Neurosis and Tomato Soup...

Since my Gastric Bypass surgery 18 months ago I've been neurotic about what I eat. Granted, on some occasions I eat whatever I want and do just fine. I always have been watching my sugar intake and I carefully check labels for grams of sugar and nutrition information. I've been told I'm over the top about it, but when I don't check - I inevitably run into problems.

In an effort to scale back how much I cook and the cost of food, we've decided that simple dinners will work. So last night, I made one of my favorites - cream of tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches.

It was so yummy going in - I could taste it before I put it in my mouth - good comfort food that was creamy and delicious. I got in about 1/2 my soup and part of my sandwich before it hit me. I started losing visual focus and my head started to swim. Then the heart beat started going faster and I started to get cold and clammy. Thinking I was having a hypoglycemic attack (fairly frequent this week), I took a glucose tablet. When I started to feel even worse, I retrieved the empty can from the trash and checked the sugar content. Twelve grams. That is double what I usually allow myself for any serving of any food. Problem solved - sort of. Now I just had to live through the feeling yucky part of the whole process. I ended up in bed at 7:30 p.m. and I never got up until this a.m.

The last time this happened was in Salt Lake City when I ate 1/3 of a blueberry bagel. I'm not sure how much sugar was in that thing, but it made me feel really bad!

Now. I may complain about this occasionally. If I'm careful, this usually doesn't happen. It's when I think I'm safe, that I run into problems. I chose to have Gastric Bypass surgery over the lap band surgery so that I would have this effect if I ate something I wasn't supposed to - so I guess I got my wish. Think - revers Pavlov's Dog theory. 132 pounds later, I don't regret my decision at all - I can live with a few times feeling crappy to live with my weight loss results. This is the hard part about surgery - but I'd rather learn to eat right (even if I mess it up occasionally) and learn to live with my new body.

Lessons are learned every day.

Almost a month

Wow. I don't know where November went. It was on it's way...I knew it was coming and then it was here and gone.

I was thrilled to have my parents here for two weeks. They came from far away and were here for Thanksgiving. It was something to be thankful for indeed. I think it was one of our best visits ever. E and L kept the grandparents in stitches most of the time, and L even impressed us with his first steps on Friday.

I feel incredibly blessed at this time in my life. I worry daily for M's job as the budget cuts here are deep and are not done yet. My job, while OK right now, will probably be OK, but it is still scary to hear about major budget cuts and projects being postponed. I was in high school during the last recession, so I wasn't really effected all that much. Now that I'm the one paying the bills, it makes all the difference.

I really pray for all of those who are in need right now. I have many friends who have been laid off or with spouses who have been laid off. They are in crisis right now. I hope that all will be OK for them. I am thankful that we are where we are and that we could potentially survive on one income for a period of time. 2009 will be a year of saving so that if something does happen, we would be OK. I guess that is my lesson for 2008 - save and plan for peace of mind.

365 Days

365 days ago Lucas was born. He came to us three days later. This day is commonly known in the adoption world as "gotcha day". He has grown from a 7 lb little peanut of a guy (top picture) to 18 lbs of rompin' stompin' boy (bottom picture). He's almost walking and he has four teeth with two more on their way. We've been fortunate enough to be with him for all his firsts. We look forward to many more firsts. While his adoption is not complete yet, we expect that we'll be through the entire process by next summer, barring any unforeseen circumstances. After some our past experiences, we're not holding our breath, just taking things a day at a time.

After years of being on the infertility roller coaster, these boys are a huge blessing. I see now, what I could not see then - that this is how we would build our family. That the children no one wanted would be desperately loved by us. How they would change our perspective and our lives in an instant. How much they would add to our lives.

People often ask how many more children we will take. I'm not making that decision today, or even tomorrow. As far as we know, number 3 for us is on the way in a fairly short period of time. We thought it would be after the first of the year, now we are told that it will probably be sooner than that. We don't know the sex of the new baby or what circumstances this child will be born into. We'll figure all of that out later. Maybe, for some reason, this child will not be given to us - maybe he/she is not meant to be part of our family. I don't question these things any more. I try to take things one day at a time and sometimes one minute at a time, knowing that what is meant to be is meant to be. After number three, we'll go from there. Many families are large and they manage to survive - I'm not sure HOW large we can get (we are limited in our home as to bed space!), but I'll take what I feel I can honestly handle.

We are truly blessed. Sometimes, we question all the trials we go through - I'm beginning to realize that the trials truly are temporary and though they seem like they will never end that they do and things get better. And that time heals, even though we're not sure at first.

Happy Birthday Lucas!

What to say today...

Today is election day. I fully expected that there would be a really long line (there was this a.m. when I went by our polling place at 7 a.m.). I was completely wrong. I walked in and checked right in to vote. I told the election workers that I had expected a long line, and was told that it was only busy first thing this a.m.

Lauryn voted for the first time ever today. I wanted to take a picture of her with her "I Voted" sticker, but she would have none of it. she is very camera "shy" so I don't have many pictures of her lately.

I'd like to say something amusing and fun, but I guess tonight I'm just too tired. Since I have to teach a class tomorrow, I guess I'd better get some sleep.

Hope everyone voted too!

Halloween 2008

So, I had the best Halloween ever yesterday. I don't really remember having such fun with my older child - probably because Halloween meant cold weather and long drives to trick or treat only the family as houses where she grew up were few and far between. Later when we moved, I don't really remember taking her too many places.

This year, was Ethan's first year trick or treating. We went to our church Trunk or Treat last weekend where he quickly picked up the knack of saying "trunk or treat pease!" then an emphatic "thank you!" before moving quickly on to the next car. Last night, we took him trick or treating just on our street. I only had to tell him once that we don't visit houses with no lights and he was off seeking those houses well lit with the Halloween decorations on full display. He'd seek out a house and point and say - "that one has lights mom!" Then he'd charge up to the door. Several times he was scared a little by the occupants of the home, especially when one of them came to the door in full (and disgusting) costume! He backed right off when he saw how little Ethan was and apologized. It didn't really seem to phase Ethan at all - he just went on to the next lit house.

Once we did our street, I convinced him to trick or treat daddy on a ruse to get him home. It worked - he was done. Then I assigned him the task of sitting with me and passing out candy to the other children. We went through about 250 pieces of candy so we must have had over 100 kids at the door. They would leave to go to the next house and Ethan would yell "hey - kids - over here - happy halloween!". He'd jump up whenever he saw a crowd coming and get all excited. He ended up handing out more candy than I did!

Thanks to a great sale at Toys R Us in December, we ended up with multiple costumes. Ethan got to be a pirate at the trunk or treat and a dinosaur for Halloween.

I don't know how I got so lucky to have both Ethan and Lucas in my life. I feel truly blessed on a daily basis!

Homesick...

My friend posted a blog entry today about whoopie pies. Now, whoopie pies are not the same all over the world. In New England, whoopie pies are a delight for the palate. They are special and just don't taste the same in other parts of the world.

While I do miss the taste of whoopie pies, what struck me more was her connection to "home" that the treat evoked. I don't have many things that make me miss home much. I, of course, can't eat whoopie pies because of my surgery. Really though, there are no foods that remind me of home that make me that emotional. Rather, I see pictures of fall foliage (fall being my FAVORITE time of year) and that makes me homesick. I miss the crisp smell of autumn and the colors of the leaves. I miss the beginning of school and the need for a jacket in September. I miss the last dive into the lake when it's 60 degrees and we thought it was warm (now I'm in a jacket at 70 degrees!) and I miss my family. The strange thing is, when I think of home, I don't always think of where I physically grew up.

I physically grew up on the East Coast where I lived 1 hour away from the rocky coast and visited there often. I left there at 28 to go to graduate school in the west. While I did my physical growing up in the East, my EMOTIONAL growing up was done in the west. So which is my home? Hard to tell. I spent only 3 years in Utah, and yet I feel like that is home just as much as Maine. How can I be so loyal to two places at once? I'm not sure. When I visit Maine, I want to go home and when I visit Utah, I also want to go home. BUT, really I'm home here - where my wonderful family lives and works and we grow together. I come back to Nevada and find that the best part of me was left behind in my travels and I get to find myself again upon my return. I have the best time when I travel anywhere, yet I'm always thankful to be back with my husband and children again.

I miss my family and my friends, but I recognize that now it is not possible for us to be together in the same state. Maybe someday, we'll all be able to be closer and spend more time together. Until then, I just have to enjoy every minute of the vacations I spend with them.

A really bad day

So, today sucked out loud. I'm not sure what is going on in my head, but none of what I'm thinking makes sense. I really want to go back to bed and start the day over, but the truth is, nothing would guarantee that the day would go any better the second time around! The other sad thing is that when I do wake up tomorrow, I have to go to work. I didn't get nearly as much done this weekend as I'd planned on so I'm behind starting the week as usual.

Grumpy, grumpy, grumpy.

Tomorrow is another day???!!!!

Blogging in general

I've never been one to keep a journal. I've tried countless times to begin and I always set a goal of making an entry once a week, or some determined period of time. I always determine that I'm a failure for not "following through" and actually meeting my goal. So. This blog has no goal. No set posting dates, no plans for daily posts etc. The pressure is off. Since this will primarily be seen by only a few friends and maybe one or two family members, I'm not going to set myself up for failure again. Interesting to me that I feel like I do this in life too - my house is never clean enough, my crafts are never good enough etc. I need to get over it.

My mother is currently in the hospital with some cardiac issues. They originally checked her in with pneumonia, but then discovered some abnormalities in her cardiac tests (she has previous cardiac history). On Monday she goes in for a heart cath. We are hoping they can remove the blockage with the simple procedure. If not, she goes into the next room for a more significant surgery. She's scared, so is everyone else. We also hope this becomes a wake up call for her to take better care of herself.

Ethan and Lucas remain the cutest little boys on the planet with sunny dispositions and antics that make me laugh daily. Lots more to post about with those two.

I'll get the hang of this blogging thing sooner or later!

Oh What Fun It Is to ..........

Spend time with your best friend, doing what you like best, in the place you like best!

I travelled to Salt Lake City on 10/8 to go to a digital scrapbooking convention with my "BFF" Kaye. I always laugh hard enough to pee myself when were together and this time was no exception. Spending my birthday with her was awesome - although Mike complained that it was the third time in a row that I hadn't been home with him for my birthday. He made it up to me by giving me "shiny rocks" for my finger!

I love Utah. I really think I want to head back that direction someday. The sense of community combined with the spectacular views and really good friends makes it quite a draw. While we've
"settled" here in Nevada, we've never made good friends (well, we have, but they have passed on) like we did in Utah. Not sure I can convince Mike to move again, but we certainly want the boys in a better school system so when Mike retires, maybe then we'll go.

This convention was great - I learned a ton and just got to focus on scrapping for three whole days. Can't wait for next year (provided with still have only two young children).