Lydia's Princess Party

Last Monday Courtney was invited to a Princess Party. They had a royal manicure, royal pedicure and a royal up-do. She had a great time and came home looking very "princessy."

Here's how she came back to us:

Michelle's Surgery

Last Thursday, after school, we loaded in the van and drove to Provo to stay with Lisa and Mike so we would be closer to the Surgical Center for my foot surgery. About 18 years ago, more or less, I was goofing off with a friend and stepped off a curb funny. I hurt my foot but the doctor kept telling me that it was just sprained. It has hurt every since but I couldn't find anyone who would believe that anything was wrong. Finally, a doctor in St. George did an MRI on the foot and found a fracture. He did a few cortisone shots (wonderful things!) which gave me some relief but nothing permanent. Finally I went to a specialist in Provo who did a CT scan and found a cyst, bone spur and "junk" in my joint that needed to be taken out. So we scheduled surgery.

Lisa watched the kids while Bryan took me to the Surgical Center. I was there at 9:15 but didn't get into surgery until 11 a.m. They put me under general anesthesia, so I got to sleep, but then they did a nerve block in my calf which numbed my foot. It was supposed to wear off between 10-12 hours, but it lasted about 19 hours (lovely!). I woke up after 1 1/2 hours of surgery (it was supposed to be about 45 minutes but he found more "junk" than anticipated) absolutely FREEZING! The blood pressure cuff on my right arm was driving me nuts and alarms kept going off. Bryan told me the alarm was because my heart rate was so low (40-45) and the nurse finally asked if that was normal for me and I told her it was, so she muted the alarm.

After what seemed like forever in the recovery room, I was able to get dressed to be discharged. Now, they told me to wear comfy, baggy clothes and I thought I had. But I didn't anticipate this huge splint that was all the way to my knee! I barely got my pants on. Bryan took me back to Lisa's where we got the kids, I changed into my pjs and then we were off.

I slept most of the way home, which Ethan watching me closely in the backseat. We had to take one pit stop at a rest area where Bryan ended up giving me a piggy back ride to the bathroom, but other than that it was non eventful.

I can take the splint off on Wednesday (yipee because it's heavy!) but I'm on crutches for 2-4 weeks. I have a post-op appointment in two weeks to have it checked. Hopefully this will take care of everything.

My orange foot:

My splint:

My splint and my left leg so you can see just how big it really is (I heard one nurse say something about "overkill" but I was out of it so I may have imagined it)! Just think how big it would have been if the surgery was on my leg!

Ethan and Courtney

I am sure Ethan is going to regret this someday but he asked me to post this photo. He was playing on his DSi the other day and Courtney decided that he needed to have his hair done. She ran in the bathroom, grabbed a bunch of flowers and started putting them in his hair. Isn't is usually the older sisters dressing up the little brother and not the little sister dressing up the big brother?!?! Anyway, he wanted it documents because he said it shows "how great a big brother I am because I let my little sister make me look ridiculous." He has a point!

Courtney's Dance

Here is Courtney's Pizazz routine (the part I got on tape before the battery in the camera died) from last night. She did awesome and had so much fun. She didn't have her glasses on because her eyelashes are too long and hit her lenses which bugs her. So she is allowed to perform without them. She gets to wear makeup for the performances too which she loves and Ethan hates. He says she looks "freaky" and "not like herself at all!" It gets washed off the second we get home.

Please ignore the psycho mom yelling in the background (it's just me!). She has had such a hard time getting the ring out in past performances that I was so excited when she got it.







Here she is after it was all over and we were watching the game.

Finding His Inner Zen?!?

Ethan paid a token to play Wii and after a few minutes he yelled for me to come and see something. What I found made me laugh.

Ethan was sitting, cross-legged, on the balance board staring at the TV screen which showed a candle burning.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

Whispering, Ethan slowly said, "Finding my inner Zen, Mom. If I move, the candle flickers and goes out. I have to be really still."

After 2 minutes of watching the candle burn down on the screen I asked, "Why?"

Again whispering, he said, "Mom, you're messing up my Zen, please leave now."

Okaaay....I guess he is clearing his mind and focusing on his inner vessel. He's been quiet for quite a while, so we'll see how calm and centered he is after this. Someone at Harvard should do a study on this...oh wait, they probably already have. ;)

I just went in to see how he was doing and he was on to play something else. I asked him, "How was it finding your Zen?"

"Oh Mom, it was good. Really, really, really good."

What a funny kid!

Ethan's "Injury"

Today at basketball practice, both Ethan and another kid went after the ball. Unfortunately Ethan fell and got scraped up. His knee and his elbow have some pretty good scrapes on them. He wanted me to post proof of his "injury" and tell everyone that he was really brave. (I wasn't there so I can't vouch for his braveness, but he didn't need a bandaid...which in our house is a big deal.)




(Courtney calls this his "grandpa look" because of the glasses.)

My Birthday!

Wednesday was my birthday and the kids were so excited! I got up really early and went to the Temple. When I got home, there were flowers on the table (from Bryan and Courtney), breakfast of crepes ready to be eaten, and a beautifully wrapped present on the table (from Bryan and Ethan) along with a few cards.

Ethan was anxious for me to open my present ("But open the cards after you open the present!") so I did. It was a Wii Fit Plus. I was really excited. Ethan had me open it up to see what the board looked like and inside was.... a board....of wood. I realized that I had told Ethan about the time I really wanted a nice camera for Christmas and on Christmas Eve my parents gave me a package to open which turned out to be a one-time-use-disposable camera. I was so sad, but got the nice camera the next day. Ethan decided to re-create this memory for me.

I then opened the card and Ethan had written a poem that gave me a clue as to where he had hidden the balance board. He was cracking himself up that he had fooled me! What a kid.

Bryan wrote me another poem...which I loved! I could get used to the poem bit because he is really good at it!

After everyone went to school/work, I got things done around the house I wanted to do and then, after doing Kindergarten carpool, my mom watched Courtney while Bryan took me to lunch and we did a bit of Costco shopping. Then, after teaching piano and school was over, my parents took us (and Don and Kathy) out to dinner at Iggy and we all came back to our house for cake and ice cream.

I got a digital picture frame from my parents, cards from a lot of people and a heart rate monitor from Bryan's parents. So I did pretty well for being so old. ;) It was a fun day and I was definitely spoiled. I love my family.

The board in the Wii Fit box:

Me and my flowers:

Courtney and me:

My flowers:

Getting ready for cake and ice cream (you can tell by the angle that Courtney took the picture.):