Wednesday, October 21, 2009

First and foremost, let me apologize to anyone that I may have offended with my last post. It was not my intent to put anyone down for choices they have made in life, only to voice my concerns on how some choices have affected me personally. I love my family dearly.. ALL OF THEM. My point was only to voice my fears of the upcoming holidays and the rest of my life and the changes that may or may not take place.

Anyway...

Brenden's football season ended last weekend. The 5th grade team (his primary team) entered into the tournament with no wins.. so we weren't expecting much different. Wow.. were we wrong! They won their first game and took 3rd place. He was SO excited! It was so much fun to watch the whole team get fired up and actually play to the end!! He was so happy that we all failed to see how sick he was actually getting! By Sunday night he was feeling really bad.. high fever and coughing. We visited the doctor Tuesday fearing that he (like several others in the area) had H1N1. The test came back negative but he was diagnosed with bronchitis. Our main hope now is that it doesn't turn into pneumonia.
Carson is being Carson - wild and crazy! He is continuing to ramble on and on.. picking up a few new words here and there. His latest issue has been sleeping at night. Doug and I have have spent several nights sleeping on the floor of his room. He goes to bed just perfect but is waking up anywhere between midnight and 3am. The only way he will lay back down is to snuggle up with one of us. He seems to do it about 4 or 5 times a week.. which is more than enough to create tons of aches and pains for Doug and I!! We are in the process of trying to find a twin bed to put in his room. He is really getting too long for the toddler bed and with the way he moves around, is constantly falling out of bed! Plus an actual bed would give us somewhere to lay when we camp out in his room for the night!!
Doug and I took a trip to Sioux Falls yesterday to have his tooth pulled. The oral surgeon in this area wasn't able to get him in until December so Doug took charge and found someone who could do it much sooner. He has been in constant pain for about 2 weeks.. so we are both happy that he was able to get it out quicker. It was quite funny to see him after the extraction while he was still partially drugged up.. he was all riled up about the dentist being a Vikings fan! He even asked me if the dentist wrote on his face! Hopefully he will be feeling much better now!

I finally got my new tattoo. I suppose I should tell you why I say "finally". When we found out that Lilly was sick and would probably not survive, I started thinking about what I could do to keep her memory with me. As most of you know, I like tattoo's, up until last week I had 5. At the time of my pregnancy we didn't have a name picked out but after her birth we chose Lillian. Since then I have been wanting to get a Lilly tattoo but I have made excuse after excuse when it came to actually doing it. I suppose it was part of my grieving process.. I wasn't really ready to come to terms with a lot of it. The past month has been a tough one for me, but a good one at the same time. I have done a lot of grieving and some healing. Last weekend I finally decided that I was ready to get my tattoo in honor of my baby girl. I asked Doug to come with me in fear of having an emotional meltdown. I was actually quite shocked at how easy it was to get through. Now every time I look at it I am reminded of my beautiful Lilly and the mark she will forever have in our lives.

We are trying to get ready for the upcoming holidays early, so that we (ok..basically "I") can feel more prepared and less frantic. We have most of Carson's birthday and Christmas presents bought, and have started on Brenden's. I have been picking up little things here and there for others as I run across them. My goal is to have everything done by the first part of December! We are currently planning to take a trip to Chicago immediately after Christmas to be able to spend some time with Doug's family as well! I am hoping that the winter weather takes a break and allows that trip! It's always nice to be able to get everyone together!

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Sorry I asked for cooler weather!

News Flash... FALL HAS BEEN CANCELLED! \
What was I thinking asking for cooler weather in my last post? Yesterday it was a pleasent 75 degrees.. Sunday it will be a chilly 36 degrees with SNOW! Can you believe that..SNOW! What Happened to Fall? For that matter what happened to Summer? We had some really nice days but not enough and not as many as usual. I have decided that Global Warming doesn't exisit and until I get some decent weather I will continue this belief!
Luckily we have already bought the boys winter jackets, hats and gloves, so they are ready for the artic air. Unfortunatley it is still football season for Brenden, so we will be freezing on the sidelines for a few more weeks! :( I didn't go to last weeks games - it was just too cold for Carson (and me) to be outside. He was really sick with a nasty flu the week before, so I am going to extremes to keep him healthy for a while! If that means staying inside for the rest of the winter.. so be it.

Other than preparing to freeze, things are going well. Doug is in the middle of his first "real" semester of college and seems to be doing just as well as he did in the summer classes. I have finally been getting projects at work, which means that my hours are no longer in jeporady.. at least for the time being. I had the first parent teacher conference of the year with Brenden's teachers, which went amazingly well. All of them want to clone Brenden! His lowest grade was a 91.8%, which is a B here, but very close to an A. I was a little worried about his grades this year but apparently it was all for nothing. He started a pre-teen after school program at a local church yesterday and seems to really like it. Carson, as I said has been fighting the flu lately. It seems like once school starts, Brenden never gets sick, but brings everything home to us! I am hoping we are done with the worst of it and that the rest of the winter will be easier. Carson still isn't talking much.. well actually he is talking tons, but you can't understand most of what he says. He does have a few more words mastered but I'm still worried about how far behind he actually is. He has his 2 yr check up in December, so hopefully we will know more.
I have been struggling with the changes in my family. My mom moved out of Gene's house about a month ago and I still at odds with my feeling on it. The holidays are my favorite time of year because of the family aspect. This year I need that more than anything because I know the holidays are going to be tough without Lilly. Now, it seems that we will be doing very little with my family. I don't understand most of it really... for the most part I think it's extremely stupid actually. I am doing everything I can to make it clear that no matter what anyone thinks about it (including my grandma).. Gene and his family are still my family and always will be. He is the closest thing I have ever really had to a supportive father figure, and he is so important in Brenden's life. I can only hope that Carson will be blessed to have the same bond with him. Don't get me wrong, I want my mom to be happy..but this won't make her happy, I just wish she would see that or at least see how her actions are affecting everyone else.... ugh.. ok I am done with that subject!

Anyways.. we are gearing up for Halloween, I finally got a select number of decorations up last week and am excited to carve the pumpkins. Gene grows them so we have SO many to do! Carson is going to be a monkey this year (totally fitting) and Brenden is going to some sort of zombie skateboarder I guess. Brenden has decided that he is too old to go Trick-or-Treating with his mom and wants to hit the town with his friends. I don't know how I feel about it. I know he will be safe, that is not my concern, but I also know its the start of his independance from me. It has always been Brenden and I and it's hard knowing that he is growing up and wanting my presence less and less! I wish I could keep both of the boys little forever!