Six and Counting

Six years of marriage! Happy Anniversary to my wonderful, hard-working husband. Having John graduate was a great anniversary present! And now we prep to go away for a few days and bask in the past six years.

On top of it being our anniversary today, the boys and I went with Aiden's class to see Go Dog Go! at the NW Children's Theatre today. It was fabulous and I wish I'd known about it earlier. This weekend is their last set of performances or else I'd take the boys back and see it again. Next season they are doing Richard Scarry's Busytown and I'll definitely be taking the boys then. Experiences like today make me happy that we live in such an artsy city - introducing my kids to the arts is very exciting!

ALMOST There!

Holy moly, what a week it has been! First, our washing machine stopped working (yes, the one that is only five months old). Then my computer ended up with a very invasive, destructive virus (thank you Aiden for clicking on that not at all suspicious looking website). It was also Spring Break which meant the boys needed constant entertaining, but they weren't really interested in going anywhere and believe me, I tried. The craziness is carrying over into this week, but we just have to make it to Thursday when we will all go away to the coast until Sunday. We so need it.

So the washing machine. It would be massively complicated to describe what was happening with it, but it's still under warranty, so we called the manufacturer. That was Tuesday. They couldn't get anyone out here until Monday (today). Do you know what it's like to have two small boys and no washing machine? Today was going to be a horribly busy day anyway (I had agreed to come into work at 4pm - way to go Carrie), but then I was also going to have to wait for a repair guy to show up. We told them it needed to be before noon and they told us noon-3pm. John called them and told them that no one would be here between 1 and 1:30. They said they'd be here between 1:30-2:30, but they'd call 15 minutes before they showed up. I needed to leave at 2:45. It was nearing 2:30 and there had yet to be any phone call. I got fed up and went in to mess with the washing machine myself. I don't know what I did, but it's working now. I was able to call off the repair guy and get my day back on schedule. It really was just one of THOSE days. I got to eat my first meal of the day at 6pm.

Then my computer. Aiden infected it with something and it was destructive to the point where John said it was dead and we'd just have to buy a new one. And then I fixed it. It took me 24 hours, but I fixed it. Obviously, I've been quite lucky with fixing things! But it's still been really stressful to deal with.

Tomorrow will be a lower key day (thank goodness!), just visiting the library and doing some shopping for the beach. On Wednesday, Aiden's class is going to the Northwest Children's Theatre and we are seeing a performance of Go Dog Go!. It should be a lot of fun. I've never checked out this theatre company before, but if the boys enjoy it, maybe we'll continue to check their performances out (their ticket prices seem quite reasonable).

Then, it's on to the coast. Now that John has graduated, we all need a little recoup time as a family. Plus, John and I will be celebrating our six year wedding anniversary (which is actually Wednesday). Five years didn't seem like a long time, but six seems huge! :^) Just that much closer to ten, I suppose.

Just a few more days until relaxation!

Con-GRAD-ulations....continued!

As you know, John finished his classes last week. He then got his grades (A and a B), then yesterday received a letter informing him that his two classes that he submitted portfolios for (basically testing out the them) were approved. After that, we knew he was done, but hadn't gotten the graduation confirmation yet. Until today when this letter arrived:

"Congratulations John! You have earned Summa Cum Laude honor status along with your degree. Your diploma will be mailed to you this week."

I have to admit that I burst into tears. We are so proud of John! And it's finally official confirmation that he is completely DONE. We've tried to imagine this event for the past five years. It's a huge relief, but we also think it will feel strange not having him in school anymore. But I'm sure we'll get used to it fairly fast!

USGS

Aiden has been on a learning high lately and we can't seem to get him library books fast enough, so I taught him how to use the internet on my laptop. That way, he could look up whatever he wanted (I started him out on the NASA website) at the table while I made dinner. After he was done navigating NASA, I introduced him to Google so he could do some searching. And yes, his spelling is to the point where he can type up what he wants with no problem. After about an hour, he said he was done and closed up my laptop. After dinner, I opened it up again and saw the website that he had left up. He had navigated himself to the US Geological Survey website and was looking up information on the earth's core and tectonic plates. I asked him why he was interested in that and he said that he "wanted to know more about how the earthquake happened in Japan". I am in awe of my five year old.

In case you want to see for yourself, here's the website he was reading:

http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/inside.html

Plants!

We know it's almost spring because Aiden and Nathan preschool has just started their annual plant sale fundraiser! Seriously, if you're wanting to buy any plants, these plants are amazing. We bought a bunch last year and they were fabulous and healthy. My herbs are already beginning to grow again and they've been sitting outside all winter!

You can check them out at this website:
http://www.newleafgreenhouse.com/Spring_Plant_Fundraiser/

If you're interested in getting anything, send me a message and let me know. Orders are due by April 6 and the plants are delivered on May 1. I then deliver them to whoever placed an order. I am willing to deliver to my Oregon and Washington friends (even those of you up in Tacoma), so don't hesitate to get in on these amazing plants. And you know it goes to a great cause!

Beannacht Lá Fhéile Pádraig!

Translation: Happy St Patrick's Day! :^)

In honor of my partial Irish-ness, we had a festive stay at home day today. I wore painted green fingernails, green eye shadow, and my usual St Patrick's Day shirt 'Kiss Me, I'm Irish'. I informed the boys that they too needed to wear green or risk getting pinched by a leprechaun (I quickly had to tell Nathan that I was joking after he looked slightly terrified). Aiden says to me, "Leprechauns get into something....what was it....hmmm, mischief!". Haha!

In the afternoon, we settled into the kitchen for the long haul. We started our green cupcakes:

Green batter!

Slightly icky looking green baked cupcakes (but they look so cool once you bite into them!).



Then frosted with cream cheese frosting and sprinkled with green sugar sprinkles. Yummy!

After the cupcakes were out of the oven, the boys played while I started on dinner. You would think that with it being St Pat's, I would make corned beef and cabbage. Nope! Corned beef and cabbage isn't actually Irish. It was created in New York City in a Jewish neighborhood! So I stick with traditional recipes from Ireland (stews, fish, pork loin, etc) and try to do a new one every year. This year was Hunter's Pie (although I do admit that I used beef instead of lamb....mostly because I wouldn't know where to get lamb!). I also found a new recipe for the traditional Soda Bread and oh my word, the entire family is in LOVE with it. We absolutely devoured it. Thank goodness it's super cheap and easy - I can make it all the time!

Soda bread with oats. Sooooo good!

Irish side dish: Glazed carrots. They were amazing, although probably not as healthy as carrots should be. :^)

So our St Patrick's Day comes to a close and we are still holding our very full tummies and wondering if we should hop on the treadmill for a while. We'd have to roll on over there first though. But I'm already thinking of making some more of that soda bread. Instead of ending with an Irish blessing, I will share the soda bread recipe. Because it doesn't get much better than blessing your home and family with some truly good food.

Oats and Honey Irish Soda Bread

1 3/4 cup flour

1/2 cup oatmeal

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

3 tbsp honey

1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 400. Grease baking sheet.

In a large bowl, stir together flour, oats, baking soda, and salt. Add in honey and buttermilk and stir until dough comes together. Dough will be sticky. Form into a ball (as much as you can) and place on prepared baking sheet. It will look very flat.

Bake at 400 for 30-35 minutes, until loaf is golden brown. Allow to cool for about 20 minutes before slicing. Personal note: Is great as-is, but tastes VERY good with butter! Enjoy!

Con-GRAD-ulations!

In just under two hours from now, John will be taking his last final. Ever. It started sinking in the other day, but has glossed back over to not quite hitting us yet. It will be interesting to not have him in school anymore, but oh so wonderful.

They do have a commencement ceremony at the end of the next term, but currently, John has no plans to walk in it. The plan is to have a combined graduation party with his sister once she graduates at the end of April.

For now, we'll just try to let it sink in once he comes home tonight. He'll come home to a freshly baked apple pie and a card from us. Then after spring break, we're all going away as a family for a few days to the coast. A combined graduation/six year anniversary trip. We need it. And we sure at heck deserve it! It's been a team effort over the past five years and we finally made it.

We are so proud of you, John.

STOMP

John and I had the opportunity to get tickets through a friend of mine to STOMP while the show was in town this weekend. We'd never seen it, but heard much about it, so we decided it would be a fun thing to see. We loved it! It's definitely loud, but the energy is amazing and watching people create music out of everyday objects like trash cans, brooms, and buckets was quite the experience. There was quite a bit of physical comedy as well. It's very much a family oriented show and now that I've seen it, I think Aiden would love it. In fact, I kind of wish we would have gotten a ticket for him. But now I know that if they come to town again, I'll make a point to take him.

If you've never seen it (and aren't bothered by loud noises), I'd highly recommend it. It's not your usual stage show and it's super fun to watch. It's extremely physical and it's easy to see why all the performers have huge arm muscles. For a little taste of STOMP, here's two links to a bit of the show's DVD.

Brooms (how they started the show):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-_mUAhzhkg

Trash Can Finale:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zu15Ou-jKM0

Changes

What do you do when your husband is FINALLY about to graduate, spring seems like it might actually be in the air, your five year old is nearing the end of his preschool career, and you're about to reach six years of marriage? That's right, you go crazy and cut all your hair off.

Things are about to change a bit around here and I thought a new haircut would be a fabulous way to welcome in a new season. Plus, I have very insistent friends who finally talked me into it. :^)

Aiden Art

Yesterday was a bit blustery and it rained off and on, so I decided to get out the canvases I had in the office. Aiden went to town! He painted for over an hour. His end result (below) was a painting for our downstairs bathroom and I can't wait to hang it up! He had so much fun, he has asked for more canvases. Since we have a couple of larger wall areas, I might get a few large canvases and see what we can make!

The Forest by Aiden Minthorne

To start our week

I'm now sick. Luckily it mostly held off until after we had dinner with Brady and Carrie at John's parents'. My sinuses had started acting up earlier in the day yesterday, but by the time we got home, I was stuffed up beyond all belief, my head was pounding, and I felt sick to my stomach. Needless to say, I had to cancel everything for today and park myself on the couch. I just want to sleep, but John can't miss any more class this close to finals and work is kind of important, so I'm on my own with the kids.

I did get a call from my doctor this morning. She wants to leave things alone and has advised ibuprofen if the pain gets really bad. She thinks that the pain is being caused by some wacky hormones and since the tissue mass isn't anything concerning, it sounds like it's just going to be a part of my life. I'm just happy that nothing is horribly wrong.

As an additional, keep John in prayer. He's really struggling to get through these last two weeks of school. I think he's afraid he's not going to pass his classes and not graduate, and it's really stressing him out. We really need him to graduate.

My Afternoon

I had my doctor appointment for the lump today. I won't go into tons of details - most of it was pretty boring. I had three straight hours of exams and waiting in between exams. Every person who examined me would feel of it, say "Whoa, I can definitely feel that" and then get a concerned look on their face. It tends to fill one's head with ominous thoughts after a while.

So I had my normal exam by my midwife (the one who was my primary during my pregnancy with Nathan). She enjoyed seeing Nathan again after almost three years, and he was with me all afternoon. I do have to say, he was an amazing little kid. He was so well behaved, he sat quietly, he held my hand, and in the one instance where he couldn't go into a room with me, he sat outside the room waiting patiently for me. He did start to look concerned after a while with so many people examining me, but he was great.

After my first exam, I was sent to have an ultrasound. After that was done, I got to experience my first mammogram. Not a pleasant experience, but I suppose it does what it needs to do. Between all the concerned looks, I got many "You're so young!" comments. The hardest part of the whole afternoon was not having any answers until the very end of everything. So much prodding and poking, and no thoughts as to the possibilities of things. Everyone looked so serious throughout the whole thing and it really weighed heavily on me. I tried to not think about the possible outcomes too much, but on the other hand, it's hard to ignore.

Finally, they came in and said, "There is a sizable mass, but it's benign so we'll see you again for regular mammograms when you're 40."

I suppose that's the answer we needed today. There's no cancer. Obviously it doesn't explain why there's a mass that's been growing for almost a year and it's entirely possible that my doctor will just want to leave it alone. I just may need to learn to live with the pain it's causing and rest easy knowing that it's not going to kill me. I should get the final word for any treatment next week, but I doubt anything further will be done with it.

Thanks for the prayers and the messages of support for today. It was about as emotionally draining as I expected, but at least the outcome is favorable. Now to try to get rid of the tension built up from the day and enjoy some time with my family.

Venom, Poison, and Electricity

Aiden has been learning about venomous creatures and this morning, he wrote a book:

If you can't enlarge the photo or read what it says, he wrote:

"Venom, Poison, and Electricity. By Joe, Ritten By MonaLesa (yes, he means THAT Mona Lisa), Ritten by Aiden Minthorn of Mr Lady Bug". When we asked why he was Aiden Minthorne of Mr Lady Bug, he informed us that while it's his publishing company, Mr Lady Bug is his assistant (no joke, he actually told us this).

Here he has drawn pictures of an electric eel and a small mouth electric catfish. This book is about how you can create a power source for cities by using the organs of electric eels and other creatures. He also made us a model using his wooden blocks, but I didn't get a picture of that.

These are the next subjects regarding the venomous creatures: Tricky Behavior and Warning Colors.

We can't wait to share more from the Aiden Minthorne publishing company. :^)

Changing Things Around

After what was one if the most horrible nights of sleep (Nathan had a stuffy nose and cough, I had a migraine, the migraines meds gave me a stomach ache, and I was stressed about my doctor's appointment), I was going to take the boys with me to the doctor to save a little bit of time. But soon after I called off the babysitter, the doctor rescheduled my appointment for Friday afternoon. Thank goodness! I was able to go back to bed and sleep for a while longer, which was good since I'm supposed to help in Aiden's class this afternoon.

So yes, the stress of my appointment has been dragged out until Friday, but I'm ok with that. Just keep me in mind on Friday afternoon.

Appointments

Just for fyi purposes for those who wanted to be kept up to date: Aiden's appointment has been rescheduled for March 16.

I, however, am going into the doctor tomorrow morning, Please keep this one in prayer. I'm a little nervous about it and we're hoping that it's something simple. Since I feel like vague doctor posts like this cause panic, I want to be open about it: I found a lump during a self-exam and it feels like it's a fairly significant size. There's also some pain and swelling along with it, so I'm hoping that means it's a cyst that can be dealt with easily. The exams are going to be a tad stressful though, since I'm pretty much guaranteed a mammogram and/or an ultrasound. I do have a family history of breast cancer, so it's obviously something that we want checked out immediately.

I don't know if that helped ease any panic, but at least you know what's going on. :^)