December Happenings and Christmas Gifts 2022

This is one of those years where I am counting down the days until it is over.

What a year.

The latest that happened this month was a doozy.  My daughter woke up one morning with her eye swelled up.  This has happened randomly in the past.  We never could really pin down what would cause it to happen, but you would give her a Zyrtec and it would be fine.  

Not this time.

The allergic reaction went out of control.  Despite me pumping as many antihistamines as I could safely give her, it just got worse.  She went to bed that night with me a bit worried because she still had a swollen spot under her eye, but it wasn't getting worse, so I prayed that with the medications in her and some sleep she'd feel better.   It didn't work that way.  She woke up with her eyes nearly swollen shut, her face one big raised welt and hives and welts breaking out over her whole body.  We ended up in Urgent care and then the ER that day.  An IV of Benadryl and some steroids and then a prescription for Zyrtec and steroids was the result that day.  Fast forward a week later, after the first round of steroids was done and the reaction came back, although it never went away to begin with.  Finally we ended up at the Urgent Care last Sunday to try and avoid the wait at the ER (if the Urgent Care saw her first and would send her onto the ER the wait was a LOT less we found) and they ended up giving her a shot of steroids and an albuterol treatment because she had a rasp to her breathing they did not like.  

I, during the entire thing, worked on getting ahold of an allergist to get testing and things done so we can figure out what caused this and get it out of my daughter's environment, but no one was returning my calls.  Our pediatrician, true rock star that she is, got us a script for an epi-pen for Armina and sent in referrals with a request to bump her up the wait list due to the way things have gone the last few weeks.  Hopefully I hear from the allergist soon.  The Urgent Care put Armina on a really strong dose of prednisone this last go round, which finally got her face to go down and got rid of the majority of the welting on her body, but the script made her sick to her stomach so she's been working to keep things down this week.  The poor thing has been so miserable.  I'm praying we are over the worst of it for now and that it'll be okay until we can get into an allergist.  Please, pray for her on this.  We need all the help we can get!

Combine that with a record breaking snowfall and then the wind picking up while it snowed again and drifted snow in HUGE amounts.  It's been rough around here.  This was the view outside of my deck door when we got up in the morning...

It was bad.  My husband ended up spending the entire day shoveling 5 to 7 foot drifts of snow off of the deck and roof, after he tunneled across the yard, up the deck stairs one at a time and things first, of course.  He had a really crappy day of snow removal and he still has to shovel off a few more vehicles and things. 

Oh and my washing machine died.  Luckily, we had our old one that my husband was able to figure out the going off balance issue and we reinstalled it in the laundry room for the time being until he can find a bigger machine for me that works (the other one blew it's motor from what my husband was able to diagnose).   

I'm just praying that Christmas vacation for my husband goes well this next week.  We could all use just a relaxing, no stress, break from everything around here right now.  Here's praying.

On the practical side of things, I just out and out told my family that I couldn't afford to send them gifts this year, which was the honest 100% truth.  My mom actually appreciated it as she lost her job a few months ago and her budget on Social Security is pretty tight now a days.  I feel guilty not sending gifts as my brother and younger sister are actually really nice and generous at the holidays, but I knew that if I sent them gifts that I'd have a hard time affording it and now with medical bills coming down the pike (plus hopefully the allergists bills on top of it), it is going to be really tight around here.  I just hope my daughter feels better as this whole situation is just terrifying for her and the rest of us.

I decided to make the husband and kids gifts this year for the sake of the budget, because I actually do enjoy doing it and the family seems to like it too.  It was so crazy around here it is a miracle that I've actually figured some stuff out in that area as we haven't even hung up all of the Christmas decorations yet.  While looking through material and things, I did find some Christmas material that I hadn't used for anything yet and some other remnants and decided to make some gifts for some friends and family that are in the immediate area.  I've found things like making gifts right now is actually kind of calming me down and distracting me, which I'm grateful for at this point.  I'm also hoping to bake a few things for gifts this year as well (aiming for simple there too).  Hopefully things will be calm enough for me to do that.  I'm aiming for things that are easy to sew and bake and projects that are quick as well as that is what I can do in this stage in my life.  I'll share what I do and link to patterns and things as well in case you want to try them yourself (trust me, I'm aiming for free patterns this year, so it'll be affordable for you to do as well) and share some money saving tips on how to make things special, but cheap if I can.

So, yeah, that is the update for today.  I'm hoping to start the Christmas Gifts for this year tomorrow if I can so you have time make some of them if you want.  Barring anything else happening *knock on wood* I'll see you then.  And Happy Holidays.  I hope, even though most people are keeping it simple this year (us as well) that you can find the holiday spirit and wrestle some fun from this season.