feel mildly spooked. You know, the whole anaphylaxis in 4 min thing. I took some children's Benadryl bc it was all we had and a few minutes later I began to break out in hives all over my torso, thighs, and arms. I was itching so badly that I took off (most) of my clothes and sat of my bed demanding Hero scratch me as hard as she could. (Don't worry, I realize how sketchy that sounds. But she wanted to and we were laughing pretty hard about it). At that point I started to look up bee sting allergic reaction when to go the the hospital and that made me feel about 100% freaked out. My right eye started to swell a bit and I decided that I definitely did not want to be the woman stumbling from the bedroom, covered in hives, unrecognizably swollen, screaming at Kirby to take me to the hospital in front of all our of children (my imaginary self). I preemptively struck and called my mom to see if she could take me to the ER before things got any worse and she did. On the way to the hospital I bought some adult Benadryl and be the time we got there I was feeling mucccch better. We decided to drive around a bit to see if I continued to improve and I did. So we got Foster's Freeze, turned around, and came home. Aside from feeling fairly waisted by the Benadryl, it ended up being over within a few hours with no real lasting effects PHEW. As far as I understand, reactions will most likely get worse, right? Which means I now have to be scared of bees which seems highly inconvenient. That's pretty much my only takeaway.

My brothers new record came out on Thursday (Colbert tonight!!)

My friend in life and The Haul shared this really profound article on 9/11. Worth the read (warning: it's pretty heavy)

Even though it's not sandal season, I just bought these. So help me (eyerolling myself as I type, don't worry).

We are headed to our annual Big Sur trip in two weeks (can't wait) and I snagged this travel bassinet for new baby. Seems legit and well-priced! Have any of you used it?

Off to not prepare my talk! Wish me luck.

21 comments:

  1. So I don't really know what I'm talking about on this, but my nieces have severe allergies and my SiL always takes them to the ER when they need Benadryl or the Epipen. She says that... I don't know... they wear off or something? Anyway, you should probably ask your doctor what s/he advises re: next time. And maybe you'll need an Epipen? Good luck! (And good luck re: your talk!)

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  2. So I don't really know what I'm talking about on this, but my nieces have severe allergies and my SiL always takes them to the ER when they need Benadryl or the Epipen. She says that... I don't know... they wear off or something? Anyway, you should probably ask your doctor what s/he advises re: next time. And maybe you'll need an Epipen? Good luck! (And good luck re: your talk!)

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  3. 1. World Market has some cool floor pillows and poufs (and 20% off plus free shipping!). We also got a sort of knit one from target that wasn't too pricey, but that was a while ago. I'm also always seeing people snag cool decor stuff on Amazon, but depends on how much time you have to sort through 50,234 results. :)
    2. My friend has that travel bassinet. She said it's short lived (I think her kiddo was out of it by 4 or 5 months) but it was great while it lasted.
    Sorry about the bee sting and good luck on your talk!

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    1. Yes! Love this concise, no nonsense response. Ha!!

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  4. Please see your doctor about your reaction to the bee sting! I'm an EMT, currently in nursing school, and while your reaction isn't anaphylaxis, it is severe. We EMTs get nervous any time the face starts to swell. Your doctor may want to prescribe an EpiPen (or any autoinjector, given that EpiPen recently jacked their prices up) just to be on the safe side.

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    1. Ok great! I definitely will. Thank you for the advice!

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  5. Might be worth seeing an allergist about that bee sting reaction. My husband had a bad reaction a year or two ago and finally got around to seeing an allergist recently. The doctor did venom tests to see what exactly he was allergic to (yellow jackets and honeybees), and now he's getting allergy shots for it. Kind of a pain having to go in for the shots, but when they're done he won't have to worry about being stung anymore. He also has to carry around an epipen until the shots take effect.

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  6. Good luck on the talk! Just sit down and write it! It's terrible having it hanging over your head!
    I read the 9-11 article and it was kinda hard on my postpartum mama heart...just a fair warning to others out there...

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    1. Oh man, good point (on both accounts)! I'll edit...

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  7. So I have a theory that those "poufs" are just a scheme thought up by bean bags companies to rebrand bean bags. Someone definitely sat in a meeting and was like, "I have an idea. Let's make these bean bags really stiff and not as comfy, make them really expensive, and call them 'poufs'. Target will eat that shiz up." I would just buy a couple bean bags at a garage sale and be way ahead of the trend... they'll totally be back in style in like... a decade?

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  8. Eek sorry about the bee, but on the pouf (yep, dumb word) note, we found ours at Home Goods for under $100. Which is still too much money, butttt more reasonable than other poufs.

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  9. Wow that playhouse. Can you link any more information about it? My kids would probably move in if I sent them snacks on a regular basis.

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  10. I bought a couple of poufs on sale from Target a couple years ago, and while they were nice and stiff when I bought them, it didn't take long for them to completely deflate into flat weird pillows... We have kids and they were the ones who sat on them so no doubt they were a little rough on them. Plus they get dirty and they are hard to keep clean and can't really be refilled without undoing the whole clasp which isn't meant to be removed! But having said all that, they are nice to look at and use for an extra seat if needed.

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  13. I was at a gathering as of late where we discovered our mentor in nature. You know, you sit before whatever and you pose a question and hold up to see what comes. Stinging remarks

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  15. Bee stings are uncommon; at least that’s what I thought. I faced the wrath of bees while I was out hiking a few months back. It was quite dumb of me to throw objects up high in the wild. They stung me so bad. I was lucky enough I had company that day, but who could have actually rushed me to the hospital. After this incident, I vowed that I will learn everything that I need to know about bees and bee stings. Thanks for sharing your experience, and what you did to treat the bee stings. I also found useful info here: http://wildernessmastery.com/outdoors/bee-sting-treatment.html

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  16. Allergies are quite a common thing that most people suffer from all over the world. There are different types of allergies like food allergy, mustard allergy, yeast allergy etc. http://archeryhunting.yolasite.com

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