Monday, December 21, 2009

Melissa this is for you......

Here is one of the family trees that I made as a gift for Christmas. Clearly the picture is not the best. I had every intention of taking better pictures in the day light.....but I forgot....and now they are wrapped.

But I do love the way they all turned out. It is the gift I am most excited about giving.....I hope my mother-in-law likes it. And as much as I would like to pretend I was the creative person who thought of this I cannot. My friend, Shauna, made these for her family a while ago and I decided to copy it. And it is really easy. I made it in Word using Word art to manipulate the "branches" . Actually Shauna made it in Word and just emailed me the one she made and I changed the info to our family.

It has the full names of everyone (maiden names for girls) along with their birth dates. I printed it on vellum paper and put a decorative paper behind it. Put it in a nice frame ($7.50 at Michael's 50% off) And Viola a neat gift.Posted by Picasa

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

I love Christmas. I love Christmas. I love Chritsmas...

I have to keep reminding myself that I DO LOVE Christmas. I was so excited when Thanksgiving was over. We immediately got our Christmas tree (it has to be real-love the smell) and decorated our house. Oh I loved it. And now 9 DAYS away from Christmas I am not sure why. For some reason I decided to make 15 presents by hand this year. What was I thinking....well I was not thinking at all. There are 3 different projects, pajama pants (even though I am not an experienced sewer), Snowman crayons ( I had to peel 168 covers off), and my favorite and by far the most attractive 2 family trees (super cool, I will have to take a picture and post it) and when I decided to make them I did not think "O maybe not a good idea since you are making so much already". NOPE. So here I am again 9 days away from Christmas and I have done nothing for the pajama pants except buy the flannel, and have not attempted to melt any crayons, the family trees I am actually almost done with but they were the easiest. And then the CHRISTMAS CARDS. Every year I HATE them and every year I do them. In a effort to look cute I got us all coordinating outfits. We got all done up and for 1 1/2 hours we took pictures (Brian has turned into the Nazi photographer...but that is for another time). None of which actually turned out well. The picture we are sending has to be in black and white because the color looks funny. So you cannot tell we have coordinating outfits on. And Brian and I are the only ones who look decent. And out of the 4 of us Ben and Austin are by far the cutest part of the family. So below are some of the pictures that will not be on the Christmas card because they would not fit. See the are pretty CUTE! But you won't be able to tell that from our card...o-well. So it is here and now that I have decided to stop stressing. So what if the cards are going out late? So what if I accidentally put the return address label where the stamp goes on all of the envelopes? So what if the family letter does not have anything to say about me because all I did this year was try to survive? Well I did and I am HAPPY it is Christmas time. REALLY.

Friday, December 11, 2009

TIRED....

....of genes that fit in the morning but by noon could fall off. Tired of pulling them up! Tired of cleaning up cutie peals (little oranges) because the boys can peel them themselves and they do anywhere and everywhere. Tired of my wedding ring flopping around on my finger because the cold has shrunk my finger. Tired of looking for my wedding ring because I have taken it off somewhere. Tired of being cold. 72 Degrees in the house should be warm enough right?

Don't get me wrong. Life is good. Just needed to get it out.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Day at the BEACH

We got to the beach in at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk
They touched to water


Austin decided to sit it out


Ben loved it


Brian convinced Austin it was fun

SHARK!!!!!
(Not really)
And we ended the day with some strange flavored ice cream
A good day at the beach

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Waste of time??

Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing.-- Phyllis Diller
AMEN
Now that I have been feeling better I have been trying to catch up on all of the house cleaning that I had been ignoring but..... we are not naturally clean people. Not to say that we are gross and smelly (although I did find 3 rotting apples under the couch thanks to my boys). We just don't put things away, we come in and drop everything. So I feel like I am cleaning & cleaning & cleaning the same things over & over again. And it is taking up ALL of my time and energy. But now that I am obsessed I am extremely frustrated.
I know some people have a system that works for them.
  • Clean on Mondays
  • Do one big chore a day
  • etc.

But I do not see how these systems can work. If I only clean on Monday it would be a mess the rest of the week. If I only did one chore a day it would always look as if I had done nothing at all.

So I am asking for HELP . Does anyone have some advice or words of wisdom that would make this process easier? Because I want a clean house but I also want some free time. Is that too much to ask?

Monday, April 13, 2009

Hello

I can't remember where I was when this happened. But the story I got was, Ben colored on Austin's face....so Austin did the same to Ben

Brian opening his favorite Christmas present ever. (I got it for him and me)
Benjamin's stuffed animal graveyard


I'M BACK! It has been awhile I know, but I am returning to the blog world. We have had a strange 6 months, my insomnia caught up with me and I began to feel a little crazy. I developed a thyroid tumor that could be cancer (still don't know). And my Dr. discovered I have sleep apnea. Seriously it has not been a fun 6 months for our family. But after tons of different medications (all of which made me sick or did nothing), biopsies, ultrasounds, blood tests, and sleep studies (by far the worst) I am feeling like myself again.


As I was beginning to write this I thought "Oh I should look to see what cute pictures I have on my camera". And after looking.....not many. For Christmas Brian got a fancy new camera (It was a great surprise and he said it was the best Christmas present he has ever received) and he is now the designated family photographer. So he downloads the pictures on to his computer which he always has with him....One day I will get them. But hey, I do need to pace myself. (I has been months since I blogged) So here are some of the random pictures on my neglected camera

It has been so long since I blogged that I put the pictures first.HAha. o-well.






Thursday, January 22, 2009

My 1/22/07 Account of Austin's Birthday

As today is Austin's 2nd B-Day, I thought I'd recount the day of his birth as it was a bit of a miracle in my book...

On Monday, January 22, 2007, we were blessed with our newest addition to our family, Austin Henry Thomas. He weighed in at 8 pounds 2.4 ounces and measured 20.5 inches long. He has straight dark brown hair.

We were truly blessed with this birth as little Austin was literally in a "life or death" situation as he was transitioning to this world.

Corinne awakened me at approximately 4:40am Monday morning telling me she was in labor and that her contractions had started about an hour earlier. When she woke me her contractions were about 15 minutes apart. Corinne showered and did her hair. I also showered. We called grandma Wilma to inform her we needed her to come out and watch Benjamin while we went to Washington Hospital in Fremont, CA.

Our memories are already beginning to fade. But when I originally called my mom I told her the contractions were 15mins. apart. She at first thought she had some time to shower and prepare grandpa's lunch. However, Corinne quickly went from 15mins to 5mins apart. I called my mom and told her she needed to leave ASAP! It took her to about 35mins to get here and we got to the hospital.

It think it took us about 20-25 minutes to get to the hospital. I think we got to the hospital around 6:15-6:30am. They checked Corinne and she was at 3cm. They had her hooked up to monitor her and the baby's heart rate. Corinne said that she didn't remember the contractions hurting this much last time. At the next check she was about 6-7cms. Since Corinne's water had not yet broken the doctor decided to break it for her.

Both the doctor and nurse were amazed at how much water was insider Corinne. A few minutes passed as they clean up, but the nurse quickly discovered that something was not right. Corinne looked at me with a very worried look on her face and mouthed "something is wrong!"
Apparently, right after the water was broke, Austin's blood pressure dropped drastically. Within minutes the doctor and nurses were literally racing Corinne on her bed down the hallway towards the operating room for an emergency c-section. Unbeknownst to me at the time, as Dr. Siobhan Calhoun was wheeling Corinne to the OR she had her hand up Corinne and was trying to keep the baby in its place.

Apparently, Austin had developed a short umbilical cord which was wrapped around his little neck like a loose fitting noose. While he was suspended in the watery cocoon that was Corinne's uterus, he was just fine-the cord was loose around his neck. However, once the water was broken and the uterus collapse around Austin, apparently the umbilical cord either tightened and caused his blood pressure to drop drastically. This tightening was worsened by the fact that with the loss of the water Austin had moved farther south which increased the tightness around his neck.

From the time the nurse discovered something was wrong, until the time Austin was pulled from his mother's womb, literally not more than 5 minutes seemed to pass. However, I think they were the longest and most terrifying few minutes of my life. I had no idea what was going wrong. Corinne's pregnancy had progressed very well-no complications.

Corinne was placed under general anesthetic because that is the quickest acting stuff. I was not allowed in the operating room. I stood out side the doors and could barely see a couple of the doctors and nurses shoulders and heads as they stood around Corinne.

As I stood outside, I prayed. I prayed that Corinne and the baby would come out of there fine. I prayed that the doctors would know what to do to help them both. I called my mom frantic telling her to start praying because they had taken Corinne in for an emergency c-section, because the baby's blood pressure had dropped drastically once they broke the water. I called the Prices and told Dan that Cary needed to hurry (she was in the shower) to the hospital because Corinne was in an emergency c-section.

Not more than 2 minutes passed from the time Corinne was wheeled into the OR until Austin was pulled out - but it felt a lot longer than that. From my position. I could see them pull Austin out screaming. I could also seem them pulling out bloody gook from Corinne. Shortly there after the nurse brought Austin to me and I got to hold him. They told me he was doing great. They also said that Corinne was fine.

After the doctor finished sewing up/stapling Corinne, she came into the recovery room to do some paperwork. I commented to her that it sure didn't take long to get him out. She told me that normally the whole procedure takes about 2o minutes. However, that this situation was life or death for the baby and that that was why they worked so quickly.

Later when the doctor came to Corinne's room to check on her and the baby, I asked if there was any chance the baby had suffered any kind of damage from the loss of blood pressure. She told me no, that baby's can apparently go close to 18mins under such circumstances without causing brain damage. We were very happy to hear that.

Austin looked perfect. Needless to say were were truly blessed throughout this whole experience. We were blessed Corinne's water did not break at home, because it is very unlikely we would have known anything could be wrong with the baby and it is very unlikely that we would have gotten to the hospital in 18mins. Austin could have easily died or suffered severe brain damage had Corinne's water broken at home. We were blessed that the nurse noticed so quickly that something was wrong and we were blessed that the doctor acted so quickly and so proficiently.

Needless to say, I'm never going to forget this experience and how blessed were truly were.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

Still alive......

Yes I have been a very bad blogger lately. It's funny because as I am falling asleep I frequently write an entry in my mind. But as you can see they never make it to the blog. Life has been crazy since before Thanksgiving. I will blog about it soon.