Halloween Photos

We had a great Halloween. We started off visiting Nana (the kids' great-grandma) in the nursing home. My brother, SIL, and niece were there too so we took some pictures and visited the other residents. Then we went to quite a few houses on foot. One guy answered the door "BOOOOO!!!!" and the kids thought that was hilarious - especially Lil Brother. He talked about that for a long time. We then drove to grandpa's house and the kids dug into their loot while we visited and took pictures. It was a really fun time for everyone.

Lil Bro loved having his face painted and loved his costume. So did everyone else. Hollywood did a last minute change up since she was dissatisfied with her fairy costume. She used the costume from last year instead and had me make her "icky". LOL. It turned out really good anyway. MK was a mad scientist...she had a lab coat with fake blood on it and her, along with some glitter hairspray and make up. :)



I think I like Halloween just as much as the kids do.

Gearing up for Halloween

The girls' costumes are planned. Lil Bro tried his on today...and then didn't want to take it off. He's a zebra this year. I'm going to paint stripes on his face when we go trick or treating on Monday.

Lil Brother did not want to have ANYTHING to do with carving pumpkins this year. He sat at the table and watched us while playing a keyboard. It was kind of funny. He just wanted us to do it for him. He said he wanted a happy face. I remember last year he didn't like it either. He'll grow into it I hope. :)

Hollywood carved his for him. This was her idea of happy I guess:

Eeeww. I know. I made her take the dirty guts out of its mouth. This year we had a kitty, a cyclops, and two ghost pumpkins.

I thought it was fitting to carve a cat pumpkin since we are being over-run with them right now. 

Hollywood's stray that showed up here during the summer still has one big kitten from then and 4 new kittens that we'll be finding homes for. We're saving up money to get the stray spayed since it doesn't appear that she's going anywhere. I just wish her big kitten she showed up here with was tame. I don't know if it's a boy or girl, but I can't get near it so it's not like I can get it fixed easily. Here's the mama cat that Hollywood named Natalie.

This is her big kitten from when she showed up here with it this past summer:

And here are a couple of her new kittens:

I got super sick on Thursday night - fever, body aches, sore throat, dizzy, sore neck, headache, upper respiratory stuff. I missed work on Friday...I didn't even shower or get dressed. GROSS. I just slept and took Tylenol. Somehow overnight Friday night things took a turn for the better and by now (Saturday night) I'm feeling pretty good. I had the flu shot on Tuesday so I just wonder if that had anything to do with it. Strange. I'm so glad that I'm feeling better though. I have way too much stuff to do to be sidelined with another illness.



I can breathe again

NO CANCER. No sign of pre-cancerous cells. YAHOO!!!! I thank God for this news.

I was freaking out just a bit. Mostly internally. I didn't want to scare the kids. I kept thinking that my baby boy would be an orphan again. That he wouldn't understand and maybe even wouldn't remember me. I thought maybe I could do those videos for them to play at big moments of their lives after I died so they would know how much I love them. But on the other hand, maybe when people die, they should just go away and not send reminders of what was lost. Ya, I thought about all of this. Every time I would hear Live Like You Were Dying I would get lost in thought and feel choked up. It really served as a wake up call. Maybe that was God's intention.



It scared the hell out of me. I looked up the symptoms and the things that multiply your risk of uterine cancer. Being more than 50 pounds overweight multiplies your risk of uterine cancer by 10. Hello, diet.

I also tried a new church this past Sunday. Not that I thought that would have saved me, but I have drifted away from my church over the past couple of years. They are very traditional. The church is full of traditional people. Mostly over the age of 60. Maybe over 70. I don't connect with anyone there. The one family that I did connect with left the church after the church became more open to homosexuals. I didn't understand that since the person I'm referring to has a relative that is gay. When we go to events there the old people stare at my family. I suppose a single mom with three kids that don't match isn't their idea of traditional. The new church however, ROCKS.

It is still a Lutheran church that I go to, but this new one offers a contemporary service that I totally connected with. The music is awesome - live Christian rock and loud enough that I can't hear my crappy voice when I sing - that's a plus. The pastor mixed in a bit of humor with his sermon - and it was directly related to family life today. I just felt renewed when I left there. Re-focused. It is just what I wanted and needed. The girls liked it a lot too. Lil Bro - he played with his toys and talked softly the ENTIRE time. LOL. Hopefully the girls will make some connections there as well.

I feel like I can breathe again. Time to take a good look at what's really important and refocus my life accordingly. Who doesn't need that?

No News...

I didn't get any news Friday from the Doctor. I am choosing to pretend everything is fine. Maybe I'm not pretending. I just worry...things are so abnormal and waiting for biopsy results SUCKS.

Still waiting

I went in to the Dr. for a couple of procedures on Tuesday - one was a hysteroscopy (where they look inside of your uterus with a camera) and the other was a bladder test...I think it was called a cystometry test or something. All I know is I did the bladder test first...and they stuck a small catheter up there to fill it with water - and the whole test just was uncomfortable. I never would have signed up for that one had I known what was involved. After the doc came in and asked how the test went the nurse said, "She pees when she coughs." Well, no shit. I told them that all along. He did look at the computer print out of whatever it measured too so that made me feel a little better. At the end of that test you have to pee in a toilet/chair thing like they use for people that...I don't know. Old people or something. They were standing there waiting for me to go and I couldn't. They had to step out of the room and then I could go. Funny.

The important procedure...the uterus one was next. I've had it done once before a long time ago, so I knew it was better than that bladder test. It still hurts a bit when they pass the camera up through your cervix. But on to the results. I do not have a polyp. That is not good. In that case, the wall of my uterus is super thick...there can be sinister causes for that. My doctor took a biopsy to send off for testing to determine if it is caused by a precancerous condition, cancer, or a more benign cause. Pray that it comes back as NOT CANCER. I'm running on the assumption that it is NOT CANCER since that's the only way I can function without knowing at this point. One thing that worries me though is that for the last few years I've had abnormal pap smears. I go in every six months for them.

It sounds like no matter what, I will be looking at a hysterectomy in the near future. They will take my cervix too since that has the abnormal cells showing up on my paps. I'm sort of stuck between a rock and hard place (again, assuming it is NOT CANCER) because the symptom that I do have is LOTS of yucky bleeding (like to the point where I thought I was hemorrhaging last time) and I bleed in between periods as well, randomly. TMI? Sorry. I don't think I have any male readers though, so SO WHAT, WHO CARES? :) 

The treatment they were talking about trying would be an ablation - where they basically burn off the inner lining of the uterus so that you either get a very light period or none at all going forward. That is no longer an option since by doing that it would mask any future signs of uterine cancer. The cancer word was brought up way too many times in that visit. Needless to say I feel anxious and scared. I am waiting for the Dr. to call me with the results. He hoped to have them by Friday.

Please pray that there is no cancer. I have no history of cancer in my family on either side so I'm just hoping and praying that this is some other thing.

 

Unexpected problems

This has been weighing heavy on my mind lately. I've talked before (on my old blog) about getting my tubes tied last March. I did that and I'm still fine with that. However, one of the hopes was that once I went off of the pill my blood pressure would improve. That has not happened. I'm sure it is due to a combination of things like genes, weight, and stress. So I'm still on blood pressure meds. But I've had a few weird health things going on lately too. I also think I'm losing my hair. Not all of it, but I KNOW it is thinner. I read online that it could be caused by changes in hormones....like maybe when I went off the pill?

I went in to the Dr. recently (my GYN) because my cycle started being strange too...too heavy and too often mostly. Plus for the past 2+ years my paps all come back abnormal. I get them every 6 months because of it, but they don't know why.

So all that freaks me out a bit. Then I went in. They gave me an ultra sound. This is all the crap they noticed:

• One of my ovaries has migrated down below my uterus. Why? Who knows.
• I have a small cyst on the sunken ovary. 
• I have a large cyst on my other ovary and inside of that cyst is another cyst. He wondered why I wasn't in any pain.
• At first he thought that my uterus was measuring triple the normal size, but then he realized what he was seeing was probably a polyp in my uterus. A nice big one.

What the doc said was - he's not worried about my cysts unless they start to hurt. I wonder if that's normal? My ovary that migrated is okay too. The polyp or whatever it is seems to be the thing that has him wanting to investigate further. I go in for a procedure tomorrow where they take a light and camera up there and see exactly what they're dealing with. A polyp would explain the extra and frequent bleeding I'm experiencing, so I hope that is what it is. If it isn't then it could be something much more sinister...like a thickening of my uterus wall or something...I just heard the part that said.."and could be precancerous...." so they need to go in there and see. The "going in and seeing" part is easy - they go up through your cervix. I've had it done once before a long time ago when I first went to him to see what was up with my stuff.

I thought while I was at it, I might as well have this test done that measures muscle strength for the muscles in charge of my bladder as well since I have issues there too - like when I laugh, cough, sneeze, etc. I have had problems with that since giving birth the first time. It's not always possible to stop and cross your legs when you have to do any of the things mentioned. If it is not muscle tone that is the problem, they will most likely give me a sling...for my bladder. Now, that sounds like fun.

Anyway, I guess I always worry about the worst possible scenario - in this case cancer. Those cells that are abnormal in my paps combined with the thing in my uterus...geez, just take all the shit out will ya? I'm all my three kids have and I need to be here.

Weekend recap

My aunt is here visiting from out of state. It has been a great time with her these past few days.

We took in an Elvis show Saturday evening. It was....entertaining. I'm pretty sure I was the youngest one there. There were actually 2 Elvises..or Elvi? One young one (the older one's son) and the older one. The young one sang the songs I like...early Elvis stuff. The older one wore the jumpsuits and sang the 70's Elvis stuff. They did really sound A LOT like him...but the looks...not so much. These are my aunts and mom with both of them.

Here's me with the King.

I had also planned to go to an apple orchard with a group of other adoptive families Saturday morning, but Lil Bro and Hollywood woke up feeling under the weather. Lil Bro's eye was crusted shut and he was coughing a lot. Hollywood had a sore throat and cold symptoms. They didn't want to get moving, so I called it off for our family. :(  I was hoping to buy some apples there for a recipe I was making the next day.

Sunday we had a lot of plans too. I started the day before 7:00 am to get food ready for a dinner at my mom's house with most of the family. We were hoping to go to a movie that afternoon as well. We also had to locate materials and build a shelter for the stray cat who showed up this past summer....and now had kittens on my front steps.

I made homemade scalloped potatoes. The recipe said it took 4-5 hours on high in the crock pot. They lied. It took more like 6-7 so that screwed up our potatoes for the dinner. Hate that. BUT the other dish I made was a huge hit. I bought some apples at the store Saturday to use - it says it's Apple Brown Betty...but it's different than what I've had before. IT WAS DELISH! This is what it looks like while cooking:

Hollywood made some Red Velvet cupcakes to bring along too.

After we all ate like pigs - a big ham dinner with potatoes, yams, corn, broccoli, buns, and who-knows-what-else, plus 5 different desserts we decided we were too full to go to the movies. I took a nap on my mom's love seat and my grandma fell asleep on her couch. I think my aunt slept in my mom's bed too. What a fun bunch we are!

The next thing on the list was making a shelter for the mama cat and her babies. They currently are residing in a cardboard box next to the door. Here's mama cat with her kittens in the background.

I found a shelter to make online...heated and insulated. I don't really have the money for it, but Hollywood agreed to work off half of it by taking over cleaning duties from my sister (my sister cleans to take $ off of rent for me). It is getting cold here and the last thing I want is for these kittens to freeze to death on my watch. Hollywood would be devastated. Bringing them in is not an option since Hollywood is allergic. We already have 4 cats in our basement (2 of ours from before we knew she was allergic and 2 of my sister's) so Hollywood can't go down there without getting sick already. Outside is not so bad for her. She takes an allergy pill and can then get by with being around the outside cat.

Here's the materials - the main thing is a 100+ quart cooler. They are not cheap:

And then you wreck it by making a 6" x 6" door for the cat in it. Hahaha. That gets covered up with a piece of carpet slit up the middle to keep the heat in.

You use a rope of lights for the heat source:

And here is the finished product:

We put the food inside just to lure the mama cat into it...the hope is that she'll like it in there and move her kittens in on her own. We'll see.

Tomorrow is going to be BUSY at work. We just got approval on a big project late Friday, so I'll be busy buying parts for it tomorrow. Yay! I like my job. I like being crazy busy too, so this should be fun.

Sunday yummies - quiche

I made up a new recipe today...we raise chickens so we usually have lots of eggs. I have been craving quiche so I looked up some recipes for it and then made my own using some of the ideas I saw. I'll share it with you because it was a big hit with the kids and turned out super yummy! Pictures of food are hard to take, so just trust me - it looked and tasted awesome.

Ingredients:

1 tube crescent rolls
5 eggs
1/3 cup milk
~2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
a couple slices of onion - chopped
1/2 pound of bacon
parsley
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350. Unroll crescent rolls and arrange in 9" pie plate to completely cover. Pinch seams together. Poke air holes with fork in crust and then bake for about 4 minutes and then set aside.

Fry bacon until crispy, then place on paper towel covered plate to cool.

Beat together eggs, milk, salt, pepper, and onions.

Sprinkle half of the cheese into the pie plate. Crumble bacon (I cut my bacon up with a scissors) and sprinkle most of it on top of cheese - save some for topping. Pour in egg mixture. Sprinkle the rest of the cheese over the egg, and then add remaining bacon crumbles. Sprinkle just a pinch of parsley flakes over it.

Take tin foil and cover the exposed edge of the pie crust. *I didn't have any so I ended up cutting off the edge since it got over-cooked.*

Bake for about 40-45 minutes. It is ready when a knife inserted into the center comes out clean.

The kids - including my fussiest eater, Lil Brother - all loved it. There was nothing left of it when they were done.

More detail...

I feel like I never take the time to write the things that are in my head. I just do a quick update and on with the show. Tonight I took the time to put my thoughts on "paper". It's not easy...constant inturruptions around here.

More on our trip to the International Adoption Clinic:

Lil Bro’s always up for an adventure. When I told him we were going to the Dr. on Friday he said he didn’t want to go…until I told him that if he didn’t go he would go to daycare. Then he was all like, “When are we going to the doctor mom??” “I wanna go to the doctor now.” We arrived at the clinic and checked in at the desk. He spotted the dinosaur in the hall on the way in (see previous post). I promised he could see it when we were all done. In the lobby they have a play area with a big TV. It had Dora on - his favorite. There was another family there too, with a bigger boy...a wild one. He was spinning the giant wheel on the wall at mock speed. I hoped Lil Bro didn’t get too close; he’d probably lose a finger. Lil Bro hung back, keeping one eye on Dora and one on the wild child.

The wild child spotted us. He stopped spinning the wheel. He came up to Lil Bro, who had ventured closer to the TV. He came up to Lil Bro and pointed to his shirt…reached out and touched his shirt…and told us all he had that same shirt! Lil Bro stepped back. The boy repeated it, louder. Lil Bro retreated to a sofa next to my chair. I moved closer to Lil Bro and the wild child ran off, yelling down the halls with his mom a few feet behind, running. Lil Bro leaned into me and said, “He doesn’t have my shirt. This is my shirt. I have my shirt. He can’t have it.” I gave him a squeeze and told him not to worry. He just meant he had one LIKE it.

We were called in for our turn. I always feel like I’m under a microscope at the Int’l Adoption Clinic. Would they think there was an attachment problem if he was playing with the toy on the wall and not sitting by me when they came in the room? Would they think the same if he was cooperative during the exam? He always cooperates with doctors. I blame my family physician – he so good with him. The doc came in and everything went fine. She had a resident with her…and I couldn’t help but think of Grey’s Anatomy…except she didn’t look like an actress. And she took notes. They never take notes on Grey’s.

After discussing the issue I came in there for, the head and face rubbing, they sent in a therapist to show me some activities and exercises I could do with him. She asked me if he liked swinging on a swing set. Yes, he does…and then I wondered if that meant something. I worried she was picturing him sitting in a swing for hours, wanting more. That isn’t the case at all, of course. I was relieved when she said swinging and doing things like sliding and jumping on a trampoline are good for him. Another reason to buy a new trampoline, I thought. Ours blew away in a storm.

One of the activities she suggested involves giving his limbs “hugs”. Basically you apply pressure all the way around his limb with both hands, climbing up slowly. Starting with light pressure and then adding pressure but not hard. She demonstrated on my arm. Okay, that felt freakily good. She also gave me a sheet of activities to do with him. I left happy - with my sweet little boy bouncing along holding my hand and a sheet of paper in purse that will hopefully hold the key to some relief for him.

We drove the hour back to our home town so I could bring Lil Bro to daycare before heading to work. He told me he didn’t want to go to daycare. He wanted to go to “town”. I decided to stop at Walmart and see if they had a backpack he could bring with to daycare. Now that he goes to preschool, they are supposed to have a bag to put their papers in. We looked but they don’t have much to choose from now that the back-to-school rush is over. I suggested a Twins one. He declined. How about a Vikings one?  They should be on clearance if you ask me, but no – they were the same price as the Twins. He declined that one as well. Smart boy, I thought. That was about all they had. We headed for the toy isles instead. He picked out a Lego’s set with some Cars characters in it.

When we left there he said he wanted to go to “town” again. I’m like where do you think “town” is? We’re in town. He said it was the town with the buildings in it. Yeah, again, I think we’re in town. I took him to McDonalds and got him some chicken and French fries instead. We sat in the car while he ate. Then I drove him to daycare. They were outside when we got there – all of their backpacks hanging on the fence. Lil Bro doesn’t care that he didn’t have one. I walked him out there, talked to his teacher and he went off to play. As I was pulling out of the parking lot I saw him running around with another little boy, laughing. He’ll be fine. I love that kid so much, it hurts.

Sensory Integration

I made an appointment for Lil Brother at the International Adoption Clinic for yesterday. I was concerned about the face/head rubbing that has continued. I'm glad I brought him there. They asked a lot of questions about it and a lot of little things were brought up that one might not put all together as being caused by the same issue. He has a sensitivity to tags in clothing. I always remove them but even the printed ones (esp. the puffier ones) bother him. He has to have the seam in his socks just right or he says it hurts him. And when I think back, he used to do a lot of head rubbing when he first came out of the orphanage so maybe its more like that has returned. He also HATED walking in grass with bare feet and refused to do it at all until this year. They said he has a very mild sensory integration issue. Here is a good article on the basics of what that means from Parents.com.

They gave me some activities to do with him daily and said they expect he will stop with the head/face rubbing within a few weeks. I'm glad my mom suggested I get 2nd opinion. Lil Bro loved this little dinosaur they had in the hallway there. He named it Rex.

They think he also may have allergies. I thought that too. He rubs his eyes a lot and says they hurt. Some of the rubbing may be triggered by itching in his ears and nose too. We're going to try an allergy medicine as well.

Here's one more from our visit:

The ups...the downs

I went to my 20 year class reunion this weekend. It was nice to see people again...there were not that many people there but I had a great time anyway. It was kind of a casual, meet at a bar with a DJ type thing - no formal plan...just order off the menu and it was open to the public as well. I took my sister with me since a certain some one decided to pull a disappearing act.

S~ is back to his same old tricks again...never committing to plans and disappearing. I knew he wouldn't last long...he was on his best behavior for a few weeks and then all the old demons started showing. I blocked him from being able to contact me by phone today...at least then I know that he's not going to call instead of sitting there wondering when or if he is. I have a weakness for him and it's best I just shut the door now. He can still get a hold of our daughter on the other phone, but can't call my cell. Maybe he was just what I needed to get over the last miserable failure of a relationship I had. I'm used to losing him, so it doesn't hurt much this time. 14 years of off and on...off an on. I'd like it to stay off now thankyouverymuch.

My grandma is in the hospital again. She has numerous things wrong. Just say a prayer if you can. She's so frail now that I really worry about the future for her.

I would really like to go back to school. I don't have the money or the time, but that is really something that I'd like to do some day. I'll keep buying lottery tickets....it's my only hope. LOL...whaaaa whaaaa.

:(

Hollywood got a bad virus this week - the GI kind. She stayed home from school Friday. She missed a school party Friday night - instead she was getting worse and had a ton of pain in her abdomen. I worried that it was more than just some sort of stomach flu. About midnight I decided she needed some help. I drove her to the ER. She had a couple of firsts last night. First blood draw - and thankfully the kind woman doing it was quick and kept it pain free. First IV - started by a male nurse who was funny and kind. He numbed it up first and she had no trouble at all. She has always been one to panic about shots, so the thought of those 2 things happening scared her to tears. I talked to her about it before they came in and gave her a pep talk and told her exactly what to expect. It helped and so did the kindness and understanding of the 2 hospital people involved. She was smiling when it was over. Here's proof:

We were home from the hospital around 3:30am. They gave her some anti-nausea medication in her IV and sent her home with some more. She needed it again around 8:00 am when she was on the toilet again. She went back to bed and slept until after 11 this morning. Finally around 1:00 she ate some rice and drank something. She kept it down, so yay!


Earlier this week while Lil Bro was watching SpongeBob and I was getting him dressed he turned and looked at me and said, "I don't have a dad." I'm like whaaaat?  He repeated it again. I wondered where he got that idea from. I didn't figure out that I didn't have a dad until I was at least 6. That was before my dad adopted me - before he was in the picture at all. I told Lil Bro that some kids don't have dads, that some kids don't have moms - he got a mom, me. He seemed okay with that.

Honestly, we have not talked much about his adoption together. I tell him that I went to Vietnam and got him when he was a baby, that he lived in an orphanage with other babies, we look at pictures from the trip sometimes but he is still young and doesn't have a clue where babies come from in the first place. I struggle a bit with that because I don't want him to feel different from my other (bio) kids. I don't feel any difference in the love that I have for each of them.