lucky…i mean blessed

ok, I know all of you in america are probably sick to death of this song, since I think its pretty high up there on the VH1 countdown, and it has always been my experience that a song doesn’t even make it onto the countdown until you’re almost sick of it. HOWEVER, I live in England, where I have never, ever heard this song on the radio. I’ve only heard it maybe 3 times ever, and so you’ll have to bear with me, when I say you should check out this song.

I love the song, I love the lyrics, and I’ve been waiting to put it on here until we got news of our appeal. Of course, I wasn’t going to put it up if we got bad news (I had another song prepared for that one), but we didn’t get bad news (about the appeal, anyway)….

Emmett’s appeal was successful!!!! Actually, I’m fairly sure that our submitted package didn’t have that much to do with anything (and I promise to get to that post soon), but at this point, I don’t care. We get to go to our next assignment – with all of our family members (because of course we were all approved to move before, just not Emmett)!

Which brings me back to the song. Of course, when I hear it, I think of Mike, and how he’s my best friend, and that so many parts of the lyrics are appropriate for us, because he’s gone so much. But there’s a line in the song about being lucky to be coming home again, and that’s how I feel about this next assignment – that we’ll be coming home again (even though I don’t really believe in luck).

Thank you so much for all of your prayers about this – I know they made a difference. And if you happen to be reading this, and are one of the many people who put in a good word for us, thank you, thank you, THANK YOU. We feel very blessed that Mike will be able to continue doing the job he was trained for, which also happens to be the job he loves. We also feel blessed that we’ll be able to do this in an area that we’re already familiar with, complete with people that know and love us, and that we know and love.

Of course, it wouldn’t be us if there wasn’t some bad news mixed in with the good, would it? I took Sawyer into the doctor today to get his ears checked, because that boy has been acting as if he can’t hear a word anyone says for the past week or so, as well as throwing some monumental fits. And he does have an ear infection, but he’s also lost 2 pounds since his last appointment (which was on his birthday in late April). This doesn’t really surprise me, since the boy also refuses to eat anything most of the time – but it is still worrisome. So now we’re supposed to try to get him to drink some pediasure every day, and recheck his weight in a month. Of course I am worried that something serious is going on, but am really trying to keep it in check. So if you’re looking for something new to pray for, please pray that Sawyer is ok. Oh yes, and also for my sanity – why does it always have to be SOMETHING?

Isn’t Emmett supposed to be learning positive eating habits from his big brothers, not the other way around?

still waiting

…on news of our appeal.

oh, have you heard this song back in america? i love it – especially the end.

a good day

Today Mike had his promotion ceremony at work. As of Dec 1st, he’ll be Major Mike. And I haven’t ever been to any other promotion ceremonies, but it was really nice – the commander said some good stuff about him, and O and Y got to take the Captain’s bars off of his suit to reveal the Major rank.

Of course, my favorite part of this promotion is the pay raise that will accompany it :). Anyway, congratulations, babe – you deserve it! (and I’m not saying this to his face because he’s off on a pub-crawl right now, and I was totally nice about him going, because I am a very supportive wife. I am. Even the commander said so.)

So after the ceremony, I took Emmett to the cardiologist. And they weighed him….and he now weighs 6.09 kgs, compared to the 5.84 kgs he weighed a week after the tube was pulled. So SUPER YAY FOR EMMETT!!

Now the cardiologist thinks we can not do the g-tube surgery, since he’s doing so well. Which I am so so so happy about. By the way, I have to give big props to the cardiologist (you know, the inverted commas guy), because he totally believed that Emmett could do this. Myself – I had no faith that he could even make it a week before becoming dangerously dehydrated. Just goes to show you – God can do amazing things, and I guess I don’t know everything :).

We’re still waiting for a date for the heart surgery – I’m really hoping to hear from them before the end of the week, so that Mike can make his work plans, and we can buy my mom a plane ticket. She’s only going to be able to come for her Christmas break, but we are so excited to see our Berd!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! This year has been one of the hardest ever – if you’ve kept up with us for the past year, you know why (and if you’re new to us, Mike has password protected some of the posts – email me if you’d like the password)…but really, we have SO MUCH to be thankful for.

And just because I’m in such a good mood, I’m gonna share a song with you – Ida Maria’s I Like You So Much Better When You’re Naked. The video is pretty poor quality, but the song is so much fun. In fact, so much fun that it is O and Y’s FAVORITE song to sing – which is either hilarious or humiliating, depending on where they’re doing the singing. Oh, a close second goes to Pinks Rockstar song, which they can really belt out. But the naked song is their favorite. After all, what could be funnier to a 2 year old and a 4 year old than saying ‘naked’ a whole lot? Consider this a thanksgiving gift from me to you.

a rough day

Emmett has had a pretty rough day today. He started vomiting again on Saturday night, and last night he was awake and uncomfortable for most of the night. So off we go to the pediatrician this morning. He has gained weight, and is still pooping, so the doctor was content to just have us keep an eye on the vomiting, watching for any bile, which could indicate an adhesion.

So I take Emmett to Mike’s office to feed him at lunchtime. And while he totally impressed everyone with his cuteness, they were not as impressed with the massive amounts of vomit that he emmitted during his feeding. Vomit that included yellowish liquid, which has never happened before. Mike and I start to worry that we’re on our way back to Addenbrooke’s, but the doctor assured us that as long as there was no neon-green liquid in the vomit, we’re okay.

Back we go to the base hospital to the dermatologist. Where we are informed that unless Emmett’s skin improves drastically over the next two weeks with aggressive topical steroids, he’ll need to do a biopsy to check for more rare conditions.

We head home after that, picking O up from school on the way. I made the mistake of informing him that the plan was for us to go back to the base to meet Mike and Y, to decorate the pumpkins we picked out yesterday ( a fun kids activity the squadron arranges). I say mistake because I later had to find someone else to take him to meet Mike,  after 45 minutes of trying in vain to aspirate stomach contents from Emmett’s ng tube (which we have to do before each feed to ensure the tube is still placed correctly). The home health nurse should be here any minute to replace the tube.

Please pray that Emmett is not forming an adhesion that will neccessitate more surgery – I don’t know how much more he (not to mention the rest of our family) can handle.

Because its Monday, I’ll leave you with a song that I’m really liking right now: Razorlight – Wire to Wire.

music monday and happy birthday!

Happy Birthday O! i can’t believe you’ve been on this earth for 4 years now. I just want to say that you are my favorite big boy ever, and it is a priviledge to be your mama. I love you so much.

Frap, I’ve just realized I can’t post a picture tonight, since we only have the laptop. Rarrrr!

Oh, and thanks O, for sharing your birthday with moving day number one.

Since most of y’all don’t get the BBC, I wanted to share this video with you: These are the Days by Jamie Cullum is the song that the BBC used for the ending credits of Wimbleton. And although I think America does a better job with the sports commentary (I missed my John McEnroe commentary), I think the song is awesome and the photo montage pretty good as well.

Ok, that’s it – I’m pooped and we’ll be at it again all day tomorrow.

music monday

I just heard this song for the first time today, and it. is. AWESOME. You must go check out Five Years Time by Noah and the Whale. It is a perfect summer song, and it doesn’t even depress me to listen to it, because it is actually WARM and SUNNY here! I know!

I. AM. SO. TIRED.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but I’m the treasurer for our base’s Officer’s Civilians and Spouses Club. Which means that I’m in charge of the money. Which means that I’m in charge of the budget. And since our board year begins on June 1, means that I have to come up with a new budget for this year, meet with my budget committee, then present our budget before our board and our membership. Considering that we give around $50,000 to charity each year, as well as operate our club, its a pretty big job to figure out how we should divide all of this money. So I’ve been working on the budget for the past few weeks, and it just wears me out. And now I’ve bored even myself with this past paragraph. It wouldn’t be boring if I could share all the turmoil that surrounds our board – I am constantly fascinated by the amount of sheer DRAMA that a group of women can create – but since y’all don’t know the whole cast of characters there, it’d probably still be boring for you. ANYWAY.

Also contributing to the tiredness: work. It makes me tired mentally and physically. I really don’t know how I used to work full-time as a veterinarian – I simply couldn’t do it now, even if I was paid a bazillion dollars.

Also: Hunky is out of town again. This is not as bad as usual since Berd is here (yay!), but I miss my husband. And the kids haven’t gotten yet to the point where they will let Berd do stuff for them instead of me without putting up a fight. Case in point: this morning I left 2 hysterical children with my mom, Y screaming “I NOT GO TO SCHOOL! YOU NOT GO TO WORK!”  and O crying “I want YOU to take me to school!”. This sort of stuff breaks my heart, and makes it especially hard to leave for a job I’m still pretty ambivalent about.

Sorry about the absence of Music Monday, but I want you to be honest here – does anyone actually listen to the music, or am I just amusing myself here?

So, since I’m so tired and all, maybe I’ll go to bed now. I leave you with The Ting Tings. That’s Not My Name was the number one song in Britain last week, and I just can’t imagine it being played on US top 40 stations. But I like it. And I LOVE when my kids sing it in the car at the top of their little lungs. Seriously, how cool is it when your kids start singing along to songs on the radio?

Protected: music monday – Bon Iver

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music mondays – Vampire Weekend and sadness

Ooh, I really like this song. I can’t explain why, although it reminds me a little of Dirty Dancing, and I can’t explain that either – maybe it reminds me of that song Baby’s sister sang? Anyway, check out Oxford Comma by Vampire Weekend.

Ok…on to the sadness part of the post: yesterday I had written this long post about how I thought I was going to have to put Parks to sleep today, after he tried to die on me and the kids this weekend. HOWEVER, last night when we got home from church, he had actually gotten up under his own power to come and greet us at the door, and today he seems pretty much back to what normal means for him now. So while I think we’re really at the beginning of the end for the best dog in the world, we’re not as close to the end as I would have sworn this time yesterday.

Which means this post isn’t as sad as I thought 🙂

music monday – Indigo Girls

So Happy Mother’s Day (ummm…belated yet again) everyone! It was hard for me to remember that it was actually Mother’s Day, as Hunky’s not here, so any pampering was out the window. Its okay though, I took the kids to an antique show and bought myself a little something (okay, 2 little somethings). And although the kids were up at 6am (after not going to bed the night before until 9:30pm), they were mostly super good all day. And although I am a big fan of Mother’s Day being a day for all mamas to be totally honored and wined and dined, Mother’s Day always makes me think not only how grateful I am to my mom, whom I consider my best friend, but how honored and blessed I am to have these 2 great kids. They are the best.

At the Reservoir – March 2008

Okay, so on to the music…this week’s choice is an oldie, but it showed up on the shuffle setting on my iPod this week, and I haven’t heard it in years, but it pretty much sums up how I feel about England. Of course its not really true this week, because the weather here has been ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS lately, and when its like this, I could picture myself staying for a few more years. But still – I love the song, and it is perfect for how I feel about the weather here at least 8 months out of the year. You’ve got to take the song literally. Here it is – Prince of Darkness

Soon to come – we really need to have a heart to heart about boy names, y’all.