Another Day, Another Picnic

Today was our playgroup's start-of-summer picnic. We were a little worried it was going to get rained out, because it monsooned all morning. However a little after noon the sun started to come out and we had beautiful weather for the picnic. The kids ran around the park and played games, it was a lot of fun! Now it is pouring again, like it has on and off for the past, I don't know, four days? This is getting really old!


Here's some pictures from today:


Amelia and Haven, playing "baseball":




Getting a lesson from Daddy:

Amelia LOVES Tiffany's daughter Chloe!

Heart Institute Picnic

Today was the annual Heart Institute for Children picnic. Families whose children have had surgery at Hope come back every year to see the doctors and nurses who treated them. We were so excited to go and see some of our favorite doctors and nurses. Lots of them were there and it was great to see them again, and for them to see how big Amelia has gotten.


Amelia's cardiothoracic surgeon, Dr. Ilbawi:

Our primary cardiologist, Dr. Husayni. There are not enough good things I can say about this man. I am so grateful for everything he's done for us in treating Amelia and in helping me stay calm and not freak out. I am so glad to have a doctor I can trust her care to completely.

Amelia had a blast - Daddy gave her lots of treats! She loved watching the other kids there and did her best with the hula hoop (which wasn't much, but she had fun).

What a great day! I'm so glad they have this picnic every year - for the first six months of Amelia's life, the hospital staff made up most of my social interactions. They are very special to us and we owe so much to them, they will probably never know. It's great to see them, to catch up, and for them to see how wonderful Amelia is doing. I just hope they realize how big a role they played in that, both by caring for her and reassuring me so much!

Pinecone Ornaments

Someone sent me to the Inkspirations blog, where there are instructions on making pinecone balls. So I've made a couple and want to share them here. They are incredibly easy, a bit time consuming, but after you get all your paper folded it goes pretty quick.


I especially love the red/gold one. These were fun to make!

Pure Joy

This is a layout I did for a contest on another blog, Blueprint Sketches.

No, it's not Amelia, it's her BFF Haven. All papers, stickers, and the tag are CTMH, rubons are Fancy Pants and the buttons, brads, etc. are just stuff I had.

I hope to start posting more of my work here. It is kinda why I started the blog....I need to keep up better!

Hospital adventures....

So we are back from the hospital, after a week's stay. Amelia went in for her cath on Thursday, October 11. She had something of a hard time coming off the ventilator, and needed oxygen for a couple days. Then on Monday, our cardiologist discovered that his orders had been entered wrong and they had not taken her off both her meds like they were supposed to, so we got to stay a few extra days, yippee. Amelia took it in stride, though. Once she got to feeling better, she was rarin' to go and go we did. Around and around the unit, in a wagon, on a rolling chair, walking, running, any way we could. We went to the playroom and spent a lot of time looking at the murals of Pooh, Piglet, and Eeyore painted on the windows at the end of the hall. As usual, Amelia charmed all the staff, and amazed me with her positive attitude. I honestly don't think she minded being in the hospital that much once she was able to leave the room when she wanted. I know for a fact she enjoyed having me all to herself - no other kids, no laundry, dishes, cooking, or cleaning to be done....we are going to have to adjust to that again! She also watched Dora practically nonstop so we are on a TV strike now.

Here's some pictures from her hospital stay:

This was in the PICU waiting for them to prep her. I was SO tired, can you tell? I went to bed at midnight the night before and got up at 3.


Friday, the day after surgery. They had to give her so much sedation to get her to sleep that it took a while to work its way out of her system. She was getting restless so they let us take her on a wagon ride.


Our favorite nurse, who has seen us through all the surgeries:


In the playroom, once she was off oxygen and a little more mobile. By this time she was rarin' to go.


She got to go outside Monday, to help with her croupiness.


I left her at the nurse's station while I went to get dinner, and when I came back she had a mohawk:

We took her froggie and baby for on a wagon ride in the hall:


She kept pulling off the leads on her chest, so the nurse made her a backpack to hold her telemetry box so it wasn't dragging behind her.


Sharing her binky with Pooh, Piglet, and Eeyore.



We borrowed the nurse's rolling chair and rode around the halls:


We were ready to go home and she was no longer hooked up to the monitors, but she refused to take off her backpack. She actually wore it to bed the last couple nights, as well as all day.


Sacked out on the way home. It didn't take her long to fall asleep - I think she was relieved to be in a familiar place and know we were going home.


So as you can see, we made the best of a crappy situation and Amelia managed to have plenty of fun while we were there. The nurses, doctors, and all the other staff absolutely loved her and she had plenty of fans coming in to visit her any time she was awake. I really can't say enough good things about the staff there - even the custodial staff is friendly and asks if there is anything you need and will help you as much as they can. Hope you enjoy looking at the pictures!

The older you get, the faster time goes.

I think this is unfair, because the older you are, the more tired you are. Time has just been flying by recently. With school starting back up, Haven is back for daycare full-time, and I have two part-timers as well. I'm helping to organize a Home Party Expo, for people who run home-based sales business like Pampered Chef, Lia Sophia, etc. to display their goods (have GOT to think of a better name! any suggestions?). And I've taken over as organizer of my playgroup (thank God I have an excellent assistant organizer or I'd really be going nuts!). There have seriously been days when I haven't hardly eaten a thing because I've been too busy. Unfortunately the evidence cannot be seen in my waistline.

Today we had a play date with our playgroup, and it was so much fun. The lady who hosted has a huge backyard that faces a cornfield (my kinda place!) and we all sat out on the patio in her comfy patio chairs while the 20+ kids played. The weather was gorgeous, sunny and in the 60s. I LOVE weather like this, it's probably my favorite time of year. We mommies got to chat while the kids wore themselves out, and I got some cute pictures:




Once again it is midnight and I'm not in bed yet. I really need to work on that!!

Adventures in babysitting.....

Does anyone remember that movie? I swear I watched it a million times when I was younger. And I read the book too. I just saw it on TV a couple weeks ago. Just like Top Gun and Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, it's so cheesy but I'll always love it. But back to my real adventures....

Thursday after Haven got here I had to go to the bathroom, and yeah, I took a while, okay? Partly by necessity, partly because I was in a room by myself and that just doesn't happen much, so I was luxuriating in the stillness. However, as my potty break came to an end, I realized things were a little too still. I walked out into the kitchen to find this:


It's not the greatest picture, but yes, they are on the kitchen table. And yes, they are very proud of themselves. So I hauled them off the table, which sent Haven into a temper tantrum while Amelia climbed back up on the table as I tried to ensure that Haven only smacked her hands and feet into relatively soft objects that wouldn't fall on her, like the loveseat and the Dora chair.

I finally realized that what Amelia really wanted was for me to put her hair in a pony like I do for Haven every morning, and she was climbing up on the table to get the comb and water bottle. The thing is that Haven's hair is much longer than Amelia's, and she can actually have real ponies. I tried once before to put a pony in Amelia's hair, and it was so small that it was just ridiculous. But she gets jealous when I spend time on Haven's hair every day, and she wasn't buying it anymore that me running the comb over her head a few times was the same. So what the heck, give the kid a pony, we weren't going anywhere today. So I did, and she was very proud of it. She showed it to everyone who came over. And of course, I've started something. I can tell that never again will I be able to get away with not putting a pony in Amelia's hair when I put one in Haven's. What the heck, just call her Alfalfa.

Friday I was cleaning and the girls wanted to "help". I actually was surprised at how long this kept them occupied.


Then they took the car for a drive....no not really. Just another place I didn't think they could/would climb to by themselves. These two are SO funny together. They are going to get into so much trouble when they are bigger! I have some hilarious videos but I can't get them to upload, so I'll have to figure that out.