The back to school germs have arrived

John started coughing late last week and on Monday James started to develop a stye. As of yesterday Tommy and Patrick started sneezing and coughing. We are washing hands and wiping noses at a furious pace here. I took James to the doctors yesterday. He prescribed him an ointment to help get the infection out. The pharmacy didn't have it in stock so in the mean time I stepped up the hot compress this time using a tea bag. This has helped tremendously. The gunk has come out - mostly. It is still a little swollen. I'll be anxious to see how the ointment works. I plan to pick it up after dinner.

John is still liking school. We are trying to figure out how John can learn to open up a carton of milk himself without waiting for someone to help him. I have sent an email to his teacher hoping this can happen. I'm trying to find small cartons of milk so we can practice at home - I haven't found any at the regular supermarket - maybe the convenient stores might have them.

We decided last week to replace our storm door. Nothing was terribly wrong with the one we had but I was hoping to get one that has all glass and a retractable screen. Lowe's put them on sale for Labor Day and I was sold. We had Lowe's install it. They came yesterday and it looks wonderful. Then today I was thinking that I would like to decorate the front of the house really cute for fall so the weeds wouldn't look cute. I went out and bought 5 and then 8 more bags of black mulch. The boys did their best to help but they weren't much of help until they helped collect the weeds. James actually was a help by handing me the different rakes when I needed them. I mulched the front and then the side of the house to where the porch starts. The boys play in the one area by the big oak trees so I'm thinking of leaving that alone - after all they would be digging up mulch instead of dirt. We'll see. I know we would need a lot of bags to cover that area and I'm not even thinking about covering under the bushes.