Thanksmas

Thanksgiving with Nick's family today, also did Christmas since Dave is having knee surgery beginning of December and won't be able to travel then. Lots of good food for lunch ... turkey, ham, sweet potatoes with a pecan crumb topping, green bean casserole, homemade rolls, a fancy lettuce salad, a cran-raspberry jell-o salad, a strawberry jell-o salad, wine, mashed potatoes. For dessert, Christine (the cousin) made 2 pumpkin pies, a strawberry rhubarb pie, and a chocolate pudding pie -- for 12 people. Lots of good presents too ... we got the new george foreman grill we wanted, only the newer one, that has an extra plate more ... so excited ... can't wait for Saturday to use it. We also got Da Vinci Code, Walk the Line, blockbuster gift card, movie theater gift cards, a head/scarf thing Sandy made, an unbreakable stained glass window hanging thing (made of fabric) ... can't even think what else there was. All in all, a good day.

Lots going on

Since my last post, it's been busy. My Grandma (last remaining of either Nick's or mine) ended up in the hospital again. She's recently had the problem of getting dehydrated and then getting confused and having to get rehydrated at the hospital. This happened again on Monday. This time she passed out in her apartment while getting dressed for the day, and didn't know how long she'd been out, but called my Aunt who lives not too far away. Brought her to the hospital, rehydrated her, released her to go home with my Aunt as long as she stayed with Grandma overnight since all they'd be doing was observing she was good to go with someone.

So now she has a home health worker come in three days (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday I think it is) to help her go to this Day Care program they have. So Tuesday, the health worker is there, calls my Aunt up and tells her that Grandma all of a sudden collapsed. They brought her to the hospital, run all their tests on her, and say she had a TIA stroke (mini stroke -- my other Grandma had lots of those before she passed away). So they're keeping her in the hospital for awhile this time.

So Wednesday night Grandma gets up out of bed on her own (which was a big no-no) ... bed alarm goes off ... nurses too slow in getting to her ... and she fell in the bathroom. Cracked a hip and a wrist. Went into surgery Thursday and got a pin and a plate put in her hip, and her wrist set. And that's the last I've heard of Grandma ... I'm guessing she's finally gotten slowed down some. This is going to drive her crazy, she's almost 95 and really likes her independence -- always has -- having to have this much help will really drive her crazy (have I mentioned this?!?)

Other, non-Grandma news. Tomorrow is the big Thanksgiving on my side. Can't wait for that. I'm making a cake (hopefully) to bring -- my excuse being it's Diann's birthday (never mind it's not her favorite kind of cake) and we're going to make special potatoes. Today I have a bridal shower for a girl at work, and then a Pampered Chef party. Thursday is Thanksgiving/Christmas with Nick's family -- still no good ideas for most of the men, if you have any let me know! Friday I'm supposed to work 8 hours in preschool, which will suck, but I asked the girl that comes in to relieve me if she wants more hours, and to come in as early as she wants.

I'm sure there's more, but that's all I can think of right now.

Here's to next ... well, month, being more calm (if not next month, I'll take next year ... actually, yea ... here's to next year being A LOT more calm -- no more strokes, passing out, sprains, surgeries, etc etc etc.

Busy Day

Yesterday was errand day ... and it sucked eggs. Had to go to Younkers to get a shower gift for a co-worker, plus I had a coupon to use for $10 any one item. Perfect! Yeah, never going to Younkers again, especially on Community Day. Pretty much everything in the store it seemed was either too cheap ($9.99, and the item has to be $10 or more) or excluded for some other reason (Door Buster sale or some other sale). I chewed a couple clerks out because I wasted my money getting the coupons pretty much. Took us probably 2 hours to finally find something I could use them on, and it wasn't even stuff I really needed (or overly wanted), but figured I could use. Then had to go to Target, plus side there we got a rice cooker that so far I really like, other than washing the rice before using it. Then to Wal-mart, where we spend wayyyy too long, but on the plus side we got most of the groceries we needed. I was sad when we got home, cuz I remembered cream cheese but forgot the bagels to go with it. Think I'm going to take it easy today and play WoW all day, other than a visit to the 'rents ... chat with mom, see who has to help her with her homework this week.

Oh, yeah, haven't mentioned. She's done with her therapies at Madonna completely. She goes to speech therapy at Barkley.

Ultrasound Results

are somewhat in. The student was going to have her instructor take a look, but it sounded like I should have basis now to call my doctor up and insist on them doing on, cuz a school of nursing student found something not right. Only had one cyst, not large, on the left side. And lots of follicles on the right, once she finally found it (it was shy during the abdominal scan). Best part, we did it after hours, and I really had to go to the bathroom midway through the vaginal scan, so I was wandering around Radiology with just a blanket around my lower half. Now Nick wants to go along if I do have another one done so he can see what it looks like after hearing about it. Hopefully I hear from the student or her instructor Monday so I can call the doctor about everything I need to call them about.

Only other thing to mention is that there's only 11 shopping days until Christmas, if you're in my (well, Nick's) family. And we have no clue what we're getting anybody. UGH!

I'm getting ultrasounded ... I'm getting ultrasounded ...

and sadly I'm excited about it. Wednesday night, after I get off work, a school of nursing student is going to ultrasound my ovaries for a project she's doing, and for me to find out what, if anything, is normal/abnormal down there. Should be interesting ... can't wait to down all that water!

Jackson Pollock

My mother-in-law sent this to me last night, and I had a lot of fun playing with it. Gotta share with the world.