Listen to mommy and daddy or get eaten by a whale

Bedtime is my favorite part of the day. Most nights it is just me and Madison while Zach is at work, and we crawl into her bed and snuggle up together. While we snuggle we talk about our day and what fun things we are going to do the next day and whatever else her little mind comes up with. She gets to pick out a couple of books to read and then we read a story from her children's Bible. We finish up with prayers and lots of hugs and kisses.

Last night we read the story of Jonah and the Whale and while we were talking about it afterwards she came up with what might have to be our new family motto. We were talking about how Jonah was swallowed by the whale because he didn't listen to God and disobeyed when God told him to go to Ninevah. Then we talked about how mommy and daddy have to punish her when she is naughty, but we don't like having to do that and we would much rather that she listen to us. Then she looked at me at told me that she needs to listen to mommy and daddy or she would get swallowed by a whale too.

Clearly we need to work on the moral of the story some more...

Summer 2011 Bucket List

I thought it would be fun to write down all of the fun things that we are looking forward to doing this summer and keep track of what we have actually done. Here goes...

• Go to the zoo (both Como and Minnesota)
• Roast marshmellows around a bonfire
• Go to a water park
• Go play on rides at Camp Snoopy (or whatever it's called these days)
• Go check out the Maple Grove Farmers Market (done!)
• Spend a lazy rainy day watching movies together
• Go rollerskating
• Go to the MN Arboretum
• Make homemade ice cream
• Go to an outdoor concert
• Let Madison decide what we do for an entire day (within reason)
• Go back to the huge playground at Highland Park and go on another paddleboat ride
• Go the the drive in movies
• Go walk around and take pictures at Minnehaha Falls
• Have a BBQ with friends
• Get Madison started in swimming lessons
• Take Madison to the beach for the first time
• Get ice cream from the ice cream man
• Learn how to work my camera
• Take a day trip somewhere fun (Stillwater, Duluth/Two Harbors, Taylors Falls)
• Go back to the deer farm
• Go back to Color Me Mine and paint more ceramics
• Get another pedicure with Madison

Where I've Been

The past couple months have been really hectic for us. After my gramma passed away a few months ago, my mom and uncle had to make a decision about what to do with her townhome. They didn't really want to sell it because of the market, but the homeowners association doesn't allow owners to rent out the houses. However, immediate family can move in if needed. Sharing a house with my parents had started to put a strain on our relationship and just didn't seem to be the right fit anymore. We started talking about the possibility of Zach, Madison and I moving into her place, and at first it was almost said in a joking way. After a while we started to talk about it a little bit more seriously to see if we could make it work for the 3 of us because my parents didn't think that it was big enough for the 2 of them (they have a LOT of stuff!) and would need alot of modifications if my uncle were to move in because he is in a wheelchair. Ultimately it is a little bit smaller than what we would like, but we can make it work and were excited to have a place of our own again after 4 years of sharing our rental house with my parents.

Because our lease was up at the end of May we needed to make a decision pretty quickly so that we could give our 2 month notice that we wouldn't be renewing our lease. Once we had pretty much decided that we were for sure going to move to Maple Grove (about an hour north of our old house), my parents decided to focus on finding a place in the north metro that was close to where we were moving. After they looked at maybe 5-6 places they found out that there was a townhome for sale that was right next to where we were going to be living. Each section has 4 units (2 upstairs and 2 downstairs) that share a main entrance area and my parents are buying a unit in the next set of 4 down from us. So when we go to our main entrance door and they go the theirs we are maybe 30 feet apart and can see each other. So far this setup has been amazing. We each have our own space and don't see each other every day, but are still super close which was important to us. Madison has lived with them her whole life and was used to going back and forth pretty much whenever she wanted. Part of why we moved in together in the first place was so that they could help out when I was in the hospital or not feeling well, but because we are so close we still have that if/when it is needed.

So over the past 3 months we have had to get through all of my gramma's things, figure out who was taking what, donate what no one wanted (and there is still a ton of stuff in our garage that hasn't been figured out yet), sort/pack all of our stuff up, and all of the cleaning/moving/organizing that comes along with a move. We, mostly Zach, also helped my parents move a lot of their stuff too. We didn't get a moving truck because we figured we would just gradually move stuff out there since we planned to be staying there at least a few weeks before we needed to be out of our old place. About half way through we realized that we had made a dumb choice and overall spent WAY more in gas for all of those trips than what we would have to just rent a truck. I guess we will know better for next time!

At this point we are almost completely settled in, we just have a few more boxes and need to get stuff up on the walls but we are waiting until after they get painted. The garage is still a disaster with some of my grammas stuff, some of my parents stuff, a bunch of things from when Madison was younger that at first we planned on keeping but have decided to sell, and some of our random stuff that we will organize on the shelves out there once we get the other stuff figured out.

So far we are really enjoying our new place. We are closer to Zach's parents, and my cousins and their families, and my uncle will be moving to the Maple Grove area in the next few months now that we are up here as well as his kids. We are looking forward to seeing everyone more often now that it is not such a long drive both ways to see each other. We are very excited that Madison will be able to be around her (2nd, 3rd, twice removed?) cousins, especially Isobel who is about a year older than her. We are going the get Madison in swim lessons and after she does level 1 then we are going to try and let the girls do it together.

So there you go, that's what we've been up to and why I have been slacking on bloging even more than usual. I have a bunch of ideas for different posts, and lots of cute pictures that I want to get up in the next few days and weeks, so I am going to try and get better about posting on a more consistant basis. Just so that this isn't just a long boring post that doesn't even have any pictures, I will leave you with one of my favorite recent pictures.

Ceramics, Pedicures, and the Circus (oh my!)

***Note-I started this a few weeks ago and am just finishing it up now***

Last week Madison and I were able to get out on many adventures together. First up was Color Me Mine, a studio where you go and paint ceramics and then they take care of everything else for you. Madison chose a cupcake where the top "frosting" comes off and she can put her treasures, and I painted a big mug. She had so much fun picking out her colors and painting it all. We were just able to go pick them up and I love how they turned out.

Working hard at painting her cupcake

Pretending to taste it!

The finished product!

After that we went to go get her first manicure and pedicure. I have been painting her toes since she was a baby, but this was the first time that she got to go have them done. She was so excited and loved putting her feet in the warm bubbly water and especially the flowers that they added. Unfortunately, she is like her mommy and nail polish comes off of her finger nails almost immediately after they are painted. The polish just peels off still intact, so I guess we will just have to stick to pedicures.

A few days later we were able to go to the circus while it was in town. She went last year with my husband and father-in-law and had a blast. This year she got to go with mommy and daddy and had a blast. We get there early so that she had plenty of time to do the fun stuff before the circus started. There were elephant rides, pony rides, face painting, a bouncy house, a big ride on train, and a place to take a picture with the clowns. She got to ride on the elephant once with each of us, go on a pony ride, and go in the bouncy house. The elephants were a huge hit, she would have rode on it all day long if we let her. She liked the animal acts the most, especially the tigers and elephants. She likes clowns from a distance, but when we walked up to one after the show she wanted nothing to do with him.

I love the chances that we have to get out of the house and do fun things that make lots of memories. Pretending to play circus or pedicure have become part of the norm around here, and she asks daily when we can go paint "ramics" again.

Five Question Friday-April Fools Edition

 

Rules for Five Question Friday: Copy and paste the following questions to your blog, answer them, then watch for the linky post to appear Friday morning and LINK UP! Remember, the most important rule of all is to HAVE FUN!
***Note-If you want to join in, head on over to Mama M's blog at www.fivecrookedhalos.blogspot.com

 

 

1. Have you ever had surgery?

• Hahaha...this one makes me laugh! I have had surgery more times than I can count. I have had my tonsills/adenoids/appendix/right ovary and tube/gall bladder all removed, have had surgery on my right wrist twice, needed to have ovarian cysts removed 4-5 times, I've had 3 surgeries on my pancreatic and common bile ducts to try and treat Sphincter of Oddi, and had a C-section when Madison was born. Those are the major ones that I can think of.

2. Ever ride in an ambulance?

• I have had a couple ambulance rides. The first time was when I was 7/8 I fell backwards down our stairs so I went to the hospital in an ambulance to make sure I hadn't broken anything in my back. At another point I was having issues passing out and my mom decided that I had passed out too many times in a row so she called an ambulance. The last time that I can think of was right after I had my ovary and tube removed once I was released from the hospital. Zach and I were watching TV and I told him I wasn't feeling right so I decided to call my mom, all I got out to her was "Mom, something's wrong" before I pretty much passed out. I was white as a ghost, and unresponsive. Once I got to the hospital they figured out that I had severe internal bleeding from the surgery. I had to spend about a week more in the hospital and have a few transfusions, but was finally able to get out of the hospital about a week before our wedding. 
   

3. How are you in a medical emergency? Panicked? Calm?

• I am very very calm. I don't freak out and just think about who needs to be called, or what needs to be done, etc. One possible exception to this could be if something major happened to Madison. She has been sick, even hospitalized as an infant, and had her share of boo-boos, but we've never been in a situation where she is extremely sick or severely injured.

 

4. Do you have a garden? Flowers or veggies?

• This past summer we had vegetables that we grew in lots of pots because we have lots and lots of wild bunnies that are known to eat everything in a traditional garden. Last year we grew green/red peppers, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, tomatoes, and strawberries, but would like to do even more this year.

5. When did you move out of your parents house?

• Well technically I still live with my parents right now. We had been living in our own place, but when we found out I was pregnant we made the choice to have my parents and Zach and I move out of our apartments into a rental house. We have the top level and they have the lower level; we each have 2 bedrooms, a bathroom, and a living room area, and share the kitchen, dining room, laundry room. In the next month or two we will be moving into our own places again, but still very close. Zach, Madison, and I are moving into my gramma's townhouse/condo and my parents bought one that is in the next building over from ours. When Madison wants to go over to visit, we can walk to the front door and one of my parents can be waiting at their door to meet her. It gives us the convenience of being close, but still gives us our own space.

 

 

 

 

Confession...

I have a confession to make...I have become obsessed with couponing. Seriously, I started getting the Sunday paper 4-5 weeks ago so that I could start using some of the coupons in it, and it has just snowballed from there. I even have a binder all set up to organize my coupons. I use baseball card holders and then have them divided into categories so that I can easily find what I am looking for. It is like a game to me to see how much I can save each trip now. I especially love that when I go to Rainbow on Wednesday or Saturday, they double my coupons! Zach thought I had lost my mind and was making fun of me everytime I would start to cut or organize my coupons, but after how much I saved last week he has promised not to make fun of my new obsession. My last trip to the grocery store I got $135 worth of stuff but saved $63, I was way too excited over it and can't wait to see what I can save next time.

Whew, I feel much better now that I got that off of my chest.

A Tough Post To Write

The past month has been a tough one for us. My gramma found out in early January that her cancer had come back. She had throat cancer about 10 years ago, had radiation to treat it, and had been fine ever since. For the last few months she had been getting severe stomach pain and some pain that was higher up by her ribs. One night it got so bad that she called my mom to take her in to the Emergency Room and after an MRI they told her that she had a tumor that they were pretty sure was cancerous.
The next 2 weeks were agonizingly slow as she would see a doctor, wait a week, have a test, wait a week, see another doctor, etc. While we were still in the waiting process to find out a definitive diagnoses, she ended up in the ER again because even with strong pain meds at home, she was still in lots of pain. She was admitted to the hospital so that they could give her I.V. pain meds until the final test could be done a few days later. Unfortunately, she never ended up leaving the hospital. While she was there they told her that she had cancer in multiple organs, including her colon, lungs, and bones, and it was not treatable. Within a few days, the lung cancer spread like crazy and she started having trouble breathing and needed to be on large amounts of oxygen, so she decided to just stay in the hospital and move to the hospice area once a room opened up.

In the beginning of her hospitalization she was still pretty alert and able to talk to us, she just got tired faster and slept more from all of the pain medicine. The first week or so, while they were still running tests and deciding how to proceed, my mom was with her to help her remember what the doctors had said and help her decide what she wanted to do. The second week, after we knew that things were progressing quickly, she was put on a continuous drip of pain meds to make sure that her pain was controlled. Either my mom or I were with her from then on, with other people staying and helping sometimes too. Two nights, about a week before she passed away, I was able to convince my mom to go home and get some rest, so I was alone with her. Those times were so special to me because we were able to talk a little bit, and I was able to tell her many times how much I loved her and how much she meant to me. I also spent much of my time just holding her hand while she slept, just enjoying what I knew were my last days with her. The last 5 days or so, I was at the hospital all the time because it was important to me that I be there at the very end.

On ‎February 5th at 1:15am, with my mom, uncle, and I by her side, she took her final breath and went to meet her husband in heaven. My gramma has always been one of my favorite people in the whole world. Growing up we would go over there and have dinner with her and my grampa at least once a week and a lot of times I would end up spending the night over there. I was there so much that I had a bus stop at her house as well as my normal one at our house. We would play cards together, do puzzles, go shopping, and just hang out. She had a great relationship with Madison, and I am so glad that she got to know her great gramma. It was so hard trying to explain that great gramma was going to go away and she wouldn't see her anymore, but she is handling it well and seems to understand what is going on with a maturity well beyond her 3 years. She got to come to the hospital a couple of times to say goodbye, She is lucky to have lots of memories with her, and we have pictures and video to help her remember. I miss her almost daily calls to ask if I was watching Dr. Phil, or Oprah, or some Lifetime movie. I miss her inviting herself over and just showing up at our house unannounced. Most of all I miss just being able to talk to her and hug her.

 I could not have survived all of this without so many people, especially Zach who had Madison almost all on his own for almost a week, and his parents who helped watch her when he couldn't. Knowing that she was taken care of so that I could be at the hospital was the most helpful thing they could have done for me. I also couldn't have gotten through it without my parents, my uncle, my cousins, and my faith. Knowing that she is in a better place where she can finally be with my grampa again (after 18 years apart), along with the support of my family and friends, gives me the peace and strength I need when the grief starts to feel like it is just to much.

Sesame Street Live Round 2

Tonight, for the second year in a row, we had the chance to take Madison to see Sesame Street Live. Her grandparents got us the tickets as a Christmas gift. She had so much fun (except for when we had to walk from the parking ramp to the Target Center) and had been looking forward to it ever since we told her that we were going to go again. We had great seats that were 3 rows up from being on the floor. After intermission we decided, since no one was sitting in any of the seats in front of us, to sneak up a few rows so that we were in the first row of seats that weren't on the floor. Madison loved being able to shake her groove thing on the floor with a few other kids, it was sooo cute! Close to the end we even went up the aisle really close to the stage to see if she could hug or high-5 one of the characters, but by the time we did that none of them came into the aisle again.

She got to bring her Abby Cadabby doll, her Elmo light up spinner thing that she got last year when we went, and wore her Abby shirt. We got a bucket of mini doughnuts and a blue raspberry snow cone that turned her lips, mouth, and teeth blue pretty much the second she took her first bite! During intermission they bring out tons of big balloons in the shape of Elmo's head which, despite telling her before hand that we weren't going to get one, she told us she NEEDED! Last year we told her that she could have one, and when Zach came back with it I could not believe that it cost $10 for it. Fortunately she was pretty easily distracted during the remainder of intermission until they took the balloons away. She was able to get a bunch of streamers that were shot out at the end of the show.

It was such a fun night and we are definitely planning to go again next year. It is so fun her see her reactions to seeing her friends that she sees on TV.

Her blue mouth from the snow cone!

Abby and Elmo are her favorite.

Dancing to the music. 

After the show, getting ready to face the freezing temps.