Preparing

I've avoided blogging the last few weeks. Matter of fact, I haven't spent much time on the computer at all. Maybe 15 or 20 minutes here and there. Every time I went to put up a new post, I couldn't seem to get past the first sentence. And then it'd hang there until I'd go back and edit the post. Another first sentence to leave behind. I have decided that if I'm going to do any blogging any time soon, I had better be getting one up. Now. So here I am.

This time next week will find me in a hospital bed. I am to report for registration at 6am next Monday morning. I have gone from crying because I'm not ready for a hysterectomy to crying because the day cannot come soon enough. Some days are not bad. Others it takes everything I have to get through the work day before I come home and give up on the couch. I find myself nesting to get ready for what's to come. Today has been a good day. My kitchen is clean, laundry almost caught up, my furniture dusted and the pain has been sporadic meaning I can get things accomplished as long as I take a break in between tasks. I caught up on work at the office so that the mound that awaits me when I return isn't as bad as it could be. By the time I go to bed tomorrow, I hope to have my floors mopped, my carpets vacuumed and my laundry finished. One can always hope, right?

I also nest to avoid the obvious. Now is when I start to get anxious. I am facing an unknown and I am ready but I'm not. So I keep busy, as busy as possible, to keep from thinking. To keep from worrying. To keep from panicking. I long for this week to be over. For them to knock me out and be done and at the same time I long for this week to never end so I don't have to face my fears.

It's moving quickly. Too quickly, I'm afraid.

The kids are excited as they approach the end of the school year. By the end of next week, Bryce will be a middle schooler. He has finished band concerts for this year and is done with practices. Brady and Belle's final concert is tomorrow now. Actually, if Brady doesn't get sick again, it will be his first and final concert for this year. We shall see how this plays out. All three kids have done well this year and are moving up to the next grade levels, excited about what next year could bring for them. I look at these kids and wonder how did I get so lucky.

Yes, I'm sentimental. Or hormonal. Or both. There's no telling at this point. Don't be surprised if you see me and one minute I'm laughing and the next I'm crying. I am to that point as well.

Lord help my husband. He's going to have his hands full the next few weeks. I'm not afraid to admit that.

For now, I'm off to bed, hoping for dreamless, painless sleep. Got to be ready for more nesting, right?

To Tell Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth

Today started off as a wonderful day. I stopped to get a drink at the local convenience store on my way to work when the lady I've seen then a million times asked me if I was on my way to school. She did a double take when I told her I was on my way to work.

"You don't look old enough to go to work," she said.

"I have three children."

"Nuh uh."

"My oldest is 12."

She was floored. Said she thought I was like 17 or 18. I told her I'd take it. I didn't realize then the affect her remark would have on me tonight.

I haven't been completely honest with you or with myself. Yes, I have got a serious case of baby-itis. Yes, I was on a heart monitor last week. Yes, there are plenty of people who saw Bryce baptised last weekend, including Ladybird's parents. But what I have failed to mention in my most recent posts is that I have been to see two doctors on three different occasions in the last week and a half and not one of them was my cardiologist. As a matter of fact, I have yet to see him or even hear those results. I have been in pain for the last three and a half weeks so I had appointments to have that checked when I had my heart checked. Today, I was given news.

Hysterectomy.

At 32.

I'm stunned. I've cried more tears than I have cried in a very long time. While I have never been opposed to the idea, especially if it meant that it would help take care of my migraines, I never believed that it would be a possibility at 32 years old. I never realized how strong my irrational hope is that one of those months where things went wrong it was because there was a baby, not because there was a problem. Yes I have three, healthy, happy, beautiful children and I am so thankful for them. Now the reality is the fact I have them is amazing. That still doesn't ease this blow. It doesn't change the fact that I am at that age where I should be having baby-itis not life altering surgeries.

Here in the very near future, I will be undergoing an MRI in preparation for the actual procedure. A requirement because I am apparently unique. Even my ultrasound tech asked me if I was tired of being an anomaly. Today I am. Tomorrow, we'll see. Tonight I'm numb as I process everything that I was told today and hope that tomorrow will show things in a new light.

Baptisms, Babies, and Wires

Yes, I admit, I did it. Again. I put up a post and was determined to put up another post. And another. And another!

And I failed.

Failed is such a harsh word. And I didn't. That's so much nicer.

I could bore you with the majority of the last few weeks. Get the kids ready for school. Go to work. Go home. Cook supper. Put the kids to bed. Go to bed. Rinse. Repeat.

So exciting, huh?

So we'll skip to the more recent stuff. Like baptisms. And babies. And wires.

This past Sunday, Bryce went up and wanted to be baptised. So this Sunday morning, he will be baptised at our home church. Given my history on the subject, I have mixed feelings. I am excited for him. I am relieved. I am jealous. I am, I am, I am so many things. But for him I will be happy.

After church, my neighbor (who is no longer my neighbor after selling her house) brought her new baby for me to see. New as in one week old. New baby smell. And little fingers and toes. Little nose and burps. Little yawns and little smiles. And that baby ache was back all over again. Little Little Man is the 4th baby that I know of born in the past two weeks.

Fourth.

Deep breathing does not help this ache. Spending time with them does but not when I have to give them up again. But listening to the newborn and the big brother cry in the car together does. A little. Sometimes.

I took this picture today while sitting at the office.

I was wired. Literally. Have I mentioned that my heart and I don't see eye to eye? That it likes to race when I am sitting down and doing absolutely nothing? It does and I really don't see why it feels the need to do this because I haven't done anything to it. But it continues to race. Finally, about six months ago, I got tired of it and went back to my doctor. He put me on some meds that haven't seemed to help one bit so I went back yesterday for my follow up. And I complained. So he wired me up. What you see is the wires attached to the electrodes stuck to my chest (that left marks that I figure will be there until this time next year) and the machine recording my heart rate that was nicely tucked in my back pocket. I haven't worn one of these darn things in 10 years and I was grateful when they took it off this afternoon. I had itches that were dying to be scratched. Next step?

A visit to the cardiologist.

Here in the next week or two, when my results come back from my monitor, I will go back to the clinic to meet my cardiologist. I thought I was ready for this step. I'm tired of being tired all the time. I'm tired of feeling like my heart is going to jump out of my chest. But I'm not so sure I'm ready for this step. Not like I have a choice but I can have an opinion, right? Or worries? More will come I'm sure as this part of my story unfolds, but today I could say I was wired.

Now I am going to jump back into my routine. The kids are in bed, the dishes are washing, the laundry is in the washer waiting for morning and I am joining the kiddos and going to bed. Sleeping while wired was just so much fun!

The View In My Chair

More information to come soon...

Wow! It's a Real Post! First Time in Months!

I've been sitting here glancing back at this screen trying to decide how to start. It's been so long since I've put up a real post that I have forgotten how! Do I start at the beginning and work my way through? Do I start at the most recent and work my way back? Do I start in the middle where my head usually ends up and try to make heads or tails of it? Decisions! So I figure my best bet is to download all the pictures I want to share and go from there. So here we go.

Football season and cheerleading came to an end right around the first of October. We had a little bit of "sibling" rivalry around that time as well. Callie was sitting there first and there was no way Zeus was going to let her have me all to herself!

Around the middle of October, we traveled to Indiana where we had pictures made of the kids. These are just a few of my favorites out of the 70 pictures that were taken.It turned off very cold up there that weekend so by the time we got to the pictures of all three kids together, they were freezing! Belle had been out of her coat the longest by that point so her smiles were a little "frozen". My sister-in-law trimmed up all their hair and fixed Belle's so that it would curl because those curls? Are natural! How I love that beautiful hair! When sister-in-law got done with her hair, Belle replied, "It's too poofy!" Belle hates the curly hair with a passion. So to pacify her, the front part was pulled back. It was still too poofy according to Belle but at that point my response was, "deal with it." No way was I going to straighten all those curls for pictures!

We had Belle's party the week before her birthday and me being me, I forgot to take pictures until the very end. By that point, the girls were burnt out on bowling and had moved onto other things. Here's Belle blowing out her candles.We ended up going to Mississippi at the end of October when Hubby's grandmother passed away. That meant Bryce's birthday celebration had to be postponed a week and the kids went trick or treating in Mississippi. Unfortunately, I couldn't find my camera so I have no pictures of the kids costumes. Brady was a ninja, Bryce was a grim reaper and Belle was a witch. The kids had a ball trick or treating and then went with Hubby, his sister and her boyfriend, aunt and cousin to their church for a Halloween festival. They went through a haunted trail, played plenty of games and came home with more stuff than any child needs!

Bryce was afraid that if he had a birthday party, no one would come so as an alternative I told him instead of picking out seven friends to invite, he could invite two people, we would go out for pizza and take everyone to a movie. He loved the idea, picked a couple of friends and we took them to see "A Christmas Carol" in 3-D. It was a great movie and the kids loved the visual effects! Hubby and I loved seeing the kids reaching out at the screen trying to catch falling snowflakes! Here's a picture of Bryce blowing out his candles with the family.The week football and cheerleading ended was the same week basketball team placements were held. Bryce is a 6th grader this year so he is playing on a sixth grade team with a coach that he had a couple of years ago. Belle was given the opportunity to play up on the 6th grade team this year and she jumped at the chance. She has the same coach she had last year. Brady is playing on a 4th and 5th grade team and also has the same coach as last year. One of my next tasks is to get a picture of them in their basketball uniforms because I have failed to that at this point. I really need to be doing that since this weekend is the last of their regular season games before tournaments start the following weekend!

Also in November, we lost our darling dog, Sophie. She had gotten to where she wasn't eating a whole lot and then suddenly she stopped eating at all. She stayed under my feet from the time she got up until the time I went to bed. Then I got up one morning and she was gone. Thankfully Hubby was here and had her buried before Brady got up because we knew that of all the kids he would be the one to be the most upset. She is greatly missed and I still haven't gotten out of the habit of calling for "Sophie, Gracie, Chi Chi!" Maybe I'll be able to adjust soon.

Thanksgiving was up in the air until the last minute. We picked up everything we needed to fix the meal but Mom was having minor surgery the day before so where we were having dinner was a toss-up. So the plan was that I would cook dinner at my house unless Mom was up to having company, then I would cook dinner at her house so she didn't have to get out. Thanksgiving morning I got the call that she was up for dinner, so to her house we went! I can't tell you when the last time it was that I cooked the majority of the Thanksgiving meal (Hubby fried the turkey this time) but we pulled it off without a hitch! Talk about a sigh of relief!

The time up until Christmas was crazy insane. The kids had six basketball practices each week and each one of them had an after school music lesson of some sort each week as well. Christmas week, the kids were out of school and Hubby didn't have to work so he stayed home with them while I worked. We spent most of Christmas Eve with Mom and Dad as well as my brother and his girlfriend. Christmas morning, the kids were up bright and early just waiting for their chance to see what they got.

I had two New Years resolutions. One was to be in bed when the new year began. The second was to sleep in the next morning. I'm proud to say that I kept both of my resolutions for the first time ever! I am definitely going to have to try to have these same types of resolutions every year so that they are easy to achieve and not so devastating when I don't. You have to aim high, you know!

And let me tell you how this work thing has been keeping me crazy busy. We had the pictures of the kids made in October and I just got three of them up on the wall last week! It took me three months to get those three pictures into frames! I still haven't gotten one up on the wall of the three of them together yet nor have I framed the ones that I had printed for my desk at the office. I have been running so much with the kids and work that even the animals are stressing. Here's Zeus giving me lovin' this past weekend.He was so excited to be able to spend time with me! I didn't think I was ever going to get him to let me up.

Saturday morning, Brady had to be at my former elementary school for a game while Bryce had to be at their school for his game within an hour of each other. So Hubby to Bryce to his game and I took Brady to his. When Brady and I got home, we found this dog sitting on the carport step. Like she lived here!I got out of the car and she met me slowly trying to decide if she could trust me. When she figured out she could, she thought she should come in! We left her outside that day because we were still running for Belle's ballgame hoping that maybe someone would come around looking for her. We put food and water down for her but she still wanted in every chance the door was opened. Finally Sunday we felt sorry for her and let her inside. Called the animal shelter Monday and left my name, checked the lost and found in the paper and checked craigslist. No such luck. She is now inside, thinking that she is queen and that she belongs on the couches and beds. She is a sweet dog, doesn't care if Gracie and Cheech bother her and she ignores the cats. She loves the kids and is fully house trained! It breaks my heart to think that someone could've dropped such a sweet girl!

That brings me to right now. I am currently waiting on Belle to go to bed so that I can go to bed. While this new dog is sweet, she is also stubborn because she likes to scratch at the side of the bed to see if I'm going to give in and let her up in my bed. Not going to happen but still keeping me from sleeping a good nights sleep until she realizes that I'm going to win this battle! I have also decided that since it seems that the dog is going to be staying around for a while, that she needs a name. I like the sound of Daisy for her and Belle agrees so she may be becoming a Daisy in the very near future. Now that the kids are all in bed, finally, I am going to join them at 9pm. And maybe it won't take me near as long to get my next post up. Maybe.

Letting You Know

Stopping by to let my few readers know that I am still alive and kicking. I hope to have a real post up soon but until then, a video of a song that I introduced to the kids this week and they absolutely loved!