The Hundred Year Post

I am pretty sure it's been about a hundred years since my last post. That's what my family keeps telling me. This is not going to be an attempt to catch up, because I think that's one thing that's been holding me back. There is a LOT to catch up on. Another day maybe.

This is more a brain dump, cuz I think I need one. And it may turn out to be fairly entertaining, who knows.

Today is Halloween. I am not super into it this year. We spent zero money on costumes and instead dug through our old dress-up stuff (which is seriously lacking in the boy department) and raided some of DH's indian stuff so the boys could be indians. I then spent about 10 minutes with scissors, hot glue gun and sewing machine and called it a day. If I remember to take pictures tonight I will post them. I forgot on Wednesday when we had the ward party. Oops.

We carved pumpkins for FHE on Monday. They then proceeded to mold so by Wednesday they were completely disgusting. When I got up this morning, they had melted onto the table. Literally melted. I couldn't even pick them up to throw them away. I had to spoon their mush into the trash. There was liquid completely covering the table and it had seeped through the cracks onto the floor under the table. Some of the chairs were covered, too. Nice moldy pumpkin juice. So this will be the first year in EVER that we won't have jack-o-lanterns burning on Halloween. Still, it's pretty funny when you think about the whole mess.

 These are from Thursday:

This is from this morning. The first one is totally liquified. The other two were just complete mush.

To say a lot has been going on is just so way far beyond understatement that I can't do it. Instead I will list some of the goings on this past 2 weeks. Keep in mind this is just 2 weeks. The weeks before them have pretty much been as crazy, so I am not even going there.

Mom, my mom, Nana to my kids, went in for an easy-peasy gall bladder surgery. Yeah... I don't know how to write this without sounding like I am playing it down or over-dramatizing so I will just say it. She died. Really, I am not kidding.  DIED For three minutes. Fortunately, the shots of epinephrine and atrophine (i have no idea if that's the real name of that or how to spell it) combined with CPR brought her back. Saying I was scared just doesn't really encompass the feelings that coursed through me. But I'm not sure how to describe it so I will go with scared. She is doing really well now, considering all that. They were not able to finish the surgery. So she still has a troublesome gall bladder full of stones and now some broken ribs on top of that from the CPR. She also has a nifty little implant in her upper chest area that monitors her heart rhythm. If there are any pauses in beating or other funny stuff going on in there, it transmits to the doctor and they can monitor it.

They are going to try to just keep the gall bladder under control with diet instead of surgery for now. It was the gas they pumped into her belly for the surgery that caused her heart to stop. 5 minute code blue. She spent the week in the hospital but is home now. They were actually supposed to do another surgery on her today, to fix her morphine pump implant. It's not delivering medicine to the right place and needs to be corrected. Thankfully they decided to let her recover a bit more before doing that. We were all feeling VERY uneasy about putting her through another thing so close to, you know, her death.

She is a STRONG WOMAN.

So, you know, besides spending lots of time at the hospital and dealing with the mental weight of all that, there was still life going on.

I currently have two jobs. One is my daytime, regular hours job of care-giver to Jose and Anthony.

The other job is my photography business baby. I am trying to help it grow. It is actually very busy season right now. Like, super busy. Super duper busy. I created a Groupon, and it has been drawing in some business for me. Newborns mostly, which I love.

Then there are all my family mini sessions going on. Some dramatic things have happened with those. Like being kicked off of a location because the owners decided not to let people take pictures there any more. Understandable with the liability, but frustrating nonetheless. Being almost kicked off of another property, but it ended up ok. Being cursed at and told off by some rudey-tudey people at another location. They were seriously so crass and mean. We took the high road, though, and tried to just brush it off. But sheesh.

Besides the many hours of shooting, there are many many many more hours of editing that goes along with that. And uploading and emailing and printing, etc etc etc.

Then there is the online training class I am taking including the homework that comes with it. I can't even express how much I am learning through all of this--classes and shoots and edits, and all--and I am so grateful for it. I am going to make some major modifications to my business in 2015. Hopefully for the much better.

Then there is church callings (HELLO primary program!!), family stuff, two cars breaking down on pretty much the same day. Yep, SO FUN.

And can't laundry and dishes and dinner do THEMSELVES for just a while??

Here's a good part--our 20th anniversary is coming up on Monday!!!! Exciting things to come with that, but I will save that for another post.

You know, there's something to be said about a good brain dump. Thanks for listening. :)