SAFE!

I watched a Softball game last night on television and it sent me back to my "ball" memories..... I didn't want to use the picture above; what I was looking for was a picture of my sister and me posing back to back with ball and bat in our uniforms......but after searching and searching, I'm stuck with this one. Yep, that's me going in for a slide into second base....and as you can tell, I was SAFE!

Softball Memories

• Playing catch out in the grove with my sister for umpteen years
• ooops! Hitting the ball and it went straight to my sister's stomach...sorry Jo :(
• oooops! Having practice inside and while playing pepper on the stage, I accidentally wailed my sister in the lip with my bat.....sorry again Jo :(
• When my cousin Connie pitched a three pitch inning......awesome defense!
• Playing first base and sometimes doing the splits or jumping way high to catch the whizzing balls coming at me.
• Playing right field and throwing people out at home or third base.
• Watching my friend Erica throw someone out at home or third base from Center-field.
• Sliding in practice and getting mudded up! Our coach watered a patch on the grass and we ran and practiced sliding on the wet grass!
• Our cool coach Mike who would make us roast in our warm-up coats in the hot blazing sun, until game time and then we were very grateful to take something off and feel cool to play.
• All the great nicknames we called ourselves and a new terminology we all developed. Like you never wanted a backwards K.....that means you struck-out looking! and an HP was great sacrifice for the team!....as an 8th grader, I did stats for Varsity Ball and then would be a runner....
• Good ol' biker pants under my pants, I used them as my sliding shorts.....remember biker pants???? mine had a neon orange on the side....yeah 90's.
• we always thought we were cool wearing that black stuff under our eyes to keep the glare down from the sun.
• When we played at Greene and it was raining on half of the field and dry on the other half.
• when a bird pooped on Jamie twice out in the outfield!
• finding four-leaf clovers out in the outfield and sticking them in my pocket all season for good luck.
• Other Obsessive-compulsive things I did which I thought gave me good luck is that I always put on my clothes the same way. Shorts, left sock, right sock, left stirrup, right stirrup, cut-off under shirt, pants, top, left shoe, right shoe,.....always in that order...always. I would also put a sunflower seed in my pocket too.....
• Sunflower seeds!
• running around with the grater with another player and grating the field....man that was heavy.....finally when I was a senior they bought a mower to pull it around and do the work.
• Numerous softball size bruises on the legs.
• Clicking around in my cleats.
• I had super long and super blonde hair playing softball......and getting it braided on the bus going to a game.
• well, as you can tell, I was pretty fond of softball and I thank my Mom and Dad for getting us interested in it. Jo and I did a lot of playing ball in our time whether it was the two of us on the farm or with our team. I sure miss those times, but at least I've got someone to throw around a ball with now.

Last Day!

Last Day of School for C-man!!

Welcome to Summer, my new 1st grader!

Posing with his shirt of autographs from his school-mates and teacher.

We celebrated by going out to dinner, his choice (Perkins). Then he and I

went to see Night at the Museum 2...cute pic!

Cousin love...Miss-o and little bear holding hands in the car.

More love in the car, little bear and C-man holding hands.



Last Day of work for Grandpa Roberts
Happy Retirement Danny!

C-man poses with the man of the hour.
It was neat to see all the people he knows through work and hear all the great compliments about him. Dan, Dan the Electrician Man will now be relaxing and settling into retirement with Grandma.

Grandma and Grandpa at the party downtown.

Balloons were great entertainment for the girls.
Little bear is pouncing the balloon on her cousins head....good times!

Cake and ice-cream YUM!

It was a productive weekend.....

Saturday: Miss-O helps Daddy build a new picnic table...she stayed out with Daddy the longest and helped and sang and was DIRTY! So, I knew she had some fun.

Here's Daddy taking care of the picnic table....we'd been using one that was handed down and was probably over 50 years old we figured out.......as you can see another project is painting our foundation of the house......Paul got a paint sprayer to do that task.

C-man hammered and used his tool kit he got from Christmas...he was busy, busy, busy. But he didn't want to forget it was Saturday Wii day so he alternated between the two tasks.

I took pictures and did get enough humph to do 8 scrap-book pages......I'm now about finished with Miss O's first year and moving on to her 2ND year.....never enough time to scrapbook.

Oh Rainy Day!

Yesterday was a down pour picking up C-man from school and he "accidentally on purpose" forgot to put on his rain-coat that he proudly wore to school. So, he was soaking wet!

p.s. I see he changed from his flip-flops back to his tennis shoes....he was so adamant about wearing his flip-flops to school and by 2ND recess, he said he changed to his shoes. HA! A mother is always right! Even though he would not admit to it!

A Weekend of Celebrations

Happy Birthday to Great-Grandma Donna!

Happy Graduation on Saturday to Alyssa, you're going to make a wonderful Speech Pathologist!

Happy Belated Birthday to Uncle Chris....his real birthday is the 8th, but we're going to celebrate it tomorrow night.

Happy Birthday to my friend Kristi, her birthday is today!
I think I got everyone covered.....

"Oh, Kidney Stone" A song......................

This should be my last obsession of the rock in my kidney, that was blasted into tiny particles yesterday. I made up a song. WEIRD! I know!
Here were my inspirations:

• every time I had a wave of pain I thought of the part of the song, "amber waves of PAIN!"
• C-man inspired me with his concert that he performed for us, O is in the shadow mimicking him and she graceful like me at that age (like a bull in a china closet!) She about cracked her head twice and pushed over the Mary statue.
• Last but no least, I was totally influenced from the anesthesia and pain meds.....truly who would be making up a song in her head at midnight and then wake her husband up to sing it to him......I don't do things like that on a normal basis!

So here goes the song.....think of the tunes to "America, the beautiful"

"Oh Kidney stone of spacious size, with excruciating waves of pain."

"Put me out oh, if you please, and blast it into grain."

"O Kidney stone, O Kidney stone, sonic waves were graced on thee."

"And crown thy good with a straining hood, from pee to every pee."

Thank you, thank you very much! This one is dedicated to all of those out there who have suffered a kidney stone and would much rather give birth to quadruplets! Phil, I heard you were one of them!

I'm thinking about submitting it into a Nursing Magazine that likes to publish poems....maybe they'd be interested in mine...however; this is very light and the poems the publish are WAY deep and inspiring....don't think I could compete...but I might try...hee-hee!

Kids say the darndest things..........

Grandma: "How's Mom doing?" she was picking up the kids while I went to my Dr. appt. yesterday.

C-man: "She's going to the P-E-E doctor." he replied spelling out the P-word.

Grandma: "Yes."

C-man: "She's got a P-E-E rock in her bladder. The doctor is going to find out if she's flabbergasted or not." he states matter-of-factly.

Oh, to think what is going on in his head. Oh, and what he's told his friends and teachers..........
too cute, he just never misses a beat.

Weekend Ball Game!

Hangin' out in the dug-out.
Look at that form!

It's a hit!

Northern Fans!

G&G Mehmen came down to watch C-man play. We were so glad to have them.

Procedure Planned for Friday

Just an update on the stone situation.

No, I haven't passed it.....Dr. said it is too big to pass.

I went to visit him this morning and (yes, he is cute.)

He showed me the films of the kidney stone and I was impressed with that. He said there is no possibility to pass the stone so I will be having a Lithotripsy on Friday.



Lithotripsy is a fancy and fun word that basically means a machine will break up the stone in my kidney by sonic waves....side effects will be a bruised back, bruised kidney and hematuria (blood in urine). The stone should break up in tiny particles so I can pass them....if the Dr. thinks they are still to big after being broken up, he will place a stent in that would hook up from kidney to bladder...the stent is bigger than the ureter and will help pass the stones........he said the Lithotripsy has a 85-90% chance of success.



So, I called my supervisor at work and they are awesome and very supportive with this. I told them I could work but won't know when these spells come on and sometimes they come on so strong that I have to take narcotics and may even throw-up.

(These spells are called renal colic.....)

Kinda sad if your nurse is caring for you and looks like she's in rougher shape than you are???? But since our census is still low and my supervisor and manager are empathetic with this, I'll be on a personal leave until next week.
Pictures for you visual people are located on this site:

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/imagepages/19246.htm

You Have to feel a little sorry for me.........

For the past two weeks I've had waves of pain in my left side that is accompanied with nausea and vomiting. I went to the Dr.'s office two weeks ago and discovered no, I'm not prego...just a UTI.

So I went through my antibiotic regimen and felt better. Yesterday, I started having the waves of pain again.
I went to work at the "mothership" hospital....(that's what I call the downtown hospital because it is so huge!) I'm caring for my patients guarding my left side and sweating. I don't want to show too much emotion...I'm floating on another floor and don't know anyone...but after I barfed, I had to disclose my disposition. Thankfully, they let me go and I went straight to ER.

I'm glad I did, I was just going to ride it out... BUT, I found answers last night. My wonderful, super, fantastic husband met me at the ER and waited the 5 hours to find out I have a kidney stone....a 9mm one...now that's HUGE on the kidney stone Richter scale......the picture above is an 8mm one.

I spoke with the Urologist (I heard he's good looking! better shave my legs for my appointment tomorrow!) He said I have a 50% chance of passing this baby. If I have severe pain to call him today, otherwise see him tomorrow at the clinic and then wait for it to pass in a week and then follow up with him if it doesn't.......
SERIOUSLY?!?!?!?!?!?!
I'd rather give birth again...maybe because the lovely epidurals took the pain away! Maybe I'll call the Urologist up and ask for a week's worth of epidural....I know that's not even feasible! I did get some pain meds to help me through it.....so, just send some prayers this way if you have some time....and I wouldn't mind you feeling a little sorry for me but don't spend too long....that's what I've decided I'll be doing too! I've got things to do and people to see and stones to pass!

(Can you tell I'm looped up???)

p.s. did I tell you about how my supportive MIL stayed with the kids last night so that my wonderful, super, fantastic husband could hang with me last night into the early hours.......thank you both of you.....Starbucks may be your priority today!

Now excuse me as I drink my water and deliver a ginormous stone!

We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo........

How about you, you, you?

You can come too, too, too.

We're going to the zoo!

C-man & E at the zoo.
Cheesin' it with the classmates. (not all of them)

Hanging around and eager to get their picture taken!

Miss-O got to come along on the field trip too!

Watching the seal show was fun!

playing at the playground was doubly fun!

feeding Mr. goat, I gave him 4 quarters to feed the animals...what does he do? he pockets the money and picks up loose pellets from the ground......hmmmm......my little frugal guy already!

Miss-O was proud to stand in line with the big kids, she thought she was pretty cool!

Happy Birthday Wishes!

H-helpful

A-always caring

P-personable

P-pretty

Y-yes, she has wonderful hand-writing that should be a font named Brooke

B-Beautiful

I-is so attentive to her children

R-Respectful

T-terrific sister-in-law

H-happy

D-delight to be around

A-Amazing Mother

Y-yes, just genuine

B-Brent's true love

R-really have a lot in common with each other

O-Outstanding

O-organized

K-kind

E-empathetic

Frugal or Fatal??

Let's Talk Gardening!

I'm very fond of gardening. As I think I should be, it's in my family roots (no pun attended!)

I grew up as a farm-girl, my Mother gardened a huge garden when I was a child and Dad plowed and harvested many a corn/beans/alfalfa. Even my Grandpa was into gardening; I remember each time we visited making the walk around his house as he pointed out all of his flowers and plants. Same goes for my Grandma Mehmen, she also didn't mind getting her hands in the earth and raising many veggies, etc. that were prepared on the table. Oh how I miss her rhubarb goodies!

As the children get older, I have the pleasure of spending more time and doing more gardening around the house. Monday, I spent two hours. I planted Day Lillies that came from the farm. I transplanted my root-bound Hosta and made 7 new plants from it. I was so proud of myself.....while running my hands in the dirt and spading the earth and letting earthworms squirm in between my fingers, I was thinking to myself......"what a cheap way of gardening! All I have to do is hack away at plants and then distribute them elsewhere!"

After digging and watering, I noticed the plants look floppy and dead? I called 911-Mom and told her the signs and symptoms of my 2 hour project.....she reassured me they would look this way until the roots take hold.....I hope they take hold soon, because they look SO pathetic.

The Huge Hosta I chopped into........it did lay nicely afterwards, never would know I took huge clumps from it.....but it looks so sad:(
The Day Lillies look nice, I just pray they can hold up from the dog rolling around in them.....YES, after sweating I look over and see the dog enjoying my lillies and oh no, she was not sniffing them or looking at them dreamily.....she was ON TOP of them rolling around...I scolded her and hope that was the end of it.....

These don't look so healthy and you should see them now after the rain.....flat as pancakes......
Only time will tell if my 2 hour project was frugal or fatal....I'll keep you posted!

Attention Scappers!

I found an awesome website www.wordle.net check it out.....it would be great journaling for your pages! I was given this information from my magazine Scrapbooks etc. I played around with it and it is a lot of fun! The best thing is you can print it out on cardstock, vellum, etc.....happy journaling!

Happy Mom Day!

Sure glad that both Grandma's like to wear aprons......we found a cool idea in our Family Fun craft book for Mother's Day........these aprons are in progress...still waiting for C-man's prints to make the flowers full.

Mom's Weekend at the Farm

4-wheeling is a must!


Miss Emma is getting SO grown-up....I liked what she said about miss-O......"When did Baby O grow up so big?!" This is very true....she did hit a big growth spurt this spring!

Petting the cat "Snow-ball"

It took a while for Jackie to warm up to Paul, but she accomplished it and they enjoyed a nice book together.

Miss-O took a nap on Grandma's lap........

Miss-O and Jackie became the best of friends and jibber-jabbered and played with what my sister and I called "antique" Fisher Price toys.

Go Austin! He had a huge fan club Saturday! We loved watching him play catcher and 2ND base..........he's got a great swing and the gift of gab!

Mom's Day Weekend

What a nice weekend! Friday, we headed up north to see my parents and to spend a weekend on the farm. A quote from C-man, "Mom, you can do lots of things on the farm!" And that they did! Swinging, playing in a house that Grandpa made out of boxes, watched Austin's tee-ball game, played with toys that I played with as a child, shoot some hoops, rode the 4-wheeler, played with bean bags, pet the cat, climbed the infamous rock, and played with all of their cousins.

Last Day of School for this year......................

Miss-O enjoying her snack on her last day of Mom-n-me preschool.....
The whole preschool gang!

Playing cars today, a change up from the dollies......

Miss-O and I truly enjoyed the year of preschool. Great craft fun and play time with other kids her age and great support system with the Mommies too. We will do this again next year and will see old friends and meet new friends........can't wait for the fall!

Take Me Out To The Ballgame

Go White Sox!
Swing Batta, batta, batta, Swing!

It's a Home-run! Where's the bases?????

C-man's #1 Fan!

Field it and touch the bag!

C-man's first tee-ball game was last night....so CUTE! No one keeps score, no one gets out, everyone plays and everyone hits......just learn the gist of the game. C-man played Right field, 1st base and Center field......when he was playing outfield he made sure to get his pants dirty, rolling around in the dirt.....probably because I encouraged him....."the more dirt the better!" (that was my theory when I played ball!)

He did great playing 1st base......made me proud since I played 1st and right field in my ball playing days.

It was totally cute the last play and he's playing center-field and all of a sudden he turns into a second base coach and was circling his arm around motioning the other team runner to keep running! I wished I had the video camera for that one!

I love School!

PE/MUSIC DAY

C-man playing the drum and interacting with a story the Music teacher is reading.
He is an EXCELLENT hula-hooper!

Doing the scooter, this is what insisted that I do too....I decided to step this one out!

Jogging around the gym for warm-up!

Catching the spider with a spider web....even little sis, got to interact in gym class.

I love school! I forgot how much I loved it until I was a mystery reader for C-man's class today.

I love kids!

I should have been a teacher..that was a plan C for me....I guess I do have best of both worlds when I'm a nurse and teach nursing students......but the nursing students aren't like children..........[sigh]

By the way, the pics are from last Monday when I visited C-man's P.E./music class, his favorite day of school by far!