I took Esme into the doctor this morning - the fever just would not keep away.  She fell asleep on the table in the room before he finally got in to us, but I was able to wake her up when he did come in.  He thinks she has a bacterial infection in her sinuses/upper respiratory and ear canal - possibly a mild case of strep to blame.  She did not tell me her ear hurt, but it was red and she had been touching it several times there in the office which led me to ask him to check both of them.  He gave us an antibiotic, which she has thrown up and cannot have more of until tomorrow.  I hope she absorbed some of it.  I am going to give her a cooler bath in a bit but have been letting her sleep some since we got home.

Mark and I were talking more about where to put a chicken house, and how, and where to fence.  He thinks we could keep two goats in the same fence with the chickens.  I am reading up and we are planning what materials, where, and how to build.  It probably will not coalesce until later this summer.  It is a lot to take up but with the garden already ready to produce for them it might be the time to act.  We keep seeing deals on the livestock themselves but I have instincts that say to prepare their 'nest' beforehand - then we can get serious.

 

My idea of a structure based on Mark's plan.

He says my brain thinks in 'messed-up isometric'.

The blue 'pins' are cedar posts, and there is a fence along the side.

To me, this is a perfectly understandable representation of what we will build!

In the meanwhile I am a hovering mama.  I stayed home from work today because of getting sick myself in the middle of the night, chills and then crashing until Esme woke me up at 2 am with 102 fever again saying she needed something for the hot.  She seemed in fairly good spirits this morning despite it all - just very tired and hot and wishing I would stop and let her sleep.  I work late tomorrow - hopefully we will both have better health to report before then.

On Productivity in the weekend...

I've got less 'done' this weekend than I have in many weeks... two days off usually has quite a bit of accomplishment with it.   But, with Esme sick I was pretty much hovering over her and staying inside out of the garden.  She seems to have benefited from it - she is quite a bit better than she had been, and is talking up a storm to me, coming up with all her usual complicated plans and imaginary playtimes.  Just about the time I was winding down and wiped out she began her upswing and drug me outside into the heat of the day to play in the sand, play ball, play puddle.... and then Queen and Princess and Knights in Shiny Arm (Shining Armor).  We took a brief jaunt up to Grandma's to bring her radishes and for Esme to play.  Most of the rest of the day has been absorbed by three complete seasons of Scooby Doo on infinite loop.  We should all know them by heart by now!

Productivity:.  Some laundry, some squash plants transplanted out and watered, some corn seeds sorted out and three half-rows of field corn put in at the west field (making 7 or 8 total). I also did a small bit of weeding,  picked radishes and lettuce, put a few rows on the knit blanket and then began feeling not entirely happy myself (just as Esme picked up speed).  I think I hit a caffeine headache mixed with the heat.

I was thinking I should plant much more field corn down there at the garden - but.. do I really want to?  I have some pink popcorn coming in the mail to plant and the peanuts yet... I think I am now finally at that edge of how much can I take care of when I am not really gung-ho into working on it.  This weekend was one of those .. and I still managed to water a lot of things and do some work out there. 

bit

Esme has been running a fever since mid-afternoon yesterday.  I got home from work and her 'cheeks hurt' was all she could tell us.  I think it is a sinus infection brewing, maybe stepped up by some bug she caught at the auction for the Amish school.  There were a lot of people and animals there, being in a crowd etc.. usually gets us all with whatever is going around.  She had a good time that day but later that night she was snorking and crying again and up half the night.  Her usual temperature is 97 on our underarm thermometer and it has been running up to 101.  Any higher than that I would have given her a fever reducer immediately - but she has been hovering between 'normal' and that for nearly 24 hours.  Mark is in town and will pick up some tylenol so we can try it out on her.  Everytime we buy it it seems she gets better before we open it and then it expires before the next time we need it!

She had seemed somewhat better this morning, woke up and was hopping and wanting me to get my blanket around my shoulders (at 6 am or so) and go outside.  She went back to sleep for a little while, and after it was over 70 outside I took her out to the west field and planted three rows of field corn - but she was just sitting there on the bag of fertilizer we have had out there for a while - staring at the ground, and the bugs, and the plants moving in the wind.  This is not my normal whirlwind child.  Inside, she was staring at her drink, and not asking for Scooby Doo or any of the other things she begs for normally.  She ate a popsicle and then wanted back outside.  She played for a few minutes before saying she was too COLD and asking for a bath.  I went to give her a bath and she puked on the floor again (after drinking juice and eating a piece of a cookie I had) and then tried to sleep in the bathtub after a few minutes.  She is still near 100 degrees - and sleeping, with liquids back in her again. 

I am monitoring her and knitting a bit on a blanket from last year - waiting for Daddy to get home from town (will be a few hours) and we will see what the rest of the day brings.  If she seems better again I do have some squash plants in the windowbox that need to go in the ground somewhere, at the very least.

Note:  I am looking at a terribly tempting pumpkin and squash seed variety site : kurkubita club, to keep my mind busy.  I keep checking on Esme every once in a while - and a few times she has woken up and looked at me with this 'wonderful teenager look' and said 'Mom!  I'm sleeping!'  OK... yes I get a bit too mothering hen at times... even she tells me that.

The medicine brought her fever down, but Esme is still tired and not perky.   I put the squash plants in the garden, hope they will make it there.   I am trying to get her to eat some chicken and drink something before she goes down for another nap.

 

Esme's 'first day of school rose'

The small fenced-in garden coming along.

Mouse cat is out there in the background.
Even the squash hills that were not producing yesterday are now showing signs of life.

 Misha dog checks out the end of the 'planted' area of the west field.

The corn and squash coming up there are nearly microscopic - but they are there.

Green tops of radishes pulled earlier in the other garden.

 

Now, with water run out there we will be thinking of planting

more low-maintenance things (like the field corn seed saved from last year)

Hooded Blue sweater finished and water to the west field

I finished Esme's blue hooded sweater, that was began in December. The warm weather is nearly here already, but not quite. She insisted on the hood, and it has already been used in the rain.

There is also lots of room to grow for next year. The buttons are large, so she can do them herself. I didn't have more than five of anything, so added one pretty green button for the very top.

Particulars:
Lion's Brand 'Vanna's Choice' in royal blue, size 7 straight needles, size 7 circular needle, crochet hook (large) to finish edging on bottom and on hood.  Pattern: Red Heart seed stitch cardigan with alterations and a by-the-fly hood based on a few other patterns I found online.

We also went to town today and bought the twenty foot plumbing pipe to run water to the field corn in the west field.  An hour after we were home, there was water running down there!  The corn and hubbard squash that are coming up down there (and sunflowers later) will be very happy.  We are on our way to having enough ground and infrastructure to feed turkeys or chickens in the future.. or whatever else we plan to bring here.  In the short term, I can experiment with the field corn genetics and try to learn more about what is the best seed to keep, select and grow for storage over the winter.

what a weekend

I worked the weekend and Esme was still coughing even with the new medicine. Nights were long and miserable, with many loads of laundry from her 'losing' what medicine and liquids she did get in waking up coughing in the middle of the night. Mark thinks she has caught another cold on top of the allergies. And she feels pretty good most of the day, but miserable at night. We are feeling a little bit of the 'under the weather' ourselves. I have today and tomorrow off - then two on, then next weekend off. I made 'semi-real' chicken soup, canned soup with added cooked meat, carrots and spices, for Esme this morning and forced her to drink as much of the broth as she would. Now if she can hold it down, it might do some good.

It is up and down cold outside. I have had a lot of trouble keeping warm. I haven't been out to the garden because I can't help having a tag-a-long, and she isn't in condition to be out there. I might sneak a few minutes to check up on things later today when we hit the daily high temperature. I need to sneak a look at the west field, as well.

I am knitting the hood on her blue sweater. It is looking a tiny bit large, but not swimming, so she will have a year to grow with it. I need to find buttons for it... usually knit the buttonholes and then go find something that fits (know that is backwards). I also intend to work out the crankiness in the sewing machine again later tonight or tomorrow. Every time I look at Esme's clothes drawers and think 'she needs more pants' I empty the latest load of laundry out of the dryer and find six pairs...

Loula has been doing well with her kitten charges...
She has been helping clean Pogo's orphaned kittens since she disappeared
for being without a mother since four weeks old they are scruffy but growing well

Kenearly beans sprouting inside...

Esme wanted me to take a picture of what she would look like if she closed her eyes and smiled at the same time... I thought that was a decent request...

Garden updates: The popcorn is coming up, as are the 'a squash' plots (saved seed - not sure if it will be what I want it to be). The lower hill squashes are still not producing, but the radishes are! I pulled in a handful and also a small amount of lettuce for a tiny one person salad. Ha. The west field corn is just barely visible with a microscope ... getting water over there will be critical for it to continue growing.  Planted cucumbers, cilantro and tennessee greasy beans.  Planted replacement beans in several of the beds and saw that a lot of the last round of 'replacements' were starting to come up.  Weeded the carrot bed and found carrots are growing there!  YAY!

bit:  It still freaks me out a little bit when Esme tells me she thinks I am another mama and the other mama went to work today but I stayed here with her.  Is she pulling my leg?  She told me the mama with the hair tie went to work today, she is not here - but I am here, and I have a pink shirt and I made her food.