Flu Season - Vaccine or Not?

Seems like everyone I know has been fighting flu right now with this flu epidemic. We thought our home was going to pass it up. After much debate we decided to get the flu vaccine this year. I am not real hip on vaccines, but I am not anti-vaccine as of yet. We had planned on bypassing the vaccine this year, but with the scare of Ebola hitting the states this year, regardless if it was highly unlikely to breakout and probably ridiculous for this to make us consider the vaccine, but it got the conversation started and based off the flu episode I had  two winters ago (ended up getting bronchitis and pneumonia) we went ahead and got our early this year.

When I saw so many people breaking out with the flu I was so thankful that we got our vaccine, but then I hear on the news that the flu shot was not preventing people from getting this flu. So this Sunday we were all feeling under the weather and just had the blahs! We decided not to go to the Kingdom Hall on the off chance we may be coming down with something we sure didn't want to share it with everyone. Before long our little complained of a sore and scratching throat. But he never mentioned it again. That evening he had a difficult time going to sleep, but this is nothing new with him. I must have read him ten stories from My Book of Bible Stories. Finally he went to sleep and slept very late, but I knocked it off to him staying up so late last night. Guess again. He woke up crying, which he rarely does. I felt his head and he was hot as a fire cracker. In a horse  whiny voice he croaked "my throat hurts!" I called my hubby and then phoned the doctor.

(If you have a weak stomach don't read the next paragraph)

I told my hubby I thought he had strep throat. On arrival the nurses wanted to test him for strep. She came in with two long Q-Tips to stick to the back of his throat. He was whiny because like anyone he hates when they make you gag. Not to mention is just didn't wanted to be bothered with or there for that matter. So the nurse is attempting to get the strep test done and Wesley begins to cough and in turn start to vomit. Now at this point the nurse is in his face trying to get the test done and he throws up right on her face. I remember thinking when she walked in that she should have a mask on. I felt horrible for her because I know if that was me I would have probably would have been hysterical. But that may be why I only play nurse at home to my family and not for a living. Right? Anyway, I ran the cabinet to find something for him to vomit in and she heads out of the room to do whatever she needed to do. You know they really don't make those little pink vomit things (not sure what they are called) big enough. He emptied his system there on the exam floor. As horrible as I know this all sounds the good news was he hadn't felt up to eating and only had water on his stomach.

Well the very stressful strep test came back negative. The doctor came in and examined him and asked about his symptoms and diagnosed him with the flu and ordered a flu test. Thankfully that test went off without a hitch. Little one was so worried he would be leaving to doctors office with a shot despite my many promises that there would be no shots. He was very pleased when he heard that his prescriptions were Popsicle's and chewable Tylenol. When we came home from the doctors he answered "Does this mean I don't have to do school today?" I laughed and replied: "no baby not today."  So he has been resting and watching television (some of them are educational :-D) for the past two days, in between cat naps. His fevers seemed to be breaking so I am hopeful that tomorrow he will be back to normal.

So will we get the flu vaccine again? Time will tell. Each family must make the best decision they can at the time armed with the knowledge that have at that time that is best for them.  Hope everyone has a healthy year!
A special thank you to our amazing family and friend for their well wishes, gifts and cheering up and the amazing Manager Cindy at the Harbin Clinic who gave us a ride to the doctors. Talking about patient service! Very thankful to all the health care workers that treated my little one, especially that poor nurse that took the brunt of the patient care.

Highlights of 2014

 

 

It has been an amazing year. By far the most memorable for our family was the Jehovah's Witness International District Convention that we attended this summer in Atlanta, Georgia. This event was held at the Atlanta Georgia Dome, home of the Atlanta Falcons. This amazing event is something I will carry with me for a lifetime and will never forget. If you have never been and have the opportunity to be invited as a host or guest I cannot recommend it enough. It will change your life for the better. The best way I can describe it is, an awesome giant most delightful pleasant hug that doesn't stop giving. I can still feel that hug now despite it being six months ago. I don't know if that makes any sense at all, but that is the best description of the feeling I have about it. I could give you a description of what I saw, heard, etc... but there is no paragraph of words I could use to describe it and I can only sum it up to one word, the greatest of all words, the most powerful word in the universal language, LOVE. Enjoy the pictures.  Some of these pictures were shared with me. If you know who posted the pictures please share the link/name so I can give them credit. Some of these were taken by friends. For more information about what this event is about visit the official website www.jw.org

 So what else happen since obviously I am a few blogs behind?!?! Life happened and we were out living it and honestly I didn't have too many moments where I had the time to sit down and share unfortunaly, because it was EPIC. If I could find the time the energy wasn't there. I am committing to writing a blog each week in 2015 and 2014 sure did supply me with plenty of material. I am going to give just a run down assessment of our year in this blog and then please enjoy some of the photos.

• We went on a week-long visit to my parents and visited the Gulf of Mexico and had an amazing time learning about manatees, whales and endangered
• Wes graduated from Kindergarten in the spring. We used a life learning style, including Five In A Row and ABC Mouse. (I will give a review of each of these curriculms in an upcoming post)
• We participating in a special host event at Ruby Falls to meet and greet delegates as they arrived to tour the attraction.
• We spent many long and enjoyable family hours making gifts for our soon-to-be friends that would attend the 2014 Atlanta International Convention of Jehovah's Witnesses.
• My little one entered the 1st grade!
• We moved. Not too far, only 9 miles away from our own home, but a huge move for us. We used to live in the country and now we are living a small town within walking distance to stores and such.

So that is just the short basic run down skipping a whole lot of the between the lines, but I will be sure to fill between the lines as I go.

 

 

Unschooling, Really School?

On top of a mountain

We didn’t plan on breaking out the Kindergarten so soon by our little is just a sponge like most and just couldn’t wait to get started. I figured we would take it nice and slow and drag Kindergarten out over two school years, but he just gobbled every book and every assignment up like the natural little learner that he is. It was a lot of work, but it passed by so fast because we made it all fun and play and enjoyable.

 

My hope is that he will always enjoy learning has he does right now. I realize to maintain this love for learning it will require some purposeful parenting on our part. I absolutely love that we starting this homeschooling method from the beginning because our little definition of school has been redefined from my own definition.

 



Lego

School for him is every aspect of life. Because he has friends public schooling he will often ask “is this school?”  I do my best to answer him “Yes, but all things are school. We are always learning and growing.”    We celebrated his “kindergarten” year of completion with some of our homeschool friends.  We had a lot of fun and was amazed at how well the event was put together by our homeschool friends.  Although the youths were recognized for their years accomplishments it was done in such a way that it wasn’t forgotten to be fun and enjoyable for all ages.  So I was so happy we were able to be a part of it. I thought it was a great way to wrap up a period of learning although we homeschool year-round it was wonderful to be a part of like-minded people, both in faith, parenting and homeschooling.

Graduation with his witness homeschool group

We went through some amazing curriculum and I love how we didn't "plan" every aspect of everyday out. It amazed me how one simple question each day led to so much learning "What would you like to do today?" I am by no means an expert on all things schooling, but as a child that has was in the public school system and in homeschool myself and now pursuing homeschool for my own family I see what kind of opportunities can open for us if we don't try so hard to do "school" at home. I can see where a teacher would need to select a topic for a class of thirty plus kids, because if you asked 30 plus kids what they wanted to do you would probably get 30 plus different answers and nothing would get accomplished. But, when you are at home with 1 to 6, give or take a few, this question posed to your learners makes a lot more sense doesn't it?   

 

Learning about days of old

  

   History: Cars, Planes, motorcycles

Art/Nature Study













When I stopped saying "today we are going to do this..." and started asking "What would you like to do today?" I noticed a huge shift in his both our attitudes and happiness levels. There was no longer a struggle to do this or that. The interest level in whatever we do is beyond anything I ever imagined and the learning is happening! We both are having so much fun "outside of the box". I love listening to him tell his friends all the things he has been learning and you can tell that he loves learning.

Determined, R/C