Menu Plan Monday

Happy Fall Y'all! It certainly is cold here in the Pacific NW. Before I left for my surgery, it wasn't too bad - a few chilly days, but still nice enough to play outside with the kids and go for bike rides. But now it's downright cold, and bundling up is the way to go. That's ok for me, though - I love the fall weather! Yummy warm foods and drinks, great sweaters and jeans - that's the life! I didn't post a menu last week, because frankly, it wasn't up to me to cook! I put the cooking chores into the hands of the grandmas and aunt that were here to take care of the kids, and from what I can tell, no one came out of last week hungry in the least! I saw remnants of homemade bread, manicotti, desserts - all sorts of good things were eaten here last week!

This week, I have wonderful friends to thank for meals - as I'm still trying to regain energy, my lovely friends have volunteered to cook for the family. I'm looking forward to this week, for sure!


Monday - Lasagna from a friend
Tuesday - Mac-n-Cheese from a friend
Wednesday - Soup & Sandwiches at church before class
Thursday - Meal from a friend
Friday - Meal from a friend
Saturday - Meal from a friend
Sunday - leftover love from all my friends!

Doesn't this sound like a great way to cook for the week! Head over to
Organizing Junkie to see more great menu ideas and lots of home organization tips and ideas!

Surgery Scars - Friday

Once again, I have lovely scars & bruising left over from my surgery. At least the surgeon went in to my head via the same scar from the first time, so it's not too bad. The eye bruising looks ok in these pictures, but on Tuesday and Wednesday it was really hard to open my left eye. I can only use baby shampoo on my hair, so it's not the best, but at least I can wash it every day. I tell you, it's so much nicer to be home after 4 days instead of still in the hospital!

Surgery Day - Kids at Home

Auntie Brenda is here for Sunday-Tuesday to stay with the kids during surgery and recovery. After a relaxing morning of playing in jammies and eating pancakes, then lunch, naps and library time, they played with paints to make get well cards for me. Although I haven't seen them in person yet - Brenda sent them to the hospital but I came home too soon! - they certainly look cute! Hopefully they'll come back home to me here so I can see them and put them in my scrapbook.

Home from the hospital

Another aneurysm surgery done and gone! This time was a lot easier. I went in to surgery at 8:30 am Monday morning, and was actually awake around 4:30 pm that same day. The first time I had the surgery it took me 4 days to wake up! The surgeon got to the aneurysm, but found that it was close enough to my skull that they couldn't clip it, so they just put a layer of derma over it to keep it protected and sewed me back together. I got home from OHSU in Portland last night around 8:30 - only 4 days in the hospital instead of 11 days. I'm glad to be home, and even though I'm a bit tired, I'm doing really good. I still will have several days of rest, but I feel tons better than the last time. I don't have to go back to Portland for another 5 years to have an angiogram - I can have my first surgeon here in Spokane check out my stitches so I don't have to travel just for that. I thank God for keeping me protected and keeping me around! And I thank God for providing such awesome family & friends to take care of my kids while we were gone, and for all the love and prayers and cards. Thank you to all!

1 year Adoption Anniversary

Wow! It's been one year since we finalized the adoptions on our children - our Forever Family Day. It's been quite a year since that day - lots of excitement, fun, some scary times, too.

Here's a look back at that very special day one year ago:
Adoption Day

Menu Plan Monday

It's been a while since I've posted one of my menus. Now that the boys are back in preschool and James is back to bowling, we are on a more normal schedule. Here's this week's offering:

Monday - BBQ Jelly Chicken with noodles and broccoli
Tuesday - Chuck E Cheese to celebrate the 1 year anniversary of our adoptions!
Wednesday - Hamburgers and Hot Dogs at church
Thursday - Meatloaf & Pasta Dish & Broccoli
Friday - Tucson Chicken & Rice & Salad
Saturday - Roasted Chicken & Rice & Veggies
Sunday - Spaghetti & garlic bread & salad

For lots of menu ideads, head over to Organizing Junkie. Lots of great menus, and lots of great organization ideas!! Have fun!

Rock-n-Roll Hair!

We decided to have some fun today with hair. I gave the kids an early bath, before dinner and church, because they had been playing hard all day and I knew we wouldn't have time after church. After bath, we decided the boys needed rock-n-roll hair, and they loved it. And we flipped up Gretchen's hair, which turned out super cute.

1st day of preschool

Today was Daniel's first day of preschool, and the start of Austin's second year of preschool. A pretty big event in our home! This just leaves Gretchen and I to ourselves for 2-1/2 hours three days a week. It will be interesting. Last year our first day of school was very warm, so it was shorts and short-sleeves. But this year it was colder - you could definitely feel fall in the air. So we opted for long jeans and long sleeve shirts. The boys were very excited!

Feeling blessed!

I don't know why it hit me all of a sudden this afternoon, but I'm feeling extremely blessed today. Kids have still been a little crazy, and we were late once again for VBS today, and it's blazing hot outside, but I'm feeling very wrapped in love and grace. I have three beautiful, amazing children, sometimes with very independent mindframes, but so sweet and loving. I have an amazing husband, who works very hard so that I can stay home and raise our kids, and loves me even when I'm in the worst of moods. And I have a family who stands by me, especially in the worst of times when my health is at risk, and is ready to do whatever needs to be done to help take care of my family. And I have awesome friends, who are always there when I need to laugh, or vent, or cry, or just whatever.

It's just a blessed day today. I hope yours is a blessed day, too.

Surgery / Aneurysm update

One of the reasons for heading down to Portland for our family vacation was to have a consult with the surgeon for my next brain surgery. When I had my ruptured aneurysm last November, a second unruptured aneurysm was found. It was deeper in the brain, and the surgeons were not able to do anything about it last November, simply because they had to deal with the already ruptured aneurysm first. But now it is time to take care of this second one, and the surgeon I consulted with, Dr. Johnny Delashaw, is the best vascular surgeon in the northwest. In fact, he trained Dr. Jonathan Carlson, who performed my first surgery.

Dr. Delashaw had me do a CTA scan with dye to determine exactly where the aneurysm is, and it is located deeper in the brain, and near where it feeds into my pituitary gland. So, he definitely wants it taken care of, and sooner rather than later would be ideal. I could do an outpatient type of surgery, where they could go in through my groin area, and do what is called stenting and coiling, where they first put in a nylon stent, and then put a coil or two into the aneurysm, with the assumption that the blood would then clot around the coil and the aneurysm would stop growing. However, there is a drug regimen before and after to adhere to, and continued monitoring via MRI's of the aneurysm. Plus, if it happens to rupture while in surgery, they would have to do an artery replacement because they couldn't clip it at that point. This could all be done locally by another doctor that Dr. Delashaw trained as well. Or I could go back to Portland and have Dr. Delashaw and his team clip off this second aneurysm, spend one or two nights in ICU, 3-4 days in the hospital, and be done with it. They would go in the same way as before, so no new scars, and because it hasn't ruptured, recovery time would be significantly less than my last 11 day stay in the hospital.

I'm really, really leaning to the clipping again. Yes, we would have to leave the kids for a week, but I've got lots of friends and family to help me out in that aspect. And my aunt and cousin have volunteered their homes outside of Portland for James to crash in for the week. I would probably plan it for mid-October, to stay well away from holidays, and before the weather to travel down there started to get really nasty.

So there it is - my life plan for the next few months! Surgery and recovery. But I'm leaning on God, and am confident that He's not done with me on this earth yet, so it will all go well. I'm fairly certain that my first aneurysm ruptured and was repaired without any side effects in order for the doctors to see this second, perhaps more dangerous aneurysm. God works in mysterious ways, and I'm not about to question the why's.

But I'm not tired, Mom!

Naptime - some days it is a real struggle in our home. The kids just want to play so much, they don't want to be bothered with rest time. I wish someone would make me lay down and sleep every afternoon! Npatime is my time to get things done around the house and check up on e-mails and update my blog and facebook.

Today, Austin just kept arguing with me - I'm not tired, I'm not going to sleep! So, I told him, ok, just lay on your bed and read. And wouldn't you know it, not five minutes later he was sound asleep - like this:



Half the time, I think he fights naptime because he knows that as soon as he stops talking for 2 minutes, he'll fall asleep!

A visit from cousin Aimee

Each summer, my sister's daughter Aimee comes to stay with us for a week and attend Vacation Bible School. She lives in Spirit Lake, and is an only child, so a week spent with my crew is pretty crazy for her! She's four years older than my oldest, and so play time can be a little tough - sharing is hard, and my kids can't always play the things she wants. But all in all, they all have a great time together. Since Aimee can read - she just started 3rd grade - she got the honors of reading at bedtime this whole week - and the kids really enjoyed it. One of these days she'll be old enough to babysit for us, like I used to do for my aunt in the summer's. Oh, won't that be heavenly!!!

Family Vacation to Portland area

We are back - tired and somewhat out of sorts - but back home. We had a wonderful family vacation - our first, actually! - to the Portland, OR area. I took a bazillion photos, and will share them in a later post. Ahhhh, home.......

Outdoor Learning Center

We went with Daddy to his Wildlife Council meeting tonight - they held the meeting at the Outdoor Learning Center so there were lots of fun things to explore with the kids.

Yardwork

The kids wanted to help me with weed pulling in the driveway today. Isn't it great when they are still young enough to think this is fun and a game? Wait until they are teens, and it's part of their chores, and then they'll whine and complain they whole time and take three times as long to complete the job, and then want to get paid extra for all their hard, back-breaking work! That's why I blog with photos - for long lasting proof of how it used to be!!

Faith, by the Grace of God

It is amazing to me what some parents must go through with their children. I cannot ever imagine being in this couple's place, and when I read their post, I was amazed by the complete faith they held. I am so, so thankful that all of my children are healthy.
Perfect by Jennifer Hawn

A little young for make-up...

I thought it was awfully quiet in the bathroom this morning. And I found out why. Gretchen decided she needed to help herself to my make-up bag, and after dumping all my blush compact onto the floor, she thought she would try a little mascara. Goodness, wait til she's a teenager - it's gonna be crazy at our house!!

Daddy & Gretchen

James and I volunteered in Gretchen's Sunday school class today, and I got a couple of cute photos of the two of them that I thought I would share.

Casual Friday

When I was working in an office, I always looked forward to Fridays. Not just because it was the end of a busy work week, but because we could dress down on Fridays, which always lead to a more fun and relaxed attitude at work. Now that I am a SAHM mom, I really don't "stay-at-home" much - the kids and I are on the go a lot during the day, with playdates and fun activities. But on Fridays, James now has the day off, since he works four-10's. And today, we spent a very casual Friday afternoon doing some family stuff at home. Homemade popsicles, bike riding in the neighborhood, basketball in the backyard, and dog-piling mommy while she tried to take pictures of it all! Hope you all had a fun Friday as well.

Wiggles Show

We were blessed with free tickets to the Wiggles show tonight, and we had a blast! The kids enjoyed it, and danced and sang to the songs, and James and I even knew some of the songs! It was a really fun show, and we got to take our friends the Hagans and the Gardners. We all went to The Onion for dinner afterward, and it made for a fantastic Saturday family night.