Adding a girl to our family mix…

Yep – you read that right!  If you haven’t heard, we are having a baby girl.  Her name has been chosen since we were pregnant with our first back in 2004.  Emily Mae.

Classic name.  I don’t care if the name has been used a lot over the years.  It’s pretty.  I like it and so does my husband.  Coming by names that we BOTH agree on is an oddity!

So, a girl.  After two boys.  My first, AJ is a very logical and intelligent boy.  Not too much into sports.  He’d rather build things out of golf clubs than swing them at golf balls. LOL  Zach, my second is pure boy.  Man-housing, dirt-eating, bug-killing, caution-to-the-wind type of boy.  So, why not toss a girl into the mix.  She’ll fit right in, I’m sure.

Here’s some irony – I’ve been hoping and wishing for a girl since the very beginning of my trying to conceive journey.  So, why, WHY am I so frightened? LOL

I’m going to be a wonderful mom to my girl – that I’m not scared of.  But all I’ve known in parenthood is BOY.  How a boy acts, how a boy pees, how a boy thinks.  And now I will have to learn all these things about a girl.  AND all the extra things – like fashion and hair.  If you know me well, I’m not so into fashion and hair. LOL  I’m the put it in a pony-tail, or let it air dry type of gal.  And fashion – ha – you don’t want me in a store.  I laugh at prices on jeans.  I rarely spend over $30 on an item of clothing.  Yep – I shop at Target and Walmart.  And I don’t care if anyone thinks badly of me for that!

Anyway – now this girl is going to need tights and bows and dresses and shoes.  Yes, I am a mom who would clothe her girl in all that cutesy stuff.  I wouldn’t wear it myself nowadays – so I would live vicariously through her.

So, why then have I not bought anything yet? You would think that I would want to shop my head off for her.  NOPE.  I hate shopping.  I despise it.  I love the clothes, but I hate shopping.  I suppose part of it is because if I start, I could possibly never stop and my hubby would get mad.   But I know my limits.  I think I can handle it.  Maybe I just haven’t seen the cute stuff yet, or the sale that good enough.

So, I think I have to get my head in the game.  Otherwise Emily is going to be wearing the boys’ Bears jerseys or Thomas the Train overalls. LOL  And I’m not saying that’s wrong, because afterall, with two older brothers, she’s bound to be a tom-boy.

By the way, this blog entry is “robo-copied” into my Facebook notes.  If you ever wish to visit my blog directly, go to www.fromatozandeverythinginbetween.wordpress.com.

 

One week..

It’s been one week.  I know the pain diminishes over time, but it’s still pretty raw right now.

I talked with my mother-in-law today.  She is a source of comfort and she held up her end today.  She shared with me her fondest and most prevalent memory of Aunt Mary.  And I’d like to share it with you.

At my wedding, we had balloons for decorations.  We had invited kids, so there were a handful.  And you know kids and balloons - they’re like magnets!  So, one of the kids, I think my nephew Tristan or Trent was playing with a balloon and suddenly let go.  The balloon rose to the ceiling.  Out of touch of most people.  Aunt Mary took a chair, hiked herself up on the chair and got the balloon and handed to the kid.  Keep in mind, I got married in 2001.  She was born in 1935.  So, she was 66 years old! No quam at all about climbing on a chair to stretch up to get a balloon.

My memory of Aunt Mary and my wedding is a sad one.  Even though she was my godmother, I forgot to take pictures with her.  I have completely regretted it ever since it occurred to me.  But I couldn’t do anything about it.  But I still have that regret.

Another good memory to share – Aunt Mary always had a can of coke in her hand!  It was her guilty pleasure.  Every time we visited in the Senior Center, we brought her a case or two.  My mom even put a can of Coke in her casket!

I think I also forgot to say that in my eyes, she was the “Baby Whisperer”.  She could take a crying infant and calm them and get them to sleep.  It might take a while, but she didn’t care.  She was patient as hell.  She could work burps out like crazy.  She could tell if the baby was hungry, wet, or just needed to be held.  I was really hoping my last child would know her.  Because Aunt Mary’s special touch is an important part of my children’s lives.  I will just have to remember her touch and try to mimic it myself.

 

Aunt Mary remembered, Part 2…

So, I thought of some more I wanted to jot down.

I had my first Thanksgiving dinner with family.  Aunt Mary arrived with a houseplant arrangement.  I still have ALL the houseplants.  In fact, there is one that is prolific.  I call it the Aunt Mary plant.  It constantly is growing and always, always tolerates not being watered.  It reminds me of her because she can make friends with anyone, talking to strangers with ease.  And also, if you didn’t see her for a month, she could pick up a conversation like you just had in an hour ago.

When invited to holiday dinners/events, Aunt Mary always brought something extra.  For Thanksgiving once, she brought napkins.  Lots of time, it would be Champagne. YUM! For 4th of July, she bought tablecloths.  She just always thought of the little extras.

We had our sister Cathy convinced, at about age 6, that she was adopted.  All of us sisters have dishwater blond hair, except for Cathy.  She has brown/black hair.  We really had her going.  We recruited Aunt Mary to agree with us.  She went along with it until she saw how much Cathy was hurt by it.  The ironic thing is that she could’ve argued we were adopted as Mom and Dad have brown/black hair!!

Those three memories are it for now.  I’m sure there will be more.

 

Aunt Mary remembered…

I wanted to write a lot of my memories about Aunt Mary.  I may bore you.  But they may interest you.  I just needed a place to jot things down.

Aunt Mary bought me my first “boombox” when I was 13.  Aunt Mary was my godmother.  She was a very important part of my life and took it seriously.  She continuously gave me big gifts on my birthday and Christmas.  I had a hard time convincing her to give only to my children.  But she finally surrendered, and she was equally generous to them.

Aunt Mary lived with us for a while.  Her boyfriend at the time was not so nice to her and we had to move her out in secrecy.  He was out of town or something and we took her stuff out and left.  I don’t remember how long she lived with us – maybe 2 years??  Even my mom and dad can’t recall. 

I used Aunt Mary’s Dynasty to take my driver’s license test.  She drove to our house from Justice so that I didn’t have to take the test with a Suburban!  I was so happy!  And she took me out for Ice Cream afterwards.  And not just me, but the whole neighborhood!!  We all squeezed into the back of the car (yep, no car seats back then, LOL) 

After her most recent boyfriend passed away, my aunt moved in with my mom and dad again.  I think she lived there about 8 or 9 years until this last June.

When Zach was born, he was colic.  Or so we thought.  I was at my rope’s end.  So was Dan.  Aunt Mary moved into our Guest bedroom for two weeks to help.  She took a whole night shift with Zach screaming in her ear.  She was so patient with him.  She never, ever got short with babies.  We eventually found out Zach was allergic to cow’s milk and lactose intolerant.  She was so very, very helpful in this phase of our lives.  And she didn’t leave when all was well.  She helped me once again.  She assisted me in potty-training AJ.  One day I woke up and she said “Here we go, we’re potty-training AJ.”  I said OK.  And followed her lead. I am forever grateful for that!

When I think of words to describe Aunt Mary, there is never a negative one to come to mind.  Graceful, elegant, traditional, patient, giving, loving, generous, spirited, maternal (although she never had children), the list could go on and on. 

It is such a shame her life was cut short.  I might come back and write more.  Ignore it or read it.  It’s actually not about the sharing for me, it’s about me writing it down.

 

The inevitable has happened…

Aunt Mary has passed away. And I’m filled with many emotions. Anger at the person/people who didn’t wash their hands and infected her with MRSA. Sadness and lonliness in missing her. But happy that she is not suffering anymore.

I had to explain death to my 5-year-old and my almost 3-year-old. My 5-year-old seems to understand it. He is asking questions. Pretty intelligent questions. I think he gets it.

My almost 3-year-old doesn’t know what the word “died” or “death” means. He keeps asking if other people have died. He, of course, hasn’t seen Aunt Mary since she fell ill on Christmas Eve. So, he doesn’t have first-hand knowledge of what it means. He knows what being sick is – but he can’t understand yet what death is.

He understands that Mommy and Daddy and Gramma and Be-bop (my mom and dad) are sad. But he doesn’t know why. And he can even empathize. But he’s not getting it.

We’ve made a decision to bring both of the boys to the wake and/or funeral. We truly believe that shielding their young minds from this experience is not healthy. The more they understand, the healthier they will be.

I hope we have made the right decision.

I will miss Aunt Mary truly and deeply. She was a great woman. She was a great role model and her memory will always be with me.

 

Aunt Mary

Aunt Mary is like a grandmother to me.  My mom’s mom died when she was 13.  And her dad died when I was 2.  Aunt Mary sort of stepped in and has been a part of our family – immediate family – since as long as I can remember.

She is a kind, generous, giving woman.  If someone had anything bad to say about her, it is that she is giving, to a fault.  She can be more concerned about someone else’s wants and needs before a critical need of her own.

She is now in a medically induced coma.  They kindly call it sedated.  She took ill on Christmas Eve.  She thought she had the simple stomach flu.  Three days later, she was in the hospital being told that she had a heart attack and tests were going to be run.  Since then, it was found that she did NOT have a heart attack.  She had a 90% blockage in one of her arteries.  She had a stint placed and she was looking a lot better.  She had color to her face.

Then when she thought she was going to be leaving the hospital (of which she hates, by the way), she was found to have pneumonia.  They dosed her with antibiotics and two days later, she again thought she was going home.  Then her breathing became very labored.  They put a breathing tube in.  She fought it.  She fought it so hard, she bit through the first tube, and took the second one out with her tongue.  So they sedated her.

She was doing better in the following days and was weaned off the antibiotics and off the sedatives.  But she didn’t wake up.  They ran some tests and found she had MRSA.

A little background.  You’d be amazed what this lady has lived through already.  She has leukemia.  And I forget what kind, because she keeps it to herself.  She’s not one to ask for pity.  She also had a stroke, which in some why affected her hearing in her left ear.  She had surgery on her neck to remove a clot, I believe.  Again, the details are fuzzy because she never wants to worry anyone too much.

So, now she has MRSA.  MRSA in a healthy person is a hard infection to fight off.  MRSA in Aunt Mary will most likely be fatal.  She has leukemia, recovering from heart surgery and recovering from pneumonia.  Her body systems are tired and are falling behind in fighting the infection. 

I visited Aunt Mary yesterday and told her I was not ready to say good-bye to her.  That I loved her.  The boys loved her and I wanted her to be around to meet my last baby.  She has always been so good with my babies and I wanted my third child to know her.  I could swear that she could hear me, because she relaxed in her breathing a little.  And I saw a tear.  However, I’m told that’s a reflex.

Aunt Mary is like a grandmother to me, and a great grandmother to my children.  I really thought that her vibrant, spunky self would be around for longer.  I hope she pulls through this. It is really heartbreaking to think that I will have to teach AJ and Zach about death of a very important person so young in their lives.  I’d rather put it off for a couple years.

Besides, we were supposed to start a new Christmas tradition.  We were going to go to the Breakfast with Santa at Aunt Mary’s living center.  It was a great idea.  It was great to see Aunt Mary flitting all over the place to help her friends, helping prepare their wares for sale.  She had befriended the whole community in such a short amount of time.  I never imagined her stay there would be so short.  I imagined her seeing lots of change in residency over the years.

So, here’s to hoping that those many years are still possible.  Currently, I feel there is little hope for recovery.  But I hope like crazy…

 

Politeness

Ok – I’m starting this blog post with this statement. This is not about anyone specific right now, or about anyone I know. Just general statements of my life recently.

I really wish it were “in” to be polite. I am really getting sick of being cut off as I drive. I’m really sick of customer service representatives who roll their eyes. I’m really sick of impolite people in general.

On Columbus Day, the kids had school off. I decided to do some shopping. Yep, I knew it was going to be crowded. The shopping experience wasn’t all that bad. However, my dining experience at Panda Express in Orland Park was an exhibit of the most appalling manners I have witnessed in a *LONG* time. I have two children with me. #1 – they ran out of trays. So, I carried three plates of food and three drinks to our table. But the thing that got me the most was #2 – it was a FULL HOUSE. No vacant tables but one. As I’m trying to coral my two kids and find the one table that is empty, I passed FIVE tables where there was one or two people sitting at a four-top. The ONLY table left was a two-top. A tall two-top. So, I had to stand while eating while I let my children eat sitting down. I was rather furious. I even looked each of these table occupants in the eye. Their eye to my very *evil* eye! No one budged. No one offered their table. The nerve!!! And one table occupant was a police officer!!!! WTF!!! Hmmm – nice community service, officer.

So that was my one experience the past week. But there have been so many others like it that I’m not being quiet anymore. Be polite people!!! Smile. Say Thank You. Say Please! Drive legally and safely! Stop texting while driving. Look people in the eyes when you speak to them. (and no, my boobs are not where my eyes are!) Keep in mind that opinions are opinions. Some things are personal. Keep them that way. Give a compliment. Give to your favorite charity. Help a family out. Help a child out. Recycle. Flush. Wash your hands. Say “excuse me” every once in a while. Be truthful, but not so truthful that you are mean. And if you can’t say anything nice, then don’t say anything at all. Discipline your kids. Praise your kids.  Hug a friend.

I think that’s about all I want to say.  Just remember – this is not jab to anyone specific and if anyone reading this blogs  this is a poke to them – it’s not.

 

McCafe

How many times can one make coffee incorrectly? Perhaps, the easier question to answer, on my end, is how many times can they prepare CORRECTLY. I have had the proper coffee ONCE out of about twenty chances I have given McDonald’s. I *always* ask for Iced Mocha, no whipped cream. With one exception, I *always* got whipped cream.

I also have given them many opportunites to tget the Iced coffee correct. I like the medium regular coffee. Not carmel, not vanilla. Just regular. And I like it prepared the way it is supposed to be prepared – not with extra syrup or not with tons of ice. I also would appreciate the proper size when ordered. At times I get a large cup, and at times, a smaller cup.

I always thought McDonald’s was a pretty consistant company. But their coffee sure isn’t. I’ve gone to 4 different McDonald’s, thinking that maybe it was the location. But nope – it’s gotta be the lack of training. The lack of quality control.

They’ve lost my coffee business. I’m preparing my own coffee, my way. Gee – sorta sounds like Burger King, doesn’t it? LOL

 

Life Lesson

Ok, so we tried this waterpark thing. We thought that with my son being almost 5, he would enjoy it more. Did we learn any lessons from going to Key Lime Cove in February? Apparently NOT. LOL  This time we tried a waterpark in Iowa.  The name escapes me now.

When going to a waterpark with an almost 5 year old and a 2 year old, you have to expect that not many slides will be ridden. However, when your 5-year-old asks you if he can go and makes your butt climb all the freaking stairs only to chicken out at the top – well, lesson learned.

So, we go on the lazy river. May I say – not at all lazy, by the way! There are waterfalls to dump about 50 gallons a second on your head if you don’t miss them. A 5-year-old who can’t touch the ground to control where he goes was very disturbed when he got STUCK under the waterfall. There were lots of tears shed dripping off his face along with the other 100 gallons of water from the waterfall. OMG!!!

Then there were the multiple trips to the bathroom. And of course, eating. And then the darn people who designed the sidewalks there. Who the flip puts dark pavement all around where people need to walk barefoot. I think I burned the bottom of my feet. And back to the 5-year-old – he cried and complained, so then you have to carry him all over the place.

So, we left the place earlier than planned. We were tired of dealing with a whiny, bratty, over-tired 5 year old and a cold 2-year-old.

Lessons learned:
1. wear watershoes when at an outdoor waterpark.
2. bring snacks.
3. make sure they are rested and not over-tired from missing two days worth of naps.
4. Only go when and if your children don’t mind splashing and will put their face under water.
5. Only go when the air temp has been about 75 for the past week. (Forgot to mention that water was frigid!)
6. Lower expectations if all of the above are not true. And don’t be disappointed when you spent $67 to get in and you hardly used the facilities.

 

Geez – you’d figure a “plug n play” printer would really be plug and play…

I am having the most difficult time installing an HP 309a Photosmart printer. It states that it’s so easy to use. #1 – I don’t use Vista. Never trusted it from the beginning, so I have never even tried it. #2 I don’t have IE8 on my machine either. #3 I’m pretty much a techie geek and can figures most things out.

The WHY the F&^* isn’t this stupid software working. Sure, I can get the damn printer on the network. But for heavens sake, part of the reason I bought the damn thing was to print on CDs. (Plus I needed a new fax machine). I can’t even get the stupid software to start. It says it’s loaded. No errors in the event viewer. No errors in any logs anywhere. No viruses. No spyware. WTF????!!!!

I am about to go insane. And of course, why did I have to do this on Memorial Day weekend?? This sucks. I had confidence that HP would know what it’s doing. But I have confidence no more. I should’ve stuck with Canon.

GAH!!!!!!!!!!