Tired

Phew!  I feel drained.  Surprised?  Ha, ha!! This past week was supposed to be our purge (aka spring cleaning) week. Even with the children all being sick I was able to get the boys' room done, the girls have most of their rooms done, I have most of the family room done, started a bit in my bedroom and tackled a bit of the laundry room.  I'm going between the laundry room and bedroom depending on if the baby is sleeping or not.  I was able to thoroughly wash our big blue couch and two blue cushioned chairs.  They needed it, BAD!  Let's just say the "no food on couches" will be firmly instituted and followed!  I didn't get to everything that needed to be done, but I am just happy, that despite the many small trials, I've accomplished so much.
   I've been sick on and off, but not with the horrid illness that everyone else had.  Mine is due to allergies getting out of control.  Because it is more of a constitutional illness than an acute, homeopathy is working, then my allergies take hold again.  I am thankful for the reprieve, but at this point I need to do a bit more drastic measures.  I could go off to get an antibiotic.  Number one, I don't want to, and two, I'm not sure if I need one.  My allergies have produced this cough, that I've had for a month now.  Thankfully it's not painful, or severe.  But it's there, and it's not a dry cough, which is what I am a bit concerned about.  A month of a goupy cough and I know I am risking bronchitis or pneumonia.  Not exactly something I want to battle with.  So I've pondered my options.  I know I could call the homeopathic doctor to get the "right" remedy to set me straight for a while.  But that costs a good deal of money.  If I had pneumonia, I'd be calling, but I don't....so I need to do something here at home.  So here is what I came up with:

1.  I've researched and compiled a list of about 16 remedies (homeopathic) to try.  The classic way would be to take one remedy and see if that helps.  I would need to take it for at least a day.  That means a possible 16 days to figure out if I got the right one.  So I am making my own combination remedy by putting 5 remedies into one bottle.  I'm hoping to find the right remedy a lot quicker than two weeks.

2.  I plan on juice feasting (I think I mentioned this before) for a full 3 to 4 days, with lots of water in between.

3.  Start taking 1/4 of a probiotic capsule each day.

4.  Make a whole bunch of my Immuni-T(made with the Immuni-T tea, garlic, lemon juice, honey and elderberries) and drinking that in between the juicing.  I'll add a bit of vitamin C powder and echinacea drops to it as well.

5.  By day 4 or 5 start adding in bone broths.

6.  Day 5 or 6 start to add coconut oil and raw egg yolk to my broth.

7.  From there add whole veggies, then meat and rice or wheat free pasta.

8.  Each evening take a detox bath.

I'm a bit worried how the baby will react.  But at this point I feel I am between a rock and a hard place.  Taking antibiotics will only further weaken my body, and possibly cause things like thrush for the baby.  The juicing will help to strengthen my body to fight this illness off on it's own, BUT I risk toxins being released into my milk and on into the baby.  It seems either way the baby looses.  Poor guy :-(  But I'm hoping that by maintaining my calorie requirements, and drinking lots of water in between and the baths, that it may help to minimize the impact for Aubrey.  Something needs to be done though.  I've just been much too tired, foggy mentally, and having to go through a box of kleenex weekly.  Not fun.

In other news our four boy baby goats went to their new home today.  They are going to a great couple, with 20 acres.  They will be well cared for and loved on.  I really enjoyed talking to the wife.  I don't think I would had ever pictured myself hanging outside chatting with a women about chicken illnesses!  Too funny.  So all of this means we HAVE to milk each morning now!  Actually I plan on milking the goats three times a day (for Honey at least as she had all her babies taken from her).  Then after a week or two go to two times a day.  I will see where that takes us.  In the mornings, when we have milked, we have gotten close to 3 quarts.  Not bad.  The only 'problem' is how fast it goes!  I'm going to have to write, "Don't touch" on the milk I plan on using for recipes :-)

We've had a few problems with our chicks this time around.  First we had a sick chicken that died in only hours from when we found out it was sick!  Thankfully we treated the whole crew and no other chicks died.  Then we lost two, they wondered into the dog area....chomp!  And now we have turned into some chicken recovery place with two chicks that have a broken leg and another one that has a broken wing.  The broken legs happened from the goats stepping on the chicks.  The broken arm was from the dog.  The girls just took off the splint to one of the chicks broken leg.  It has healed, although a bit out of place.  But the chick can walk on it and do all of it's chickeny things.  So we have hope for the other wounded ones as well.  Although I'm not sure about the broken wing one.  Isabella was able to wrap the broken wing to it's body to immobilize it.  Smart girl!  I was talking to that lady today about it and we both agreed that not to many people would have tried to 'salvage' the chicks.  They would have been culled.  Ah, not these peeps!  Our peeps are cherished by the girls and we go through great lengths to save any chick who is in peril.

The oldest two girls had their Portfolio Night for their art class last night.  It was a lot of fun.  It was a pot luck dinner between the art class and another class.  I told Jonah we were going to a party, and ALL day he kept asking about the party!  Oh too funny.  He was quite obsessed about it.  When we got there he was like, "Where's the party?"  Ha, ha.  Speaking of funny.  I soooooooo wish I had a video camera to have caught this, but it would have been impossible since it was just one of those totally unexpected things.  We were going through Walmart after church, picking up a few things.  Jonah was in the seat in the cart.  Coming towards us, but behind Jonah, were his Sunday school teachers.  I was about to say, "Hey, Jonah, look who's here."  But he happened to turn around and saw them himself.  His eyes went WIDE with wonder, confusion and I'm not sure what else, and he exclaims, "HEEEEYYYYY, what are you guys doin' here?!?!!?"  As if his Sunday school teachers only live in the classroom.  I think I almost cried I was laughing so hard!  Oh, the look on his face! 

Well dinner is here.  Long, long day so we got some take out.  I'm beat!  Oh, do pray that I will get over this illness.  Not only will I be trying to recover next week, but it's also testing week for the three oldest girls.  Not their favorite time of year :-)  I've got to maintain a quiet area for them.  That kind of stresses me out.  Moira, in particular, has to have quiet to work.  She gets very stressed out with tests.  Although last year she did much better, and it was Flannery who was freaking out.  I'm a bit nervous to see how it goes this time.