Sick Week!

Well, it's been tons of fun at my house this past weekend and week.
Ema had to go for her 6 month check-up where she was found to be almost 16 pounds. That's right! My 6 month old daughter weighs more than half of what my two year old sons weigh! FATTY!!! Anyways, she had diarrhea when we went to the doctor that day, but she seemed to think that Ema was looking ok, so she just told me to keep fluids in her and make sure that she was essentially getting the BRAT diet. Ema got 5 (that's right FIVE) shots that day. So, when I woke up the next morning and found her to have a fever with beet red legs, it was not great. We had a time of it over the next day or so. I had to give her Tylenol every four hours for a couple of days. She DID manage to continue to have the diarrhea for days! Actually, she still has it as I am writing this!
Unfortunately, she gave me the diarrhea. Cooper had a little bit of it, too. Good side of this, again, as I am writing this blog, Ethan and Hunter feel fine! I worry about Ema getting sick more than anything. I'm not sure what I can do, but I hate to think that it could be anything that could affect her shunt. I know that sounds crazy, and rationally, I know it won't worsen things. I just worry! I had to miss two days of work which stinks, but sometimes, there's absolutely nothing you can do about missing work or things that you really need to do.
Well, I'm going to go hang out with my hubby for the few minutes we get at night!

Thanksgiving was so crazy, I'm just getting to blog about it...

Well, my first annual Thanksgiving dinner was a success! We spent all day the day before getting the house cleaned for the 19th time. Then we managed to entertain two house guests (AKA - My niece and her boyfriend who were a HUGE help). Then we had dinner guest on Wednesday night b/c Hunter's brother and our sister-in-law came over to visit with us and see the kiddos! It was hectic, but I still managed to get my 23 (that's right I said TWENTY-THREE) pound turkey ready and in the fridge to be cooked Thursday am!

I got up at 6:30 to feed Ema and put the Turkey in the oven. It cooked for 6 hours! When we went to move it from the roasting pan to the platter, it fell apart. It was so moist and juicy!! YUMMY! Everyone started arriving around 3 or later. We ate at 5 and it was a wonderful dinner. I've never seen so much food in my life!!! It was crazy. We had to clear off a counter in the kitchen just for the desserts there were so many. Maybe I over-planned...oh well, it was great!
I spent all day Black Friday at the mall. It was crazy. I managed to shop for 13 hours. I got a lot of Christmas shopping done.
We took the kids to my in-laws on Saturday and spent the whole day decorating the house for Christmas.
All and all it was a great holiday! We managed to have a successful Turkey day with 25 people in our house and spend good quality family time together!
I love our family and we are so blessed with how much love and caring we have in our lives. I'm not sure what we'd do without them sometimes!

What a Call Weekend

Well, I guess I've come to the point where I don't have time to stop and blog until the weekend is over.
I was on call this weekend and since I was off to take Ema to the Doctor on Monday, so I worked Friday (BLAH!!). Over the course of the three day call weekend, I had 18 patients in the hospital. Oh my goodness, Oh my goodness! (A little Annie reference for ya!) I had a Silpada jewelry party in the middle of rounding, so I ended up going to the hospital twice on Saturday and worked 7 1/2 hours!! ARGH!!! Anyways, I've never been so excited to see a Monday in my entire life! I miss my kids so much more when I don't get to spend the weekend with them!!
I'm soooooo excited about Thanksgiving! Only a few short days and way too much to do! Then there's BLACK FRIDAY!!!
There will be tons to blog about this week...

Ema's Dr. Appt

Well, we went to Nashville yesterday. This time it was only Hunter, Ema and me. (Me IS grammatically correct here!!! - Inside joke!) After waiting a little over an hour, we saw Dr. Tulipan. He felt like Ema looked good and that she was doing well. He gave us some examples of things to look for to know if the shunt is malfunctioning and is planning to see us in three months. We only have to see him two more times until she turns 1, then we go to seeing him once a year unless something happens to the shunt.
What amazing news!!! It was a long trip to get the news, but it was worth it.
Hunter and I came home and went to his Referee banquet last night. I've actually got an entire Thanksgiving Menu prepared (ahead of time!!!). I'm so excited about it this year. It collectively will be organized chaos...What fun!

More Weekend

Well, I got to spend the day with the fam on Saturday. Hunter went to watch the horrible UT/Ole Miss disaster with some friends and I hung out with the kiddos. 2 1/2 year olds...that's all I know to say. They are a handful!!! We have so much fun, though. I got to spend a lot of quality time with Ema, too. It seems like all I get to do with her is feed her and put her to bed, so getting to put her in the floor and play with her was awesome.
My family is so blessed! Hunter and I talked about what this time in Ethan and Cooper's lives means. It's crazy for me to understand that it's all about shaping them into the people that they will be. Even at 2 1/2. It's so hard for me to discipline them sometimes. I told Hunter that I feel like I am constantly punishing them when I only see them for a couple of hours a day. He's right though...this is when they learn manners and appropriate behavior. It's just really hard to discipline and have them get upset with me when I don't see them much.
So, anyways, we got to go out with one of my really good friends and her boyfriend on Saturday night without the kids. That seems like I'm talking out of both sides of my mouth, but if you have kids, you totally understand. While I do enjoy spending my free time with them, it is also important that Hunter and I have some no kid time with adult contact. We had a ball, and who knows, Hunter may have a job lead.......
Sunday was busy, busy as usual. After Sunday School, we met with all of the youth leaders. It's a really amazing group of adults that work with our youth at church, and I am so proud to go to church there and be a part of this awesome youth group.

Early Black Friday

So, Friday, we had an absolutely amazing time. My boss takes the entire office on a shopping trip to the outlet mall in Pigeon Forge. Ron and I (if you don't know who he is...Nurse Practitioner that is my counterpart at work), left Ooltewah super early and headed up to the hospital to get the piddly work stuff taken care of and then met everyone at the office. We loaded everyone up in a rental van, a huge Yukon XL and a Honda. The van included my boss, Ron, me and 3 others. We had a great time, just on the ride up. We ate lunch at the Apple Barn....YUMMY veggies! Then we headed to the shops. I, of course, shopped til I dropped. I had an absolute ball. I found this great place on line for coupons. I googled "Retail Coupons" and found printable-coupons.blogspot.com. It was great!! (20% off at Coach, 30% off at BR, Gap, Old Navy). Needless to say the website was great. I saved over $100 at Gap. I got tons of deals. I actually didn't buy anything for myself and got lots of Christmas shopping done. (If you know me, you know that I am huge into Black Friday and getting everything I can for Christmas done on that day; therefore, getting stuff done before then is AWESOME!)
We ended up shopping from 12 - 6 at the outlets and I didn't even get to some of the places I wanted to go. I shopped with two of the girls from work who now think I am a mad woman!! AKA: Shopaholic/Saleaholic!!! We also did a Scavenger Hunt during our shopping. TOO FUN!!
We left Pigeon Forge and headed to Knoxville where we had a super nice sit-down Steak dinner at Ye Ole' Steak House. It was great.
We ended up hopping in the car on the way home with "Christmas" on our minds after the long day of Christmas shopping. We ended up singing Christmas Carols all the way from Knoxville to Cleveland.
What a great day! My boss is a great, compassionate, giving person that ANYONE could take lessons from!!!

Another Great Weekend with the Family

I had a really busy week at work this week, so our plans for the weekend were not really etched in stone. It seems like they just kinda fell into our laps. We ended up having great family time!

We decided to take the kids to see their great-grandmothers this weekend and next. This Friday we went to see my granny. She lives in the retirement center where my mom works, so me and the kids (Hunter was reffing) surprised my mom and my granny. Granny was really excited to see the kids. The family jokes b/c she is always asking me, "What do you do with three of em?" My answer of course is always, "Um, Granny, the same thing you did!!" (My mom has a brother and a sister and they are all within three years of age!) We ate lunch with my mom afterwards, and I just can't describe how good the kids were at lunch. They have been acting so good lately when we've gone out to eat. {SIDE BAR: My mom took the boys by herself on Wednesday to pick out some shoes at Stride Rite at the mall. They were perfect little gentlemen. They tried on shoes. Rode the train. Played on the playground (Ugh, gross!) Ate lunch and even got a cookie b/c they were so good.} I got my hair done, then we ended our Friday with dinner at home.

OF NOTE...we tried the new Gigi's cupcakes for dessert. Well, just so everyone knows, when I was pregnant with the boys, I dreamed of cupcakes. All I wanted was there to be a specialty cupcake store in Chattanooga, but of course, we didn't have one. Well, NOW we do and it is amazing!!!!!!!! TRY IT AS SOON AS YOU CAN!

Saturday, we got up early and took the kids to the RiverPark. We played, ate lunch, played some more and headed home. We took the boys down on one of the piers and watched the water. It's so cool to watch little kids be so amazed with things that we take for granted. The water and the boats were the coolest thing to them. Wouldn't you just love to be sweet and innocent like that!
They have had colds for about two weeks and haven't quite been able to shake them. I guess taking them out to play near the water where the air was cooler kinda sparked the cold, again. It's really probably just allergies. We all have snotty noses these days. (HUNTER COOKED DINNER!!! It was really good, yay Hunter! The gumbo was great!)
So, Ema woke up Sunday morning with a pretty yucky cold. It's the first time she's had any type of sickness since her surgery. It's a little nerve-racking to watch over her and make sure that it doesn't turn into something worse. Just pray for her! Needless to say, I didn't take the three sick children to church yesterday. We went to Sunday School and had to miss out on church so that we could stay home with the kids.
Hunter has been asked to go to Brazil on a mission trip, so he went to a meeting about that after church and me and the kids hung out again. Hunter and all of his old fart friends are playing soccer, again! So, he got home for dinner and we just hung out. We've got so much planning to do with the holidays coming up. I'm going to be way stressed. Oh well, it's a good stressed...