Busy Saturdays

The first Saturday in March the extended Jones' family got together to celebrate Grandma and Grandpa's birthday. Grandma was turning 86, and Grandpa was turning 96.
Of course Amy made the super fabulous cake/cupcakes that tasted as amazing as they looked.

It was just Caleb and I for the party that day. Tom stayed behind with Talin and Collin so they could play in a chess tournament.

Everything on these beauties were edible, the pearls and the pictures. So cool.

It was great to drive up to Mesa for this and see my Grandparents and all my family, close and extended.
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The following Saturday we packed the entire family in the car and went to the Renaissance Festival.

Talin, Caleb, Savannah, London, Collin & Reagan.
We met Mandi and her girls there, prepared for a day of food, sun, heat, more sun and lots of fun.

Collin & Reagan.

Reagan, Collin & Caleb.

I have mixed feelings about this fair. I love/hate it. You have to go prepared to spend a lot of money, get really dirty, have some frightening Renaissance images ingrained in your brain and even more frightening outfits. All I can say is that at least my children are low to the ground while walking around. The dirt is much more desirable than the outfits and images.

But of course they loved it and had a great time. Talin in the swing with dirt all over his face from the Wild Men/Mud Show.

Even Mandi took a break with the kids in the swing chair.

Collin swinging around.

You can tell it's the end of the day because the kids all look hot and trashed.
The day went by super fast.

$30 on lemonade, I think I drank a whole stand myself.

Losing Collin for awhile. Worst part is that it took us a while to realize we had lost him, I felt real bad about that. I spent the rest of the day counting our small army of children.

1,2,3,4,5,6. All there.

Okay.

1,2,3,4,5,6.

Again.

1,2,3,4,5,6.

That's how the rest of the day went in my head.

Update

Yummy Valentine's Day chocolate covered strawberries.

I seriously make the best ever.

Monday morning Tom surprised me with breakfast in bed on this lovely homemade breakfast tray that he made for me while I was out of town last weekend.
I was super impressed. Apparently it only took him ten hours to put it together on Saturday.

Entering the 18th Week.

This has been an interesting pregnancy. Battling Hashimoto's has thrown a wrench into an already exhausting journey to create junior. First I was under treated, and in a panic they have over treated my condition. So when I started having heart palpitations and my resting heart rate was at a 100, I called the endocrinologist who got me in immediately. We have changed my medication and dosage and hopefully I can feel like a normally functioning human at some point. I'm starting to forget what that's like.
I also got the fun miscarriage talk about how high the possibility is and how hard my body has been working with being over dosed increases the chances. But I saw my o.b. yesterday and she calmed my fears and I'm feeling better. Just trying to take it easy and not over stress my already over stressed heart/body and wait for the new meds to take me down.

Caleb goes to School

Yesterday was Caleb's first day of preschool at the Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind.
I tagged along this first day.

It was a bittersweet moment. I've known for a long time that he would start preschool really young with all his developmental delays. I've also had to come to the painful conclusion that I don't have all the resources and ability to help him learn, and that an early start was critical for his development.

Yesterday was not so bad.
He enjoyed the preschool, loved his teachers and kept busy all morning.
It was this morning that was the most painful. For me that is.

We waited out front for the bus to come and he had no trepidation getting on the bus, buckling up, waving good-bye to me from the window and driving off.

I had to fight off tears.

I can not believe my baby is going to school four days a week on the school bus.

Definitely a bittersweet day.

Thankful

Today I feel thankful.
First of all I found out my test results for my thyroid biopsy on Friday, and those results were benign. Out of all the four options, this was obviously the one I was hoping for the most. I've been plagued with fears about surgery and cancer and I'm so glad and grateful we have the results now and I can rest easy.

My other main reason for being so happy is because I need to be as healthy as possible to grow this little person inside me during the next months.

(Imagine an ultrasound picture here, my wouldn't load.)

I'm dubbing this my crazy, unexpected miracle baby. At a time where it should have been impossible to get pregnant due to exceptionally low thyroid functions and Tom and I not trying. All we can say is that there must be a reason, and whether we're ready or not, (I'm feeling not ready) we're going to be welcoming #4 this summer.

We announced our baby news to the boys at Christmas time. Collin was very excited, hoping for a calmer baby than Caleb. Talin turned to me and in his most adult voice said,
"Don't you think it's a little soon to have another baby with Caleb and all?"
Yes I do.
Yes. I. do.

Christmas

Christmas Eve:

Early Christmas present that Tom bought for the family was opened.

Caleb is obsessed with trains and this one provided hours of frustrating entertainment.
Tom prepared Christmas Eve dinner. He seriously keeps our family functioning lately, which I'm grateful for. He also keeps us in hysterics. This is the result of him and Collin's punch creation. They lost the spoon and then forgot about it.
My boys were so excited for Christmas to come that they asked to be put to bed at seven. Is that normal? We of course agreed and never heard a peep from them all night. Christmas PJ's




Christmas morning:
Tom was up at four. By seven he was becoming increasingly impatient, rummaging through my drawers and picking out "Christmas pajamas" for me to put on. Thankfully the boys woke up shortly after that.

Waiting to see what Santa brought.

The quad was a big hit.

Talin with Harry Potter Legos and his coveted MP3 player.

Collin disappeared all day with his DS.

But when they weren't building or playing games they were riding.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas!

Pity Party

The week before Christmas was a little rough on me.

First of all I burned my face. And it was bad.
There I was cooking dinner, tortillas to be precise for fajitas.
I pulled the tortilla off the stove top and it looked so enticingly warm and cooked that I took a bite out of it.
I am so stupid. And I knew better.

My piping hot tortilla was holding a bubble of steam in the middle that I punctured and blew all over my bottom lip and chin.

I immediately knew this was bad. And it was.
My face was red, my lip was swollen to twice its normal size.

The worst of it though was on Sunday when I woke up and looked like I had a piece of leather across my chin, with my swollen lip split open and bleeding.

I still went to church, sacrament only, the stares killed me. I left immediately after the Christmas program.

It honestly looked like Tom had beaten me. It was so awful. But I'm happy to say that the leather peeled off and I have nice pink skin underneath it all. What a relief.

On another note I had to endure my biopsy on Wednesday. I knew it wasn't going to be pleasant, and it really wasn't. Three needles in the neck extracting cells from my thyroid nodules. Surprisingly enough the needle going in was not that bad, but once he started pulling out the cells with the syringe it was quite painful. And then two more pokes after that just about did me in. But it's done, thank goodness.

My doctor says that there are four possible outcomes:

1. the results come back benign and no cancer.

2. the results come back malignant and there is cancer and we have to remove the thyroid and do radiation.

3. the results come back inconclusive and we have to remove the thyroid to be safe.

4. they didn't obtain enough cells to test and we have to redo the biopsy.

I should find out next week what's going on.

And for Jo, here's the awful burn picture.

Yes, it was as painful as it looked.

Happy Birthday 2nd Born

Collin is cool.

Today he turned 7.

It's unbelievable.

His birthday menu consisted of hot wings and hot chocolate and no vegetables.

We accommodated.
He woke up this morning to a new bike, fit for a big seven year old.
His other presents were pretty cool too, a nano from Talin and a new hat from mom & dad.

He is definitely my middle child.

Constantly striving to be center of attention, and he usually is.

He's an awesome dancer, insanely bright, hilarious with a smart mouth to go along.

We are so thankful for this kid. He really is a lot of fun and I keep telling myself that he's only going to be more amusing as he gets older, right? I sure hope so.

Another Chaotic Adventure at the Chambers

Collin is a drama king.
So when he ran into the house screaming that Talin was bleeding I was in no rush. I casually made my way to the back porch, certain it was nothing.
But there was Talin, pale as death, calm as death and bleeding like a faucet from his left hand.
I don't panic.
But I've never experience this kind of blood loss. The faucet kind.
I panicked. Blood was pooling in his chair, it was all over his clothes and the cement.
I got it together and ripped his shirt off to apply pressure to the wound and yelled at Collin to get dad and to tell him it was an emergency.
Talin I think was in shock. His response to the situation was creepy, "Can you just get me a bandage mom, it doesn't even hurt."
Are you kidding me???!
Can I just say, thank goodness Tom is a doctor? It was divine intervention that led him to medical school.
He was calm, cool and collected.
He gathered his collection of medical supplies and got to work.
Collin was in a state of adrenaline excitement. He decided to document the whole gruesome procedure.
He would yell at Tom before snapping the picture, "now show me your medical face!".

Looks a little pale huh? I hope he didn't need a blood transfusion or anything. He was feeling a little nauseous at this point. So was I.

Once again. I love my husband.

Two stitches for that gaping nasty wound.

Comfort from mom.

And those two little dots on his hand are his stitches.

Thank goodness for my awesome Tom.

And here's the story behind the self inflicted flesh wound.

Talin was given a pocket knife for his eighth birthday last April.

Tom had spent time with him teaching knife safety, he even passed it off in his cubscout book.

Tom and I felt confident that he was ready to have his own knife, we both received our first knife at that age.

We didn't allow Talin to keep the knife, it was kept with Tom's things and was only aloud to come out when Talin was in the backyard, and Caleb was sleeping.

Sad boy was working on a present for me out of a piece of wood.
I guess that's when he forgot knife safety and plunged it into his palm.

And that's the story.

I feel guilty.

Practicing Thanksgiving

I wish I could photograph food.
I wish I had an amazing camera.
But alas I don't.
So while these pictures do my food no justice, take my word for it, it was divine.

Tom and I decided to practice smoking a turkey for Thanksgiving. Well I should say that Tom decided. He did all the prep, all the cleaning and all the turkey cooking monitoring.
And the most amazing thing (besides how awesome the turkey tasted) was how he cooked it in his homemade smoker.
Remember this?
This homemade smoker makes some amazing grub. So far we've experimented with ribs and chicken, all to great satisfaction. Smoked meat has become a regular staple in our family dinners. And the best part? Tom loves to do it.

But I take all the credit for these beauties.

The best apple pie. And my first attempt at making apple pie.
We had some friends over and we didn't even bother sharing with the kids, we just ate the whole thing ourselves.

I've found my calling for baking tarts and pies.
This lemon tart beauty was made a couple of weeks ago and was beyond divine and perfect.
Crust expertly crisp and yummy, not too tart lemon and not too sweet.

Someday when my life is calm (okay, probably never) I'll open a bakery. And Tom will open a smoke house.

Most Awesome Bed Head EVER

This is what happens when...
you take a hot bath before bed,
you wake up at 3:50 am to feed your baby,
where you find a termite tunnel coming out of the wall by your babies crib,
then you allow baby to sleep in your bed after the feed and find,
then you sleep sideways to accommodate not being kicked in the head,
and have multiple nightmares of termite tunnels.
Resulting in crazy lady hair first thing in the morning.
And if you're wondering why I had to feed Caleb at 3:50 am, it's because we spent the afternoon at the hospital for a cat scan and he had to be put under anesthesia where we starved him beforehand. Standard operating procedure around here. Good thing my baby doesn't mind a grumbly empty tummy.
He did awesome and we'll get results in about a week. Really just finding out how his little ears are formed on the inside of his head, which has always been a source of great curiosity for me since he was born.

Giving Up, Throwing in the towel, whatever...

Last week was a doozy.

In a week and a half I gained six pounds.

I started passing out around 8:00 pm every night.

(to Tom's annoyance)

I groggily awoke at 7:00 every morning.

My jeans barely buttoned.

My head started to hurt.

So I went to the endocrinologist.

He ultrasounded my neck, checking out the old thyroid.

Then he shared his fun findings.

Now he wants to do a biopsy to check for cancer.

And that's when I quit.

I quit being me, being a mother, being a wife.

I listened to him drone on about my low thyroid levels, causing all my fun side effects, I thought about all the things I needed to do that day as he continued talking about how it's only a 20% chance my thyroid nodules are cancerous.

And then I decided I was done.

I quit again.

I stopped caring about the crusty floor in the kitchen, I half heartily went about preparing Caleb's food. I didn't try to stay awake in the afternoon when Caleb napped. I stopped doing the dishes. I stopped making dinner. I stopped caring if my children's homework was done, or if they watched too much tv. I stopped weighing myself and caring about eating a zinger for breakfast.

It was a difficult week.

For my family.

No, I don't think I have cancer, and that's not why I quit. I just got so tired of being tired.

Then I dragged myself out of bed on Sunday and cried that I couldn't go to church. I couldn't face people, listen to testimonies and act like a normal functioning human.

Tom caught me off guard; he agreed.

So of course I went.

And something happened. Something unexpected.

All my insecurities and exhaustion started to wash away and I listened and I felt the old familiar burning and I knew that I couldn't quit.
So today I'm me.

It feels good to not be conquered.

My floor is mopped, the laundry is going, and I feel like I can do this again.