51 weeks of shopping remain for Christmas 07

Current mood: lethargic

Sorry about the gap since the last blog. I've been sick with an upper respiratory infection since last Friday and with our friends' wedding and Christmas, I've been too busy to dedicate much time at all to journaling our week.

We'll start with Christmas Eve. We went to church in the morning and the service was rockin. The worship hall was packed and the music was awesome. Gary really brought home a great sermon. The girls had stayed the night at Nana and Papaws so they missed the children's festivities in Tiny Town. After church we did some last minute shopping at Wal-Mart and picked the girls up. We collaborated in the afternoon to make my mom's special coffee cake. For it being our first attempt, I think we hit it out of the park. We then went to my parents house for the big family thing. We had munchies and the kids opened their presents and ran around like crazy. Afterward, we all went to see "Charlotte's Web" which Lexi loved. We then returned home and, once the kids were in bed, Stefan and I had a wrapping party.

Christmas day. It was a good day. My parents came over to watch the girls open their presents in the morning and to partake of the infamous coffee cake. Judging by their reaction, I think we did a good job. I did not have a voice at first and felt pretty cruddy. Around noon my parents took off for my sister's house and we spent the rest of the day putting toys together and watching Lexi play with them all. Abby had a couple of firsts. She ate in her high chair and also had her first biter biscuit. Here's a pic.




Lexi had fun opening her presents and Abby's too.




The rest of the week, Stefan worked like crazy on his newest and biggest client while I tried to nurse myself back to health and take care of the kiddies.

In more Abby news...she cut her first tooth yesterday and has graduated to the next car seat because she outgrew the length of her infant carrier.

A Season of Miracles

Current mood: happy

A while ago, the pastor at my church posted on his blog links to other church members' blogs. I clicked on them all just to see if I knew the people, but one really caught my attention. It was the blog of a woman and her husband and their experience with an open adoption. This intrigued me. I became an avid reader. I guess part of the reason I was so enthralled with it is that my oldest sister is adopted and, after two years of trying to conceive our second child, adoption was beginning to creep its way into me and Stefan's conversations.

I read her story. It was heartbreaking to read of their attempt at a previous adoption that fell through and to sense the apprehension in her writing of their second attempt. Well, at the beginning of this month, their son was born in Salt Lake City, Utah five weeks early. He has had a bit of a struggle with being able to feed and the amounts that he was expected to tolerate, but after weeks of his stay in the hospital, they are coming home...just in time for Christmas! That's a double whammy! What a blessing.

In other news, some friends of ours, Dawn and Billy, who have been engaged for quite some time have finally decided to tie the knot. Their wedding will be on Saturday and Stefan and I are both in the wedding party. We are very happy for them. This news is somewhat bittersweet because a medical crisis was at the core of their decision to push forward with it now but we knew that they would get married some day so whats the point of waiting any longer? We pray that everything will work out for these two and that they have a long and happy future together.

This truly is a season of miracles and we are so happy for the Popps and the (soon to be) Rohdes.

Star Student Poster

This morning, we all got together to do Lexi's "Star Student" poster. I whipped out my scrapbooking supplies and we went to town. Overall, I think Lexi was satisfied with the outcome.

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Rudolph the Red-Eyed Reindeer, Hanukkah, and my puddly, piddly, poodle
Current mood: sympathetic

Today was such an eventful day, I don't know where to start.

Lexi's Holiday Program was today. Let's be honest, it was a Christmas program that ironically was on the first day of Hanukkah. Anyway, when we got there the kids were on the playground getting fitted with reindeer antlers and blinking reindeer noses. Stefan and I got seats next to the door. When the kids came in, Lexi acted pretty shy.



This was the beginning of the end. The chin started to tremble and the tears began. I guess it was due to these factors:
1) She was taken aback at the amount of people there.
2) She is still sick and wasn't feeling well.
3) She wanted Sparkly (the beanie baby Stefan and I brought home from our trip to Texas)

When she got to her mark on the floor, she had a meltdown.



Believe it or not, this was not the worst case of stage fright. At this point a boy was escorted away by his mommy because he was heaving. Yum I know.

The teacher moved her to the side. I noticed her mouth the words teddy bear and suggested Stefan get Sparkly from her backpack. He discretely had the bear passed to her and she sulked as the rest of the class performed "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer", "The Chubby Little Snowman", and "Jingle Bells."



Afterward, Lexi had five apple slices. Why 5? In Lexi's words, "Because I'm five!" She and I did a craft sticking little foam decorations on a white foam candy cane. We also made reindeer food with oats and glitter to sprinkle on the front lawn on Christmas Eve to attract the reindeer to our house. Lexi also found out that next week she will be the star student in her class. She has to make a poster with some pictures of her on it. Usually the teacher sends home the poster on Monday to be returned on Tuesday, but she gave Lexi extra time because she knows how creative and precise Lexi is. I don't know WHERE she gets this from. Anyway, she also gets to bring in various things throughout the week to show to the class. On Friday, Stefan and I will be able to join her for lunch. That'll be nice. At this point, all was good with Lexi. Here is a picture of her with her teacher, Mrs. Eastridge taken at Lexi's request.




We left so that she could celebrate the first day of Hanukkah with Daddy. She opened a present from her Aunts Sunny and Arlene. They got her a Dora Talking Cash Register. She loved it!!!!! She wanted to play with it right away but we wanted to take a picture for Sunny and Arlene. She didn't want a picture she wanted her toy so she was being stubborn with the smiles. The only half smile she was able to muster was when I told her to say, "Daddy has a stinky butt." Hey whatever works. I plead the fifth on if this is true or not.



Onto Cassi news, I heard from the vet and she said that what Cassi experienced the last couple of days were more likely seizures. Seizures and Vestibular Disease have common symptoms but Vestibular Disease episodes do not resolve themselves quickly like these two did. For now we'll wait for the next episode. When that occurs (depending on the severity) we'll discuss medication (phenobarbitol (sp?)) or "other courses of action." She said that these episodes do not concern her so much. But she did say that when Cassi had her episode in October that it was one of the worst she has seen and that she didn't expect Cassi to recover from that. Hummmm.....

If we took a holiday - just some time to celebrate...(Madonna circa 1983 man I'm old)

Current mood: indescribable

Well, I can officially say that the semester is over since the grades have been posted. I ended up with an A in linguistics and a B in Spanish. I was a bit surprised. In fact, I expected the grades to be reversed but I'll take what I get.

Today is Lexi's Holiday program at school so stay tuned for pics and videos of it. Last night she was coughing and running a fever so I wasn't sure she was going to be able to go. I doctored her up with Vicks 44 for the cough and children's Tylenol for the fever. Thankfully, this morning she felt considerably cooler but yet slightly feverish. I decided to take the chance and send her to school. Normally I wouldn't do this, but she has been looking forward and rehearsing for this program all month. She would have been heart broken if I said that she had to stay home!

Is there a (dog) doc in the house?

Current mood: anxious

Those of you who loyally read my blog know that my eldest pooch, Cassi, came upon some ruff (pun intended) times a couple months ago. It turns out that she had vestibular disease. The past two months she has been somewhat normal although slow partially because she is 9 years old, partially because of her bad knees, and partially because of the lasting symptoms of the disease.

The last two days, she has given me pretty good scares again. Yesterday, when I woke up, she was splayed out on the bathroom floor with her head tilted all the way over and was snorting like she couldn't breath. I thought that was the end for her. However, about 30 minutes later she was fine. Today, when she woke up she was fine. So I carried her downstairs and let her outside to do her doo - again she was fine. I went to feed the dogs (Lou and Brandi in their respective crates and Cassi free in the room) and no sooner did I put her food down and she tried to take the first bite it was like someone grabbed her in a headlock and wrestled her over. Her head was tilted so far that it was forcing her to do barrel rolls. I was mortified.

I got on the phone and called the vet. She's not in the office today. But while I was on the phone, Cassi stood up and it looked like she shook it off. She ate her breakfast, lapped some water from her dish, and walked around like nothing was wrong. The nice receptionist on the phone offered to make her an appointment for tomorrow, but I told her that I don't want to spend the money on the office visit if Cassi is going to be asymptomatic by the time I get there. My main purpose in calling was, if this is going to be something that afflicts her everyday the way it has, what quality of life does she have?

I guess I was wanting to pawn the decision off on someone else. I struggle with euthanasia because this is my first dog that I call the shots for and I just don't know where the line between murder and humanity lies. I mean this only seems to affect her 30 minutes per day at most. Is it easier for me because I won't have to watch it? Or is it what is best for dear Cassi?

If anyone knows a vet and wouldn't mind asking, please ask them what their opinion is in this matter. I would greatly appreciate it.

Lexi strikes again

Current mood: amused

Lexi loves driving around and looking at all the Christmas lights this time of year (I do, too). Well, this year she became curious about what the nativities were all about so I explained that they are recreations of the day the Baby Jesus was born. She never mentioned anything else about it...until today.

Stefan told me that when he was driving Lexi to school, she saw a nativity and said that when you see one, you need to scream "JESUS!!!" I laughed not knowing where she got this idea from. When we picked her up from school, I was curious about this so I screamed (with the windows up) "JESUS" and Lexi laughed. She corrected me and said that we have to count to three first. There are three nativities on the way to her school so this should be entertaining for awhile.

Everyone needs a little chaos

Everyone needs a little chaos
Current mood: tired

Well, we're back from our quick trip to College Station, TX for Stefan's cousin's wedding. It was so beautiful and we are glad that we went. We were able to see people that we haven't seen for awhile and Stefan got his 88 year old Great Aunt tipsy which was pretty funny.The girls spent the weekend with Grandma and Grandpa and we got great reports. It kind of makes me wonder whose kids they were watching, because I know that mine aren't as well-behaved as they claimed they were. Just kidding.We brought home beanie babies for the girls from the Houston airport. Lexi loves hers. It is red with the state of Texas on it's belly and says Texas across it and has a cowboy boot on one of its feet. She named it Sparkly and, without our knowledge, took it to school in her backpack. She is completely unseparable from the thing.

Come to find out we missed a pretty good sermon at church. Keep in mind our church is run by white rednecks about our age. They decided to dress up and perform a rap song about our Christmas Eve services. The lead pastor even did the worm in the town gazebo! It's worth checking out to see why they say white men can't dance!



While on the trip I tried to study for my English final which is tomorrow. I didn't get much done, but I think that I'll be okay. This time tomorrow I will be free from school stress until after the first of the year. I can't wait!!!

New link for Corey's report

It has been brought to my attention that I posted a dead link for Corey's report. Try this

Corey's big report

Current mood: good

My nephew, Corey, is a superstar. He has been taking Choi Kwan Do (sp?) since the beginning of the year. He liked it so much that he made a three year commitment and is in an elite club whose name slips my mind. His dad (and my bro-in-law) is also taking lessons and remains a couple of belts behind his masterful son (trust me he hears about this, too).

Recently, Corey did a book report on Choi Kwan Do and instead of reading off a piece of paper, he put on a demonstration for his class. His Choi Kwan Do studio featured him on their website here. We're all so proud of him!!!

Did someone say stress?

Current mood: busy

When Lexi was a baby and a toddler, I used to sing a song to her as I tucked her in at night. I would sing it every night and every night she would giggle as I sang it and tucked her in. Recently, she started asking for the "Tuck Song" again. I'm glad that she remembers stuff like this. I didn't realize how much I have actually done stuff like this for both Lexi and Abby. In fact, I made up a song with Abby's name in it. I didn't realize how much I actually sing it until recently. She loves it and it makes her smile every time I sing it no matter what is bothering her at the time. I hope that she remembers it years from now like Lexi remembers the Tuck Song.

So, today was the last official day of classes for the Fall semester of 2006. I'm so relieved but the next few days are going to be absolute chaos. I have been down with a cold for the last couple of days. I switched medicine last night and the new stuff seems to be working much better than the old stuff. All the while I've been trying to do my best to prepare for my Spanish final that is tomorrow. I say try my best because I don't think there is really a way to study for it. The professor is going to give a passage that I have to answer questions on and then I'll have to write a 300 word essay. Whatever.

Friday, I get to do all the prep work for our whirlwind trip to Texas for Stefan's cousin's wedding. Saturday morning, we will fly to Houston, rent a car, and drive the rest of the way to College Station. The wedding is Saturday afternoon. We'll stay the night Saturday night and then do the reverse trip Sunday afternoon. Meanwhile, I need to be studying for my English final which will take place on Tuesday.

Tell me again....why do I put myself through all this?

Bottle junky, superb dinner, and ChristmaHannuKwanzaaKah
Current mood: contemplative

My baby is a bottle junky. Poor little Abigail, she just can't help herself. She sees a bottle and her eyes light up. I came home from school on Thursday and Stefan had cooked a wonderful roast for us for lunch. We settled Abby into her Bumbo seat on the table so she could be a part of this family feast. One look at my Fruit 2 O bottle and she was captivated. She reached and stretched her chubby little arms trying her best to seize the bottle that she thought belonged to her. I laughed and teased her a few times raising the bottle to my lips just to see the desperation on her face. Finally, I tipped the bottle in her direction and she grasped it before I could blink and put it to her mouth. This gave Stefan and me a good chuckle.



For the past couple of days, it's just been us girls in the Lewitt house. Stefan left for work on Friday to stay the night at his parents house so that his dad could drive him to the airport early Saturday to catch a flight first thing in the morning to Indy. The purpose of this trip is load a U-Haul for his brother to move his belongings here to the ATL where he will reside in March. We're all excited about that. I think his parents are bursting at the seams with excitement. Meanwhile, I have a newfound respect for single moms. Being alone with the girls is tiresome. I'm constantly being pulled in different directions to tend to the needs of one or the other. For that reason, I needed a break.

I took the opportunity to take my inlaws up on a babysitting offer and invited my friend of 14 years to join me for a girls dinner at the Melting Pot - a dinner we've been meaning to do since our birthdays that fell in May and July. What a nice treat! Since she had her son a year ago and with the arrival of Abby, we haven't been able to get together a fraction of what we have been used to over the years. Our Thursday night TV nights are a distant memory. The trade off is great (the kids) but we needed this time together. It was great. We discussed the possibility of a girls weekend to the mountains in the near future but we'll have to see if those plans come to fruition. It would be nice, though.

On the topic of discussion at dinner was the neuterizing (yes I just created a new verb) of the end-of-the-year holidays. How Christmas, Kwanza, and Hannukah have all been lumped into "The Holdays." My husband's family is Jewish and I can see their point that Hannukah doesn't gain half the attention of the others, but what is the happy medium. This "Happy Holidays" stuff crawls on my nerves.

This has been an issue on the radio lately with broadcasters asking questions like: "If a store refused to say Merry Christmas, would this affect your decision to shop there?"

Me personally, I don't know. I think each holiday should be respected in it's own right. I don't see that saying "Merry Christmas" is desrespectful to people of other religions especially if it is Christmas when they are saying it. Just like if some told me during Hannukah, "Happy Hannukah" I would see it as their way of saying "Have a Good Day." I don't know much about Kwanzaa, but I think the same applies. The person saying it is well-meaning and is just in the spirit of the season. But I think that if you lump everything under the umbrella of "Happy Holidays" that each observance loses a piece of its significance. There is a retailer (whose name has slipped my mind) who has an ad campaign that states, "Merry ChristmaHannuKwanzaaKah." In fact, if you google this term it comes up with 336 results. Is this the solution? Besides the fact of being outright difficult to say, I don't think it is.So, why can't we say "Merry Christmas" during the Christmas Season, "Happy Hannukah" during Hannukah, and "Happy Kwanzaa" during Kwanzaa? That way, each holiday is respected in its own right.

End rant. As Dr. Phil would say, "Save your emails." I know this is a touchy subject, but it hits close to home here and I just wanted to get my thoughts out.