I just heard this from a friend who is in law enforcement.  You know those cans of compressed air that we use to clean the computer with?  Well kids inhale this and are dying from it.  It contains R2 or something like that which traps oxygen in the heart and cuts it off to the other organs and the brain killing them within a few seconds if not immediately.  Most parents don't even know about it he says, but almost evey 10 to 15 year old does hearing it from other kids at school or that they play with in their neighborhoods.  That can of compressed air just went in the garbage.  I told my son to pause his movie this morning and asked him if he knew what dusting was.  I was relieved he didn't know what it was, but it did surprise me that he thought it was a form of oral sex!  Being 14, he is asking a lot of questions about sex these days to whoever will answer him!  Teenagers.... man it's a lot of work to keep up with what they know, what you need to know as a parent, and how to protect them!

I have about 50 more eyeglass frames and sunglasses left to list and wonder if it would be better to list them all at once ending a few minutes apart or to continue staggering them out 7 to 10 listings end then list more and relist unsold ones like I have been.  Any thoughts on this? 

Today my teenage son returns home from school for the summer.  I remember the summer before high school.  The last time you could feel like a kid and run free without worrying about being cool.  Now my first born is at this place in his life.  Damn I feel old.  So, he has a list of movies to go see, places he wants to go such as Great America, and wants to get an RC car to take out when my husband takes his out.  My son is grounded from all video games until his report card comes in the mail because last we knew he had a D in Algebra.  He swears it is at least up to a C with all the make up work he turned in the last few days of school.  When the report card comes, he will know if he spends the rest of the summer with or without video games.  He also has a lot of bonding with his little brother and sister to make up for being gone all the last school year.  They haven't seen him since Christmas.  So keeping him occupied and outdoors instead of cooped up in from of the video games will be a challenge.

You think the infant would be the most time consuming of the three I have, but he's not.  He is the easiest, the perfect baby, my reward for having the first 2.  He is always happy, unless you mess with his food, and he is forever smiling.  Both his sister and teenage brother take up so much more time.  The toddler thinks she runs the show and is absolutely testing every rule, our consistancy, even learned to tell us to shut up recently.  That would be our fault as parents, we tell the dogs to shut up when they bark at the neighbor.  Oops - that will teach us!  She starts her ballet lessons in June, so we've been driving around to find size 2T & 3T leotards, dance skirts, and toddler ballet shoes.  She is already gorgeous, this outfit just makes her look more precious.  She is me.  My worst fear each pregnancy was that it would be a girl.  She would be just like me and my parents, their old friends, past baby sitters, and my whole family would have their sweet revenge for the terror child I was.  Paybacks are exactly what everyone says they are!  I laugh while typing this, because I wouldn't want her any other way.  Women have to be strong and know what they want with enough courage to go after it.  It takes a strong woman in these times to compete in this big world of corperate America to be considered equal.  She is going places.  She has that special something kind of personality mixed with determination and intelligence...

Now to add to this crazy place we call home is my younger sister, almost 28, single, and pregnant.  Her life with her boyfriend ended and was in transition just as they broke up and she found out she was pregnant.  She has the potential for disaster, so I roped her in and am trying to keep her on the right track.  She is due the beginning of July.  We live in the Central Valley of California.  It gets so hot here in the summer!  Needless to say, she is miserable.  In about 6 weeks, we will have a newborn baby to add to this chaos.   Life is about to get real interesting around here.

 

We took my daughter for a check up on her allergies and asthma.  The doctor listened to her lungs saying he didn't hear much wheezing which is a good thing.  Her allergies trigger her asthma so we try so hard to keep them under control.  While he is listening to her lungs, he hears something else, gets a frown on his face, and starts listening all over her chest, back, and sides.  He looks up at me and says, "Um, that clicking noise shouldn't be there."  I ask, "What clicking noise?"  He turns away from me and says, "It's in her heart.  It shouldn't sound like that clicking so loud."  Shock - instant shock.  Panic was next, "What do you mean 'It shouldn't sound like that.'? What's wrong?" And I start to tear up.

At this point the doctor shuts down.  No more facial expressions, no more easy going nature, nothing, just cold, emotionless responses.  He explained that he didn't want to say anything and just wait until we had an echo done and see what it says.  This is the doctor that I have been going to for 26 years, since I was 7!  I know him; we are open and casual with each other.  He always just gives it to me straight, no fluff, no medical BS.  So when I say, "Waiting is fine and dandy before getting all worked up, but the fact that my 2 year old needs an echo-cardiogram at all, it is just disturbing!", he replies, "I agree." and turns away again.   THAT is what scared me the most.  That last comment that he is disturbed, too.  He didn't say "I understand your feelings." or anything else neutral, he said he agreed that I should be disturbed.  So of course I am freaking out inside my head.  My daughter is still sitting next to me now coloring, so I can't freak out and upset her. 

Driving home was horrible.  Going into the house and looking up at my husband was worse.  He knows me.  He knew something was wrong.  So I explained as evenly and as calmly as I could muster about what had happened and why I was scared.  He is so calm, shrugs his shoulders, and proceedes to tell me there is nothing wrong and that I need to not overreact.  The images of strangling him to death and just cold cocking him come to mind.  So I just walked away.  As I thought about it, I consider several things.  My husband does not like those he loves to be hurting, he is her Daddy and she is the epitome of Daddy's Girl, and I realize he is scared, too.  And he is SO in denial.  That fast his brain denied anything could be wrong and went straight to no way, this is not a big deal, tells me that yes, he knows it could be bad...

I could not help myself.  I typed "clicking sound in the heart" into Yahoo! Search and came up with most all the same results.  It's called mitral valve prolapse (MVP), and it can be so minor that it doesn't affect you at all other than to take antibiotics before dental work, or as severely as immediate surgery to correct it.  Relief that most people are not even affected by it in their lives and that my daughter won't die from it was one reaction, but freak out all over again that my perfect daughter - absolutely beautiful (see our me page), so advanced and smart, willful and stubborn, but as a woman adult, no man will ever abuse her physically or emotionally, that she may have to have surgery that would leave a scar forever down the top of her chest. 

To blemish this beautiful child that I am so protective of, so vain of her beauty, so proud of her advanced intelligence, is unacceptable.  What if she wanted to be a model, what if it affects her self esteem, what if, what if, and more what if's fill my head.  Guilt that I was too proud, or too vain of her being so gorgeous was a reaction until I pulled my head out and got myself to calm down.  My friend helped by saying, "Better a scar for the rest of her life, than not being alive, right?"  So right, what was I thinking?  Once I got it all out and processed and got my reactions over with, then I could put it aside and wait to deal with the results.

This morning was the echo test, and everything was fine.  The tech doing the test heard nothing abnormal and said everything looks very healthy.  The doctor came in and looked over the test results with the tech right there in from of us.  Once he pointed out the peaks and markings that were the clicking sounds, the tech understood that in a little tiny body like my daughter's, it would sound really loud and not ok through the stethoscope.  But on the monitor and through the test, it is well within normal parameters.  They both came to the same conclusion that because she is small, it just sounded worse than it was.  The tech listened to her chest and agreed that it would have made her wonder enough to have the test done as well.  They will still send it to a pediatric cardiologist just to be sure, but if my doctor was comfortable with the results, I am going to trust that.  My husband was smart enough not to say the good ol "I told you so.", but gave such a huge sigh with a little tug at the end, that I knew how scared he was, and that he was just as relieved and thankful as I am. Thank God she is just fine!

 

 

 

I only sell between 3 and 7 items a week.  It increases each week, but I am not sure whether a storefront will help me or hinder me.  I as a Buyer don't usually find that good of deals in the eBay stores.  But I can see some savings on the listing fees and length of listings by opening one.   I do plan to add an old record collection and over 5000 baseball cards to my listings in addition to the eyeglasses and sunglasses.  Does anyone have a person experience they don't mind sharing to give me some feedback to consider?

Sold 4 over Saturday and Sunday, then 3 more today!  That is really good for me with the product I have!   I hadn't sold outside of the US and Canada before, so it was interesting to compare all the pricing for the different countries that I have been asked to ship to.  Learning process for sure!  And the European countries definately realize the savings I offer on my listings.  I sell what they pay $300 for at about an 80% savings to my customers. 

 

Husband let me sleep in for a few extra minutes - very nice.  Coffee was already made - very very nice.  Had another Buy It Now purchase for a pair of eyeglass frames when I first checked in on my listings.  Kids did well with learning time, my toddler is learning ABC's, and numbers, and I am trying to teach my infant how to turn the board book pages without eating them.  Small kids are now going down for naps on time and teenage son still at his father's.  Husband is off to a few meetings, and live-in pregnant sister of mine is off to her friends for the day!  Wow - some quiet time to myself - and I am here blogging!!  I am off to do some housework while I am still able to do it uninterrupted!  Let's pray that the rest of the day continues so smooth!!