Coleen's blog

The last couple of weeks...

2009-06-08T23:47:00.005-06:00

So I've been typing out the events that have occured over last couple of weeks far too many times, so I thought I'd put the details in one central location that I can just point people to so they can read up. I'm pretty exhausted all the time these days, so I'm not as interested in typing this all out over and over again anymore.

Now just a warning...if any of the people mentioned stumble upon this...nothing that I've said is meant to be bad mouthing ANYONE. I don't blame anyone else for situations that they find themselves in. I just want to clearly explain the situtations that I've been facing. Also...please ignore grammar. I normally care...but my emotions have taken over my brain...so I don't care at the moment.

Matt's had problems with his back for years. He had surgery in 2006, and has been on pain meds ever since. Of course, being on the same stuff...it doesn't work as well anymore. He finally had another operation in April which was suppsoed to help. Nope. The pain kept getting worse and worse...literally by the day. I had SO many problems trying to get his medications the way that they were prescribed...it was like pulling teeth to be able to get more when we were following what was on the bottle religiously.

He had an appointment with his surgeon on June 1. More than a month after having another MRI, and 3 weeks after I contacted them letting them know that his legs kept giving out when he tried to walk. During that 3 weeks, he couldn't even roll over in bed without pain. If he were to be able to finally fall asleep...he would wake up if he accidentally moved at all in his sleep. Pretty frustrating, and irritating that they wouldn't move up his appointment.

So June 1st...we go in. The dr can immediately see how much pain he is in, and sets surgery for that Friday (June 5). I had taken the day off of work on the 1st because he had 2 appointments that day. That is the only PTO I had saved up from the time I took after his last operation (and putting together time I missed for his other appointments). So I worked Tuesday...trying to make up extra hours so that I would be able to miss work on Friday (or possibly work just half day). Around 4:30 Tuesday afternoon, I got a call from Matt letting me know that they moved his surgery to Wednesday. So now...not only do I have to figure out PTO for Friday...but Wednesday and Thursday, too. I talked with my manager and was able to work a few things out. I had a bunch of stuff to hurry and finish up before being out the rest of the week. 5:30 I got a call from Matt's mom asking me if I was almost home. She felt that Matt needed to go to the ER. I dropped everything and rushed home, grabbed my laptop and we took off to the ER, knowing that he'd be in for surgery the following morning.

They kept him in the hospital overnight for pain management, which didn't seem to help a whole lot. He was having problems with surges of pain that would shoot through his back. It got to the point where he could feel them coming...I joked around that they were like contractions. They gave him what they could...but it was really just to get him through until surgery.

They came to get him for surgery at 11:00 in the morning. My parents came to be with me, and we hung out in the waiting room. They said that once the operation started, it would be about an hour and a half. Around 1:45, the dr. came out to let me know that everything went perfectly, and that he should be awake in about another hour and a half or two hours. He had already been admitted the night before, so we were able to go up to his room to wait.

4:00 came, and we hadn't heard. Around 4:15, I went out to ask a nurse, and she let me know that they were giving him a shot of something that should help him wake up so he should be out in about another half an hour. around 5:15, a nurse came in to let me know that he wouldn't be coming back to this room, he would be going to ICU or PCU because the drugs from the ER the night before seemed to have just been lingering in his system, and they all hit him at once causing an overdose. They let me know that if he was going to ICU, that I would only be able to be with him for 10 mintues every 2 hours. Yeah, that didn't work for me. Luckily, they put him in PCU so I was able to stay with him. All the while...I still hadn't been able to see him. I was freaking out the whole time...I just wanted to see him. They finally brought him in at almost 7:30. He was out of it most of the night.

We made it through Thursday, but he was in a lot of pain. They, understandably, wanted to be careful with pain meds until everything was stable. He was also dealing with difficulty breathing, so he had a mask on which drove him crazy. I was just happy that it seemed he would be ok. Thursday night they took him back to the regular floor, and pushed him to do Physical Therapy. I left the hospital to quickly run to the store to grab a couple of things (I hadn't brought any change of clothes or anything to take care of myself when I ran out the door!). I figured it was good timing, because I couldn't bear to watch him in that much pain while they pushed him. He apparently *really* pushed himself.

Friday morning, the dr let me know that he would be going home on Saturday. After seeing how Thursday went, I didn't see how this would be possible! He was not doing well at all. He did pull a complete 180 on Friday, though...and by the time Saturday morning came around...he was ready to go home. He was in TONS of pain...but his breathing and everything was stable enough for him to go home.

We got home, and our bed had been moved upstairs. We were sleeping in the basement. His mom thought that it would be easier for us to be on the main floor so that he wouldn't have to go up and down stairs for anything. This is SO true...and that was very helpful. The only problem is...the mattress, itself, is all that had been moved. As soona s we got home from the hospital, I had to run downstairs and grab sheets and stuff to make the bed. I then had to start slowly lugging everything up the stairs to try to make him comfortable. At the same time, they had already brought the 3 kids back (we have them for the first 2 week stay of the summer) so I was trying to figure out food and everything for them. I was exhausted.

I forgot to mention, the rest of the family had been moving out the weekend before, so most of the furniture, food, everything had been taken. Luckily, the previous Monday I had done a HUGE shopping trip so that we would have food for while the kids were here. When we got home from said shopping trip, Gavin had gone missing. Long story, he has some trauma issues to deal with...but he was afraid because we were gone too long. He eventually came home, but there was another major freak-out for half an hour to 45 minutes. Back to talking about the house...there wasn't a single room that was really ready for us to take over, though, so nothing else was ready. I've since been trying to put things together so I have what I need to do basic things like cook and clean. I still have to somehow figure out how to get my furniture, etc here. My family (which is usually GREAT for helping) is scattered all over at the moment, and all kidns of busy. I can't ask his family, because they all have their own stuff going on. I'm just stuck.

Back to Saturday, I went to pick up Matt's prescriptions, and there was one that the pharmacy didn't have...so I had to drive out to another pharmacy to get it. On the way back from there...Matt's car broke down. Did I mention that my car was already broken?? They brakes are horrible...and I had been trying to take the car in *forever* before the surgery...there was just never a good time.

So here we are with another broken down car (this one not even starting...so it's sitting on the side of the road). Luckily, a guy drove by and saw Tyliegh attempting to push the car (she's *tiny* but we didn't really have any other choice to try to get it off the road). The guy stopped, and luckily he wasn't creepy and there were a few things about him that made me feel better (I know still not perfect...but I didn't feel like we had a choice) so he drove us home. Later that night, my parents tried to help out, but there wasn't much they could do. Yesterday, Matt's dad and brother tried to tow it with a chain...but there wasn't anything for them to hook the chain to...so there the car sat.

This morning, I got the kids up and got them breakfast, got Matt his drugs (and set him up for the rest of the day in case I didn't make it back), and came down to Les Schwab to get my brakes taken care of. I called to have someone tow Matt's car (which they can't do until I can get back up to the car to leave a key), and arranged to have it fixed. How? I'm not sure. I just found out that my car is going to cost $700. I'm afraid to hear what his will end up being. Not to mention...my car will take the better part of the day. No one is available to come get me or take me anywhere...so I've now been sitting at Les Schwab for over 3 hours just waiting. I know I have a couple of hours left, too. I called the kids to make sure that they could get lunch together. I've been on the phone all morning getting power, gas, etc all changed over to my name for the house.

I took today off so that I could be at home and make sure that I could get everything set up for everything to run smoothly while I worked the rest of the week. Now I haven't even been able to be at home. I know Matt isn't doing well, because he's just watching everying that I had to do...and he feels useless because he can't do anything while being stuck in bed. This makes me feel like I can't tell him anything, because he's already stressing out. I just want him to feel better.

Oh! I got so caught up in Matt's back stuff that I didn't even get the chance to mention the condo. So I finally signed with a realtor to sell my condo. One of my brother's friends. He understood that the condo wouldn't be my first priority. It was my understanding that he was waiting for me to email him some pictures of the condo before even listing it. He called me the Friday before all this started (May 30) to let me know that he had shown it to aboout 4 - 5 people now, and that it would probably sell better if I could get all of the clutter out. Uhm...WHEN?!?!? and WHAT?!?!? I didn't even know he would be showing it! I would have NEVER agreed to ANYONE seeing it the way that it was!!! *sigh* So with the help of my parents and Julie & Roger, we took 3 carloads down to the house. We then went back, and with the help of Julie & Roger and Jen & Casey, we were able to fill up my car and Roger's car again, and took those 2 loads down. I then found out that the realtor called my brother on Sunday and told him that he needed to "get his sister to clean her condo". Excuse me?!? What right does he have at ALL mentioning ANYTHING to my brother?? Not to mention...again...I didn't even KNOW that he was showing it to people! Luckily, my brother called my mom and told her instead of telling me, directly. I would have lost it. Too much going on already (and at that time...all that was going on was getting ready for the surgery on Friday!)

So...craziness. Here I sit still...waiting for my car. Knowing that there's SO much that still needs to be done at home...and nothing I can do about it. Knowing that I have SO MUCH time to make up at work...and there's nothing that I can do about it from here right now. I just feel stuck and like I'm just wasting time. It's driving me crazy.

So really?? I'm just done. I can't take ANY more. (I finally got out of Les Schwab after almost 4 hours...and it's now 11:52 at night and I'm trying to make myself go to sleep because I *have* to work tomorrow!)

I just don't understand

2009-05-23T23:48:00.010-06:00

There are some things I just don't understand, and I'm convinced that I never will.

I took Friday off to hang out with Matt and one of his old Army buddies who stayed with us for a few days. It was really nice to sleep in and everything, but we didn't really get out to do anything until that night. We did finally make it to see Terminator Salvation then to dinner. Because we didn't get out until late, we got home after the kids had gotten there. We walked down to the basement, and this is what we had come home to:

Now, many people have tried to warn me about Matt's ex-wife. I've been told over and over again about how the kids are raised at her house, and I do see a lot of her (and her husband's) influence on them...especially on Gavin. He came home with the first earring a couple of months ago, and after the first weekend here with the earring he didn't wear it again. He got made fun of by most of the people in the house. Earlier this week, Tyliegh came over to work on some school projects with me and the boys came with her. All of a sudden, Gavin had 2 earrings instead of just the one...and both boys had the pink hair *shakes head*. I asked how long it's supposed to last (hoping to hear it was some spray in stuff or a kool-aid job) and found that it'll last 6 weeks. Seriously, HOW is this a good idea in ANY mother's mind for 9 and 11 year old boys?!? Tyliegh has a pink streak, too, but I didn't get a picture. I'll have to work on that tomorrow.

Of course, we discussed the need for it to be fixed. We were discussing whether we should opt for more dye or a buzz, and decided that a buzz would be more appropriate. The boys were reluctant, of course, but we have found that bribery works. With Halo 3 for Gavin and Sims Castaway for the Wii for Owen, we were able to convince them to let me buzz them. I'm not going to lie, it was kinda fun for me. I know it's pretty difficult to mess up a buzzing so it's really no big deal, but it was the first time I've ever done it.

One more before shot:

Then off to work:

In the end, they both still had pink splotches, and we're still deciding how to handle that...but this is at least better than it was.

They're happy on the inside....really...

I think one of the things that bothers me the most is remembering conversations with my mom regarding her "problem kids" that she taught. In describing some of them, I remember her mentioning earrings and erratic hair (mohawks, etc). I remember thinking that I couldn't believe that some parents would do that to their kids at such a young age. Never in my life did I think that my kids would be facing the same things. Those weren't the things that made the kids out to be "problem kids" but the parents who would allow their children to make such unnecessary changes to their appearances at such a young age seemed to be the same parents who would raise their children in ways that would lead them to troubled behavior. These kids do have a tough life, and aren't living under the best of circumstances. They do already identify with this stereotype and their mother doesn't really take responsibility. I just hope that I can be enough of an influence and example to help them out before it's really too late.

2 years down

2009-05-17T21:34:00.007-06:00

I can't believe the day almost ended before I realized it. It's one of the most important decisions I have ever made, and has become overtaken so much of my daily life...that I haven't been paying much attention to when it all began.

2 years ago I had my gastric bypass. It's amazing to see how much life has changed...how much *I* have changed. I definitely would not still be in the same place without it. Many people call it "the easy way out". My response to that is that "almost guaranteed" and "easy" are not the same thing. Anyone who has been around me after my stomach randomly decides it doesn't like something knows it's not easy. Matt always asks me if it's worth it. It's a trade. I traded the difficulty that being overweight brought to my life for other inconveniences and pain. For me, it was the best trade I could ever have made. I had already done everything that I could before making that trade. Of course it would have been better had "eating less and exercising more" been the easy answer. Most people who know me know how much I love to be active and how little I really did eat. I actually end up eating a LOT more these days (which isn't a good thing...something I need to work on). I can only eat a small amount at a time...but there are times when even just half an hour after getting "stuffed" I'm actually hungry again. This, of course, wouldn't happen if I ate the way that I "should" but I'm working on it.

So here I am...2 years later...and 180 lbs lighter. We all know I hate showing it...but for the sake of showing how far I've come...here are my before, 1 year ago, and today photos:

I am participating in Walk Now for Autism

2009-04-28T06:05:00.001-06:00

Please join me in my fight to make a difference in the lives of the more than 1 million Americans living with autism today.

I am participating in Walk Now for Autism to help find a cure for autism. Autism is the second most common developmental disorder in the United States affecting one in every 150 children born today. Despite some promising discoveries, the cause of autism is unknown and a cure does not exist. Research is crucial. Every 20 minutes another child is diagnosed with autism. Not only must we find ways to improve the quality of life for children and adults with autism, but we also must find a cure, and soon.

Walk Now for Autism is our chance to make a difference in the fight against autism by raising money for autism research and heightening public awareness. Please join me in my fight as I raise money to help fund essential research. You can donate to Walk Now for Autism and/or join my team online using the links at the bottom of this page. Donations can also be mailed to Autism Speaks using the donation form located on my page or send me a check made out to Autism Speaks.

Follow This Link to visit my personal web page and help me in my efforts to support Autism Speaks

Thank you for taking an important step in the fight against autism.

Donations are tax deductible to the fullest extent allowed by law.
Autism Speaks 501 (C)(3) Tax Id #: 20-2329938

Matching gift program: Many companies provide their employees with matching gifts. Please consult your employer on its matching gift guidelines and attach matching gift forms accordingly.

I'm NOT dreaming of a white April!

2009-04-16T08:35:00.004-06:00

I know, it's been too long. Things have been just crazy!

Speaking of crazy...the purpose of my post today is to whine. Now in checking my calendar, I see that it's April. The kids are home because it's SPRING Break. There have been little snow/rain storms here and there over the last couple of weeks, but nothing has really stayed. Imagine my surprise when I get up and ready for the day and look out the window and see this:

That's just NOT right. I grabbed my stuff and headed out the door to find that I couldn't get out of the driveway. In APRIL. So, I called in to let my boss know that I would try again later, then came back to my room. I then, of course, had to grab my camera and go back to take some pictures :-)

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v138/cocomo78/April09/snow/

Breast Cancer Awareness

2009-01-26T10:36:00.001-07:00

I promise, a "real" update will be coming soon...relatively. In the meantime...

I know that most of our lives have been affected by someone that we know who either survived or lost their fight with breast cancer. I was recently recruited to donate a basket of goods for people to bid on at a fundraiser. I'm looking to make the "filler" at the bottom of my basket a little more meaningful.

One of my random hobbies includes making various candy wrappers (I know, it doesn't sound terribly exciting...but I love it!) This is where you all come in :-)

I'm looking for names and/or messages that I can include on wrappers for Hershey's miniatures and Hershey's kisses to fill up the bottom of the basket. Please either respond to this note (keeping in mind that responding is public) or send me an email with names of or messages for survivors or those who battled the disease. If you know of anyone else who might be interested in contributing, please feel free to have them email me at coleenscandles@gmail.com.
Thank you all for any help you can give!

Headless Groom?

2008-12-26T09:43:00.004-07:00

No, this post isn't about MY groom being headless...I just needed to vent. Far be it from me to post a negative eBay experience, but gah! Seriously?!? I don't understand some people!

For those of you who were able to attend my wedding (or just looked at the photos), you may have noticed the beautiful 8" LLadro of a bride and groom that my friend sent from New York. Now you all know how Lladros are in our family...so I'll skip that part. My mom saw it and fell in love with it. I was able to find one on eBay ending the next day, and ended up winning it for $46 (plus $6 shipping...so $52 total). YAY!! I won it, paid for it...we're good to go.

Fast forward about a week. I stop at my condo to get my mail, and have a 7"x7"x6" box waiting for me. Strange, I can't think of anything that I ordered that would be this size. I look at the return address...and the name sounds vaguely familiar. I start thinking it's the person I won the Lladro from...but that's impossible, right? A 7x7x6 box for an 8" Lladro? No....

Sure enough, I open the box and see a packing slip from my PayPal payment for the Lladro. *blink* It's in the box diagonally. Well...if the seller was somehow able to pack it well enough and have it still fit diagonally...I guess that works. I start unwrapping the brown paper that is around it. Paper. Not bubble wrap...not styrofoam...paper.

I got down to one layer of a bubble wrap style bag (where half of the bubbles are deflated) and I start to hear a clinking sound. Uhm...that's not good. No...really...when I got the Lladro out of the bag, the groom's head was missing. It was, of course, found at the bottom of the deflated bubble wrap. Hrm.

So I email the seller...inquiring about the 7x7x6 box for an 8" Lladro...knowing that surely she must have suspected that something could happen with a packing job like that. I feel that I was extremely nice in the email considering the words that I WANTED to use to ask about it. The response I got back? On Christmas??

"I am so sorry to hear that it broke. I often ship things that size in a 7x7x6 box, as it fits perfect on an angle and I always wrap it well, as I did. Since you did not take the optional insurance, I'm sorry I can not do anything about it. So sorry....."

*blink* seriously?!? So...I can start selling things...and if you don't purchase the $2.00 insurance then it doesn't really matter how well I pack the item to ship. I just don't understand what goes through some people's minds. I was also surprised to find that she stated that she often ships things in that size box. In reviewing her feedback, I see that she has sold a lot of high end items....but none that were breakable. I can understand shipping an 8 inch purse in a smaller box...but a Lladro??

Ok, I'm done. It's sad, my first post after so long really should have been about my wedding, or Christmas...but sometimes it just takes something THIS confusing to get you riled up enough to type it all out :-)

Where are we now? I sent her a reply letting her know that lack of insurance would be a good enough excuse if it appeared that the package had been mishandled by the USPS, but where the box was barely bent? If I had purchased insurance, the USPS wouldn't cover damage for an item that is poorly packed anyway. Luckily I paid with PayPal, so I'm covered either way. I just hope that she'll be willing to work something out before I have to go that route. I don't want to be the icky mean-spirited buyer...but in this case? I'm trying to be ok with at least expecting the seller to be fair :-)

Wedding news!

2008-11-18T00:39:00.003-07:00

For those of you who haven't heard yet...a wedding date has been set. A lot of things are finally falling into place. It's so crazy to think that things are moving along so quickly. Matt and I will be getting married on December 19. That's just 31 days away for those of you who are counting (ok, maybe that's just me, hehe). I'm SO excited, but there is still so much to do!!

This does mean that I'm looking for addresses for announcements :-) Send them to me via email at coco_J_20@yahoo.com.

There has been a LOT going on, but I'm not sure what else there really is to say at the moment...so I'll just leave you with some pictures. For those of you on Facebook...these will, of course, be repeats:

Pictures from my Grandpa Hanson's graveside service

Pictures from celebrating Tyliegh's birthday last weekend

Last new Twilight Trailer!!

2008-10-11T04:24:00.002-06:00

The last trailer for Twilight before it comes out next month was released last night. YAYAYAYAYAY!!!! For those of you who haven't been able to see it...you can love me now :-)

Clicky here to watch!!

(Just to give you fair warning...it takes *forever* to load...but it's DEFINITELY worth it :-) )

*watches again*

*and again*

Me? Obsessed? No...

*twitch*

Last day home

2008-10-10T08:34:00.003-06:00

Today is officially my last weekday home before going back to work. I can't believe how fast the time has gone by! After my foot surgery, I spent a lot of my time drugged up and sleeping. I got sick a lot from the pain meds...and would sleep some more. Next thing I knew, it was time for my tonsils to come out. The time to get to that came WAY too quickly. I can honestly say...I would rather go through the operation where they broke most of my bones and fused them all back together multiple times again before having my tonsils out again. Of the 10 operations I've had, that was the worst. Thank goodness that's only done once!!

It seemed to take FOREVER for my tonsils to heal, and they're still working on it. I still get pains in my ears at night and in the morning. It also still hurts when I yawn (and Rhonda, no more making fun of my "*yawn*OWWWW's"! Hopefully all of that will finish going away over the next couple of days. I *really* need to get back into a normal sleeping, then getting up for the day and doing stuff routine. We'll see how that goes, hehe.

Because today is my last non-work weekday, I'm going to try to get some stuff done. I'll be heading over to my condo to clean & box stuff up, I want to get to the store to buy labels so I can make my basket testers for my Scentsy stuff (Seriously?!? *anyone* want to have a party?!? I'm giving away a free warmer for anyone who does! *sigh*), and I need to do some laundry and clean up my room that I've been staying in at my parents' house. Just SO much to do, and it feels like no time to do it, hehe.

For now, I'll share my pictures from our trip to St. George from last weekend. I didn't get to take many photos, but there are a few at least:

Here ya go if you didn't catch them on Facebook :-).

Can't Sleep

2008-10-04T05:57:00.003-06:00

So here it is...6:00am on a SATURDAY, AND I'm on "vacation"...and I'm awake because of pain. *sigh* I'm getting sick of this crap. My throat should be better by now!! It's finally working on it...but seriously...ridiculous. I'm supposed to go back to work on Wednesday. I really hope that I'm better enough to be on the phone all day by then. I'm really over being home all day (although I still have TONS that I need to get done while I'm at home...it doesn't really get done anyway because I don't have the concentration). I also *really* need to get back to my full pay *sigh*. I can't take not having enough money anymore. Luckily I have my parents watching out for me, and they have been helping me out...but I can only ask so much there. Blah. I'm just over it all. I can't wait to just be better, and back to work, and back to my "normal" life (as normal as it was anyway, hehe).

I'm also tired of waking up at odd hours and not being able to get back to sleep. Matt & I are in St. George for the weekend visiting Todd & Rhonda, so I already have the "not my own bed" factor against me. Then I realized that there is no humidifier (which I've been depending on since I had my tonsils out), and I'm waking up at exactly the 4 hour mark from taking my last drugs for pain. The last little bit I've been able to get away with sleeping a little longer to put the pain off, but apparently not today. I hope this doesn't keep up, because I didn't bring enough drugs with me!

This ramble is brought to you by Lortab and my inability to sleep. Thank you.

Desperate times call for desperate measures

2008-09-29T22:27:00.004-06:00

So, I'm *really* close to hitting a goal with my Scentsy stuff for the month. I hate to advertise it here...but as my title suggests...desperate times call for desperate measures. I'm giving 20% off of everything in the catalog for one day only. Everyone that I have introduced to these products have absolutely fallen in love with them, and they make GREAT gifts!

What's great about this, is that those of you who are out of state? It's only a 10% charge for shipping, which means that it's still a great discount! I know most of you aren't interested, but I have to at least try to see if I can hit these numbers.

You can read more here.

Victory is mine!!

2008-09-26T01:58:00.003-06:00

So tonight while I was in the bathroom, I decided to pull the scale out of the tub long enough to weigh myself. It's not healthy AT ALL but I haven't really been eating because of the pain from my tonsils. What I saw on the scale was a shock in and of itself, but I'll get to that in a minute.

After weighing myself, I shook the scale a bit and listened for the spider. I could hear him last night, so I figured after shaking him a bit he would need to readjust himself somehow. I didn't hear anything. Could he be gone? I couldn't be sure, so back into the bathtub for the scale.

When I went to return the scale to the bathtub...I noticed something in the drain...

Either he had come out, or I had made yet another spider discovery. We all know which theory I'm choosing to believe! I immediately sprayed the drain with hairspray, then turns on the water and let it run for a full 10 minutes. In case that wasn't enough, I also closed the drain so he couldn't come back up.

Like I said...victory is mine!!

It's mine in another way, as well :-) I'm trying to not be *too* happy because I know I'll go back up after I start eating again...but my scale tonight said...

*drumroll*

149!! *gasp* I NEVER in my life thought that I would see the numbers "1" and "4" together as the first 2 numbers on my scale! I know there are a lot of you skinny minnies who read this who are thinking, "Man, I'd kill myself if I got to 149 other than through pregnancy"...but seriously?!? Never in my wildest dreams...so...YAY!!!

Spiders

2008-09-25T01:42:00.005-06:00

UGH! I hate spiders. I'm not like the people who can't kill them on their own or anything...but I just hate them. Whenever I let one live...I wake up the next day with a spider bite. Just gah.

Now for those of you who have attempted to watch a movie at my parents' house in the last few years, you know about the little spider that Todd & I found while my parents were out of town years ago. He had somehow gotten between the screens, and couldn't find his way out. He decided to die in the middle of the screen. When we watch tv, it'll end up on people's faces, and in food, and we always have to explain the spider.

Here's our little friend. I should name him or something.

The week before last, I was walking into the family room after grabbing one of Jen's fabulous no bake cookies. When I took a bite, a piece fell. It was dark, and I bent down to try to scoop up the dark spot on the kitchen floor. Instead of a piece of cookie, I was shocked when the SPIDER started scurrying away. I jumped a mile and ran (*laugh* that would have been a site since I can barely walk) to the other room to get a shoe to kill it. Grossness.

I told my mom about it, and she of course laughed at me. The next night, however, I had just finished my ritual gargling with salt water for my tonsils and was on my way back to the family room...and what do you know? A couple of feet away from the first night...there was ANOTHER yucky hairy spider. I jumped again, and grabbed a shoe and killed it. Blah. Luckily, my dad has one of those things that you plug into the wall and it keeps spiders away. I had him plug it in so that theoretically it will work for the family room and kitchen.

So imagine my surprise when tonight, I go into the bathroom and I'm doing my thing, and I look down to see spider legs sticking out of the hole on my scale where you turn the dial to set it! I immediately picked up the scale and tried to shake the stupid thing out. Of course it didn't come out, so I have a spider just waiting to come bite me.

This is where he was trying to come out...

but he wasn't there later when I had my camera.

I went in to tell my mom about it, and was asking about the little plug in thing. I wasn't sure if it actually killed spiders, or just repelled them. My dad mentioned that it just repels them. Crap. I asked my mom if I plugged it in the bathroom, what the chances would be of the spider turning suicidal since it can't seem to get out.

So I went in a few hours later...and the little wheel with the numbers was moving. Nice. I then saw little spider legs sticking up. *shudder*

So as if scales aren't evil enough, I have a spider living in mine. I promptly put the scale in the bathtub so the ugly little thing would have one more obstacle before it could get away and find me!

Gah. Stupid spiders!

Still recovering

2008-09-06T22:24:00.002-06:00

So in the midst of my excitement, I'm still trying to recover. I'm having a very difficult time staying down, though. I keep wanting to get up and do *something*. Generally anything I can find. At the moment, I'm fighting the urge to put together my cheap Ikea computer chair that I bought *forever* ago. I've been getting up and putting things away and organizing little things in my old room at my parents' house for the last few days. I need to learn to at least obsess over stuff I can do on the computer while sitting down rather than the things I have to sit down to do.

Ok, I'm going to put the chair together then go to bed. 9am church in Lehi. Blah. I want to thank everyone for all the well wishes from my last post :-) I'm really excited...and I'm sure I'll be even more excited when we start to put things together. I was talking with my mom about reception type stuff tonight. It's really odd to think about. It still doesn't feel real.

Ok, here I come chair. Then bed. Night :-)

2008-09-02T14:31:00.004-06:00

Yes, that is what it looks like. Last night, Matt took me to dinner and asked me to marry him. As you can see, I said yes. We don't have any details down (like a date or anything). Right now we have little mini-goals we're focusing on first, then we'll set a date. We just decided that it's silly for us not to be engaged when we know we're going to get married. He already had the ring, and he would rather it be on my finger than sitting in a box in his room, hehe.

We went to The Melting Pot for dinner (and we all know how I love The Melting Pot). I was actually sick, which was REALLY sad with so much yummy food in front of me. I was just leaning over against him because I was trying to decide if I needed to throw up, and he started talking about how much he loves me and how lucky he is to have me *insert the appropriate "awwww's" here*. I'll spare you all the rest, but he went on and pulled out the ring and said, "I know we've talked about it already, but I still need an answer" and asked me.

So there's your quick rundown to catch up with me :-) I also had my surgery last week and I have pictures and everything from that, but I'll work on that post later. Now, I had to get pictures of the ring put up beause the family that lives far away (or those that are traveling...like my parents) wanted to see the ring. I figure it's a good time to just get the "announcement" done and over with at the same time.

I don't have many pictures of us together, so this will have to do for now:

Also, here's a link to the picture of all of us from Lagoon for those who haven't seen it on Facebook.

Surgery Day

2008-08-25T01:47:00.003-06:00

So...today is surgery day. It's almost 2am...and where am I? Oh, at work. I've been here for HOURS and haven't managed to do what I need to. I have issues letting go...so I'm avoiding. I need to get on the ball, though. It's only 7.5 hours until I have to be there, and 9 hours until surgery time. Yikes! I'm really not excited. I'm just anxious. I know this won't be even close to as bad as prior surgeries...but I'm still anxious. I think it's ok to be anxious when you know that you'll be waking up with pins sticking out of your toes :-P. On to happier stuff...

Saturday my work had a Lagoon day for our Summer picnic. I took Matt and his kids with me. Even with only hitting like 5 or 6 rides, almost passing out, the whining, and the pain...I had a lot of fun :-)

We went to Pioneer Village and did one of those Outlaw pictures (which I'm sure I'll post later when I get home). I was a little reluctant because...well...it appeared to be a family picture, which we're not yet. The kids loved it, though...and made sure to take it around to show everyone at Matt's house when we got home.

I ran into Alisha Rios (Jones...Linda Rae's daughter) at Lagoon, too. I hadn't seen her in years, so it was a LOT of fun to chat with her for a bit :-) We were able to exchange numbers again, and will hopefully keep in better touch.

We went on the skyscraper, which was hilarious as Matt & 2 of the kids are afraid of heights. This wasn't too bad until we got stopped right at the very top while they were letting people off. I had Tyleigh on one side just holding onto me for dear life...Owen on the other who started holding onto me as soon as he saw Tyleigh do it (I guess once he saw that I was ok with it?), and Matt getting after Gavin who kept wanting to spin us while we were so high, hehe. It was entertaining if nothing else :-) I also had the privelege of taking Tyleigh on her first (and possibly last) roller coaster ride. She chose Jet Star 2, thinking that it wouldn't be that bad. As we got closer and closer to the front of the line, she was holding onto me tighter and tighter. I had to keep reassuring her that with this ride, I would be directly behind her (she'd almost be in my lap) and the seatbelt would be directly over her holding her in. I felt horrible about halfway through as she was screaming for dear life, saying that she wanted it to stop. Poor girl. She can now say that she went on one, though!

That's when the kids started to get cranky (the boys were upset that they hadn't been able to go on the ride with Tyleigh and I), so we decided it was time to leave. I smoothed things over with the kids by letting them see my Guitar Hero for my Nintendo DS and by letting them play with the pictures that we had received on cd from Pioneer Village. Overall, they all still say that they had a good time, and "can't wait to go again next year if my work does it again!"

Ok. I'm really going to get this work stuff done so I can get out of here for the next month and a half!!

Shameless Scentsy Plug

2008-08-25T00:09:00.002-06:00

So I just saw that one of my friends mentioned a Scentsy party that one of her other friends was having. Made me kinda sad that I hadn't told this friend sooner that *I* sell them, too!! I'm really not a salesperson, so I don't generally mention it. I would, however, like for those of you DO like this kind of stuff to have the chance to take advantage of the cheapness :-) So...I decided to do a quick post so everyone can have a chance to get the best and yummiest smelling candles ever for the cheapest price you'll probably ever see!

For more details, see my Scentsy site here!

These candles are wickless and burn using a 25 watt bulb. It's great for those of you with kids, because the wax doesn't get hot enough to burn them if they somehow happen to get to it. There's no yucky soot in the air from the flame, and the the way the yummy smells can fill up the house is amazing! Not to mention, the warmers are just cute!!

I also have all kinds of capabilites for out of town/out of state parties. If any of you out of state would like to host a party, please let me know. I would LOVE to send you the scents!

Ok, I'm done. I just wanted to make sure that I let you guys know! I won't push anyone, but I might end up keeping you all informed a bit :-)

Stupid broken toe

2008-08-13T07:52:00.003-06:00

Sadly, it looks like the 5k is a no go for me :-( I'm *really* disappointed as I was looking forward to proving to myself that I could do it. It just doesn't make a lot of sense to do it with a broken toe (or the breathing problems, or worse ankle problems that came up...but the broken toe did it). I kept hoping that I'd start feeling better enough that I could justify it. Sadly...it seems to be getting worse. The other days I could at least wear some of my normal shoes. Today? I had to resort to my wannabe crocs. Blah. I hate that pain can control me like this. The good thing is that it saves me over $100 in gas. The bad thing is that Rhonda had planned a candle party because I was coming down...and now I won't even be there to do it. Luckily she's fully capable of handling it on her own...but it doesn't make me feel any better. Blah. I'm sick of this crap.

Quick Update...

2008-08-10T21:16:00.003-06:00

So I guess a quick update is in order now that I've had my dr. appointment and a few other things have taken place.

It turns out that I'll be having 2 operations over the next 6 weeks here. Talk about crazy! On August 25 I'll be put under for yet another operation on my foot. They'll be cutting away a bone on the side of my foot, cutting out a wedge of bone from my big toe so it'll sit straight, then they'll cut away the ligaments that are holding my other toes in place. I then get pins yet again to try to keep them in place while they heal. They'll also cut into the top of my foot and cut down the stupid bone spur that I found while snorkeling. Blah. This should be a LOT easier than the other operations I've had on my feet, and it sounds like I don't even have to have a cast. Just a walking boot. YAY! I can hope :-)

On September 16 I'll have my tonsils out. I swear, aren't I too old for that?? What's funny is that years ago I asked a dr. about it (as they've always kinda been in the way for me) and he kept talking about how unnecessary it was. Turns out...he was wrong! We'll see how that goes. I'm just not excited.

The rest of the week and weekend has been pretty crazy. Matt's family had a reading party carnival thing yesterday, so I helped man the wheel (which we borrowed from Rob & Chris, of course!). It was a LOT of fun, but I'm exhausted. (If you didn't see the pictures on Facebook, you can see them here).

The next couple of weeks are going to be crazy...so I'll update when I can!

Oh yeah!! I forgot to mention...I have my 5k coming up on Saturday, right?? One by one...I'm getting knocked down. I had a very lenient goal of making it in under an hour. As I went on with training...I started to lose hope that I would be able to do it. Still planning the 5k, though. I then started having problems with my breathing. I got some inhaler things...and moved on. I then started having problems with my ankles. Got some braces (which I think made it worse) but decided to move on. But a sprained toe?!?!? Come on!! Enough is enough!! (because I'm horrible, I'll be taking a picture of the lovely bruises to post later...lol). I sprained my toe last night after the carnival thing while climbing over kids in their basement where they had all settled in for a movie. I'm STILL going to do the 5k. I don't care if it takes me 2 hours!! I'm VERY sad that this is becoming more and more of a reality *sigh* I was REALLY hoping to be able to stick to under an hour. I know how slow that sounds to many of you, anyway...but blah.

The Great Update

2008-08-06T05:00:00.001-06:00

I know, it's been a while. I swear it's not my fault!! The last 2 months have just been a big whirlwind. I'm not even sure if I remember all of the highlights...but here goes the highs, lows, things that mattered, and things that don't:

June 3 - I had the 2 moles on my face removed (uhm, yay?)I'm still getting used to this :-)

June 6 - I had a lovely little chat with Brandon. You all remember Brandon, right? Guy I "knew" I was supposed to marry like 8 years ago? Yeah, that was fun :-P Long story short...we decided we should go out and "see how things are".

June 14 - I went on my, date(?) with Brandon. I then went to Park City for our annual Father's Day bbq & swimming party at the timeshare.

June 15 - Spent Father's Day hanging out in Park City with my family.

June 18 - I finally got rid of my parasite of a roommate. I had *never* referred to her that way before...but wow. When you can give more than you even have to someone, and they STILL can't respect you? I'm just happy that she decided to move out :-)

June 18 - 21 - eBay Live in Chicago! This was a BLAST!! Lots to report from there...but it'll have to wait for another post (which means I'm sure I won't mention it...but...at least I have a highlights list!

June 26 - July 2 - Scott came to town from Arkansas. YAY!! I love when I get to see my brother.

June 28 - My parents, Julie, Roger, Dominic, Scott, Jen & other Scott, and their 3 kids all went boating. It was my first time boating since *thinks* I think since we all went to Lake Powell back in like 97! How crazy is that!!

June 30 - I went with Julie, Roger, Brandon, Todd, Rhonda, Jake, and Levi to see Josh Gracin, Collin Raye, and Joe Nichols. It was a BLAST!! We spent half the time playing cards, and just goofing off. I LOVE blankets on the grass concerts! There were even fireworks :-)

June 30 - July 10 - Tammie & Shantal were in town from Germany. I LOVED having them here, and cried when they left. I can't wait until next time I can head out there, or they can come back :-)

July 3 - Julie, Roger, Dominic, Tammie, Shantal, & I went to the Drive In to see Wall-E and Prince Caspian. It was SO much fun!! I love the Drive In.

July 4 - We had a bbq at Jen's house, and did some fireworks. It was a LOT of fun, as usual.

July 5 - The drive in group got together again for some mini golf. I hate to love mini golf.

July 10 - I finally caved and decided to start selling Scentsy stuff again. I apologize ahead of the time for the catalogs which may be spamming your mailboxes. I'm SO not a salesperson, so I'm just trying to get the word out. No pressure at all (but if you're interested in hosting a party or whatever...let me know!)

July 14 - I photographed a wedding and a 50th anniversary in the same day. Insanity. It reminds me why I'm *not* a professional photographer...no matter how much I would LOVE to be. I have the interest, and can push the button...but I just don't have the ability to take pictures that people would pay for...lol. I then went to play games at Julie's, though I was so late...we only played 1 game before everyone left...lol.

July 17 & 18 - I went to St. George with my parents to support Todd & his family for the big "finally! Unsuperised visits!!" decision. About freakin time, is all I have to say!

July 18 - I was supposed to get back from St. George in time to see Dark Knight. I got back in time...but not to the theater in time. You see...like a moron...I looked at the tickets on a stressful day and saw $8.00...and in my head that translated to 8:00. Since I "knew" start time was 8:00...I didn't bother to look again until I was on my way into the theater. Yeah...start time was 7:00 :-( My friend and I went to see Mama Mia, instead, after dinner at Geckos.

July 19 - I was able to get tickets to see Dark Knight (which is good...cause I was VERY sad about missing it the night before).

July 20 - I had an interesting chat with a guy I dated about 4 years ago. Things didn't exactly work out then. Long story. He's been trying to get me to entertain the possibility of us dating again for about 6 months. I decided to at least drive down to see him. We had a nice, long talk. Matt and I are now "dating" I guess. I feel too old to be calling it that, heh.

July 23 - After a LONG day at work, I got REALLY sick. I decided that sleep was more important than going to the dr. I woke up just in time to go to InstaCare and find out that I don't have strep. Same stupid thing they tell me 3 - 4 times a year when I get the strep-like symptoms. They then referred me to my dr. so that HE could refer me to an ENT. Aren't I getting too old to be looking into having my tonsils taken out?

July 24 & 25 - I stayed home because of being so sick. It was SO nice to rest...but I hate missing that much work. I can't stand getting behind.

July 25 - 26 - I went to Julie & Roger's for Dominic's birthday party. I slept over the night before with the intention of helping them finish up a few things in their yard. Instead, I didn't do anything. Way to be helpful. It was fun to spend the extra time with them, though :-)

July 26 - After Dominic's party, Rob & Chrissy's girls decided to ride home with me. I went rainbow chasing (VERY cool rainbow and I wanted a picture...Mandy and Anna mocked me). I didn't get a good picture of the rainbow, but we did end up at temple square for an impromptu photo session with girls. They're so easy to photograph...makes me sick.

July 28 - I had my Dr. appt and got my referral. I also got asthma meds (which helps a LOT with this 5k I'm getting ready to do, ugh). I also went to dinner for Dominic's birthday with Julie, Roger, & Dominic. I love Pizza Factory! I also closed my first Scentsy party since returning to selling. It was just a catalog party, and kinda happened by accident...but it was my first order over $150.

July 29 - I just hung out with Matt. This is starting to become a habit again, and I'm not complaining at all. I love the fact that I can just take my laptop with me...and he can do his thing and I can do mine. I just enjoy spending time with him. (Sorry, I'll try to be done with the pukey stuff, heh).

July 30 - I ended up taking Matt to the ER (against his will). He's been having problems with his stomach, but kept saying that things would just pass. Sadly...nothing was found.

July 31 - We spent most of the day at the hospital, again, for Matt to get tests done. I went with him to get an endoscopy, which found minor stuff. He kept insisting that he needed to get back to work, and the nurse was begging me to not let him. Luckily, he works at the same hospital that we were already at. I figured that alone should get him a pass for missing the time. I then went to work for a couple of hours, then back down to take him in for another test. I finished taking him home from that just in time to pick up Rhonda from my mom's house and head down for our football clinic at the Y. *drool* there were FAR too many hot football players hanging around. I already posted about all of that, though :-)

Aug 1 - I went with Rhonda, Kenz, and Ashalee to the BYU bookstore for the release of "Breaking Dawn". Now for those of you who have finished NO TELLING ME ANYTHING!! THIS MEANS YOU, ASHIE!!! I love you, though :-)

Aug 2 - Bobby's baptism. After not much sleep, it felt like a long day. It was fun, though!

This is the conclusion of the great update. Today I have my appointment with the ENT, so I hope to remember to update later (and a lot more often so that none of us have to go through a "Great Update" again!!)

BYU Football clinic

2008-08-01T08:27:00.003-06:00

So I have this whole long update waiting in my "draft" section to update everyone on the last couple of months, since I haven't been around. In the meantime, though...I thought I'd share the pictures from the night that Rhonda and I had last night.

(Click on the picture to see the rest :-) )

I stepped down too hard on one foot, twisted the other, and looked like a fool, but it was a BLAST! I did take a few videos, also. If you go to YouTube and do a search for "BYU Women's Football Clinic" you should be able to find them. I would go grab the links...but I gotta get focused on work here. Blah.

Random pointless update :-)

2008-05-30T06:52:00.000-06:00

Well, there has been a LOT going on. Not sure where to start :-)

I've been working TONS of overtime lately. There's just so much work to get done...and not enough time to do it. Last night, I didn't go to bed at all. I worked until about 11:30pm (only on the clock until about 6 something...then I just wanted to get caught up!). I then went to a midnight movie with one of my friends. I went home to shower and change, and was right back at work by 4 this morning (I didn't log in until 6, heh).

The building has been FREEZING this morning, though. Luckily, I have a wheat bag here from when I used to hurt more. I threw that in the microwave for 5 minutes, and put it on my lower back. I don't hurt...but it helps SO much with the cold :-) I'm so happy that my mom and I made so many of these a few years back. I don't ever know where any of them are...but I always happen to find one when I need one. This one I'm definitely going to continue to keep at work.

I know how random this all is...but I feel the need to express my love for Pandora.com. If you love music like I do...and haven't discovered it yet? You'll thank me! You just create your own music stations based upon a group or song, and it'll play music by that artist and similar artists. My problem is that I'm finding WAY too much new "unknown" music :-) I started with just 1 or 2 stations. I keep finding new artists that I *love*. It's to the point where when I'm just listening to music while doing other stuff, I have to keep a notepad document open or keep a physical notebook by me. Even with how long I've been listening to Pandora, I have 15 new songs I need to look for just since yesterday. Yeah, I'm a music geek...I know :-)

Now I guess I should get back to work. I want to thank everyone for your congratulations on my 1 year mark in my previous post :-) I'm pretty excited. I still have a difficult time knowing what to say when people tell me how good I'm looking. Still gotta work on the self image thing. I'm trying to learn to say "thank you" and leave the rest of my line ("for saying so") off. We'll see how that continues to go.

When I finally get a block of time at home, I'll try to post some pictures from the last few weeks :-) I have some fun pictures of the Idaho Falls temple (that's for you, Court) from when my friend and I drove to Montana a couple of weeks ago to take his kids back up there. I also have some WAY cute pictures of Dominic trying to help put together the play yard thing in Julie and Roger's backyard last weekend. That was a LOT of fun! My Dominic is finally starting to get attached to me, it seems. He played frisbee with me for a while last weekend. Yeah...lots of cute stuff. I promise I'll try to get to it!

1 year

2008-05-17T12:42:00.007-06:00

Wow...today is my 1 year anniversary of my gastric bypass. I'm just...surprised. If someone told me that this is where I would be a year ago...I wouldn't have believed them. Especially with all of the plateaus and such I was hitting.

10 lbs away from what I had as my "I would be happy here" goal. It's interesting. There are still SO many things that I'm not happy with when it comes to my weight and my body. I think that a huge part of me sees the 325 lb me. Wow...did I just admit my pre-op weight?? Can't say I *ever* thought I would do that. Especially where all you skinny butt girls could see. Now? Doesn't really matter. I've come to terms with how I got to that point, and have decided that I don't care what anyone else thinks anymore. People can think that I just sat around watching tv and eating junk all day long. That's fine. I know that I did everything that I could...and ate less than most people I knew. It's interesting to me the number of people who get this operation who are ashamed. There is a girl at work who I ran into at the place that I had it done, and she begged me not to tell anyone. How sad that must be! For me...it was the most exciting thing to happen for me in a LONG time. I was finally making a choice to make myself feel better! I'm happy that I don't really care anymore :-) I might even post a "before" and "after" picture later today if I'm feeling *really* brave. We'll see how that goes, heh. The "before" pictures make me want to cry. That helps me see how far I've truly come.

**Edited**
Ok, I decided to just post pictures. Why not? It's not like you all didn't know me then, anyway. Just a note...I chose the "huge" pictures on purpose. I know I look *extra* gross because it was just after a concert. They have hot Pat McGee in them with me, though...so I figured at least then there's someone attractive in the picture (and it's about the only time I allowed pictures of me at the time).

Before....here's what years of operations and drugs and crap in your system will do to you:

Now...

So that's where I'm at now. Craziness. I still have a VERY long way to go...and I would give anything for the money for the plastic surgery it will take for my skin...but I'm SO much happier. Just looking at my accomplishments over the past year. Most of you won't understand this...but they're huge.

I can cross my legs at the knee again, and now do *constantly*.

4 months after surgery I was able to ride on a plane without a seatbelt extender. I haven't been able to do that since I had the surgery to remove my ovary in 2005.

I went to Disney World and didn't worry about whether or not I would fit on the rides.

I went to Germany and was able to walk around pretty much anywhere I wanted to.

The 2 events I've been to for work, I've been able to stay up and walking and mingle with sellers like I'm supposed to. I didn't have to take all kinds of breaks to sit down.

I wore a swimming suit in public without wearing a shirt over it!

I can now work out for an hour a day again!! This is HUGE for stress relief.

I can clean for longer than 15 minutes without having to sit down!! Now if I can just make time for it to get myself all caught up, hehe.

There are literally hundreds of other milestones. I'm just thrilled.

Twilight Trailer

2008-05-05T19:55:00.003-06:00

Since none of my "Twilight" friends are online...I have to blog about it.

They finally have a trailer for Twilight!!! Yes...I know it doesn't come out for 7 months...leave me alone :-P

Twilight in HD

Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee. (Again...I know I'm a geek. Leave me alone...lol)

Sooooo much!

2008-05-02T00:01:00.003-06:00

Do you ever just get SOOOOO much going on that you know you can't write about it all? Then...it seems kinda silly to write about part of what's going on, but not everything?

Yeah...it's like that.

Maui firsts...

2008-04-15T02:20:00.003-06:00

So with this being my first trip to Maui...pretty much everything is a "first" for me. I've been here since last Wednesday...but I've done a lot of just hanging out. Yesterday I did visit my first volcano. We drove up to Haleakala. I know that most of you know...but man...what a drive. I think I might *still* be carsick! I have my certificate to prove that I survived the 37 mile drive from sea level to 10,000 feet, but I'll have to post it later, heh.

This morning I went snorkeling for the first time. I know that most of you already know how completely cool snorkeling is...but wow!! I was skeptical...but I will never doubt again! I went through about 3 minutes straight of hyperventilating when I first started looking under water. Something about having my head submerged and breathing through a tube just wasn't connecting for me. I, of course, got over it and loved every second. Even if I did spend the rest of the day with a line through my forehead from the mask...lol. I also attempted to take some underwater pictures. Unfortunately, they're not of the digital variety...so it'll be some time before I can even think of getting them put up. We'll see how they turn out :-) I also thought it was pretty much the coolest thing ever that I could hear the whales!! Again...I know that most of you already know how cool it is...but WOW!!

I got back to the condo in time to get showered and changed, then went shopping with my mom and Aunt Sharon. I definitely spent FAR too much money (although not as much as my mom OR Aunt Sharon...lol). I do have a *bit* of buyer's remorse...but I think I'll live :-)

After shopping, I went back out to the beach for a bit. I swam in the ocean with Sharon, and I can still feel the waves even just sitting here. Unfortunately, I didn't have TOO much time. I came back, took another shower and got ready *again* to head out to my first Luau. Well...my first "real" Luau, haha. One of the girls who grew up in my neighborhood was Hawaiian...so we had a "luau" almost every year in school. This one was pretty cool. The only problem is now that I'm back...my body realizes how much I've been up and going today...and I'm ready for some SLEEP! Especially when I plan on being up and going again at 7 for more snorkeling ;-).

Oh yeah...and pictures of everything will come later. I'm definitely WAY too sleepy tonight!

Only a month later...

2008-04-11T04:25:00.002-06:00

I know it's been a month since I last posted. It makes me feel better to know that I'm not the only one falling behind, though. I do still need to try to keep everyone caught up a little better.

In the last month...SO much has happened!! There are some things that I'm not quite ready to discuss here, even...so feel free to ask me about it if you talk to me...lol. For now? Here's the gist of the last month:

March 13 - 16 I spent in St. George celebrating Levi's birthday. It was SO much fun!! We had 2 parties. The first was a family party with Ashie, Andrew, and Adam. Any chance I get to see those kids is just absolutely amazing. I always worry about the time we were apart...and I think that they'll forget or not like me. Luckily, they seem to still enjoy being around me at least some, hehe. The 2nd party was on Saturday for Levi's friends. It was pretty cool, I was able to help design some stuff for the party. I was able to put together some candy wrappers for favors as well as a Transformer's Bingo. Rhonda also put together a WAY cool Optimus Prime cake that I was able to help frost. It turned out really cool :-)

Thurs March 20 I was able to make my 2nd trip to The Melting Pot. Man, it was just as good the 2nd time as it was the 1st. I went with Lys and Dan, and we were able to talk lots. It was great, because Dan and I were able to restart our friendship. We had stopped talking for a while (SUCH a long story), but after clearing up a few things, we were able to talk and stuff again. It was great because I really missed his friendship.

Sat March 22 I met up with Julie and Roger at my mom's house. We dyed eggs, and had dinner. It was a lot of fun. Then again...any time that I get to spend with my Dominic...I'm happy, hehe.

Sun March 23 was Easter. Lys and I hung out all night because her best friend that is a guy got married that night. It was crazy. Not much else I can say about that, heh.

Things were a blur for about a week. Trying to get stuff ready with work for all kinds of stuff.

April 1 - 2 I was in Mesa for an eBay In Person event. That was actually fun. I had to deal with the guy who caused the biggest problem during the Q&A session...but he left happy. It was GREAT! Such a good feeling to show what I do every day. I was also able to hang out with Debi, Emily, Zach, and Alyssa. We went shopping for a few hours and grabbed some lunch before I had to head back to the airport. I'll have to post some pictures later :-)

April 5 - I was able to attend the morning session of conference at the conference center. That was amazing! I was about 10 rows back in the very center. Such a cool place for a solemn assembly! I do have to admit that with the resemblance to Grandpa...it was tough being that close to President Monson. The resemblance is even more amazing now that his hair isn't quite as red. I cried when he entered and left the room. It was such a great experience, though.

April 6 - I was at Jen's for the morning session of conference. We had breakfast, then played some Settlers of Catan in between sessions. I love family time. I also went to Lindsey's for dinner. I LOVE her new house!! I'm extremely jealous.

April 9 - I headed out to Hawaii to meet up with my parents and Sharon and Stan. That has been a LOT of fun so far. I'm looking up some stuff for us to go do. It might be too late to get into too much...but it was such a last minute decision to go...I dunno. I don't have any money, so it looks like it'll just be a lot of reading and relaxing time. If the clouds would go away...I might even be able to get a tan before coming back, hehe.

So...that's the last little bit with me. Lots going on...not much to say. I'll try to update more (but everyone else needs to, also!!)

Sorry, I know how long it is...

2008-03-10T11:58:00.001-06:00

I kept planning to blog over the weekend...and just never did. I was very busy, but I did actually have some downtime. I just kept falling asleep when I pulled up the page to post anything.

First I want to let Debi know that I found out on Thursday that they're sending me to Mesa at the beginning of next month! I realized after I didn't directly tell Melissa about DC that I need to point it out more clearly :-( I'll only be there for 1 night, though, unless I make other arrangements to go early or something. Let me know if you wanna say hi while I'm there :-)

So on to my weekend. I took Friday off. I wanted to go to KFC downtown at noon to score free passes to "Horton Hears a Who" on Saturday. Because I took the day off, my mom wanted to have lunch with me. Worked out well that KFC is where they were handing out the tickets. My mom, my friend Lys, and I headed downtown where we met up with Roger, Dominic, and Cami. We got our passes, then settled inside for lunch. It was a lot of fun to just hang out, talk, and eat.

After that, I went back to my mom's to help her with her blog and getting pictures from Mexico up. I missed not going this year :-( It would have been SO nice! After that, Lys and I hit Beehive Clothing. Since my weight loss...I haven't bought anything new there. It was becoming apparent that it was a necessity. That's the one difficult part about this weight loss thing...I feel like I keep shelling out money...and I STILL never feel like I have anything to wear! I really need to clean out my closet/room. There are SO many clothes that I keep picking out to wear, then realizing that I REALLY shouldn't wear them anymore. I then headed to the library, then to get an oil change, then finally home for my weekly WoW group. Fun as always :-)

Saturday was even more busy. I woke up at about 6:30 to go get in line for "Horton Hears a Who". We got our passes, but unfortunately a pass didn't guarantee a seat. I ended up driving to Bountiful to pick up Julie, then we headed back to Gateway for the movie. Armed with donuts and hot chocolate, we were set to face the rain which was falling at that point. We were the first there, and it wasn't too bad. The movie was REALLY cute. I'm happy I took the time to do that.

The plan was to go home, pull out rolls for dinner that night, then head out to have them take plasma. Yeah...I decided that I didn't need the money bad enough to go on Saturday. After being up late on Friday and waking up early on Saturday...sleep was MUCH more appealing. I then checked my bank account online, and found out how necessary the money was. Off I went to get poked.

I got to the plasma place, and everything just went wrong. They lost my folder, so I waited about 30 minutes longer than I would have had to. I finally got to the back, and the girl couldn't hit my vein (my veins SUCK...they roll LOTS and are just really deep...so I really didn't blame her). She finally got it...and they got one round of plasma out of me, and the machine couldn't return the rest of my blood because of how the needle was placed. They dug around with the needle to get it again..that didn't work. The poked my other arm and dug more...that didn't work. They poked one more time and dug around more...that didn't work. So...they sent me home. Luckily I still got paid...but my arms are now both all purple and red. FUN!

I then came home, overslept, and went to Rob's for his birthday dinner. I love getting together with my family. I just wish they were all here! It was fun, though. I then went to Lys's to introduce Lys and Dan to Settlers of Catan. I've created 2 more addicts. YAY!!

That's about it for me. I started a 5 day pouch test thing yesterday which means liquid only yesterday and today. That kinda sucks, but I've already started losing weight again (I've been at the same place for a month!) so that's good :-) Tomorrow I can have this omlet casserole thing that sounds SO yummy. I think I'll have to make it tonight and put it in little containers for me to bring to work with me. We'll see how it is, heh.

Group Date Pictures :-)

2008-02-21T22:08:00.005-07:00

Ok, I know I'm WAY behind on pictures...but FINALLY...here are the pictures from the infamous group date with Courtney and Rebecca.

Click HERE for the rest :-)

Free rice?

2008-02-16T13:40:00.003-07:00

Ok, so I normally don't advertise stuff or send forwards, cause most of them are completely stupid. I did just find out about a site today that donates rice while you improve your vocabulary. As I'm ALWAYS trying to improve my vocabulary (if anyone wants to buy me "My Word Coach" for my DS I would love you forever), I found this to be interesting.

www.freerice.com

The skeptic that I am, I ALWAYS check these things out (to the best of my ability as far as the internet is concerned...but if you read it online it's ALWAYS true, right?!?) You all know that Snopes has been my "is it true?" site of choice for YEARS, so you can read up on the free rice thing here.

So...go check it out, donate some free rice, and pass it along!!

*smooches*

eCommerce Part 1

2008-02-06T16:05:00.000-07:00

So I never did give my report on eCommerce last week. It was INSANE!! I'm still not sure where my time went.

We left Sunday morning, and the airport was crazy!! In trying to figure it out, we finally realized that Sundance had just ended. There was also some kind of outdoor convention thing that had happened the week before. It took over an hour to get through ticketing and security. Thankfully, we made it. We got to DC, and I was in charge of the shuttle. I had made a reservation ahead of time, and silly me...I thought that meant that a shuttle would be there for me (they ask for all the flight information, so I figured they would know whether or not the flight actually made it). We ended up waiting about 45 minutes to an hour for the shuttle after getting our luggage. Gah. So much for reservations.

We got to the hotel, and it was pretty nice! We got all checked in, and decided to all head to dinner. We went to a place called Clyde's, and I have *never* had worse service. We called ahead of time to make sure that a group of 18 would be ok. 45 minutes after we got there, a few of us were finally seated. The rest were seated about 10 minutes later, and we still hadn't even seen our server, let alone even water. Another 10 minutes pass, and the group that was there after us was served their water and they got their drinks ordered. Meanwhile, those of us who were seated first...waited. The bad thing is that 2 of the guys sitting with us needed to get to a meeting. We finally communicated that, and they were able to order and get rushed out. The rest of us ended up being at the restaurant for 3 hours total. So much for having time to do anything else! We got back to the hotel, and a bunch of us hung out playing Guitar Hero. Someone actually packed up their PS2 and guitars, and they rented a large tv for the room for $75 a day. Crazy! It was a lot of fun, though :-)

Monday morning we had a meeting at 10 before sellers showed up for the conference. A few of us met up at 8 to see how far we could walk and how much we could see before we had to be back. It was a lot of fun (even though it was COLD). After that, the whirlwind began. I went to our meeting at 10:00 then had time to quickly grab lunch and eat in the lobby. My sellers were already showing up, and I was meeting with them all afternoon up until the cocktail reception and dinner. It was SO much fun to see them all, though! Some of them I had met before, and others I hadn't. I'm not going to lie, it was GREAT to see the people that I've met before, because they all just told me how fabulous I look ;-) I don't ever feel that way, so it was fun to hear. We had our dinner and were able to be done for the night at about 9:30 or 10. Knowing how long Tuesday was going to be, you would think I would have made that the end of my day. Of course not! A group of us decided to grab a taxi and head up to the Lincoln Memorial. We got there around 10:30, and wandered around taking pictures. We then decided that it was time to head back, and we couldn't catch a cab for the life of us! We checked with the information booth that was there on the grounds, and they told us where to stand. We did that. We saw cabs passing another corner, so we went there. Nothing. Someone dialed 411 to get the number for a cab company and got voicemail. We went back to the information booth and they gave us another number, and the number was no longer in service. The guy then suggested that we head down to Constitution Avenue, thinking we'd have better luck. On the way there, we found another information booth. We figured we should get the number for ANOTHER cab company just in case. The guy at that booth told us that even if we DID have a phone number, no cabs would pick us up from the Lincoln Memorial because there is no address there. *blink* REALLY?!? NO cab can pick you up from the Lincoln Memorial by calling?!? Huh. We finally made it to Constitution Avenue and caught a cab about 2 blocks down (after Lance rolled his ankle, of course). I have to admit, though...it was a lot of fun watching all the guys chase after cabs that were driving by, hehe.

Tuesday was an early morning. We had to be down for breakfast by 7:30. We ate and had to socialize, and we couldn't sit with our "friends", we had to find lonely members and go talk to them. Last year, that part killed me. I hated walking up to people that I didn't know. I have this tendancy to assume that no one would want to talk with me. This year it was no problem at all! I would just walk up to random people and start talking. It was a LOT of fun :-) It was a day full of not fun announcements for the company, and long classes and complaint sessions, but we made it through. We did the dinner thing, then a performance by "The Capitol Steps" (I wasn't too impressed...but I don't get into political stuff much so I had a difficult time finding the humor). Then came my FAVORITE part of the conference. Karaoke!!

Ok, I'll pick up where I left off later :-) It's time for me to hit the gym before heading home!

Adam's Baptism

2008-02-03T01:24:00.000-07:00

Wow, I never even got caught up after eCommerce. I decided that I'd better write about Adam's baptism while everything is fresh on my mind. Unfortunately, I tend to get caught up in the idea of "but I need to get caught up on everything else first!" I then get further and further behind...so I decided that everyone can deal with me writing about things out of order. Maybe one of these days I'll even get back to writing about Disney World from clear back in September. Tonight it's all about Adam and his baptism, though :-)

It's been a really long day. My parents, Julie & Roger, Jen & Scott, all their kids, and I all met up at the gas station to caravan down to St. George. After my whirlwind trip to DC earlier this week, the last thing I wanted was another 5 hours cooped up (that's how long my flights were). To see the kids, though?? I would have doubled the travel time and cut the amount of time I could see them in half. It's just really nice to be able to spend time with them again.

We made it to Hurricane in time to hang out with Todd's family for a bit before the 3 kids came over. I was SO excited to see them! Dominic had fun handing money that he found over to Ashalee. He was hesitant at first, but he warmed up :-) My mom gave the 4 boys each a hat of Grandpa Astle's. Jake and Adam both like BYU, so they got the BYU hats. Levi and Andrew ended up with Dodgers hats. They all looked so cute! It was nice to see how well all of the kids interact.

We then hurried over to the church for the baptism. The baptism itself was great. I had a few issues that I was trying to get over with the whole thing, but overall it was really nice. I'm SO proud of Adam for making this decision on his own. After the baptism, there was time for cake, a little chatting, and a quick change. It was nice to see Angela and her family again. It always makes me sad when I think about the friendship that was lost with the way that everything took place. I'm hoping that at some point there might be a way around that. Who knows.

I considered staying down there overnight with Julie and Roger. I decided to come home, though, due to all the time that I had already been away this week. I really wanted my bed. Then what do I do? I stay up until almost 2am instead, hehe.

You can see the rest of the pictures from the baptism here.

Quick post before leaving...

2008-01-27T05:56:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's 6am and I haven't slept yet. Does this sound familiar?? Sadly, this happens almost every time I travel. I don't know what it is. I thought I would spend a little time catching up quickly, again :-)

After New Years, things got really busy at work. Between trying to rush through and finish getting stuff ready for eCommerce and trying to catch up from being gone for a month...I had a lot to do.

The next couple of weeks were a little foggy. I went to a YSA activity somewhere in there, and we played glow in the dark volleyball. Seriously...a LOT of fun :-) We also went to lunch for my mom's birthday. It's getting to be near impossible to get everyone together for that stuff anymore, hehe. I also had a game night at Jen's where we played "Settlers of Catan" (the German version that I brought back, hehe). When my friend Brandon came home from his mission about 8 years ago we played it (he brought it back from Germany with him). I LOVED it. While I was in Germany, I mentioned to Tammie that I couldn't remember what the game was called or anything about it, but I knew what the board looked like. By looking at the backs of all the games, I was able ot pin it down to "Settlers". I then got back home, and started hearing commercials for it over here...lol. I see how it is!!

I also ended up going to a play with my friend, Marjorie. I think this has to do with the "news" that my mom was referring to in her comment. One of Marjorie's other friends ended up coming with his nephew, and he sat next to me. As soon as intermission started, he started grilling me. Long story short...after the play, he gave me his email address and had asked for help with his eBay account. I answered his questions and sent an email back a couple of days later. I then got another email back asking if we could text back and forth. I said yes, of course, and we've talked to each other at least on the phone every single day since. He invited me to lunch last Saturday, as well. That went well enough that he ended up coming to Julie's to play games with me.

The rest of the week followed with dinners, lunches, or him just stopping by to see me every day for the last week (and 3 times on days like Friday). I'm still deciding how I feel about the whole thing, but apparently it's exciting for everyone, hrm.
Not much for "news" but apparently everyone gets all excited at the possibility of me dating someone...lol.

Ok, I've GOT to finish getting stuff ready for eCommerce. I need to leave for the airport in a little over an hour. Blah. I can't keep my eyes open! With any luck I'll have some pictures ready to post when I get back :-)

Where did all my time go??

2008-01-23T23:11:00.000-07:00

Wow...it's been a month since I posted. I have NO idea where all my time went. Christmas, starting back at work, New Year's, game nights, WoW nights, yeah...I don't seem to know where it all went. Here's a *very* quick update (and I promise I'll try to get pictures later).

We started our new Christmas traditions this year. We got together with my brothers and sisters (all who could) on Christmas Eve for dinner, presents, and all around family togetherness. It was a lot of fun to be together. As always, we really missed those who weren't there. One of these days we'll all be together again. I'm counting on it!

Christmas morning, I made the rounds with my parents. Wow, could I feel any more pathetic? I'm going to be the psycho aunt Coco who has nothing better to do for Christmas day than tag along with Grandma and Grandpa. It was nice to see the kids again, though (even though I had just seen them the night before). It was fun to see excitement on Christmas morning :-)

Mandy and Courtney came over a couple of days after Christmas to help me clear out my office. We got TONS done, but I still have a lot to do. It's always fun to just push through some cleaning with some nice good help.

I went back to work on New Year's Eve. I was SO not ready. Even though I had just spent 3 weeks out of the country...it didn't feel like I had been off of work for long enough! The first day was pretty easy, though.

I spent New Year's Eve with Julie and Roger and some members of Roger's family up at their house. We had a lot of fun with dinner, playing games, and just talking. Julie and I went outside and did fireworks at midnight (which was HILARIOUS when we came inside and saw the 3 guys hanging out in the living room watching out the window).

New Year's Day, we went to Stan and Sharon's to hang out. It was a LOT of fun. Becky, Courtney, and I shared the kid's table with Dominic (pictures still to come) while some of the other kids were swimming. It was then that I was convinced to make dinner and plan games and stuff for a double date for Courtney and Becky. More on this to come later.

Ok, at least I'm caught up to New Year's Day :-) A lot more has happened since then, but I'm far too exhausted. With my traveling to DC on Sunday for eCommerce...I have a LOT to do before then. I'll try to get a little more info in where I can, though :-)

Jet lag sucks

2007-12-21T07:02:00.000-07:00

So when I flew to Germany, I spent the first few days napping all day long and still able to go to bed at night. It wasn't great use of my time, but at least I was able to sleep through the night. Now that I'm home? Everything is all screwed up. 7:00 last night I couldn't seem to keep myself awake on the couch. I did wake up every 10 - 15 minutes, so it wasn't exactly *good* sleep. About 9, I came around again and was able to stay up. I finally went to bed at about 11, and woke up about an hour ago. 4:45 is not an acceptable time to be up and going for the day when I don't have to go to work. I'm tired, but not exhausted enough to crash.

I'm also having a difficult time just...resting. It's funny, I usually have no problem just being lazy when I get home from work. Now that I *should* stay down, I have far too much that I feel like I absolutely need to get done around the house. Don't get me wrong...it's true. I can barely walk through any room in my house at the moment. I have a LOT that I could do to stay productive while staying down, but of course I'm in the mood to do the physical stuff. The grass is always greener, right?

I had a lot of problems with pain yesterday. Wednesday was a very long and trying day. We apparently brought back WAY too much stuff, so we had to pack some of the heavier stuff in our carryons so that our checked luggage wouldn't be over the weight limit. My mom has issues standing for a long time, let alone carrying stuff. The result? My packing a good 75 lbs worth of stuff all through the Atlanta airport. As a result, I've found 10 bruises and I feel muscles that I didn't know I had. My plan was to stay down yesterday, but instead I apparently needed to grab my stuff from my parents' house and shop. Silly need to have food at my house :-)

So, I promised myself that I would stay down today. It's difficult when I wake up feeling a little better, but I know if I'm up and going it'll just get worse again.

This is why I'm happy that I planned my trip for the beginning of my sabbatical, and gave myself plenty of recovery time before going back to work :-)

Getting ready to go home...

2007-12-18T20:29:00.000-07:00

So it's 4:30 am, and I'm still not in bed. Trying to tie up a few last minute things before jumping on the plane to head home in about 5 hours. Man...time flies! I've really enjoyed my time here in Germany, and it's been SO nice to see Tammie, Gardner, and the kids!! I still have SO much to write about!! I'm excited to get home, though. I have SO MUCH to do for Christmas, I don't even know where to start! We'll see if I can sort through my thoughts on my way home and get a list started :-)

In the meantime, my Dominic started talking while I was gone!! This is the longest I've gone without seeing him, and I miss him SO much (I did have my Ian as a replacement...but that was a different happiness all together). Since Julie doesn't blog (YET) I feel the need to post the video of it :-)

100 lbs!! Wow!!

2007-12-18T05:45:00.000-07:00

So we're getting ready to head home. I have a lot of updating to do still, and a lot of pictures to post. I had to mention this exciting moment for me, though. A lady from Tammie's ward brought over a scale for us to weigh our suitcases. I was stuck at the same weight for about 2 - 3 weeks before coming over here, and with all the junk I've had I was SURE I had gained or stayed the same. I, of course, had to check. I stepped on the scale, and found that not only did I lose...but I finally passed my 100 lb mark!! YAY!!

I would post before and after photos, but 1) I'm not at home and don't have a "before" picture here, and 2) I'm still WAY too embarassed about the "before". Maybe one day I'll be able to :-)

An update

2007-12-14T02:34:00.000-07:00

Well, I've been trying to keep everything in the order that we've done them. This is getting me further and further behind, hehe. So...I decided to just go with yesterday. Tammie keeps mentioning that I haven't updated...I just want to note that she hasn't updated at all since we got here :-P Thank goodness for Gardner!

First, we went shopping yesterday at a store called Ratio. It's kinda like a WalMart. Food and sales on all kinds of random things. I spent about 60 euro, and it turned out that they didn't take my Mastercard. There went all the cash I had left (before the day even really started!) I DID get 2 pair of nice boots and a pair of shoes that I could wear. That's amazing! 40 euro for a pair of shoes and 2 pair of boots? Yeah...I was a happy girl.

Yesterday, we just went during the day to a couple of nearby cities. We first went to Venlo in the Netherlands. A lot of people have mentioned to Tammie about crossing the border to shop because everything is cheaper because of taxes. Venlo is the "across the border" city that people go to. So...off we went. I'm still amazed at how beautiful all these little towns are. You get to the city center, and everyone is just buzzing down these little narrow roads, and everything is all decorated up for Christmas. I find myself taking pictures of the same type of thing over and over again. There are so many beautiful buildings! We went into a LOT of shops! The first one that I kinda made Tammie & my mom stop at had fuzzy socks for 1 euro a pair. Seriously...my FAVORITE socks ever! So I bought a bunch, and convince my mom and Tammie that they wanted a few also :-)

We moved along, and just stopped in at all kinds of different shops. I loved it!

We then went to Kevelaer in Germany. There were some beautiful churches there! Tammie and I went inside 2 of them, and it's just amazing. We also found a Euro Shop (Dollar Store, hehe) and we were able to pick up a bunch of random stuff. Grabbed Belgian chocolates for people at work, more fuzzy socks (yes, I know I have a problem), and just all kinds of stuff. It was fun :-)

We then headed back home, and settled in for the night. Dinner, I spent some time reading, then Tammie, Gardner, & I watched some Joan ("Joan of Arcadia"...I still love that show).

I'll put of pictures later :-) That's another thing that was holding back my posts, but I figured it's better to get it written so this part is here at least!

12/1 - Brugge, Belgium

2007-12-05T18:13:00.000-07:00

We had a new adventure today. We headed out to Brugge, Belgium. Tammie mentioned to someone that we were thinking of going to Brussels, and she was told that we should try Brugge, instead. It's apparently a lot prettier, and there's just a lot more to see and do. Having never been to Brussels...I can't agree or disagree, but I *loved* Brugge. There was a LOT of confusion as to where we were supposed to go, and what we were trying to do...but we finally made it to the center of town. We also took Hannah with us to Brugge. We decided that as long as we were going on day trips, it would be nice to take one of the kids with us each time so that we would be able to spend that much more time with the kids one on, well, 3. There were a few rules about coming with us. Hannah wasn't allowed to say that she was bored, she couldn't complain about walking (cause hey...if Grandma can walk, Hannah can walk), and I don't remember the other rule right off...lol. It was an interesting drive in. About halfway through, Hannah was saying something about drinking a lot of water. At that point, Tammie pointed out that meant that she would need to go to the bathroom a lot. Hannah didn't seem to get it, so Grandma clarified with "What goes in must come out." That opened up a whole new set of information from Hannah! We learned all about what comes out your "tinkle place" your "poop place" and even the "baby place." Wow. We got quite the education! It was quite a trip. We quickly changed the subject, and Hannah then fell asleep.

Once we finally made it to Brugge, it was all kinds of confusion trying to figure out where we needed to go. Even with the navigation system, we couldn't seem to find parking, or which streets we could go down, or anything. We finally found a parking spot, and headed out into the cold to find Market Square where we could catch a carriage ride and a canal tour. We started walking towards a cathedral and the bell tower. We got to the cathedral, and sat to rest for a bit. We then realized that we had no idea where we were going, still. Someone who spoke English walked by and asked us if we knew where the canal tours were, so we had the chance to figure otu where the tourist office was (they had just been there). We left my mom and Hannah on a bench by the cathedral, and Tammie and I headed to the tourist office. We boguht ourselves a map, and got a better idea of where we needed to go. We hurried back to let my mom know that we were almost there.

We walked up a few more blocks and finally made it to Market Square. It was unbelievable! The clock tower, they had an ice skate rink set up, a Christmas Market, and all kinds of old & beautiful buildings. The Burg was the next area we had to go to. It was a couple of blocks away from Market Square, but wow! It was beautiful! I really wish we would hae had more time to look around, but we were trying to make it to a canal tour before it started raining (or got too dark!) We made it to the canal tour, and got just a little bit of rain during it. I was able to videotape some of it, but I don't think that the video does it justice. The pictures are pretty, but there's nothing like being there. We came out of the tour, and went back to The Burge for a bit. I took a few more pictures, but we got to the point where my mom was just done. On the way out, I kept thinking that I should buy some Belgian chocolates at least...cause...well...we WERE in Belgium. I never did buy any from the little shops that were there, though. We were just trying to get my mom back to the car. We stopped in one more little shop to try to get some chocolates, but they were so much more expensive than any of the other little shops. I keep thinking I should have just picked some up there anyway...because if I'm going to eat chocolate, it might as well be the *really* good stuff. I stopped myself, though. We made one more stop on the way out of town, and I bought a small box and a small candy bar there. I haven't eaten them yet...but I kinda wish I would have bought a few boxes at the cheaper price to take home, even. I also wish I would have picked up a Diet Coke with Lemon (since we don't have that in the US anymore). It's good, though...I definitely didn't need the Diet Coke!

We made one more stop on the way home. We needed potty and dinner (definitely in that order). We found a Pizza Hut Express which was apparently just what Tammie wanted. The good news was, it was only 30 cents to use the restroom instead of the usual 50 cents. YAY! It was very interesting to see wine offered in little bottles with the pizza, heh. Just..different. We ordered our pizza, and were on our way!

I tried to stay awake on the way home. Really, I did. I've had issues all week with staying awake unless I'm up and doing something. Jet lag has just completely kicked my butt. Not only did I sleep part of the way home, I also tried to stay up late enough to be able to sleep in tomorrow morning (which makes no sense because I need to get up early enough to shower and get ready for church, but that's a whole nother story).

Ok, I don't feel like playing around with the placement of pictures on the blog tonight...so you guys get a link. YAY!!

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v138/cocomo78/December07/Brugge/

2am

2007-12-05T18:03:00.000-07:00

Well it's 2am here in Germany, and I still haven't posted about our trip to Brugge last Saturday. I have it all typed up and everything! I even finally posted the pictures to my photobucket! I also still haven't gone to bed. I was all set to, then someone from work emailed me to let me know that I had been selected to go to our conference in D.C. next month like I was hoping. YAY!!!

Ok, I guess I'll put up my Brugge post since I'm up :-) *posts again NOW*

11/30 - Amsterdam

2007-12-03T17:01:00.000-07:00

Today we were going to rent a car and go to Amsterdam. Well...we still did, but just the car rental alone ended up being more of an adventure than we expected! Gardner and Tammie went to get the rental car that we had reserved online last night. My mom and I hung out with Emma and Ian while they went to get the car. Man, I thought they would never get back! I've never seen 2 kids so upset about being left with their aunt and grandma, hehe. I got them settled down with a movie, and they were finally settled by the time Tammie and Gardner got back to let us know that they weren't able to get the car yet. Wow! They hadn't taken their passports, which they apparently needed, as well as a bill or something to prove that they live in Germany (we got a deal on the car because of their residency here). We packed up and all headed back to the airport to get the car and take off to Amsterdam.
We got back to the airport and just waited. The machine went down, and we just had to wait. Come to find out, they actually upgraded our car, so we ended up with a hybrid. That was great (considering gas comes out to be about $6 a gallon here once everything is converted over)...but turning it on proved to be a challenge. They already warned us that the car wouldn't make any sound when it turned on, but Tammie also couldn't get the car in gear at all. It was...interesting. The car doesn't take a normal key, it's a big square key that you have to put in this big square hole. I'll have to take a picture before they take it back...lol. Once we got everything going...we were on our way. It took us just over 2 hours to get to Amsterdam. It was interesting to see all the old farmland all throughout Germany and the Netherlands. Also, I noticed that in The Netherlands, I saw exactly 1 advertisement along the freeway. The same one over and over again...lol. It was also interesting to see a bunch of buildings with the name "Visser" on them. Back in my chatting days, I used to talk to someone with the last name Visser, so it kinda threw me off. When we finally got into Amsterdam, the streets were very narrow, and the buildings with the apartments in them were just huge and close together. Tammie was telling us that you don't often see those places for rent or sale, either, because most people live in the same place their entire lives. Also, I swear *everyone* in the city rides their bikes, and they were all out today!

The Anne Frank house was our first stop. We were VERY lucky to get a parking spot *right* by it, as there wasn't much parking downtown at all. It was very interesting, but not quite what I expected. It was still nice to see, though. Makes me want to read the book again. We were then going to try to go on a canal cruise, but we couldn't find it. Tammie and I left our mom in the car and walked around for a bit. We ended up finding a little stand with hot dogs, hamburgers, and fries so we were able to grab lunch/dinner. Right next to out lunch/dinner stand...we had the gay and lesbian info center. Not sure what kind of info they were handing out...but I thought it was interesting that they had an entire kiosk...lol. It was and interesting city to see, and I would have liked to walk around more but it was *freezing*. We were going to look for the red light district as well, hehe, but decided to just move on to The Hauge the temple. Much better choice, hehe. We headed up there and the temple was beautiful. It was dark really early, so we weren't able to get too many good pictures, but you get what you can. It was definitely a good day trip, and we had the chance to talk a little about our plans for tomorrow.

You can see the rest of the pictures from Amsterdam here:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v138/cocomo78/November07/Amsterdam/

I was kinda selective, so I may be adding more later :-)

11/29 A day at home

2007-12-02T17:31:00.000-07:00

Today was mostly a day at home. A *very* busy day for Tammie. We went in the morning to take their mini van to get winter tires. Tammie, Emma, & I then walked home. On the way home, we stopped at the bakery. Tammie decided that we needed to start sampling what they have available at the bakery. We got brochen, a raisin snail, a pudding pretzel, and Emma got a Shokobrochen. The pudding pretzel was my favorite, I'd have to say. Emma had her Shokobrochen almost gone before the rest of us had a chance to sit down.I ended up falling asleep again off and on all afternoon and evening. Tammie went to parent teacher conferences for all 3 kids, and picked up the car before one of them. Not much else to say for the day, I just kinda hung out.

11/27 - 11/28 - The flight, and day 1 in Germany!

2007-12-02T17:04:00.000-07:00

Well, we made it :-) After working Monday night, I went to my parents' house and slept for about an hour before we had to get up and head to the airport. There was *no* line at all for ticketing or security. It was nice. The flight to Atlanta wasn't bad at all. I used my mom for a pillow, and slept the entire way. In Atlanta we rode one of those carts to our next gate (thankfully, not sure my mom woulda made that trek otherwise!). We grabbed lunch at Panda Express, and the layover was over before I knew it. I do have to mention...the Atlanta airport had these odd vegetables all over. I didn't notice them anywhere else...but the gate across from where we were had this random giant carrot with a lima bean rotating on top of it. Just...odd. There was also an ear of corn shaped like an airplane. Yeah...we couldn't figure them out *laugh* but it gave us something to laugh at while we were waiting.
We were very lucky for the flight from Atlanta to Dusseldorf. It was empty enough that we were each able to have our own set of seats. Spreading out over 2 seats makes a HUGE difference when you're flying for 9 hours. They gave us these little kits with blindfolds, headphones, earplugs, a toothbrush & toothpaste, lotion, and a few other things. They also fed us tons of food (well...tons for me...lol). I slept lots, and tried to watch the movies ("Mr. Bean's Holiday" isn't my kind of movie...then "License to Wed" was on and I was so tired I couldn't stay awake). So overall, not bad. The sunset even looked WAY cool when I woke up in the middle of the flight. I tried to take a picture of it, but the picture couldn't capture how cool it was.We made it to the Dusseldorf airport about an hour early, and hung out waiting for Tammie to pick us up.

Tammie showed up with Emma, and we headed back to their house. We did have our first experience on the autoban. Ok, I have anxiety bad enough when other people drive...but going 90 on the curves? I had to not watch. My mom kept telling Tammie to slow down. It was pretty funny. We got back to their house just in time to say hi to Spencer and Shantal just before they had to leave for school. We sat up and talked for a bit, then my mom went downstairs to sleep. I tried to stay awake, then slept on the couch for 4 hours apparently. It didn't feel like that to me, but then again...it never does! I still had a pretty bad headache when I woke up, and I fought sleep the rest of the night. Tammie and I ran to the grocery store to get more bread, and she wanted to show me the grocery store experience. Wow! If you don't watch it, you'll get left behind. They check out the items, and you have to bag them as fast as they check them out. You also have to deposit a euro to use the shopping cart. Then, when you lock the cart back in, you get your euro back. We had dinner, then I went upstairs with Gardner to try to figure out the wireless internet (they didn't know their security key...then when we figured it out...it still wouldn't work because Vista hates wpa-psk security, apparently.)

I then just completely crashed. I was SO tired. I tossed and turned a bit, but was up for the day by about 7 in the morning. That is SO not like me. Here are some of the pictures from the flight/airport & my first day :-)

Seperation Anxiety?

2007-11-27T02:36:00.000-07:00

I apparently have an issue letting go of work. A lot of people who know me, know this. I'm supposed to be technically on my sabbatical at the moment. I leave for Germany at 8:45 this morning. What did I do after I got all packed and took my bags to my parents' house? I came to work. At midnight. To finish up a project. Why? That's a good question. I'm using the excuse that it'll be good for me to stay up all night so that I'll sleep on the plane (It'll be about 7:30am there when we get in, hehe). Really? I just have a hard time letting go. I'm thinking that once I can finish up this project, though...I should be good to go.

Really...I can stop at any time!

4:30 am...and still no sleep

2007-11-24T04:37:00.000-07:00

Well here it is. 4:30 am, and I still haven't gone to bed yet. You would have thought that I would have learned from last night! Julie, Roger, Roger's brother, and I did the Black Friday thing, and headed to WalMart at about 1:00 am. We got back to my parents' house at about 8, then I fell asleep for a few hours. I then got up, and we did the Almond Roca thing. Mmmmmm it's far too yummy!!

Well, it's now 5:30, and I haven't gotten much more done...though it feels like I've been working the entire time! I really need to work on a few more things, see how much I can get done before friends come over for the game today.

Well, this is pretty short, and with any luck I'll be able to upload some pictures during the game (no...really this time! Maybe!!)

6 days?!?

2007-11-21T07:49:00.000-07:00

So as much as I hate Christmas music on the radio way too early in the season, there are a couple of songs I can hear year round, and there's just something about them. One of them just came on my iPod. "Believe" by Josh Groban. *drool* Seriously?!? I can't get enough of his voice. He actually came out with a Christmas cd last month, and this song isn't on it (neither is his version of "O Holy Night" which is another that I could listen to him sing over and over again).

I'm having a difficult time getting any work done at the moment. It's 7:30am, and I'm just plain exhausted and overwhelmed. I feel like I have SO MUCH to do for work before I leave, and SO MUCH to do for non-work stuff before I leave. I just...don't feel like there's any time. Originally, today would have been my last day before my sabbatical started. Instead, I'll be working some over the weekend as well as putting in a 12 hour day on Monday. I then leave Tuesday morning at 8am. Just crazy! No time to get my ipod updated with music I randomly have saved all over the place, or to put new movies on it (I still have the movies I originally put on it a year and a half ago, and that's all), or to put together everything I'm trying to take for Tammie's family (movies they've missed, etc). Just...craziness! I need to get together with my mom to figure out clothes (we're sharing so that we can save room in the suitcases, heh).

Also, I'm taking a break today to donate blood, then I need to go straight to my dr's office after work today to get my flu shot. From there, I need to go get my oil changed (at WalMart so that I can get my other shopping done at the same time! hehe).

Sorry, just had to have a little mini freak out moment. This was especially due to the fact that I am exhausted and can't concentrate. Doesn't work well when I'm trying to get everything wrapped up at work :-) I'm feeling a little better now...so off I go to try to get something done!

The weekend...

2007-11-20T07:37:00.000-07:00

A week from tomorrow I will be leaving for Germany. I have FAR too much work to get done to think I'm leaving in a week, let alone the fact that 2 of those days I won't be working because of holidays!! I might have to come in over the weekend to get some things done.

It was a pretty busy weekend for me. I had Rob & Chrissy's kids Friday night so that they could get away for Chrissy's birthday. Mandy missed the bus, so I left work to go get her, then made her sit here at my work while I finished some stuff up. I later couldn't decide if that was a reward or punishment...lol. Either way, it's alwways fun to show off the kids :-)

When we got back to Rob & Chrissy's, the other kids and I did a Smith's run to get treats (as we always do when I watch them). I then played around until I found the password to their wireless internet, at which point I squealed and clapped. I then acknowledged myself as the geek that I am...lol. Lee decided to throw in his "Coco is a geek" too. I was ok with that :-) I was then able to play with my weekly WoW group while watching movies with the kids. Always fun!

Then, as usual, half of the kids fell asleep in the family room upstairs and the other half in the family room downstairs. Oh well. As long as they had fun :-) I then told the kids that they *had* to clean, and I fell back to sleep (since I was up til, oh, 4). A little before 11 I got up to check on them all, and there was still SO much to be done. I felt like the mean aunt not letting Allison and Mandy go to a party they had been invited to last minute...but that's the ONE thing Chrissy wanted for her birthday. It eventually got done, blah blah blah, I let Courtney drive them over :-)

After Rob & Chris got home, Chris made a cake for Allison's birthday party that night. After the cake was in the oven, we heard s a loud "OH MY GOSH!!!" from the other room. Next thing I see, is little Lee walking in...just as seen here. I was pretty amused. It's not my desktop at work :-)

Beyond that, things have been EXTREMELY busy here. It's the 2nd day of a 3 day work week, and I feel like I didn't accomplish anything yesterday (although the number of emails in my inbox Went from 91 to 29, so that's not too shabby!) Today is also "Show your colors" day for the big game on Saturday. So, I'm sitting here in my blue with all kinds of red around me. It'll just be that much more fun they kick butt on Saturday ;-)

7 Random Facts...

2007-11-14T01:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry, this was from a couple of nights ago...and I just realized I never posted it!

Well, Gardner tagged me for 7 Random facts. SO...here goes...

1. I worked 42 hours of OT the week before last. Not 42 hours...but 42 hours of OT making my total workload for the week before last 82 hours. That was a good paycheck :-)

2. I get to see Tammie and Gardner in 2 weeks!!! I know everyone knows this, but I'm sososososo excited!!! I'm a little nervous about being in a country where I don't speak a WORD of the language...but it should be fun nonetheless.

3. I almost did an impulse purchase on eBay today for $550. I want a Sony HandyCam DCR-SR42 SO badly. I found a great package for it to come with, too. I kept trying to justify it by saying, "Hey, when am I *ever* going to be in Europe again?!?" I still couldn't do it. No matter what...I just can't justify the money. I hate that.

4. For the previous post...I typed the word "busy" in the title as "bisy" 4 or 6 times before finally typing it correctly. Seriously?!? I can type!

5. I REALLY want to get my condo organized to the point where my space is useful. As it is, you can't get into the office (I would take a picture, but I would be WAY too embarrassed to). I have scrapbook stuff all over the floor of my front room which has been there for about 3 months. I *seriously* need to take time to get stuff done at home...but I never seem to have any time to.

6. I was VERY nice to my neighbors and chose to not do my elliptical tonight due to the time. I do, however, still need to find props to take with me to work for the silly little video that we're doing for our holiday card. I really really don't want my accounts to see me. Yeah....

7. I'm addicted to sunflower seeds and sugar free sobe adrenaline rush energy drinks (I wonder if the energy drinks are because of the busyness...hmmm...)

I tag Courtney, Mom, and Rhonda. GO! :-)

Busy busy girl...I know...

2007-11-14T00:46:00.000-07:00

So here it is, 12:45am. What am I doing? Sleeping? Of course not. I'm waiting for chicken to thaw so that I can cut up chicken to put in with cream of chicken soup for our potluck at work tomorrow. The one that I was asked to arrange, oh, Friday afternoon. YAY! Someone suggested Hawaiian Haystacks, which seemed like a fabulous idea. I didn't realize at the time that it would be Wednesday...which meant that I would have to prepare Tuesday night. The same night that I had already signed up to work overtime. The same night that I promised a couple of girls from work that I would go to the gastric bypass meeting with them (they're getting it next year! YAY!!). The same night I was planning to shop for a new shirt because we have to be videotaped tomorrow for a holiday card for our sellers. The same day that I woke up late and had to go BACK to work after the gastric bypass meeting. SO...tonight has been hectic. I worked until 5:30, went to the meeting, got back to work around 8 and worked until 10. I was at WalMart until 10:45, then had to stop at my parents' house to pick up my large crockpot. Got there at 11, showed my mom my new shirts (yay!) then got home to realize that it was 11:30 at night and I still needed to let the chicken thaw. Great. So the chicken is...trying to thaw. I got the cream of chicken soup into the crockpot...just waiting for the chicken. I still need to do my elliptical for the night (I'm sure my downstairs neighbors LOVE me for that), and I feel like I have a million things to do still. I leave for Germany in less than 2 weeks now, I have about a week of work left, and the rest of the quarter's worth of work to do. My friend would also like me to take pictures of her rings from her first engagement, and I still have LOTS of cleaning to do. Just....blah. NO TIME! On the upside...I just got an email from The Melting Pot stating that for every $100 in gift certificates I buy, I'll get $100 in gift certificates :-) Looks like I might be able to go back sooner than I planned!! hehe

Visiting Grandma and Grandpa

2007-11-06T08:01:00.000-07:00

So when Lindsey and I did the haunted tour a week and a half ago, we made a stop at the Salt Lake Cemetery. We half joked about visiting grandma and grandpa, but there was no way we would have enough time, heh. Todd brought Jacob up for the BYU game on Saturday, though, so after the game we all went up to see Grandma and Grandpa's gravesite. It was my first time going since they put Grandpa's death date on there. It seems so...real now. I remember when we took Grandpa a few months ago to go see the headstone. He saw his name on it, and said, "There's no date, so that must mean I'm not dead yet!" We all got a good chuckle.

I was disturbed, however, to see tracks running OVER the gravesite, however. I'm sure they're from a riding mower of some sort, or something for the sake of groundskeeping...but because there is not any sod covering the grave yet...it just makes it worse. In a situation like that where the sod isn't covering the dirt...would it be so difficult to at least try to rake over the dirt or SOMETHING?!? I could just be a little sensitive about it...but...it made me sad to see.

Birthdays all around

2007-11-04T23:36:00.000-07:00

After what's been an extremely overly crappy week, I decided to should do a quick post. I still (as always) have SO MUCH to catch up on...but I decided to just...post about today. We went up to Jen's today to celebrate Cami's 5th birthday. She's already 5...how did that happen?!? We also celebrated Courtney's 17th, Allison's 10th, and Chrissy's 41st birthdays. Wow. All kinds of craziness! I've really really got to get some sleep so I'll leave my update at that...but I thought I'd also include one more picture. Cami (at 5!!) has already developed an interest in using my camera to take pictures. I allow Courtney and Jacob use my camera if they have the strap around their neck...but I wasn't sure about Cami. I decided that as long as she stayed on the carpet, she would be ok. I actually thought this was a decent picture of me (and Court), so I decided to include it.

Last work update...

2007-10-27T14:15:00.000-06:00

Ok, this is my last update from work. This is to help push me past this last little bit. I made it, though!! I totally forgot that sunflower seeds help keep me awake! I need to buy more before tomorrow, because tomorrow is going to be crazy! I'm coming in at 5am. I'll be working until about 12:30 so that I can go to church. After church, I'll finish up the last 4.5 hours. Ew. The good news...is that it's still emails. That makes this OT SO much easier!

Now, I'm going to head home and shower then nap. Tonight we're really (really this time, heh) going on the haunted tour of Salt Lake. Should be fun!!

Update: Working WAY too early

2007-10-27T07:04:00.000-06:00

Well...my update is SO not good. I think I have been defeated by OT. I can't keep my eyes open. I might have to go home and get a little bit of sleep and come back. I know it's not possible for me to wait it out until 2:20 at this point. That's 7 1/2 hours away. Longer than I've been here. in another 2o minutes, I will have only been here for 5 hours. Blah. I definitely haven't bee productive enough. Blah blah blah!

big yawns

2007-10-27T02:32:00.000-06:00

Well, it's 2:30am, and I'm at work again. I haven't gone to bed yet. Why, you might ask? Because there's overtime available! Anyone who knows me knows that if there is overtime available for work...I jump at it. So...it's been 12 hour days since Monday. I've been trying to still keep up with my weekly routines, too. So all in all, it's been one exhausting week!! Monday night was Melting Pot. Tuesday night I stayed til 7:30 while Lys was still interviewing (she got hired today, btw!!)we then had to go rescue Dan from work, which meant driving him down to Lehi. I then took Lys home, and got home around 9:30, myself. Wednesday night I didn't get home until about 8 or 8:30, but I was able to stay home the rest of the night :-). Thursday night is movie night. My friend Becky comes over to watch Veronica Mars. I was late getting hime, but we both decided that we still needed our movie night. It was really nice. I also spent a couple of hours designing a logo for a friend at work. She loved it! (which made me REALLY happy). In fact, she showed it to so many people, that I now have a few requests to work on. I love being able to put things like that together :-). Tonight (er, last night?) I got off of work a little after 7:30. I stopped at home just long enough to grab my laptop, then head to Lys's. The plan was to help her unpack while I play WoW with my weekly group. Yeah...I wasn't as productive as I had planned, heh. I did play with my group until about 1:30, at which point I had to leave. It was either come to work now, or come in at 5:00am (so I'll be done in time to go on the haunted tour tonight!!) So...thank goodness for Del Taco being open 24 hours, and for having a Totinos Party Pizza in my freezer. I luckily also had 1 sugar free energy drink left in my fridge. YAY!

I'm now sitting alone on my half of the building...in the dark...and I just got spooked by my own reflection in the cubicle window. Yeah, that was great...lol. Oh! I also got our "professional" pictures back from Disney World. I can't wait to get some up! It took 7 discs to get all of our pictures in high resolution...so this is going to be FAR too much fun, hehe.

Ok, back to work for me. The OT for today is, luckily, emails. I can just throw on my headphones and crank out the emails. It's great! If I can just get through the next 12 hours...I'll be great!

The Melting Pot

2007-10-23T08:27:00.000-06:00

For how much I was dreading it, last night was actually a really fun night. After working 7am - 7pm on no sleep, the last thing I wanted to do was go to dinner with Lys and some guy I don't know . I just wanted to go straight home and get some sleep. Sadly, I couldn't. I had already said I would go to dinner. Luckily, that didn't end up being a problem. We went to The Melting Pot, and it was way too yummy. The atmosphere was great, good music, and just time to hang out and talk. We were talking last night about how dinners aren't "events" anymore. Most places you go, you rush in and rush out. We were there for 2 1/2 hours, and it was nice to just sit and chat. The problem is that it makes me want to go places like that more often and...well...I SO can't afford that :-P

Marjorie & Bill's Engagements...take 2

2007-10-22T04:31:00.000-06:00

I had another go at Marjorie and Bill's engagement photos last weekend. I haven't had much time to play around with them, so here are a few (click the picture to see them)...

Can't Sleep...

2007-10-22T01:32:00.000-06:00

So I've been laying in bed for the last hour and a half, and I can't sleep. With how much I have been running myself ragged the last couple of months, it's been a while since I had this problem. My problem lately has been getting back up after crashing at night. I finally decided that I should probably just get up and try to make my sleepless time at least productive...so here I am up to work on business plans for work. This really isn't a good way to start out a HUGE overtime week. I plan on working 7 - 7 every day this week through Thursday. Friday I will be working 4 hours, then driving down to St. George for the night to see Todd, Rhonda, & the kids. I'll then head back up here on Saturday just in time to do my Haunted Tour that was postponed from this week. Sunday I'll hit church then work (or work then church?) to make up the time that I'm missing on Friday. So...tonight is not a good night to start off with insomnia.

Blah.

Time to update

2007-10-21T15:53:00.000-06:00

Well, I finally have the time to update, and now everything that I was going to talk about feels like it was SO long ago. I could still do Disney World, and probably should since I'm so bad at keeping a "real" hand written journal. This would at least allow me to have some written record.

We didn't end up going on the haunted tour last night because of the snow. I was *really* disappointed, because I have been looking forward to it all week. I was really relieved, though, when Lindsey called and brought up possibly waiting. Just driving from my friend's house to my own was kinda scary enough in the snow. Now? It's bright and sunshiny. Hrm. God sure does have a sense of humor when it comes to the weather sometimes :-P

Hanging out with Lindsey and Dennis

2007-10-16T23:26:00.001-06:00

So as usual, I'm exhausted so I won't be writing much. I just wanted to make sure that I get in what a great time I had tonight hanging out with Lindsey and Dennis! It's always a little nerve wracking to hang out with someone that I haven't spent that much time with in so many years, but it was really a lot of fun. I got there, and we just talked for about an hour and a half straight. They also made me yummy bratwurst (which I can actually have...but I found that I can't eat a full one of...lol). Catching up on the last 15ish years and stuff was great. Lindsey and I then hung out in the hot tub for a while which was SO nice!! It was pretty cold and rainy here, so it was nice to enjoy the time semi-outdoors while staying nice and warm. The talking, of course, went on the entire time we were in the hot tub as well. I was just getting ready to leave when we started talking about a haunted SLC tour which is running for the holiday. I decided that it sounded like so much fun, that I practically forced them to invite me *laugh* so it looks like we have plans for Saturday. We then got into all kinds of fun ghost stories and such. I'm so happy that I was able to go tonight. It was really nice to see their family and hang out for a bit.

mini update in pictures...

2007-10-15T22:54:00.000-06:00

I've had so much go on in the last 2 weeks. What's funny is that with each one, I think, "Oh, I have to blog about this!" or I'll take pictures and think "I can put these pictures in my blog when I write about this!" Neither ends up happening, as I have been WAY too exhausted at the end of each day to even start typing up what has made me so exhausted! So, here are a few pictures that represent the last couple of weeks. With any luck, I'll be able to get a real update done soon :-)

Here's the cake from my dad's birthday. Fitting for a 64 year old, no?

He still has it (and no, the grandkids didn't help, hehe). He was able to get all *8* candles out ;-)

These were my projects for our Fabulous Friday for Enrichment. I'm so excited at how they turned out! I wish I woulda done something different with the Thanksgiving one (I saw someone break away from the "pattern"and painted the "Turkey" block green. It looked really nice! I'll have to remember stuff like that for next time :-)

Friday night was also Whitney Dansie's Quincinera. The big 1-5 in Latino world. The party was at Bar-D ranch out in Herriman. I was running late because of Enrichment that night, but it was actually a LOT of fun. I will have to elaborate on the party later. It's definitely worth the story (and more pictures!)

On Saturday, we celebrated Julie's birthday with dinner at Golden Corral. It was nice, I was able to buy my food by the pound, and took LOTS home (and still spent less than everyone else, hehe). Cami came straight from her soccer game, so she's still in her uniform. She informed me that she won her game. She then later admitted that it was a tie, hehe.
Sunday morning, I was finally able to get more engagements taken of Marjorie and Bill. I know, I know, I still need a LOT more practice. Every time I think I'm ready...I finish with a shoot, and think, "Seriously?!? Was that the best I could do??" once I get them on the computer. One of these days I'll be happy with it, I'm sure!!

Sunday evening we got together for Uncle Dave's 65th birthday. It was a lot of fun! That's where I learned that he had started a blog, too. I also fell in love with his camera. Don't get me wrong, my camera is still my baby...but it's always nice to play with something new. It's a good thing I don't have *any* money to spare after the new laptop.

Marjorie & Bill

2007-10-02T17:38:00.000-06:00

I don't blog much about my photography, but I decided that since it's a lot of what I love that maybe I shoulg start! Last week, I took the first set of my friend's engagement pictures. I say the first set, because we knew that we were fighting the light, yet I was eager to get my practice in :-) Please keep in mind that there are some things I couldn't control well (I won't list them here, because it might sound a little mean...lol). Here's what I was able to do with what I had :-) (Yes, click on the picture to view the rest of them).
We'll be doing more this weekend (with any luck!) at Cascade Springs, so I'll be sure to share those, as well :-)

Lots of stuff

2007-09-30T02:22:00.000-06:00

Today turned out to be a pretty good day. It started with going up to North Salt Lake for Justin's baptism. Man, these kids are growing up!! Justin is Lindsey & Dennis' 3rd child. It was a lot of fun to see family again (especially under more exciting circumstances than last time, hehe). It was nice to spend some time with Lindsey, and we even made some plans to get together in about a week and a half here :-) It should be fun.

Did I mention what while we were at the baptism...it snowed?!? It's September still!!! There should be NO SNOW!! Luckily it changed back to rain...but still!

After the baptism, I had to run to Costco to get the cake for my dad's birthday tomorrow (ok...today? I need to stop writing stuff after midnight! lol). It actually turned out pretty cute with a little skateboarder kid on it. Perfectly appropriate for a 64 year old, right? I was also able to pick up my dad's main birthday present. No one has been able to think of anything to get him. I finally came up with an idea while I was at Costco, and quickly called my mom and siblings to go in on it. It should work out well :-)

After Costco, I was just hanging out at my mom's for the rest of the night. We watched the rest of Women's Conference while I played with my new laptop :-) Yup, I got myself a new one! I know, trust me, I know I can't afford it. Luckily one of my friends owes me enough money that she will be paying for it AND she'll still be paying me back some cash. I figure with all of the projects that I've been trying to work on...I'm going to need the new one!! (Not that any of you care, but I'm geeky enough that I *have* to include the info on it. You can see the laptop I got HERE. :-)

Well, that's gotta be all for now. I really need to catch up and post my Disney World entries, as well as some of the stuff that's gone on the last couple of weeks. Things have just been INSANE to say the least.

Home

2007-09-17T22:38:00.001-06:00

I just wanted to do a quick post to say that yes, I did make it home yesterday. I'm just *exhausted*. I'm hoping to blog about it all soon...but I'm still trying to pull my life back together. Work today was horrible! I hate coming back, because if things don't get taken care of completely while I'm gone...it's just a mess. That's what happened this time. It's also the busiest time of the quarter...the end. I have this week and next to finish everything up. Yeah...we'll see how it works out. I have about a million things that people want me to do for them, too...so I'm gonna be a busy girl. Right now? I just want some sleep!! So...I hope I can update soon...but forgive me if I don't :-)

Turn Around...

2007-09-05T02:07:00.000-06:00

So, the funeral was today (Ok, it's 2am, so technically...yesterday?). I felt very numb at first. With the viewing and funeral...it just...didn't look like my grandpa in the casket. It is, of course...but it felt surreal. Things started to hit more as the funeral progressed. It was really nice to hear Grandpa's best friend speak. It was a lot of fun to hear stories that I never would have heard, otherwise. Grandpa siphoned gas from someone else's tank to get home from a scouting activity?? When he was first ordained to be a bishop...someone spiked the punch at a fellowshipping party?? Even better...Grandma knew, and didn't tell Grandpa!! How great is that!! There were also the stories I had never heard about the war. With working on the video for grandpa (which, for those cousins that read this, I *am* making copies of...I just didn't want to sacrifice the little sleep I got last night in order to make them in time for the funeral, heh), I saw a LOT of WWII pictures. I saw Grandpa with lots of other men in the service. I did not realize that he was the *only* survivor on a mission where 8 were sent. When I see older men around who fought in the war, I never really thought about how lucky it was that they were still with us. Grandpa, especially, never talked about the war...so the naive part of me assumed he was always in a "safe" place (if that's possible). To hear that his life was spared *so* closely more than once...it's a miracle. I'll be eternally grateful for his life being spared.

I now leave in about 3 hours to go to the airport for my Disney World trip. I didn't pack until WAY too late...and now I wanted to get things updated, and pictures posted. We'll see how that goes. I'm very happy to be one of those who can sleep on planes. It'll be interesting to see how I can just turn around and be excited after such an emotional day today.

Also...the pictures from the viewing can be seen here, and the pictures from the funeral can be seen here.

Also, today was my mom and dad's 42nd wedding anniversary. How sad to have to bury your dad on that day. Tonight Lys, Scott, & I ran to Costco and picked up a cake and got my parents each their own container of cashews. It's not much...but I wanted to make sure that they weren't forgotten in the shuffle of it all.

The viewing...

2007-09-04T09:07:00.001-06:00

It feels like forever ago that I got the call letting me know that my grandpa passed away in his sleep. In reality, it was just 9 days ago. I made it through the viewing last night, though partially because of the fact that his body didn't look like him. I *just* saw him 2 weeks ago, too...so it's not like he's changed all that much (besides the whole being dead thing).

I meant to post his obituary yesterday or Sunday...but Ive been pretty busy with trying to get stuff done for the funeral.

Last night was a little surreal. As I did with my grandma, I passed over the body at first, and didn't go up until much later. My 4 year old niece, Cami, actually dragged me over to it. She just stared at him, then placed her hand on his. Very cute. She then looked over and me and said, "He is freezing!" It was quite funny. Her next comment was, "Coco, why did his spirit have to go to heaven?" For lack of a simpler answer, I told her that his body hurt really bad, so he needed to leave it here so that he wouldn't hurt anymore. She then said "It was a long time ago when Grandma Astle was in there. Then we buried her!" The "then we buried her" part was said in a louder voice while swinging her arms back and forth, almost as if she were marching. I just giggled at her, and let her know that we would be doing the same thing with Grandpa "tomorrow" (today). She then went on to talk about her excitement for Disney World (as we leave tomorrow).

His passing is still bitter-sweet. It's SO good for him to be able to be with my grandma again. Someone at my work made a comment about "deep love," and about how studies have been done regarding the passing of 2 people who deeply loved each other happening within a year of each other. In this case, I really think it came down to him not knowing *how* to live without her. I envy that feeling.

After picking up my brother from the airport at midnight last night...we're up and going, and on our way to the funeral.

2007-08-26T23:06:00.000-06:00

Grandpa...

I waited all day before posting this. I wanted to make sure that none of the family members who read my blog learned from my post. Now that I'm positive they all know...

Sometime between 1 and 3 this morning, my grandpa passed away. I have very mixed feelings about this sad blessing for him. Ever since my grandma passed away last October, he has just gone downhill. Recently, he hasn't had any kind of life at all. He missed my grandma tremendously (although his short term memory wouldn't allow him to remember that she was already gone). I'm happy that he was able to pass peacefully, and that the "burden" that had been on my parents and my mom's siblings since September of last year is gone. They had been visiting my grandpa (and my grandma before she passed away) every single day for the last 13 months. The only exception to this was vacations (which they all felt horrible going on with). A strain that definitely took it's toll on my parents & my aunts and uncles. With the blessing of peace for everyone that this brings, I'm very very sad that I no longer have my grandpa. I'm not sure it's hit me yet, though.

One of those days...(in a good way!)

2007-08-22T09:09:00.000-06:00

Do you ever have those days that just randomly get off to a good start? Today is one of them for me. I'm not sure why. I got up easily, I got to work 10 minutes early, and I've been productive so far this morning (which for me? is huge! I'm almost never productive first thing in the morning!)

I guess what I'm trying to say...is that I actually feel good this morning. Every once in a while, I've noticed a difference with how I've felt since surgery, but it's really obvious to me today for some reason.

It's now safe to ask...I'm very happy I made the decision to have surgery :-)

Pictures...

2007-08-21T21:55:00.000-06:00

I've been meaning to post for a few days now. Last week, I had my birthday, we went to the zoo, and my cousin's wedding was Saturday. All fun stuff, I have good pictures that I wanted to share...and I never got to it. SO...here's a link to pictures from the zoo:

Hogle Zoo

Here are pictures from the wedding:

Billy & Cindy Marquardt (I hope I spelled that right...the invitation is in the other room...lol)

Enjoy :-)

The weekend

2007-08-13T23:43:00.000-06:00

Most of Saturday was spent volunteering for the corporate games. I'm not sure what possessed me to sign up for so many hours...but I was volunteering from 8:30 am until 2:30 in the afternoon. I volunteered for longer than that, but they were done with me. I volunteered to help with the softball tournament (where as you can see, eBay took 2nd place :-) ). It was a lot of fun. I ended up running up and down stairs all day, which means that I'm STILL sore...but very much worth it. I was able to read while in between registration rushes, so it all worked out :-)

I then babysat my Dominic the rest of the night while Julie and Roger went to a Bees game. He walked around with his tongue out like this for most of the night, hehe. It was fun, though. I love being able to have him around!

Sunday, I forced myself to go to church (I was in LOTS of pain...and wanted to stay home to read...but I've been doing well for 2 months and I'm not about to give up now!). It turned out to be a really good thing, as one of my friends from when I grew up showed up! Her mom is in my ward, and it was nice to see her. It's been more than 10 years since I'd seen Emily...and...she hasn't changed a whole lot. We had some interesting conversations, got caught up, and I'll leave it at that...lol.

Over the weekend, I also went to my friend's house to help him make sure it's all ready for his custody evaluation. We then lightened things up by going to see Rush Hour 3. It was actually funnier than I thought it would be...but not much of a story to it. I was entertained for an hour and a half, so it all worked out, hehe.

Work today was BUSY! I'm in charge of getting a meeting put together for Wednesday, and I was assigned 15 new *very* high profile accounts. They're assigning more tomorrow...so we'll see how it goes. Tomorrow is going to be even worse as far as being busy, as I have appointments and meetings almost all day. At least that means it'll go by fast :-) I'm going to head to bed and try to make it so that I'm in the office by 6 tomorrow morning. I have some reports that HAVE to be done by about 8:30 am. We'll see if I can make it, hehe.

(I also just realized that I'm going on over a month without a single comment on my blog. Oh yeah, I'm feelin' the love :-P)

2 posts in a day...don't be too shocked, hehe

2007-08-08T12:51:00.001-06:00

Last week, one of my friends and I decided to start walking on our 15 minute breaks. Neither of us were taking our breaks like we were supposed to, so it was a good way to force us to take them as well as a way for us to get some exercise in (as I have been quite lax about my exercise habits lately). Last week, we walked around our building once a day. We were only using 1 break (because she comes in so much later than me, I didn't want her to have to take her 2nd break so early as to get it in before I went home for the day). Well today, I suggested that we use our 2nd break, also. Mainly because if she's not taking her break anyway...what's the harm in taking it earlier? Also, I suggested that we pick up the speed a bit. We ended up making it around the building twice in one break instead of just once, then bumming around for the last 5 minutes. YAY!! We had time to grab a cup of water, then head back to our desks. We have also set up that we will be doing the same thing at 3. This will be SO helpful for me!! I really hope that this can help me pick up on my weight loss. I have a certain goal that I'm trying to reach by the time we go to Disney World (September 5)...and I will be so close!

Things are looking up :-)

2007-08-08T07:45:00.000-06:00

I've been waiting for "Eclipse" to come out for a few months now. I'm so happy it finally did!! I spent all of last night reading (well...trying to read while chatting on various IM's at the same time, hehe). I was up until about 1, and *really* considered staying home today to read. I haven't taken a day off just to have a relaxing day off in such a long time. I tried when the HP movie came out (after going to the midnight showing)...but that day proved to be anything BUT relaxing, heh. I then remembered some work that I had to do for one of my accounts today. SO...I came in. It's actually turning out to be not so bad, as I'm not overly sleepy, and I'm feeling pretty good about being here. Now I just have to make it through the day!

After work, I'm going to volunteer for the corporate games here in Salt Lake. I have to go up to Fat Cats to help get people registered for the pool tournament. Yay. The bad part? Fat Cats is connected to The Pizza Factory. One of my favorite restaurants ever. It's probably a good thing that I don't have any money right now, as I would probably have to break down and buy a pizza to take home...and that would make me SICK. Days like this make me sad about the surgery, but then again, how can I be sad when I'm down almost 60 lbs in 2 1/2 months?? :-) (I guess I would be happier if it were more noticeable...but we'll get there, hehe).

OH!! I also have good news after my post about possibly having to move! Yesterday, my best friend from Pittsburgh got offered a job in Salt Lake. Now, she has known about a position with this company for a couple of months now, and they've been kinda dragging their feet on some things, but she's finally starting on August 20th. The result? Is that Lys will need a place to stay until she moves. They're not paying for her to move, so it'll take some time to save up some money. This means that I'll have someone to help with bills, etc. for a bit while I'm working things out :-) This could save me from having to move (although I still need to do the math on it all, heh). So...happiness all around!

Not so great news...

2007-08-05T23:09:00.000-06:00

When I started this blog, I was determined to post both the good and the bad. With my surgery, it was easy to post the bad, because it was just little things like "Oh, I'm really sick" and "Man, part of me wishes I hadn't done this." I've had a few bad things happen over the last few weeks, and I haven't posted. I've been trying to focus on the good. Now that something life-altering has happened, I have been avoiding actually posting about it. I guess I should just get to it.

On Monday, my supervisor pulled me into a room to talk before I went home. It turns out, that they have been overpaying me for the last year and a half. A year and a half ago, I worked the grave shift. I then got my promotion, and they never stopped paying me my 15% differential. I know, I know, I should have realized this somehow. I have direct deposit, so I never see my pay stubs (I can look them up online...but I never really do except to see how much paid time off I've accrued). So, what makes this a life altering thing? I'm losing $500/month that I'm used to getting paid. That's more than half of my mortgage. That's a LOT to lose each month. On top of that, I'm required to pay back over $7,500. Wow. How does that work again?!? Luckily, they're trying to make it as easy as possible. They know that the $500/month is already a lot to lose, so they don't want to deduct it from regular paychecks if they don't have to. So the plan which I agreed to is to let them have my bonuses for the rest of the year (we get them every quarter), and to let them take my pay raise that I will be getting in March. My problem is...even then...it'll take *forever* to pay off, as I know that they don't plan on giving me that much of a raise :-P.

So...what does this all mean? Well according to my calculations (and thanks to credit card debt which I've been diligently paying off since having to use the cards back when I've had operations and no money coming in from work)...I can't afford to keep my condo. What's worse, is that I can't really afford to pay rent anywhere, either. So...it looks like I might be moving back with my parents. I'm not positive that it's come to that yet...but in looking at the numbers (and a few things I have coming up) that's how it appears. I keep talking about how it's just my income that pays for my place...but then I see all of my friends and family who have stay at home moms, and I know that they are living on a single income, also. How do they all do it?? I really don't understand. I see people living in places which I *know* are more expensive than mine. I see people with car payments on top of other expenses (my car is luckily paid off)...and I just don't understand how they live. It's not like I'm working a $11 or $12/hr job, either. I'm making, what I thought, was a decent amount of money (not great of course...but decent). It just doesn't add up at all.

ANYWAY...it's past my bedtime. I just thought that I should get this information out there because a lot of my upcoming decisions are going to be based on all of this. I'd also rather have it out there when/if people start hearing about me moving back home for a while.

I'm really just done with everything at this point. I don't know that I can handle much more.

Pictures posted...

2007-07-29T22:22:00.001-06:00

Not much time to post tonight (we'll ignore that I've had all day, hehe) but I did get the pictures from yesterday posted.

Go see!!

Dominic's 1st birthday!

2007-07-29T03:45:00.001-06:00

Today has been SUCH a long day. I have a lot that I wanted to write about...but it's 3:45 am and I'm exhausted. Even with my exhaustion...I'm hesitating going to sleep. The reasons are stupid. I stay up really late on weekends because the sooner I go to bed at night, the sooner I wake up to a new day. For weekends...that's one day closer to going back to work. Blah.

Dominic's party this morning was fun :-) He's SUCH a cute boy!! I'll post more pictures and talk about it a little more tomorrow, if I get the chance.

Long Long entry...lol

2007-07-23T22:50:00.000-06:00

Wow, I feel so behind on so much. There's been a LOT going on with me, and I'm not sure where to start.

I went to the dr. last week, and I'm officially down 45 lbs. YAY!!! I would feel MUCH better about it if the difference could really be seen...but I'm still ok with that :-) 45 lbs in 2 months is great, and I know it is!! I just hope that I can lose another 35ish by the time Disney World pops up (September 5).

I'm SO excited for Disney World!! I've never been :-) It's going to be a large group, and I'll have to rent one of those scooter things to keep up...but it'll be fun. We'll be having character meals almost every day (which with as excited as I am...you would think I was 5). We're also planning on attending Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween party :-). The other adults aren't dressing up...but I'm considering going as Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland. How fun would that be?!? The more I think about it, the more fun I think it would be for me to dress up, even if I can't afford a $75 costume...lol. I'm just hoping that I'll be to a point where I'm comfortable enough having my picture taken again...that I can finally have pictures of me again without the tears. We'll see how that goes.

After that...I have my trip to Germany to look forward to! I've been so excited talking to Tammie about where we can go and what we can do while I'm there. I really can't wait! I was telling her that I wish that I could extend my time and stay over Christmas. My mom is coming with me, though, and she won't be able to stay extra, and I would like to be there with her while she travels home. I really can't wait to see what all we can fit in, though!

Right now? I have enough other stuff going on. There's this whole long story about the pipe to my water heater leaking, and there being all this damage inside the walls downstairs. There's a LOT more to this story...but as of now...the HOA is saying that I'm liable, and that I have to pay to get it all fixed. I contacted my insurance company, and they're fighting it. SO...there's a lot going on.

Tonight, I went with 2 of my sisters to see No Reservations. It was SO cute!!! Very much a girlie movie...and all kinds of pukey...BUT...I loved it :-) I also finished Harry Potter at 3:30 this morning (which caused me to get to work an hour and a half late, heh). I have so many thoughts and feelings about the book...but I don't want to ruin it for those who haven't finished yet :-)

On another note...Paul Potts (the guy who won Britain's Got Talent) already has a cd coming out next Tuesday!! I'm really excited for it. I was reminded of this when the song that he auditioned with (Nessun Dorma) was in the movie I saw tonight. I LOVE it.

Ok, that's more than enough for one update, heh. It's past my bedtime!

2007-07-09T23:11:00.000-06:00

So I keep trying to be upbeat and positive about my lack of weight loss...and today it just didn't happen.

My friend at work had her surgery 2 weeks after me. Today she let me know that she passed her 50 lb mark. I'm SO SO SO excited for her!!! That's wonderful!!! It did, however, make me more depressed. I know I shouldn't let it get to me. Her success has NOTHING to do with my lack of success. Still...I fought the tears all day. Seems silly.

On a much happier note, though, I did get 3 scrapbook pages done over the weekend :-) Considering the fact that before this weekend I only had ONE done at all? I think that's great!!

You can see them here.

I was gonna post more stuff, but I just got a call from a friend at the airport. His ride didn't show up. SO I'm apparently headed out there. We'll see if I get back to this when I get back.

11:30 and restless...

2007-07-01T23:48:00.000-06:00

I hate when I get all productive on Sunday nights. This isn't an uncommon thing. I have a whole list of things that I want to get done...and they go through my head over and over again. I get completely ADD, and just want to get stuff done around here. I start picturing my condo being completely put together (after 2 years) and I can suddenly see what I need to do to make it happen. This almost never happens on a Friday or Saturday night...when I can sleep in the next morning. The most common night is Sunday night. Because...that makes the most sense :-P. For example, I was just (at 11:00 at night) measuring rooms and windows. Rooms to see if I can rearrange them the way that I want to, and the windows because I want to buy new blinds. All kinds of craziness.

With that, I'm going to try to go to bed without taking the time to move a few things from my bedroom to my extra room like I really want to. If I don't get back, I hope you all have a great week!!

2007-06-30T22:04:00.000-06:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TAMARA!!!!!

I tried to talk to you today...but you were signing on and off of Skype faster than any of my messages could get through :-P So I wanted to make sure you knew that I was thinking about you all day!!

Also...why do you have to do your podcast while I'm at church?!? I was hoping to listen to it live, hehe.

Love you!! *hugs*

I was tagged, too...

2007-06-27T20:52:00.000-06:00

I have been tagged by my sister Tamara. So this is how it works. I must post the rules, 7 random things about me and then tag others to do the same. Sound fair enough, right? These are the rules…. each player starts with 7 random facts about themselves on their Blog. People who are tagged need to blog 7 facts about themselves and post the rules as well. At the end of their blog list 7 people you are tagging. Let them know that they are tagged by leaving them a comment. Here goes!

1. I went back to Curves today after paying for it for the last 2 years and not going. (Long story involving surgery, shock).

2. I made peanut butter cookies today that I can actually eat!!!

3. This is one of the busiest weeks of the year at work (last week of every quarter). I'm having a VERY difficult time as I usually get pink cookies from the vending machine. I've cried lots this week.

4. I tried salad tonight for the first time....and I didn't get sick :-)

5. I haven't lost a POUND in the last 3 weeks. Not that I'm bitter.

6. I get to turn in my passport application tomorrow!!!

7. I'm going to DisneyWorld for the first time in September!

I don't know enough people on here, so I'm tagging Carrie, Dan, Laura, and Debi. Melissa was already tagged by Tamara, so that covers everyone I have on here :-)

I need a longer weekend

2007-06-24T22:51:00.000-06:00

I made it through my first week back. There were some points where I wasn't sure I would. I have a LOT of work left to do from the week, too. My plan was to go into work sometime over the weekend to get some stuff done. Yeah...that didn't happen.

Friday, 4 hours were shaved off of my work day due to a department bbq (at which, I couldn't eat anything). I'm really afraid for how much more work awaits me when I get back to work in the morning. On the up-side...our bbq included a dunking tank which we were able to use to dunk out supervisors and managers. I would have stepped up and tossed a few balls...but there was no way I was going to embarrass myself in front of everyone. I was also highly entertained by the the watermelon eating contest. I'll soon have pictures up under my June pictures.

Friday night, I went to Park City with My sister, Julie; her husband, Roger; his brother, Jared; my nephew, Dominic; and my friend, Marjorie. It wasn't long, but we had a good time. Roger bbq-ed hamburgers: (Guess which was mine...lol). Then we went swimming... and I thought we were going to have a repeat of Dominic's first time in the pool... (He fell asleep the first time...it was quite cute). He did make it back to the condo before falling asleep, though. After swimming, we all just played games, and went to sleep. Pretty boring for a lot of people...but we had a good time getting away for the night :-)

Saturday was Herriman Days. In the past, I've been in charge of a game. This year I didn't quite find out until a few days before the festivities...so I wasn't included. That actually turned out to be a VERY good thing, as I got REALLY sick. I went out there to hang out with everyone else...I was only able to snap ONE photo...of Lee playing in the duck pond...and I was done for the day. So home I went where I slept for 4 hours, then just recorded movies from HBO on Demand the rest of the night. How sad is that?!?

Today...I slept in until 10:30, went to church, came home and slept on the couch for an hour after dinner, then went back for a fireside (which makes me REALLY sad that I can't go on our stake's trek, btw)...then home for the night. Now...my weekend is over...and I'm really sad that I have to go back to work in the morning. I got spoiled with my time off from surgery...lol. 2 1/2 months until DisneyWorld....5 months until my sabbatical (and Germany!!!)...I can make it, right??

Good day

2007-06-20T23:11:00.001-06:00

Because this doesn't happen often enough, I feel the need to throw in a quick post to mention that I'm feeling really good at the moment. The day started off rocky (I was 4 hours late to work because of exhaustion)...but I made it through AND have been able to get in 2 sets on my elliptical. I'm about to do my last one, then shower, then bed...and I feel great :-)

Work was stressful...but that's normal. I had almost forgotten how busy I can get, hehe. I'm hoping that I can continue to feel well, and that I can start feeling like I can handle everything that I was trying to juggle before :-)

I also have to mention that I saw "Evan Almighty" last night, and it was *great*! I definitely recommend it. It's a great family movie, too, so feel free to take the kids! My nephew loved it!

The last monthish...

2007-06-18T21:23:00.000-06:00

Well, I was going to write about the last few weeks. Lys's trip here, my week at home with my niece Casey, last week in Park City...then today as my first day back at work. Instead? I'm gonna take a hot shower and go to bed. I'm *finally* feeling kinda better with my tummy (I didn't get sick much today at all), AND I worked all day and made it through. What happens when I finally start to get better? I get sick. My tonsils are swollen and red with a few yucky puss pockets. So instead? I'll leave you with my June pictures.

HP5 IMAX tickets :-)

2007-06-13T00:35:00.000-06:00

Yay!!! The IMAX tickets for the midnight showing of Harry Potter finally went on sale tonight :-) I bought 8 tickets for Jen, Julie, Casey, Courtney, Mandy, Anna, Allison, and myself :-)

Lots of new stuff has gone on, too (and in spite of a few yucky episodes...I'm really feeling MUCH better!) I even had a sugar free ice cream bar today!!! How exciting is that?!?

I know I've said this before...but I will really try to make up for the last few weeks over the next day or 2. I'm WAY overdue for bed (I need to start getting used to my usual sleeping schedule again...I go back to work on Monday!!)

Sorry, more stupid food stuff...

2007-06-06T22:05:00.000-06:00

I'm having a really difficult time with these first few weeks. I saw the dr. yesterday, and I've lost 27 lbs. I know that for 3 weeks...that's great. It really doesn't feel like enough for what I've been going through, though. The doctor mentioned to me that 3 - 5 weeks is when the possibility of stricture starts. Stricture is when the food doesn't go down. Scar tissue from surgery can start to block what goes down. Well, just as if it happened because of his suggestion, my egg white lunch yesterday got stuck. It hurt SO bad!! It was as if it was just sitting in my chest. I couldn't even breathe without the pain. So, I took a 2 hour nap. I woke up...and I could still feel the egg white. It felt like the only thing that I would be able to do in order to get rid of it would have been to throw up (which was looking more and more appealing). I went with my parents to visit my grandpa, and had one of the sugar free peppermints that they had at the counter...and oddly...it seemed to help!! I grabbed a few to put in my bag for future use, and enjoyed the rest of the night (with just yogurt for dinner to ensure I wouldn't have the problem again!) Well, today at lunch, I had my deli meat. It happened again!! I waited about an hour...and tried the peppermint again, and it didn't work. So? Up it all came. This really worries me, because the dr. mentioned that if I do have a problem with stricture, then I would need to go on an all liquid diet for a week, and that should give it time to get back to normal. Blah. I was getting all excited at the possibility of trying hamburger tomorrow (yay!!)...and now this happens. So, I'm trying cottage cheese for dinner, and we'll see how it goes. I will probably try solid food one more time tomorrow. If it gets stuck, again...I'll have to do all liquids for a week. I thought I was past all that :-P

I really will get to it...

2007-05-29T01:17:00.000-06:00

So I keep meaning to update, then just don't get around to it until it's too late. I'll definitely try to "get to it" tomorrow. I've done a LOT more than I planned while having the time off from work. The most difficult thing right now is the energy. I mean, I didn't have tons of energy before...but this is ridiculous!

Also...I *love* egg salad. I can't have the bread...but somehow just the egg and may with salt and pepper tasted SO unbelievably yummy!!

Another Day...

2007-05-25T03:01:00.000-06:00

I'm just warning you all ahead of time that I'm not sure whether or not this particular blurb makes any sense. I'm pretty tired, and it's almost 3:30am. For some reason, I'm not sleeping when I should.

So I made it through another day. That's one thing I have a difficult time with when I have operations. It's all about making it through the day. This time even more because of how many changes there are. It's tough to explain the difference. I've had so many operations on my feet, for example, which have left me unable to walk afterwards. As constricting as I thought that was...this seems to be worse. The pain isn't as bad...even though I didn't have pain meds after leaving the hospital. I just can't eat what I want. I know it sounds silly, but it's so...distressing. Even when following the program as I should...I run into problems.

Today, I was thrilled that my mom was going to scramble me an egg with some cheese. I'm allowed to have an egg, and I'm allowed cheese, so I thought it would be good. About 4 tiny bites in...I could tell it was a bad idea. I made it to the bathroom before my body started in on signs of "dumping syndrome". Sweating, racing heart, nausea, all of it. I ended up dry heaving for about 5 minutes as my body tried to get rid of the few bites I had (nothing ever came up), then I ended up forgoing breakfast and just trying to lay back and go back to sleep. I slept through the morning, feeling pretty sick all day, then lunchtime rolled around. I knew I *needed* to eat (especially after not having breakfast), but nothing sounded good. I ended up having just yogurt for lunch and for dinner. Now I'm afraid of trying anything new. Just...not fun at all.

I've been really good at getting in 3 walks every day, each time going a little further than the time before. Today I didn't do so well. I managed to take a shower, and I went to my grandpa's (which requires walking) but I didn't do more than that. Hopefully I'll get better.

I did find out tonight, though, that my best friend from Pittsburgh is going to come out from Sunday until Friday :-) That should be fun! She's already been warned that I won't be able to do much, and is ok with that, luckily.

Back to the whole "as constricting as I thought that was...this seems to be worse" thought, I had a rough time yesterday. One of the other things they told us ahead of time about this surgery is that us girls would run into emotional issues similar to "the baby blues." Now, I've had operations before...and I've gotten all sad with them before...but yesterday was bad. I'll spare you all the details, but it's gotten better today (but today came the sickness, heh). With any luck...I'll be able to make it through tomorrow without the sickness OR pain, and my exhaustion will be mild. We can all hope.

Yes, I made it home...

2007-05-22T00:23:00.000-06:00

I'm sorry I haven't posted since getting home. I've been here...I've even been online, but those who have chatted with me can attest that I'm a woman of very few words these days. It's amazing how much energy it takes to type! I've decided to hurry and throw something together, though.

I came home on Saturday, after the dr. finally decided that it was ok. We thought I would come home on Friday...then I had problems with nausea (and the lovely dry heaves that went along with it). Saturday afternoon I got to my parents' house and parked myself on the couch. That's pretty much where I've been since.

I'm still "eating" 2oz of food 3 times a day. The first couple of days of broth and jello weren't bad, as I didn't want anything. My mind is coming back, and my new obsession with food is driving me crazy. I'll watch a movie...and I'll focus on the food. I was reading my book last night, and they mentioned an egg salad sandwich...and suddenly that's *all* I wanted (luckily I can start having an egg for meals on Wednesday...lol). This is going to be a long, grueling process. I knew it would be. I didn't think about the fact that I wouldn't be able to have pain killers once I left the hospital. Pretty much the only pain killers I can tolerate is lortab...but it makes me sick if I don't eat enough with it (2 oz. of broth and/or jello? Pretty sure not gonna cut it). So...I've just been dealing with it. I'm also still on oxygen, as my sats still weren't high enough without it at the hospital. Nose cannulas SUCK for the record...lol. I've been doing well with taking 3 short walks a day, even though I'm beyond exhausted. Today was especially difficult, as I managed to shower (which took 20 minutes) and I actually went downstairs before that. It's amazing how exhausted I get over the silliest little things.

Even with all that? I'm still up...typing away. I promised myself I would read more tonight, too. We'll see how far I get, hehe. I need to work on getting my water in between meals, I think that is adding to the exhaustion. We'll see what I can do.

Today, I was able to add in yogurt, string cheese, cottage cheese, and strained soups (I had tomato soup for dinner!). It was a nice change to the jello & broth. Yogurt for breakfast, string cheese for lunch, and 2 oz of tomato soup for dinner. It was SO nice!! Wednesday a LOT of things are added back in...so I can't wait!!

Ok, enough of my update. Just wanted to let y'all know that I was, in fact, home (though most of you know). I also wanted to let you know that I've just been too exhausted to type. With any luck, that'll pick up!!

Off to read (I *hope* I can pull myself away after 1 chapter)...

Today is the day....

2007-05-17T10:13:00.000-06:00

It's so odd to me that here it is....surgery day...10:00am....and I'm still sitting at home. For every operation I've ever had (7 before this one), I've had to be there early in the morning. Today...I got to sleep in, put together the last few eBay orders to ship out, pack up the stuff to take to my mom's...and it's weird. The only thing I really don't like is that I'm really really thirsty. That doesn't change after surgery this time, though, as I can't even have water or ice chips right away. Everything is going to be different after today. It'll just be interesting to see how!

I'll update when I get back from the hospital :-) (or if I can get away with it...from my phone while I'm still in the hospital...lol).

Oh! and for those who don't know...my surgery? I'm getting gastric bypass :-) So this beyond huge girl that you've known in the past may not be who you see next time you see me!!

2 days left....

2007-05-15T22:42:00.000-06:00

I'm really going to try to post on here more often! I need to try to update my posts here whenever I make one on my lj account, as there are different people on both. Over the next couple of weeks, I'll have nothing but time anyway, hehe.

It feels....odd. This is the first time since I accepted my current position that I have taken a significant amount of time off. I tied up all the loose ends today, and now I'm free. It's SUCH an odd feeling!! To know that *no one* is relying on my being there tomorrow. I don't have any messes I have to clean up. I don't have to review anyone's business and try to make it better. I don't have to even think about any of it until June 11. This just feels.....strange to me. I've become SO attached to some of my accounts. It's a strange thought that they'll be ok without my being there (in spite of what some of them think ;-) ). I've been so focused on surgery....that I never thought about how *this* would feel. I feel...strangely sad (yet, of course, VERY happy at the same time!).

Luckily, I have a LOT of projects to work on while I'm down. I need to work on Marjorie & Glen's engagements that I took a month ago, still. I have been SO busy that I haven't had the chance to work on them at all. I also have to start designing their wedding invitations. Now if only I knew what they wanted! hehe. I also have to work on Jen's family pictures that I took, as well as the pictures of Mitsy's boys. I LOVE that I'm going to have time to work on this stuff! I realize I'll also be sleeping a LOT, though.

Tomorrow, I go to the hospital for my final appointment and all of my tests and classes. Then, Thursday is the big day!! I can't wait to see what's going to happen in these next few months. For the first time in a VERY long time...I feel something that slightly resembles hope :-)

Hey look! I caved and got a Blogspot!

2007-03-30T00:24:00.000-06:00

Ok, I have online journals and stuff all over, but I have quite a few people that I can keep up with on Blogspot. SO...here I am :-) Hopefully I'll remember to post....