Friday, July 27, 2007

NAVUOO PAGEANT HERE WE COME!!!



We will be in the Nauvoo pageant this week as the fourth influx of cast members, otherwise known as the GOLD CAST. We stay only a week +, and we perform only the last number, and we help with the pioneer pastimes. We leave Bright and early tommorow morning. My parents and my sister Sarah will also be in it with us.

We will be fitted for costumes as soon as we get there - and I mean fitted. We each submitted our 32 different measurements - neck wrist, knee to heel, hip to heel, across the chest in back and in from, armpit - ETC ETC. It will be a fun family vacation/ adventure!!

We will post again in about 2 weeks!!!!!! Until Then....

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

HARRY POTTER EXCURSION


So this was not a completely elaborate excursion like Cami Turpins – see blog role - we had a fabulous time.

We went to Galina, Illinois – right on the Mississippi River. We arrived at this very cute townhouse (the bathroom, complete with whirlpool, was about 6 times as big as the bathroom at our house – I LOVED it) and cute kitchen, one of those pull out of the wall beds, and a bedroom, a patio. It overlooked the rolling bluffs that border the Mississippi. It was so cute.

The girls had to pull me up to speed since I didn’t quite finish the 6th in time, and since I had only read the 6th one time previously at the speed of light, my retention was, sadly, lacking. So we all started reading at a maniacal pace at 7 pm. It usually takes me a chapter to adapt my way of thinking. I found pages 300 to 500 were sapping my energy and mental stamina with the desperate atmosphere so I had to take lots of breaks. It wasn’t until a certain Patronus chapter (won’t say which for those who haven’t read it) that it really started picking up for me. Once I hit 500 – I read at a steady feverish pace with no breaks. WE stopped every once in awhile to chat about what was going on – but mostly read and read.

At one point past 600 A killing curse (I won’t say to or from whom) was shouted out and I really thought I was going to have a heart attack until I realized that it missed the intended person. PHEW!!

The other girls sniffled quite a bit at 650 and I came close (but as many of you know, I simply can’t cry –its weird) however, I did tear up, and when we talked about it later I almost lost it.

It was definitely an emotional roller coaster. Sunday night after reading the first 300 pages, I drempt I was trying to duel several people and I could not remember the petrifying spell, so while everyone was stunning me, I kept thinking to myself, “ I KNOW it begins with a P!” It was horrible – too much harry potter on the brain!

At the end I felt like I had just eaten a 7 course meal with a variety of flavors and surprises and textures and layers. Some things were bitter to swallow, some soured me a little, and some were surprisingly sweet. I had to give myself some time to digest it all. At the end I felt “JUST RIGHT” and satisfied.

I will leave with just one thought for those who have read it, “OCCUPATIONS???”

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

911 calls




So in the wee hours of July 5th, little Tyler had a very rough incident – at midnight he woke up with shallow breathing with abdominal pulling. This is the 2nd time in his 21 months of existence that this has happened. I thought – well, we can’t do anything tonite – I will have to bring him in early in the morning. We propped him up in the car seat to sleep so his head could be elevated.

Well, at 4 A.M. I heard some strange crying from him. I went in to check on Tyler and I hear him saying, “Hek, Hek.” Which means, “HELP.” He was looking at me and pulling on him car seat straps. But I knew by the way he was doing it, he was trying to figure out a way to breathe. It was very shallow at this point, he was burning up, and he had no strength to put pressure on his limbs or hold onto me. I told Brian and we decided to take him into Urgent Care. I hoped we could be in and out – and expected to probably give him breathing treatments for the next week.

Well, after Brian took Tyler to the back rooms, they suddenly came back and asked me to be in there too. The Doctor proceeded to say, “I don’t want to freak you guys out, but his not getting better, and its so difficult for him to breathe (WHILE HE WAS BREATHING WITH A NEBULIZER) that we don’t want him just to give out and stop breathing. That’s what we worry about for someone so small. His oxygenation was actually getting dangerously low.

The doctor ordered an immediate IV to get air to him that way. They pricked him with a needle to get the IV in – TYLER DID NOT REACT TO THE NEEDLE!

Tyler was so lethargic and unresponsive that PAIN did not register in his little body. As the nurse announced that she had never seen a child NOT react to the injection and there was something very wrong with this - horrible chills went through my body. The doctors were freaking out – and the head doctor said, “MAKE THE CALL!.” They called 911 and in 2 minutes we were in the ambulance. I held him on the stretcher as they rushed us to the closest hospital.

Before we took Tyler in I had been wondering if I was jumping the gun by taking him into Urgent care. But instead of confirming that I was right in taking him to Urgent Care, they said, “Next time, don’t even bother with Urgent Care – THIS is a 911 call.”

For 3 hours they pumped Tyler full of intravenous steroids to open up his tight, constricted lungs. They rushed a pediatric team from Christ Medical because they weren’t equipped to treat young children there at that hospital.

So for the 2nd time that morning, I found myself in another Ambulance, with Tyler in the back with the paramedics. At the Hope of Christ Pediatric Unit, they placed Tyler in his literal CELL – a crib of steel bars and a plastic tent covering the upper openings. He started breathing on his own again, and he was advanced to breathing treatments every 3 hours, along with IVs now and then, and other meds. We prepared to be there awhile.

They did tests for pneumonia, whopping cough, influenza – all negative. My personal guy feeling on the whole situation was that He had a little cold – runny nose for a couple of days, and then we went blueberry picking right after rain – a VERY muggy, humid, day. With sends red flags for one thing – MOLD! I think that combined with pollen there was just an overload on his little body and immune system (since we knew because of his eczema he would be prone to allergies).

He ended up being diagnosed as BASICALLY Asthma without deeming it to be Asthma. Its called Reactive Airway Disease. And he COULD grow out of it, which would be ideal. But they also said he was have to be medicated with breathing treatments of steroids indefinitely, as well as allergy meds everyday. Well, that’s fine for now – but how about lets try and figure out what the triggers are! I asked every nurse and doctor about allergy testing – all were evasive and – “ get in touch with your regular doctor.” I can medicate him everyday – but if I never find out what caused the issue, what good am I doing for him. I could be exposing him everyday. So I am definitely going to have to take the initiative and get some testing done. At this point I don’t think enough research has been done to know how these meds can effect a child developmentally or behaviorally. And, if it does, it could be in minute ways that add up.

At the hospital, Tyler was extremely obedient and compliant with the nurses and doctors. When they told him it was time for a breathing treatment, instead if the normal fighting they would get, Tyler would put his head forward so they could put the mask on. When they had to give him an extremely foul tasting med they said all the kids hated and coughed and spit out, Tyler sucked it down with a slightly puckered look on his face. The nurse said it was the best she has ever seen anyone take it. During the breathing treatments, one of the black nurses said, “He take it like a MAN, don’t he?” We were proud of him that he was handling things well.

So we left the hospital after 2 days – to our relief, purchased a nebulizer, and started him on his indefinite breathing treatments. Glad that our little scary and expensive adventure is over.

JULY 4th






For July 4th, we had fun picking blueberries and picnic ing and going to the outlet stores. Brian and I picked a paltry 18 lbs combined. (Sarah and my Mom EACH picked 18 lbs!) We then had a BBQ at Brian’s parents house. Delicious! We also lit off some very lame smoke bombs. We can’t even find those snakes that we used to do as kids. But hey- those smoke bombs WERE pretty darn cool!

(Right, and I can't forget about the sparklers - the kids thought they were both intriguing and intimidating!)


Here is the crew if you can see them - Tami, Kevin, Abby, Mom and Sarah.
It was great!

Little did we know what would happen that night….

Before and After: THE PATIO











Before and After of the Patio

Well, I have put many many manhours into this baby and here she is – our patio. To fully appreciate this transformation – please note that it used to be an old dog run with Astroturf and woodchips on one side and an unsightly compost pit (rotting vegetation) on the other side. And look NOW – AHHHH – much better!

Seeing my Roommate after 9 YEARS!!!


Mary Meyers Marble was my room roommate during my junior year at BYU in 97-98. I was the roommate who observed the budding romance transpire between her and her husband Ben, who us roommates approved of. She was married before the year was over (in March)– and she was a GREAT roommate.

Mary has been in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and I always saw her at General Conference. The Motab FINALLY came to Chicago after like 12 years or something and we got really lucky and got the $95 seats after purchasing the don’t-even-think-about-watching-you-can-only-listen lawn seats for $10. So we ended up sitting just 10 rows back. I recognized and knew quite a few people that I had worked with or been friends with at BYU...but I wasn't sure if I saw Mary. After the concert was over I ran over and I asked the first violinist if she could find Mary for me. Finally I found her and we had a very LOVELY chat! MARY, IT WAS SO FUN TO SEE YOU! She said right after she gets back from tour, they are moving that day to Colorado so Ben can start his Practice. So this was Mary’s last time singing with the choir. MO TAB just won’t be the same without you! I am putting a disclaimer on my picture because 5 hours of humidity and a bumpy school bus ride does absolutely NOTHING for your hair OR apprearance, I found out. But here are some nice 1997 BYU roommate pics and a current 2007 pic of Mary and I. Also, here is Brian and I hanging out afterwards. FUN!