This totally deserves its own post.  Sydney earned her yellow belt!  The pictures are terrible because I forgot my camera and only had my phone, but it's better than nothing.

Sydney started karate on August 24, and her sensei said that she would be tested after three months of instruction.  However, there were some kids who were coming up for testing on November 2, and he said he would like to test Sydney as well.  That was only 10 weeks after she started!

She was a little nervous, but she easily earned her yellow belt and amost made yellow belt 2nd!  Ben was able to come watch her test.  She is so intense and focused when she is doing karate.  I've been surprised how much she likes it and how talented she is.  She actually missed the promotion ceremony with the other kids because it was the day after ER trip and she still had lots of hives so she had her own little ceremony on Wednesday.

Go, Sydney!

We're going all the way back to Halloween.  We carved pumpkins on Saturday.  They don't last long here in Missouri, so you have to wait until the last minute.  From left to right, they belong to Ben, me, Sydney, Tansy, Zachary, and Tyler.

On Sunday, we made our traditional Ding Dong spiders.  Tyler didn't care about the instructions, but he enjoyed himself anyway.

The fancy one with the yellow and black legs is Ben's.  Mine is the one sneaking up behind him.

The kids were really excited to go trick-or-treating.  On base, it goes from 6:00 to 8:00.  Ben was working swing shift (4:00 to midnight, which usually turned into 2:00 a.m.) so the kids had to wait until he came home for his dinner break at 7:00 so we could all go together.  They were absolutely tortured for the first hour watching all of the other kids come and go.  They managed to have pretty heavy buckets themselves when we got home.

Last weekend, Sydney started breaking out in hives.  Now Sydney does this occasionally.  When her allergies are bad in the spring or when she has a fever, she can get hives.  Sometimes she'll get a mild case for no reason at all and a dose of Benadryl will knock it out.  That's what I thought was happening when I got a call Saturday night from Sydney saying she was really itchy.  Ben and I were on a date and the babysitter didn't know what to do.  I had her give Syd some Benadryl and went back to eat my dinner.

After I dropped the babysitter off, I came home to check on Sydney.  She still had a lot of hives so I gave her some Claritin and sent her to bed.  She was fine most of the day Sunday, but at dinner she started itching.  She had about four dozen hives the size of the pencil-eraser.  Ben and I couldn't come up with any reason for her to be breaking out so we had her take a shower to see if there was some on her skin that was irritating her.  Bad idea.  The heat made them spread, and in less than an hour and half, nearly half of her skin was covered.  There were a lot on her face and around her mouth, and I worried that they would spread to her airways.

I took her to the ER where they monitored her for a couple of hours since she does have asthma.  The Benadryl finally started working and she was looking better by the time we left with a prescription for Prednisone.

I kept her home from school on Monday since she still had a lot of hives and wanted her close in case she got bad again.  Besides, I just couldn't ask a 7-year-old to go to school looking like that.  I gave her everything the doctor at the ER told me too, and I was applying hydrocortisone cream like body lotion, but by late afternoon, she was going crazy with the itching.  I called her allergist to ask what else I could give her.  He had me add some Zyrtec and said he wanted to see her Wednesday if she was still getting hives.

On Tuesday, she only had hives on her feet and ankles, so I sent her to school.  The nurse called at 11:00 to see if she could use some Solarcaine to ease her itching and keep her at school.  That worked for a while, but a half an hour before school let out, she had broken out pretty badly and the kids in her class kept asking what was wrong with her face.  I picked her up and brought her home.  I loaded her up with her meds because he had her swimming test that night and was freaking out about missing it.  She made it and passed her test.

On Wednesday I called the allergist and took Sydney in at 11:30.  He pretty much said the same thing as everyone else, "She has a bad case of hives."  Isn't that what I told you?  He put her on a new medicine and said that if it didn't work, the next meds would also be sedatives, and he wanted to avoid going there.  He also said she was fine to attend school and do anything she wanted to.

Since we were in town, I picked up a couple of things I needed, then headed home.  I got Sydney some lunch then put her back in the car to get her to school for the afternoon.  I was nearly there when I remembered that it was an early out day and school would be dismissed at 1:00.  It was 12:50.  We went in anyway so I could talk to the nurse and Sydney's teacher about her medication and condition.

Fortunately, the new meds worked and Sydney has been hive-free for two and a half days.  Sorry for the long story.

I got all of the parts for my food rotation system this week, and Ben and I built it on Friday.  I would tell you the story about that, but only one long story per post.  Here was the condition of my food storage before the rotation shelf and the new shelf we bought at Walmart.

And here are the after shots.

Doesn't it make you smile just to look at it?  Aaahhh.

The kids had their Primary program today at church.  I am so glad that we are done singing those songs for a while.  My fingers are tired of playing them.  They did a great job.  It was a lot of fun to watch them.

Ben goes back to day shift starting tomorrow.  Finally, life is getting back to normal.  I hope.

We have had some fairly varied weather over the past couple of weeks.  We have worn everything from capris to heavy coats.  Today is a capri kind of day.  The end of this week is a different story.  We did have a nice windy day for Zack and Tansy to have their first kite flying experience.  The $1 Walmart kites actually held up this time.  Although I do have to say that the last time we tried to fly a cheap kite we were in a tornado watch, so it's probably not a fair comparison.

 And we did find a moment to decorate for Halloween.  We have had the witch inflatable for a few years.  The kids call it Grandma Halloween because they think it looks like my mom.  We bought the vampire this year.  The kids immediately dubbed him Grandpa Vampire because, well, he does kind of look like my dad.  And Ty spilled water on himself.  I do change his diaper.

On Thursday, I had my first Shelf Reliance party since becoming a consultant.  I was so nervous!  We had it all scheduled, and the day after my friend sent out the invitations, Ben told me that he was working nights because of an exercise on base.  On top of everything, I now had to get a babysitter.  I was able to work things out, and the party was great.  I had so much fun!  I really like this product, and it was great to see how much everyone else liked it too.  I've got several orders, and my friend is going to get some great host benefits.  I'm so glad I signed up to do this.

Back to the exercise.  Starting on the 18th, Ben went on the 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift for an exercise here.  It continues through next Thursday.  After five nights of this, we are all wiped out.  Ben came home early this morning (4:30 a.m.) and told me he was going to swing shift (4 p.m. to midnight).  I was so happy.  That would help him get so much more sleep.  Then, right before I started writing this, he got a call saying he doesn't have to come in tonight!  Happy day!  Maybe we'll carve some pumpkins!

I have become a coupon lady.  Not quite crazy yet.  No matter what Ben says.  I have been having a lot of fun.  I got started at a good time and got some great stuff for our food storage and Christmas.  Yes, I have a binder.  Yes, I am that person squinting between a little piece of paper and the shelf.  But when I save $40 at the register, I love it.  I will never appear on Extreme Couponing.  But I will smile a little when I think about getting batteries for FREE.

Things has been pretty normal around here.  I threw a baby shower with a couple of my friends last week.  A family from church was able to adopt a baby a few weeks after moving here.  It was a lot of fun to get to know her better and help her get a few things for her new baby boy.  They had very little notice that they were getting him.  They already have a 5-year-old girl they also adopted.  Such a great family.

Zack finally finished his second potty chart last night.  On this one, he had to keep his underwear clean all day to earn a sticker.  He had some cheap toys that he could choose from each time he got three stickers.  Once he got 30 stickers he got this:

This is quite possibly one of the most annoying toys ever.  It makes shooting noises and the green and orange striped part rotates and has blinking lights.  I took him to the store to pick out his big reward, and he fell in love with this.  He couldn't even be persuaded to look at anything else.  But you know what?  It is totally worth it to have him potty trained.  Just one more to go. 

This week the girls started swimming lessons.  We missed them here on base over the summer, but a mother at the Warrensburg rec center assured me that was probably for the best.  Her daughter is in the same class as Tansy.  She said that the class over the summer had 20 kids in it, and her daughter didn't get a lot out of it.  The classes they are in now have a cap of 8 students with 2 teachers.  I feel better about all of the driving now.

I got to attend the General Relief Society broadcast last night.  I appreciated the perspective I got from all of the speakers, especially President Uchtdorf.  Sometimes I focus too much on my golden ticket.  I need to learn to enjoy the chocolate.  Mmmm. . . .chocolate.  Gotta go!

I let another week of blogging slide.  Here are our past two weeks.

Zack got a new helmet.  He loves being big enough to ride a tricycle, and he loves Spiderman, so he was in his heaven.  Although he's only just three, we had to get him the 5+ helmet because my kids have enormous heads.

The 7th was Tansy's first day of preschool.  She was so excited to finally go.  I was worried that she would get nervous and want me to stay once we got there.  She found her seat, got to work on her playdough, and said goodbye.  At least she let me take a picture before I left.

The 7th was also Zack's first day of soccer.  We chose the 6:15 session so that Ben could go with him because parent participation is required.  There was a conference that day and Ben didn't know until 6:00 that there was no way he was going to make it home.  I packed everyone in the car, put Tansy and Sydney in charge of Tyler, and played soccer with Zack.  The director of the Youth Center spent some time watching my kids too.  He is awesome.  He was juggling soccer balls for them and everything.  Zack loved it.

On Saturday the 10th, the girls started tumbling.  I was also hosting a Shelf Reliance party that day (I became a consultant, in case anyone is interested!) so I couldn't take them.  I sent Ben with much less information than he needed, but he is so good at getting tings taken care of.

My party was great.  I am learning a TON about food storage and Shelf Reliance specifically.  We are so excited to have a start on our food storage in a way that makes sense and is easy.  Plus, I ordered a can rotation system.  I am really excited for that to arrive.

Zack and Tansy also decided that they needed to try on their Halloween costumes this week.  The chilly weather so early in the season has convinced them that it is almost Halloween.  That and the enormous aisle of Halloween candy at the store.  Sorry, guys.

Zack also cracked his head on Friday night at a cookout for Ben's work.  I thought he would just have a bump, but when I took of the hood of his jacket, it was bleeding.  There was a water fountain nearby so I used a bunch of napkins to clean off the blood.  It looked like he had taken out a chunk of skin, but since there wasn't anything to stitch, we just gave him a plate of Cheetos so he would let me ice it.  After about 25 minutes, the swelling had gone down, and he ran off to the playground.  Tough little monster.

Poor Zack had his first round of post-potty training diarrhea yesterday.  He was so scared about what was happening until I said, "Zack, your bum exploded!"  Now he just thinks it's funny.  Whatever it is got Tyler too so they stayed home from church today with Ben since I couldn't find a substitute for the piano in Primary.  They seem to be fine now, but better safe than sorry.

August 23 was Sydney's first day of second grade.  She got the same teacher she had for summer.  Miss Slagle is awesome, and Sydney is having a great time.

Sydney has also started Karate on Mondays and Wednesdays.  On her first day, she slipped on her pants right at the end and fell on her face.  For the next two hours, she swore she was never going back.  She changed her mind at about 7:00 that night.  She is actually pretty good.  The girls start tumbling this weekend and swimming lessons in a couple of weeks.  Zack will also be doing soccer.  We are busy!

Ben and I will celebrate our 9th anniversary on Tuesday, but we decided to make an early start on the festivities.  Our friends, the Fosters, watched our kids overnight on Friday.  Ben and I went out to dinner, then to Worlds of Fun.  It was so quiet there that night.  We pretty much walked right on to every ride.  We enjoyed a lazy morning the next day and had a yummy breakfast before coming home.  So much fun!

And here is a puppet show put on by Tansy and Zack.