Alaskan Inn

Back in April Brad and I got away for a weekend for a little marriage retreat/getaway at the Alaskan Inn in Ogden Canyon. On our way there we witnessed a pretty bad accident that we would've been in had we been a couple seconds faster at the green light. It was scary and I felt shaken for the first few hours up there. We got to stay in a cute little cabin and had breakfast delivered to our room.

The food at the seminars we attended was catered by Rooster's Pub and it was good too. One night we went into Ogden to have dinner at my favorite restaurant, Tona. If you ever find yourself in Ogden I highly recommend you eat there.

I'm mad at myself for accidentally deleting the picture of my dinner. It was beautiful! So you're stuck with a picture that I am in. Just look at that yummy food though. Brad got sushi but since I am not a fan I got a Bento box with teriyaki chicken and rice, a salad with an amazing ginger dressing, cucumber salad, vegetable tempura and steamed veggies. It was so good!

Two nights without kids plus good food plus good company makes for a great weekend!

Trevor turned 4!

Clear back on March 21st our Trevor-boy turned 4-years-old. We celebrated with a little party at both Grandma & Grandpa Newman's house and Grandma & Garry's house as well as going out to dinner as a family. When I asked him what kind of cake he wanted all he requested was something orange (it's his favorite color) so I made him a cake and tried to frost it orange but it turned out more of a peach color. I didn't feel like going out to buy some Wilton orange that night so I decide to just stick with the peach and he didn't seem to mind. We got him a Spiderman scooter which he loved!

***

"Smile for the camera"...

"Eyes were closed, let'a try again"...

"Ok, can you make a real smile?"...

"Oh I give up!"

***

Here are some things you may not know about Trevor:
He loves animals. A little too much sometimes.
He loves the color orange.

He is an excellent eater and will eat anything and lots of it!

His favorite "food" is fruit snacks and we have to limit how many he eats in a day.

He loves to jump on the trampoline at Grandma's.

He is outgrowing any fears he had- like riding water rides at Lagoon

He has a great personality and is always making us laugh.
He has more gas than anyone I have ever met. And it stinks really bad!

He's an excellent sleeper; he'll sleep 12 hours at night (if able) plus take a nap (if allowed). It's awesome.

He talks cute like saying "darf" instead of "barf" and "Chik-A-Flay" and thinks he's pronouncing them right.

He loves babies (which includes any child younger than he is). He talks to them, coos at them and wants to hold them.

He loves preschool.

Happy Birthday Big Boy!!

There's that smile!

Funny church story

Last Sunday Tyler was giving a talk in sharing time in Primary. The theme for this month is "Jesus is the son of God and he is a God of Miracles". The little girl before him who also gave a talk spoke of....

The ten leopards!

Brad and I were sitting on the back row of the chapel giggling so hard but trying not to because we didn't want to make a scene. I swear not one of the other adult leaders were laughing! Maybe they are just used to the kids saying funny things? It was a good laugh because later in the day things were not so happy.

Tyler did a great job on his talk! He is such a good little reader. We are so proud of him.

And the winner is....

Commentor #1...

Crystal

Congratulations! Now you can be all dolled up when you go in to labor! :)

Email me your mailing address and I'll get this out to you. You're gonna love it!

Saving money....one of my favorite things!

Want to get extreme savings at local hotspots (not just in Utah)? Check out this website called Groupon:

http://www.groupon.com/r/uu2667193

How it works:
1. Each day we feature something cool to do at an unbeatable price.


2. You only get it if enough people join that day.

3. Check back the next day for another awesome Groupon!
 
Seriously great deals!

Best. Husband. Ever.

So Brad entered me into a contest and I won free Lasik for Mother's Day. It's being done tomorrow (Friday May 7th) at The Eye Institute in Murray. I am so excited and nervous / sick at the same time. Channel 13 will be there doing live coverage of me and the other three women who won during the 11 a.m. hour and then Channel 2 will be doing a little story about it on one of their evening news broadcasts if you are interested in seeing it. Personally I am not real thrilled with the idea of being on TV with no makeup, wearing my glasses and being my usual overweight self. But I want the free Lasik so I'll comply with their wishes. Isn't he a nice husband to enter me into this contest? I was lucky to win, apparently they had hundreds of entries and my name was drawn. I have wanted Lasik for years but haven't been able (or wanted) to afford it.

No more contacts or glasses for me....Yipee!

100th post GIVEAWAY

I've been blogging for probably 2 years now but I'm lame and don't post very often so I'm barely hitting my 100th post. In celebration of this momentous occasion I am giving away one of my favorite things...

A Loreal Lash Boosting Serum and Double Extend Mascara
to one lucky reader!

Anyone can win, just leave a comment and a winner will be randomly selected on May 21st. Even if you have never commented before or are a blog lurker and don't know me personally, it's OK, you can still enter to win (I'll be mailing the prize so you can live anywhere). This is an equal opportunity giveaway!

Good luck!

Little Black Raincloud

I've got a little black raincloud following me around. I seem to have a case of the blues that I can't quite kick. I think Satan is working double-overtime to get the best of me and sometimes he wins.

I had a little run-in with a jerk at the gym who was cheating the system and making others wait longer than they should've had to to get on a machine. It wasn't fair and I called him out on it. Now he gives me death-looks and I never want to be leaving the gym the same time he is since it is a dark parking lot. He scares me. Of course, I now foil his little plan by intentionally signing up for the treadmill he is on so that he has to end his session after 35 minutes. I know, I'm rude but he should have to play by the rules everyone else does.

My car turned to 100,000 miles. I guess I am a snob and never thought I would drive a car long enough to get to that (judge me as you will- I deserve it). The car is 10 years old and is in awesome condition and I am so thankful to no longer have a car payment. I just wish I could afford a newer, even better car but 100k miles or not I will just be grateful that we have it.

Every day I feel guilt/frustration at not having enough time to do all the things that I need to do. Right now instead of doing soccer or swimming lessons for the kids I am focusing on taking care of myself and going to the gym. I hired a personal trainer and everything. I can't get up and go early in the morning before work because, well, I am lazy and I like my sleep too much. I have a hard enough time getting up to go to work and they pay me to be there at least! So I try to go in the evenings but I end up having to take the boys to the childcare center there two nights of the week because of Brad's work schedule and that costs me another $13/month. (I won't even tell you how much my gym membership and personal trainer has cost me...let's hope it's worth it in the end). On those nights when Brad is at work I end up picking up the boys from daycare, running home and giving the boys a snack while I change and then heading to the gym. Another drawback to these two days is that I am limited to an hour so I don't get time to do cardio and weights. But I digress. So then after the gym we go home, I make dinner, help Tyler with homework and then do whatever else we need to before bed (showers, bed time routine, etc). But I don't have many quick recipes so I feel like I never have anything to feed the boys and I don't want to feed them a bunch of junk. See? Satan wanting to squash what little self-esteem I do have and keep me from feeling better about myself.

Tyler is having a tonsilectomy and adenoidectomy on March 31st. He has had strep throat three times in the past 4 months not to mention all the times he has had it in the past year. So after this most recent case I called the ENT who did the ear tubes for both boys and asked about getting the T&A for Tyler. He said that Tyler has definately had it enough to "qualify" so we are going ahead with it. Thing is, ever since we made the appointment I have felt all nervous and upset about it (even though it was my idea in the first place!- I know, call me crazy). I know this is a very common procedure and the ENT has done it hundreds of times, it's just that I know of every possible complication because of the job I have and the thought of my little boy under anesthesia and then in pain afterwards makes me want to cry. So, is me feeling this way a sign that we should cancel or postpone it or am I just being neurotic and should go through with it because he will be better off in the long run? I mean, my internal dialogue tells me that there are mothers who have to watch their children be taken into far scarier surgery than this one and I am being a super-freak over this? Sheesh!

Maybe this little black raincloud feeling is because I am going through Olympic withdrawals. For two weeks it was routine for the boys and I to watch some of the Olympics before bed each night (and then I would stay up way past my bedtime and keep watching!). I love the winter Olympics and loved watching them with my boys. Tyler was totally into them and asked great questions about the sports, Olympians and countries. It was awesome to see him so in-tune. I also have a little crush on Apollo Anton Ohno so seeing him skate several times didn't hurt either. You know, he trains at the Oval here by my house....maybe one day I will run in to him. Tyler wants to learn to ice skate so as soon as life settles down we are going to let him take some lessons.

Trevor's birthday is in less than two weeks and it is killing me. How can my baby be 4? The time has gone too fast since he was born. I don't even know if I am done having kids but the older he gets and the more nights I have without having to wake up with a baby and the further away from diapers I get the less I am going to want more! Ahhhh, too many decisions.

There are potential life changers coming up in our lives but I cannot talk about they yet. I am waiting to see what all plays out. Hopefully some really good things will happen so that life will be a little less stressful.

Thanks for checking in on us. I know this was a long post. I am feeling a lot better physically since my appendix surgery....now I just need to feel better mentally.

Just call me Frankenstein

Last Thursday evening I started having abdominal pain which isn't uncommon for me and luckily it was Brad's night off his second job so I was able to take a pain pill and go to bed. I woke up Friday still hurting but able to get through my day. By Friday night though I wasn't feeling well and it got real bad about 5 a.m. I didn't want to wake Brad up so I suffered through it until 8 and then told him it was time for me to go to the hospital- this wasn't like any ovarian cyst I had had before.

After a CT and blood work the doctor came in to tell me that it was appendicitis and that it had to come out today. Like in the next two hours. That's when things got really interesting. The surgeon came to see me, we called my brother-in-law Jeff to see if he could come give me a blessing with Brad, made arrangements for the kids, I called my boss, Brad called his boss, they did pre-op stuff. You know- it was crazy. At least by this time I had morphine on board so the pain wasn't as bad.

The surgery was successful and my appendix had not ruptured. The doctor said it was probably within a day of rupture so it was good I went when I did. She also said it looked as though it had been infected and inflammed for several days and we think that antibiotics I was taking for something else had held it at bay. Otherwise I could've had this done on my birthday! I was admitted to the transplant floor for post op care and it was nice and quiet up there. I had trouble with my respirations after the surgery so I had to stay in the PACU for longer than expected and then on oxygen the entire night which was totally annoying. I think if I had been able to take the oxygen cannulas off my face I would've slept a lot better that night but they had to wean me from 4 liters to room air throughout the night and every time they took me to room air my sats would drop into the 70's. In the morning when my breathing had stabilized and I was able to use the restroom on my own I was unhooked from all the machines and that was a great feeling. I ate breakfast and got out of there as quick as I could.

Now I've been home resting and healing. Today I feel like I have started to turn a corner. I still feel crappy but a lot better than I did on Monday so it's progress. I'm constantly worried about work and need to knock that off. My boys have been going to their normal daycare and school so I have been home alone and then Brad has been home in the evenings until tonight. This will be my first night caring for them since the surgery.

The good thing is I have now lost all non-essential organs:
Tonsils: gone in the late 80's
Gallbladder: gone in 2000
Appendix: gone in 2010

And, at least my 2-piece swimsuit days are over because my abdomen looks like Edward Scissorhands got to it!

On a side note....I'm one post away from my 100th post and I will be doing a giveaway so check back soon. You won't want to miss this!

They say it's your birthday....

I turned 31 last week. It's been a little bit of a bummer because I realized that I met none of the goals I set when I turned 30. None. That's a way to make me feel like a loser.

But I did win a birthday cake and that was fun because until that day I had never had a professional birthday cake. Not even from Walmart. I entered a drawing here http://www.4theloveofcake.blogspot.com/ and won! The cake was an awesome chocolate with raspberry filling and it was the best cake I have ever had. It even tasted better than my wedding cake (because it was chocolate, of course). The cake decorator gives away a cake every month so if you want to enter visit her site the month before your birthday and register. But you should check out her website just for the fun of it too. She does great work.

Here's the cake:

We celebrated my birthday over at my Mom's. Lilly (Jennifer's youngest), me, Mom and Jennifer all have birthdays in the same week so we had a big ol' celebration. We had a repeat of Thanksgiving (minus the stuffing and yams-boo!) and it was so darn tasty and then stuffed ourselves on two cakes. It was great!

Christmas 2009

We had a nice Christmas this year. The season was busy with parties and shopping but Christmas eve and day were really nice and spent with family.

We did Christmas eve like we always do with my Mom but this time it was at her new house. I am still having a hard time adjusting to this new way of life with her. I am not comfortable in Garry's home and miss the way life was before she got married. I miss her. But I digress. We had a great dinner and gift exchange and stayed up way too late. They gave me a Lion House cookbook that I love and Brad and cool flashlight that has a tripod for a handle. How cool is that? And then money for the Bosch mixer that we are saving up for. My life will be complete once that appliance joins our family. My sister Janeen just got her Young Women medallion again since she is in the YW in her ward. For one of her projects she transcribed my dad's journals and had them bound and a copy made for each of us. It was the most amazing, treasured thing anyone could've ever given me. These journal's were written when I was young and to hear how he talks about his love for us kids and his hopes and dreams for us was incredible. He also expressed the love he had for my Mom and he loved her in a way I didn't even realize. I hope Brad loves me like that. He was also so hard on himself and had high expectations for himself and it was painful to read some of it. It also made me understand him more. It is a beautiful and bittersweet memory I will treasure for the rest of my life.

Christmas morning we opened gifts at our house before going to Brad's parents for breakfast. We tried not to go overboard on spending this year and I think we did pretty good. All Tyler wanted was "100 sets of Lego's" (that's an exact quote) and Trevor really didn't have any specific thing he wanted. They both go Zhu Zhu pets which are my kind of pets. Brad surprised me with a pink Creative Zen mp3 player. It's pink! And he got me a rice cooker/steamer and a hot cocoa maker. I love them all! I got him a Blue Ray player and a Guitar Hero guitar.

After we filled ourselves with food we did presents with Brad's side of the family and that was fun. Lynette made me a Family Home Evening assignment board which I have always wanted and Lynn & Margaret gave us all season passes to Lagoon. I guess we will be spending a lot of time there this summer.

We missed great-Grandma & Grandpa Newman at breakfast. Grandpa wasn't feeling well from the Christmas eve party he went to the night before so they stayed home. Turns out he was having a heart attack and wound up in IMC's Cardiac ICU later in the day with 2 new cardiac stents. Little 90-year-old man gave us a good scare. He's doing excellent now. We got another treasure of a Christmas gift, this time a book made of life stories written, and typed on a type-writer, by Grandpa Newman. One of Brad's cousins then illustrated each story and it was hardbound. Too special for words!

Wanna know what my best gift this year was?? Trevor deciding to potty train. Oh yes folks, it's finally happened. I thought he would be wearing diapers into college. It was our Christmas miracle.

Overall a great ending to the decade.

A call for action, a plea for help

Dear family & friends,

As many of you know I was a living kidney donor in June 2004. Recently, the gal I donated to contacted me in a panic because she had just learned that Medicare was going to stop helping cover her immuno-suppressant drugs and she could not afford them on her own. Without these drugs her body will reject the kidney I gave her and she will need to go back onto dialysis and eventually be re-transplanted. This is a terrible loophole that kidney transplant recipients fall in to and right now we all have a chance to do something about it. I am asking you to contact your local Senate and House representatives and urge them to support Section 1232 of H.R. 3962 (also know as the Affordable Health Care for America Act). There are lots of details to this bill and I won’t go in to the here but if you want to know more I’d be happy to share them with you.

These are not lazy people looking for handouts; in general they have returned to great health after being on the brink of death. In the case of Mia (my recipient) she is now able to work again but her private insurance will not cover immuno-suppressant drugs because it is considered a pre-existing condition. It makes no sense that the government will pay for them to be on dialysis and get a transplant a second or third time but will not pay for the medication they need to keep their first transplant from rejecting!

All I am asking you to do is contact your Senators today using one of the two methods below and ask them to "urge conferees to include Section 1232 of the House bill, H.R. 3962, in the final health reform bill." Section 1232 extends Medicare coverage for immunosuppressive drugs for the life of the transplant to ESRD patients who have received kidney transplants.

1). Call the Capitol Switchboard to call your Senators and Congressmen at (202) 224-3121

2). Click on the following link to locate and contact your Senator: www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Click on the following link to locate and contact your House Representative:

http://www.house.gov/

I thank you with all of my heart. One day it could be one of us who needs a transplant.

People bug me

OK, not everyone bugs me but I encountered someone tonight who really irritated me.

I took the boys to Panda Express tonight. Believe it or not, that is their favorite restaurant. The one nearest our house is the one at Jordan Landing which also happens to be busy pretty much all the time. So as we were standing in line they were horsing around with eachother, being a little crazy (but really I have seen worse in both my children and others) and I could tell that the lady in front of us was getting annoyed. I made sure that we were far enough back that my boys didn't bump into her and I tried to calm them down a little but they were excited and hungry and maybe a little hyped up from the sugar they got at the family Christmas party today. So after about 10 minutes she turns to me and says "do you need a whip or something?" and I did a little fake laugh "ha ha, maybe a little duct tape would do"- you know joking, friendly banter. Then she says "maybe you shouldn't take them out Christmas shopping or anywhere else if they act like this". At first I was shocked but then after it sunk in I was a little mad. My boys are generally well-behaved and tonight they were certainly not being bad. The man with this woman didn't seem bothered by them but she sure did.

I have every right to go places with my children and to be honest, I really don't go many places anymore since Brad has been working 2 jobs and I am alone with the boys in the evening. You know how kids are in the evening when they are tired....not the time to take them out shopping or anything. So generally we just stay home, but sometimes I have errands to run or shopping to do and they have to come with me. It hasn't been fun. Recently at a grocery store Trevor decided he didn't want me to buy milk that night so he cried all the way from the back of the store (why is the dairy in the back of the store?) to the checkout area "I don't want to buy miiiiillllllk!" while I carried him. He was tired and so was I but we needed some groceries and it was the only opportunity I had to go to the store.

It reminded me of a time, many years ago, when I was strapping Tyler into his car seat in the Walmart parking lot and an impatient woman honked at me because she was unable to pull in to the next parking space because my back door was opened. You parents out there know it only takes a few seconds to strap a child in so it's not like I was taking very long but apparently it was too long for her. Back then I did give her a little piece of my mind, today I didn't.

So why do people have to be so rude? I don't get it. If I see a child throwing a temper tantrum or crying in a store I feel sympathy for that parent because I know what it is like and it isn't easy. I guess I will just have to let her rude comments roll off my back and know that I am doing the best I can.

Oh Trevor! Part 2

The other night we spent 30 minutes looking for Trevor's favorite blanket at bedtime so he could go to sleep. We searched everywhere and finally found it in the refridgerator. When I asked him why he said "because I wanted it to be cold" as if that were a completely normal answer!

A productive conversation

This exchange happened tonight between Tyler and me.

The scene: I come walking into the kitchen to find him and Trevor digging in the cupboard where we keep the paper plates, paper cups, napkins, etc.

Me: Tyler, what are you doing?

Tyler: I'm doing something so I can do something.

Trevor: Yeah, do something

That cleared it up for me.