The big 35

Today I turn 35...I don't mind the numbers but I do have to admit that this one sounds a little...old. More than anything that I am 5 years from 40! Don't get me wrong...I look forward to 40 and definitely want to turn 40...but wow!

I will have to say that I have appreciated and enjoyed this birthday more than any I can remember in many years. Maybe because of the last few weeks that we have had it makes me appreciate things more. It was a simple birthday weekend...my boys took me to TGIFridays and bought me my favorite dessert in the entire world, Vanilla Bean Cheesecake and then my mom cooked me a fantastic meal on Sunday. I had all of my important (family) people around me that day. Today was also fantastic at school. I generally try to keep my birthday a secret anywhere I work but thanks to the calendar that isn't possible anymore. Once again, I don't mind aging but I just don't care for the attention. So many wonderful ladies made me feel special today though and I honestly enjoyed it for a change. The highlight of the day though was when every third grader sang Happy Birthday to me in the cafeteria! Jacob said that I turned very red, lol, I'm sure I did but I really enjoyed it. One class of the 5th graders sang to me also but that third grade group is just special to me.

Today has been so nice I might even look forward to 36...

It's snowing...again

I didn't realize we were supposed to get any more snow before next week but there are huge, fluffy flakes coming down right now. Don't get me wrong...I love snow. I will be the first to say how much I want a huge snow that Jacob can play in...enough that they call off school the night before and so on. I don't like ice though! I don't want enough ice that they call off school for an entire week.

I can't complain too much though because through it all we have only been without power (knocking on every piece of wood I can find) for 8 hours. There is a tree limb though that is dangling by a splinter over our power lines right now...the least little bit of wind or pressure and we will join the thousands without power. Keep your fingers crossed for us. My grandparents were without power on Wednesday and refused to leave their house. When it started snowing so much that morning Shannon decided he was going to go up there and drag them out if he had to. Their house was 55 degrees and dropping and they were hungry for something warm so luckily no bodily force was necessary. They stayed with us until Thursday morning when their neighbor called and said the power was back on.

We seldom listen to the Richmond radio channel but Shannon had it on when he went to get my grandparents and they announced that McDonald's was out of food!! I have never in my life heard of a restaurant running out of food. I guess where so many other places and people were without power everyone went there. I just thought that was wild.

We have the prettiest little birds hunting for food in our back yard right now...they are very fat and have a yellow breast. I don't know what they are but I have thrown some bread right off the porch in hopes they will get close enough that I can get a good picture of them.

So far the only bad thing in this experience is the ice broke my cherry tree. It is a beautiful tree and we built our house so that it would be in our front yard...we also threaten the builders if they damaged the tree. This land belonged to my grandparents and this particular tree has always been here...for ever 45 years. I have always loved the tree since I was a child. It has split and fell onto the chain link between us and mom. We can, of course, fix the fence but I don't think there is any hope for my tree.

Here is a pic of one of the trees that are next to our property in the back yard...the 2nd big tree is the one that now has a huge limb dangling over our power line. These are the trees from the house I grew up in.

Mom and Dad have had a lot of tree damage also...Shannon caught Dad trying to pull a huge branch out of the road the other day. Had to fuss at him for that considering he is still restricted to picking up 10 lbs. It is a sign that he is feeling much better and he has worked the last two days by phone to help his guys get through this ice storm.

Blackbirds just came and ate the bread I threw out for the pretty little yellow birds so I give up until later. I am going to go scrapbook. Stay warm!

Gross topic...funny though

After Dad's surgery on Friday the nurse is telling us about his post-surgery care...incision care, med directions, etc. Almost as an afterthought she adds that we might want to get him some stool softeners (sorry Dad) because of the meds and being put to sleep. As we are riding home, Mom is making a list of things she needs me to pick up at the grocery when I pick up his prescriptions and she adds the stool softeners to it. Jacob is sitting in between us and repeats the words "stool softener".

I'm pretty sure he doesn't know what this is so I ask him "Jacob, what is a stool softener?"

Jacob thinks for a moment and then very seriously replies "A really soft cushion for a stool?"

Everyone cracks up...even Dad. This will be a family joke for years to come.

We have had barn duty for the last week since Dad has been unable to do his chores...I've included a picture of Jacob on his way to the barn to help out on one of the really cold days this weekend.

Here are pictures of all of us playing Ravin' Rabbids on the Wii. We are "driving" motorcycles with our butts. I think Jacob is also trying to steer with his face!

Surgery Day

Up at 5am this morning...trying to get something fixed for breakfast before we leave for Lexington at 6:15. Warming up the 4-runner...despite the fact it was parked in the garage all night. It's -3 according to channel 18's website...

We get to St. Joseph around 7:15 and they check Dad right in and tell us we will see him again in an hour. Almost 2 hours later they finally have him prepped for surgery and we get to go back and sit with him until they take him to the operating room at 9:45. At 10:20 they call and say the surgery has finally began. At 11:30 the doctor comes in and says the surgery went well and she has fixed all the disc problems and that he will be in recovery for an hour. At 12:45 they call for us to come in and see him...by this time Jacob and Mom are a nervous, twitching mess. Shannon is exhausted because he only had 2 hours of sleep and I'm trying to hold everyone together...as usual. Jacob speeds ahead of us and we are trying to warn him that Dad might be sleepy, bandaged, in pain etc. He pays no attention and just barrels into the room. I see him struggling not to cry and go around the corner...expecting the worst. Dad is sitting up in the bed, looking better than he has in a week, eating saltine crackers and drinking diet pepsi. I then realize that Jacob's near tears state is absolute relief. His Papaw is okay.

3o minutes later, we are on our way out the door and they have almost had to chase Dad down to get him to sit in the wheelchair so they can "do their job" and escort him out. Other than a sore throat and some shoulder soreness he says he feels fantastic. This all started a week ago tonight/tomorrow morning. In less than 24 hours we found out he would have to have surgery and the surgery is complete. It's absolutely amazing. Mom is still fussing because his doctor looked like she should be on a soap opera...Dad, however, was not complaining, lol.

Stress

Why does life have to be so stressful? I remember, back when I was young and foolish, I used to thrive on stress. The more things I had going on, the more productive I was...that is not the case these days.

I'm stressed about school even though I really enjoyed my class on Wednesday night and even more stressed about the praxis I took on Saturday. Then on top of all that, my dad woke up last Saturday in severe pain through his shoulder, neck and left arm. He honestly thought he was having a massive heart attack. Mom took him to the emergency room but did not tell me because this was the day of my praxis test. By the time my test was over he was home. He had not had a heart attack but they couldn't really tell what was wrong with him. On Monday, he found out he had a bulging disc in his spine and would need to see a neurologist. I took him to the neurologist this afternoon...he is still in such severe pain he can barely speak...they talked to him for 20 minutes and scheduled back surgery for him tomorrow morning! So at 7:30 tomorrow morning they will go through his neck, hoping not to hit the major artery, and fix the bones and discs that are giving him trouble. Now this sounds major to me but when I ask the doctor today how long he will be in the hospital they tell me I will take him home tomorrow afternoon! Are they crazy?? All I can say is thank goodness for snow days so that I don't have to worry about getting back to Jacob or finding a sub. Needless to say, Jacob, my little worrier is very nervous about tomorrow and has smothered his papaw with instructions for tonight and tomorrow. We will have a hard time separating the two of them tomorrow when they come to take Dad back.

Snow Day

I'm sitting here watching the bottom of the tv screen, knowing that Madison County will never announce "No school" the night before but still hoping. We will probably go back tomorrow and in my mind I know we should because I don't want to be in school all summer but I was able to get such a good start on our Disney vacation scrapbook today that I would love another day to work on it!! Last winter I declared every snow day a day to work guilt free on my scrapbooks. My logic was that I wouldn't have done housework if I had been at school so why should I on a snow day?

Can I just say how awesome the new text messaging system that wlex has is on snowy mornings!! They text message you if your school is out for snow so around 4:30 this morning I get a text message that there is no school. I turned off my alarm and went right back to sleep without having to get up and walk down a cold hallway to the computer.

Shannon got a new cell phone this past weekend and as we are looking through all the options we come across an option that says "Reject List"...for some reason this struck me so funny. I can just think of all the people that I would put on my reject list. I know that is mean but how many times do you get calls and just wished you'd had the good sense not to answer the phone? I would love to have a voicemail message that simply says "You are on my reject list today, you suck, try again later."

Fall Break

Back to the real world today...fall break just wasn't long enough! We went camping on Saturday, just down to Boonesboro but even though it's close we feel like we are a hundred miles away. I LOVE it down there in October. If we were wealthy and there was no school for Jacob I would spend the entire month of October there. I would definitely have a nicer camper though. They go all out decorating for Halloween and at night it is just awesome. One of the hosts has several hundred pumpkins on his site with lights strung in the trees and on the grass. We are hoping to go back down this weekend (maybe next weekend too). If you haven't driven through the campground during October you need to...it's almost like Southern Lights at Christmas. They decorated the rec hall with lights, spider webs and ghosts that are set to blink in time to music that is playing over the loud speakers. Nothing creepier than hearing the Michael Myers theme song in the dark across a campground :-) We will be the campsite with the ghost car (spooky voice here) so stop and say hey.