Oh yes she did…

 

 

 

As in, cut her own hair…

 

It was a Friday night and I was going to go workout – Sara was happily playing downstairs after work (Alex and Lance were at soccer practice).  I was gone for about 2 minutes and came downstairs to a pile of hair and some kid scissors gone wrong.  OH MY… OH MY…, I thought!  It could be so much worse. 

 

She actually did quite a nice job, going from a bob to a “tapered” bob.  When asked why she did it – she simply said she didn’t want to chew on her hair anymore (causing tangles and many requests to stop it).  She simply solved her problem. 

 

Like any self respecting photographer – I asked her to take the pile – o - hair and the scissors to better light to take a picture! 

 

This was truly a first for me! 

 

 

 

 

 

We straightened it out a bit with a stylist next morning she is amazingly beautiful and  totally cute 4 year old! 

 

 

 

 

Sara’s scar

 

Sara’s scar is looking really really good!  The plastic surgeon did really good and it’s so flat and, especially with her hair going over it sometimes, almost unnoticeable.  We are putting on sunscreen (many times a day) and the silicon gel (2 times a day for 3 months) which will help the scar totally fade away. 

 

We have a girl who is very much back to herself, but because she seems like she’s past napping now at 3 years old, won’t nap on weekends at all.  Needless to say, we have a cranky girl at the end of the evening most nights now. 

 

She talks about the accident every night:  “I scary of my accident where I fall out my 2 story window” (love how it’s “I scary” instead of “I’m scared”)… “Daddy call 911 to get the ambulance people”….”You came and scoop me up and Papa T came and scoop brother up”… “I ride in an ambulance to Evergreen Hospital”…  We always repeat back to her and say how scary it was, but Daddy has fixed the window and we moved her bed away from the window, so it won’t happen again.  But, yes, it very scary for everybody.  We know it’s just a part of the process to talk about it and there is no harm in talking about it over and over.  We all learn something from talking about it. 

 

Honestly, though, some times I see her scar and still have all the Momma bear stuff rush through me and I feel so sick to my stomach about it all.  Thankfully, she is perfect in every way.   I still can’t believe it happened though.  And then I get all petty and think about that damn scar!  I hope it fades into almost nothing…

 

Guess who’s potty training???

 

 

Sara was flirting with the idea back in Feb/March, but still not ready yet.  She would tell us when she was going and that was definitely one of the necessary pieces to be ready, but still just flirting with the idea.  I was getting excited, not at all to rush her – but because I could see that we were on the downhill slide of diapers in our household.  I could see the end in sight!  At long last! 

 

 

 

I still can’t quite believe it, but it’s true!   She’s only ~ 2 years 3 months old, but she’s doing it! 

 

 

 

And when I mean doing it – I mean doing it all!  Going pee and poop in the potty.  Not by any means perfect, but pretty gosh darn good if you ask me!  During the day at school – she had some totally normal accidents right at first (I think this is how kids actually learn it all anyways), but after a day or two – she now goes in panties all day at school, even during naps and comes home dry and in the same underwear. 

 

 

Her teacher was the one that was telling us that she thought she was ready and anytime we were ready, just send her in panties and they will go for it!  At first, I just couldn’t believe it!  No way could a 2 yr 3mo old be “ready”.  But, after a few weeks, we decided to try it.  Plus, I was just not that ready for all the work of dropping everything (fast!) when your kiddo says she has to pee. 

 

 

So, both the parents and the kid have to be ready, not just one or the other.

 

I’m glad we went for it because it is going along very nicely.

 

Cabin progress

 

Oh – we are making quite a bit of progress on the cabin.   Slowly but surely, little tiny bits of progress. It went up so quickly with the big parts, the walls, the roof, the floor going up in only ~ 2 months.  But now, things seem to be dragging and dragging and dragging.  It feels like every other weekend we are down at the cabin working and making small amounts of progress.  It actually feels like we are always working.  But, finally, finally, finally – we have some progress to show for it.

 

It is by no means anywhere close to done.  No.Where.  But, it’s getting closer and we are able to stay there now the weather is warmer, which is nice. 

 

The upstairs loft is getting the most attention lately.  It’s about 2/3 of a floor, so I can’t quite stand up in it.  But, that’s OK since we really should be outside at such a beautiful location. 

 

The upstairs have gotten a new coat of porch paint for the floors and most of the ceiling is done.  There are some tricky angles, as you can see.  But, Lance is diligently working away to get it all together and the insulation all hidden away from the kids level. 

 

The walls are up, and still need some caulking and some paint, but the hardest part of all the cutting and measuring is done. 

 

We have some twin beds for us and some smaller-than-twins for the kids.  We tested them out on Saturday night and it was very comfortable! 

 

 

The loft stairs have been installed and we can now get up and down very easily.  The downstairs, as you can see is still studs.  We are planning on leaving it like that for the summer to be able to have some fun and not just keep working, working, working on it.  We will paint the downstairs floor too to make it easier to keep clean.  Other than buying a very small fold-out couch and maybe a small table/chairs, we are done with the downstairs for the foreseeable future (or until Lance gets an itch to work on it again, which ever comes first).

 

 

The outside is looking really fabulous.  It looks almost done, until you realize that the yellow color is just primer.  Bummer!  Although, I really do like the light yellow color so we plan to paint it roughly that same buttery yellow color, so it is nice to see what it looks like before taking the big plunge and buying the paint. The shingles will stay the same color and we painted the door last Fall, but it came out all blotchy, probably because we were pushing it in terms of temperature when it was drying.  It will have to be re-painted. But, not anytime soon. 

 

 

 

Here’s where a long day will be spent this upcoming week or two – all that wood that is laying on the ground needs to be split and stacked in that nice shed/covered-area that Lance built.  There is a lot of wood, so Lance is planning on getting a log splitter.  It will be so nice to get this off the ground and stacked and ready for s’mores time!  We have a picnic table that is perfect for this site and just love sitting around the campfire. 

 

 

Here is Lance and Sara celebrating the end of a nice long (fun) work day at the cabin.  Whew!  It sure is a lot of work to build this thing, but we sure love it and have been having fun learning about all sorts of things and Lance enjoys doing something completely different from his day (desk/computer) job.  We enjoy seeing Grandma Judy a lot and the kids are really loving that so much!

 

We hope that now that we’ve got a nice area, we can have lots of people come down and enjoy it with us.  If you are interested in enjoying the beach, playing in the sand, playing on the boat (if the tides are right for putting in and taking out the boat), getting clams, oysters, even geo-duck – let us know. 

 

We would love to have you join us!

Last day of preschool

Today we celebrated (sniff sniff) the last day of Montessori preschool for Alex.  He is going to kindergarten in the Fall! 

He will be going to various camps offered at Evergreen Montessori over the summer, space camp, soccer camp, circus camp, cooking camp, and all of them will be so much fun.  It took me a while today to figure out the momentous step we are taking right now.  I knew that I wanted to take their pictures on the last day of school, just like on the first day of school, but it didn’t hit me that my boy is now a kindergartener until this evening.  Alex is totally ready and we are so excited for him.

When you look back at the first day of school (well, second day, but who’s counting) from last August, Sara has changed SO much!  She’s talking up a storm, independent, sassy and totally fun!  Her hair is so long and she’s probably grown at least 4 inches in height since then.  Wow!

I was reading some poems that reminded me of how fast time goes by when you have kids.  How fast indeed. 

Rocking My Baby

Cleaning and scrubbing

can wait ‘til tomorrow

For babies grow up

we learn to our sorrow

So quiet down cobwebs

and dust go to sleep

I'm rocking my baby

and babies don't keep

~ Author Unknown ~

A Touch of Love

He was six months old and full of fun,
With a blink of an eye, he was suddenly one.
There were so many things we were going to do,
But I turned my head and he was two.
At two he was very dependent on me,
But independence took over when he turned three.
His third birthday, another year I tried to ignore,
But when I lit the candles, there weren't three, but four.
Four was the year that he really strived,
Why, look at him now, he's already five.
Now he's ready for books and for rules,
This is the year that he goes to school.
The big day came, he was anxious to go,
We rode to school, going so, so slow.
As he climbed the steps and waived goodbye,
I felt a lump in my throat and tears stung in my eyes.
Time goes so fast, its hard to believe,
That just yesterday he was here at home with me.
And tomorrow when he drives home,
And I hear his music pound,
He'll be wearing his cap and graduation gown.
So I'm holding to the moments as hard as I can,
Because the next time I look, I'll be seeing a man.

~ Author Unknown ~

My Daughter Grows Up

Life is fleeting, years rush past . . .
and little girls grow up so fast!
Let me take time out to be
glad that mine's still here with me.
And though I'm busy through the day,
let me take time out to play . . .
Let me take time out to smile,
to linger with her for a while . . .
To invite her under the table for tea
and dress up silly as can be.
Let me take time out to sing
and dance and skip
and twirl and swing . . .
To splash in puddles when it rains
and make her fancy daisy chains.
Let me take time out to hear
about the things that she holds dear.
Let me tuck her in at night,
hear her prayers, turn off the light.
And for one more moment let me pray
and thank God that we shared this day!

Sara’s first haircut

 

We scheduled Sara’s first haircut on Saturday this past weekend.  Her hair was getting a bit long and needed a little evening out.  I had trimmed her bangs (a little crooked) and so we decided to take the plunge.  I knew my baby wouldn’t look the same after this…

 

This is a kids hair salon and shop, so she got to sit in an airplane to get her haircut.  She wasn’t too sure at first…  She got some sprays of water and then the haircut.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The hairstylist asked my if she would mind a blow dry on low, and I thought she would be OK with it.  She didn’t love it, but didn’t hate it as much as this photo below makes it seem. 

 

 

This was the best part!  I asked for her to see a mirror, just like when I get a haircut, and she looked at herself and just smiled and smiles.  So pretty!  The hairstylist just took a tiny bit off, with mostly just shaping and helping the long parts (that naturally go straight forward) stay out of her eyes and face. 

 

We got some Mama and Sara photos by a lovely tree and a stream where there were ducks and she just loved those too!  What a wonderful first haircut!  I’m so glad the curls decided to stay around!

 

Cabin progress

 

It’s been a long time since I last updated on the cabin, and so much has been done.  So, here we go -

 

We have the boat structure up and the boat is in it – being protected from the elements as we speak (and apparently storage for some wood).

 

 

The cabin is up and level, sided, the door and windows are on/in, the roof is done, the stairs up to the cabin are up, all it’s major pieces are put together and done!  There is so much left to be done, but it’s great to recognize how far we’ve come.  Lance was sweating the roof for a few weeks with the rains coming in November and the roof not finished yet, but we made it!  There was only a few minor rains before the roof was done…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We have yet to paint the outside (the yellow color is the primer) and the door.   We also hope (someday) to put on a small deck surrounding the front of the cabin, by the door, and to the left of the house facing the fire pit. 

 

This is what the inside looks like right now.   We have a lot of work to do here.  Electrical, insulation, walls, paint, floor, furniture, bedding and an outhouse.  That doesn’t seem like too much, right?  Well, the good part is that we are in no rush and we can take our time (except the outhouse which needs to be done first thing this Spring/Summer). 

 

 

 

 

We bought some twin mattresses (the only size that will fit up the pull-down ladder up to the loft area) and put them up in the loft.  We’ve used the cabin a few times in September, once in October as a whole family and Lance and Alex did one time in November by themselves.  But, with no insulation and only a space heater, it was pretty cold I guess.  We’re waiting for it to warm up in late Spring to stay down there again.

 

We plan on getting a couple more twin beds for the loft area to make a nice sleeping area up there for all of us.  Downstairs is planned to have a hide-a-bed couch (for extra sleeping space), some furniture for storage and a table & chairs. 

 

We are so excited for this Summer to spend many weekends down at the beach in our cabin.  We hope to have many friends and family join us! 

 

 

Kids playing with glow sticks up in the loft.

 

 

and two happy, lucky cabin kids

 

 

It’ almost looks like what we imagined last summer before anything was built!

inguinal hernia – surgery here we come!

After the whole intussusception thing – I was super sensitive about Alex’s tummy area.  Did it hurt here?  I would press on it an feel.  Does it hurt here?  I would press on it there.  I was super vigilant.  So, not long after the event – I noticed one side of his groin was puffy, and when I pushed on it he would say it hurt a little bit.  I was sure I was being overly cautious, but had Lance check it out just to make sure.  Sure enough, he saw that it was puffy on one side and a little bit painful when he pushed on the area. 

 

The next day, we took a peek again, nothing there.  And over the course of about a week.  In and out, in and out – literally!  So, we scheduled a visit with the pediatrician and sure enough – all the signs and symptoms of a hernia.  Not the kind of hernia adults get from lifting too much, but one he was born with and one that wouldn’t go away without … surgery. 

 

He has an inguinal hernia – common in boys and preemies apparently.  It happens when the lining around the abdominal organs does not close all the way, the inguinal canal.  It seems he only has it on this right side.  Although not life threating right now, it could be in the future and there is no “wait and see” for this type of issue.  It won’t go away and has to be fixed surgically.  I didn’t realize the issues until visiting with the surgeon this past week – not only could something go through that hole, get infected, etc.  But there are blood vessels that go through there that go to his testicles, as well other tubes and vessels that would all loose blood supply if that got cut off from circulation. 

 

The crazy thing is – this is so much easier to schedule than ear tubes.  Ear/Nose/Throat surgery took ~2 months to get done, with one month to get the first available appointment (trust me – we wanted it as soon as possible!) and ~ one month to schedule the surgery at Children’s.  Now, general surgery is a snap.  They saw with in less than 7 days, and scheduled surgery for this Thursday. 

 

So, Alex is getting surgery on Thursday at Children’s Hospital in Seattle – please keep him in your thoughts that day.  So far, he doesn’t think much of it when we talk about it.  But, we’ll see as the days go by…  Probably Lance and I are having more of a tough time right now than he is. 

 

We talked about him getting surgery and all he really had to say was “So I don’t get to wrestle for a little while, like Daddy?”.  We say yep, no wrestling for a while.  (Lance had Lasik surgery in September and couldn’t wrestle for a week or two, apparently quite a big impact on Alex). 

Let’s discuss a little intussusception

A funny thing happened while Lance was out of town on business last week…

 

It started as a normal day, except that Lance was traveling for his job to San Francisco.  Alex woke up at ~6:45 am and we went downstairs to get him some breakfast and start a cartoon, so that I could go upstairs and take a shower to get ready for work.  Sara was, thankfully, still sleeping.  Not long after his breakfast and his second or third (!?!) cartoon, he said his tummy hurt.  I suggested that he go to the bathroom, but he said he didn’t need to go.  He’s had little moments of complaining about tummy hurts now and again, I just thought it was one of these episodes.  When this has happened in the past, we have suggested that he probably ate too much and should just go poop.  The tummy hurts subside, they’re really not that bad, and life moves on. 

 

Well, this was different.

 

Alex at the pediatrician’s office

 

He kept complaining his tummy hurt, more than he’d ever done before.  He was moaning and groaning, and holding his stomach.  It hurt him so much that I told him to lay down and it would probably go away.  It was hurting him so much that I noticed he didn’t want to walk, move or bend his knees up towards his chest.  I had him laying back in his bed, on the couch, but nothing helped.  He kept calling for Daddy, but Daddy was not there.  He would call for me and I would come to him, rub his tummy for a bit, but then continue getting ready for work. 

 

We decided to call Daddy on the telephone, me thinking that he was just missing him and talking to him on the phone would make him feel better and get ready to go to preschool.  We called, he talked to him and told him that his tummy hurt, but it didn’t help. 

 

After a while, it was clear that I probably wasn’t going to work, for sure that morning.  By the time our Nanny arrived at ~9 AM he was full on laying on the couch, pale as a sheet, moaning in pain.  I called into work, saying I wasn’t going to be there that day, Alex was sick.  I called preschool and said Alex wasn’t going to be there, he was sick and asked if there were any tummy bugs going around.  They said there were no tummy bugs in preschool.  After trying to get a few things done, Alex was in so much pain that he wanted me by his side constantly.  We tried to get him to watch a movie, but it didn’t last long.  I knew I had to call the Doctor, something just wasn’t right.  My boy in so much pain that he couldn’t move?

 

My Mom was coming up that evening, to help since Lance was gone, so I wrote her an email saying that Alex was sick and I was taking him to he doctor, so come up early if she wanted.   I called the Doctor and made a sick child appointment for about 1 hour from then.  In the time waiting for the doctor appointment, my Mom called the house and said she was on her way.  She said that it wasn’t like Alex to not moving, she was sure something was not right either. 

 

We waited what seemed like a long time to get ready to go to the doctor, and by the time it was ready to go, he didn’t want to move.  I had to pick him up and carry him with straight legs since it hurt so much.  He didn’t want to change his clothes, he was still wearing pjs, it hurt so much.  So I carried him out to the car and carefully put him in the car seat.  I packed a couple of things and *thankfully* remembered his teddy bear, named “marshmallow”. 

 

I made sure to nurse Sara before I left, I didn’t know how long this day was going to be.  On the way out, he made a funny swallow.  I asked him if he needed to throw up.  He probably didn’t know what that was, he’d never done it before.  I took him quickly to the bathroom and he proceeded to throw up a few times and then it was over.  Our wonderful Nanny suggested we take a bag or a bowl in case he threw up in the car, good suggestion I thought.  Good thing we didn’t need it. 

 

On the way there he would shut his eyes and almost fall asleep, saying how tired he was.  He was so pale and not like his usual self.  While he would have his eyes shut, he would make a grimacing face every minute or so, in pain.  How horrible this was!

 

We got to the doctor and didn’t have to wait long.  We got him checked out by one of the doctors, and she agreed that he seemed pretty sick.  We could go home and just observe, maybe it was just a tummy bug.  But, I told her that my husband was out of town on business and I had a Nanny taking care of my other child at the moment – I would rather see what was going on during the day, instead of an emergency this evening or tonight.  She agreed and understood, thank goodness!  It could be appendicitis, that is what we were thinking.

 

We were on our way to an urgent ultrasound place, right near the hospital.  She had called ahead and we were expected.  I packed Alex up again, carrying him to the car.  He was SO tired.  So pale.  Again, he would almost fall asleep, but wince in pain.  It was getting worse and worse on the drive, and when I took the exit for the imaging center (take a right) and the hospital (to the left), I really considered going left to the hospital.  But, I chose right and went to the imaging center, they were expecting us and would get right in. 

 

I carried him into the place and he would be crying and screaming sometimes because he was scared and in so much pain.  We were taken back after 5-10 minutes and by this time Alex was in the most pain.  We tried to do the – “see – Mom gets an ultrasound on her tummy and it’s not scary” thing, but it wasn’t working.  I just told the technician to start.  It was just hurting him too much.  She did an OK job, Alex was screaming in pain and she had to put the wand thing on his tummy.  She wasn’t pressing hard, it’s just anything at that point was too much for him.  She did a quick exam of the region, lower right tummy area, and was out to “talk to the doctor”.   At this point, I knew it wasn’t good.  She came back about 5-10 minutes later with the Radiologist and did another exam with him there.  Again, I didn’t hear a thing since Alex was screaming, but I knew it wasn’t good.  The Radiologist talked with the original Pediatrician and told us to go to the ER.  His appendix was enlarged, ~6mm, which is (apparently?) above the cutoff for adult appendicitis. 

 

My Mom had picked up Sara from our house, with the help of our Nanny getting the car seat in her car, brought her to me and met us a the imaging center.  I didn’t have my pump as it was at work, and at some point, I would need to pump or nurse her.  Thank goodness for my Mom!

 

I could choose Children’s Hospital, which obviously specializes in pediatrics.  Or Evergreen Hospital, only ~ one mile away, but if it was appendicitis, some surgeons operate on children and some do not and I might be sent to Children’s anyways.  I chose Evergreen – my kid was in extreme pain and I needed help now.  I second guessed myself, and thought I should’ve taken a left to the ER instead of the right to the imaging center.  Darn it!

 

We got to the ER and I once again carried Alex.  They got us right into triage, but had to wait for a room in the ER.  Another 5-10 minutes.  I texted Lance, while holding Alex in the waiting room.  He said he was busy between 2-3pm, so I didn’t call.  I’m not a good “text”er so I just wrote “appendicitis, ER, call when you can”.  Not long after that, they took us back to a room.  Little did I know, when in the ER they shut off all cell phone service, none, nada, zip.  Lance was not able to get a hold of me.

 

I explained what was happening to the nurse, they were getting ready to start an IV, and the ER doc was in quickly.  He had been laying down for about 5 minutes and by the time the ER doc was there, he wasn’t screaming in pain much anymore.  He was feeling a little better.  I thought, this is crazy!  What is happening?  She talked to me and felt his tummy.  She asked him to stand up and stand on one foot, jump around.  He did it!  Without much problem?!?  What is going on?

 

All this while, my mind is going ALL the way.  Alex is going to have emergency appendix surgery, Lance is out of town, I’m going to have to make life-and-death decisions by myself and on and on… 

 

Things calmed down a bit from there, since he wasn’t in the extreme pain.  They started the IV, he was pretty dehydrated from throwing up and not eating/drinking anything since that morning.  They were going to take some blood to see if they could tell what was going on. It was now 2:30ish.  I was able to nurse Sara, she was hungry and I was ready to nurse her.   After making sure Alex was doing OK, nursing Sara, I finally went out of the ER quickly to call Lance and tell him what was going on.  It was almost 3 pm.  At that point, I realized that he had been trying to call me but the calls wouldn’t go through, I had no reception.  Uh Oh!  

 

He asked – do you want me to come home right now (as in – go to the airport, take the next flight home and be there at some unknown hour)?  I told him to wait, we were waiting for blood results first, he was seeming to get better. Let’s just wait for the blood results and go from there.  I told him I would call when they came in and we would decide what to do. 

 

The results came back after a bit and showed no infection signs, increased white blood cells (or something like that).  It probably wasn’t appendicitis, since the blood results didn’t show an infection and with appendicitis – the pain doesn’t just go away, like his did. 

 

We waited a bit more, I was so confused by what was happening.  Was Alex just pretending, was I going crazy, would his tummy hurt if he forgot the doctors were there?  I would be talking to him about something and casually ask about his tummy.  Does it hurt now?  Did it stop hurting really bad, but still hurt a little bit?  All signs showed his tummy was feeling much better. 

 

Alex started to get a *tiny* fever, so they gave him so tylenol.  They started with some anti-nausea medication, perhaps since he might have to have surgery, I’m assuming.

 

The ER doc told us that the on-call pediatrician and on-call surgeon would be by later, but if we wanted him to stay, if my instincts were telling me that he needed to stay (she also knew that Lance was out of town because I told her), then she would admit him to the hospital.  But, if my instincts were telling me that he was fine, then we could go home later.  We decided to have the on-call pediatrician visit before we made a decision. 

 

He was great – the on-call Pediatrician.  We started by explaining what was happening that day and he did an exam.  He told me that it wasn’t appendicitis, since the blood work didn’t show it and the pain from appendicitis doesn’t go away.  He thought it was intussusception – a telescoping of the small intestine into the large intestine.  It causes all the symptoms that Alex had, pain, vomiting, and then can subside when the intestines get straight again. 

 

This diagnosis seemed to really fit what we had experienced.  I, for sure, didn’t want anyone to cut into my boy Alex if they didn’t have to!

 

He was getting better and better, and was soon into everything in the ER room.  He put on a mask and “glubes”.  He wanted to use the stethoscope that the doctor was wearing, he wanted Sara to lay on the bed with him.  He wanted to listen to my heart and be “the doctor”.

 

It was clear – he was better.  We decided to go home.  By the time we got home, it was around 7 pm and I was so tired.  What a day!  I started the day off thinking I was going to work, getting both kids ready by myself.  It ended up in the ER, thankfully with no surgeries. 

 

ER visit for Alex # 3, check.

 

3 year anniversary - blogging

 

It’s my 3 year anniversary of blogging.  Wow!

 

I started this blog as a way to record and remember what is going on in our lives.  I had just gone back to work after Alex was born and wanted some way to “capture” what was happening with him and our new family.  Things were moving so fast and I felt like I would forget it if I didn’t put it down somewhere.  I tried scrapbooking for a while and learned that it wasn’t for me - I needed something more real-time and current with what was happening then.  If I waited too long, I lost my motivation.    I started a blog and learned that it was easy for me and I loved it!  I have blogged about starting solid foods, being a Mom, sleeping, new words to add to the dictionary, teething, hairstyles, my own poem about pumping, remodeling, ear tubes, layoffs, cooking, gardening, Halloween, The beach, dancing with elmo, a carrot, an egg, and a cup of coffee, ER visits, pregnancy announcements, hope, birth announcements, birth stories just to name a few. 

 

A few stats from the last 3 years:

 

First post: August 30th, 2007

# of posts to date: 431

# of posts in 2007: 73

# of posts in 2008: 134

# of posts in 2009: 121

# of posts in 2010: 98 year to date

most popular post: Baby Phoebe, Part 2

2nd most popular post: 4 generations

# of absolute individual visitors: 1,031

# of total visits: 8,469

Day with most visitors/#: 37 visitors

# of countries: 34 (everything from USA to Norway, Pakistan, Cambodia, Japan, Argentina, Italy, Australia, and many more)

pages/visit: 1.27

average time on site: 33 seconds

 

Traffic sources over the last 3 years: 70% direct, 7% referring sites (facebook) and 13% search engines (google)

Traffic sources over the last 3 months: 55% direct, 38% referring sites and 6% search engines

 

Most searched keywords to get to my blog: allison torgesen (306 times), torgesen family times (146 times), toregsen family times (71 times) (misspelled last name), torgesen family times blog (16 times), torgesen family, torgesen, and a few others.

 

Visitor Loyalty: WOW!  Most of my visitors are repeat visitors! 

Most visits repeated: 201+ times Count of visits from this visitor including current Visits that were the visitor's nth visit Percentage of all visits 1 times 1,015.00 9.65% 2 times 298.00 2.83% 3 times 182.00 1.73% 4 times 148.00 1.41% 5 times 120.00 1.14% 6 times 111.00 1.06% 7 times 99.00 0.94% 8 times 93.00 0.88% 9-14 times 487.00 4.63% 15-25 times 653.00 6.21% 26-50 times 1,001.00 9.52% 51-100 times 1,269.00 12.07% 101-200 times 1,400.00 13.31% 201+ times 3,642.00 34.63%

 

 

It’s been so fun for me to blog our weekend updates, our funny stories, our ups and downs.  Here’s to the next 3 years!

 

Cheers – and thanks for reading!

 

XOXO

Allison

Guess what????

I'm pregnant and expecting a baby at the end of April (April 25th to be exact)!

I have been feeling tired and nauseous, like a normal pregnant lady, but you do forget! I'm about 11 weeks along and right in the thick of it all. Hopefully by 14/16/18 weeks, I will be feeling full of energy, the urge to nest and be feeling like food sounds even remotely good. I've lost about 5-10 lbs because of the nausea. But, the same old foods that if I can't eat anything are holding true this time - cold cereal, bread with olive oil and balsamic vinegar and yogurt. Weird mix - I know - but that is what it is.

I haven't been feeling like doing ANYTHING, not even taking pictures lately. Vacuum/cleaning/cooking/picking up toys - why? It's too much for me right now. I come home from work and pick up Alex and sit on the couch for the rest of the night. Lance has been calling me "lump" because all I do is sit on the couch. We got to see a quick ultrasound of our baby and he/she is doing well.

But, with all this - my back has been hurting and a good friend told me about how she has been seeing a chiropractor during her pregnancy and how she has been feeling better. I looked into it and decided to go. I went last Wednesday and had an adjustment and felt SO SO SO good afterwards. Nausea usually comes around lunch time for me, and lasts until about 8-9 PM. But, that day and the next day I barely had any nausea. My back felt better, so much better, and I felt like my old self again.

I went again on Friday having great expectations.... sidetrack here ..... Along with everything, I'm monitoring my blood pressure daily because of the pre-eclamsia with Alex. So, I got a new monitor a few days before and started monitoring. It was reading about 100/65. Pretty low for me. But, I thought... it's a new monitor for me, so I would talk to my doctor about it when I saw her next month. Well, Chiropractic is known for lowering blood pressure, which is one of the reasons I wanted to do it. It's natural and it could help me out if my blood pressure starts to creep up. But, on top of that I am taking a low dose of a blood pressure medication because after Alex, my BP was pre-hypertension (~135/85) and it's better to control it now that have 20 years of pre-hypertension. Which I take in the morning.

Some of you might see where this is going....

I fainted at the chiropractor. She took my BP before the adjustment, did the adjustment and I started to feel lightheaded. I sat down and she started to take my BP again and I got that black tunnel vision and the next thing I know I'm resting my head on her shoulder wondering what the heck happened. I was only out for a few seconds, but it was pretty scary. I probably scared the crappola out of the chiropractor.

Turns out that early in pregnancy with all the blood volume changes, my blood pressure actually was ~100/65 and the chiropractic really lowered it even more, so much more that I fainted. I guess it's normal to have your BP lower in the first trimester. I had no idea.

I went to see my family doctor the day I fainted to make sure everything was OK, and it was. But, she told me to get off the BP medication immediately and to keep monitoring 2x a day.

We'll see how it goes!

Anyways, It's been hard to not share the news that we are expecting. But, we've come to the time when we can shout it from the roof tops. We are exciting, scared, thrilled, tired and wondering how we are going to do it all. But, what we've learned from parenthood, is that we'll figure it out together.

What we did this last week

Beautiful views of Mt. Rainer

Drawing with caulk on the driveway

Playing with a big dump truck in the grass

The bridge finally finished. Doesn't it look great?

Building a bridge

During the summer of "if it's free - we'll do it" - - - we (meaning Lance) took on an amazing project where we dug a creek bed and lined it with rocks. Basically a hand dug ditch, in some places as wide as 4-5 feet, others are only 2-3 feet wide with nice curves that follow the land. We uncovered some french drains to help with our soggy back yard and cleaned them out, hopefully making them work better. We took rocks from other parts of our property and hauled them to our newly created "dry creek bed" and it was really lovely.

It did really help with some parts of our soggy back yard and it was TOTALLY free!

Fast foward a couple of years and now we have a little boy who loves walking over the dry creek bed to get to the other side with the big stump and lots of things to explore.

So we decided to build a bridge! Not just any bridge, but a sexy curved bridge! It was Lance's design and I think it really came out wonderfully. Alex not only loves bridges right now, but he loved helping his Daddy build it!