Catching Up

This summer has been a little more than busy because of extra projects at my job.  However, the busyness, stress, anxiety, and all other issues with my challenging work projects make me appreciate my limited time off with family all the more.

It's a Sunday afternoon and I should be working on some things for this week, but I'm taking a mini-vacation to review some pictures from things we've done this summer.  I thought you might enjoy a picture tour!

Swinging with cousin, Abby

 

4th of July at Indian Lake Campground

 

Telling PaPa "THIS IS THE BEST NIGHT EVER!!!!!"

Emily's friend, Vivian, turned 4!

Our family attended a Children's Ministry Expo (CMX)
in Kentucky in early July for 2 days and then stayed at
Shaker Village in Kentucky for the rest of the weekend!

Emily's friend, "Kitty"

My friend, the bull.  So photogenic!

Shaker Village at night.

Taking the ferry down the Kentucky River. 

Em and her daddy.

 Ahhhhh, I feel refreshed, how about you?

Christmas Time Part 2 of 5

Papa's lodge had a Christmas party a few weeks ago and the guest of honor made an appearance. In true fashion, Em ran across the room to give him a big hug before he could even make it to the Santa chair.

A little later that week, we were scheduled to have some new carpet delivered for our living room. The previous carpet was a lovely shade of 1970's gold. To save a little money, we (Tom) tore up the old carpet ourselves. We discovered that our prediction was correction... hard wood covers the dining room and living room floors. We decided to refinish the dining room while I'm off for Christmas break and we ordered new living room carpet.

A Porch, The Bucketheads, & A Kangaroo

Once again, we've been certainly keeping busy the past couple of weeks... but not too busy to take some pictures for the fan club!

1) Our new front porch was finished up the week before last and we've been enjoying some beautiful summer evenings hanging out there. It's a great place to read, surf the web and greet our neighbors! We love it!

If you look closely, you'll see my prize-winning weeds to the right of the window air conditioner. I worked really hard to nurture those and my husband was kind enough to pull them this week for me! (Thanks!)


To finish the look and make the porch a tad more enjoyable (and usable) we went shopping for some nicely padded chairs and tables. Well, the tables aren't padded but you get my point! We still need to get a few little things to finish it off, but we have furniture!


We love our new porch. Emily has really taken to helping water the plants and we love being able to sit out there when it's raining. Great family bonding -- in the shade!


For Father's Day, we were invited to Aunt Shell and Aunt Laura's house for a pool party and supper. As always it was a hit! We even got to meet their new synchronized swimming team, the Bodacious Bucketheads! They still have a LOT of work to do on their routine but they might sign up for the kiddie pool olympics in the near future!


We were able to get our pictures taken with them, but they weren't prepared to do waterproof autographs just yet!


Last Wednesday, a friend of mine invited us to the zoo for ADOPT Day. It's when families that sponsor an animal at the zoo get some special privileges at the zoo and get to do some behind the scenes things that you don't normally get to do. (Thanks, Terri!)

We were able to go behind the scenes at the aquarium and got to see their choral reef project and then they took us to the other end of the building and we got to see the holding tank for the nurse shark and got to see the upper level of the aquarium when the fish are fed and the divers get in and out. This is a picture of the top of the huge aquarium that we normally stand and look at. There were fish, sharks and rays swimming beneath us while we were on the tour.




We got to enjoy a free ride on the carousel. I have a cute video to upload another day, but here's a sneak peak!



The kangaroo walkabout was open later than normal too so we were able to walk through that and see some kangaroos up close and personal. By this time, Tom and Emily were feeling a little wiped out and weren't too highly impressed that they were that close to the kangaroos.


We also got to walk inside the koala habitat with the koalas. It felt like we were on exhibit because there were people on the other side of the glass looking at us. We weren't allowed to touch them or take pictures of them but they sure were soft and cuddly looking!

We shared a $900 bowl of Dip'n Dots. (Okay, it wasn't really that expensive but they sure seem like it.) This was Em's first taste. She wasn't too impressed with her first spoonful but once we explained what it was and she got past the idea of eating little frozen balls she became a big fan.

There were a lot of other things to do that night too. Baby Beco (the new baby elephant) was on display. We could have met with the gorilla and tiger keepers and toured behind the scenes in their facilities. The boat and train rides were also free. There were inflatable games/rides there for family night, etc., etc.

Thanks for inviting us Terri! Our family had a great time! We loved the short lines and all the extra things we don't normally get to do at the zoo!

A Bit Distracted Lately

I apologize to our fan club... we've been a bit distracted lately.

Two weeks ago Emily started to get a little tickle in her throat. I got an early call from her babysitter saying that she was really warm (cheeks like tomatoes) and was extra tired and had a cough. Whatever she had - she shared with me a few days later. That weekend I tried fixing her supper while she was watching TV... but,s when supper was finally ready and dished out on our plates, this is what I found...



If I'm remembering correctly, she slept here from about 6pm until 8:30pm. I fed her a little supper, let her play for a while until Tom came home from his church meeting and then she went right back to sleep around 9:30 or so and slept until morning.

Last week, Em had her 3rd set of botox injections at children's hospital. I started preparing her for them that morning and told her that she was going to be seeing the doctor and that she was going to get 2 shots. She would also need to hold really still and if she did it would go faster. My mom went with us to help hold Em down so I could talk to her and attempt to comfort her. If you remember this post you'll recall that our last visit to children's didn't go over so well. I made a point to let the nurse know our concerns and asked that Dr. B. please make sure she spend some extra time with Em before she just starts working with her and that it traumatized Em for over a month afterwards. The nurse made the note in Em's record and I figured that would be the end of that. Surprise! Within 2 hours of my chat with the nurse, I received a call from Dr. B. at home. She was very genuine and apologized for any problems our previous visit caused and that she must have been having a bad day, etc., etc. I was very surprised she called and it really felt like she understood what happened and would try to see that it doesn't happen again. Our next appointment for a follow-up is in a couple of weeks... we'll see how it goes!

On the way home from children's I set up an appointment for Em to see her pediatrician because she was still having "issues"... runny nose, cough, ear aches and a new dark circles under her eyes with goop thrown in for good measure. Once again, I prepped her for the appointment and assured her there would be no shots this time... the doctor was simply going to help her eyes, ears, nose, throat, etc. to feel better. Emily was a champ. The only struggle we had was the death grip she put on her carseat while I was trying to get her out of the car. I carried her inside to the elevator and from there something changed and she was an angel. When I signed her in, I let them know that she had a bit of "White Coat Syndrome" and they picked up the clue and let all the folks know that would be dealing with her. She ACTUALLY ALLOWED THEM to weigh her, take her temperature, listen to her heart, look in her ears, nose, eyes and throat. She was the picture of the perfect patient. I have no idea what changed, but I keep bragging about it in front of her hoping for a little positive reinforcement. (A mom can hope, right?) The final diagnosis... Emily was dealing with allergies and had a mild "smoldering ear infection" that would easily be cleared up with a little Zyrtec and Amoxycillin. So far, they've worked wonders!

Last week, Tom spent quite a few days/evenings at the house on the church property getting it ready for our new worship leader and his family to move in. I was able to chip in partway through the week to do some trimming and painting. I helped out over the weekend and again some more this week.

We were greeted by this lovely face on Saturday morning when we went to start painting the living room... I believe this is Keith's artwork. (The white parts of the eyes are actually open port holes from the living room to one of the bedrooms... with the bottoms of water bottles painted for the pupils!)


Amidst the doctor appointments, sickies, painting and work, Tom and I decided to tackle putting together Em's new playset on Wednesday. Armed with the instruction book, some chalk and a plethora of power tools, we set to task.



We started around 9:30 A.M., took a lunch break at the G&R and then kept working and I think we wrapped up around 9:30 P.M. We had a good time working on the project and are marriage is still intact. Bonus points for that, eh?

Tonight we finally had some quality time to spend on the playset and Miss Em seems to be a big fan already.

Oh yeah, and on top of all that other stuff we've been adding a new porch onto the front of our house. Well, "we" haven't but we've hired someone to do it for us. Playset construction is about as advanced as we get! This week, Emily's been thrilled with "new roof!" and "mine steps!"