Updates Feb 2012

Life is still moving on. Weird how that happens. I mean you know it would, even after you lose someone you love....life goes on. But now you have to adjust...in ways that you never let yourself think of before. Like trying to explain to a three year old boy why his Nana B can't come to his birthday party....like not having a place to stop by in town while the kids are at an activity....not having her face light up when she sees us come in to visit her. I miss her. We all do. Little Brother does too. He tells me that a lot.

Updates on everyone, youngest to oldest....

Little Brother had his dental surgery done 2 weeks ago. I was so scared that something would go wrong...but thank God, it didn't. He had a tough time with everything though. The dentist came to talk to me after he was done and before I saw lil brother. He said lots of stuff - the things that stuck in my head were 1) He has a very small mouth even for his age 2) He had a lot of trouble getting the work done because of the space 3) It was a good thing they didn't attempt to do the work in office because of how hard it was to do.

Then they came and got me so I could go see him in recovery. I was unprepared for what he looked like. He was still out of it but he sat up to search for his Angry Bird pigs that I had given to him before the surgery...his mouth looked disfigured - the swelling was so painfully big that his little lips were at least 4 times the normal size. He was bleeding from his nose, had an abrasion under his left eye and he just looked like hell. I felt so horrible for him. My stomach did a flip and I wanted to cry like a baby. The nurse told me they had trouble with his breathing tube...which was inserted through his nostril since they were working his his mouth. They had to remove it and reinsert a smaller one. I honestly cannot even think of him laying there while they did this stuff to him. It makes me sick. He did much better after they let me hold him in my arms while he came out of it. He was really brave and did great. We got to the hospital around 9 and were home by 3.

He was in rough shape - his lips had ripped in the corners and had sores inside of them from them stretching his poor little mouth out. He also had a low grade fever and of course wouldn't eat a thing. I stayed by his side, reading books, watching TV, singing songs, and getting him to eat bits of food and drink. Wednesday I had to work so MK stayed with him. I kept him home from daycare all week until Friday. That was the only day he went. By Saturday I had my boy back to pretty much normal. He talks a little differently than he did before...harder for him to say his "s" sounds. We have a follow up this week to make sure that things are good inside there. The molars to me seem a little big...like he can't get his front teeth together anymore. He even said that his teeth are big. I suppose they would feel that way though since they no longer have craters in them. Ugh, glad this is behind us.

Hollywood:

She's doing great in school...and by great I mean all A's. She's rejoined swimming and dance so she's busy 3 days a week with that. She seems to really enjoy both. They just got their dance pictures taken this week so I'm looking forward to getting them back. I do have a hard time swallowing the $ they charge for pictures. I could take them myself for a few dollars a print. But I don't have that choice. :)

Her BFF is in both activities with her so they have been hanging out a lot also. Her BFF spent the weekend here. They always have such fun together and I hardly notice she's here really. They went out for a walk together Saturday morning and took some pretty cool pictures from behind our house.



Her kitties followed along behind them as well:

Mary Katherine:

She continues to do awesome in school too. She's in her 2nd year of Spanish in high school and I'm amazed by how much she knows. Sometimes she and I text back and forth in Spanish for fun...except she's going from memory and I have to use google translate for everything. She's still in dance...they had their 1st dance competition of the season last weekend. She's got nerves of steel. I don't know how she does it. I'd hide in the bathroom while my team went out there, but not her! She was flawless. I didn't get to see her in person...a close family friend passed away and I was at the visitation. It was the first competition I've ever missed, but I saw it on tape afterward. She was so sweet about me missing it...she told me it was important for me to be at the visitation and she could go with her friend to the competition. I was relieved she was so understanding about it.

Me:

I'm doing pretty good. I got a nice raise at my new job...puts me back up to where I was (and then some) when I was at my job of 14 years that went under. I think I continue to prove my worth to them. I do a LOT there...they are totally getting their money's worth out of me. :) Seriously...I've never worked so hard in my life...and I love it. I love learning new things...getting things done for them that they had only hoped I would be able to sometime in the future. My boss doesn't seem like one to give you much credit until you prove yourself to him...but I've managed to get a couple compliments out of him and the raise said a lot to me. I'm starting to find my groove there.

I have to say that I'm as fat as ever. Fatter, really. Fat as I have ever been...even heavier than when I was 9 months pregnant - by a LOT. So disappointing to me. I have been gaining weight pretty steadily since about the time my love life fell apart last year. I'd like to think that had nothing to do with it, but who knows. Only one thing I do know- I can't stand it anymore. So last week I joined weight watchers. I have done really well and am sort of looking forward to my weigh in this week. I am trying to follow the plan completely...and I am finding it pretty easy. It's the points plus system. I went overboard a bit today with the Superbowl party food I had, but I had enough "bonus" points to cover it. The scale will tell....

I have not gone out since my class reunion back in October last year. I've been reading a lot. I started playing Farmville again too. Don't laugh. Hahahaha. I already gave it up again though...too time consuming. The reading is too, but I feel like I'm doing something more constructive that way. I read all the books in the Twilight series...yes, I know what happens in Part 2 of Breaking Dawn. But I won't tell. And now I'm on the 2nd book in the Hunger Games series. Those are really good books too.

I have not been doing much with photography since my main computer got a virus and I'm too broke to fix it. But here's a picture of my back yard Saturday morning:

This weekend we went to visit Hollywood's grandma - she made us homemade pho and eggrolls. To die for! Here's a picture - Hollywood, her Ba, my would-be nephew J. (he spent the weekend at my place this weekend too), and Hollywood's aunt (my ex's sister - she's awesome and I love her!):

Since we had 2 extra kids sleeping over, Lil Brother slept in my room last night. He's so sweet - I have a big fluffy down comforter that I sleep with and it was bunched up between us this morning...I heard him stirring so I was awake and I see his little head pop up over the comforter to see me...he said, "Hi mama." I said, "Hi sweetie."  He laid his head down and he said, "I love you." Awwwwww...what an awesome moment. I love him so much it hurts.

Fun Friday Night

Hollywood has been baking again. :)  She made this cupcake for a friend from school. She does such a nice job! She told me she wanted to go to a culinary arts school when she's out of high school. I told her she can do anything she sets her mind to. We think it would be fun to open a bakery/coffee shop together someday.  



May is the name of kitten we are keeping from the litter that Natalie (the injured stray that we nursed back to health last summer) brought up on our front steps. She's almost 9 weeks old now. She loves to sit up on your shoulder...she tucks her head in and sleeps sometimes.

I took her to the vet yesterday for a check up and to start her vaccinations and also because she had a really yucky looking eye. I thought she had gotten something in it...the lid was so swollen and red. Hollywood was so worried about her...I couldn't just wait it out...it looked really bad. I used my birthday money to pay for the visit. Vets charge a lot for an office visit. It would have been $55 just to have the vet look at her eye...but for $95 I was able to have her look at the eye, do a complete evaluation, and get her whole first year of shots. It cost a little extra since she needed medicine for her eye. She has conjunctivitis so they gave her an antibiotic drop with a steroid in it. It helped overnight, but she has to be on it for a week. She's in the clear with everything else though - no worms, no mites, no fleas, clear lungs - she looks good.

My cousin just got back from a trip to New York City. It's the first time he's been out there. My mom was actually born in Brooklyn, NY. I've never been there yet either. He visited FAO Shwarz while he was there and got the ultimate Lego set for Lil Bro. My cousin just got back on Wednesday but he called tonight to see if I minded if he gave it to him early. Too cute! Of course I said to come on over. We all had supper together (I made a hot dish) and Lil Bro was so excited to open it he didn't want to eat. I used it as a bribe to get him to eat instead. After supper the kids all sat down with my cousin and put all of it together. That was a perfect gift for him - he LOVES it...he wanted to sleep with it tonight. :)

Tomorrow evening a local church is having a live nativity scene outdoors. Live animals, angels, Mary, Joseph, Wise men, etc. I hope to bring the kids out there. It would be nice to see and come away with the true story of Jesus instead of all the commercial stuff the kids see too much of. 

Fuzzball

I love this picture...furry little kitten legs and tail.

Kittens

Did I tell you about the stray cat (I guess she's ours now) who moved her kittens up on my front steps? Ya, I did. Smart cat. Now we have 4 little fluff balls running around out there. They are so cute I can hardly stand it.

Hollywood is working to raise money to have them all spayed/neutered/shots done so she can keep them. I'm hoping to convince her to let me find them good indoor homes, but she's got other plans. She's allergic to cats so they can't live inside.

This one's name is Jellybean. He's named that because of a story MK told Hollywood about an animal shelter that was having trouble finding homes for black cats. They named one of them Jellybean and posted it's info online. It got adopted right away. So they tried it again with their next black cat that couldn't find a home. It worked again! They started doing that with all of them and there must have been something to it because they found homes way faster than with other names. Here is our black Jellybean:

Next is Bruno - it just fit. He or she is sweet and fluffy and OHMYGOSH I can't stop petting him! It's hard to tell if it is a boy or a girl when they are so young and fluffy.

Here is Jack (with the moustache) and Christopher - named after Christopher Columbus - he's the explorer of the bunch. He was out running around at 2-1/2 weeks, a good week or so ahead of his siblings. Jack is the whiner of the bunch. He's more shy and he cries when he gets too far away from his mama.

They are all very special to Hollywood. I guess they are to me too since I had a nightmare the other night that a giant tom cat came over and killed some of them. I was so upset. So scary - I hate it when I have nightmares. It doesn't happen often, thankfully.

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.



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.