So my mother-in-law (who I love dearly) is coming tomorrow…bright and early…and just when I thought I was going to have a minute to actually get the kitchen clean, something else came up.
First I must lay out my deepest cry-outs of gratitude to my dear dear dear friend Linn. She called me today needing a ride home. I am grateful that someone values me as someone who would drop anything for them (who isn’t in my family and expects it), but she was at the car repair shop and needed a ride home. Thus the call. She didn’t want to interrupt my desperate attempt to get the game room cleaned up. I had been at it for several hours at this point mind you. I am not entirely sure what time I got started to be real honest with you. It was still morning and well before lunch is all I know. She is calling about 2pm-ish. She didn’t want to interrupt “my work.” But, I’ll confess, I really needed to get up and away from it for a little while. That isn’t what is important though. The break was nice, but she graciously came and helped me finish cleaning my game room with me! How great of a friend is that? Linn, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Your little gesture made the “last mile” go quickly and easily. I was just flat out tired and you helped not only lift the spirits a little with the middless task of sorting little Legos and whatnot and made it all seem “not so bad.” Thank you!
Now, I am arranging with Ben to take the older boys to karate tonight. Why? It is usually my time away…a little quiet time for me…well, because I still had a kitchen that looked like we had baked way more than 3 home made pepperoni pizzas and 18 cup cakes. *blush* Yes, I made a mess. I usually do when I do either of the above items, but you do them both AT THE SAME TIME and you can only imagine…well, I’ll leave it to your imagination. Both were good by the way. Yummy! So I wanted Ben to take Andrew and Kyle to karate and we’d have Lance down for a nap while I work in the kitchen getting the dishes finished, the icing flecks off the mixer, the flour out of the nooks and crannies and whatnot. Oh, and the floor mopped. I got the dining area mopped, but didn’t make it to the kitchen.
Ben agreed to do this and off I went to take Linn home. She’s not far from us, so I wasn’t gone long.
I am maybe 4-5 blocks from home when Ben calls and asks if any of the urgent care centers have x-rays (never mind that we had a child’s door squashed fingers x-rayed in one of these said urgent care centers Christmas Eve). That is a legitimate question under the circumstances. Why do we need an x-ray machine? Well because Andrew (as opposed to Kyle and Lance who have already granted me the privilege of having broken legs within 2 months of each other) is “barely able to stand.” Now those are not the words you want to hear when your house is still not spotless and your mother-in-law is coming the next day. *sigh* Oh wait, those aren’t the words you want to hear ever. I remember the last 2 times well. So I’ve got all these crazy things going through my mind as I didn’t have much detail from the phone call…
I get home and ask Andrew what he did. I mean, wouldn’t any mother be curious? He’s sitting there in his underwear and a t-shirt with an ice pack on his knee. Well, at least it isn’t a broken leg or a broken foot or a sprained ankle or anything like that. Remember I had crazy ideas running through my head in the last 4-5 blocks? He could have fallen down the stairs for all I know. At least I know he wouldn’t have gotten run over by a school bus or something as those generally stay still until all kids have boarded. But anyway…
We find him some soft stretchy shorts to wear just incase it IS something serious. Well, I figured it would be something serious enough to make him whine about how bad it hurts. Off to the urgent care center we go in the rain. I really need to take the car to Discout Tire Company and get them to check the tire pressure…and well…ummm….rotate the tires…as it just wasn’t handling very nicely on those rain slicked roads. Squealing aside.
Let me just say that I love this little urgent care center that is close to our house. You really have to be careful with them as many are not contracted with insurance companies or only a select few. Well It opened up probably 18-24 months ago and I’ve been in there 3 times with Lance and 1 time for myself. I can’t remember if I have had Kyle in there. This was Andrew’s first trip as it is already 4:30pm and the doctor’s office usually closes at 4:30pm. They don’t have an x-ray machine either so they’d have to fax orders over to the hospital where I would sit and wait and wait and wait and wait. Not super expensive to do it that way, just a total pain in the butt if you have things to do because it is a time consuming process. So I love the First Choice Emergency Room Urgent Care center that is by our house. They are actually contracted with our insurance as an urgent care center. I don’t owe anything on the way out the door (own a $100 co-pay at a normal hospital ER). So far, none of the bills we have received have been over $35, including the x-rays. The wait times are minimal. I think the longest I’ve had to wait was 10 minutes when I went in for the flu. You are usually back in a room and being seen by the doctor before you call all the prerequiste paperwork filled out.
So that’s where we went. The doctor was very nice. His knee is pretty puffy sitting there watching her manipulate it and what not. Ends up, nothing shows on the x-ray. It is soft tissue inflammation. That is a good thing, really. She said that if the radiologist will actually read the x-rays and if they find anything they’ll contact us. No big deal. They even provided me a copy of his x-rays on CD to take with me to either the family doctor or an orthopeadic doctor (I can follow-up with either). They gave me a referal card for an orthopeadic doctor. We have used that particular office before for Lance and then Kyle. It was nice to get the x-rays though as it saves me a trip later and that they were on CD as that saves me the wait. They have prescribed him some anti-imflamatories as his diagnosis is prepatellar bursitis. They wrapped it in an ACE bandage. I grabbed him a proper “knee support” at the pharmacy when I went to pick up his Rx. I just don’t think that an ACE bandage is the most efficient means of support for the knee of an active 11 year old. He’s out of karate for at least a week, so I had to get him a doctor’s note for that. Karate is his off-campus PE. He will only get a release back to karate after we follow up with either the family doctor or the orthopeadic doctor in about a week. I will call the doctor in the morning to find out if they want to see him for this or if they would ultimately send us to an orthopeadic doctor anyway.
Oh and Lance fell asleep while I was there at the urgent care center. Go figure! So I didn’t get to clean the kitchen like I wanted. I just made dinner instead. Then ran to the pharmacy. Then to Walmart to get food saver bags so I can seal up the meat I bought on Monday’s late night grocery shopping expedition. I’ve spent the last couple of hours tidying things up. Cleaned the bathroom. Loaded the dishwasher. Fixed the kids’ books on the book shelves in the living room, tidied up the living room some more, 2 loads of laundry, swept floors, finished mopping, and started cleaning off the kitchen counters.
Now I sit here…cooling down…I should be sleeping as I’ve got to be up early tomorrow with the kids and heading to the airport to pick up Ben’s mother.
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