B-Day Boy

Happy birthday Matthew-Man! This actually happened 11 days ago (sorry my love). Both Matthew and I had the day off work, so his mom and john came over to watch the kids and we drove out to the coast and enjoyed a yummy lunch.... without the kids!!!!! That evening a handful of people came over for a little BBQ and ice cream sunday eating. It was wonderful.

Happy Birthday!

What A Day!

I don't have the time to go in to all the details... but I have to get this down before I forget the intense/sickening/wonderful feeling. Yesterday I had the most exhilarating, frightening, nerve wracking, adrenaline pumping emergency at work that I have ever had to deal with!
I literally had a 60 pound boxer (yes people, that's a breed of dog) :) blow part of her jugular vein to pieces (it was the maxillary branch of the jugular, for those of you who want to know). She had been attacked by a boar and once the clot let loose, my hospital looked like a scene from a horror movie... I am in NO way exaggerating. Blood was pouring and gushing from this poor dogs neck!!!!!!!!!
My staff was GREAT! They totally got everything that I needed as a tech and I and bark orders since we were keeping pressure on the neck (I could feel the pressure of the blood hitting against my palm) and trying to stabilize that patient. Within minutes the dog was under anesthesia and I was trying desperately to keep my hands from shaking as I searched for the exact location of the tear. At one point I had to place my pointer finger inside the vein (yes it was THAT big!!!!!) so that I could get a good visualization of the wall of the vein as cut down over it!!!! I kept talking to myself and to God, asking for help... which He gave me, because somehow I got ALL the bleeding to stop (with the wonderful help of sutures and some clotting gel for added reassurance). We ended up playing ambulance too, and transported the patient in my truck while she was sedated, intubation and on IV fluids to a 24 hour emergency facility (since this of course occurred at 5:30 pm and I wanted her monitored overnight). By the grace of God she is alive and doing great, despite getting gouged by a boar multiple time, losing an obscene amount of blood and having emergency surgery! It was an amazing and very frightening feeling knowing that literally at THAT moment if I couldn't find or stop the bleeding, she would bleed out and die... then and there! Once it was all said and done, I felt like I needed to vomit and I'm pretty sure my hands didn't stop shaking until I finished a glass of wine and sat in the bath for 1/2 and hour! What a day!

July Visitors

July has been WAY fun and its mainly due to the copious number of visitors we have had!
Brie and her wonderful family started it off and came the first part of the month. Needless to say EVERYONE and their mothers (literally) were vying for her time. We got to see them quite a bit and even spent the 4th with them, my parents and the Shiras! Really good times.

Benna, Aunt Dottie, Jeff, Lindsay and Connor all came up mid-month and it was heaven seeing them all. Jeff's stay was way too short, but it was cute watching Connor and Wesley hang together. Connor taught Wesley how to play with his feet (pretty sure Wesley didn't even know he had them prior to Connor), and Wesley taught Connor how to chug milk like nobodies business.

It's been fun having Benna here, though her allergies, my work, and life-type factors haven't let us spend enough time together. But it has been so sweet to see my kids getting to spend time with their Great-Grandma! How lucky are we?!?!?!?!
Aunt Dottie spent almost a week at my folks house and that was a blast! We had wonderful meals, fun shopping trips and she and I enjoyed some nummy wines and a great talk on our little Dry Creek outing.

People keep commenting to me about how it 'seems' like my family is so nice and are amazed that we all get along and really enjoys each other. Well, it's true! I guess sometimes I just take it for granted that I have such a close, friendly family. I forget that not every family is THIS lucky!

Wesley

I'm a little late with getting Wesley's 5 month picture up, but here it is. I can't believe how much he is growing!!! He is now rolling over (every few days), and is VERY into eating! He is loving his once a day solids (all except butternut squash). He is still happy and mellow and would be content to spend the day watching faces and laughing at his sister.

 The other big even with Mr. Wesley man was that on July 15th we had his Dedication. It was really nice and so special that soooooo much of the family could be there. Once again he wore the dedication gown that Benna made for my older brother to wear when he was dedicated, then each of us siblings wore it along with Mallory, and now Wesley! Tradition! (it makes me want to break out in song... for those of you who know Fiddler On The Roof).

 

Yeeeeehhhhaaaaaa!

Ok, seriously?! How cute is she??????

 

TWO!

On Sunday July 15^th, Mallory Rose turned TWO! I can’t believe that my little baby girl is already two… and yet she is ONLY two (and we already have another one that’s 5 months).  How is any of it possible?!?!?

We had a Cat in the Hat birthday party for her on her b-day, thank you to all who were able to attend/help (I have to give a special shout-out to Shawnon who made the amazing cake, and used her embroidery machine to help me make the kids outfits... THANK YOU!). At one point there was close to 50 people in our little home!!!!!!!!!!!! Mallory had a blast, playing with friends/family, jumping in the bounce house (which mom found at S.A for $10), coloring, opening a sinful amount of gifts and eating cupcakes AND cake! Could life get any sweeter? (It seemed like all the adults had a good time too, which was an added bonus).  Friends and family came from all over (Denver, Oregon, San Diego and Sacramento) so it became a mini family reunion at the same time (hey, why not kill two birds with one stone, right). Wait, why are we killing birds?

Any way.

Mallory Rose, you are such a joy. You are funny, sweet, helpful and stubborn (all qualities that I am proud of). You know your mind, your wants and other people’s wants (even if they don’t know it)! You are my little monkey girl, my love-al-buggal, my baby girl and my Malla Rose. You make me smile, motivate me and have helped me be a better person. You are the life of the party, you have the memory of an elephant and when you set your mind to doing something there is NO way to stop you. You are bright, joyful and truly amazing. I adore you and am so proud and blessed to call you my daughter. Thank you for making me a mother.

 I have so much more to tell about. So much has happened over this past week/two, and I’ll get to it all…but I wanted to spotlight our little lady first.

Rolling

Poor Wesley. He started rolling over on the 4th of July and it's taken me an entire week to talk about it. But he did it none the less! Matthew, Mallory and I were all there to watch it too!!!!! The look on his face was priceless... it was pure shock!
He's such a sweet little man. I feel my love growing and growing for him daily. Matthew has started calling him "Face Time," because that's all the little guy wants. Just someone to sit next to him and look at/talk to him. I feel like sometimes we are so busy running after his Super Charged Sister that he doesn't always get the one-on-one time that he is craving. That being said, he LOVES his sister! He loves watching her run, jump and sing... but is favorite is when she grabs a book and reads to him. He gets the biggest smile and his little feet start kicking. It's darn cute!

Yes, Wesley is on the bed listening to a story... he just hiding under the covers. He's a silly little boy, if there is ANY fabric around him (blankets, clothes, toys...) he will grab it and rub it on his face and in his mouth! It cracks me up.

Rugby... The Next Generation

Just like Daddy!

San Diego Fun

Potty update: Mallory is doing great!!!!! She’s got the hang of it and only occasionally forgets that she’s supposed to go in to potty. She has started resisting me (I mean tantrum throwing resisting) when I try and get her to randomly ‘try’ to go potty… even if I KNOW that she has to go. I don’t know what the deal is with that but I want it to stop! So besides her tantrums and the annoying lower eyelid twitch that I developed right around potty training time, things are going great.

A couple months back I got the feeling that I needed to get down to San Diego and visit my family there. Being the loving and supportive people they are, my hubby and mom thought that it was a great idea and they took time off work and came too! We were there for about 4 days and it was amazing!!!! I think I took around 600 pictures, so I’ll just put in the highlights.

We stayed at my Aunt Alicia house (thank you, thank you, thank you), so we spent an amazing chunk of each day swimming, going in the hot tub, playing on her ranch and letting Mallory ride Lacy the pony (my aunt has 12 horses and lacy). We got to visit a ton with Beena, have a HUGE family dinner with all my mom’s siblings, and even made it to the zoo. Matthew and I even got to head out on a little date one night! Oh and Mallory, in true Mallory style got yet another black eye!

We had such a wonderful time; the one down side was that it went too darn quickly!