All I wanted was a pack of buns

On June 11th, I managed to ding my knee up. And all for a pack of buns, too.

I planned BBQ sandwhiches for supper, but needed buns. So I loaded the kids up in the SUV and headed to the local bread store, just a couple miles away, and a lot closer than Wal Mart. I didn't see the need in going to Wal Mart just for a silly pack of buns! So off we went.

I pack of buns and a few treats later, we headed back out to the SUV. I'm not real sure how, or what, I did, but the next thing I know, my right ankle gives out and I'm heading to the sidewalk! On the way down, my left knee went to visit my right knee, making me look like: ) OUCH!

The one worker in the breadstore rushed out to check on me, asking "Ma'am, are you all right?" Seeing my face, and the rest of me on the sidewalk she followed that up with "No, you're not. Do you need me to call the paramedics?" Frankly, I felt kind of silly, and just wanted to go home, get on the couch, and ice the knee and ankle down. So I asked her to simply call my hubby. Thankfully, he was able to leave work long enough to get me home, make sure I was on the couch, had ice packs, etc.

After a call to "Dr. Mom", I realized I really should have the knee and ankle looked at, just to be sure I hadn't done something more than a simple sprain. Of course, driving was a little more difficult than I wanted to deal with! After Brad got home though, we headed off to the ER. Thankfully, a neighbor was gracious and wonderful and let the kids stay over there while we were gone. The x-rays didn't show any breaks, so the doctor announced I sprained my right ankle and left knee. Talented, aren't I??? They sent me home with crutches. I discovered something. I'm terrible on crutches. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that that was the first time I had to ever use them?

A week later (June 18th), the ankle was better, but the knee and I weren't on speaking terms yet and I knew I needed to call my doctor. However, just to complicate things, Brad's car kicked the bucket, which meant he was driving our SUV while we figured out what to do about the car. Thankfully, God provided Brad wisdom (because I was too busy panicing) and Brad was able to buy a used car on June 20th that will do great for him. However, I wasn't able to see my doctor until June 29th due to me taking 8 kids from church to camp and my doctor being unavailable, etc.

My doctor played with my knee, showing me the 1 - 2 inches of give I had in my left knee that shouldn't be there. She thought I tore my miniscus and promptly referred me to an orthopedic, who also thought I tore my miniscus and scheduled me for an MRI.

July 7th, I had an extremity MRI, pretty cool by the way. The MRI machine sucked up my knee brace when it was over...made me laugh. That afternoon, I went back to my doctor and found out I had bronchitis!

July 10th, I saw the orthopedic for the MRI results. Is it bad when the doctor comes in and says "You suprised me."???? I tore my miniscus in two places, ruptured my ACL, and have a bone bruise on my tibia. All that from one fall?? One catch....we were going on vacation to NM (to visit family) that evening! So his instructions were: no squatting, bending, or kneeling; ice as needed for 15 minutes, 3 times a day; use either a cane or one crutch under my right arm; and to generally behave myself.

We're now back from a relaxing vacation, and the bronchitis is just about clear. I'm still coughing a tad from the bronchitis, but it's certainly MUCH better than it was several weeks ago. I'm scheduled to see the knee surgeon on Aug. 11th to see what he can do about my knee. He should definately clean up the miniscus tear, just not sure if he'll fix the ACL rupture.

Gee....and to think that all I wanted was a pack of buns.

Ah, procrastination!

My wonderful, sweet, intelligent daughter has done it again. She's put off an assignment until the last minute. This one is a writing assignment, a story (mystery, tall tale, or realistic fiction), must have handrawn illustrations (done by her), and completely written and typed by her. This isn't the first time she's had to do this assignment, either. It's school-wide, called "Author's Convention". Not only is this the third year we've done this, this is the second time this year that we've done this....last one was in the fall. To make matters worse, she's known about this for a good month, and the teacher has had a count-down display in the room! When is it due? On Tuesday, and this is Sunday. She's still writing the rough draft, too.

Now I know how my mom felt with me. I can't remember how many assignements I put off until the last minute! So Elizabeth certainly comes by it naturally, bless her heart. Her teacher has been giving them time in class to work on their stories, so either Elizabeth hasn't been using that time wisely, or just got stuck, I'm not sure which. Of course, she hates writing, not just the handwriting, but the whole writing process. She's got such a wonderful imagination though!

She's got a good start on her story, and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of it. She'll write a part, then bring it to me to read....wonderful! Except she's teasing me! Did I mention she's writing a mystery? And I absolutely love mysteries, too. So I'm looking forward to her complete story. She really does have a great, wonderful, huge imagination, which makes coming up with stories not too hard. It's just getting them started.

In her defense though, mysteries are one of the hardest stories to write, according to my sister, a 3rd grade teacher. I tend to agree with her, too. There's the plot to figure out, the plausability of the mystery, who the culprit(s) is/are, motive, opportunity, etc. And doing this on a 5th grade level, too! She's got her work cut out for her, but she's going to finish this. Quitting isn't an option, especially since this is for a grade. Think she'll learn something about procrastinating? If she's like me.....sadly, no.

Just one of those weeks

Ever had just one of those stressful weeks that wouldn't stop?? Don't lie, you know what I'm talking about.

Brad wound up working a little later Monday than he planned, so I missed my Ladies class I'm participating in at church. I wasn't happy about missing it, but I also knew Brad had done everything he could to get home on time.

Tuesday, Brad wound up staying home due to a massive headache, that I'm sure was caused by stress from the previous 3 work days. That wasn't too bad, I wasn't upset with him, I was actually upset with the situation that caused the headache, even though I had no control over it. Ok, so in hindsight that was not the best thing to be upset over. Anyways, the stress level hit EEK that day when we found out that Geico wasn't going to reissue our auto insurance policy with them when the 6 month premium ended in March. WHAT?!?!?!?! It all had to do with Brad's "use of his vehicle". HUH??????

See, Brad's employer, back in July of 2008, decided in order to help prevent them from getting sued, all employees that go on-site to customers (like Brad does), needed to extend the liability coverage amounts to 100/300. From a business end, I can understand it. From a spousal point, it was frustrating. So back in July, Brad talked to Geico, except at the time him (and his coworkers) all thought the extra coverage was to protect "company equipment". Geico's lovely underwriters were going back to that inital conversation and used that as a reason to not reissue the policy in March. No matter how we tried to explain to Geico that the extra coverage is NOT about protecting company equipment, that it's to help prevent his employer from getting sued if Brad has an accident while on the job...no matter how hard we tried to explain that, they just wouldn't listen.

Oh, and did I mention that if Brad doesn't keep that 100/300 coverage he could lose his job???? Yep, my stress level hit nuclear on Tuesday. So we spent most of Tuesday afternoon checking out other auto insurance policies.

I could go into more, but I won't bore you with any more. So it's just been a stressful week. But the good news is, we now have new insurance, the way it needs to be done so Brad's job isn't in jeopardy, and actually paying less than we were to Geico. Plus, they also do homeowners insurance and it looks like our agent will be able to give us a better rate on that, too. So we've been thanking God that He allowed Geico to decide not to reissue the policy in March.

It's just been the kind of week that I can feel the tension in my body. That's not good, is it? So I'm taking today off of taxes, dishes, and possibly laundry. I'm going to stamp and scrap today. The weekend starts this afternoon, and I really don't want to be physically stressed this weekend. In college, I would go play raquetball to relieve stress. Now I stamp and scrap to relieve stress. LOL

New Year.....New Goals?

I don't know about you, but we had a marvelous Christmas. It was our first Christmas with Nikkie in the family. I really was expecting her to try to eat all the ornaments she could, or try to eat the tree, but she was a super good girl and left them all alone. Digit was a completely different story! You would have thought the decorated tree was his personal toy! But at least he didn't get in the tree this year, so maybe there really is progress with him.

Shhh....but I still have all the Christmas stuff up! Unfortunately, I can't leave it all up all year. So alas, it must come down and be put away. It doesn't mean I can't listen to Christmas music all year though! I've never done that before, but I may do that this year. Brad got me Mandesa's Christmas album as a stocking stuffer, and I'm really liking it. Liking it enough that I could cheerfully listen to Christmas music all year long this year!

I refuse to make New Year's Resolutions. Nope, not going to do it. I will, however, set some realistic "goals". But are "goals" the same as "resolutions"?? If so, don't tell me, just let me live in oblivion. So what are my "goals" this year?

• Scrap more! In the past, I've set goals of "X layouts a week", but not this year. Life gets too crazy, and some weeks I just can't get to my scrapbooking. But I definately want to scrap more this year.
• Finish at least 1 project that I already have started. I have UFO's floating around my house, did you know that? Not alien UFO's, Un-Finished Objects.....UFO's. A quilt top I started in college, at least 2 cross-stitch projects, and that's just the ones I can think of right now. So this year, another goal is to finish at least 1 of these UFO's.
• Excercise more. Oh boy, is that needed! But going to Karate for Christ at church will take care of that, our instructor will make sure of that. LOL It's actually fun, too. And I can take it at my pace. The week's that my asthma is flaring up, I can take it as easy as I need to. And in the process, I'm learning to defend myself.

And I think that's it for this year. Some easily reached goals for me. Cautious? Maybe. Chicken? Probably. :-)

I got to see Les Miserables!!!!!

Brad took me to see "Les Miserables" on Oct. 11th!!!! The Arkansas Reperatory Theater (http://www.therep.org/) was showing it, and my wonderful hubby knew I would love to see it. We managed to buy 2 of the last 40 tickets sold, numbers 37 & 38 to be exact. Whew!

It was just amazing! I have the original Broadway cast soundtrack, and I've seen the 10th Anniversary Concert, but you really do miss a lot of action between all the songs. The Rep has a rotating stage, and boy did they put that to use. The acting was wonderful. The orchestra just grand. The singing was just plain awesome. The Rep is a small theater, so you really do get to see all the action on stage upclose and personal.

Of course, no cameras were allowed, so no pictures to scrap. We did bring home a program, though. So I'll have to get real creative when I get around to scrapping this!

Elizabeth asked what the saddest part was. Well, considering all of the main characters die, it's got lots of sad parts. She asked if she could go, but I simply told her that Les Mis. just isn't for kids.

Now, the movie "The Tale of Desperaux" which hits theaters in December....that's a different story. "The Tale of Desperaux" is Elizabeth's favorite book and when she heard it's being made into a movie, she was practically begging to go. My response? "I don't know, we'll have to see." hehehehe Little does she know that we plan on getting her tickets for Christmas. Sounds like a great day for a girls' day out, to me. Shhhh!!! Don't tell, it's a secret!

Karate for Christ

Our church started "Karate for Christ" a few weeks ago. It's grown tremendously over the past few weeks, so much that we're going from meeting once a week to twice a week. We have two classes each night, an hour for kids from 5 and up, and then an hour for teens and adults. It's free, as long as you go to church (somewhere, anywhere) on Sunday. Both of the kids are doing it, and are enjoying it. We missed one night a couple weeks ago, and both kids were bummed. Most of the parents who bring their kids stick around to watch, so it gives me and other adults from our church an opportunity to talk with them and get to know them.

Our head instructor has been trained in "Karate for Christ", and has a 3rd degree blackbelt in karate, working on his 4th degree. Brad has a 4th degree blackbelt in taekwondo and helps as an assitant in the kids class. We also have 2 teen girls who assist in the kids class, one working on her red belt, the other has a black belt. It's a good thing our head instructor has so many helpers! :-)

Brad then works out during the adult class. It's been so long since he earned his black belt, that he's forgotten some, but it's coming back to him. When Elizabeth was in taekwondo, Brad promised me that if I ever wanted to take taekwondo classes, he would do it with me and start over. Well, he's keeping that promise and starting over in the adult Karate for Christ class, even though I've told him he doesn't have to start over. It's nice having his experience in the house though. It means that if I work out at home, he's here to correct my mistakes. He's so supportive of me in this! He's there encouraging me along the way, and gives me that extra push when I think I can't do it.

Apparently I did push it a bit last night, though. Part of our warmup in Karate for Christ is stretching. Well, apparently I pushed myself a bit too much stretching my right leg. Yep, it REALLY hurts today, difficult to walk, and don't even think about asking me to do a flight of stairs. I hope this works itself out by Thursday night, because the adult class will be meeting again then. I don't want to miss anything!

I've surprised myself in what I can do, though. LOL I have more power in my arms and legs than I thought I did. I'm not anywhere near Brad's power, though...just WOW! Brad hits or kicks the big 'wave bag' we have, and that bag knows it's been hit. I'm proud of the work I've done, though. I'm learning a lot, thanks to our wonderful head instructor. More than that, I'm slowly getting myself in shape. It's not always easy, but I'm glad I'm doing it.

It's also nice that I'm not the only woman in the class. Our head instructor's fiancee is in the adult class, plus another mom started with us last week. There's also a couple other ladies who want to join in with us, so hopefully we'll see them in there soon!

Introducing Nikkie

This is Nikkie on 9/20/08. She's Brad's 1 yr. old bassett. This pose is normal for Nikkie, because being a bassett is hard work. It's tough sleeping all day!

When we first brought her home in March of this year, that sad, pitiful look got to me every time she got in trouble. It wasn't too long before I could look at her and tell her "That look won't work on me anymore." LOL

Nikkie is a joy to have in the family. She loves the kids, the neighbor kids, our friends, and pretty much anyone else that comes in the house.

There's actually been someone that she hasn't liked, so I really do believe she has a sense of who's good and who's not. Her and Digit get along, and actually play together. It took several days for Digit to stop hissing at her, but he calmed down and now they at least tolerate each other if they don't consider themselves buddies. When Brad comes home, she wags her tail so hard that her rear end wiggles. It's so funny to watch.

She thinks she's a lapdog, but convincing this 50 pound bassett that she's not a lapdog is a different story. So her and I comprimise. She can lay her head or front part of her body in my lap and we're fine.

On the 28th of September, we noticed a huge lump on the underside of her neck. It was about the size of a lemon, and I will be the first to admit that I was scared for her. So off to the vet she went a couple days later. The vet says it's an allergic reaction of some kind. She'll be fine, it's just going to take time to get her all better. Short of sending off blood for allergy test, it'll be a bit hard to find out exactly what she's allergic to. So for right now, the vet's starting with a possible food allergy. This means only her food, no scraps. Sure, tell that to Nikkie, who's a walking vaccum. She can find the smallest bite that the kids drop on the floor. Her dry food can stay the same, but her little multi-flavored treats are going to have to change since she can only have the light-tan colored ones. In the meantime, she's on an antibiotic and gets a medicated bath. In the past, she's taken pills just find when they're hidden in cheese. Not now. It was like wrestling a walrus for the first several days. It's easier now though, especially since Brad started hiding it in a small bite of turkey lunchmeat. Oh, except for when she finds the pill hiding in the turkey and spits it out. Hmmm....I wonder if that's why the vet's office told me "Get as much of this medicine down her that you can."

Giving her the bath is easier than the medicine! She just stands there. But she started feeling better a few days after seeing the vet. She's really feeling better now, but still on the antibiotic and baths.

I knew she was feeling better when I had to fish the water bottle cap out of her mouth. Yep, the walking vaccum has returned! It's times like this that I wish God had given animals (or at least my pets!) human-like vocal chords so they could talk to me. That or someone invent a translator thingy for animals like they have in Star Trek. Of course, I may not want to know the thoughts that go through my furbabies heads!

Found a new toy!

I found a new toy to use with my stamping. It's called "Glimmer Mist", made by Tattered Angels. I went on a hunt the other day for 1 thing, and ended up at one of the local scrapbook stores, only to find out they didn't have what I was looking for. And since I feel it's my duty to help support my local scrapbook stores, I just HAD to look around. Plus, they had just moved to a new location and I hadn't been in the store for a few months. It wasn't too long before I spotted these small, 2 oz, spray bottles in various colors.

"Glimmer Mist" it said on the bottles. "What's this?" I asked. Come to find out, Glimmer Mist is a spray containing a pigment. They have a pearly, shiny, sparkly, look to them. Would you believe me if I said the gal made me buy 2 bottles? Ok, so she didn't but I really did buy 2 bottles. "Winter Pine" & "Coffee Shop" are now added to my new toys.

I played with them Friday night, and here's what I created.

I used the Coffee Shop Glimmer Mist on one of the flowers from Stampin' Up!'s "Pretties Kit". It didn't take much of the Glimmer Mist to create the pretty brown flower! It really does have a pearly shiny look, but that doesn't really show in the scanned image. :-( The red flower was made using another flower from the Pretties Kit and dyeing it using Riding Hood Red Classic reinker (one of Stampin' Up!'s NEW In Colors).

I'm looking forward to playing some more with my two Glimmer Mist colors. According to the Tattered Angels website (http://www.mytatteredangels.com/), they have 52 different colors. I know the scrapbook store didn't have all 52 colors the other day, and that's probably a good thing...at least for my checkbook! LOL

Blog? What blog? (AKA Long Update!)

I almost forgot I had a blog! I think my memory leaks worse than I thought it did. LOL In my defense, I would like to say there's just been so much going on that my brain couldn't handle it all and had to shove things out. Yep, that sounds like a good story to me! :-)

We had a great summer here. The kids & I had lots of fun at Day Camp in June. The highlight of the week was Jordan wanting to accept Jesus as his Savior. Brad & I were concerned about the genuiness of this, so we asked our pastor (who's also one of our dear friends) to sit down with Jordan. So on June 29th, right after church, Brad, myself, and Jordan sat down with our pastor and talked. There's no doubt in our minds that Jordan knows exactly what he was doing or why it was such an important decision.

Jordan's sleep study went fine. I'm thankful for the Arkansas Children's Hospital and how hard they make experiences like this good for the children. Everything from the design and decorating of the main lobby to the caring staff. He got to watch a movie while the tech hooked him up to all the wires. (Although the glue they use really stinks, litereally!) Of course, I was there taking pictures all the way from waiting in the main lobby to getting hooked up. :-) The fire alarm went off in the middle of the night, and I honestly thought it was the wake-up call or something. LOL We've gotten the results back though, and no sleep apnea. There was moments where his respiratory stopped, but his pediatrician said that could be sinus drainage causing that. So all in all, no need to worry about his sleeping. YAY!

Vacation Bible School was so much fun! I was paniced about VBS because I waited way too long to start looking at the materials, but God worked wonders. We even had to do some emergency substitutions the week before we started. We did the VeggieTales VBS, and it was their "Pirates Who Don't Do Anything" theme. Myself, and "me crew" LOL, all dressed up as pirates. This crew really got into the pirate spirit, too! I know the workers had a blast that week, and that helped the kids have fun, too.

August started off with my parents coming to visit for Jordan's baptism. What a treat to have them here twice in one year! :-) An even bigger treat and blessing, was being able to watch my husband baptize our son. And to know, like with Elizabeth, that Jordan received his spiritual gift(s) the moment he asked Jesus to come into his heart, is just amazing. And I get to watch him grow and discover that! I'm blessed with two wonderful, beautiful, caring, loving, Christian children.

School started Aug. 18th, and between the two kids, I've seen their pediatrician twice already. Yikes! I hope this isn't how it's going to be the rest of the school year. They both have wonderful teachers, too. I've applied to be a substitute, but only for elementary. I'm not sure I'm ready for middle school or high school! LOL

A joyous occasion

Back in April, our daughter Elizabeth asked Jesus into her heart! This is something that God has been preparing her for for a long time. Unknown to us, some time back she filled out a response card at church saying she wanted to talk to our pastor about becoming a Christian. In a later conversation, he asked if I knew about that, which I didn't. So we setup an evening for him to come by and talk to Elizabeth. Yes, Brad is the Children's Pastor, but this wasn't something we were going to take likely, and we felt that our pastor would have the wisdom to know whether Elizabeth was ready or not. Well, after talking with her, asking questions, etc, she was ready to ask Jesus into her heart! It's been awesome to see the change in her!





My parents have said for a long time that they wanted to be there when she was baptized, so we made sure they could be here. On May 4th, Brad had the wonderful privledge of baptizing our daughter. It was his first baptism, so he was nervous, but he was wonderful.





In 1 Corinthians 12 - 14, the Bible talks about spiritual gifts. What an amazing thought that my daughter received her spirtiual gift(s) the moment she received Jesus as her Savior! And I get the joy of watching her discover her gift(s), whatever they are, and watch her grow in her walk with God.

Sure, she's not perfect. Yet, who of us are? I know I'm surely not perfect. I pray for wisdom, though, wisdom to know how to help my daughter continue to grow spiritually. Oh, and patience as we begin to enter the beginning of hormones! :-)

Jumping in!

It seems I've now joined the world of blogs! There was a time where I didn't think I would, but here I am anyways. There's a first time for everything, right? LOL

Here it is, the day after Memorial Day and my two kiddos are still in school. They think it's "not fair" that their cousin, 1 aunt, and 1 uncle are all done with school for this year. Of course, at the same time, my kids have at least 1 day off of school every month throughout the school year due to a holiday, parent-teacher conferences, etc. I just keep reminding them that they only have to survive until June 5th and then their summer will start! LOL

Summer! Summer! It's almost here! Sorry, but no matter what the calendar or weather says, it just doesn't feel like it's officially summer until the kids are out of school. LOL Usually, we make a trip to NM to visit my family. Alas, it won't happen this year. Instead, we're sending the kiddos to NM so they can spend 2 weeks with their nutty relatives out there. (I can say "nutty" because I'm related to them! LOL) Right after they get back, we jump right into Day Camp thorough our church. It'll be 4 days of fun, Bible stories, missions, and activities! This will be the first year Jordan gets to go. Of course, I'll be the counselor and I'll definately have my camera with me.

Right after that, Jordan gets to do a sleep study. He has various symptoms that all point to sleep apnea. Did you know kids can have sleep apnea? I didn't! But they can, and so Jordan gets to go through a sleep study. The sleep study will confirm whether or not he has sleep apnea. If he does, and depending on how severe it is, it will be treated with either medication, a breathing machine, or surgery. Personally, I would prefer either medication or the breathing machine!

So far, July plans are fairly quiet except for Vacation Bible School, in which I'm the Director again. But there's a whole month between now and then, so who knows! LOL Before we know it, summer will be over and we'll be getting ready for another school year!