I shouldn't complain because I am lucky to have a job, and one that is so flexible around Aaron's school schedule to boot. BUT ( here I go) I am getting tired of working every single weekend. Just one Saturday I would like to stay home and just hang out with my husband and our kids, maybe go visiting somewhere. But ever since I started working, I have worked all but two or three Saturdays. :(
I went for an oil change on our van the other day..... I wish I hadn't gone. We knew our van probably needed some work, but didn't know the extent of it. The car tech pretty much told me my van is hardley safe to drive there is so much wrong with it. He kept saying the words expensive, and lots of work. So..... now what? I wonder if it would be cheaper to get a new vehicle, but we still are paying on the one we have now. I am keeping my fingers crossed that it will last a few more months as tax season is right around the corner. So much for the fun weekend shopping trip I had planned with Jennie. But the safety of my family is a top priority.
We are going up for Thanksgiving. I can't wait to see everyone. :)

Mad dash to Rent

My father in law put an ad in the local paper last night on his way home from work listing our house out for rent. Well the same night a few hours later a family from Texas called him asking about the house. They decided over the phone they are going to rent it from us! yea! I guess they asked for pictures, and when he told them the house was listed for sale online and they could see pics then, they realized they already had looked at it and loved it!
I don't know a whole lot about it cause Pete handled all the details, but that they have six kids and the dad is going to be working at the hospital blocks from the house. I am so excited! That is really a HUGE load off of our shoulders not to have to worry about the house.
I guess that is all for now....... more later!

Let it Snow!

I had these plans to go out today to the bank, and Walmart, the grocery store and the library. But the snow changed that..... It snowed tons down here and it just keeps coming! I think we have like six inches on the ground and we are supposed to get up to eleven by morning. The funny thing is..... I don't mind! I am actually enjoying the snow today. It's pretty. :)
We went to the grocery store tonight.... filled up my cart and got a few meals for the week. We are going home for thanksgiving next week and I can't wait. I have been craving turkey dinner. I actually went and bought a half a turkey about a month ago, with the greatest intentions of cooking it ( I've NEVER cooked a turkey before) for a Sunday dinner and inviting a few cousins of mine over that are living in the area away from home. Well that turkey is still sitting in my freezer, and with next week being Thanksgiving.... I think it will wait another month. It's not going anywhere. :) I did buy a roast today though, and have a tentative plan to cook it on Wed..... maybe I'll give those cousins a call for a roast dinner. mmm..... this talking about food is making me hungry. I think I'm going to go and eat something. bye!

Knocking on Doors

I did it. I just went over there, rang their door bell and apologized for knocking on their door again, but if they could please tone it down a little bit as my kids are sleeping and I don't want them to wake up. He just said yeah sure, sorry bout that. So..... we'll see what happens. Hopefully they take our lifestyle into consideration as we have two little kids who go to bed early. But I am proud of myself for doing it and taking the matter into my own hands. go me. :) Now hopefully I can go to bed without hearing the boys next door.

What would you do?

My neighbors are having a grand old time next door. It's eleven at night and my kids are sleeping and so is Aaron. I know the curfew for quiet time here on campus is nine p.m. It is driving me nuts to hear them hollering so loudly in my apt. Do I work up the courage to go and tell them to maybe try and be a little bit quieter as my family and I are trying to sleep? I'm kind of chicken to go and knock on their door by myself. This is getting old though. They have been doing this every weekend and so far we have said nothing. My housing advisor said that we should go and tell them that their noise is bothering us as we have the right to quiet in our home like any other housing situation would be. I just don't know! I hate to be a pest, but I have the right to not really want to listen to them whooping and hollering and stuff next door. what would you do?

Jump Start to Christmas

I'm in the mood for Christmas. Ever since I was a little girl, Christmas has been my favorite time of the year. I know it's not even Thanksgiving yet, but I'm just in the mood for Christmas. I have been a bit stressed about a few things lately, and am ready for some happiness. And Christmas means happiness. Everyone is nice around the holiday season. People are smiling, and buying gifts for their families. I love the tradition that is seeped around the holiday. I remember writing to Katie back in the day where our letters were known to come sometimes twice a week, about what we would do for Christmas. I love the dinner we have, potato sausage from MN, fruit salad, green bean casserole, grandpa's flatbread, and a few other things. I look forward to that dinner every year on Christmas Eve at my mom's.
I used to wake up in the middle of the night and sneak downstairs to see what Santa brought, our gifts were always wrapped, but I'd still dig around to see who got the biggest gift. When I got to old to wake up on my own in the middle of the night, I'd set my alarm for two am and sneak down the steps, get my stocking and munch and dig. I miss doing that. :) It's different being on the other side of the spectrum, but a different kind of excitement knowing what is inside the wrapped boxes awaiting excited happy children that morning.
Different families do different traditions. My old neighbors across the street from where I grew up would wake up to gifts from Santa unwrapped. They would just have tags on the gift to let you know who got what. Some families got their gifts from Santa early on Christmas Eve and opened them that same night. But it's all tradition.
So like I said, I love the season, the mood, the traditions, the excitement.... the reason we have Christmas, church on Christmas Day night..... the whole shebang. I can't wait to go look in the woods for our Christmas tree. Even that has tradition for my family. The night we would decorate it, my mom would give us kids a new ornament that year that would go on the tree. Our tree was always a hodgepodge of homemade ornaments, to ones that were store bought or my parent's from when they were kids. It always looked like the "best tree ever." When we were done, we'd have cookies and shut off the lights and sing Christmas church songs, and enjoy our tree.
I could go on and on, but I'll save it til closer to Christmas. I am waiting til after Thanksgiving to go get the tree, and to start my shopping. Is anyone actually done with their shopping yet?

Oh yeah.....

Oh yeah, and Happy Veterans Day! Thanks to all those who have served us in the past, and a big thanks to those who are fighting for our honor overseas right now.

I am headed home to see my family today. Jenna cannot wait to go to her muumu's house. She was up and ready to leave at 6:10 this morning. I didn't have to get up til seven thirty though. Aars stayed home to study for an Anatomy Test this morning instead of leaving for work at four thirty am. So she hung out with her dad for a bit this morning. We are going up for the night as I have a scrapbook party for Close To My Heart at Liz's house tonight. We are spending the night because I don't have to work tomorrow.
I'm excited to go as well. I'd like to check out my mom and sister's bakery that I have yet to see. They don't know what time we are coming through so it is going to be a surprise. They know we are coming though. I guess they got the bakery in another local grocery store in C****et, along with the one they have been at for a month in L.L. They are pretty excited. A bit overwhlemed, but excited. In a month they have basically doubled in size. So a big congrats goes out to them! They are doing a great job.

missing dad

Aars comes back home today, and my kids cannot wait. Jenna has been asking for her daddy every day since he left. I don't think they will get back til after dark, but at least he's coming home today. :) Jenna will be pumped. I don't think she will give him much space, but hopefully he missed them as well and won't really mind.
It snowed last night. I should actually say it snowed all day yesterday. We woke up to a white blanket covering the ground. I love the first snow of the season. It gets me in the mood for the holidays, and everything looks so pretty outside. I get tired of the dreary gray and browns after the fall colors are all gone. It also reminds me I don't have snowpants for Jenna. I should look on Ebay or at Goodwill for some for cheap.
I went to pull out Jenna's winter dresses today, and realized she doesn't have any! I have sweaters for all of her summer dresses, but they aren't very warm. So she has on her dress from last year, it fits ok length wise, but the sleeves are now 3/4 length instead of full length.
Two more days til I go up to see my family. I don't have to be back til Thursday technically when I work in the afternoon, so I am debating if I should stay and try and visit some friends all day Wednesday and possibly Thurs. morning. It would be fun to try and do some catching up. We'll see I guess what I end up doing. If the kids and I are gone for two days, Aaron would be able to get his homework done with no problem. Speaking of homework, he is thinking about switching majors from radiographer to a surg. tech. He is going to go and talk to someone about it this week from the surg. program. He's kind of sold on the idea, but just needs more info. I'm all for it because you are pretty much guarenteed to get into the program, where as his one he is in now only takes ten people a year. Plus if he switches I think he'd be done a semester sooner. Bonus. :) I suppose... the kids are needing some TLC. Bye!

I am a hunters wife

I am a hunters wife. I knew that was something I'd signed up for when I married Aaron. He's always been a hunter. It's like his next biggest love after his family. And thats fine, I am sort of getting used to it, but it's still never easy. This year though, I actually wanted him to go. He's been bumming so bad about not being able to hunt like he usually does. This is his first weekend at the hunting camp, and he was so excited to go. My dad and brothers were never really big hunters, so it was a total change I needed to get used to when we started dating. I still don't get why sitting fifty feet up in a tree, freezing your buns off, and waiting for a deer that "might" show up" could be fun. :) I even tried hunting in a blind with Aars last winter..... we didn't see anything, so it was pretty boring, and did not change my outlook on hunting. But, it makes him happy, so it makes me happy too.
One of my biggest things I hate to do is drive in the rain, and when it's dark and late. Last night, I did both. I had to work, but then had to drive Aars to meet Marcus in L'an** so they could head out to the hunting camp where Ryan, BJ, and Brian were already there. I did it so he could have a great weekend, and hopefully release some of the stress that we both have been feeling lately. I'm hoping he comes home a happy and content man. We'll see. In the meantime, we are going to have to have fun without him this weekend. Maybe I'll take the kids to play at Burger King and order off their dollar menu. We do have pop cans to cash in..... :) They also have a little bit of money from Grandma they got in a Halloween card that I promised they could spend this weekend. I think maybe we'll do that today, as I work tomorrow. Jenna is excited cause she gets to spend the day at Aunty Jennie's and Ricky Ricky's. :) Thanks Jen!

Pleasant Surprise

I had a fairly productive day today. At least by my standards..... I got my kitchen cleaned up, and made oatmeal rasin cookies for my husband to take to the hunting camp this weekend.
I even made it out of the house to do something fun with my kids. We went to the library, where I picked up books for me to read this weekend, and books for the kids. Then when we got home, I made supper. Kind of. I made mashed potatoes, heated frozen meatballs and gravy from Fall Services and opened a can of peas and carrots. So I sort of cheated, but it looked and tasted really good. :)
I had a pleasant surprise waiting for me when I got home from the library this afternoon. I'd recieved a basket of flowers! They were from my mom and sisters Loretta and Alanna. The card simply read Thinking of you. It completly made my day. I had no idea they were getting me flowers. :) So if your reading this guys, Thanks for the flowers! They produced a smile and a great day.
Travis was pretty much 100 percent today. His appetite is back and I took the dressing off of his incision this morning like the hospital instructed me to do. He has stitches and steri strips over his cut. It looks good though, seems to be healing well.
The kids are still adjusting the time change. Every night around six thirty they are so ready for bed, and Jenna has noticed that it gets dark much earlier. I really don't like the time change in the fall. I love the longer days of summer and have a hard time adjusting to sunsets at five thirty. Oh well, maybe next year they will decide that we don't really need to do the time change. Rumor was for a while this year that we weren't going to, but then did anyway. Who knows. Either way life goes on, and we just adjust our schedules accordingly. Not like every day is a schedule around here though... we just kind of decide that morning what we need to get done that day, and when and where we are going to go if we feel like bumming that day. It's kind of nice to be flexible.

Proud to be an American

On my way to the armory, where we were registered to vote, I heard this on the radio

"Go vote! There are people out there right now who are fighting for that right for you."

And that really hit home and got me to thinking. How lucky are we to live in a free country where we do have that right? We have the right to vote for John Mcain or Barack Obama. Or even Ralf Nader who I think is now just going for the record of running for president the most. :) How lucky is that?
But today I was proud to be an American, and I am proud to say I did go and vote. Did you?

The Update

The surgery actually went really well. They went in and found it was a hydrocele, and were able to remove it with no complications. We were actually in and out of the hospital and back home in a time frame of four hours. They exceeded my expectations.
Travis is doing pretty well. He's a little bit sore, swollen, and starting to show some bruising, but that was told to us to be normal. As long as we stay on top of his tylenol, he is almost like normal. :) Poor kid though, they had to poke him for an IV MANY times. I think on the back of one of his hands he has like eight needle pokes. I'm glad they made him go to sleep first, and that I wasn't there for that part. The hospital wouldn't let me be there in recovery for him when he woke up. That made me a little bit mad, but actually, when he woke up, he woke up mad and wanting his mom. Nothing the nurses did could make him happy, so they brought him back up to the floor almost right away so I got to hold him. He was pretty sad, and was still very tired and groggy all day. But overall, I look back and say that it wasn't so bad. I guess there are all those what if's that run through your mind, and it's scary because you don't know what to expect. I'll be glad when things are back to normal around here and nobody needs any major medical treatment.
Thank you to everyone for your thoughts and prayers. It was nice to know people were thinking of us on the day when we needed friends and family. It really meant alot. So thanks again.

We're here at the hospital, sitting in the waiting room. And it's hard. I'm trying to be brave and not cry, but it's not easy. I dressed Travis in his little lion hospital gown, and changed his diaper so he'd be clean for surgery. I had hardley finished, when the came to wisk him away and prep him for surgery. Surgery..... I've never had to think about it before. It seems like such a big scary thing for my little thirteen month old boy. All weekend I was just not thinking about it, and was telling myself, Megan, be brave. It's a routine procedure, you know he'll be fine by the end of the day if not the next day, and you won't even be able to tell anything ever happend. But no matter how much I tell myself that, I still find myself all choked up.
There is a little girl cruising around the waiting room, who is the same age as Travis. It makes me miss my little man. We have a two hour wait before we hear back from Dr. Edwards on how the surgery went. I can tell you now, it's going to be a long wait. But at least I have my wonderful husband next to me to give me a hug or hold my hand whenever I get too overwhelmed. He emailed his proffessors last night to let them know he wouldn't be in class today. I'm glad.
So, now the wait begins. I'll keep you updated.

Two more days

Two more days til Trav mans surgery. We have to be at the hospital at six thirty a.m. Jenna is going to Missy and Ted's tomorrow to spend the night. Thank you Missy for offering! She is SO excited to go to Hannah's house all by herself in Aunty Kate's car. Thank you Kate for bringing her there. She is fired up to ride in your car!
I am really trying not to be nervous. I know things are meant to be, that God has a plan and that he'll take care of us, but you know.... it's my baby.
But enough of that. I've talked lots about that lately.
Trick or treating..... we did go. We actually went to the mall and it worked out slick. Jenna was a pirate, and Travis was a clown. I did paint his nose red, but he'd rubbed it off by the time we got home. I actually didn't get any pictures. A first for me, but I can do a pretend halloween day and take some then. Jenna had it down pat, she'd take a piece for her, then for Travis, and then she'd try and take about three more for her. Then she'd say thank you! At least she was polite, and people thought she was just cute, not greedy. :) I was glad for the mall trick or treating. I had to work at four thirty, and wouldn't have been able to go with the kids but for the mall starting at three instead of four like the town. I am enjoying the candy as much as them. Maye I'll use Jenna's to potty train..... yes I am thinking of trying again..... I'm thinking I might be nuts. But they aren't in the same size diapers anymore. Jenna is in a 4 and Travis just moved up to a 5. So.... diapers just doubled in price..... worth it to try potty training again.