Robin's Nest

I headed to town rather early this morning considering I did not have to be in attendance at work. With the girls in tow I decided to head to the Bx and the commissary for a few things. On the way my daughter called and asked the girls over to play this morning so I left them with her and headed to the Bx alone to get "Bunny" stuff. What got was a visit with some old friends who politely, okay it wasn't polite, but they asked "just how much weight have you gained?". Now I didn't expect this comment/question but in all fairness I hadn't seen either one of them in 40 pounds or so... maybe more. I could lose a fast five pounds by cutting my hair to shoulder length, maybe more if I gave up creamer... or cut back to say 1/2 a cup per serving and add more coffee to the cup? Perhaps changing jobs would help too. Cut back on snacking... as I nibble a bottle cap candy intended for the plastic eggs. Or I can do as I did and say at least 40 pounds maybe more ho

It has been 24 days officially since I was informed there would be an audit of my department.  All of our ancillary departments offered up the support that they were tagged with.  Unfortunately none of them were nurses nor were they tagged with nursing items.  They supplied me with the necessary items to make the audit go smoothly....well most of them did. The first planned day was cancelled for reasonable circumstances and then the second one was cancelled... then a member of our "team" decided it was spring break and he needs to spend time with the kids. I totally agree! (I wonder when I will get time to do that?) So after asking for that team members' part I was told no the audit person would be told to come later. Perhaps the steam was visible coming out of my ears, or it could have been a touch of sarcasm in my voice, but either way I heard nothing until a third team member said she heard that the audit would be Monday of next week. No worries I felt relatively prepa

Another 14+ hour day and in the end I still wasn't done with all that needed to be done. On the other hand when I got home my incubator had arrived!! So I've read the instructions twice, they really should spring for a proofreader before printing these instructions. They seem easy enough to follow even when written in broken English however, it is way too late to go out to the henhouse and steal eggs. And tomorrow is scheduled to be a very early day so maybe after work might be a good time... we shall see.  The best laid plans of mice and men have often found me still at work way past the bewitching hour. DH found time today to use the workbooks the girls have so some progress was made even if it was minimal. At times when it is my turn I get the same result. I am so tired I am pretty sure I am going to crash soon and hope for a better morning tomorrow.  I need to be there early enough to get something done before it all goes into the handbasket again. And my phone is not hel

Home schooling is freedom and chains at the same time. As I try to fold laundry this evening one little is on the kitchen PC doing a word search. She is getting frustrated and so am I.  So casually I offer to let her quit...NO WAY! She screams. Good for her! She struggles through and finishes! Then the game offers to let her do the same puzzle again or a new one. She chooses to do the same one again. Most of the words are the same but they put them in a different order. It is still a challenge though and she starts to get frustrated again... then for whatever reason it clicks. She knocks that puzzle out fast! The next one is taking too long to long. So it is time for a little "home ec" class, folding laundry. It seems her interest is in folding underwear, only hers though.  Well that's better than no help at all. I'm glad she is showing an interest in helping. She has helped cooking but then when I am gone to work I have to emphasize "no cooking". When hel

I am a procrastinator. There I have confessed it to the world even if the world doesn't read my blog. It may be a good thing that they don't read as I may have to claim amnesia on the procrastinator thing some day. Easter is two short weeks away and that means April is the same. Which means the next schedule needs to be posted ASAP, so that I know where I need to go with extra help. Two of the most recent CNA hires are not really working out as well as one might hope. And one PRN is a bit on the testy side. The main reason for having the schedule out ahead of time is to develop a pattern that everyone can follow and they know is their work schedule. This ensures that the residents are taken care of no matter what. Also it will come in handy in the near future for me too. When I go out for surgery it won't be that hard for someone to come in and fill my shoes, hypothetically of course. With long term and short term disability in place I should be able to pace my recovery t

It is time to order chicks! At least it should be... I think the cost raising chicks out weighs the savings but it is fun and educational at the same time!!!  We may try hatching some of our eggs to see what we get.  I've ordered an incubator.. yes I know not very thrifty.. when trying to stop using CC's. in my defense it came to $2.39 with free shipping because of the credits built up on my card.  Yes I would have purchased the item if paying cash only. It is a small incubator and will be fun to watch what happens. This year we will purchase ducks, turkeys and geese to with our current flock and open up the south end of the chicken run for the meat birds. I'm even toying with idea of a mechanical plucker... just considering it and maybe thinking of ways to set aside for it. Okay if you have ever plucked a bird you would understand this thought process. In the mean time I will be driving to Burlington to buy seed for fodder! Yay!!! They have barley!!!! And oats but they h

It seems to be the only day that I can manage to get a whole day away from the building, at least in body.  There are always phone calls to answer and problems to trouble shoot from afar.  But the day itself seems to disappear before it could possibly be more than half over. We had the pleasure of the baby today and the girls went crazy once they realized she was over.  The one thing I didn't expect was for the baby to get upset when she had to leave the kids and go back home!  Once I returned her to her gramma I was able to meet her two week old cousin "wolf" and yes that is his name.  Somehow looking at him conjured up names like "sweet little lamb", "peanut", even "little pumpkin".  He was so tiny and adorable :)  Wolf, was no where near a fitting title, at least not at this time. I'll check on him later in life and see. Enjoying the little ones makes me regret working full time, well really more than full time because I am there way

Whoa... I have had some unique days this week and on some days I've had a whole week of unique! If I could remember and write chronologically this post would be the longest I have ever written.  Luckily I can't. First things first... I am having cell phone challenges.  How can you get texts but you can't send any nor get any phone calls or make any for that matter? I don't get it. But that is not really what this post is about.  But with all the small people distractions today I may be just be thankful to get a post done.  :) When woke this morning very early, I made a mental list of things to get done.    So far the kids are dressed, I have checked in at work and the coffee is made.  None of those were on my list... Okay maybe checking in at work was there.  Oh wait so it was a mental list and I do make coffee pretty much every morning, either here at home or at work for the residents...so score two for the mental list!! And that was 4 hours ago now so on to the laun

This is coming from the one who rarely gets to sleep in, however I think it really is true. This morning was not an "official" sleep in no one will wake you day. Only because I would have to be living alone for that to ever happen! But there wasn't a mad rush to get up and get going as there are most days. Should have been but there wasn't. I only have 5 things on my morning "to do" list or least on the paper one that is. So much for staying home today until I had to go in for SNF. One of the CNA's just let me know they cannot come and work after all.  But I can still get a few things on my list done before going in and finishing a blog post isn't on my list... My first cup of coffee is not quite finished but since my time at home has been slashed in half I best get busy. I have called on my list who might work a day shift and no response.  So I guess after I get dinner set up and the rest of the dishes done I will head to the shower and get read

Today I had big plans to sleep past 0600, or at least until that time since the granddaughter was scheduled to arrive at 0600. The usual middle of the night wake-ups by the littles taken into consideration of course.  But it was not to be.. (insert a very tired face right here). Baby Athena decided this was to be the day of her grand entry into our lives forever to change the way we look at the world. The new grand parents were in attendance for her arrival and just wanted to make sure the new great grand parents (AKA us) were aware that everyone who was anyone to baby Athena knew she was on her way.  They made this declaration at 0330 by calling the house phone (I had wisdom the wisdom to turn my cell phone off the night before).  Unfortunately or maybe fortunately I forgot to turn the ringer off on the house phone. Personally I believe one of her little "aunts" sent her a message somehow alerting her that a few grown-ups had plans to sleep in.  Just a theory.... So later