Birthday Weekend

May's been a very busy month! I've started a new job, Quinton turned four, Violet's turning two on Wednesday, Jake gets out of school at the end of the month, and all in all, I'm not sure that I've sat down for more than two seconds straight!

This last weekend, my mom and I took the kids to the zoo for Vi and Q's birthday weekend. They had such a blast! I thought Violet was going to crawl into the monkey cages (heaven knows she'd have fit right in) and Q was obsessed with the elephants and giraffes. It was crazy busy, but it wasn't too hot, so it was very nice. Jake (my logical child) walked around with one of the maps all day directing us...and he knew where we are at all times! He's such a hoot.

Then on Sunday, we had a birthday party for the kids. Quinton had a Batman cake and Violet had a CareBears cake (Oh the joy of buying girl cakes!) They each got a bike. Quinton got a big boy bike, with training wheels of course, and Violet got a trike. Q got on his and took off at the speed of light -- he knows how to really cruise. Violet can't figure hers out, but it won't take long. For now, she piles her and her babies on her bike and pushes around with her feet.

I started a new job today at the Village at Silver Ridge, a luxury apartment complex here in Rock Springs. It's a fantastic position, pays very very well, and has set days. It's across the street from Jake's school last year, so he'll be able to walk to school. I'm planning on moving there this summer after Jake gets out of school. I am so excited to have my OWN place, my very OWN place again! Not that living with my mom hasn't been a godsend (she's a huge help) but I can't wait. I loved working in the ER, but the shifts were too hard on the kids (they felt like they didn't get to see me very much) and the drama there is just ridiculous. So when this position was offered, I jumped on it!

Easter Pictures

Easter 2010

Wow what a crazy couple of days it's been. My sister and her fiance and their boys did make it down for Easter, and we had a grand time. Wyatt is officially in love with Violet and spent most of his time down here toting her around. :) Jake and Q had a fantastic time playing with the boys. We dyed eggs on Saturday night and of course, the Easter Bunny came Sunday morning. Then we went to my sister Kerrie's house for a few egg hunts and some very delicious deep fried turkey and potato salad (and my world-famous deviled eggs).


Then on Easter afternoon, I started having some pretty severe stomach pain, but I was able to ignore it since we were so busy with egg hunts and baskets and everything. About three, Kim and Chad decided to head for home (they live in Gillette) and so we all loaded up to get back to my om's house to get everything sorted. After they took off, I got all of my kiddos down for a nap. It was then that my stomach pain really blew up. I couldn't move, I couldn't do anything but lay there and cry 00 pretty much some of the worst pain I'd ever been in.

About six my sister Kerrie came down to take me to the hospital. We got there, and they gave me some morphine, and Dr. B told me flat out that he thought it was my gall bladder. He sent me for an ultrasound, and you know it's bad when halfway through the u/s the tech looks up at you and says, "Do you by chance know who the surgeon on call is???" I had so many gallstones in my gallbladder that they couldn't even count them! So they admitted me to the med floor and told me surgery would be on in the mornig.

Dr Franks came down (I requested him) and explained to me what to expect (I was unaware that all general anesthesia patients were intubated!_ and how long the procedure would take, etc. Then they headed me down to same day surgery. The anesthesiologist on call was a hoot -- we were talking about Michael Jackson and hew as like I odn't know if I believe the whole Propofol business, after all he only had 25 cc's in his system, and I'm gonna give you closer to 170! I guess the look on my face was priceless. Dr. Franks said that when he pulled my gallbladder out it was the biggest one he'd ever seen due to the inflammation. BUT he did give me some of my gallstones to take home with me (they look like teeth!) and he made me a picture of my surgery! I told him it was going in the scrapbook! ;)

I had to stay that night in the hospital (which was good because I needed the IV drugs) but got released on Tuesday morning. I'm home now, and out of work until the seventeenth. Chris has the babies this week, because I don't think it was a good idea to be taking care of my babies on pain pills, and Chris was nice enough to offer to keep them. So I'm healing now! Giant pain in the butt, but I will feel much better very soon. :)

The Road Not Taken

~Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that passing there,
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
Some where ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood and I-
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Graveyards

I have always been a night owl. I can stay up until three in the morning and still get up the next morning just raring to go -- or at least I always could! Working my job now, as soon as my body is horizontal I am out for eight hours. Not so much a struggle when I'm on days, because if I go to bed as soon as I get the kids in bed, I can still get my eight hours in -- even if I am *the horror* getting up at four thirty am.

However, on graveyards, I am lucky to get in six hours -- I get off at six thirty, get home about seven, get the kids ready for the day, drop them all off at daycare about seven forty five, then come home and get started on some of my chores for the day -- tossing in a load of laundry, starting the slow cooker, etc. By the time I crash, it's close to eight thirty or nine, then my alarm is set to go off at two thirty so that I can get up, get ready for work, THEN pick up the kids, get Jake's homework done, get dinner on the table and then I leave for work about five thirty. It's tiring! But at least on graveyards, I see the kids more than on days. On days, I am gone from five thirty am to seven pm and by the time I get home, there's only time to cuddle up with the kids and read some books before bed at eight.

I can't complain, though, because overall I enjoy my schedule. By the end of days on, I'm dragging, but I usually have at least four days off to recover! :) And during that time, the kids usually get me all to themselves.

We had parent teacher conferences on Friday, and Jake's doing fantastically. He is plugging right along and reading like a champ. He talks WAAAAAY too much and needs some help staying on task, but overall he's doing great. I couldn't ask for a better kid. He's such a help, always willing to pitch in and help wherever I ask. Now if I could just keep Violet and Quinton from getting into WWE style beatdowns every time I turn around.....yeah right.

I'm way excited because my sister and her fiance and kids are coming down this weekend for Easter. I have yet to do ANY Easter shopping (that's Saturday's main job!) but it will be so nice to let the kids play together. Now if Kellie, Rockey and Sawyer were going to be here! But hey, I'll take what I can get.

Well, I better get my nose back to the grindstone. Have a great night -- I will!

Here We Go Again!

Wow, it's been so long since I've written a blog!! I deleted my last blog last May and I've missed it so much. I intend this blog not only to keep everyone up on what's going on with me and my heathens, but also as a vent for anything that inspires me, whatever random thoughts are going through my head, really anything that I feel like sharing.

Life is definitely going incredibly well for us. I'm back at the ER at MHSC, and I love it -- it works great with the kids because even though I work four or five twelves in a row, I also have four or five days off in a row (sometimes even six!!) I love how the shifts fly by, and especially how no two days are ever the same.

Jacob's in first grade now, and doing great. He is such a smart kid, and so funny. He's got my smart ass attitude, which I'm beginning to regret! Quinton is acing preschool (is that even possible?) but we're struggling with some behavioral issues. Violet's raising hell wherever she goes, which is pretty much par for the course since she's been born. :)

My thought for the day:

When you come to the edge of all the light you have known, and are about to step into the darkness, faith is knowing one of two things will happen: either there will be something to step on or you will be taught to fly.

Till tomorrow!!