Misc Ramblings – Page 14 – a hippie with a minivan

A few of Willa's favourites…

One of the things that occupied Willa at the hospital was the iPad.

She can turn it on, unlock it, swipe the pages until she finds her favourite page, open apps, change them etc., but something that would keep her attention when she was not in the mood to play was music videos…

She loves music, she sings and dances but when she was stuck in bed, not able to move, it was something that was almost always guaranteed to put a smile on her face. And still now as a part of our evening routine she loves to relax while watching a few of these right before bed…

So I thought that I should share some of her favourites… maybe your music loving kids (or yourself) will enjoy these too… (more…)

Électrium

On the south shore of Montreal, on highway 30, just east of the 20, there is a hidden gem called the “Électrium” that not many people seem to know about…

Really, unless you are going there specifically, or out to one of the towns past the 20 (including where I live) you would never see it.

The Électrium is Hydro-Quebec’s “Electricity Interpretation Centre”… It is full of information, experiments and hands on activities about electricity and best of all, it is free! If you have read my blog for while or looked back in the archives you will see that I have already written about it, but another visit, warrants another post.

Last Friday the boys and I headed to Montreal for Wilhelmina’s Dr. Appointment… (btw… everything is looking good!!!) On the way back I went to the Atwater market to get some veggies and food for the week and then on the ride back home I decided to stop at the Électrium on a whim. Each time we had passed by the boys would talk about it but it was never a good time, so this time it was perfect and they got so excited when I took the exit.When we arrived, there was no else there.

We were met at the door by one of the guides and she asked if we wanted to just go around by ourselves or if we wanted the guided tour… The last time we were there we were with a french homeschooling group, so even though the kids understand french, it takes a bit more effort and were not able to really listen and follow. Of course, it was also more than 2 years ago so the age difference adds much more to comprehension also. So I said that it would be fun to have an english guided tour. We were asked to wait for a minutes in the unlikely event that others that wanted to follow an English tour may arrive, but no one did so we started…

(Waiting for the tour to start)

The first part of the tour is watching a series of clips on electricity made by the NFB.

They only showed the ones on electricity but the whole set can be watched here… (they are really fun to watch!!!)

oehttp://www.nfb.ca/film/science_please_1

oehttp://www.nfb.ca/film/science_please_part_2

After the watching the clips we were led into the next room which is about safety. The guide was great and really engaged the kids… even Willa was interested… well… somewhat…

Because it was just us and the guide, the boys were able to ask as many questions as they wanted and the guide was great at answering them. He was also very passionate about his job and about what he was talking about which made it so much more interesting and informative.

After learning about safety, it was the section on electricity in nature. Our own nervous system, our reflexes, the brain, heart etc… and of course, on of the highlights of the show is the electric eel (did you know that it is actually not an eel but a knifefish?). A blue panel next to the tank has lights that light up when the eel becomes electrified. Pretty cool of you ask me…

The next section is about static electricity and starts with a small film on the Aurora Borealis/Australis and lightening… both natural reactions of static electricity…

(making balls move though glass using static electricity)

This is of course a favourite section for all because static electricity means playing with the Plasma ball and the Van de Graaff Generator.

(Wilhelmina loved the Plasma Ball)

(Van de Graaff Generator)

The last section is on magnetism and generating electricity. The boys listed and took in as much as they could but soon started getting restless… they last about 90 min before this so it was actually pretty impressive!

Since we were getting the private tour we were able to cut it short at that point and the guide left us alone so that we could go back to the beginning and the we could play with everything again…

Again, this is a great, free, hands on place to head with the kids… If you are in Montreal it is worth the short ride and will make for a great outing. They do ask for people to call ahead to not be at the same time as a group, it is a small place so if a school group is there, it will be cramped and not much fun but if it a lazy day, like on the day we went, it is a great way to spend a few hours…

NaBloPoMo 2011

For the fourth year in a row I have decided to do NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) in which the goal is to have at least one post per day for the whole month. Each year I use it as the opportunity to get back into the habit of writing and each year I find it hard but well worth it. When I was with Willa at the hospital I wondered if I had missed it (I forgot if it was Oct or Nov) and when I got back home I was so happy to see that I hadn’t. Of course if I had missed it, I could have done it by myself but my self-motivation is at times lacking and having the added outside pressure trumps my procrastination.

So I am putting myself up for the challenge once again. Posting every day for the whole month and getting back into the habit of blogging on a more regular basis.

So… If you have any ideas for me I would love to hear them!! Questions? topics you would like to hear my point of view on? Recipes that you would like to see?

I’m open!

And if you have a blog and are also going up for the challenge I would love for you to share your link with me…

Talking about UC on CKUT…

A friend put me in contact with a local mom who is pregnant and has her own show on a Montreal radio station and was wanting to talk to someone who had a UC…

We friended each other on Facebook and then we were able to meet at the Not-Going-Back-to-School picnic a few weeks ago and hit it off… we talked about tons of things and we have a lot on common and today I was invited to talk on the show and will most likely be back to talk about a few more things in the future.. I was nervous but it was fun!

The time passed by so quickly and I could have said so much more but I am so grateful to have been on the show and talking about something that means so much to me.

Here is a link to the program.. I come on about half way though after a pre-recorded interview with Ina May Gaskin!

In the Motherhood hosted by Trixie Dumont

Late night last night…

Last night I got all geared up to give Wilhelmina a sponge bath…

and when I say all geared up, I mean it… besides washing her with a cloth when she is dirty on a regular basis, about once a week I do the big clean up. I take her bandages off, I clean up the site where her Nephrostomy tube goes in, clean the glue off her skin and off the tubes, put fresh new bandages on and then clean her all over including her hair…

So, as I started to take the main bandage off I noticed something weird… a bit of the crust that usually accumulates around the wound was near the bottom of the bandage and there was evidence of a yellowish fluid that had dried on the inside of the bandage itself and then I noticed that the sutures that had been holding the tube near the skin were about 2 inches out and near the bottom of the bandage. I took a breath and touched the sutures to see if they would just slide back up the tube but when I did, it was the tube that slipped back into her body slightly. Not a good sign…

I had been told repeatedly that a nephrostomy tube was one of the hardest ones to deal with and that if it comes out it is an automatic ER visit and another one would need to be inserted… So when I saw that it was no longer in the way it should be, and had complete freedom of movement in and out, I knew I had to call..

I quickly bandaged it up so that nothing would move again and called the hospital to talk to the Urologist on call and within minutes I was on the phone with him explaining the situation…

So… at 8:30, we got ready and Wilhelmina and I left for the ER.

We got there at about 10pm and went to pre-triage and she was given the code P2 which is the highest priority you can get without being in need of resuscitation… that meant that we were able to go through the ER process quickly. I don’t think that her case was really as urgent as they classified her but because we didn’t actually have to see a doctor in the ER and just needed a place to wait for the on call urologist, I think that it was the easiest way to do so. After waiting a bit in the ER the Urology resident finally arrived. I found him a bit rough but he was nice, I just have a feeling that he is not used to working with kids much yet.

As I had observed, the tube was moving freely and had slipped out about 2 inches but was still functioning well. He was able to push it back into place and then sutured the tube so that it no longer could move… not to her skin, but to the rubbery plastic layer that is just over the incision. She usually is quiet and still when we are touching her bandages but I have the feeling that his roughness, not being mean but just a bit too hurried, and the fact that it most likely hurt when he pushed it back in, made the experience quite unpleasant for her.

We were able to leave right after and at 12:30am I got back on the road to drive the nearly 100km home…

Tomorrow we are heading back to the hospital to meet up with the head Urologist and make sure that everything is OK…

just 20 days left…