Christmas Dinner

After we finally dragged the boys out of their pajamas, we went to Grandma Paletta's for Christmas Dinner. It was good to see everyone and see how all the cousins had grown. When we started opening presents Chrie kept telling the teenagers to sit quietly like my boys and stop sneaking the presents. She told Brandon how great he was doing leaving things alone and Brandon -very truthfully like only a child can be- said it was only because he didn't know where his presents were at or he'd be looking too.

Christmas Morning

Christmas morning was of course early. Brandon actually woke up at 2 am and refused to go back to bed so Bryan and I ended up putting him in our bed inbetween us. He still kept trying to sneak out. I guess he finally make it out when we passed out because the boys were up playing for awhile before we finally rolled out around 7 am. Brandon got spy gear from santa, Ben got a huge lego star wars kit, Sean got some ben 10 toys, and Sam got his huge Geo Trax set. They played all morning. Eve and Daniel stopped by to pick up medicine for the baby and Eve got to open her presents. It was a great day. We had gotten stuff for hoggie sandwhiches the day before so I didn't do any cooking or cleaning all day. It took until late in the day to coax the boys out of their pajamas, and that was only because he were leaving the house. We talked to grandma and grandpa Good who were snowed in, in Oregon of all places.
I know this is a lot of posts all at once, but Christmas has so many fun pictures.

Christmas Eve

Jared (my brother) and his family were able to come over for Christmas Eve this year. Our family tradition is to act out the Christmas story each year, Hannah was excited to be Mary and carry around the baby Jesus. Brandon said he was to old to be in the play but relented if he could be the donkey this year. Then all the boys get to open up their new pajamas on Christmas Eve, and Hannah and Ammon opened the gifts they got. It was a great evening. Daniel wasn't able to come since his kids were sick this year.

Sean and Mac

Sean and his friend Mac were in preschool together. They got married and have been "husband and life" ever since. Mac has Sean well trained already. When I asked him what it ment that he was married he told me it ment that Mac was the boss of him. :) He has to buy her jewelery and bring her flowers as often as he can. Yes, she has his well trained already. So this is sean bringing her Christmas present. He got her a princess necklass and she bought him a giant Hershey's Kiss.

Gingerbread House

Brandon took the liberty of breaking out the gingerbread house while I was sleeping today. They got everything put together and only had me put the white frosting on the roof. They actually did a pretty good job getting it together. Tonight they are picking it apart eating it. I'm glad I got some pictures this afternoon because it won't be around for much longer.

We have been making the rounds of the stomach flu this week. Sam had it for 24 hours and I'm just getting over it. Hopefully it'll stop there but with lots of kids of just a matter of time before it spreads. I was worried the illness would shut down Sam's kidneys again, but since he hasn't finished his steroid regiment yet he seems to be doing OK. The boys are going nuts trying to figure out presents. Poor Sam can't stand it, he keeps digging under the tree and pulling all of his out and piling them up. I guess he can recognize his own name because he only piles up his own presents and begs to open up 'just one'. He is going to be fun to watch on Christmas morning. Not sure if it will live up to all the hype though.
I would like to know what it is about my DNA that triggers a baking fit each holiday season. For some reason I start cooking for Thanksgiving and can't stop till New Years. I've probably make 7-8 batches of fudge at least, dozens and dozens of breads, cookies, etc. My neighbors are all loving me because I don't want them all in the house but can't stop baking. We haven't had many nice days so I haven't attempted divinity or peanut brittle yet and it's supposed to snow until Christmas day so maybe well pass on those this year. At work I'm becoming known as the fudge lady. If there is a therapy or treatment available please let me know asap.
My shoulder is healing well. I have most of my range of motion back, but still a little uncomfortable now and then. I'm going to physical therapy 3x a week, and he says mine is the fastest he's ever seen get back to normal. So I'm busy planning my race schedule for next summer. Well I can dream at least. I've had so much time off from training I'll be starting at square one again. With a few lovely pounds from the dozens of cookies.
We got progress notes from the boys' school. They don't give grades since it a big hippi school, but they let you know if the child is progressing well and internally motivated to learn. :) Ben now thinks I'm the meanest mom ever. He is so smart but if he doesn't like something he refuses to do it so he has a few 'areas of concern' on his report. So now every day even weekends he gets to sit and write his abc's to improve his penmenship, and will start this week doing extra math problems I make up until he no longer has an area of concern and a takes little interest in the subject. I figured he needs to learn he has to do all the busy work and jump through the hoops now and hopefully when he does get graded on things later he'll be able to accomplish things. But for now I'm a really mean mom. Oh yea and for good measure he through in that I make them do all the work around the house and I never do anything. Boy I felt like I had finally achieved true motherhood. I was honored. I can't tell you how many times I said that to my mom. I'm finally a real mom.

Getting Ready for Christmas

Wow, I forget how much I use two arms. Spent the day with the boys finishing up Christmas Decorations and getting together teacher gifts and Christmas cards. I'm feeling very festive I just keep forgetting I can't move my arm more than a few inches in any direction. It doesn't really hurt till I try to reach for something and then oh boy does it let me know I just had surgery. Feeling so much better already, only taking the pain pills when I wake up at 1am because I rolled on my arm wrong. I am a very restless sleeper and constantly move around, wonder where my boys got that from. But I can type again since that doesn't require me moving my shoulder too much. All the major house decorating was done on the 2nd. When I told the boys I was going to have surgery on my arm all they were worried about was that we hadn't put up any Christmas lights or decorated the tree yet. So of coarse that had to be done before the big day just in case.
Just wanted to wish everyone a happy holidays!

Shoulder Surgery

Well it 2 am and my body is wide awake. I've had more sleep in the last 24 hours than I usually get in a week so of course my body thinks I should be wide awake at 2am.
I went in for Same Day Surgery on my shoulder Wed morning. I usually have pretty severe nausea and vomitting after surgery, just like everyone else in our family so they decided to be preemptive and put a motion sickness patch on me. About 5 minutes later I started running a whopping fever, turned red from my ears to my chest, couldn't stop coughing, I felt like clawing my throat open to catch my breath. Needless to say I had a severe reaction and they had to give me benadryl iv push and epi before it calmed down. I was feeling good after surgery, not even nauseated, but as soon as I got up to get dressed, I started coughing uncontrollably and sweating etc. Needless to say the nurses freaked out and I had to stay a few more hours. The anesthesiologist made my promise I would take 50 of benadryl every 6 hrs for the next 24 hours. I thought they were being a bit paranoid, the patch was only on me 5 minutes, but sure enough at 10 pm last night it had been over 6 hours since my last benadryl and the coughing and itching came back. We'll see how I do in the morning. Each attach has gotten lighter and less severe so hopefully it'll be gone come morning.
The truth is though, I haven't been nauseated once and the tight throat still feels better than throwing up for 24 hours. Too bad I know they'll never give me that medication again, since besides the difficulty breathing it worked great. :)
The surgery went well. My ligament was less than 50% torn so he didn't have to sew it. Hurray!! That means no immobilizer for 6 weeks. I have a sling on and I can start using my arm as soon as the pain subsides. He said my shoulder was a mess, full of debree, fluid, puss, yuck, so He thinks it will heal up much faster now that it's all cleaned out.
Now If I can only get my knee better I can start training again.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving was a nice quiet affair this year. On Wednesday night we had our second annual PIE NIGHT! It's really great, we get together and have only dessert! It's much more enjoyable than trying to shove down pie after Thanksgiving dinner.
We had my brothers and their families over, Mel and her family, Scott came down too it was great to see him. Mel made her grandmothers goop. Once I tasted it I remembered it from growing up, It was delicious.!! I will have to remember it for holidays from now on. Next year the rest of you in the area have to come by. I'll send out emails earlier so you can plan on it.
Thanksgiving day we spent the whole day home alone with just Bryan and I and the Boys. We haven't down that in years. It was fun to wear of PJ's and watch the parade and football all day long with no set time schedule. It took longer to cook the turkey than I had planned and it didn't matter at all. And yes we still muscled down more pie after dinner. It had to be done.

I know it has been a while since I posted. Crazy month! I guess everyone could say that most of the time. There has been progress though this month. Sam's kidneys are working again and we are weaning him off the steroids. My MRI showed a ligament tear in my shoulder and I'll be having surgery Dec 3rd. I won't know until I wake up if I'll have a sling on for a few days or have my whole arm immobilized for 6 weeks. Really not looking forward to that! My knee is in a big brace but still finds ways to pop out of joint. Taking it easy does not seem to be helping so as soon as I can use my shoulder again I'm giving up the whole taking it easy and letting the body heal senario. Not really working so why embrace the depression.
On a brighter note. I just turned in my last assignment to get my bachelors in nursing!!! Yea!!! At least I will have about a year's brake before starting NP school. Hopefully things will slow down by then but I doubt it. Mom in case you were wondering yes I do officially have a life now and it's draining the life out of me. :)

Halloween Video

Sorry most of these pictures are a bit out of focus.

No one wanted to hold still.

Halloween

Better late than never.
Halloween was pretty fun this year. I swore to the kids they could wear whatever fit out of the box, I was not making costumes this year. So two days before Halloween Brandon says he really wants to be Harry Potter. I felt bad since he had been an army man the last 2 years so I caved and made him a cloak and want and found him some glasses. He looks awfully cute, I think.
We took Hannan and Ammon trick or treating with us this year. Hannah said she had to be a princess so I made a princess hat and found a princess dress. I think she's found her new favorite thing. He was estatic that she got to dress up as a princess and people would give her candy. Is there anything better in the world?
I was glad than Sam actually wore his Thomas costume. I actually made it last year but he refused to wear it, so being the vain person that I am, I made poor Bryan carry it around and let everyone know I was not a looser mother who sent her child trick or treating with no costume, but had actually slaved away to make him a homemade costume. I know pathetic, but it was so cute and he wouldn't wear it. He was pretty excited to wear it this year.
So we have Brandon - Harry Potter; Benjmain - Darth Vader; Sean - Red Power Ranger; Sam - Thomas the Tank Engine; Hannah - Princess; and Ammon - Superman. We were quite the group walking down the street.

Long weekend

I thought my next post would be a cute happy halloween up date, but it has been a long weekend. Bryan's foster father passed away this weekend. It's the only father he has ever really known and it w as hard to him to accept that he wasn't going to get better. He able to spend time at the hospital with the rest of the family saying good-bye and I'm so glad he did.

The past couple weeks Sam has been really cranky. He's ben clingly and not sleeping or eating well. I was worried about him getting sick since his last cold caused his kidneys to shut down. I checked his urine last week and all was normal, but today I noticed his tummy was a little bloated. Sure enough he is spilling 400+ protein in his urine again. This winter is going to be interesting, he will have to go back on the immuno suppressent for another 3 months. For those of you who don't know he has Nephrotic syndrome that is an autoimmune disease. When he gets sick his immune system goes into overdrive and for some reason starts attacking his kidney tissue. I've been really worried about the boys in school what they would bring home, but just like last time all he has had is a stuffy runny nose and cough.

I'm up late finshing some homework, but I will post that cute halloween blog asap.

Running Away

Yesterday afternoon Sean came down from his room packed up and ready to go. He took one of the cowboy neckerchiefs down from his room, wrapped up some pajamas, socks, his teddy bear and his superman toy. He also brought a blanket and pillow and declared "Mom, I need a big stick to tie my stuff too. I'm running away." He was so determined. I asked why and he said he was tired of his brothers picking on him and he had to go. Of course I was welcome to come with him because he still loved me, but he had to run away. It took some convincing to talk him out of running away, he said he would wait for summer so he didn't freeze at night. Poor picked on boy, he has the middle child syndrome. If Sam didn't pick on him so much he might do better but he is just gets his feelings hurt so easy and Sam loves to cause trouble. He must have seen a cartoon with someone with their belongings in a neckerchief tied to a stick because he imitated it perfectly.

Discovery Park Video

Fall Break

The boys are enjoying their school break. They were so excited to have almost a full week off of school. Poor Sean, I was getting him up for school last week - the boy does not do mornings- and as I'm sleep walking him into the bathroom he's asking where he has to go. So I tell him it's time to get ready for school. He gives me this horrified look and yells "AGAIN! I have to go everyday?!" Poor little boy, too bad I couldn't get him into afternoon kindergarden. Neither of us work well before noon, I can totally relate, I too hate getting up for school.
Yesterday we had a fun day at the Park. There is a great park out in Pleasant Grove by Daniel and Brittany that my boys love. It's called the Discovery Park. There are all sorts of neat things to do and educational play in this giant fort of a park. We took Brittany and Eve with us and had a good time. It was actually a warm day and we didn't freeze. Lovely warm fall day. Brittany and I both agreed it was a good thing Daniel didn't know about the park or he would spend hour there making Eve read all about the live cycles of trees and frog, and trying out all the science stuff when she just wanted to swing.
Actually all the kids loved the huge space shuttle. It's the huge wooden space ship, and there is a cock pit they can climb into and pretend to travel into space. They kept going back over and over to take off.
I'm going to try to upload a slide show of our pictures, I'll see if it works.

Timpanogous Cave

I've been hearing about this marvelous cave in the foot hills that I had to take the boys to. Everyone said it was a bit steep but paved hike up to the cave. A bit steep is a severe understatement. More like 1.5 miles at a 10+ degree incline, no shade and a jagged rock cliff drop off along the entire right side. The boys actually made it all the way to the top, through the mile long cave and back down again. Of course not with out a lot of grumbling. At one point I was telling Ben that we should climb this path every day until he could run up the mountain. Well a little while later after one of our water breaks Ben takes off running full bore yelling over his shoulder "I'm not doing this every day, I'm running now!" Poor kido.

We'll they really did enjoy the cave when they got to it.

My favorite thing though was Sam falling dead asleep on Bryan's head on the way down. He hiked all the way up, all through the caves and on the way down told dad he needed a lift. Not 30 seconds later he's snoring on dad's head. It's priceless!

The Zoo

Well we usually visit the Zoo once a year and we've been a few times this year. We went with Jared and Family in August and this week the boy's school had a field trip. Sam loves that when I drive for field trips he gets to tag along. He thinks he's part of the school and is already addicted to field trips.

Must Love the Cowboys

Just thought you might all enjoy following the best team ever with me this season!

learning

I've been fiddling with this blog for hours at work. I know can you believe they pay me to do this? We'll someone has to be awake at 3am just incase. I think I'm figuring out how to use all the nifty extras. Now I just have to break down and buy a digital camera so I can actually use the computer. I know I know I still can't believe I don't have one either. But I'm too picky to use the point and shoot ones with the delays, they drive me batty!!! And I'm too cheap to buy a nice Digital SLR so I'm stuck with nothing. Maybe my OCD is starting to effect my life.

School is in full swing for the whole Yazzie house hold now. The boys are glad they get to see friends again, and I'm not glad I have busy work homework to do. I don't even get to go see friends at school, Just log on and do busy work. I was worried that I would have to start NP school in January. Nationwide the nurse practitioner degree is becoming a doctorate degree, but not until 2015. So I can take my year off before starting full time again. Work is finally starting to slow down again. We always slow down in the winter. That means I'll be able to get more homework done at work. Again yes they pay me to do that. :)

Brandon and Ben wanted to have a roller skating party for their birthdays. Wow flashbacks to Jr. High. They went to the roller rink and we had a party room. It was actually really fun and the boys could use their skooters since neither of them can stand up straight on Roller skates.

Finally got some pictures back from Visiting Thomas the Tank in March. I love taking pictures but never develop them. I've tried several times to buy a digital camera but I'm too picky. The delays drive me nuts and I'm not ready to spend over 1000 on a digital SLR. Soon hopefully, but for now I have a great camera, I just need to use it and not loose the film.

New Job

Well I just got a new job. Wasn't even looking for one. The boys go to a charter school and last year I did the vision screening and records for some volunteer work. I just got an email from the principal saying that an employee had to be in charge of the screenings, paperwork, immunization records etc so I was hired. :) I was going to do it anyway but now they have to pay me to do it. State laws are great. Now I have to come up with something else to get my volunteer time in. This charter school is great because all of the parents agree to at least 40 hours of time spent in the school. They have plenty of help with the students and the parents are really involved in their child's education. Too bad the public schools can't require parents spend some time in class.

The Spudman

We'll I'm home safe and sound and still in one piece from my triathalon. More than one piece since my left leg was swollen to twice it's normal size last night. The swelling is gone today, but per agreement with my MD and PT no more running for me for 3 months till my knee heals. It was well worth the pain though. I'm getting addicted to triathalons.

The morning started off pretty tense. My wave was in the water ready to start when they pulled us all out. A swimmer in the wave ahead of us went under and never resurfaced. I had several friends in that wave and we didn't know for over 1/2 and hour who went down. They walked us all past the river to the bikes to start while divers combed the waters. Not the best way to start the day. So my fear of swimming the big river was null since I only spent 5 minutes in the water. After that I did great on my bike and my run. I haven't run much since injuring my knee last month. I took meds and put patches and braces on my leg and figured it was my last run for a long time might as well blow it all the way out. I know not smart, but you'd be supprised how hard it is to curve the competative spirit. I didn't go planning on really competing so I didn't bother checking the finishing boards till after I got home.
I took second place in my category. I didn't hang around to get my big potato trophy so I'll have to have my friend in Idaho pick it up. Now I wish I'd run a little faster and not limped so much. :) always next year. Definatly have to go back. I think I could have done better if we had been able to do the swim. My swim is pretty decent. Now it's lots of yoga and rehab for the knee. Only one more big bike ride and then the summer season is over. It's so sad. I'm trying to get brandon to ride the last ride with me in August. He is liking his bike. I'm hoping to get him hooked young so I'll have someone to drag with me to competitions. There were lots of teenagers with their parents and grandparents competing yesterday.
The boys are not happy that were getting ready for school again. They start in 3 weeks so were buying clothes and school supplies. They really don't think it's fair since its still summer. I have to agree. I much prefer laying around the pool and sleeping in. Oh well life must go on