Macie Marie turned THREE!!!

On October 9th our cute girl celebrated her third birthday!! It was Chip's first birthday celebration with us so he was pretty curious as to why Macie was getting all the attention that he would normally try and get.

We got Macie her favorite treat that she only gets on her birthday (and now Chip's birthday, too). Vanilla ice cream! Chip ate his ice cream in a gulp and a half so Brent had to take him upstairs to Macie could eat hers in peace.

Little hoover. I didn't get any pictures of him actually eating the ice cream since he ate it so fast.

Last year she ate it too fast and gave herself an ice cream headache. So this year she slowly enjoyed it. And by slowly I mean I had to sit there for 15 minutes waiting for her to finish.

Even Emma made an appearance (once Chip was upstairs)! Getting ready to give her the presents.

A big fight over that toy happened right after I took this picture. Chip wanted it and Mace wasn't giving it up!

Toy Blow Pop!

Ultimately the little whiner got what he wanted and played with the new toys. Macie is a good big sister for sharing.

This past year with Macie has been full of ups and downs, but mostly ups. She had some stomach problems that the vets couldn't figure out, but she has been doing much better. She also recently decided that she no longer likes dry food and refused to eat for three days. Finally we started mixing wet food in with her dry food and she hoovers it down now. I guess I can't blame her. Some of that stuff smells exactly like the Chunky soup we eat for dinner.

She also surprised us with how she reacted to Chip. To say I was nervous to get another puppy was an understatement. Macie has never really gotten along with other dogs. But it only took her a couple days to warm up to him. Now they are best friends!! She is very patient with him and is a good example to Chip of how you are supposed to act (even though some of Chip's less desirable traits, like barking, are rubbing off on Macie). We love our little goober so much and we're so glad she's a part of our family!

Poor puppy :(

Poor Chip got the snip. And he wouldn't stop trying to lick it. So he got the cone, too. You would think that a giant cone on your head would prevent you from eating a bone.
But not my Chipper!

If you got it, you got it!

When I pulled out my chicken sandwich from Burger King today, I also found this: It made me laugh.

(and yes I scribbled out a couple of the numbers to protect the creeper that did it :) )

What the Forks?

Since we've lived in Seattle I have wanted to take Brent to the Olympic Peninsula. It's one of the most gorgeous places I've ever seen and where else can you go from the mountains to the beach to a real rainforest in just an hour?? So we decided we were going over Labor Day weekend.

We drove over on Sunday and were planning coming home Monday night. Pets are allowed at the Forks Motel, so the puppies came with us. Our first stop after we got off the ferry was Hurricane Ridge. This is what you're supposed to see when you are there. And this is what we saw.
Next we drove around Lake Crescent which my family calls "Puke Lake" because of how sick you feel after you drive around it from all the twists and turns.Brent got tired of driving and I didn't want to, so we decided now was a good time for Chip to learn.

Next we went to the Hoh Rainforest. I know that it's called a RAINFOREST but it rained like I haven't seen it rain forever. This was the view from our sunroof.

We got out for 5 seconds because of the downpour, but then saw a sign that pets aren't allowed on the trail so we got back in the dry car.

By this point I was pretty frustrated. I wanted the weekend to be perfect and it only had clouds and rain. But Brent thought it was funny and said we could go back some other time so that made me feel better.

After the rainforest we checked into our hotel. Macie refused to eat her food so she made herself sick from not eating. Then Chip decided he forgot he was potty trained and pooped on the floor of the hotel (and this is why you ALWAYS wear something on your feet in hotel rooms!!!).

Around 8:00pm Brent said he wasn't feeling too well. He ran to the bathroom and started projectile vomiting across the room. After he was done I ran in and started throwing up, too. Lucky for me once I threw up I felt better. Brent, on the other hand, did not. He was up the entire night throwing up. Around midnight (after we still hadn't slept) we decided to leave at 2:30am and just take the ferry back early so we didn't hit Labor Day traffic.

The rest of the night for me was spent puppysitting while poor Brent was sick. Chip was so curious about everything and even hopped into the tub at one point. We got a quick picture at about 3:00am as we were headed home.

Needless to say our Labor Day was super lame. I was so upset that we went all that way and didn't even get to see the ocean! I was pouting for a few hours, but now we can laugh about it :) The highlight of the drive home was that Brent threw up as we were driving around Lake Crescent so now it really is Puke Lake!

Infertility sucks.

That's all.

I'm never going to be like my mom...

Oh yes I am! I always said this growing up, but as I get older I am more like her every single day (and I do NOT think this is a bad thing!!).

There were many things that my mom did and said to me when I was little that I vowed I would NEVER do to my kids. Like grounding. There was nothing I hated more than being grounded. And it really seemed like I was grounded all the time (I wasn't a bad kid. But I did do stupid stuff sometimes. Like getting two tickets in 5 months. And hiding my 7th grade report card because I got a C). But now as I'm older I will TOTALLY ground my kids when they deserve it. So there you go mom, 1 point you.

Another thing she used to tell me had to do with Santa. And I will do this to my kids (to an extent). The night before Christmas or Easter she would tell me if I didn't do my chores SUPER well, Santa or the Easter Bunny would not come. Cruel, maybe. But it WORKED. The stairs in our house were never vacuumed better than the night before a holiday. She also used to tell me that if I got out of bed at night to go to the bathroom and Santa was there, he would leave. I'm sure this was just because she knew I wouldn't get out of bed if I thought this. Well I vividly remember cracking my door open and yelling down into the living room, "SANTA. I AM NOT PEEKING. I JUST HAVE TO PEE REALLY REALLY BAD!". And then squeezing my eyes as tight as I could and crashing my way down the hallway until I got to the bathroom. I'll probably use the chore one, but I might modify the bathroom one so my kids don't show up on Christmas morning with a black eye from crashing into something they didn't see because their eyes were shut out of sheer terror of Santa leaving.

My mom also taught me never to drink and drive. 1 point mom. But minus one point mom because she didn't tell me she meant ALCOHOL. Driving to the grocery store was one of the most stressful times for me when I was little because I was so scared my mom was going to get pulled over for drinking in the car. When I teach my kids this, I will make sure to tell them that Diet Coke is an OK thing to drink while you are driving.

The last thing I remember my mom telling me is something I will definitely NOT do with my kids. She told me that every time I told a lie, I got a black dot on my spirit. This scared me soooo much. When I would lie she would look at me and tell say, "You just got a black dot on your spirit." And I remember crying because I was so scared I had more black than white on my spirit and I was going to hell. And then when I got a little older I figured that I was a lost cause and already had more black dots than white so I should just go ahead and lie.

So yeah. I vowed to never be like my mom. But the older I get I realize that I am already so much like her (and I don't even have kids yet). So I'm not going to lie, I know I'm a mini version of my mom and that my kids will probably say the same thing about not wanting to be like me when they are young (plus I don't want to lie anyway. I don't need another black dot).

Happy 4 months Mr. Man!

Chip is 4 months old today! I can't believe he is only/and already 4 months! He is soooo big (especially since we compare him to Macie is size) and sooo smart. I also feel like he's been in our family forever, even though we've only had him for a month and a half.

He went from this:
To this! In just a a month and a half! Chipper likes:

Macie

• Me (he's a momma's boy!)


• Brent


• His bones
  
• FOOD

• Playing
• Sleeping in soft places

• Wrestling with Mace

• Going on walks
• Making friends (people and dogs!)

• Chasing the kitties

• ToysChip does NOT like:
• Being alone
• Getting put in his crate
• Baths
• Being ignored
• When Macie gets to be on the bed at night and he has to sleep in his crate (hey, sometimes being older has it's privileges!)

Chip can:

• Sit
• Shake
• Lay down (sometimes)
• Come when he is called (or when he feels like it)
• Listen when we say no bark
• Respond when he hears his name
• Tell us when he has to go potty

He is the best little boy and we are so glad he is in our family!!! We love you Chipper!

Pissed at my Cyst(s)

Monday night I started having really bad pains in my stomach/pelvis area. I've had these the last few months thanks to Clomid so I didn't think too much of it. Well I went to sleep and when the alarm went off at 4:30 I was in so much pain I couldn't move. I had actually woken myself up in the middle of the night screaming in pain. I was convinced I had appendicitis so off to the ER we went.

When I got there they asked me how bad it hurt on a scale of 1-10. I know that 10 would be like having your leg chopped off so I said 8. I guess 8 isn't enough because they sure took their sweet time checking me in and trying to figure out what was wrong with me.

Finally I got an IV and they gave me morphine. The first dose did NOTHING so they gave me a second dose. That did nothing, too. Apparently morphine either works for you or it doesn't. I guess I'm one of those people that it doesn't work for.

I have sucky veins so I look like a junky right now because they had to stab me so many times. At least it got my mind off the pain in my tummy!

Brent called off work and took care of me the whole day. His brother was coming in to town that afternoon to see us and so Brent took on the duty of cleaning the house! We were also there so long that when we got home Chip was a Chocolate Chip and had pooped in his cage and gotten it all over the floor, cage and even the wall. So Brent got to bath a puppy and clean a cage. What a good husband!!

I had to pee in a cup and they had to take my blood to make sure there wasn't an infection. So then they told me I wasn't pregnant and I told them I KNEW it was too soon to tell. Well the Dr. dismissed me and said "Our tests are very accurate". Anyway they did a CT scan on me and said that I had multiple cyst-like structures and fluid in my fallopian tubes. So they told me to make an appointment with my OBGYN to have an ultrasound and see what was wrong. So I went in to my doctor today and the FIRST thing he said to me was that it is WAY too soon to tell if I am pregnant and it will take at least another week to show up for a positive pregnancy test. It's pretty sad that a girl that has no medical training knew more about pregnancy than the ER doctor that was working on me (he actually said, "What's Clomid?" when I told him I was on that).

Anyway they did an ultrasound on me and I have a massive cyst on my right ovary from the mega dose of Clomid I was on this month. My doctor said that he thinks I had another cyst but it burst already. So this basically means I have to take next month off Clomid or whatever other drugs he would try on me so the cyst can go away.

So now we just have to wait for the cyst to shrink or pop. So in the meantime the doc said it's going to be painful until it goes away. At least I got some Percocet to help with the pain! :)

Baseball overload!

On Saturday Brent's work had their annual softball game/BBQ in Sammamish. It was fun to be back at my old stompin' grounds!

Chip wasn't really impressed. He was more concerned with trying to get people to come over and pet him.Macie, on the other hand, was fascinated by the game. She actually watched more than I did!

My mom got Brent Yankee tickets for his birthday so later that night we dropped the puppies off at my mom's (thanks again Mom!) and went to the game!

A-Rod!

Yes, Brent wore his Yankees hat and Mariners jersey.

I really go to the game for the food. Mostly the garlic fries. We couldn't even finish them they were so garlic-y! Check out that pile on the right! And this is AFTER we ate a ton!

The good thing about garlic fries is when you both eat them you don't notice the other person stinking as much :)

Ode to Peanut Butter

If there is one thing I could eat everyday for the rest of my life, it would be peanut butter. See, I have always liked the stuff. But something happened my freshman year of college that would change my pallate forever (or at least a few years).

Back in February 2003 my ward had an ice skating activity at Seven Peaks in Provo. Since I used to take ice skating lessons I figured I would do great. Well, my first time around the ice we were doing a whip and I was on the end. I got whipped and that was the last thing I remember. I came around about 45 minutes later in the nurses station. I guess I had been up walking around and talking to people, but I don't remember a thing I said or did. I guess I also kept talking about how hot the guy helping me was. Whoops.

Anyway, I went to the hospital and found out that I had a concussion (no surprise). About a week later everything I ate tasted weird. Pretty much everything I ate tasted the same and it was a VERY gross taste. When food was cooking it also smelled like this weird taste and made me nauseous. Everything from rice to chicken Parmesan to cookies and french fries tasted the same. And very very gross. The only things I could really eat and taste were things that had a very distinct taste like pickles, oranges, and cherry fruit snacks.

I thought I was going crazy so I went to a neurologist to make sure everything was ok. He told me that this can happen when you get a concussion. You can damage your olfactory nerve which is where you get your smell/taste. He told me that I had a 60% chance of not getting better (thanks for the odds doc).

The worst part about this was that I could no longer eat anything I used to like! The hardest thing for me to not be able to eat was chocolate and peanut butter. I went 2 years without eating chocolate. I tried it every now and then but it still tasted gross to me. Gradually my normal sense of taste came back and I was able to eat rice, french fries, pasta, bread, jelly, cookies (all the stuff that made me gag before), but I still couldn't eat chocolate or peanut butter.

Finally after 2 years I tried chocolate one night and it tasted good again! I have never been so excited to eat chocolate in my life! About a year after Brent and I were married I decided I would try peanut butter. I occasionally sniffed the jar to see if it smelled like it used to, but it never did. Still gross. But one day I decided to try it and BAM! my peanut butter taster was back!!

Now it's another couple years later and I will never take peanut butter for granted again. I eat it every day (whether it be on a waffle or in M&M's and Reeses cups) and I will continue to do so for the rest of my life. I LOVE YOU PEANUT BUTTER!!!!!!!!!!