The one where I lose a . . .

I wasn't going to blog about The Incident because it gives me chills and I like to think of this blog as full of flowers and fluff. Just kidding. I don't really think of this blog like that at all (although I do like flowers, I also hate fluff).

But when I mentioned The Incident to SIL Katy, she asked if I was going to write about it and post pictures. And then tonight, as we talked about the result of The Incident, Seth asked me if I was going to post about it. And he never asks if I'm going to blog about anything. So I figured if it warranted a post in his mind, then maybe I should post about it after all.

And so I shall.

But I shall also give you this fair warning: this post will send a chill down your spine (seriously, if you don't get a shiver, let me know and I'll give you 1,000 bonus points (that mean nothing)). So if you have a weak stomach, stop reading now.

Right now.

I mean it.

If you're still reading, then consider yourself warned. This is gonna get ugly.

Last Saturday, the Special Olympics of our area hosted a fire-engine pull as a fundraiser.

Our town's volunteer firefighters signed up as a team -- Seth included. So I took the boys to watch their daddy pull a fire engine.

Which they did. Three times.

I'd like to say that all of his valiant pulling earned them a first place trophy. However, another group -- one touting muscle-building protein supplements and composed of 15 heavily armed (and I mean that in the bodily sense) men -- also showed up. And won. Surprise, surprise.

At any rate, the boys had fun looking at the various fire engines on display (all of the local volunteer firefighter squads participated).

Including this one from our town -- a 1936 engine that still runs (but doesn't go on fire runs).

And then Kieran found that the bell on another one actually worked and couldn't stay away from it.

We had a nice morning together.

Are you still with me? The Incident hadn't happened yet so you still have time to stop reading. Just sayin'.

On the way home, I stopped by a fast-food restaurant to take advantage of a buy-one-get-one-free-milkshake coupon. And I bought one chocolate shake and got a strawberry one free (or vice versa). Cael drank some of his, but Kieran wasn't interested in his, so when we got home, I put them both (the shakes, that is) in the refrigerator for later.

"Later" came after Cael woke from his nap. I asked him if wanted more of his shake and he did. And instead of waiting for me to get it for him, he opened the fridge, got his shake, and in the process spilled the other one on the floor. I wasn't happy about that and began cleaning it up a bit grumpily (I know, I know). Since some of the shake went under the fridge, I decided I needed to move it and clean under it (and in the process perhaps find some of those fridge magnets we'd been missing) so that the milk didn't putrify.

Seth was outside mowing the lawn at the time, so in my grumpiness, I decided it needed to be done right away and started moving the fridge back and forth trying to get it away from the wall.

This is where The Incident comes in. Stop reading now. I mean it.

In the process of moving the fridge, my left hand got too close to the counter by the fridge and at one point, somehow, in some odd way, STOP READING NOW, the nail on my pinkie finger got lodged in the veneer of the counter and when I pulled my hand out, the fingernail stayed in the counter. (I know this because when I went to the fridge later that evening, I saw it still in there.)

I have never been in so much pain in my entire life (including those few brief pre-epidural hours that I was in labor with Cael and those post-C-section weeks after both boys were yanked out of me). I can't really describe the noise that came out of my throat, except to say that poor little Cael was scared and crying (Kieran was oblivious in the other room). Every time I tried to stand up and walk around, I ended up on the floor feeling faint because of the pain.

Seth eventually finished mowing, came inside, noticed the blood gushing from my finger and asked about The Incident. He then helped me clean it and bandage it and took care of the boys the rest of the evening while I sat on the couch cradling my hand and wishing I hadn't been so grumpy and impatient.

We didn't go the ER because I figured there was nothing they could do anyway (the nail I found in the veneer had STOP READING NOW already hardened and wasn't really in the "re-attaching" state), but I did ask a family doctor who attends our church about it the next morning. He assured me that it wasn't fatal and that I'd have a new nail in 8-10 weeks (which sounded a lot better than the year I was expecting after Googling "what happens when you lose a fingernail" all Saturday night).

So there it is. The Incident in all its ugliness (although the picture doesn't actually do the ugliness justice). And here's where I get all spiritual and say "ugly results from ugly sin."

If you made it this far, let me ask you this: have you ever lost a fingernail? Do tell and let's experience the shivers together.

Saving the Holler from itself

Over the past few years, one of our Holler neighbors has fallen on hard times and has been asking us to buy some of his land in order to give him cash flow (and us, uh, land). Although that particular piece of property would be necessary should we ever decide to build a house on our land, we've been stalling because we didn't want to part with such a large chunk of money from our savings account.

And then the neighbor forced our hand. He gave us an ultimatum: buy my property or I'll sell the whole thing to someone else. We may have been okay with that except that our other neighbor (who's friends with Hard-Times Neighbor (HTN)) knocked on our door and explained what would happen.

Apparently, HTN found a buyer for his property who was willing to pay cash and take immediate occupancy. The problem was that the buyer wanted to turn the place into a "party house," which the neighbor took to mean there would be lots of drinking and smoking and yelling and partying and general nuisance-ing and he was concerned about how this would impact our boys ("I know how you like to take walks down the lane with the boys. Not sure you'd be able to do that as much if they turned it into a party house."). And, furthermore, said buyer was already feuding with our third neighbor (there are enough feuds going on in the Holler without adding to the mess).

The Holler was threatening to become just that . . . a holler.

So, we sighed, decided to take the bait, and Seth went to talk to HTN about purchasing the property. And then we sat down together to talk about how we were going to save money so we could replenish the savings account once we bought the property. He suggested I start hypermiling. I suggested he stop going out to eat so much for lunch with his coworkers.

And then we both looked at each other and laughed. We knew neither of those things was going to happen.

Our biggest monthly expense is our house payment. On a whim, I started looking for local banks that would refinance our type of house--a modular home. We'd checked into it before but after the housing crisis, no large mortgage lender would refinance modular homes. So I started looking locally. There are plenty of these types of houses around the hills and hollers of where we live, and I figured someone must be financing them. Lo and behold, one of the local banks emailed me back in the affirmative and with the even better news that we could refinance at 3.75% instead of the 7.25% we'd been paying! We quickly jumped on the offer and found out several things in the process.

1. We've been living a lie. We do not own 26 acres of land. We own 21. Our dreams of being land barons were dashed. (And then buoyed again at the thought of acquiring HTN's 2+ acres.)

2. Land titles in hollers are . . . hollerish.

3. We saved almost $700 on our house payment (our only debt) by refinancing. With that kind of savings, we could potentially pay off our house in 10 years even while stashing money into our savings account to replenish it from purchasing HTN's property and using some of it to help others. And there was great rejoicing.

In the process of saving the Holler, we ended up saving ourselves quite a bit of money. I'd say that's a win all around.

Bedtime conversation

When Kieran was a baby, he cried a lot. A lot. Especially in the evenings. I'd put him down for bed and he'd fall asleep for awhile and then wake up screaming. And nothing we did would calm him down. He'd scream for a long time--anywhere from 30 minutes to over an hour. And after he would finally fall asleep, he would wake up several hours later and cry again. I'd give him a bottle and gingerly lay him down in his bassinette that was propped up on one end. And hope he didn't wake up screaming again. He usually did. This went on for months. And months. And months. I was one weary mother with frazzled nerves, as you may well imagine.

We found out after he was diagnosed with Williams syndrome at nine months old that sleeping problems are common in those with WS and can be caused by hypercalcemia or reflux. And they can also be unexplained by anything medical.

After his diagnosis, I began making WS friends on Facebook and found that many parents of children with WS gave their kids melatonin to help with falling asleep. I checked with our geneticist who said it was fine to give him a small dose and see if it helped. It did. He still had difficultly staying asleep but he fell asleep much more easily (he didn't sleep through the night consistently until he was about a year and a half). We kept giving him the melatonin until late last year and ever since he's done fairly well at falling asleep on his own and staying asleep. And I've been breathing sighs of relief when I say good-night to the boys, close the door to their bedroom, and don't hear any screaming.

Last night, though, after the boys went to bed, Kieran began with the screaming and crying. He does this occasionally, and I ignore it for awhile and if he doesn't stop, I check on him. Which is what I did last night.

Hey Buddy, what's wrong?

K: I heard a loud noise.

Me: There was no loud noise.

K: It was crickets outside.

Me: Crickets? (I started smiling.) I don't think the crickets are making you cry.

K: I feel sick. (He affects a sad face.)

Me: You're not sick. You're fine.

K: I'm so sad. (He affects a sad face, again.)

Me: Why are you sad?

K: I don't like thunder.

Me: I know you don't but it's not thundering. It's not even raining, silly. (I smile again.) I think you're making stuff up. (He starts smiling.)

K: My knee hurts.

Me: I'm pretty sure your knee is fine.

K: I need some juice.

Me: How about you just go to sleep? (I'm smiling and he's smiling by now.)

After assuring him of my love for him and telling him it was time to go to sleep now, I left the room and he finally fell asleep.

Settling on the sofa again, my heart was happy . . . for several reasons.

1. That he was able to think up and converse about things he thought would get him out of going to bed.

2. That he knew when I was calling his bluff and found it funny.

3. That he fell asleep after I left without any more crying.

He's come a long way in his four-and-a-half years. And it makes me smile.

X-Y-Z

Kieran's second preschool year has drawn to close. Which means he's made it through the alphabet with show-n-tell items one more time.

I scrambled looking for something that began with an X and put out a plea for help on my Facebook page. Sadly, however, we had no X-rays, x-tra cookies, xylophones, xenias, ex-lax, stuffed animals named Xavier, boXes, or weedwackers with a brand name that start with X. I briefly thought about taking my friend Roger's advice and soaking "some celery in some red food coloring and show them the xylem that absorbs the red dye. #sciencegeek" but didn't think that would go over very well with a bunch of 3 and 4 year-olds. So I hemmed and hawed, and at the last minute asked the gal who watches the boys while I get some work done for my part-time job if she had any ideas. Thankfully, Cydney had a puzzle piece in the shape of an X that also featured a xylophone that she let us borrow.

Y wasn't too difficult -- some type of yo-yo thing we've had for awhile.

And, in case you couldn't guess, Z was one of many zebras (like this one) we have in our toy boxes.

We've finished with another year of school!