January Accomplishments

• This last week Mom biked +/- 100 km for appointments and errands... this isn't exactly how the whole month has gone, but we are out and about a lot more than last year. We are sleeping well for it - and Mom's only gotten one sunburn for all that time out in the sun.
• The girls plugged away all month and got one school course completely finished: Canadian history is off the schedule for the rest of the year! Now they are mostly left with the fun stuff tailored to their interests: Creative Arts, Digital drawing, Creative Writing, Music, and the like.
• Our blender bit the dust. As we are notoriously rough on our blenders, this one lasting nearly 4 years is a record. Mom spent some time asking various repair places to try get it fixed, but everyone said it needed a new motor so there was no point. We chafe at having to buy a new one only a year and a bit from our projected leave date, but as we found a blender very similar to the much loved one we had in Manila years ago, Mom is more than satisfied.
• Aiden has had quite a few science "labs" to do this month. Unfortunately the most recent ones included blue food coloring... and being all boy and 9 quite a bit was used and not much thought about where it got put... so one evening the jar got swept off the shelf and splashed very blue water all over. And not just the floor, but somehow he managed to get it in all the three shelves of books and games underneath, so it was a rather mammoth clean up - and still somethings are permanently blue streaked .
• Aiden's Social Studies course has him going through the provinces and territories of Canada, learning all sorts. One thing he has to do for each is make and eat a traditional food from that place. This month that has been Alberta and British Columbia. We had bison fireballs and Nanaimo bars. Or, at least, sort of. By the time mom has finished substituting ingredients, we're not that sure how authentic the food is! The Nanaimo bars were pretty good, but she made them in a too small pan so each layer was whoppingly thick! Yummy, but not exactly easy to eat or pleasing to look at.
• Grace has upped her music practice time to 2 hours - one for voice and one for piano. So we are all getting very familiar with her pieces! It is rather fun to hear songs sung in German, French, Italian, English - and Malay, just because. And, of course, this much practice takes some fitting in with the rest of the days' activities.

A Little Something From Aiden

 We've had lots of samples from Grace and Jasmin on here, but now it's Aiden's turn! Here's a short story from his school work. Completely his own - not even edited by anyone else.

The prairie was baked and cracked by the sun. Tumbleweeds were scattered across the field. Scorched Prairie was arguably one of the most hottest places as the area was flanked by two deserts, covered by mountains on the other side, and the last side was prairie. I am Corn, a prairie dog. Prairie dogs are dogs that live in prairies and they hide from the sun by underground tunnels. I was an obnoxious prairie dog as I wasn’t fully brown with white spots. I was, ermmm,  black, with brown spots.
So I was an outcast, but that didn’t stop me from trying to accomplish my dream, to be a digger. Diggers were the safest job, yet the most dangerous. That does not make sense, but think, a digger has the high risk of cave-ins, but they are safe from predators. When I think of predators I shudder, I could never face them. I wouldn’t even try to run, I would be frozen in pure fear. As a matter of fact, even though I was an outcast, a digger would be perfect! No one could see my odd colors under the dirt, and it’s very risky, so other prairie dogs could get rid of me! Even though in the truth a digger is the safest job.
The one thing stopping me is I’m too young. Would you like a three-year-old expanding your house? No, of course they wouldn’t do a good job. Most likely they would make the entire tunnel fall down. But there was one thing I could do to try to become a digger. I could make myself look terrible at every other job. First there was a seed collector. They had the most dangerous job, and I could say that ‘m not fast enough to collect the seeds. Then second there was the caretaker. They had a difficult job, but it was fairly safe. I could say, I didn’t know how to clean up the tunnels, or if I did learn, I would be terrible at it. I could also say, “Plus, digging is good for me, I’m the only one who doesn’t care about sanity.” The best thing about this plan is that it’s true! All those statements are true. Just as I was satisfied by my plan, I heard yells saying, “CODE BLUE, I REPEAT, CODE BLUE!”
I was shocked, code blue meant there was an unknown attacker, birds were code black. It turned out to be a blep. Bleps are the most terrifying creatures on the entire planet. The could literally suck you in with their gleaming, adorable, innocent eyes. Then as soon as you got close that red tongue would be splattered with your blood. No one could process that a blep squeezed it’s way into the tunnels. Then I realized it didn't squeeze into the tunnels. It legitimately walked over the tunnels. I could see prairie dogs getting sucked in. I started running even though I felt guilty for the prairie dogs being sucked in. They are already gone, I reminded myself. I ran to a dead end. It’s not a dead end to me. I dug, and scratched, and clawed. I tunneled through the dirt. It was even easier than I thought! The dirt fell beneath my claws like grass in a wildfire. I thought of an ingenious, unthinkable, incredible idea. Stuff the dirt behind me. It worked. No one knew where I was. I could feel the pull of the blep’s eyes, but the dirt stopped me from being sucked. I tunneled further. I would need to get back to the surface. Even though it was full of dangers it was my only hope. I broke the scorched ground. I could see birds soaring above my head.      
AHHHHHHHHHH, I thought. I am going to be eaten! In blind panic I started running. I stumbled into a hole, when I looked around I panicked even more. I was in a blep cave. “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” I screamed. I quickly jumped out of the hole and ran. A while later I tunneled into the ground. I have to, I must hide. The dirt flew everywhere. Then I fell, more like fell on top of another prairie dog.
They said, “Glad to see you alive.”
I replied, “How are you guys alive?”
They said, “For some reason the blep started to tunnel into the ground where you went. You tunneled so fast, you deserve to be a digger.”
I replied in shock, “Really? Please, I really want to be a digger.”
“Sure, I grant you to be a tunnel maker, your first shift starts tomorrow,” the mysterious prairie dog said.

When It happens, it happens

Last week we decided it was time to check out the lump in my wrist, doctors have always said is a ganglion and of no worries. Since it had begun restricting my use of my hand/wrist and was bothering more than normal, I moved on from the family doctor system to specialist system. And in the private medical system here, it went blindingly fast: I met with a specialist last Friday and yesterday I had surgery - with an MRI, report visit, and mandatory Covid test in-between! As I posted last time, the MRI showed that it was actually not a ganglion, but a Giant Cell Tumor. Still nothing much to worry about as the name doesn't mean that it was giant, nor does it have much risk of being anything but benign.

It was day surgery, but with general anesthesia so I was at the hospital most of the day. The adventure didn't begin all that well as my alarm didn't go off so my wake up call was the Grab driver's call to tell me he had arrived! Thankfully I had prepared everything the night before so all I had to do was dress and brush teeth and hair.

The other hiccup in the day was utter confusion when I woke up - to the point where I was telling the nurses my name was Katie! So I took a bit longer to come around 😉 As a result, though, M had to come get me, as they wouldn't discharge me on my own. So poor M had to bike out a second 24km round trip that day (he had taken Jasmin to the orthodontist) to get me discharged! But as on the way home he bought roadside friend chicken, mangoes, and longyan, it ended up being a bonus over all.

The surgeon said the GCT was deep in the joint, but he got it all out. He kept telling me to use my hand normally straight away and not to worry about slowing healing or anything. On the other hand, apparently getting the incision wet requires a trip to the ER...

As he had also used local anesthesia and had to dig deep, it was too clumsy and painful to use my hand at all yesterday. Today is much better, though, and I'm not needing the pressure wrap already. Still, there are plenty of things I'm not using my hand for as it is quite painful. For example, Aiden chopped the ginger and garlic for breakfast cooking this morning... 

 Next Wednesday I will see the surgeon again for follow up and get the lab report. And then, hopefully this story is all finished and I will have free use of my wrist and hand - better than I have for the last 10 years or so hopefully.

2022 Quietly Begun

 

2022 Very Quietly Begun

We didn't attend the church watchnight service (which had to end by 10pm because of Covid SOPs) but rather had our own at home that was simple and sweet and meaningful. And just happened to be awake to catch a snatch of fireworks from our balcony. We have yet to get to our New Year letters from Dad to each kid though...

Jasmin discovered that she likes macramé: not too hard, but looks nicely complicated😄

Mom followed up with a doctor about the lump in her wrist (that had been casually diagnosed as a ganglion before) because it was bothering her a bit more than usual. With the fast track private medical care here, within one week she saw a specialist, had an MRI, and is scheduled for surgery on Thursday! It turns out it is not a ganglion, but a Giant Cell Tumor, which sounds a lot worse than it is apparently. According to the surgeon, it is of no real concern and only means day surgery and a week or so of recovery to heal the incision. Let's hope that this is so.

We've restarted school. So same-same as before. Except now Grace and Aiden are biking out to in-person Chinese classes after being on-line for nearly a year! They get better tuition this way, but don't particularly like losing the extra hour of transport time twice a week.