Health Care Woes

I seriously hate this time of year! I was actually enjoying it until my husband called today. His boss has revealed his new cost savings measures.

New health insurance.

Our current relationships with our current doctors are coming to an abrupt end. The new insurance will be going into effect on December 1. Nothing like giving us some time to find the doctors that we think will best suit our families. There were two options for family doctors near (if you call more than 10 miles/less than 30 miles away near) my home. The first (and closest) option does not accept patients under the age of 12 years. Seriously?!? So I called the other option. They will have no problem participating with our daughter’s Children’s Special Healthcare Services coverage on top of our primary insurance.

We also get new dental insurance. The nearest dentist is over 45 miles from our home. Looks like we’ll go another 10 years or so before we go to the dentist again.

We also get vision insurance. Let me just say, what a joke!!

Frustrated.

On top of this, if my husband’s employer did NOT offer health coverage, we would be eligible for subsidized healthcare coverage. If we opt out of the “employer provided” coverage, we also “opt out” of subsidized coverage. This is freaking frustrating. The ACA (Affordable Care Act – aka ObamaCare) is making it impossible for families to have affordable options!

***end of rant***

Summer Has Begun

Summer officially began for the Ingram household at 12:15pm when the last day of school dismissed. The 5th graders did their Final Walk of the Hall to the tune of “Happy” by Pharrell (the fact I spell that name even remotely correctly surprises my daughter).

Interesting twist #1 for Summer 2014 occurred at 6:15pm this evening when my husband called. We’ve been looking for a camper – any camper that would sleep our family – for a while now. Hubs found one listed on a Facebook Yard Sale group yesterday. I went and bought it today! Happy Father’s Day!! LOL The thought of all the gear we’re going to need to even go camping in it has my head spinning. We got a really go deal. We’re looking at this as a “starter camper.” Most people get a starter home. LOL With 4 kids (at home) and 3 dogs I didn’t want to buy anything super new & expensive. I managed to back the silly thing into the driveway all by myself. Honestly, it took a little while. Our gate is fairly narrow and we have a dead vehicle parked in the driveway.

Friday we’re ditching our big name, big bill cable and internet provider for the local smaller more personal service cable and internet provider! Looking forward to it!

Friday is a big day… Christopher is coming home from school for the weekend. Ok, so he gets off the train at 10pm on Friday night and we have to get to the train station before 7am on Sunday morning – so he’s coming home to spend Saturday with the family. Looking forward to seeing him. he’s been away at school since the 13th of May. Then in July I’ll go get him and all of his stuff. He’ll be home for a 6 week stint before going back to school on September 2 (just like the rest of the kids).

Took the kids to the library today after school. The summer reading program starts on June 23 – must remember to go back and sign them up! Started each of the (at home) kids a “shelf” on my GoodReads account so we can track the books they read this summer. I’ll try to show/link the books (with my Amazon affiliate account) as we finish them.

Time Flies

Time flies when you’re having fun, I suppose.

Nicholas started basketball in January. Practice one night a week and games on Saturdays. This ended just in time for big sister’s activities to really ramp up.

Mary Ann is currently participating in Girls On The Run, a volleyball league at our local YMCA, and she’s continuing with her Hip-Hop Dance class. Recital is coming soon!

Happy 2014!!

I should have dropped by the ol’ blog yesterday to wish everyone a happy new year and to fill you all in on the latest from the Ingram homestead.

December ended up being a lot more –fill in the blank- than I bargained for!

Early in the month, I went to my doctor because I had some pain in the left side of my neck and it looked swollen. He ordered an ultrasound. A couple of days later he calls me to make an appointment to come see him, but he needs me to get a lot of blood work done before the appointment. Fast forward a couple of days to completed blood work and my appointment. He is referring me to an endocrinologist to have a biopsy done on my thyroid. Wait! What?!? Yes, I heard him right, we were on a path to rule out cancer. YIKES! I got a letter from the endocrinologist on New Year’s Eve – “The results of your recent biopsy were negative.” Good news. I could have wished for more personal delivery of such delicate and important news.

Now, let’s back up again to December 19th. My kids are pumped about how close Christmas is getting. Our Advent Chain saved me from an endless stream of curious children wanting to know how many more days until Christmas. SCORE! Problem, we were awakened at 5:30am by the telephone ringing – School “will be closed on Friday, December 20th, 2013 due to inclement weather.”

WHAT?? Since when is an inch of snow “inclement weather”? Oh – right. When it has ice underneath of it.

One severely disappointed almost 6 year old… all vacation long asked when is my Christmas party?

Saturday, December 21 – My beautiful daughter turned 11 years old. I’ll spare you the gushing. Later that evening, hubby and I went to our Eagles’ Club for a caroling party. We were pumped. Couldn’t wait to share all that Christmas cheer with the residents of the assisted living facility and the nursing home. I think we were even going to visit some of the home-bound elderly Eagles Members. We’re at the club… Caroling is CANCELLED. WHAAAA!!

Sunday, December 22 – huge ice storm hits. Trees down everywhere. Power goes out for a lot of people including my in-laws – thankfully we kept ours. So, my in-laws move in with us until their power can be restored. The energy company was estimating 12/28. My home – 9 people + 3 dogs (one of the people doesn’t like my dogs). It made for a very long 5 days – in-laws’ power was restored on the 26th. They were able to go home on the 27th, we wanted them to wait until the furnace could warm the place up a bit. We had our generator at their place running their sump pump, refrigerator, freezer, and a space heater to prevent the pipes from freezing.

Christmas Eve was spent with my parents at their home. Wonderful as always. I’ll probably make some scrapbook pages and share them eventually.

Christmas Day was spent here at home for a change. We usually go to my in-laws’ home. They were already here. So we just kept the meal plans in tact and changed the venue. They had fun being here to watch our children open their Christmas gifts.

New Year’s Eve we went to the Eagles’ Club. We had a great time. The band was amazing. Potlucks always have the best food!

Today – I just want school to open back up, my husband to go back to work, and to have some time and space to myself, by myself. *sigh*

In other news – TLP (The-lilypad.com) is having their 2nd annual Month of Challenges. One scrapbook challenge per day for the entire month of January.

Day 1.

Day 2.

Pages are linked to the gallery where proper credits are displayed. When in doubt, assume Michelle Godin at TLP.