T is for Turkey

I'm still catching up on my blogs, so I guess better do this one before Christmas is here :)

We did Thanksgiving at our house again... I think it's like the 5th year or so. We started having T-day at our home when we bought the last house (hm, that means this is probably the 6th). And it went fabulously at the new place.

I make the turkey and the stuffing usually, and others bring the rest. This year I kinda made everything but dessert. I tried out a new dressing recipe this year... in the Crock Pot! It was delicious if I do say so myself :) And it saved a ton of room in the oven. Room needed for potatoes (sweet and regular), green bean casserole, rolls and the bird. We also had a salad with dried cranberries, walnuts and mandarin oranges. It was WAY too much food, but we managed it ok :)

My parents, my sister, Jason's mom and aunt, and his grandparents all came. We watched our traditional TV shows, the dog show and football. Then that afternoon Emily and Mom helped me decorate the Christmas tree. I didn't get to go to any Black Friday sales this year due to having to work, but Jason made it.

On Friday evening, Emily, Eileen, Jason and I went out to Austin's Long Center to see Cirque Dreams: A Jungle Fantasy. If you've ever seen a Cirque de Soile show this is Broadway's version. It was awesome and we had great seats in the 4th row, actually almost too close. These people are amazing what they can do. My favorite parts were the contortionists and the aerialists. Also these guys who balanced together on a board atop a cylinder... atop 4 other cylinders going opposite ways. One girl swung around by her hair... don't know about that one, ouch.

I'm still catching up... so expect to see some more back dated blogs :)

"It has been my observation that people are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be." - Abraham Lincoln

Home Improvements Fall Edition

So far this fall we didn't do much as far as home improvements on our new house, but we hadn't really planned on it, and really haven't had time.


The focus has been the dinnnig room. There is a large wall in there that we are going to have black and white photos on, so for paint color, I wanted to have a grey or silvery. As we all know, the piant never quite looks the same on the wall as it does on the chip. Once it got up there and dried it turned out to be more blue then silver.


I really like the color, but I had bought burnt orange curtains, and there's no way orange and grey-blue go together. So I had to completely scrap that idea. Instead I'm going to stick with the black and white accents. I've got new curtains, but we'll have to wait until the Christmas tree is moved to put them up.



We also finished out the attic floor and now we have tons more storage! I love having an attic handy in the house. Our last home had a 2 foot square in the garage for attic access and once you were up there were too many beams to move around. I have too much stuff, I'm aware of this, but I'm not getting rid of the holiday decorations any time soon, so they have to go somewhere...



I'm hoping the spring provides us with more time to work on the house some more, because the winter is already busy. Check back then :)






I wanna hang a map of the world in my house. Then I'm gonna put pins into all the loactions that I've traveled to. But first, I'm gonna have to travel to the top two corners of the map so it won't fall down. -Mitch Hedberg

Touring Houston

I know, I know, it's been awhile... again. I'm not so good at this lately, I don't know why. We've been busy though, so it may take a few entries to let everyone know what we've been up to.

The weekend before last, Jason and I went to visit my aunt and uncle in the big metropolis of Magnolia, TX. They are big enough now to have two 5A schools, big times :) We visit almost every fall, usually to go to the Renfest. This year we wanted to try something different and ventured into downtown Houston to do the tourist thing and visited the Natural Science Museum and the Houston Zoo. Lesson learned: don't try and do both in the same day, you miss things.


The Science Museum is pretty cool. They have a great butterfly garden, a bunch of dinosaur skeletons and lots of other great things. My favorite part was the rock/mineral and gem exhibit. The large samples of rocks and minerals are set up beautifully in glass cases around the room. As you meander through the cases you come to the best part, the vault. In here are some gorgeous gems, singular and set in jewelry. That exhibit really made the trip. Don't worry, I was sure to point out to Jason which ones he's getting me for Christmas.


BUT if you ever go to the museum, I have to warn you against using the elevators. On our way from the first to the third floor, I got stuck in an elevator for the first time in my life. Not fun. Luckily it only last about a minute or two and we had good cell reception, so if it had lasted longer, I would have been calling.


The zoo is fabulous. I haven't been to the Houston Zoo since I was a kid, and they have done a great job reinventing the place. At that time the zoo was free to get into, so they didn't have a lot to make the place habitable for the animals. I remember it being one cage after another along the sidewalk. So much better now, and they are still working on it. The monkeys have quite the set up in the trees. You enter onto a bridge that takes you from one type of monkey to the next. My favorite was the giraffe, who was reaching over the fence and snacking on the landscaping in front of the cage.


We were there as they were closing and on our way out we past them setting up a dance floor and tables near a beautiful reflecting pond. Apparently you can get married at the zoo! How cool is that. I can just imagine saying 'I do' and then a lion roars in the distance. haha


I was so tired, I slept most of the way back to the house. The next day we did a little shopping in The Woodlands before driving home to Kyle. It gets dark so early now, it was night before we even started back. Luckily for me I had the next two days off :) well, one day off and then Veterans Day...I love bank holidays.


And thanks to our wonderful friends for taking care of our kids while we were gone!

Butterfly landed on Jason's head!!

"What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us." - Henry David Thoreau

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Welcome to the world, Everett

Everett James was born early, early this morning to our good friends Krista and Jason! He's 7 lbs 11 oz and 21 inches long. Both Mom and baby are doing great! I'm going by there today and I'm sure I'll have pictures to upload soon.

I can't wait to meet you Everett! You're going to do some great things in this world and you have some of the best parents ever!

The Syndrome

I've hesitated to post about this. Its very personal, slightly depressing for me, and not something I want to necessarily be asked about much... and I'm not entirely sure who all reads this thing. But I've talked it over with Jason and I've decided to go ahead. This blog is about me, what my interests are and what's going on in my life. And this is definitely a 'going on in my life' one might say.

Fair warning, this is a long entry and I'm going to talk about womanly problems. Don't be squeamish now.

Some of you know that Jason and I have been trying to get pregnant since last Dec - with no luck, just a lot of tears. For a few years now I haven't been exactly normal as far as monthly cycles go, I just kinda considered it normal for me.

Last year in the summer (2007, before we started trying) it got ... well, gonna skip the details on that one... and I went to get checked out and ended up having surgery to remove endometrial polyps. That was a first for me - surgery. And it was surgery in rather sensitive area for a woman-maybe more mentally than physically, but ... well, no woman of 27 wants to have surgery on her uterus. It turned out not to be a horrifying experience after all. And I thought 'All right, we've fixed whatever problems have been going on, let's get on with the baby making.'

That was not the case however... and after another year of strangeness- and the previously mentioned tears- I headed back to the doc last month. Turns out the polyps - totally unrelated - where hiding another issue. There was some blood taking and a sonogram involved, and I have been diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS).

PCOS is not rare, around 5% of all women have it and it's the leading cause of infertility. There is tons of literature out there for it, even support groups. I may have this all my life, but it's treatable with meds.

Basically I'm not ovulating every month - only 3 or 4 time a year. We may have been able to eventually get pregnant on our own. But sometimes the ovaries just hang onto the egg, because they're not being told to let it go. One of the hormones needed to kick off this very important part of the process is missing a few of it's scheduled appointments. Now there is a build up of follicles causing all kinds of nasty symptoms - the follicles increase estrogen levels that the body then turns into testosterone because it doesn't need it. If you check out the Wikipedia page, there is a sonogram picture of an ovary, the black spots are the follicles- mine looks just like it. I don't have all the symptoms yet and may never have gotten some of them (acne is one thing but lets try to avoid the hair loss please). But we're going to get control now and possibly get rid of the problem altogether.

To get me back on course, the doctor has put me on Metformin and Clomid. While I am not diabetic (another symptom of PCOS), Metformin will help with insulin resistance and also help the second med to work better. And Clomid will make the ovulation cycle start on time.

When you read about this stuff online, it sounds a lot scarier than the doctors make it sound. I have a syndrome. While it bothers me on some levels, I think I'm OK for the most part. I feel like I finally have a reason for some things - things that are wrong with me, that I felt uncomfortable and depressed about maybe. Ah, something to blame my issues on.

Sorry if I'm dramatic - I just really wanted everyone to know. What better way than blog about it - let everyone know at once.

If we never have a baby, it will be OK. Maybe God doesn't have that plan for us. But I'm not giving up on it yet, not without a fight.

Welcome to the world, Lucy!

Please send up big prayers for Lucy and her parents, our good friends Tammy and Jake. Earlier this week, Tammy's had some problems with pre-eclampsia. Not good. The only way to fix it is giving birth, so the baby's entrance to the world was moved up a few days. Lucy Jane was born at 6:20 pm on Oct 8th. She's 18inch long and 6.1 lbs. And she has so many people that love her already!

A few weeks ago in an ultrasound they found Lucy has enlarged ventricles in her brain that may be Hydrocephalus. Now that she's born they will be doing tests to determine if she needs brian surgery to relieve the fluid, and she will be having this surgery in the next couple days. I know with a whole lot of prayer and faith that she -and Mommy - are going to come out of this fine and do great and wonderful things in this world.

Congrats Tammy and Jake! I can't wait to meet your little blessing!