What a week...

Well, here we are at the last day of 2009, I still can't figure out where the year went. Like I said on Facebook - some of the year was good and some bad but I am ready for a new start so to speak with 2010. I just don't see it happening!!! We had one heck of a week this week. My last day of work for 2009 was December 23 and I have to go back on January 4. I was sooooo looking forward to scrapbooking everyday to catch-up on my backlog but have only done 6 of the 100 page goal that I had set for myself. Of course, it is a lot more difficult to scrapbook with a 6 year old assistant!! She has started to go to my scrapbook area by herself to "scrapbook" on her own. She is doing a good job, but I worry about what she is using - some scrapbook stuff is expensive and I bought it with a page in mind so I really don't want her using it for play. At least when I die, I know who to leave my scrapbook stuff to since Kristi doesn't like to scrapbook. She got a scrapbook kit for Christmas and we are going to spend one day working with her on her own scrapbook. We have several zoo pictures and some other that I was going to let her have. She is so excited about it. We are going to make a few cards as well. Kristi is feeling better now that the stint has been removed. The doctors appointment went well and the stint was a lot longer then I anticipated. I was expecting about a 2 inch stint and it was more like 12 inches. He kept pulling and pulling to get it out. Dr. Remis told Kristi that it would take about a month to get the stone report back (they must have sent it to a 3rd world country!!) and then he would give her more instructions. Until then, he told her to drink a lot of water and rest. After Kristi's doctors appointment we had to stop at my work to get my paycheck. I ran in and when I came back out, the van wouldn't start. It was suppose to go to the shop for the back door struts replacement, but now it was going to more. I called AAA to get it towed since we couldn't get it started and the tow-truck driver did a couple of things and with help from the tow truck got it started. He said go straight to the Chrysler dealer - don't turn anything on like the heater or radio and don't turn it off! Luckily, Tom was at work so we had another car at our disposal to drive. It has been 2 days and the van is STILL in the shop. They said that one of our issues was the battery, which we went and bought. But, Tom gave them a list of about 10 items he wanted fixed. I don't think I will see my van for another year!!! After I got home, Brian called and wanted my Sam's card to go shopping, so I left to meet him at Sam's and he called - he had locked his keys in his apartment and needed me to come by and let him in!! What a day this had been. We went to Sam's and then I headed home to go to bed, I was afraid of what else was going to go wrong!! Yesterday, I went to the grocery store and then was a little fairy - I went to Brian's apartment and made him some Chili in the crock-pot and made his spare bed up for him. I told him that I wanted to get a special mattress pad on the spare bed since he bought it from a stranger and it looked like it has been USED a lot. Since I was the one who told him to wait, I decided I would make the bed for him. He called when he got home and said that he had a reverse break-in. Someone broke into his apartment and fixed him supper and made the bed. I asked if he was going to call the Police, and he said heck no - I want them to do this again. I guess I need to look for some more good crock-pot recipes and do this again. Tonight is New Years Eve and we are not planning on doing anything. Kristi and Tom have sinus infections and don't feel good. Our dinner tonight is going to be homemade Chicken noodle soup. What a good meal for the last day of the year!

Merry Christmas to All...

We finally made it to Christmas, I still can't believe that it is Christmas day. I don't know where time as went. I was really terrible this year because I didn't get anything for the kids (my kids) and only a couple of things for Alayna. I just couldn't get the time to get anything. We really had decided that we would adopt a family instead of buying presents for each other. This turned out to be a $1,200 Christmas. I would have spent less on my own kids. But, the joy of giving to others made it nice. I am sure they are happy this morning as well as we are.

This week - up to Christmas has been hell for Kristi. She started on Saturday feeling bad. About noon, she came and asked if Kidney stones would make you want to cry - which Tom answered yes. Kristi said I think that is my problem. She tried everything but the pain would not ease up, so at 12:30 on Sunday morning Tom and Kristi were off to the emergency room since she was in extreme pain. After a cat scan to confirm the stone and several bags of fluid and medicine they sent her home at 5:30. Of course, Tom and Kristi slept most of the morning in which I teased them that the were too old to stay out all night like that.

Sunday was not a better day with the pain, but Kristi was dealing with it the best she could. Since she can't take narcotics she is really limited on pain medicine. She called the hospital and they were not much help, they just told her to keep drinking - which she did but it wasn't coming out the other end as needed.

So, on Monday she tried in vain to get an appointment with a urologist but with it being Christmas week they didn't have any openings. So, about noon she and Tom headed back to the emergency room for help. After much arguing they decided to call the urologist on call and have him check her. Well, that happened to be the same doctor that sees mom and I, so we were very pleased that she could get with him. He said that there is something wrong and she needed to have emergency surgery.

So, at 5 pm Kristi headed into surgery to have the stone removed. Dr. Remis was glad he did that since the stone was sideways in the tube from the right kidney to the bladder. It was plugged by the stone. He said that when he removed the stone he got flooded! He said that there was only a 20% chance that she would have passed it on her own and it would have been very painful. Surgery took an hour because he put a stint in the tube to keep it open and reduce the swelling. Now, the stint is hurting her, but it comes out on Tuesday.

We were back home by 7:30 with a very hungry girl. She had not eaten since Friday night, so she was ready to eat. We are thankful that Dr. Remis was on call and Kristi got a great doctor to take care of her.

Alayna has been really good this week, but bribing her with Santa helped. What are we going to do next week? She is really bored not going to school and next week we are going to work on her kindergarten workbook so she doesn't forget all that she has learned. She is so excited right now waiting for Bubby to wake up so she can open her presents. We told her she has to wait for him and she is going crazy!!!

Brian had to go into work yesterday for an emergency call. Since it was a paid holiday he got double time and a half. So, he made a good amount of money for his almost 4 hours on the call. He has to work tomorrow for his regular Saturday on call. He is not looking forward to that.

Oma has been enjoying all the activity going on around her. She is just trying to stay out of everyone way while they run like crazy!! She is very excited about going to David and Angie's tonight for Christmas dinner. We have not done this in a long time and we are all ready to go. We are making some good food to go with David's good food...yum yum.

Tom was off this week to keep Alayna while Kristi worked, but instead he spent the week keeping Kristi while Alayna played!! He had his hands full taking her to and from the hospital and convincing them that he was really her father!!!

I am off next week to keep Alayna. My plan is to scrapbook 10 pages a day while I am off. This means that I should have 100+ pages done by the time I go back to work. Well, I have been off for 2 days now and have not touched anything - so I am already 20 pages behind. Of course, this will be a difficult task complete since I have a 6 year old that LOVES to scrapbook. Stay tuned for the final tally of completed pages.

It's Kristi.....

Since it's taken Mom so long to update her blog, I guess I'll do it for her. You snooze, you lose! We have been extremely busy the last couple of weeks, which is probably part of the reason that Mom hasn't had a chance to update recently. We've been fighting being sick and this past week was full of owies. Monday, Oma tried to sew her finger and had to go to the emergency room to have the tip of the needle that broke off in her finger removed. After much digging by the plastic surgeon, they were able to remove a quarter inch piece of needle from her finger. It's bruised and sore, but Oma seems to be doing quite well. Also on Monday, I decided that I forgot how to walk and ended up falling down some stairs at work. My feet somehow came out from underneath me and I landed butt first on the stairs. I am still in quite a bit of pain and think I am going to have to break down and go to the doctor. I have been putting that off since I don't think there is much they can do for me. Again on Monday, Mom had a spot removed by the dermatologist and has some stitches to be removed. We were all hurting Monday night, so I am sure you can see what dinner was like Monday night. Brian went to Kansas City this weekend, but ended up getting plagued with a horrible migraine. After stopping several times on the way home, he finally made it safely Saturday evening. Dad ended up getting some sort of bug on Saturday and spend some of the day in bed. Alayna was the only one out of us all who didn't have anything major happen. **knocking on wood** It turns out she makes a really good nurse. Alayna and I had experienced a first together in the latter part of November. We, along with Oma and Aunt Kris, went on our first train trip. It was exciting and a lot of fun. We left from Jeff City and went to St. Louis for the weekend. We stayed at the hotel connected to Union Station, so that made things much easier. Union Station wasn't as big or full as we expected it to be, so we took the day Sunday to explore St. Louis a little. We rode on the Metro all over the city and even took a side trip to the arch. We couldn't have asked for better weather to do all of this, it was absolutely gorgeous. I highly recommend doing this if you just have a weekend that you want to get away. Alayna is doing very well in kindergarten. She loves her teacher and is learning things that I don't remember touching on until first or second grade. She has a list of around 50 words such as "like", "and", "but", and so on that she has to know how to say, read, spell, and write by the end of this year. We are working with those quite a bit. She's learning to add, match, and separate in her math class. It's amazing to see her mind soak all of this in. She came home with a letter from the school nurse a while ago requesting that we have her eyes tested again, so we went this past Saturday to do that. They have to have their eyes tested before they can start kindergarten, so we had already done that in May, but the school felt there was a need to test her again. Good thing. In the past six months, her eyes have gone from a .25 to a .75 and have gained curvature. In other words, she is going to be as blind as her momma. We got her some glasses and hopefully they will be here in the next week or so. She is very excited about having to wear them, but I have a feeling that is going to wear off rather quickly. I have had a lot of ups and downs recently. Work is going good. I was told recently that there is a possibility that I am going to get a promotion, so that's been pretty exciting. School has been great this session. I took two online classes, but I made sure they were not difficult classes due to the holiday. They've both proven to be very easy to handle. I have finals this week and feel really good about both of them. Otherwise, I have been struggling a lot recently. For some reason, my emotions are all over the place. My next appointment with the oncologist is next week, so I am going to speak with her about that when I go. I don't know if it's a hormonal thing or if it's just me. I guess that's all for now. If I don't get to see or speak with you before the holiday, I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas and New Years. Lots of Love, Kristi