The not-so-fabulous start to the New Year

Well, we made it home from our trip at one-ish Sunday morning. After the horrible trip home, and the week away, I had completely forgotten about what the house looked like when we left. I wish I would have taken a photo of what it looked like when we came home (but since my good camera died, I didn’t even think to grab the old one). I have the photo of after we opened gifts Christmas morning, but multiply that by all the gifts that come home for all of us from my dad’s house, and just tossed wherever we could find a place. So when I walked in and saw it like that, I could have just cried. We were all exhausted and cranky after that long ride and although I am extremely grateful for all the wonderful gifts we received, I would have given anything for my fairy godmother to have waived her magic wand and said Bibbity Bobbity Boo and all the gifts were neatly tucked away in their appropriate places. Unfortunately, no such luck. The next morning we got up, and came downstairs. It was so funny when Reid walked down the stairs and said “Ooooo” in his high pitched squeal of delight. It was like Christmas morning when he saw all the gifts. Needless to say, there wasn’t a peep heard from him all day while he was playing with his new toys. Rod & I spend the day cleaning up the mess and dodging Nerf gun bullets (thank you Gauge). So to end the day, I was coming up from the basement with dinner in my hand, tripped, and fell down the stairs. Of course I tried to catch myself and landed on my wrist and left side. What a dummy move. That was my New Years gift to myself.

Monday and Tuesday I, of course, had the hardest time walking around. I was so sore and considering my RA was already flared up when I fell, it was about a million times worse now. I looked like the biggest gimp hobbling around all over the office.

Tuesday, Rod called me on his way home from picking up Reid to tell me that Reid has spots on him that looked like chicken pox. Oh wonderful I thought. So I called the doctor and made him an appointment. That evening, while feeling like I had been hit by a train, I was getting dinner ready, and while the convection over was running, it got really bright inside, made this loud pop noise, and shut off. And that was it. It wouldn’t turn back on. It wouldn’t do anything. I just looked at it and thought, you have got to be kidding me. After dinner, I went in to the laptop to work on some photos that I need to get edited. I spent about an hour working on them and then all of a sudden, the screen went black. I wasn’t sure what was going on, but I was completely irritated. I sat there for a few minutes, and when nothing happened, I shut it off and then turned it back on. And all that was there was the same black screen. Then I started to panic. And then I flipped out.

Wednesday morning, I took Reid to the doctor. As soon as we got there, he knew where we were. He kept pointing at the front door and saying “Buh-bye?”. He hates the doctor’s office for some reason. We went back into the examination room and as I was getting him undressed, he flipped out. He must have a great memory, because the only thing Rod or I can think of is he remembers getting his shots. The doctor came in and looked at Reid’s spots. No it isn’t chicken pox, but it’s a staff infection. All that kept running through my head was all the public places we were in the past week or so and all the gross germs that crawl around in all those public places. Yuck! But the doctor did tell me that some people just get staff infections on their skin from time to time without a real reason for it. So we picked up his prescription and hopefully he will be on the mend shortly.

When I got up earlier Wednesday morning, I again tried to start up the computer, with no luck. I called my friend Jane (aka my computer guru) and left her a message to see if she could help us. That evening she walked Rod through trying some different trials to see if anything would work. Unfortunately, it didn't. I just had a bad feeling. But, I didn't want to flip out again, so I took a deep breath, and told myself, if it's a gonner, it's a gonner, and not amount of throwing a temper tantrum was going to help (and I wonder why my children throw fits...ha!). So at this point, it looked like data recovery was the only thing left to try. So that's what the plan is for the weekend. I have so much information on that computer, a lot of it backed up, and a lot of it not backed up. Dumb, I know. Maybe one of my New Year's resolutions should have been to not do so many dumb things!

Needless to say, I was not sad to see this week come and go. Next week has to be better, right?!?

What a busy, crazy, humbling, lesson learning and emotional week it was…

Monday…

Reminder #1 this week to never take anything for granted:
Monday was the two year anniversary of the death of my dear friend Jane’s husband, Brian. He died unexpectedly following a procedure on his pacemaker. My heart breaks for Jane every time I think of her being such a young widow. She was 29 when Brian passed, their daughter Ally was 7, and their son Jake was 3. Jake turned 4 the day after Brian died. Jane and I have been friends since we were both pregnant with Ally and Gauge at the same time. The day that Brian died I went down to their house and I will never, in a million years, forget the look on Jane’s face when she saw me and we made eye contact. It gets me choked up just thinking about it. Which one of us would ever imagine that we could be a widow at the age of 29? Jane is a complete inspiration to me. She is the mother all of us desire to be. She had done everything she can to help her children through this hard time. There just is no way that I can give her enough praise. Jane is very tech savy and is creating a website to keep Brian’s memory alive for herself and her children. Here is the link if you want to check it out: http://www.brian-whitman.com/

Rest in Peace Brian

A Reid milestone…
As I am attempting to get Reid into an every night bedtime routine (Lord HELP ME!), I was getting him ready for bed tonight, I got his bink and looked down at him and said ready for night-night? And he looked back up at me and said “nigh-nigh” (notice the lack of the t). I was so dumbfounded that it stopped me right in my tracks. I asked him the same question again, and got the same response, again. So I had to post this super cute pic of Reid going “nigh-nigh”…with the bink, the lovey, the blankie, and IN OUR BED. Someday, someday, someday…I will sleep again.


Tuesday…

First off Happy Birthday to Jake Whitman! He is the cutest little guy you’ve ever seen and we are so lucky to have been there to see him grow from baby to boy.

We took Reid to the doctor today because I thought for sure he had an ear infection. He has been super fussy and aggressive and when we were at the pool on Saturday, he kept sticking his fingers in his ears and hasn’t stopped since. Well, no ear infection, so I think the very technical, medical diagnosis for his behavior is… the terrible twos. Ugh! And seven months early may I remind you. So does that mean he will be out of the terrible twos seven months earlier than normal? Only time will tell.

Reminder #2 this week to never take anything for granted:
For the past week or so, Gauge has been complaining that his knees have been bothering him and although I was pretty convinced that it was just growing pains, there was a looming concern in the back of my mind that it may be juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. So while we had Reid at the doctor I expressed my concerns to Dr. Betkerur. Although he did tell me that RA is hereditary Gauge’s symptoms were not consistent with juvenile RA. What a HUGE weight lifted off my shoulders!! I was feeling worried and kind of bummed that Reid was fussy & not sleeping well and Gauge was fussy about his knees. And isn’t it just when you are feeling sorry for yourself, something comes along and brings you back to reality? There was a story in the newspaper about a little boy in need of a heart transplant and possibly a double lung transplant. And I complained about a possible earache and sore knees. Boy do we have a lot to be grateful for. What a reality check! http://www.timesreporter.com/homepage/x1528800891/Lanes-courageous-fight

I did another senior shoot and had so much fun! I found several new interesting places to take photos around town and tried them out tonight. The pics I’ve edited so far I like, but it also helps that I had a cute, little (like size zero little) girl to take photos of.


Wednesday…

I got my long awaited (not really it’s only been a couple of days) package of digital scrapbook pages…100 pages to be exact. I was so thrilled to open them! Poor Reid is a year and a half old and has only a few months worth of pages in his book, so I figured it was about time to fill his book up. I tried a new company to print them… http://www.scrappinsimply.com/ and I absolutely love them!! I would recommend their company to anyone wanting to print their pages.


Thursday…

Mom took the boys right after Rod got off work, so when I got home we took off and went to the Roadhouse for dinner. I love that place! Unfortunately Lindsey wasn’t working and I didn’t see Aisha before we were seated, so we didn’t get to have either of them as our waitress. But the food was yummy. I could sit and eat rolls and cinnamon butter for my whole entire meal.


Friday and Saturday…

Pretty much lazy days for us (gotta love those!). But on Saturday, my cousin Carabeth delivered her baby…Hudson Samuel Kelly weighing in @ 8lbs 11oz and he sure is a cutie!!




Sunday…

Went to church and met Julie and the family there. The sermon was good. Not as good as last week, but still good. It was nice to see the Copes there again. And every Sunday it seems that I see at least one more person at church that I didn’t know attended there. Our church family keeps growing and growing. I love it!

And to end this weeks “novel”, lol…FOUR DAYS TILL WE LEAVE FOR HILTON HEAD!!