You asked for it...

Here it is...cute pink helmet. Well as far as motorcycle helmets go. It's a bit darker in real life, but still a soft pink. No, we are not in biker gear because we were just going over to the weekly group dinner at Native New Yorker tonight. Sadly when I look at this picture, I think...dang! that girl has got to lose some weight. We all have goals...that one is at the top of my list.

Cody just got his glasses in today. He broke his old ones. Well actually Chad stepped on them. He was so excited to get them because now he can see without squinting. They actually gave him the wrong color frames, so I'll have to take one of his pairs back because he really liked the pewter ones better. Can you tell that he is a tall boy from how long his face is? He just started 7th grade and is taller than a good chunk of the kids at school. He totally sprouted up this last year and I mean HUGE! He is taller than me. I imagine growing that fast has to hurt a little bit. Now 4 of my boys have out grown me...1 to go!

New hair-do!

You all guessed it right! Mine is the pink purse. I also have a matching wallet...so cute! I don't buy expensive purses. I got the purse, wallet and a pair of motorcycle glasses for $63...pretty good, I think.
Today I took Brittany to the doctor. They did an ultrasound and stress test. Baby Mark is now up to 6 pounds. The stress test showed lots of uterine activity...which is normal for being 37 weeks. Can you believe she's 37 weeks already? I sure can't! It wont be long now. Brittany is doing great! She doesn't look miserable or feel miserable. I guess that's one of the perks to being young and thin.
My hair girl was gone all summer and I finally got in this afternoon. My hair was getting very unmanageable and I had butchered my bangs numerous times myself. I got it cut and colored and highlighted. No more Grandma grey hairs! It's shorter and darker than I thought it would be, but I have crummy hair so she had to chop it to get it looking healthy. Cole took the picture of me...I know! I look tired! Frankly I am tired...life is too busy!

A bit of scrappin' and shoppin'

Today Coleen and I got to scrapbook. I got 2 layouts done. One of Cole and his best buddy Nathan and one of The first day of school. I also covered one of the cheap little Target notebooks that I bought months ago. I love those little things. I always have one in my purse. Coleen got 3 layouts done of their trip to Disney World. It was so fun to be creative again.
Yesterday we went shopping. We both got a dress for church and a purse. Can you guess which one is mine??? :o)

Cool pool!

Sorry I haven't posted in a few days. Blogger hasn't been cooperating so well with me.

Cole had cub scout pack meeting this week. It was held in the backyard of some friends in our neighborhood. I was blown away by their way cool pool. All of the scouts and their siblings had the best time swimming here. They also have the neatest playground that would put any parks to shame. They did an amazing job creating a fun place for their grandchildren to play. They were so sweet to invite all these kids to play in their back yard. The boy with Cole is his very best friend Nathan. I took a bunch of pictures of them together, so I can make a best friends layout on Sunday when Coleen comes over to scrapbook with me. I am so looking forward to scrapping. It's been weeks! I get grumpy when I go so long without being creative. I guess I better get my desk cleaned up tomorrow, huh?!

Big brown truck just pulled up!...guess what he brought me?...yep! cute pink helmet! Pictures to come when we go riding next....hee..hee..

A little antiquing...

This morning me, Brek and Brittany went to her doctors appointment. Tuesday's are ultrasound days. Everything is looking good. They didn't measure his size. They'll do that next week. We also went to the hospital to meet the doctor who will take care of baby Mark after he's born. We got to take a tour of the NICU. They were all very sweet and made us feel very welcome and comfortable. The only bad part about the hospital is that parking is just terrible because they are in the middle of building a parking garage...but on the upside to that, the do have FREE valet parking over at the maternity door. COOL!

After the doctor I took them to a cute place called Grandma's kitchen in downtown Mesa for lunch. Then we spent 2 hours walking off lunch in an antique store. Brek got himself a little trunk like box. He LOVES trunks. He wanted a big one, but couldn't afford it. I think I'll get him one for his birthday in October. I got a very cool scale (so love it), a little fan and 2 salt and pepper sets. I collect them, so I've always got my eyes open for different looking ones. The blue set is real heavy and were made in Italy. The anchor/lantern ones were just so different, I had to get them. There were a couple of other antique stores that we didn't get to. Maybe Brittany and I will hit those of Friday. We like to do something fun after doctor's appointments.

Completely off topic...I was sitting here eating a few candies from my candy dispenser. I have skittles, reeces pieces and m&m's all mixed up in there. So it's kind of luck of the draw with what comes out. Here's a tip....I just discovered that an m&m and a reeces piece in your mouth at the same time taste real good! :o)

Campers and kitties

At the forest ranger look out
my little posers...cute boys!
they LOVE riding quads
the little darlings

I just got the camping pictures off the camera from Mark taking the little boys to the mountains. I'm wondering just how long I can get away with calling them the little boys. They really aren't so little anymore. I guess it's just my way of holding onto them a bit longer. They really had a great 4 days of fun together. I'm glad Mark got to do this for them before school started. With running our own business, it's hard for him to take time off. The boys are so glad he did.
I also included a new picture of the kitties. It's HARD to get all three of them to cooperate for a picture. Sugar really is way cuter in person and doesn't look like a demon kitty like she does here. Patrick is in the back and has lots of spunk. Ellie is a true princess and has the sweetest squishy face. I love how funny and playful they have become. They make me laugh everyday.

Mark took me to La Parrilla Suiza Mexican food restaurant for the first time last night. Let me just say that it was the best flavored meat I have ever had! So dang good! For you local residents, It's on the SW side of the 60 and Stapley. I had the #15 and I'm thinking I have to go back very soon for another #15. It was amazingly yummy!

I ordered myself a new pink motorcycle helmet today. Totally girly baby soft pink. I'll post a picture when it comes in....so excited!

I've been tagged

I've been tagged by Smiley Carrie!

1. If you could build a house anywhere, where would it be? In the mountains somewhere surrounded by pine trees and cool breezes...yet close to shopping! The best of both worlds.
2. What's your favorite article of clothing? Jean shorts and a t-shirt or a blouse
3. Favorite physical feature of the opposite sex? smile
4. What's the last CD that you bought? Haven't bought one in many years...how lame am I?
5. Where's your favorite place to be? There's no place better than home...unless boys are fighting, then get me the heck out of here.
6. Where's your least favorite place to be? A car lot or anywhere that people are trying to sell me stuff by cramming it down my throat. I avoid eye contact at all cost.
7. What's your favorite place to be massaged? neck and shoulders, but I love my back to be scratched. My son Brek seems to think I like my scalp massaged. He does that to me EVERYDAY. I think he just likes to mess up my hair.
8. Strong in mind or strong in body? I'll go with mind...my body is wimpy wimpy wimpy
9. What time do you wake up in the morning? It's different...somewhere inbetween 6:30-7:30. Just whenever my body decides to wake up...not an alarm clock kind of girl unless I have to be somewhere early.
10. What is your favorite kitchen appliance? My professional size kitchen aid stand mixer. I LOVE appliances and all kinds of kitchen gadgets.
11. What makes you really angry? mean self absorbed people...they suck!
12. If you could play any instrument what would it be? Piano...and I wish I could sing as beautiful as my sister in law MaryAnn. She brings me to tears everytime I hear her. That is a gift!
13. Favorite color? Pink and blue to wear. Red, green, earthy tones to decorate. Actually I just love COLOR!!
14. Sports car or SUV? SUV...then I have a chance of living in an accident.
15. Do you believe in an afterlife? with all of my heart I know that is true
16. Favorite children's book? Good night moon and Brown bear brown bear
17. What's your favorite season? I love everything about Fall. It puts me in my happy place
18. What is your least favorite household chore? dishes, mopping and laundry
19. If you could have one super-power, what would it be? To blink and have a spotless clean house...hey...I could make some serious cash with that power. My friends would call me up and invite me over to blink their house clean too.
20. If you have a tattoo what is it? No tattoos on this body...unless were counting freckles...lots of those, and they are very permanent.
21. Can you juggle? Balls...not so much...BUT I can juggle 5 boys, a daughter in law, a needy husband, a house, the bills, the business, church, friends, school, cooking, kids homework, the shopping and much much more on demand.
22. The one person from your past that you wish you could go back and talk to? My sister Debbie
23. What's your favorite day? Friday...date night with my biker dude hubby...he's not the scary biker dude kind...just the mid-life I want to ride a cool bike with my friends kind of guy. :o)
24. What's in the trunk of your car? I drive a truck so there's nothing in the bed, but in the back seat there's a open box of gobstopper candy that my son Cody left in there. I know this because I heard them roll across the seat on a turn. I'm afraid to open that door now. It's going to be pouring candy down my driveway.
25. Which do you prefer-sushi or hamburger? hamburger all the way...I will NEVER eat sushi...I'm a hugely picky eater!
I'm tagging September and Joni. :o)

Buttons, Pumpkin, and stuff...

Look how big Pumpkin has gotten!!! She's HUGE! She out grew her collar and she found out the hard way that she can't fit through the pool fence anymore. Brek loves this dog, but then Brek is at work all day and doesn't have to deal with her naughty behavior. She is definitely trainable and smart, but very much a mischievous puppy.

I had all my buttons in one large jar, but I hated digging for the colors I needed, so when Kyle asked if I'd take him to Wal-Mart to get a few things I said yes, because I wanted to pick up some small jars so that I could sort my buttons. I got these cute little jars for $1.96 each (so cheap!) and spent MANY hours separating thousands of buttons. Big pain in the rear, but well worth it because now I can find the color I want much easier. I put my spools of thread in the big jar the buttons were in.

Doctor's appointment updates....I'm finally healing up, not bleeding and not bruised. I still don't lift heavy things, because I'm afraid to hurt myself. Brittany went to her ultrasound while I was at my appointment. It was the first one without me. There is a reason why I like to be there...I get details!!! I asked her how it went and...
she said..."fine...no new damage to his intestines and that she is dilated to a 1"
I said.."oh my gosh! Are you effaced?"
She said..."I don't know"
I said..."that's kind of important information"
she said..."Oh, they might have said something, but I don't remember"
I said.."did they measure him?"
she said..."yes...he's over 5 pounds"
I said..."5.what? how many ounces?"
She said..."don't know"
okay...I will be at next weeks appointment.

The good wife that I am made a sacrifice tonight. I told Mark I would go with him to his biker group dinner get together. It's HOT outside, so I was more than nice to do this for him. The hot wind in my face felt like someone was trying to smother me. I don't like that feeling, but I'm his biker babe, so I made the best of it. :o) The group he's with are real nice people, so it was fun to visit with them.

First day of school

Sung to the toon of "The witch is dead"

Ding dong the kids are gone
the kids are gone
the kids are gone
ding dong the kids have gone to school!

hee...hee...hee
okay...that wasn't very nice, but after the long exhausting weekend, that is how I felt this morning. After I got Cole settled in his class at the elementary school and Cody on the junior high bus, did I come home and clean house? Heck NO! Instead stopped by the scrapbook store, then I went to the nail salon and got a fill, then went to my friend Paula's house for a mom's potluck luncheon. It was to either celebrate or boohoo that the kids started school. I can tell you that there were no boohooing mom's at this lunch. It was fun! I didn't have time to make anything, so I ran and picked up honey BBQ wings. They were good! There was lots and lots of good food. I couldn't get blogger to let me upload pictures for quite a while today....and I've never been able to get them to upload in the order that I want, but who cares about that I guess....it just bugs me a little bit that I can't figure it out. Anyways...Kyle starts 11th grade next Monday...so fun!
I have a follow up doctor's appointment in the morning to check on my little bleeding hole and Brittany has an ultrasound too! Will let you know how it goes.
P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY RYAN!!!!

Baby shower fun!

fun personal popcorn bags
table in the entry..cute!
more popcorn and thank you candy...huge hit!
The mom to be, complete with sash and tiera
food buffet...so good!
All of the baby gifts
No party is complete without the chocolate fountain
Another view of food buffet

Today was the big day! After days and days of preparation... weeks and weeks is more like it. The baby shower was beautiful! We had so much delicious food and wonderful sweet guests. All of our hard work paid off, because they were all thrilled with everything. I got so many sweet compliments. It's just worth it to me to go the extra mile to add special touches to make it memorable. Brittany was glowing and happy. You never saw her without a big smile on her face. We had so many family and friends show up. I didn't count, but it had to be over 50. You can tell by the full gift table that we has a full house. This baby is going to be styling in all these new outfits and I love all the books he got too. So many wonderful things! I'm always amazed by the sweet generosity of others. I appreciate that they love her and our family enough to come celebrate with us. Seeing all these cute things gets me even more excited for him to get here. I so can't believe that I'm going to be Grammy George in a few short weeks! :o)

A bit of rambling...

A little bit of this and that of happenings around here.
* Look how much Brittany has grown this week. Her tummy just went BAM! overnight. So fun and cute!
* We are all sleep deprived...stayed up till 3:30...got up at 6:20. Clearly not a good idea! I happen to really love and need good sleep.
* We had our first appointment with the high risk doctors today. We feel like we are finally in the loop and that things will be done right from now on with this baby. That is a great feeling!
* Pumpkin got stung by a bee on her mouth and her whole snout swelled up big. I chopped up a benadryl and put it in cheese....problem solved! She still a spunky cute little pain in the butt puppy!
* We've been cleaning my house for days and it's still not even close to clean! I hate that! Problem is that we've been doing deep cleaning, sorting, and purging. It's never ending!
* Laundry! 8 people live here...enough said about that!
* Got my hands on the brand spankin' new Chatterbox paper! I love it so darn much! Can't wait to use it.
* Mark is still gone with the two little boys up at a friends cabin. They've had a blast riding quads, visiting with the forest ranger at the fire lookout tower, playing games, watching movies, etc. Just good old father/son bonding.
* Another friends cabin had a pipe break. HUGE flood. Neighbors called and told them they has water coming out the front door. I sent one of our employees up there to take care of it. Main level had 2-3 inches of water. Basement had 8 FEET! Can we say...indoor pool! It's going to take some time to clean up that mess! I feel bad for them, but they have kept positive about the whole thing.
* We have Brittany's sisters baby here again. She is very crabby, but still adorable.
* Looking forward to Steven, Chris, Morgan, Aaron and Ryan coming to town in a few days. It will be fun having more family here for a visit. I love them!
* Also getting excited for the baby shower on Saturday and VERY excited about my BIL Rodney and SIL Cam getting baptized Saturday evening. It's going to be a perfectly wonderful day!

FYI...

FYI...when the doctor's after care instructions say DO NOT take off the steri-strips and to wait until they fall off (at least 5 days)

LISTEN!!!

Oh my heck! I had 3 criss crossed over each other and they were starting to come off. It was bugging me so I "helped" a little smidge. I know, I know...bad idea! Not only did the steri-strip come off, but so did the glue! Yep! You guessed it...bleeding!!! Plusalso it is very creepy looking to have a HOLE in your breast...not like a cut...an actual HOLE! I cleaned it up, put on some mela-gel to help it heal, put on sparkly band-aid and a sports bra to hold pressure. Somebody please tell me that this doesn't leave an ugly "hole" scar.

Lesson learned...follow instructions!!!! I will be good from now on...honest!

Day 1 of the 21 day challenge

Rhonna Farrer started round 5 of the 21 day challenge. This biopsy scare got me off to a late start, but I'm still doing it. Here is my day 1. My challenge this time is to do something with one or more of my children everyday. It can be big or small. The point is spending time with them. Today I took Kyle to register for school and then picked up Chad and took them to lunch at Tia Rosa's...our favorite mexican food restaurant here in Mesa. Right when we got there is when I got the call that the biopsy was benign. We had a great time and got to visit and celebrate that I was cancer free. I look forward to doing things each day with all of my boys and my daughter in law too. This is the layout I created of our time together this afternoon.

Beep beep beep...news alert!

The doctor's office called me just a little bit ago with the two best words I could hear...."IT'S BENIGN!!!" I couldn't be happier and more relieved! I was so worried about waiting until Monday to find out. She said "have a great weekend!" I replied to her "well, now I finally can...thank you!" I know in my heart that I was blessed by Heavenly Father though the prayers of my family and friends. I'm still pretty darn sore, but feeling much better. Now that we have hurdled over this test, we can get more prepared for the baby to come and take care of his needs. I just know he will be blessed as well. It's all a matter of faith!
THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

It's over!!!

It's over!!!!! I'm in lots of pain, but so relieved that it's over. We got to the hospital yesterday at 11:00 and got back home by 3:30. I took the meds at 12:00 and was taken back at 12:30. My stomach was doing number on me from being so nervous. Once the meds took hold my stomach was doing better. The biopsy nurse got me ready and put me on my table with my breast hanging through the hole. That hole was quite large, so I'm guessing it accommodates some of you women that were blessed with a large bosom. I however was not. She raised the table up like a car lift and did several squeeze x-rays to pinpoint the exact location. Then the doctor came in and put needles in to numb the area. Then she inserted the tool. It "snaps" in quickly and feels kind of like the sting of a rubber band. She would pull of lengths of tissue, turn the tool and pull out more. In total she pulled out 9 tissues samples. After it was over the nurse showed me the tool and the tissue. It looked like a sharp metal rod that is slightly smaller than a pencil. Each sample of tissue was over an inch long and the thickness of thick yarn or cooked spaghetti. Plus a pile of tissue was was caught in the filter. It was a painful procedure to go through. I laid there on the table just looking around in disbelief that I was actually there all the while clenching my fist so hard from the pain and trying to stay perfectly still. After it was over it took a bit longer to stop bleeding than she had hoped. Once it finally stopped she glued it and put streri strips, then a big gauze pad and ice packs, then wrapped me up tight in an ace bandage. Then I was wheeled into another room to have more mammograms taken and she took pictures of the tissue as well. We took it to pathology and will find out as early as Friday, but possibly not until Monday. You know how after something tramatic happens to your body, that your insides just tremble and shake? Thats how it felt after everything was over. She did tell me that from what she can see that it looked good, so we will just wait for the official report to come in. Mark and my parents were waiting for me afterwards. That was nice to have them there. Last night I had some good friends bring us dinner. It was DELICIOUS and very much appreciated.
This morning I went to Brittany's ultrasound. I know I probably shouldn't have, but I wanted to be there. Everything with the baby is looking good. He is holding stable with no new damage to his intestines. He has gained a pound in the past 2 weeks. He's now up to 4 pounds 6 ounces (not including intestines) Now that I'm home again I am heading back to bed. I wanted to check in, but don't feel very good and hurt quite a bit. By the way...the pills didn't make me nauseous. They do make me feel pretty loopy, but that sure beats sick to my stomach in my book.

Thanks so much to all of you who care enough about my well being and the well being of my family to keep checking in on me and listening to me babble. I love and appreciate your thoughts, prayers and comments.

what a cutie!

We have a baby in the house!!! not our baby, but a baby none the less. Meet Skye...this is Brittany's niece. She is taking care of her today for her sister. As you can tell by her red little eyes, that she had been crying. I got her to smile a few times. She is a cutie! Brittany takes such good care of her. She's going to be a great mom...and soon I think. I can't wait to have a new baby boy in the house!
I probably won't be able to post until Thursday. I'm anticipating the meds for the biopsy will be wiping me out, so I'll be sleeping (or puking) the better part of tomorrow away. These past few day, as Wednesday comes closer, the more scared I get. My stomach is in knots with worry and I don't have much of an appetite. Still working on my filthy house today. It keeps my mind busy on other things. I'll let you all know how everything went as soon as I can.
Have a great day, my friends!