Month: May 2025

Whataweekend

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Frugal LifeLeave a comment

On Friday Jackson graduated from high school. I cannot believe how fast time flies by. I know that he will cherish his time at East Texas Charter School and that him going there was the best decision ever. Small class size, teachers that truly care and an amazing superintendent that kept the school in tip top shape made for an amazing 4 years.

The students get to pick their first and second choices of who to stand up and speak about their time at ETCS. Jackson picked his favorite teacher Mr. Damoude.

It’s so interesting to hear about each graduating senior. I’ve never been to another school that does this. There are no valedictorians. Each student has a chance, if they choose, to speak after the teacher gives their speech. Jackson did not want to.

There were a whopping 29 graduates this year.

Group shot before the hat toss.

A proud dad who unfortunately had to go back to work right after this was taken.

Proud mom and sister.

Jackson’s best friends. Two of them will be also heading off to Kilgore College in the Fall.

We have a tradition that when it’s your birthday or another special event, you get to pick whichever restaurant you want to have dinner. Jackson’ picked Rotolo’s. I loved it because they have cauliflower crust pizza. That was the last meal I have eaten because I got sick.

Right before we were about to leave I started having floaters in my eyes. The headache came right after we got home so I went to bed early. Saturday morning I woke up and felt like I couldn’t get out of bed. My body felt like it was made of lead. I still had a horrible headache. I ended up sleeping all day.

Sunday I was feeling a little better so I made a quick Aldi run. When I got home my stomach and back were cramping so badly. I was also coming down with a UTI. The fatigue was also back in full force. I asked Donny to pick up so AZO and cranberry juice. He knew that I was not eating sugar so he picked me up the only zero sugar he could find. I highly recommend NEVER getting this juice. My whole body puckered and seized up. I tried diluting it with water and stirring in some honey. Nope, that didn’t work at all. Hannah didn’t know that it was awful and had the same reaction.

I went to bed early on Sunday night and by Monday I still wasn’t feeling well. Now let’t throw in a sore throat and my TMJ acting up. It’s like my body’s check engine light came on. I slept most of the day, again. Today I feel like I’m at 75% which I’ll take over the previous days.

To make matters worse a skunk sprayed a possum right outside our patio door on Sunday night. If I hadn’t known better I would have sworn it had sprayed in our kitchen. It made Donny so sick to his stomach and gave me another headache. So that’s how the weekend ended.

I am ready for some good days ahead that’s for sure.

Blue Dog x2

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Longview, txLeave a comment

If you ever come over to our home you’ll probably notice that I have a thing for Blue Dog. If you aren’t familiar with Blue Dog, it’s George Rodrigue’s most famous subject. I first saw a Blue Dog painting while I was in New Orleans having dinner. There was a huge painting hanging in the restaurant. I had never seen or heard of this artist before, but it was love at first site.

When we first heard that the exhibit was coming to Longview we were so excited and last week we finally got to go. Hannah was busy so Jackson and I decided that we would go check it out and it did not disappoint.

I mean, c’mon, I got a smile out of him. He rarely smiles in pictures.

We now have two fine arts museums. This is the newest and it used to be a bank.

We took a picture at the selfie stop.

Hannah was disappointed that she wasn’t able to go so yesterday she and I visited.

Both Hannah and Jackson picked this picture as their favorite.

The saddest picture was the one that George never finished. He died of cancer and this was left on his easel. You can see the sketch lines.

After we finished touring this museum we decided to head a street over to see this exhibit at the main art museum. It’s called six degrees of separation because each vignette is connected somehow. We found several pieces that we really liked.

This was my favorite.

This was Hannah’s.

We both liked this one. The background are Splenda wrappers.

It was such fun days taking each of the kiddos separately to hear their take on all of the art.

I also couldn’t leave without buying a poster and a decal.

Jackson and I ran by the thrift store on the way home to see if I could find a small frame for the decal. I found the almost perfect one. I just had to paint the back of it to compliment Jackson’s Picasso rendition.

Hangry Cat

On By thefunkyfrugalistaIn Medical stuffLeave a comment

I’ve mentioned the stray cat that found us who we named O’Malley. Well, O’Malley had really wanted to come in the house all the time. That was great, except that unless you watched him like a hawk, he would spray. I felt bad having to keep him outside so I made an appointment to get him neutered.

We kept him in the house the night before the appointment. Now the funny thing about this cat is that he stress eats. Whenever you pet him or even just talk to him, he has to run to the food bowl and eat. It’s like his comfort thing. We were told by the vet to take his food up at midnight. The morning of the surgery he came into the kitchen and I was petting him. He will always roll over on his back to have you scratch his belly. This particular morning, while I was doing just that, he identified as a gator and chomped down on my hand. I felt his teeth sink into my skin and blood started pouring out of the wounds. He, realizing what he had done, jumped up and ran to the now non existent food bowl.

I immediately washed the bites and sprayed hydrogen peroxide on them. My whole right hand was throbbing, but I couldn’t miss the appointment, so into the makeshift crate he went. I do actually have a cat carrier somewhere I just can’t find it. It had poured the day before and I had only a bit of time to search the stacked up with totes to the ceiling shed. I had to just make due with what I had which was two laundry baskets, a Bungie cord and hair clips.

It was a little embarrassing walking into the vet with so many people in line staring at my “carrier”, but you do what you have to do. Six and a half hours later Jackson and I went to pick him up. He was supposed to be crated for 2 days, but that wasn’t working. Milo was very curious about his friend.

After about 8 hours he seemed fine so I let him out. He ate and used the litter box. We did keep him in for about 2 days and he was fine with that. It seems like he has taken to house life because he now is in more than out. This was him today and now he’s curled up on the bed with me.

I, on the other hand, was not fine. I didn’t want to tell Donny about the bite, but my hand started swelling, getting red and was still oozing. There was no way in hell that I was going back to the bougie ER and luckily I had a doctor’s appointment the next day. It was just the twice a year appointment to go over my labs, but I was definitely going to ask for antibiotics.

The bite was Wednesday, the appointment was Thursday. He did give me a prescription for antibiotics, but by Friday I was so sick that I stayed in bed all day. I couldn’t eat anything, but Donny got me a vanilla shake so I could take my medicine.

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I felt lousy. We don’t know if it’s cat scratch fever or if I developed cellulitis but whatever it is it is taking its own sweet time healing. It’s not as swollen, but still has a hard area around both wounds. The antibiotics make me nauseous and give me zero appetite. Next pic is gross, but it was taken this morning.

I guess we’ll just take it one day at a time. Geesh, the things we go through for our pets.