Stiches and Rattles

Ruth: I hardly ever mop.

On Wednesday the nesting instinct took over and I mopped all the floors when the kids were at the computer. As I was rinsing the mop Kaitlin and Christopher came out of the bedroom, Kaitlin dressed up in her pretty pink-and-purple princess shoes and white gloves. The girls have some plastic shoes that they like to wear for dress-up. They are too small for Rachel and Emily. But Kaitlin still wears them sometimes as well as the boys. Before I had a chance to warn them about the wet wood floor, Kaitlin lost it and fell on her chin, splitting it open. Emily was freaking out, took one look and said "She needs stitches!" I didn't want to scare Kaitlin, so I told her she may not have to get stitches, but we should get it cleaned up first.

Kaitlin was much braver than I was, but the fat showing through her open wound was making me faint. I called Jason asking him to come home as soon as possible, but I knew she needed to be taken care of right then. Luckily, Sarah and Joe still live right down the road. Sarah came over to find me crawling around the house avoiding potential fainting injuries and Kaitlin holding cotton balls to her chin.

Sarah drove me and the kids to her house where we left the uninjured children with Joe and she took Kaitlin and I to the emergency room because I did not yet have the stomach for driving. We waited for 2.5 hours before being seen by the nurse. They numbed her chin with Lidocaine(sp?) and Kaitlin was back to her goofy self for an hour until they came to stitch her up. I couldn't watch but I held her hand with my head between my knees.

Jason visited twice, both times to take my place, but Kaitlin wanted me to stay with her instead of her dad. Jason brought us some roast beef sandwiches while we waited because we were missing dinner at Sarah and Joe's.

Kaitlin was very brave. She said that the only part that hurt was the shots (anesthestic). After they were done they gave us both juice boxes and let us lay there for a little bit. The apple juice was good. On the way home I bought her an ice-cream cone and let her choose some popsicles from the supermarket.-RuthJason: Saturday we spent most of the day at home. I worked outside digging holes for a fence around our garden. But we did something fun this evening because we aren't going camping.

The Cache Creek Wilderness lies in the mountains between Clearlake and Woodland. There are some trails that are accessible from highways 20 and 16 that border the wilderness area. I wanted to go out there for a evening hike since we weren't going to do anything else for the weekend. I have been studying the area on Google Earth as a possible deer hunting area.

For the trip we popped some popcorn, made some kettle corn, filled our water bottles, and stashed some carrots, raisins, trail mix, granola bars, and fruit snacks into our bags. We left the house around 5:30. It had cooled off by then and was quite nice outside.

The trailhead is about a 20 minute drive from our house. When we were almost there I ran over a huge snake at the edge of the road! The road trip was enjoyable with the kids and parents singing silly songs most of the way.

There is a "bathroom" at the trailhead that amounts to a two-stall pit toilet. Some of the kids said they needed to go, but mysteriously changed their minds after sizing up the bathroom. So we locked the van and started walking.

We gave the kids rules before we began. Everybody stays together, stay on the trail, no running, etc. We hadn't gone 15 feet down the trail when i hear a loud "BZZZZ". Kaitlin and Christopher are in front of me and my heart starts racing because they are between me and the noise. Luckily the noise had stopped them in their tracks. The rattlesnake slithered away through the grass still shaking its tail. I never saw it but the grass bent out of its way as it left. It sure got my adrenaline going. I was ready to grab both kids and pull them back when the snake started moving away. But the snake never showed itself.

The rest of the trip was enjoyable and uneventful. We walked in about .8 miles (according to google earth) and stopped for dinner. We saw a gopher snake on the way and lots of blue-belly lizards. Our dinner site had a limited though pretty view of the mountains and a little valley to the south. It was breezy but very nice. No noise but the wind and nobody else on the trail.

Happy Memorial Day to all of you. Thanks to God and to those who have given their lives for ours and our freedom.

Jason

P.S. That was the first rattlesnake I've heard of the five that I've encountered.