Culinary dilemma or Homeschool lesson?

Today in our homeschool science lesson, we studied the life cycle of the Indian Grain Moth. Not that I particularly wanted to study it, but in order to make dinner, it kind of proved necessary.

Here's a little back-story: after a very long day of getting very little done, I decided to go to the store for a deli chicken, a cornbread mix, and babyfood (totally spaced on the babyfood & had to improvise, but that's not important right now). We get back from the store and I ask M (7y/o) to start 3 cups of rice in the rice cooker. Easy enough. She'd done it dozens of times before. Measure, add water, plug it in, flip the switch, done. But not so easy tonight.

Here's a little back-back story: Ever since we moved into this 60+ year old house, I've been battling Indian Grain moths. They'd eat through bags of rice, beans, cereal, spices, you name it. They even ate my cayenne pepper, and that stuff's supposed to be nature's insect repellent! Every time I'd bring home a new bag of something yummy I'd have to put it in a glass jar to keep it safe or it'd be fair game to these little stinkers.  As of today, this plan was no longer working.

Apparently, the bugs have figured out how to crawl in my metal screw-topped glass canister into my rice. AAARGH! Well, I wasn't about to let them ruin my dinner plans, even if my 'planned' dinner was only haphazardly thrown together twenty minutes before. So I did what I'd done in ages past and thoroughly (and I mean THOROUGHLY) washed the rice. Simple. Waste not, want not. Just like Grandma would've done (or more likely great-grandma, as she was the cook of the house a-way-back in the Depression). So there. We had rice for dinner. But what about the rest of the canister? I couldn't let those little creepy-crawly larvae ruin the lot of it. I'd tried that once before and wound up with a jar of seeds that looked more like an ant farm that had been attacked by Spiderman than something fit for human consumption. And throwing it out, well, with six mouths to feed on a single pinch-every-penny-till-it-screams income, I wasn't about to ditch $10 worth of rice!

My solution? Dip out the rice a quarter cup at a time into a loaf pan, sift through and pick out the little critters, put the rice into a fresh container, and let D (4y/o) go to town smashing bugs. Worked pretty well, too. I think we've got them on the run. D even made up little cute ditties about bugs dying, and we all got to see the larval, pupal, and adult stages of this fascinating (and irritating) little bug. Needless to say I'll still wash my rice before cooking just in case... and after this probably won't have anyone brave enough to come to dinner... But, dear friend, if you do courageously cross our threshold to dine in our humble abode, rest assured: I won't be serving you rice!

Easy Ride...

Today is Thursday. Thursday in my house is Project Day. Sometimes the project is 'sneak in an extra nap', but today's project was a little more ambitious. Today's project was to fix the bikes! We had invested in super thorn resistant inner tubes to replace the shredded sieves decaying in the girls' tires from last year, but they were laying about gathering dust for several months now. It was time to take action (mostly because the boys woke up from their nap before I could manage sneaking in one of my own... sigh!)

I pulled M away from her lessons early (yay Mama!) and had her and D fetch their bikes and our brand new, never before used kiddie cart from the back room. We only misplaced two wrenches, three nuts, and a rubber washer, but we got found them all again and got it done! We changed two inner tubes, hooked up the cart, and added a cupholder to my fancy hybrid Mom Bike. Somehow the boys didn't even meltdown in the process. Knowing my strength is somewhat dubious after suffering a nearly two week major flare-up of Sjögren's, I insisted to the girls that we only go up and down the block a couple of times.

Needless to say, our enthusiasm for our nicely renewed machines got the better of us and we soon took to the open road! Er... well... took to the neighborhood at least. Both girls insisted they were up to a trip to the park, even D who is still on training wheels, so I, like the sucker I am, indulged them. It was a fair ride down. A sunny day, gentle breeze blowing, not too hot, and only about two frustrated explosions from D per block on the way there. But we made it! Bubba (aka J age almost 2), and the girls played, the baby (aka Little Bit) and I sat and made faces at each other, then the wind came up.

If you've ever been to our neck of the desert, you know that the wind around here can be nastier than møøse bites... and everyone knows møøse bites kan be pretti nasti. So we loaded up and headed back riding into the wind with sand stinging our eyes. M, being tough as leather, just pedaled on through, but by this time my legs were getting rubbery from lack of exercise and poor D was being literally blown backward on her bike as she struggled to pedal against the gale! And yet, the stoic mother must never show weakness in the face of a frustrated and panicky preschooler! I therefore encouraged, cajoled, and empathised to my wits end and eventually she got in a good rhythm and pushed on through to make it home again. It was a bit of an adventure, but a good time was had by all.

Still, I'm already starting to regret it this evening. While it's imperative that I get some exercise, my body doesn't always respond to it very well. Joint pains are starting to burn and my arms are so weak that typing on my computer feels almost as hard as pulling that kiddie cart with my bike. Sure, I could've better used my returning energy to, say, get caught up on laundry or tidy the nursery, but boy howdy! was it worth it to get out and RIDE!

The Requisite "Why am I Blogging?" Post

Search for disabled mother. Go ahead and pop on out and search, then pop on back. What did you find? Probably not much about being a disabled mother. Tons on being a mother of a kid with a disability, or being the daughter of an elderly mother who is disabled, but almost nothing about being a disabled mom. I know I can't be the only one out there, so I figured it was time to give us a voice.

Allow me to introduce myself: I'm Erin and I was diagnosed with Sjögren's syndrome in 2010. To boil it down, I appear perfectly normal, but routinely suffer severe joint pain, brain fog (more on that one later) chronic dryness (eyes, mouth, nose, and everywhere else one would expect to be... not dry), and worst of all debilitating bouts of fatigue and muscular weakness. BUT that's not how I usually introduce myself. I'm usually Erin, wife to G., mother to M, D, J, and Z ages 7, 4, almost 2, and 6mo. I'm a conservative skirt-wearing Christian woman who is also a super Geek, minor health-nut, free-lance seamstress, and somewhat musically inclined. I also love gardening, dream of urban homesteading, and have four backyard ducks and a gray tabby cat. The ducks are named Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, and Chuck (just in case they don't produce eggs & wind up on the table). The cat, well, his name depends on who you ask. I just call him 'Cat' so we'll go with that for now.

So how do I, who have all this going on, manage to do all the things I love, raise four children, support a wonderful husband, and nurse a baby while hindered by a disability? Long story short: I don't. I do many things in a mediocre fashion and often rule the roost from my armchair. And yet I love my life, more often than not! Sure, there are many ups and downs to being me, but I'm slowly learning to cope and even to laugh from time to time.

Alright. Let's start this blogging journey as I bare my soul, expose my weaknesses, and show how a real-life disabled mother does(n't?) it!