Ambidextrous?

Grace has yet to select a hand preference for writing or drawing. She swaps hands willy nilly while writing or coloring. It's comical to watch. It's like watching your chef prepare your dinner at your table at Benihana. All seamlessly. Flip. Switch. Color. Switch. Color. Switch. Color. Flip. Color. Switch. Color. I'm begining to wonder if she's going to stay that way. I'm not going to make her choose.

Adventures in house hunting

Kevin and I have started to look at model homes. We're in the very earliest stages of planning. The twinkle in the eye, so to speak. Ideally, we'll move right before Grace goes into kindergarden so as to cause the least amount of disruption to her life as possible. But, sometimes my plan and God's plan are not always one and the same, so we'll just see how it all goes. The idea right now is to learn the new home ropes and see who is who and what is what.

The main thing is to get us into a ranch style home. I can't live in a house with stairs any more. I'm walking fine today, but there was a while there I was not and I don't need to be unsafe in my own home. As a mom, I can't risk not being able to access all the exits or laundry or whatever. So, that's the motivation. Wish us luck.

Went to the movies

Went to Hollywood Blvd to see Wild Hogs on Saturday. My sister had Grace and my neices for a sleepover, so Kevin and I went to this local theater for a date. This theater is different because it's adult only - they have tables in front of each seat and have waiter service to serve food and drinks (alcoholic ones too) during the movie. It's pretty cool. The food was not very impressive. The movie only had one star from the Chicago Tribune, but we laughed really hard at it. I liked it a lot. It seemed like a lot of people were laughing a lot too - so evidently the Tribune critic is a little stuffy.

Winter is almost over

Yesterday we had record warm weather. I think the high for the day was about 73°. Maybe it was 74°. I'm not sure how high -- I just know that it was pretty warm . Grace and I went out on a bike ride with the neighbor kids. I was pretty impressed with how far grace could go. I think we rode our bikes for about a mile. Not bad for a 3 1/2 year old kid.

Grace does pretty well on a bike too. We bought her the bike at the end of last summer. She didn't have much time to practice on it before the weather got cold. She never did figure out how to use the brakes last year. She seems to have the hang of it now.

Wow! I can talk to my computer

I just got my new Dragon NaturallySpeaking software. It's really cool. It lets me type by talking to a microphone. It's still pretty new so it makes a lot of mistakes. It's supposed to get smarter over time and make less mistakes. I'm typing this post, using the software. Once I get good at it I should be able to do a lot of things completely hands-free.

Pretty cool huh?

Diary

Grace has a new diary. She couldn't find it the other day. She yelled to me from another room, "Mom? I can't find my diarrhea book!"

Grace's first dentist appointment

Grace had her first appointment February 21 and she did great. Her teeth are close together, so they did x-rays and everything. She loved it. I'm glad it went so well. I did the pediatric dentist route, and they recommend that you wait in the waiting room, so I did. It was surprising at first mention, but it makes sense when you think about it.

I'm guessing since her baby teeth are already close together, and both her dad and I had crowded teeth ... we'll have an orthodontist bill in our future.

Valentines day, ruby slippers and the Easter bunny

Let me tell you a little story. Grace is obsessed with The Wizard of Oz since she first saw it. She asked Santa for it months after she saw it, and got it. She asks to watch it every chance she can, tortures all her friends with Wizard of Oz fantasy play, and so on.

She was telling me that she was hoping the Easter Bunny would bring her ruby slippers for Easter. Some days I would spy her meditating while looking at the DVD cover, repeating, "I wish I had ruby slippers. I wish I had ruby slippers." Exaggeration? I'm not that clever.

On Valentines day, as we were almost ready to leave for daycare, she asked me, "How come the Easter bunny didn't come?" Evidently, she had her holidays a bit confused. I briefly explained and dropped her off at daycare.

Fortunately for me, I still had not picked up a Valentine for her. So, since I now realized she had hoped for her ruby slippers to arrive on Valentines day, I get to be her hero and buy her them. And we all lived happily ever after.

My rookie mother story

Right around mid January Grace had croup, but I didn't get a chance to post my funny rookie mother story about how we found out she had it. I woke in the middle of the night to this horrible sound coming from her room. So, I went running in her room to find her sitting up in her bed, eyes watering, and making what I think sound like gasping for air noises. I ask her if she can breathe (Rookie move #1) and she shakes her head no.

The panic begins. I run to her, turn her around, and start applying my feeble and untrained version of the Heimlich (sp?) (Rookie move#2) and begin screaming "SHE'S CHOKING!" at the top of my lungs. (Rookie move#3). I look at her to see if my fancy anti-choking technique is working and she is still making that awful noise. Now I'm turning her upside down and screaming "KEVIN!" (Rookie move #4). I'm in pure panic and terror mode and screaming and terrorizing my poor child and now my husband has joined me and he's in that panic too. Fortunately for us all he's able to remove her from my grips and figure out that she's coughing and not choking. The poor child was abused for coughing.

I took her to the doctor the next day and told the doctor my story. I laughed so hard telling my sister the next day that I cried. We joked that I have to tell the doctor, "Ignore the marks on her ribs and her ankles - those were not child abuse... they were my attempts to revive her."

I'm cool as a cucumber under pressure.

Had a great physical therapy

Had a great physical therapy session at RIC last week. They figure out good ways to make a bunch of us laugh thru 3 hrs of frustrating work.

Where have all the gas

Where have all the gas stations gone? Our gas stations are closing all around us. Gas prices are so high. What gives?

Grace in the tub

My angelface taking a bath. This is my first post made entirely from my cell phone - picture and all! Pretty cool, huh?

Merry Christmas!

It's been a while since I've been able to update. The days following Thanksgiving I had a another MS flare that caused a rapid decline in my health. Kevin liked to describe it as my left side was drunk. I had a lot of left side weakness, walked with a cane, and was too frustrated to do more typing than I had to.

To make a long story short, I'm doing some intense drug, physical and occuptional therapies, and they have really helped. I've recovered a lot of my abilities and am not so reliant on other people. I think the doctors will release me to drive again, and that will take a big burden off the family. I'm hopeful for a full recovery.

I think that I had the best Christmas yet. Grace is at a great age now. I'll post pictures and stories as I get the time. Right now I have to focus on my therapy and Grace. I know many of you have been wondering how I am doing, and I wanted to get word out that I'm improving every day. Keep those prayers coming! They are working!

Sasquatch Sighting

The elusive photo of Kevin. Yes. It's proven that he does indeed exist, despite beliefs that he is merely a legend and rarely seen or photographed.

Thanksgiving 2006

When I was a kid, we just took naps after Thanksgiving dinner?!?

What's with the googly eyes on Grace? That's me . I'm glad I finally have a recent picture of myself that looks decent.

Here's all the kids. L to R Rachel, Angela, Anthony, Kelly and Grace. Poor Anthony. He manages to hang with the girls pretty well.

This is a picture of my sister Val and my cousin's husband Claudio.

Here's my brother Brian and sister Val. Brian and his wife Theresa hosted Thanksgiving this year for the first time. It turned out very nice. They have a nice house.

As a side note, Brian shaved his mustache off on Halloween for the first time in over 10 years - so for those who know him, this is a no doubt a shocking picture!

Bengston's Farm

The first picture is Grace's very first pony ride. That's her cousin Rachel with her. The next picture is Grace and Rachel in the pumpkin patch. Look how Grace adores Rachel! It was really cold that day - look how red the girls' faces were. We couldn't stay and do everything we wanted because we weren't dressed warm enough. Note to self: Next year, wear hats and gloves, even if it seems like a nice day out when you leave home.

October Snow???

Here's a strange sight - Check out my petunias in full bloom covered in snow. This picture was taken in my front yard October 12th, 2006. I put the planter of petunias in the spot where we had a tree and stump removed until we could get something else to grow there.

How to cook a turkey by Grace

Here's Grace's version of how to cook a turkey. Given 11/15/06 to Tammy, her daycare provider. Here were the intsructions: "Write the directions for cooking a turkey. Make a list of ingredients you would need and how much. Include oven temperature and time. "

List of ingredients:
Water maybe
Sugar maybe

Directions:
She puts the nose in and theleg. She puts the turkey in a pan, maybe. She puts milk on it.

Neurologist visit

I saw the neurologist last week Thursday. He showed me my MRI results and there were two new MS lesions on my brain that were pretty big. They were in my occipital lobe, which is the lobe that is involved with your vision. So, the MRI findings correlate perfectly with my symptoms. My doctor wants me to start taking the MS medications again, and I'm going to try to do that. I've had a hard time sticking with them in the past, but I feel like I need to try again. We'll see how it goes.

On a more positive note, I'm back to work this week after being off for two weeks to take steroids for my MS attack. The steroids seem to have helped improved my vision. I don't know if I've had total recovery, but I am not noticing blind spots like I was before! That's a very good thing. Thanks everyone for your prayers and support.

Maybe this is a better picture of her in the dry creek bed. I can't decide which one I like better. You'll have to help me decide. Which one do you like best? This one or the next one? Use the comments to help me pick! Thanks!