What have I been up to?

Since the 2 weeks before Thanksgiving, I have been lucky enough to babysit my grandson, St. John for 3 days each week. His mom, Liz, went back to work so I am helping to ease everyone with the transition. However, things haven't gone smoothly. The first week we discovered Liz milk is doing one of those odd things that only happens to very few mothers. It changes rapidly and just smells (and probably tastes) awful after a few hours. After some advice from medical people, all that frozen milk got tossed (which is very sad for a nursing mother and child) and now, all milk must be scalded before being kept for a short time or frozen. Of course, St. John decided all bottled milk must be bad so he refused to take a bottle from then on. Everyone has offered advice, methods to try, etc and we have tried them all . He has finally taken a bottle occasionally but isn't at regular intervals yet. We find it usually take 2 people to accomplish the task with one person in charge of his head that turns back and forth and the bottle aimed at the moving target while the second person plays with his hands and feet that move constantly when he is awake. All this while we keep him happy and not make it a traumatic experience. So, Mom has to drive all the way home on her lunch hour daily. I was only going to keep up this babysitting schedule for 2 weeks but continued after Thanksgiving so he is with the same person regularly. He is progressing so we figure he will start taking a bottle regularly sometime before he goes to college so we will all hang in there with patience.
So this is why there haven't been any posts on this blog lately...
I am back at the beach finally today and we are experiencing our first winter storm. So far, we are experiencing at over 50mph winds and lots of rain. The roof got a little leak that we will have to get fixed quickly but luckily it stops and only drips once in awhile. The storm is supposed to bring record breaking cold, snow on the beach and higher winds. Our candles are out of hiding and we are ready for power outages. Our heavy chairs on the upper deck were threatening to crash through the big glass doors so those were moved. We are prepared. I still remember being here the first week of December last year with no electricity, phones or cells for 3 days before we finally were able to drive to our condo in West Linn with lights, heat, etc. It's just Winter on the coast!