My New Hair

Ok...no laughing. I took all these pictures myself. This morning. BUT my hair is done and my makeup is nice and even though our smiles are all lacking that genuine "cheese" smile, I think we are still pretty cute! :)
I can't believe how green my eyes look in this one!
I've never been blonde before. And even though it's not bleach blonde it's WAY lighter than I've EVER had it! It's kinda fun. Haven't had it long enough to know how long it's going to last. But I think I might try to stay blonde for a while and maybe even go a little lighter. If funds prevent the upkeep (ie: major dark roots all the time) then I will be going back to dark very quickly. But for now...here I am! :)

more Christmas pics

the doll house. :)

I love Chase's cheesy grin!
Another cute excited face on Chase...

Just me. My hair looked nice. :)

I actually posted this to see the difference between my hair before and after. I dyed it "blonde" which ended up kinda redish this last weekend. I'll post a good pic when I have one. I'm going to be putting more blonde in it so I'm waiting for that... :)

Christmas....late....

This is our spread... We bought a bigger tree this year. LOVE it. But with a bigger tree you need more ornaments to cover it, and it makes it look like less presents underneath too! LOL
Christmas Eve we always have the one present they get to open. New pj's!

My adorable kiddos posing in their pj's next to Santa's cookies and milk.

I just realized that I didn't even post a dang thing about Christmas.... I think in my mind I told myself to wait until I had pics to go with it. Well, I finally downloaded my pics last night! :) So I guess it's time to talk about Christmas! ...in almost February. How. Sad.

We had a wonderful Christmas! The girls tried to wake up at 2AM! We are cool with waking up early...but not that early! So we were able to keep them to not opening their presents until 4:15am and then decided to get up. Why fight it? We were excited and not really sleeping anyway! Santa was very generous this year and gave the girls a big Barbie house. Between mom and dad getting them Barbie's and Grandma B giving them clothes they were extremely spoiled! Chase got a HUGE firetruck, remote control car, a 4 track race track with cars, etc. ... they each got a movie, some clothes, cute stocking stuffers. The usual things. :) They had a wonderful time opening and playing all morning.

After we were done opening our gifts we were able to Skype with the Thalman side. :) It was fun to get to see everyone. And technically it was the first time I got to see my little nephew Gideon (besides in pics). After that we got dressed and went over to the Barrett's for breakfast. We did omelets in a bag. You put your scrambled eggs in a bag with cheese and whatever else you want then put the bag (make sure they're heavy duty freezer bags) in boiling water and it cooks your eggs. Soooo yummy and the only way to do it when you have lots of people to feed. We were quite spoiled with more presents. On the way home we stopped by Great Grandma Thalman's house. But we were so tired at that point we didn't stay long. But it was really nice to say hi and wish them a Merry Christmas too! :)

Chad and I kept our Christmas small this year. I really don't feel like I missed out. My sister gave me a waffle maker. Best thing ever! We've had waffles a LOT since then. :) LOVE IT! Both Chad and I got our favorite perfume/cologne smells. Chad got a nice pair of pants and a couple of shirts. I got a cool book about entrepreneur. It's been quite insightful so far and helped us gain direction for our business. Nothing really too exciting. But we had a wonderful time being together and enjoying some much needed time off to just be together.

Bombshell...

I wrote most of this post earlier this week. Any "updated" info will follow UPDATE. That way all info is out there at once and I don't have to post about the same thing all the time. :)

Nope folks. We're not out of the woods yet.


Good news first for once! I am feeling a little better. My pain gets pretty bad at night. I was given a steroid shot on Monday and will get the second one on Wednesday. (Doc said no to pill form cause it's a high dosage - shot is the same thing they give when they want babies lungs to develop...) We will know by Friday if it's helping my pain or just gave the baby a little boost. Either way - no harm done. :)
UPDATE: So far the shots actually seem to be helping. Amazingly enough I've had a little more energy (I think because I'm not in as much pain) and that's been a huge help since I have had to step it up a bit to take care of our little family.

Other good news. The kids are healthy and happy. Maybe a little bit of extra boogers but for the most part they are very healthy. I'll take it! Chase is completely potty trained except at night. Even pooping - I don't catch him the corner anymore, he goes straight to the potty. YAY! Daija starts public school tomorrow (Wed). She was quite upset on Friday about leaving her old teacher, Mrs. Smiley, but she's over it now. We went today and found her some jeans and she is so excited to get to wear whatever she wants to school now! Haven't heard if she was able to be put in the class I wanted her to be in but I don't see any reasons that they wouldn't. *Keeping my fingers crossed!*
UPDATE: Daija LOVES her new school and being able to be around all of her friends. It has been a good thing so far and I'm hoping it just gets better. I've had WAY less stress being able to just send her out the door to catch the bus. *ahhh* She was put in a different class than I requested, but she still has 3 friends she knows in that class so all is well!

Du Du Dun....now for the bad news.

Apparently my struggles aren't enough for this family. God has seen it fit to throw us one more curve ball. (Please don't see this as murmuring...I'm just calling it like I see it...) Monday morning I had my OB appt. Just a simple appt to talk about how I've been feeling, check my belly size, talk about possible induction date....really just a touch base appt with nothing exciting. We arrived and were sitting in the waiting room. Suddenly Chad didn't look so hot and he said, "Pam, I'm not feeling that great...." I said, "I can see that...are you ok?" No response. I noticed his eyes were wandering aimlessly and he wasn't responding to me at all. I tried to call his name - nothing. Suddenly his eyes rolled back and his head fell backward and hit the wall. At this point I asked the only other lady in the waiting room to go get a nurse for me. I grabbed Chad's head to hold it steady and kept trying to talk to him to get him to come out of it. As I was calling to him I noticed he seemed to not be breathing, then he started turning red. I made sure I was holding his head as straight as possible to not have his airways blocked, and whether I did anything to help or not, thankfully he started breathing on his own. He was still unresponsive. (The whole thing probably lasted a minute, no breathing about 10 seconds - felt like FOREVER.) In the meantime, a nurse had brought me water and Chad's eyes focused. He started sweating and was responding to me talking to him, so I set the water down and went to get him some wet and dry paper towels. When I came back he was awake again but not feeling so good. We got him to lay down in a room where he stayed and slept until I was done talking to my doctor. He still wasn't up to walking so we wheeled him downstairs to see a neurologist right away. So he goes in on Wed (tomorrow morning) for an EEG. It tests his brain waves to see if he is likely to have another seizure. He has to be sleep deprived so after he woke up at 8:30 this morning, he gets a 4 hour nap from 5pm-9pm tonight, then can't sleep again until his test at 9:15am. It's going to be a long night. Then on Thursday he goes in for some blood work and to get an MRI done on his head to see if there's abnormalities like tumors and such.

He went through all this about 8-9 years ago. I've known a little bit about him having weird feelings, but never as far as him passing out completely before. From what we've researched online is he probably had a partial complex seizure yesterday - without convulsing. Hopefully we will be able to figure it all out and fix it! He has his follow up with the head doc on Friday morning to talk about his results. We'll see!
UPDATE: We got the results back from all of Chad's tests today. GOOD NEWS = no brain tumors or anything crazy. So a clean MRI. EEG was "inconclusive". Which means they could see he had a seizure but couldn't tell if the test was showing an increased risk of having another one soon because it can take a couple of days for the brain to reset and settle down after having a seizure. He goes in next Thursday for another EEG (luckily not sleep deprived...) to retest what his brain waves look like. In the meantime, he's going back on anti-seizure medication. Not a bad thing, he did very well on it before. BAD NEWS = apparently in the state of Utah, after you've had a seizure you can't drive for at least 3 months without having another episode. We aren't sure how we're going to manage that. Commuting to West Valley every day is out of the question. So we are waiting to hear back from Chad's manager to see what we can work out. Whether it be carpooling sometimes and/or working from home. Basically that's all we know for now.

New Year's

I know I'm a little late. I have been so focused on staying alive (yes - I know it's exaggerated...) that I've forgotten all about making New Year's resolutions. Have to admit I never really have. Not in the Write-it-down and really think about it much kind of way. I always resolve to do better or be better. This year I'd like to make it a little more specific.

#1 - Start my own business. (Well, both Chad and I...) Gridlock Advertising. So far - so good, and we should be up and running before February.



#2 - Be a better Mom.

OK...I know I said more specific... We read from the Book of Mormon Stories every night before bed. Sometimes 2 stories because they can be short. Don't know how much the kids are really listening but I don't care as long as we make it a good habit.

I'm trying not to yell as much. And along with that, I'm trying to teach them more responsibility. Like - not cleaning up after them so much. Even my almost 3 year old son can pick up his own room, and so I make him. If Daija leaves her pens down, and Chase finds them, they get confiscated for a couple of days until she can have them back.



#3 - Don't eat out so much.

I know this might sound weird, but I've become a lazy cook. I can cook. I'm not a terrible cook. So I should be cooking healthy meals more frequently. Granted being put on bed rest hasn't helped this area. Chad's been very good to come home and cook for us. Or I'll at least get it started for him and then he'll finish and clean up once he's home. NOTE: He has been AMAZING supporting me in our trials lately. LOVE YOU CHAD!



#4 - Be honest.

Another weird one. And I won't confess everything for the world to see....but little white lies are still lies and I'm trying really hard to not to it at all.



#5 - Have better communication with my hubs and kids.

I've started to notice if I start talking to my kids and asking them detailed questions then I get detailed answers. I'm learning a lot about them. They are so different and think differently than one another. And I'm noticing also that after we have that open communication they are more willing to approach me without me having to play 20 questions. It's nice actually. :)



I think that's a pretty good list. Of course it's not everything I'm working on. The list is endless. I have a lot to perfect in my case. But it's nice to work on it, and feel like a little effort actually means something. So here's to a GREAT 2011!

Domain Name

Our business officially has a domain name!!! :) I am just itching to get this up and running. We have put sooo much work into getting it started and it just feels like we keep finding more and more things we have to do or pay for to get it actually started that we are never going to get it going for real! BUT WE WILL!!! Hopefully soon we will have the website up. (Don't bother looking right now...there's nothing there.) As soon as we pay for the business license we can move forward getting everything else finalized and printed and then we are in business! Wow it sounds simple putting it that way.... hopefully it's faster than I think it will be and I can post in a week or two that we are open for business! :) It has been an extreme learning lesson. We've read books on how to do things and are trying to follow all the good advice. Now it's up the Big Guy Upstairs to see us through. And I truly have faith that He will. YAY I'm so excited!

www.gridlockadz.com

Bed rest

Being on bed rest is soooo boring! I am so lonely. My ward (as explained in the last post) has more than been awesome with helping me. Every morning this week a different lady came and picked up Kyla and Chase and took them to their house for a couple hours. They have LOVED it! I do enjoy the quiet time. It's been nice to nap without the guilt of knowing my kids are just stuck in front of the TV doing nothing and being unsupervised. But by the end of the week the quiet was getting quite lonely. I know it's whiny. Even though I don't play constantly with them, I find comfort in listening to them run around and play with each other. Then twice a week we are brought dinner so Chad doesn't have to stress about that. It's more than we could ask for. We are very grateful!

Chad and I have worked out a system so the house is staying pretty clean actually. Almost better than when I'm not too tired to do anything. He unloads the dishes in the morning. As we use dishes during the day I put them in the dishwasher. Then after dinner is cleaned up all the way we run the load and we never have a pile of dishes in the sink. It's lovely really.

We have a little system that seems to work with laundry too. Chad carries a load or two up to the family room. I sit and fold it and put it back into the baskets. Chad carries the baskets up to the bedrooms and the kids help me put it away. It's not working as smoothly as the dishes but so far it's working good enough. It's just a matter of doing it more often to make it work just as well as the dishes. I think we should just keep it this way. Why not? If it works then keep doing it.

I will admit I've been going crazy wishing I could mop the floor, clean/organize the pantry, scrub bathrooms. Call it nesting. Call it boredom. It's probably a combination, frankly. I tried to go grocery shopping on Friday night. Thought it was a good idea. The list wasn't that long. Not such a good plan. It was too much. Sitting here, I think, how in the world was it too much?? I feel so lazy, and yet if I try to do more than make lunch and clean up afterward I start contracting and the pain in my ribs starts to kill me. On a good note: My breathing has significantly improved. I have moments of feeling like I can't breath. Pressure in my chest and just no satisfaction breathing deeply. But for the most part it's much better which gives me hope that tomorrow at my doc appt we can look into solving the problem. Instead of the answer just being "stay down for the next 8 weeks". I barely survived one week. I've LOVED having my family home all weekend. I don't think I can handle 8!

NOTE: Chase is Potty Trained!!! :) He doesn't have to be asked to go. He goes by himself! Poop and everything! Even nap time he wakes up dry! He is still in a diaper at night. That doesn't bother me at all. I am SO RELIEVED that he is doing sooo well before baby Collin is born! It's something I don't have to worry about and have a newborn and the financial relief is wonderful. Did double diapers for 8 months with Kyla after Chase was born. Don't want to again. So I'm feeling extremely blessed he caught on so quick. :) I love my little man!

Mini Update and Thankfulness

Ok...Mini Update:
I went in Monday and did my heart echo. My doctor had heard a murmur last week so they were checking on it to see if it was a valve not working. The doctor who did my echo couldn't find anything wrong with my heart. Including the mysterious murmur that disappeared. Not complaining! I'm very thankful that there is nothing wrong with my heart! So basically I have a very slight protein deficiency (I don't think that's contributing much) and then the inflammation of the diaphragm. So we're going to focus on solving that now. I talk to my doc tomorrow to find out what's next as far as fixing it. I have to admit it doesn't sound like a big deal to me. And yet, if I even attempt to do too much I really can't breath and it feels like a big deal. Just seems weird. The body is so complicated. I've learned a lot about anatomy lately...

I would be completely rude if I didn't say THANK YOU to my wonderful ward family. They have REALLY stepped up to help me. My mom was about to catch a flight to come stay with me for two months! And quite frankly she can't. I have such wonderful friends! Every morning this week I have someone picking up my kids for at least 2 1/2 hours. Daija's at school already and Kyla and Chase get to go play with other kids. Today they came home, ate lunch, and actually asked for nap time! We have had a very, very good day today and I'm excited that I think I can handle this. I feel bad that means I have to lean so much on friends and I am VERY thankful for their willingness to help me! I have two nights a week where Chad doesn't have to worry about cooking dinner either and that has been a big relief for him as well! :) My heart is so full and my cup runneth over. I really hope they understand how much I just couldn't do it without them and really, really appreciate everything!

Prego Drama

Sheesh this pregnancy keeps getting better....
Let's see. I'll try to spare some details or this post would last forever. Wednesday night I went to the ER. I tried to hard to talk myself out of it. The usual shortness of breath and rib pain. But then the pressure in my chest started in and I just couldn't risk a heart attack and it was only 2:30 am (I'm beginning to loath 2am). I'm pretty sure now I could have "survived" until morning...but it was pretty scary to feel like someone was sitting on me when I could barely breath as it was. So I wake up Chad. He wakes up his dad who comes over to sleep at our house so we didn't have to wake up the kids. (Thanks Lee!) We get to the hospital and check in by 3:30. They check my immediate vitals. Fine. They recheck a bunch of the tests they did on Tuesday since I was at the clinic and the hospital had no way of seeing those results, plus it was a whole 2 days later so they could have changed. Fine. Even the EKG was fine. So they run a special blood test.

Insert side ramble.... I HATE NEEDLES. I know I know... I've had three kids. IV's should be no problem by now. The nurse at my OB's office is the best flabotomist (i know it's spelt wrong, you know...the blood guys) I've ever had and she can draw blood without me feeling anything. Well since I was stuck in my one great vein in my left arm twice on Tuesday I was hoping to avoid another repeat in the same vein. The guy tried another vein in the same arm. After digging around for a while (and my whining the whole time - it REALLY hurt) he said "Sorry" and had to do it in the same vein. My poor elbow niche is all bruised up now!

Ok. Back to the blood test. If my levels are high then there's a risk for blood clots in my lungs. Blood test came back high. Blood clot in lung means 30% chance of DeAtH. (Isn't that what you want to hear at 3:30am???
Between them drawing the blood and getting the results the doc gave me a pain med to help with my rib cage pain. He said it was something that starts with a D and that it would give me a pressure in my chest (not that I needed more of that) and then spread to my head and then go away. Please don't misunderstand me. If I NEVER have to go through that again I will do ANYTHING!!! It was the scariest, longest 5 minutes of my life! I seriously had the thought in my head that I was going to die. So when they offer you a pain med that starts with D...DO NOT TAKE IT!
So after they got the blood test results back -high- I had to go in for a CT scan to make sure of no blood clots. If you've ever had a CT scan before you will know what I mean when I say I thought I was going to pee my pants! ...or hospital robe-you get the pic. Not very pleasant but more tolerable than the pain med experience. Luckily they didn't see any blood clots. So after all that they still didn't know what was wrong with me.
They sent me up to Labor and Delivery to monitor the baby cause I was contracting. I'm pretty sure it was from the stress and after I was up there a while the contractions stopped. After way too long I was able to go home. They said come back later that day and did a big ultrasound of my liver, kidneys, and gallbladder. Which of course looked fine.
After that I got to see my baby finally. He looks just like Chase! I've never been able to look at the ultrasound and say that I recognize the baby before. Seriously...just like Chase! I am so excited. I hope I can keep the little guy in long enough so he can be healthy and strong from the get-go. Doc says he will induce at 37 weeks if I can just make it that far. That's still 8 weeks away. I'm on strict bed rest. Hard to do when you have 3 kids running around. My sisters have been here for the weekend which has helped a TON. But they leave and Chad goes back to work tomorrow. I don't know what I'm going to do. Frankly. I still have to get Daija to school. And I contract every time I stand up. No lie. Which is weird, and just started last night and today. I know it's my body telling me to stay down. It's sooo boring! And a girl's got to pee! But it never fails and I will admit they have been pretty strong. Not just the braxton hick kind. So I'm staying down. Skipping church. Not folding the laundry that is staring me down right now. You know it's bad when I'm contemplating folding laundry!
So what do I know? I know that I can't do anything. I'm on half a Loritab to help with the rib pain. Which is probably being caused by Inflammation of the Diaphragm. Which they can't treat cause my heart is too weak. I should find out why the heart is murmuring on Monday at 3pm when I go in for a heart Echo. If it's a valve not working properly they can give me meds for that. I'm hoping to find out what I can do cause this not doing anything is getting old and it's only been one weekend... Anybody want to come keep me company and help take care of my kids for two months? *sigh*