Hello October!

Good Morning!

Watching Mickey Mouse

Bathtime

"Fields"



Wow I can hardly believe that October is upon us. And it is even harder for me to believe that Mason will be one year old in just a few weeks! This first year has just flown by. Ellie's seemed to go at a more even pace. But I guess that is the poor second child for you. With Ellie, I focused everything on her, but with Mason, my time is split. But Mason has the benefit of learning and spending time with an older sister who adores him. I am so thankful for their relationship and I hope it continues. Ellie is so patient and sweet to Mason.
We've had another bought of illness that is hopefully coming to an end very soon. We were back at the dr's office yesterday with both Ellie and Mason yesterday. Mason's ear infection has come back (while on antibiotics no less!) and Ellie could not be outdone so she has an ear infection too! Mason and I are headed back to the ENT this afternoon for hopefully our final visit where the dr and I will discuss tubes and I will tell the dr it IS happening. Also, Mason's clogged tear duct is not better after 10 days of antibiotics so I am hoping to coordinate the surgeries so he can have the tear duct and the tubes done all at once. I am waiting on the call from the Eye dr at Vanderbilt.
I'm including some pics. Ellie was just playing around on her magnadoodle last night and she said "Look, I wrote 'Fields'" And to our surprise, she had! Brandon had written Fields at the top for her to "practice" and she did it. At 3 years old! I am pretty sure Harvard will be calling soon. The other pics are bathtime and my little tv addict. Ellie only started watching tv in the last 9 months or so. Mason has been a tv hound since day one! He didn't even know I took his picture!

Almost Friday!

I always love Thursday since it's the day before Friday. And I especially love it during this time of year when I know we can spend some time outside and have fun. Brandon is still on the hunt for that big one he saw last weekend so hopefully he will get it. Me and the kids are going down to mom and dad's Saturday morning. I am going to take my machine and retreat to mom's sewing room/ upstairs bonus room and she has promised to occupy the kids. She also offered to cook my dinner if I bring her ingredients and a recipe! I could go on for days about how lucky I am to have all the help I do from my family. I absolutely could not do it without them. Well, I probably could, but I would certainly not be sane!
I'm not sure if I said that Mason is back to his old tricks and was diagnosed with a double ear infection last Friday. His eye is also infected again. I took him to the ENT but he still wants to wait another 6 weeks before we do tubes to see if the fluid clears. The pediatric eye specialist at Vanderbilt said to get through his entire course of antibiotics and if he still has the infection, then he will see him. But he really is a trooper and he's been eating, sleeping, and playing great. We're still waiting for that first step. And for him to say "mama" instead of "da da da da da" all the time. Ellie is getting a little sniffly too but I hope it's just the cooler weather and she can get through it. She pointed out a house this morning and told me that's where she and Bob live. Bob is her imaginary "baby's daddy". (These are her own words. I could not make this stuff up!) She said "See that white car? That's Bob's." So I asked why he wasn't at work and she said that he rides with his friend. (Hmm...this sounds oddly familiar...Brandon carpools to work...) I said "Is his friend's name Jim? Jim Dpeadin?" (this is a joke about my brother-in-law Tim Dreadin who happens to be Brandon's carpooling friend) And he answer was: "Yes. But Bob and Jim aren't at work yet. They had to go to the store to get milk and bread." My goodness. I really need to record this so she believes me when she is older. Maybe this blog will still be around then.
I talked to my cardiologist yesterday. He said everything looks good and is pretty much just as he thought: my pulmonary valve is leaking as a result of my surgery in 1996. He said the course of action is to keep an eye on it with a follow-up MRI every year or so. He said he thinks we are looking at more than 2 years before we will need to discuss surgery, but we may have to look into replacing the pulmonary valve. I could wallow in this news and worry about it. But I won't. I have a beautiful family and I want to enjoy and appreciate every day. I trust in God and my very smart (and handsome) doctor and feel like for now I have done all I need to do. However, I must lose some weight. I did ask Dr. Prudoff about losing weight and would that have a significant impact on the progression of this issue and he said in general losing weight would be good for my heart health, but for this specific issue, it would have little to no impact. I am going to switch to a dr who specializes in adults with congenital heart conditions. The dr is a colleague of Dr. Prudoff's and I talked with him about me switching and I have decided it would be best to go to someone who works with patients like me every day. Dr. P really went above and beyond in researching and talking to his colleagues to be sure the course of action he took was the best, but he is more accustomed to working with strictly adults issues and I have learned in my 33 years of dealing with this heart thing that there is a WORLD of difference between congenital conditions and adult conditions.
PS Everyone can leave comments now. I can't wait to see what you've all been wanting to say!

WHAT is a blog?

AND why does Jennifer have one??? These questions are coming from my dear family. Here's a definition I found for "blog" that I really like: "A blog is a personal diary. A daily pulpit. A collaborative space. A political soapbox. A breaking-news outlet. A collection of links. Your own private thoughts. Memos to the world." My parents are a little freaked out that I am publishing a blog for all the world to see. My dad wanted to know if I need someone to talk to. My aunt thinks I am divulging deep personal secrets here on the "interweb" and she is also concerned for my safety. So, all you stalkers and crazies, WATCH OUT! My family's got my back.
For me, a blog is a place for me to use my wannabe writer skills and express my unending humor. I explained to my mom that people in my generation want to keep in touch, but we don't always want to talk! Two of my very best friends in the whole world live in Virginia and New Jersey. I pretty much only ever talk to them via email, blackberry messenger or text message. (And I read Des' blog!) I know everything there is to know about them and we always know what is going on in one another's lives. We meet up a couple of times a year (on good years) for a little girl's weekend and that's that. I am (mostly) not anti-social. I don't mind phone conversations or meeting up with friends for lunch. But I really like blogging. I also love to read blogs of people I know and care about. I figured since I am reading everyone else's blog, I should contribute.
So there you have it. And I write all this as if I have millions of readers when in reality, there might be 5! But at least the 5 of you know where I stand on blogs.
We had a nice weekend. Brandon hunted. He is stalking the BIG ONE. I hope he gets him. Seriously. Five years of living as a (mostly supportive) hunter's wife and we both deserve that deer on the wall! Ellie went to the WKU game with Nana and Poppop and she had a BLAST. Mason is into everything. Last night he pushed a chair around the kitchen and then tried with all his little might to climb into it. So I set him in it and pushed him around some more. All is well with the Fields'!

I miss Jackie!

Brandon and I are in the process of building a house on our farm. When we decided to build, I had no idea what all this would involve. So far, we are to the point of ordering our plans( and they have come in). Now we have to sit down and make our changes, meet with our builder, he has to make the changes and then we break ground. While we are building, we are lucky enough to be able to live in a quaint little farmhouse on the farm. Quaint. My dad called it "cottage living" the day we were moving. Basically, we lost about 900 square feet when we sold our house and moved here. The kids are sharing a room and we have ONE bathroom. Yeah, quaint. The clutter builds up fast. And most of all, I miss Jackie. Jackie is our cleaning lady. A few years ago, Brandon came in one day and said "Charlie said they have this great cleaning lady and we should call her." Now I can just guess how this conversation went: something along the lines of me just having been on a rant that we have to cleanthe house and Brandon moaning to Charlie that he can't go off and hang tree stands or fiddle fart in the woods because he has to help. At that point, I imagine Charlie dropping the bomb that he has a great cleaning lady and we should call her.
I digress...When we sold the other house, I had to tell Jackie that I just didn't feel like it would be worth her time to drive all the way out here to clean such a tiny house. But man do I miss her! Why do I miss her so much today, you might ask. Because I have been attempting to get this tiny little house clean since my feet hit the floor this morning. So far, I deep cleaned the bathroom, washed and dried mine and Brandon's sheets. And since it is almost 9 pm, I suppose I better be getting said sheets back on the bed.
Ellie is at her first WKU home game of the year with Nana and Poppop so hopefully I will have a chance to dust, change the kids' sheets and do floors. And Biz and I are planning to hit a few of the Parade of Homes houses for ideas! Brandon had a GREAT huntoing night and saw 6 bucks! That certainly makes it worth us living over here. He climed out of the tree and was in the house within 10 minutes!
If anyone sees Jackie, tell her I miss her and please don't fill my spot because I will need her again!!!
I can't get a link to work to save my life so here it is (cut and paste!): http://www.frankbetz.com/homeplans/plan_info.html?pn=3973

Fall is coming!

One of the best things about living in Kentucky is that there are seasons. Now many native Kentuckians would disagree with this, but they need to live in Alabama for about a week. Christmas week is a good week to chose since we usually wore short sleeves to ride the new bikes Santa brought us! For the last week or so, when we step out in the morning, it is nice and breezy and cool. Now it does warm up during the day, so we aren't wearing sweaters yet, but jeans feel nice (with flip flops!) and the humidity is mostly down. This morning, I dressed Ellie in her Auburn tee and jeans. When we stepped onto the front porch to head to the truck, she told me she was cold. I told her once we got going in the truck, she'd warm up. So as we were pulling out of the driveway she said "Get this going Mama! I'm about to froze!" Whenever she says stuff like this I always think "WHERE did she learn that word????" Then I remind myself she is listening to everything we say and it will come out of her mouth soon enough. And I remind my sweet husband of that daily when the lovely words that he'd never say in front of his Grandma come out of his mouth!
So fall is upon us. Mom and Dad are taking Ellie to her first WKU home game of the season. I am extremely proud of myself for the t-shirt I made for her to wear. Mom called Monday and said "The game is a white out, Ellie needs a white WKU shirt." OK as if I don't have enough to do!!! But I made it in stages. Designed it Tuesday, hooped it yesterday morning and sewed it last night. Whew! Check that one off. (You can see pics on the other blog!)
One final note on my dr's appt's yesterday: I had an SVO2 test which is pretty much a stress test. You get to wear this lovely contraption on your head, several heart monitors, a blood pressure cuff and they plug your nose then you walk on a treadmill with increasing inclines so they can see how you use oxygen. I was fine with the walking and the monitors and all that, but the nose plugging got me. ICK! Try getting a good deep breath with your nose plugged! What finally got me was the inclines. I was feeling the burn fo sho. After that test, I went to another part of the hospital for a cardiac MRI. I'm really pretty low-key about my own personal health matters. I try to take it in stride and not worry. So I figured people have MRI's every day. No. Big. Dill. Well it kinda was. The MRI alone would have been fine. Then they tell me I have to have an IV for contrast dye to be injected during the procedure. I HATE NEEDLES! Then they tell me that all during the MRI I will have to hold my breathe. I easily could have fallen asleep, but every minute or so they were saying "Take a deep breath. Let it out. Now hold it............breath and relax..." Repeat. But it's all over now and I hope to have some results today or tomorrow. These are pretty much just baseline tests so that we know where we are starting with this leaky valve. I'll update when I have more info. Enjoy the weekend! The weather here is supposed to be wonderful!
I'm including some pics of tailgating last weekend.

Welcome to my blog!

I have had this blog for quite some time and wasn't sure if I wanted to make it public. But obviously, I decided to!
We had a busy weekend. Me, the kids, my parents, Biz and Tim went to AL for the WKU/ AL game. We left Friday and got there early afternoon. We met up with Biz, Tim, his parents and my friend PAIGE, her husband SCOTT and sweet son WILL at Chili's for dinner. FUN! Everyone loved Paige, of course. Scott is just as nice as she is and Will is an absolute DOLL! We had a nice weekend in the jungle of AL (SO SO HOT. And Kentuckians do not know humidity!). Yes it was fun even though WKU got stomped. We tailgated for most of the day with the Dreadin's friends the Ridgeways at their emmaculate RV. We had such a great time doing that and it was so nice to have a place to cool off. Biz didn't sit with us but she texted me during the first PLAY of the game and said "This is going to be BAD. And it was! Another highlight of the weekend was the big gas freakout on Friday afternoon b/c of the hurricane. People were lined up for days and gas prices were going up by $.20 at a time right before our eyes. Dad and I joined the chaos and got in line because a lot of stations were actually running out. And my gas guzzler needed to get us to Tuscaloosa!
Brandon hunted all weekend which made him very happy. He saw several deer including 4or 6 bucks (can't remember. I'm sure he'll correct me!) I am so glad that our farm is finally becoming the hunting paradise he has wanted! And I really mean that with zero sarcasm. Nothing makes me happier than to have him be able to hunt right there on our land! It means I am not a hunting widow! I really hope he gets the BIG ONE this year to go along with the one already on our wall. Which can then move to the basement when the house is finished. HA!
Yesterday, I was off. I got suckered into keeping Ellie home. (By suckered I mean she was onto me when she realized I was saying "let's go to school" and I had not showered and so she started questioning me and I broke and let her stay with me. But we took Mason!) She was good. She destroyed her room in an hour and then she watched some movies. This is a big milestone for my little Ellie. Only in the last 3 months or so has she really become interested in TV. Her favorites are Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Backyardigans. And yesterday: Lady and the Tramp. Mason will watch ANYTHING! I sewed all day. I finished orders, but I want to do some extra stuff to show people what is available. I have a lot of ideas! The problem is finding time to get it all done.
Mason cut his first tooth at school yesterday!!!! We knew it was coming all weekend and when I picked him up, Makalla said "He got a tooth!" and I said "AT SCHOOL! He didn't have it this morning!" Now I have to get him some shoes because he is THIS CLOSE to walking.
So the week has started. My only major news is that I have a cardiac MRI and a VO2 test scheduled for Thursday. At my cardiologist appointment last month, he found that my pulmonary valve (the one that was repaired when I was 20) is leaking now. After talking to some adult congenital heart specialists, my Dr, the handsome Dr. Prudoff, has decided it may not be anything to freak out about just yet. But he wants some baseline tests and he will keep an eye on it. In a lot of ways I think I tempted fate with being pregnant twice. But it was certainly worth it!