Happy 11th Birthday, Andrew

11 years ago Andrew was born on Black Friday! I guess the Thanksgiving dinner the day before did me in. Actually we really didn't do Thanksgiving that year because I was due.

When Andrew was 5 years old his birthday fell on Thanksgiving. Every 11 years his birthday will fall on Thanksgiving. So, you know what that means-> when he is 16 years old his b-day will be Thanksgiving. No driver license on his b-day. hee hee!

Last night he opened his b-day presents because we have a tradition of the kids spend the night on Thanksgiving at G'ma's house so we can go Black Friday first thing in the morning. We actually didn't see Andrew until we picked him from gymnastics this evening.

All of us plus our friend, Cari (who lives up North), went to Nachos for dinner. I'm bummed I had misplaced my camera and didn't get any pictures. It took a couple hours searching for it this evening to find my camera. I had put it in my other jacket before I changed to go get Andrew for dinner.

Macy Thanksgiving Day Parade

I got the idea from StephieAnne's blog. I printed off bingo cards and gave the kids pennies to mark their cards. They had a lot of fun watching the parade.

Then for a prizes I came up with a $2.00 bill for 1st place and gold dollars for 2nd and 3rd place. There was a little arguement on who really "won"...so, I decided to keep the $2 and give each kid a gold dollar. Next year I think I might change some of the stuff on the cards (one thing was for Mom/Dad to yell turn off the TV). I could probably come up with something different for that spot. I have a whole year to figure something out. :)

I survived Costco

The last couple of days we've been trying to get all the leaves to the street while it was nice in the afternoon. Yesterday morning the leaf crew came and put all the leaves from around our area in front of our house. When I left for Costco I backed out the driveway into this pile of leaves. Geesh.


I went to Costco when the business people can get in (10 am). It was STILL crazy. The lines were long and the parking lot was full. I called two of my friends and found out if they needed me to pick up anything.
Below is our pie count:
5 pumpkin pies, 1 pecan pie, and 1 apple pie
Tara took 2 pumpkin and Jill took 1 pumpkin pie.
Costco has great pumpkin pie. It taste just like Libby's Pumpkin Pie. The best part is it is only $6.00 and it is huge. Normally I bake all the pies but this year I took the easy way out. :)

MEME: Christmas

I saw this on StephieAnne's blog and thought it would be fun to do:

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? If I have to wrap it then it is "gift bag" time (I wrap presents like I'm in second grade). Jay on the other hand is a totally different story. He's a fancy wrapper.

2. Real tree or Artificial? Real. Oregon is the leading producer of Christmas trees.

3. Why are you willing to answer these questions? for something fun to do

4. When do you take the tree down? Usually the day after Christmas.

5. Do you like eggnog? I can't do dairy. But my son loves it.

6. Favorite gift received as a child? My laptop

7. Hardest person to buy for? it is toss up between Jay and Tara

8. Easiest person to buy for? I'm really bad about picking gifts out for people. Jay is so much better than me at all that stuff.

9. Do you have a nativity scene? Yep. I have several of them. I love the nativity scene.

10. Do you send your card by mail or e-mail? Mail

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? I won't say since I know people who read this blog but don't comment. I don't want hurt feelings. But those who know me well know what it was. :)

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? ELF

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? no certain time. Usually on Black Friday. LOL!

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? Maybe. Not sure.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? sweets

16. Lights on the tree? Yep. White lights on the Christmas tree

17. Favorite Christmas song? Hmmm...changes from year to year. "I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas" or "Mary whose child is this" (not sure if that is the correct name).

18.Travel at Christmas or stay home? at home

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer's? probably not

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Angel

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? We open one present on Christmas eve. We actually don't put any presents under the tree until after the kids go to bed on Christmas eve...so they wake up to presents under the tree.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? All the Christmas music. After awhile it gets old (my kids like to play it all waking hours)

23. Favorite ornament theme or color? I like snowmen

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? kind of like Thanksgiving dinner

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? well behaved kids. just teasing. :)

Choir

Maddie joined the choir today for 1st service. Amy and Emma picked up Maddie early this morning to help us out(3 services). Thank you, Amy, because the two older kids were still sleeping when you picked up Maddie. She had a great time with you.

If you click on the pictures you can see them better. Maddie is in the second row from the bottom (far left).

The next set of pictures are from 2nd service (I didn't take any of 3rd service since they would of been of the same thing).

Maddie couldn't hold still while singing. She had her legs bouncing and then it moved to her shoulders and finally her head.

Samantha is on the far left in the purple Easter looking dress.

It was a lot of fun hearing all of their sweet voices singing God's praises. All the kids did a great job. :)

What pain looks like

I mentioned in an earlier post that Samantha is being weaned off her chemo meds. It isn't going as well as Samantha would like. She was hoping to be done with them forever. But her body is starting to go into a flare. I took this picture of her this afternoon (after school).

She woke up on Monday barely able to move her head because her neck hurt so badly. The pain is still hurting her today. On Tuesday when she woke up with her neck pain she told me that her wrist and ankles hurt her also. She said she thought she slept funny on them but I knew that wasn't the case. I talked to her Ped. Dr.'s office and they told me to ice and then put heat on the spots (plus Tylenol). Then if the pain was still there the next day to call her Dr. at Dorenbacher.

So, I have a call into her dr. up in Portland.

Samantha has a hot water bottle on her neck and a heating pad on her ankle. After the ice and then the heat she felt a little better. She is going to youth group tonight so she is hoping she can play the games when the time comes.

Report Card Day

Today the Samantha and Andrew got their math report cards from Logos.

Fighting Ducks

I love sitting in the Suite. We took a bunch of pictures with me in them but my eyes were always shut because of the flash. So, here is one without a flash and my eyes are open.

Here are some photos of what it looks like inside the Suite.

Andrew and Maddie reading during the game. There is food all around them. The food is always so good.

Sewing

Last week Samantha asked me to take out my sewing machine. The reason she wanted to sew was because on Veteran's Day she went to the VFW Hall and sewed stocking for Service Men and Woman. It motivated her to want to make one for herself.

She did all of this by herself. I can't sew and she knows that I'm no help. :)

Fly Over

On Saturday before the Duck game we were on our way home and Jay took us on the new fly over. It was mine and the kids first time. So, being a dork I documented me right before we got on the fly over.

$4 million or so (give or take a few million) for this road.

Kung Fu Night

Last Friday night I got the privilege of being the photographer for the Middle Schoolers Kung Fu Panda night at First B. I followed the kids around taking all kinds of fun photos. They had different stations set up (like showing your secret ninja move, ninja star making and so on). The kids had fun dressing up for the evening. We found that dress Samantha is wearing from Goodwill. It is authenic (from Vietnam).

Above is a shot of Jay and the girls showing me their secret ninja move before we headed out for our night at the church.

October's Dr. appointment

I'm sorry to family members that I didn't blog after our last dr. appointment at Dorenbacher's Children Hospital. A few weeks ago we headed up for our every 4 month dr. appointment with Samantha. G'ma kept Andrew and Maddie here that day.
It was a good appointment. Samantha has been on methotraxate for 9 years. At her previous appointment the Dr. weaned her from 3 pills once a week to 2 pills once a week. She didn't do so well for a couple of weeks after being weaned to two pills. But Samantha didn't want me to say anything to the dr. because she hates taking the medicine so much. So, after a couple of weeks she started adjusting to the new dosage.
At this appointment the Dr. thought Samantha was still doing well enough to go down to just one pill. I told him what happened after the last time he reduced her medicine and he told me to let him know if it continues for more than a couple of weeks. Samantha promised to be honest with us about the effects the medicine was having on her.
Again her body didn't do so well being weaned to just one pill. She started having flare ups in her ankles and wrist. After a couple of weeks it seems to have quieted down. She is so happy and hopeful that after taking this medicine for almost her whole life she might be able to be done with it.
She was about 62 pounds and if I remember correctly almost 4'10". She is still the lightest kid she knows for her age. She is content with her small size. The only thing that frustrates her about her size is when people think that her brother is her twin (he is the same height...maybe 1/2" shorter).

Here she is waiting for the Dr. to make his appearance.


Jay and I playing around in the Dr. office. I always look so white compared to Jay.

Here is Samantha at her March appointment.

WE'RE DEBT FREE!!!

The day after Halloween (Nov. 1st) we got up early and headed to Portland. Dave Ramsey was doing a seminar on finances. We took all three kids and G'ma. Our friends, Tara & Jim came also. We got there early to make sure to get a seat. The two pictures below are of us there about an hour early. Good thing we got there that early because it was packed. 9,000 people showed up to listen to Dave speak on money.

One of Dave's main things is teaching people how to get out of debt (everything but the house). And once you do you call into his radio show and yell- WE'RE DEBT FREE!! We always said we would do that but years ago when we got out of debt we just never got around to it.

The conference was from 1 to 6 pm. The kids did really well sitting there (2 of them brought Nintendo's to entertain themselves),

Tagged~

My blog friend Stephanie tagged me for a meme.

Here are the rules:
1) Link to the person who tagged you.
2) Post the rules on your blog (copy and paste 1-6).
3) Write 6 random things about yourself (see below).
4) Tag 6 people at the end of your post and link to them.
5) Let each person know they have been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.
6) Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

1. I'm an only child. I always wanted to have an older brother. When I was little I use to pretend I had an older brother.

2. I use to play tennis in high school. I was #1 singles for our team and I played year round.. Here is the irony...we have tennis court right outside our back door and I NEVER play anymore. In the 8 years we have lived here I have probably pick up my racquet to play 3 times.

3. Jay and I met 14 1/2 years ago over the internet. He was a Senior at Slippery Rock University (Pa) and I was a Senior at the U of O. We use to telnet (does anyone still do that?) to a college "talker". It was all text based. This was before computers are what they are today. People didn't have them in their homes.

4. I had our 3 kids in less than 3 years. It was crazy times when they were little.

5. I love watching TV. Probably comes from the fact that when I was 2 years old my Mom threw our TV out the window because she was frustrated with my Dad watching TV. So, I grew up withOUT a TV.

6. I'm addicted to Facebook right now. I've used myspace in the past to keep in touch with our Portland friends and family across the country. Then I got a Facebook and I've been connecting up with my highschool friends.

If you want to know more quirky things about me ...I did another MeMe last June. You can check it out here.

Okay, I tag: Jay, Tara, Jill, Raellyn, Cari, and Becky.

It's My Birthday!!!

Well, actually my birthday was Election Day (Nov. 4th). My day started with Samantha waking me up by singing "Happy Birthday" Build-a-Bear style. She also had gotten up early to decorate. Then G'ma Betty called to do her traditional birthday singing to me.

Before we left for Heart to Heart (at EBF) I had asked Samantha take a picture of me. For some reason I can NOT keep my eyes open when the flash is on. I have a bunch of pictures of me with my eyes closed.

Tara beat me into H2H and had everyone wear a party hat and blow horns when I came in. Then everyone sang Happy Birthday to me and she kept announcing how old I am now (37 years old). I would have to say my cheeks turned very pink throughout the morning.

Then off to my birthday lunch with my family at Red Robin. The lunch went well but we did have an awkward moment at the end of lunch when my ex-boyfriend's (highschool through college) dad came over to wish me happy birthday and visit for a few minutes. hee hee!

Here is my b-day from last year.

Can you find me?

October had some really nice weather and the kids took advantage of our tree dumping leaves everywhere. They were suppose be raking leaves but I could hear them laughing and giggling. So, I went to investigate and found them burying Tag in the leaves. Tag loved it. He would tunnel his way out. Sometimes he would try to eat his way out.

Do you see Tag in the two pictures below? (you can click on the pictures to make them larger)

The kids moved the leaf pile to the back yard. They created a huge mound and when I let Tag out to play in the back he goes straight for the leaf pile. He jumps (if you can call it that when his legs are so short) and tunnels through the leaves. It is funny to watch.

Halloween Customes #2

Andrew as Dark Helmet (Space Balls the movie)

 

 

 

 

Andrew and Maddie both have on our friend's high heels on(boots for Andrew and clear shoes for Maddie). Their feet were killing them. :) hee hee! We were telling Andrew he should be Gene Simmons with the boots next year. He has different ideas for next year.

Halloween Customes #1

Maddie as a Zombie Fashion Model

 

Tag as a Butterfly

 

Samantha as a Kitty Cat

 

Picasa only lets me do a couple pictures. I will blog again with more pictures.

Maddie's costume got changed the day before (from a Rock Star to the Zombie Fashion Model)because she had an accident with the shower curtain and cut her along her lower lashes. We sat in the Urgent Care for 3 hours. Luckily everything turned out fine.
Jay did Maddie's make-up and hair.