guh... (that's ugh all mixed up)

Oh how it has been a week for ugh.

Yesterday I got a call from a government collections agency. Apparently, Wells Fargo decided to say I had defaulted on one of my loans. I was confused. I had been working with them on deferment, but when a fax apparently didn't go through, they decided to just default instead of contacting me first. Granted, I probably should have called them to make sure they got the fax, but it was still a little shocking. After a few hours of crying on the phone to a complete stranger named Michelle (the lady assigned to my account at the agency), I calmed down a bit. She was really the nicest person I have talked to about loans since graduating. She gave me options and it turns out that one of those options is even better than never having defaulted. Sure, I currently have a rather nasty mark on my credit that looks the same as if I had filed for bankruptcy, but she assured me that as soon as my loan was rehabilitated it would be as if it never existed. The really good news? Everything should be back to normal (well, even better than normal) in a couple of months. I'm hoping it all goes as smoothly as Michelle told me it would, but I really do think she was telling me the truth. In a couple of weeks I should be well on my way to a brand new student loan and also to having my credit restored. Whew.

Jenna has been a pill all week. At least when Josh is gone. I feel like she has a little switch that turns to naughty when it is just the three of us, and to nice the minute she senses him in the vicinity. The booger has been hitting, pinching, pulling hair, name calling, and taking toys from Cole. I think she knows I'm tired. I still try to be consistent, but insomnia and parenting a 3 year old don't seem to mix very well. I'm going to start tomorrow with a new strategy I think. If she even comes close to being bad, it's time out time. I need to stop with the second chances. Punishing takes a lot of effort when you are fall down tired, but I think in the long run it will save me energy.

Finally, there was the scarf. I can't even talk about it. *sob* Wanna know? You can read about it here...

I'm going to out think the insomnia tonight. I've going to bore myself to death with a constant stream of House Hunters on Hulu. Hopefully it bores me into dreamland and becomes insta-cure for the constant stream of sleepless nights I've been combating recently.

project linus

I don't know how many of you have heard of Project Linus, but it is a great organization. Most people wouldn't know about it unless they had been positively affected by it. When Cole was hospitalized as an infant, we were given a quilt from the Project Linus organization. I can't even tell you how much that meant to me. It's hard to be a parent watching your sick child be hooked up to machines and tested for different things. It is even harder feeling like it is your fault, like you could have somehow prevented it. Something as small as a blanket made by a stranger for your child can mean the world. I've decided to challenge myself to make several blankets for Project Linus this year. I know how much my heart warms when I see Cole's quilt, I'm hoping I can bring the same feelings to other parents and their kids. If you have the ability, I would like to challenge you to find your local chapter and make at least one blanket for them, if you don't have a local chapter, I'm sure that mine would be more than happy to receive your donation. :)

more of the usual...

It has most likely been too long since I last posted. Holidays make life busy.

I got new DS games for Christmas! The Professor Layton game I had demanded Josh get me was nestled sweetly in my stocking where it was supposed to be. The puzzles are fun. The story isn't as good as the first one I don't think, but that is okay, I play them for the puzzles anyway. the other game I got was a Sherlock Holmes game. I am excited to check it out, but right now Prof. Layton is consuming my DS attention.

On an even nerdier note, I have been spending entirely too much time leveling alts on WoW. Silly addictive game. My Paladin is now a 73 and I have a hunter up to 47. I'm sure that they will both eventually reach level cap and join my other two 80s. This may make me completely pathetic, but I really don't care. I find plenty of time for my family and other hobbies as well.

Knitting is a new hobby taking up a lot of my attention. I've discovered that since I started knitting I have found time to make projects for myself. I don't know if I could knit for others, it takes too much time. Crocheting is easier to part with for some reason. I've been posting my projects on a different blog so that this one wasn't swallowed up by all of the things I have been making. It's great to have something to keep my hands busy. It's also great to make a little extra money from something that I enjoy.

My book is feeling neglected. I suppose that holidays suck up a lot of time, but I still feel bad for not working on it like I would like to. It is coming along. I like my plot and I like where I am going to be able to take it. I thought about giving myself a word cap, and then I changed my mind. I don't want to limit where it could go, or extend it beyond where it should. Maybe I will just give myself a time cap. I'd like to have it done and ready for editing by the end of the year.

Comic. Oh, the comic. Sweet time-suck of frustration and awesome. It is getting better I think. The art is progressing and the writing is starting to look and sound like actual comic writing. I hope that the people that read it are getting enjoyment from it, and I hope that this new year brings even more readers.

In other news, I have a three year old now. I'm old. See her blog for more details. I also have the sweetest 1 1/2 year old on the planet. He is such a monkey and he makes me smile daily. See his blog for more details. (I have such a terrible blog addiction, it isn't even funny, I wonder if they have special therapists for that...)

I think that's about it. I won't bore you all with any more details of my life. Things are busy, hectic, crazy, obnoxious, and messy. However, they are also wonderful. With the bad comes good, and sometimes we wouldn't find the things that are making us deliriously happy without going down the painful roads. I hope you are all having a wonderful new year so far and that it continues to be so. Happy January!

looking towards christmas...

I'm guessing that we will have as little money this Christmas as we have every Christmas. So, I've been looking online for patterns to make some crochet type gifts. So far, these are the finalists (all from the lion brand web site).

For Cole:










For Jenna:
















And if I have time, I'd like to pull out a couple of these:
(from www.berroco.com)

mother's day...

My parents woke me up with a phone call on Mother's Day. They brought over a wonderful picture frame with pictures of the kids they had taken while Josh and I were in Portland. The center picture is of the kids with my grandma. Such a special gift!

















We spent the rest of the day with Josh's parents. We had lunch with them and the kids had a great time playing. I took a really long nap and while I was napping Josh left to go to work. While I thought he was working, he actually took a trip to Nampa to run an errand. He got back without me knowing and we took off to go home and put the kids to bed. When we got home, there was a Wii Fit, Gardening Mama (a DS game), and two wonderfully perfect pictures finger painted by my kids. It was so special! I could not have asked for a better day with my family.

the room can't catch up with my vision...

I got maybe 2 hours of broken sleep last night. That is probably the normal thing for a mom of a 5 month old to say, but not me. My son sleeps all night. Therefore, I am not used to not sleeping. Cole was up sick all night (for details click here) and now my vision is all screwy and my brain can't keep up with the rest of me. How do moms do it? How do they never sleep and still manage to function and take care of their kids? I have absolutely no idea. Luckily for me, Jenna wanted to get up, sit in her high chair, and pulverize crackers while watching Playhouse Disney this morning. Woohoo for not having to supervise at least one child.

i highly recommend it...

You should visit Jenna's blog today. It is a VERY special day.

http://jenna-irene.blogspot.com

Jenna has an owie...

If you are up late enough to be reading this, please pray for my kiddo. She has some sort of bite or blister on her leg and it is really bugging her. Her jeans rubbed against whatever it is for long enough before we noticed it that it is raw and sore and she is very sad. Hopefully she will be feeling better soon, but right now she is pretty miserable.

fyi...

Jenna and Cole's blogs can now be read by anyone. This should make it easier for some of you that have been complaining about having to log in to check up on my kiddos. ;) Their blogs can now be followed too so that you won't have to check them all the time since I don't post on them as often as my own blog.

Jenna: http://jenna-irene.blogspot.com
Cole: http://nicholas-james.blogspot.com

plot, pause, plot, pause...

Plot: She seems to be stuck. I'm not sure what happened, but her story is currently at an impasse. No matter which way she turns, there is only one end. Unfortunately I am nowhere close to wanting to end her story and the end in sight is not what I had in mind for her. Not only that, but said end does not fit well with the rest of who or what she is. Drat. Blast!

Pause: Jenna went down for a nap today without a fuss. She said, "Jenna nap now please." Then she got up grabbed Lumpy and Braffe and walked herself into her bedroom where she said, "Mommy, Jenna bed now. Blankets please. Night. Bye!" Not only is this an impressively long progression of words from my not quite two year old daughter, but she went willingly into bed! No fit, no screaming, no mommy guilt. What a great day!

Plot: What happens when you get caught in a lie? Not a little lie, but a huge, terrible, awful lie. Do you suffer consequences? Or do you just get away with it? What happens to someone who comes from an intensely moral place and ends up somewhere entirely different? Do they feel guilt? Does life within the plot mimic life without? If that is the case, everyone gets away with everything without any sort of repercussions. Of course she lives outside of the normal realm, but what about those around her? Life gets complicated when you are trying to keep two separate realities from colliding. At least for me. Maybe for her? Maybe life imitates art more than art imitates life. Drat. Blast! A pox on fictional obsessions...

Pause: Cole makes me laugh. Today he spit up everywhere. He started to laugh, but then his hand landed in the mess. His eyes got wide and he started to scream. Yes, scream! You would have thought that someone had pinched him. I cleaned him up, and he went back to cooing and giggling. He must be my kid after all.

my very own christmas pickle...

Today at M.O.M.S. we had our annual treat exchange and pickle drawing! I had decided that this year if I didn't win said pickle, I was going to go get myself one. Let me explain a little about the pickle. There is a German tradition where you hide a glass pickle on your tree. Every time someone finds the pickle, they re-hide it somewhere else on the tree. The person that finds it on Christmas morning gets an extra gift. Pastor Carol does a drawing every year for about five glass pickles. Last year it was a no go for me, but this year, I won! My little pickle is now on a branch of my tree looking very nice and pickley.

I'm in the Christmas spirit and so I think I will go work on presents with Jenna. I love my Jenna!

God is bigger than the boogeyman...

...or in this case a failure to thrive diagnosis. Cole gained an entire pound this week! He is now 10 pounds 9 1/2 ounces and in the 4.4 percentile. Last appointment we got the same song and dance as in the hospital that we should expect 1-2 ounces of weight gain a week and also to be making weekly weight check visits for the next couple of months. However, today the doctor took away the FTT diagnosis and said that she didn't want to see us again until his four month check up. How great is that?!?! Anyhow, I just wanted to share my little miracle of the day.

In other news, Jenna has a sinus infection and bronchitis. She's on antibiotics so hopefully she'll start feeling better soon. Poor kid.

cole...

Cole is home from the hospital. At his doctor's appointment on Monday he weighed 8lbs. and 7oz. which is entirely too small for an almost three month old. She diagnosed him failure to thrive and sent us over to Mercy. I was a little skeptical about having my baby boy admitted there, but I wanted his doctor to be able to monitor him so I allowed it. Our nurse (Connie) was fantastic! It turned out that she goes to Bethel Nazarene and knows Heidi's family and the Pridgen family. Anyhow, she took really good care of us. They got Cole hooked up to an IV and started pumping fluids into him. They also hooked him up to a machine that monitored his pulse and O2 sats. It was sad seeing him all hooked up to machines. He kept trying to grab his IV tube and hold onto it, and every time he bent his leg up it set off the alarm that he had lost his pulse. We deduced that for some reason that he wasn't gaining weight by breast feeding, so we put him on formula. After talking to the doctor, I decided that all breast feeding would really do for him right now would be to delay weight gain. He needs to be on formula only so that he is able to get the nutrition he needs with every meal. She told my I could continue nursing if I wanted, but I decided to go to bottles. (I really don't like nursing that much anyway... so I'd rather just go to bottles and formula and get him gaining weight!) By yesterday morning he weighed in at 9lbs. 6oz. This was really great because they really only expected him to gain a few ounces and not almost a whole pound! This morning he had gained a couple more ounces and was at 9lbs. 8oz. When the doctor saw him this morning she was super impressed and told us we could go home a day early. We have a follow up appointment on Monday, and she wants him to get up to 11lbs within the next few weeks. Everything is looking pretty good! Thanks to everyone for all of the prayers.

how she says i love you...

Yesterday I was sick. I woke up with a headache and quickly realized that it was much worse than that. After being very thankful that I had just cleaned the bathroom, I got Jenna up, changed her, and carried her back to my bed with a bag of toys. I looked into her still sleepy eyes and told her very seriously that mommy was not feeling well and that she needed to rest. I asked her to play quietly on my bed and I turned on cartoons for her. I expected a fight. I expected my energetic daughter to bounce around and make a bunch of noise. She didn't. She grabbed a stuffed animal and a book out of the bag and sat next to me. She cuddled into me and watched cartoons, and every now and then she would look at me and pat me gently. She even got me tissues to wipe my nose (even though I didn't need them) because that is what you need when you are sick. My daughter is perceptive and sweet. I am so thankful for such a wonderful kid!

sweet cole...

I feel like I need to write this to remind myself that my beautiful crying baby is a blessing. I don't know what has him so upset tonight, but he has me at the end of my rope. He didn't sleep very well last night either, and so I am feeling a little sleep deprived and more than slightly emotional. And so here we sit. Sweet Cole crying on my lap while I cry and try to distract myself with the internet. Poor sweet Cole. I wish I could fix whatever is making him so sad...

perspective and a pajama party...

Today is a better day. Today I woke up with perspective and a smile. Remembering that God is with me always and so it doesn't matter what naysayers may say... someday we will be okay.

My kids and I are currently having a pajama party in my bed. I asked Jenna what she wanted to do. She said, "Pooh". Pooh is code for cartoons. I asked her if she wanted to watch them in the chair and she said, "No, bed!" So, that is what we are doing. We are watching cartoons in bed. Still. We've had breakfast in bed. We've played games in bed. We've watched cartoons in bed. And now I need to go and so I can wipe "Braffe's" nose. Jenna has a cold, and therefore so does Giraffe.

my life...

I am a little more rested these days. For the last two nights Cole has slept for at least 5 hours. I'm hoping this trend continues. This morning he has been really happy too. He has been smiling and laying by himself without crying. If all of this continues, all we will have to do is wait until he quits spitting up all of his meals. In the mean time, I suppose he will just be very well bathed and I will be doing laundry a lot more often.

In other news, I think it might be time to start potty training my daughter. This morning I woke up to, "Mom, out please." I went in to get my daughter up and she had unzipped her pajamas and undone her diaper. It was still on, and it was only wet, but I know it could have been much worse. I think she needs to learn how to use the potty... and soon!

Meanwhile, the rest of my life is falling behind. I have mounds of laundry to fold, piles of dishes to wash, carpets to vacuum, and bedrooms to clean. I did manage to clean the bathroom the other night at least. I haven't been to the grocery story in almost two months. We are out of EVERYTHING, but I haven't mastered leaving the house to shop without Josh quite yet and Josh is so busy with catching up at the school.

I feel scattered and too busy. I don't have time for basic chores, and so I don't have time to do things like shower either. I suppose I will just have to join the ranks of the run ragged and unwashed.

it's been a grand sort of day...

I stole the title for this blog from my son's outfit. It really does fit. Although for most of the day I have been anxiously waiting for phone calls. I think that God was trying to remind me that faith is good, but along with it you also have to be patient.

At Cole's doctor's appointment today all we found out was that he was healing very well. The doctor was pleased with how his circumcision and stitches looked. However, she had not received his lab results back. She told us that she would call us when she got them. So I started waiting for that call.

Yesterday Josh had an interview with an elementary school in Kuna. They told him they would call him within 24 hours to let him know. So, I was waiting for that call too.

We didn't get either call until way late this afternoon. We got the call about Cole at about four. They said that his test results were NORMAL for a kid his age! They want to test him again at six months just to make sure. Josh's call we gave up on at about 4:44... they called at 4:45. HE GOT A JOB!!!! So, he starts tomorrow. lol. Open house tomorrow night, school starts Friday. Pray for him please? I know he'll do great!

because we're Nazarene...

So, I know that we're Nazarene and that because of this everyone knows everything about everyone in just a matter of moments after any sort of event or happening. I love that this means that there is prayer and support when it is needed, but I hate how things can get skewed and changed over the course of people being informed. Therefore, I wanted to write this so that no one was misinformed.

Cole had his circumcision yesterday. He was bleeding a lot which is a common risk, but the doctor said that if he didn't stop we needed to bring him in again. We ended up in the E.R. for a little while last night, but the doctor sent us home after putting a pressure dressing on him. This morning he was still bleeding, so we went back in to see our doctor. She was mildly concerned and after examining him she needed to put in seven stitches. However, she was still concerned about the amount of bleeding that had happened, and she decided to test Cole for a bleeding disorder. His first set of tests came back slightly irregular, and so she is running a few more tests that we'll get the results for in a few days. There is still a good chance that there is nothing wrong with him, and even if there is something wrong, most of these disorders are very treatable.

We appreciate any prayer, but we also appreciate people staying calm about this. I'm very high stress anyway, and so the more that other people freak out, the more I freak out. We'll keep everyone informed about things as we find out what is going on. Thanks to everyone that has already expressed concern and offered prayer.

I know I'm overreacting but...

So, tomorrow is Cole's circumcision. I know that it isn't a big deal, but I'm REALLY nervous about it. Please pray that everything goes well.