Oesophagitis

Did you miss my blog updates this year?
Somehow, I just couldn't get myself to blogging.
One of the reasons is probably that this year already started challenging, healthwise, and remained so ever since.
In fact it was the day after Christmas... that it all started.
I really felt sick, which might of course have been due to the gourmet party at my in-laws, but if that would have been the real problem, I should have been feeling ok again after a couple of days. Instead it just grew worse and worse.
Just like in my pregnancies, I would get nauseous as soon as I got up in the morning. The smell of bread was an absolute no go, and coffee and meat are also on that list.
So even though a pregnancy shouldn't be possible at all, I was starting to fear that something with my husbands vasectomy might  have been going wrong,  or that nature would have found a way to heal it somehow.
Major relief when that wasn't the case, but I still had these problems.
Even using omeprazol, a proton pump inhibator, didn't have any result, so the GP finally sent me on to a specialist.
My first appointment was somewhere by the end of June. Everything he could see/feel/hear seemed normal, so he decided on a bloodtest and a gastrocopy, although he warned that that might not show any reason for how I felt either, it would only be a slim chance. Since I don't like having all kind of yukkie things done to me, I asked him for a percentage, which he estimated around 25%. So I agreed to have it done. My gastrocopy was planned on the first of August, as I would like to be put under, before they would stick anything down my throat.
The first of August came, and my husband took me to the hospital. Over there he nurse insisted they usually had very good results with local anaesthetics, so I finally allowed her to do that.
How I have regretted that ever since!
The moment she started to spray the stuff inside my throat, it started to burn like hell! But 1 spray dose wasn't enough, so I had to allow 3 or 4 more times, major agony!!!
I will spare you the details of what it was like when the actual gastrocopy happened, but I think it will suffice to say the nurse made her apology afterwards, and said I should have had an aneasthetic after all.
Lesson 1: if you know you're really nowhere near a hero when it comes to stuff like this, don't let any nurse tell you to try someting else than a complete anaesthetic.
The gastrocopy showed a grade 3 oesophagitis, so the doctor who performed the gastrocopy, immediately prescribed me another proton pump inhibator, since I told him the omeprazol 20 mg didn't work for me.
When I met up with my family after probably 10-15 minutes, my middle one asked me what had happened to me, as the skin of my neck was looking so red. Of course, being a mum, and not having looked in the mirror yet, I told her not to worry, and that it was probably just something that happens right after you have a gastrocopy, and that it might sure fade away quickly.
Back home again my throat still felt completely raw, and the idea of a late breakfast wasn't anywhere near on my list of things I would eventually like to do. I finally decided on having an ice lolly, which was about the best I could think of to get down that sore throat.
Late in the afternoon it still hurt so much, that I decided to have a look in the mirror.
I had quite a rash on the skin of my cheeks and my neck, and my throat looked like I had a real throat infection. To make sure I could show it to the doctor, I took a picture of my rash. This is what it looked like:

On saturday I felt so horrible, I decided to call the weekenddoctor, but all they did was tell me to take ice lollies and I should be fine be sunday night.

Lesson 2: when you are sure your throat looks like you've got an infection, don't tell them you've had a gastrocopy the day before, or they will just tell you to eat ice lollies.

On monday I made an appointment with my GP, as I also have a bursitis, and painmedication, rest and exercises didn't work, so it was time for plan C,an injection.
As per miracle I could have an appointment that same afternoon, and while I was there anyway, I told her what had happened, and that I was still unable to eat any solids.
Oh well, she could have a quick look at my throat. Surprise! Yes, you've got a throat infection indeed!
She figured the rash, which was nearly gone by monday afternoon, may have been an allergic reaction to the local aneastetic. As my tongue was looking a bit misty, she thought I might have a candida infection in my mouth and throat, so she gave me nystatine for it.
After using that for a week it was only very slightly better, and as my GP was on holiday by then, so I decided to wait for my appointment with the specialist on wednesday. I told him the same story, showed the pictures of the rash, and he totally agreed with my GP, but decided to give me something else for my throat infection, which turned out much more user friendly and more effective.
The infection is still not gone, but I can eat solids again, and I have 6 more days to go with this round of medicines.
All in all, there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel.
The reason I wrote this blog entry, is that despite my searches on the internet, I couldn't find any information like this, so maybe I am just the only one with experiences like this, but if not, I would like to know, and hopefully my blogpost will help anyone who may be going through the same......

Happy 2014!

First of all I would like to wish everyone a Very Happy New Year!
Yes, I know I haven't been blogging for quite a while, as it was the festive season, and it was a bit too busy to blog about everything that was going on. I did take pictures with the intention to blog, but just never got to it..
I'm planning to make up for it, so I thought to make a good start and write about our New Years Eve.
On the 31st of december I always go over to my mum, to bake some traditional food, Oliebollen & Appelbeignets. My DH just hates anything that might mess up the kitchen, and this sure does!
Mum loves baking and we just have lots of fun together, getting everything ready.

 As you can see, my DD11 helped peeling apples and cutting them in thick slices.

My sister hosted the party this year, and she also had lots of yummie stuff like deviled eggs, deviled tomatoes, cheese cubes, cucumberslices, and the likes.

This year we bought some childrens firework, and allowed them to use it. Only, before everything was used it started raining, so they used the last bits of it in our garden this morning.
Now I just have to go back to mum tomorrow, and help her clean the kitchen, as she didn't want to do that yesterday, and I made her promiss not to do anything about it today.

More Friday Frenzies & Fun

Friday somehow always seems to be my most hectic day of the week.
I woke up early (because of DH's alarm) and after trying to get back to sleep for an hour, I gave up around 6 am and got up. I figured if I would manage to get back to sleep I wouldn't be able to wake up again in time.
So, I went downstairs and cleaned the fridge.

The girls got up in time too, so after bringing them to school, I went to the first grocery store and got my first round of groceries for the day. Then I went to a small special shop to buy my GF breadmix.
Back home I put away the groceries and made the bread dough.
After that I started walking the first bit of my postround, which gave the yeast some time to do it's work properly.
When I came back I put the bread in the oven, and asked DD13 to look after it, while I went to the second grocery store and got  DD11 & DD8 back from school again for lunch. My bread was nicely baked and ready when I got back home.

So I put away the rest of the groceries and prepared lunch for everyone, and then it was time to bring the girls back to school again. I went to 2 different charity shops, where I bought nothing, just this time......
Back home I had to walk the rest of my postround, which I managed to do just before I had to get back to school to collect the girls again.

Yes, those 5 black crates were all filled with post which I had to deliver today, so you might be able to imagine why I am very happy to use a pram for the post....
All in all I was quite proud that I had managed to do all this, despite a very sore back.
I decided to relax a bit for the rest of the day, apart from cooking dinner, of course....

Yesterday I was shopping and found a christmas dress & hat for a wine bottle.
Being a doll addict I immediately decided this would work for 2 of my favourite dolls.
I had to adjust the dress a bit, but look how much fun this is:

 The dress is just the right size for Ellowyne, and the hat is great for Daisy!

Chocolate & Charity Shops

Last week we did run out of the chocolate mix we use to sprinkle on our cappucino.
So, that was one of those little tasks that needed to be done in this family B&B. (Seriously, I think it's more like an Inn, as my family doesn't only use it as B&B, but they also have lunch and dinner here.)
I got out cacao, cinnaman and sugar candy.

And with a little help from my late Gran´s coffee grinder, I made us some chocolate mix for our cappucino again.

Something I just wanted to share with you is this poem, which a friend of mine posted on my facebook wall:

Obiously I shouldn´t spend too much time dusting, so I guess our Family resort is going to be called 'The Dusty Dream Inn'.

Some of you may know I just love to go to charity shops.
Here are some of my latest finds:

Yay! A Daisy doll, a bit grubby, but she cleaned up beautifully

And what´s that? Blossom Knickers! And in good condition too!

doll outfits for my DD´s

Moxie Girlz for the DD´s

a chair for Daisy

a teapot for the dollies

a necklace which I intend to make another necklace with

a book for DD8

a book for DD11

I haven´t been taking pictures of everything I found over the past few weeks, but as you can see I found quite a few nice things.
Because of all the dollstuff, I also had a doll laundry day, which I do in my kitchen, with a special doll clothes cleaning product, called Perk, from Twin Pines of Maine.
With a family of 5 you may imagine there´s also quite a lot of real life sized laundry to be done, and that was only too true, as I hadn´t really been keeping up with it, so between washing some dollstuff, I wrestled my way through mount Washmore.......

The Family Bed & Breakfast and St Maarten

Yesterday my sister from The Greedy Minimalist, blogged about her Family Bed & Breakfast.
This rocked a memory in me, as I have been following The Fly Lady more or less for approximately 5 years.
If you have read my sisters blog post, you will know by now that  it isn't an ordinary B&B, but a way of living in your own home with only your own family to take care off.
Here's a quote from her blog: "It's not a real business, but I will treat as if it were just that. I will have working hours and I will pay myself too. My pay probably won't be much more than 10 euro a week, but it will be money that I can use as I please. No strings attached. I'll just have to run my B&B as if it were a real business."
Well, the thought of a B&B, where everything is beautiful & calm and where you can relax and have all comfort at hand is appealing.
So, I will follow my sister on her path, and see what I can do with this concept.
First thing of course, is to get rid of the clutter. To me the kitchen is the heart of the home, so that's where I started working today. The kitchen counter is usually quite empty, as the hubby simply can't stand to see much on it. But, in one of the corners there were 3 empty glas jars, which I had cleaned to use for apple sauce or compote, but I ran out of apples, so instead of something useful, they now started to clutter the kitchen counter. Looking at them I realised that I had read something about the school needing empty glass jars, so I checked my email to make sure this was the case, then went to the shed to get out 4 more jars, and clean them, so they were all ready to go to school at lunchtime.

 And speaking of lunchtime, I had just run out of GF bread this morning, so instead of buying the very expensive factory made bread, I baked my own very yummie and less expensive version, which was just ready at lunchtime:

Now, the kitchencounter itself is usually not cluttered at all, but we do have a cupboard on the opposite side of the kitchen, which tends to attract clutter, so I set myself to work on it, and this is how it looks right now:

 The hubby was really well pleased when he arrived home and saw the change here!

Today it is the 11th of november, and as per custome, in the evening kids will go from door to door and sing a song and get some treats in return. They always love to do this, but DD13 is feeling to big for this.
I had to buy new lanterns this year, as we had ditched the old ones last year.

DD8 & DD11 with their lanterns

So the girls had lots of fun, and got a quite a nice haul.........
Oh, of course, I should add pictures of a part of their loot. (yes, they had already been eating some of it before I even had a chance to take a piccie)

DD11's loot

DD9's loot

and everything of DD9's tin laid out (she really wanted to have a picture like this)

A weekend away

As mentioned in my previous post, we went away for the weekend.
We went to a nice holiday park in Arcen, which is just a little over an hour drive from us.
We arrived on friday afternoon somewhere between 3 and 4 pm, which is quite a good time, given that we first had to do DD13's newspaper round....
We had a very nice bungalow, DD13 had the room closest to the frontdoor.

DD13's room

Next to her room was our room:

Not to worry, DH rearranged to furniture, so he could sleep close to me :D

DD11 & DD8 had the room close to the livingroom, which had a bunk bed, so much fun!

DD11 (top) and DD8, 2 naughty little chickies!

And then, of course, there was the livingroom:

 

We didn't really do much anymore on friday, except for some grocery shopping in Germany, which was just approx. 10 km's from our holiday home...

After breakfast on saturday morning, the first thing on our program was to go to the swimmingpool, as the DD's had all been very anxious to go.

Well, the swimming pool being wet and all, I thought it wasn't such a good plan to take my camera with me, so I nicked some pictures from the www.

 We all had lots of fun there, but eventually we had to get out and go back to our little home to get us some lunch.

After that we had to do some more shopping, as we forgot a couple of things the other day.

This time we went to Venlo. DH bought us some yummie milkshakes at KFC.

In the evening I had some dolly time, and made up a little nightie for Amelia Thimble:

I also made a nightie with yellow accents

Breakfast on sunday morning:

After breakfast we went to the swimmingpool again, until I was really worn out......

So we went back to the bungalow, had lunch, and already had to pack our things, as DH had to work on monday. 

But, there was still a little fun activity for the girls: going to the indoor playground and dancing there.

Unfortunately DD11 hit her head a couple of times, so she really didn't feel up to the dancing

The Hokey Pokey, one of DD8's favourites

 

DD11 & DD8 taking a little pause

 Some more climbing fun for DD8:

After that little break, we went back to the bungalow, had dinner, and finished packing.

Driving back we found out the storm had already started to build up, but we arrived back home safely.

What a lovely weekend it was!

(Thanks Mum & Dad, and DH for helping Mum & Dad with their kitchen)