So, Emmett turned 2 yesterday and I realized that I haven't blogged since we got him. I'm going to add some new {old} posts soon to fill in the last couple of years. It's finally beginning to look like spring again after the most miserable winter weather we've had in a decade. After months and months of snow on the ground, we can finally see the tired brown grass. All of the snow melted in a couple of days and sent the state into a tailspin of massive flooding. Thankfully, Lincoln hasn't had to deal with much of it but for many other cities, it's been devastating. It's been raining all day today so, this won't help anything. There's been flooding in Ashland where a lot of our water comes from so we've been told to limit water usage until they fix the issues there.
In other news, Eric is going to be having surgery on his right hip on April 9th. He's been in pain for a year or more and doesn't remember doing anything, in particular, to have caused it. He tried medications and physical therapy, but therapy made it worse. Turns out, he has a torn labrum in his hip. This is an injury similar to what happened to his shoulders and why he had them fixed years ago. They will do the surgery laparoscopically and recovery will take a couple of months. Thankfully, his employer offers up to 3 months of full disability pay.
As for myself, I don't have anything exciting to report. I am always relieved around this time of year to be done with our taxes. {yawn} Corporate taxes are due March 15th instead of April, so it's stressful to try to get all of that done so quickly in the new year. Design by Bridge is still kicking. New business keeps coming my way and old business sticks around so I must be doing something right.
Ivy is done with swimming for the season and is excited to start volleyball this week. She's 12 and still enjoys hanging out with me so I'm holding onto that for as long as I can.
Ada is going to start playing volleyball this spring as well and is ready for that to begin. It kinda feels like we've been cooped up all winter. She's really into Minecraft and Roblox on the Xbox so it'll be nice to get out of the house and get active again.
Eve is loving Kindergarten and making lots of friends. She loves her teacher, Mrs. Rynearson and seems to be doing very well. She is getting so good at reading, it's so fun to watch. Spring soccer starts on the 31st so I'm hoping for warmer weather before then.
This year for Mother's Day I got a puppy! His name is Emmett and he's the cutest thing you'll ever see. We'd been on a waiting list for a dog from PrairieWyn in Pacific Junction, IA since last March. As annoyed as I was waiting that long, I think it was a good thing. The weather has been much better now than it would've been in November and with Eve being a little older has made it nicer, too.
He was born on my older brother's birthday, March 18th and we picked him up on Friday, May 12th. I had to miss my niece's graduation party because this was the only day we could pick him up and I didn't want to spend 4 hours in the car with this 8-week old puppy (sorry, Katie). So, Eric took all the girls to Kearney and I stayed home alone with Emmett. The first 3 nights were kinda rough, but honestly, that was it! He sleeps in his kennel so well and only starts whining around 6:30 or 7 am. He'll go to the door and paw at it when he needs to relieve himself and he already knows how to sit, shake, lay down and roll over. Don't get me wrong, he's super naughty when he wants to be. He loves to bite anything and everything and we're all hoping he gets over that quickly. I take that back, he doesn't bite Eric....he looooooves Eric.
He was around 14 lbs when he brought him home and is probably close to 30 now. He seems to grow every day and is starting to lose his puppy fur and teeth. I am sad that this phase goes so fast, but it will be nice when he can just be around us hanging out instead of biting everything and getting into trouble. We sure do love him already.
I don't really have anything to talk about right now, but I'm sick of seeing the thumb post on the top. This year seems like it's been a busy one so far. Lots of website work and school stuff have kept me occupied. Ada just had her First Confession and is gearing up for First Communion at the end of April. The girls have a long school break after Easter so we've planned a trip to Colorado to unwind. After that, we're hoping to have a new Golden Retriever puppy in early May. It will be a huge adjustment, but I think the timing will be awesome as far as weather and having the kids home to wear him out. That's about all for now!
I woke up on the morning of Friday the 13th of May with a slightly aching right thumb. It felt like I'd knocked it on something the day before and maybe bruised it a little. I had been cleaning and organizing boxes in the basement and assumed that's where it happened. Well, as the day progressed, the pain got worse and it became red and swollen. When Eric came home from work around 5:30, I told him I thought I might need to go to urgent care because it was a more throbbing pain than earlier. I went in and the doc thought it was some sort of infection, although there were no visible sores so it wasn't obvious. She put me on an oral antibiotic (Keflex) and said to watch for systemic symptoms like fever, nausea, etc. I went to bed that night and was absolutely miserable. I was in so much pain and just felt like crap in general. I got up around 1 am to take some ibuprofen and tried to get to sleep. That didn't seem to help so at 3:30 I just got up and thought it might help to ice my thumb a little. I checked my temp and it was 102.7 (a couple hours after 600mg of ibuprofen). My sister asked earlier in the night if I had any red streaking near the thumb because I mentioned my right arm pit being sore. Well, lo and behold, there were now red streaks from my thumb to my arm pit and I commenced freaking out. I called my doctor's office and the on call doctor said I should head to the emergency room because the infection was spreading faster than the antibiotic could handle. I woke Eric up and called my dad to come over and watch the kids. Eric took me to the ER and they started me on IV antibiotics. I assumed we'd be there a few hours to get the infection sorted out and I'd be on my way. One of the ER docs came in and glanced at my arm and winced, "Eeeesh, I hope we get that under control". Um, thanks for the vote of confidence! The nurse said they would be sending the hand surgeon in as well. I couldn't believe how overkill it seemed, but after looking at what could've happened, I realize why they were so worried.
My mom and I took Eve to see Daniel Tiger Live at the Orpheum Theatre in Omaha tonight. For some reason, Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood is her absolute favorite show to watch. It's a modern, cartoon spin-off of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood. We had a great time and Eve loved the show. We knew all the songs and she had a huge smile on her face the whole time. The only problem was that we were seated behind the naughtiest, most ADHD boys in the whole place. They were never seated which made it difficult to see the stage. There were two mothers on either side of the boys and neither did a bit of disciplining the entire time. One was on her phone texting or emailing the whole time and the other just kept looking at the boys lovingly. I just kept telling myself, "it could be worse, they could have those flashing wand things". Well, after intermission, what does the loving mother bring back with her? The flashing wand things. But only two, for the three boys to share. What could possibly go wrong?
Just thought I'd do a quick post about this Christmas. The kids raked it in, as usual. Santa didn't disappoint either. He must've gotten sick of hearing Ivy ask for the same electric sit down scooter for the past 3 years because he finally brought one! Ada got a jungle gym dome thing since she's always doing gymnastics in the house. Eve got a cute ride on car and all the kids thought that was pretty cool. The only thing that was hard is that these are all outdoor gifts and it's been snowing and freezing cold the last couple weeks. Maybe we'll get a nice day sometime soon.
So apparently Nebraska has a wet season, and this year it happens to have coincided with the digging of our basement hole. After they poured the foundation it rained every day for weeks. So here we are, basically, a month later and all they've managed to do is tar the basement walls and backfill around the house, just this week. I guess I can't really blame anyone since it was mostly out of their control. However, if the hole would've been dug a month earlier like they said it would be, they would've had ample time to get these things done before the rain set in.
Next step is getting a plumber over there to do the rough-ins before they pour the basement floor. Currently, there is about a foot of water and mud in the basement, so we really need some consistently dry weather!!