Biles Family Blog

Cooper found Steven's MP3 player this morning and was talking on it like a phone. It was really cute because he was having a "conversation". He'd jabber a little, then stop and laugh, and then jabber again. He accidentally turned it on, and then discovered that it makes noise.

We have been housebound since Friday when we learned that Cooper has Hand, Foot, Mouth Disease and is very contagious. It is a virus that causes blisters on (and in) those parts of the body. It also causes fevers, and because of the blisters in the mouth, a lack of appetite. Because it's a virus there isn't anything we can do for it except Motrin and Tylenol. The doctor said we need to stay away from people through Monday, and then after that once he has been fever free for 24 hours we can play with others and he isn't contagious any more. The blisters will last up to 10 days. He still had times of fever today (Sunday) so hopefully he won't have any more, so we can play with our friends starting on Tuesday.

We've been working in our garden a lot and have been giving plants away because many of them are thriving so well (and Cooper didn't prematurely pick them) that they are crowding each other. I asked Steven if we could buy a house with more land next time so we can garden like crazy. Our radishes (that we left in the ground to go to seed) have flowered and I'm excited for the seed pods to develop. We've harvested Swiss chard, peppers and lettuce for some meals. We have a zucchini that we can harvest tomorrow and our peas are just about ready. We've got flowers on all our squash and tomatoes, so we're excited about that too. The herbs have been doing well and we've used cilantro and mint, with chives and dill just about ready to be used.

I started looking into dehydrating and canning options for when we get more produce and would like to save it. If anyone has tips they'd like to share about either I'd love to hear them.

This evening it's been raining and Cooper has been signing 'airplane' every time he hears thunder, so I decided to look up and teach him the correct signs. He would sign 'water' and then point outside. Now that we've clarified it for him it was fun to catch on video. He even says "Rain" verbally at the beginning of the video.