"THE" Decision

Well......... I would like to say that I have been giving a lot of thought as to whether I should continue to blog or not. I would like to say that I have made up lists with pros and cons and that I have spent endless hours pondering over this decision. However, the truth is that I have kind of forgotten about it all together.

That being said, I am going to make a more committed attempt to blog. However, it will not be until the new year. I know that sounds cliche~ my New Year's resolution is going to keep up with my blogging/journaling better (who hasn't heard that before~ along with not as much sweets, more exercise, weight loss, etc.). But I think I would feel instantly overwhelmed with trying to keep up with the holidays. So, I will start back up when things wind down. I am hoping that will give me a better chance of actually sticking to it.

So to all~ I wish you a healthy, safe, happy and enjoyable holiday!

See you in 2011!
(hopefully!)

I'm debating.......

whether to just let my blog die a slow and uneventful death or to try to nurse it back to health.

Jackson Update

Jackson went to the doctors on Tuesday and they put a cast on his arm. It was so stressful hoovering over him while his arm was just in a splint the past few days so that he wouldn't move it too much or bump it on anything. It is so much easier now. But, much to Jackson's dismay the pins have to stay in another 3 weeks and he could not get a waterproof cast. He was very brave during the appointment especially since almost the entire time I was sitting down with my head between my legs trying not to pass out! Yes~ just the sight of 2 small pins sticking out of Jackson's arm was enough to make the blood drain out of my face, my fingers to go numb, my head to get completely dizzy and light headed. The nurse had to spend more time giving instructions about me than she did about Jackson's arm! I am such a wuss!

Since then it feels like Jackson has more energy than ever! The cast is not slowing him down one bit. He is all over the place, doing everything he was before.

The boys also got their hair cut this week. Tanner's is just a trim, so nothing too exciting. With Jackson we decided to try a buzz cut. He says that he doesn't like it very much, but he is

loving all the attention he is getting from it (I can't stop rubbing it!)

What a way to start summer!

Thursday was the kids last day of school! I can hardly believe how fast this year went by. We celebrated by playing at Thanksgiving Point's childrens water garden. The kids had a blast playing the in water with all their friends. Then it was home for dinner and baths and I was off to Bunco. In the middle of Bunco there was a knock at the door and it was my dad coming to tell me that Korby was on his way to Primary Children's Hospital because Jackson had broken his arm! Korby assured me that Jackson was fine and told me to finish out my game before I headed up since they were just going to be sitting in the waiting room for a while. So, I finished playing Bunco (I won the top prize!) and then headed straight up to the hospital. They had just barely gotten in a room and x-rays taken when I got there about 9:30, so I didn't miss much~ it was a VERY busy night in the ER. (By the way~ thank goodness my parents are living with us so that Korby and I were both able to be with Jackson and not have to worry about our other kids!)

At 10:30 pm the nurses came in to start an IV in Jackson's hand because it turns out he has broken his humerus bone down at the elbow joint and it has to be surgically fixed with pins.

At 11:00 pm I went home to change (I was still dressed up from Bunco) and grab some other stuff since I was going to be there over night and then drove right back up

At 1:30 am they came in to start the paperwork and process of getting him ready for the OR

At 2:00 am they were ready to take him back. We were at that horrible point where the parents are supposed to stay in their spot while they watch strangers wheel their precious baby away through some double doors. At this point the doctor gave Jackson something to "take the edge off of the separation." Literally 5 seconds later while we were talking to the doctors Jackson started cracking up laughing. It was so funny, but too stressful to really laugh about. It was a strange moment. And then he was gone......

At 2:03 am we are taken to the OR waiting room where there is one other family waiting.

At 2:40 am after the longest 37 minutes ever the doctor came in to tell us that the surgery went well and that Jackson did great.

At 3:00 am after another LONG 20 minutes we are finally allowed to see our little boy again.

At 3:15 am Korby went home to get some sleep so he could get up in the morning, get Shayden and Tanner to a friends house for the day and head into work.

Jackson and I had a LONG night. He was pretty drugged up so he wasn't really aware of what was going on around him. He kept complaining about all the things he was "plugged into." He would go into fits about "getting the plugs out of him." They came to check his vitals every hour, so neither of us got much rest.

Around 9 am they woke Jackson up and tried to get him to eat or drink something. Well, he may not have been feeling well, but his appetite certainly wasn't effected~ he ate and drank everything they brought him and even most of my food.

Around 9:30 am they took out all his "plugs"~ his IV, heart rate monitor and blood pressure cuff and he got to ride in a wagon down to the car.

At 9:50 am we left the hospital

At 9:53 am Jackson informs me that he has to go the bathroom right now

At 9:55 am we stop at a gas station to use the bathroom and as we are walking in Jackson tells me "mom, since I was so brave at the hospital I think I should get a treat." Obviously the meds weren't effecting his mind too much and of course I let him pick something. His treat of choice~ a blow pop.

At 10:30 am we got his prescription filled

At 11:00 am we were finally home!

Here we are in the empty waiting room at 2 in the morning.

Jackson right after surgery

Jackson giving me a pretty drugged "thumbs up"

All of Jackson's "plugs"

Jackson's IV

Jackson getting ready to leave the hospital and plug free

Jackson's wagon ride to the car

Jackson with a much happier thumbs up with his sucker

It is never a good thing to have to spend any amount of time at the hospital with your children, but we feel so blessed that we had such a minor injury compared to most of the people that we saw there. Broken bones heal and Jackson will be just fine. He has 4 pins and his arm is in a splint. We go in this week to have more x-rays. If all goes well, the pins will come out and he will be put in a cast for 3-4 more weeks.

It isn't the best way to start our summer vacation, but at least it won't last all summer!

PS In case you are wondering~ we are glad he broke his right arm because he's a lefty!

Swagger Wagon

Ok, so I don't have the actual swagger wagon, but my Honda Odyssey is still pretty cool!

PS Two posts in one day!!! Unheard of!

Rated R

So my mom got Tanner and Jackson these walkie talkies for Christmas last year. My boys love the idea of them, but still haven't quite mastered how they are supposed to work. Usually they just stand in the same room shouting into them asking the other person if they can hear them (which of course they can because they are yelling at each other from 5 feet away).

Well, this morning Jackson and one of his friends had turned them on and we picked up another frequency (I am very technically challenged, so I am sure I'm not using the correct terms) where we could hear other people talking. The kids thought it was pretty cool and started listening. Turns out it is the frequency that the construction crews by our house are using as they are working on the roads. It was pretty fun to listen to for a little while~ they were talking about dumping asphalt, picking up rocks, you could hear tractors backing up and then someone got upset about something and they all started using quite a bit of REALLY bad language. I don't think that the kids picked up on any of the specific words, but I quickly grabbed the walkie talkies and they are now hiding in my closet (where they will probably stay for the next couple of months until the construction is done just to be safe).

I never would have guessed that a G rated toy could pick up on R rated language!

Leading the Way

In the last 2 weeks both Shayden and Tanner have been nominated by their teachers to receive the "Lead the Way" award from their school. As another school year is all to quickly coming to an end I am so proud of both of them for all their hard work.

Shay received her award the same week as her best friend.

I just love this picture of Tanner looking up at his principal with his hands in his pockets.

Tanner with his award giving me the typical "Tanner" smile. It is so hard to get a picture of him with his "real" smile. Maybe next time....

Piano Recital

Last week Shayden had her end of the year piano recital. She did a wonderful job.

Something that I love about her piano teacher is that she also takes time to teach them about different musicians, music periods, etc and tests them on it. Shayden passed her test and got some rice krispy treats shaped like music notes dipped in chocolate!

This is just before her recital. Just in case anyone is wondering.... half the time I take pictures of Shay she is not wearing her glasses. That is because she has transition lenses and I want to be able to see her eyes when I take her picture.

What happened to my little girl?!? She is growing up way too fast!

I love you princess!

Don't Hold Your Breath

There probably isn't anyone left who even checks this blog anymore since I haven't done anything with it in almost 3 months. But that's okay since I am not convinced that I will keep it up anyway. I want to get back in the habit of it because I feel like I can document the little things that happen in our lives that won't get written down in journals or even remembered unless I put then here, so for posterity's sake I am going to try my best, but like I said don't hold your breath!

Perfect example of something I want to remember~
Yesterday afternoon as I was outside reading and the boys were playing in the dirt.

Jackson: Look mom I see a yellow jacket
Me: I know. It's okay. If you leave it alone then it will leave you alone.
Jackson: There it goes.
Me: See. It didn't bother you. It must have had some work to do.
Tanner: I think it had to go make honey.
Me: I don't think yellow jackets make honey.
Tanner: Oh yea. Just bees make honey.
Jackson: I think yellow jackets make jam.

I love this kid!!!!!!!!

Who's kid is this?

In an attempt to be healthier this year I have started choking down a glass of V-8 juice every morning. It isn't horrible, but definitely not a favorite beverage of mine. However, I have learned that Jackson LOVES V-8! Every time I get it out he asks for a glass of tomato juice.

I have the biggest sweet tooth around and eating healthy is something that I really have to try hard to do. Jackson on the other hand could eat fruits and vegetables all day long and be in heaven. After all the struggles we have had (and still have) with Tanner eating Jackson gets the gold star in the food department. Now if I could just do something about his dramatic meltdowns ;)

Hard Lesson to Learn

This weekend was a little crazy. I finally got Christmas put away just in time for a disaster to hit my house. Korby's project for the weekend was to add insulation to our attic. He got the insulation for a great price (one of those rebate deals) with the option of paying extra for someone to install it or renting the machine from Home Depot and doing it yourself. For anyone who knows my husband, you will know that if there is ever any option to do it cheaper he is all over it. Can you tell where this story is going yet?!?

I'm not even quite sure where to start. The concept was simple enough..... rent a machine from Home Depot, dump the insulation into the machine and pump it up into your attic. Easy~ right? Should only take about 2 hours~ right? The hose seals off to prevent too much insulation from getting in the house~ right? If you answered yes to any of those questions then you didn't guess correctly where the story was going!

The professionals have hoses long enough to have the machine (I have no idea what it is called) outside the house~ Home Depot did not. Korby's plan B~ put the machine in the upstairs bathroom and run the hose from there. Now my my upstairs bathroom is decent size, but there definitely wasn't room for the machine, 30 bags of insulation and a person to dump bags of insulation into the machine. So they (Korby and my dad) had to pile the bags at the top of the stairs instead. So much for cleaning my house. Obviously they needed access to the attic, so there was a ladder in the middle of my upstairs hallway blocking both the boys bedroom door and my bedroom door. Korby tried to prepare for the mess by laying down tarps, blankets and taping off the bathroom door~ it didn't help.

Then of course the machine wasn't working. What was supposed to be a quick morning project quickly turned into an all day mess. Korby had to make multiple trips back to Home Depot and make multiple phone calls to Home Depot as well. It took them about 5 hours just to get the machine to work. Since no one was expecting it to take longer than a couple of hours I didn't think twice about not having access to my room or the boys room. My mistake! The boys ended up having a tv day downstairs since all their toys were nicely cleaned up (in their room), Jackson didn't get a nap (making for an extra long day!), and I had to spend the day in my grimy work out clothes with no access to any of my toiletries or even my purse! Needless to say it was a pretty frustrating day for everyone.

By the end of the day everyone was tired, frustrated and my entire upstairs had a layer of dust, dirt, insulation on it. The pictures below really don't do it justice as to just how dirty everything was. When my mom saw the bathroom her mouth dropped open and she was speechless. It looked worse than when we were in the middle of our remodel~ which was pretty bad.

I was feeling a little like the fish from "The Cat in the Hat" when he gets mad at the cat for the mess he made and tells him to leave. No~ I did not tell Korby to leave, but I was pretty upset about the mess he had made. However~ just like the cat~ my husband it the BEST at cleaning up the messes that he makes. He worked longer and harder than any of us to clean everything up. And he had a good attitude about it.

Korby and I might not always agree on how to get things done, but he is amazing at following through with whatever he starts and he always puts 110% into everything he does. I'm still not sure if it was worth it. It was one miserable messy Saturday, but it did save us quite a bit of money and hopefully it will be beneficial in the long run to have this done. I love my hard working, determined, reliable, helpful and amazing husband!

The moral of the story~ NEVER let your husband blow in insulation himself unless he is a licensed contractor or you are going to be out of town!

Now I'm off to dust! (again)

Nothing...

I made a goal that I was going to blog once a week and I already missed last week. I'm not off to a good start. But it wasn't for a lack of thinking about it. Almost every single day last week I thought to myself... "okay, I didn't blog yesterday so I need to post something today." Obviously that never worked out since I didn't post anything last week.

So, here I am at the beginning of a new week and I still don't have anything to write about. Is my life really that boring?!? Do I really not do anything? Of course that's not true, I am busy all the time. I guess I just don't think that very much of it is blog worthy. I am pretty sure no one wants to take time out of their busy day to read about all the loads of laundry I did, how many times I had to unload the dishwasher, bills I paid, what I made for lunch and how many toys I picked up~ because that isn't very different from what your days are like as well.

Which leaves me with my dilemma of what to write about........ (5 minute pause as I stare absent minded out my window). Still nothing......

Well, at least I wrote about how I have nothing to write about. Which you can't complain about since my goal was just to post something every week, I didn't say it was going to be good! Now I have 6 more days to come up with something to write about next week~ I better get started!

Excuses, Excuses

Well, it's the new year and along with that comes New Year's Resolutions. I am a little behind in making my resolutions, but I am really trying to take time to come up with ones that are realistic, ones that are important to me and ones that will help make me, my family and our lives better in 2010.

One of my goals, which will benefit all my loyal readers (haa haa!), will be to post once a week! I have definitely gotten out of the habit of blogging and I am hoping this goal will get me back on track. As with all goals, there are obstacles to overcome. One of the obstacles I must conquer in order to blog more often (besides my laziness, lack of picture taking as of late and leading a pretty humdrum life) is sugar!

Although real sugar is a problem for me (which is why every year I have some goal centered around not eating as much of it), when it comes to blogging my obstacle is Sugar~ my cat. I love my kitty very much and he is my baby. But for whatever reason, he assumes that when I sit down at the computer that my intent is not to actually type anything or look at anything on line, but to be completely focused on him. He likes to sit down right in front of the keyboard and block 3/4 of the computer screen so that I can not get anything done.

Eventually I get frustrated trying to type with 2 fingers or only being able to read portions of an article that I scoot him off. Which of course leads to me feeling guilty for being mean him, which in turn leads to me giving him a kitty treat (which might explain why he is such a big boy).

In any case, I am not going to let Sugar be an excuse for why I am not blogging anymore!

Here's to new beginnings and more blogging in 2010! Wish me luck!