Rainy Day

It has been incredibly rainy the last few days here.

My kids and Husband made the best of it by playing in the puddles and rain. Georgia and Tommy adopted my quirk of not liking water in my face, so they did not stay and play in the rain too long.Katherine LOVED playing outside in the rain, she was even wearing her nightgown the whole time.

This is the love of my life all soaking wet. I love that he is enough of a kid at heart to do silly things with the kids. Even though I think the neighbors might think we are crazy.

It was really really pouring down rain

Bed Rest

So, I have been on "bed rest" for quite a few weeks of this pregnancy. During that time I pretty much considered bed rest sitting down to watch TV a little more often than normal. I noticed contractions here and there, but they didn't really bother me. So then at my last dr. appointment, they sent me immediately to labor and delivery at the hospital. 3 previous pre-term babies, and I was dialated to a 3 and 50% effaced. CRAP, this again.

The dr. gave me a choice between Mag. or some blood pressure meds, both would stop labor. I knew Mag makes me vomit uncontrollably, so I picked the blood pressure meds.

Little did I know they should have said would you rather vomit uncontrollably or have a migraine so bad you would rather die. They both sound so nice, what would you choose???

After thinking I was seriously having some kind of brain annyerism, they finally took pity on me and gave me some more meds to fix my headache. They told me they were giving me stadol and phenegren. At that point they could have told me they were going to hit me with a hammer and I would not have cared.

Once they injected the meds I felt this weird thick sensation move through my body finally stopping in my head. The really crazy thing is the dreams! Very, very disturbing dreams. Have you ever had a dream so bad you can't even talk about it days later? I have one image in my head still, that is just haunting me.

After a really long night of this, and being woken up every 20 min for blood pressures, vital signs, and moving moniters. They let me go back home.

Let me just say I am SO incredibly thankful for some of the friends that I have that would take care of all three kids at the drop of a hat. I don't know what I would do if I was worried about my kids while all this was going on.

My mother-in-law flew in to save the day. I have been ordered on strict bedrest, and I will do anything to avoid going back to the hospital. So, here I lay.

Georgia gets stung by a wasp, and I lay here

Katherine gets a diaper change, but not by me, because I am in bed

Tommy wants to play on his scooter, so I watch from the window

They need help finding shoes and sunscreen, and I tell them from bed where to look

My MIL is incredible for taking over all my duties,

it is hard to let her, because I FEEL FINE!

I have tons of energy... sigh

I have a feeling I am going to be blogging a lot in the next few days>

Ready, ready, ready, ready...ready to run

So... I am running away... from North Carolina. Wishing I could completely run away from reality. I guess Utah is about as close as I can get to that. I have decided to go to Utah for a few months. I figure I am going to come back when I get called for a house on base. I will probably hold my name on the list for a month or so. That way I can stay at least a month.

I am putting all my stuff in storage and just hoping everything works out.

catch up

The last 3 1/2 months
1. Thanksgiving- After completely ruining the 2008 turkey I tried again, and I made the most awesome turkey EVER! We injected it with flavor and wrapped it in bacon. It took forever to cook but it was amazing. Thanksgiving is my favorite time to be around a lot of family, but this year I spent it with Dan and the kids. We also took thanksgiving dinner to some of the Marines on duty.

2. CHRISTMAS- We had a GREAT Christmas! We drove to Utah and got to see a lot of Aunts and Uncles, cousins and grandparents. We missed the Hoffmasters, but we did not miss the horrible-ness of Indiana during winter :) The cousins went sledding, and we opened presents almost every day we were there. It was really awesome, I am so blessed to have such a wonderful family.

3. CNN interview- I got interviewed by CNN... Even though I was embarrassed about crying it was a really cool experience and I am glad I did it.

4. New Years Eve- Dan and I were planning to go to his CO's house for a New Years party. I was a little worried because my period was late so I took a test to see if I was going to be drinking that night... Needless to say the test said I was destined to be the designated driver of the evening.
On our way to the party a car pulled in front of me, and I hit her going about 45 mph. She was belligerently drunk. Our car was towed away, but gratefully someone came from the party and came and picked up us and the kids. We were planning to go home, but they suggested we go to the party anyways. So we did, and we had a blast.

5. DEPLOYMENT- A few days after the New Year, Dan left for Afghanistan. He has now been gone a month and it has been incredibly challenging. I feel really lucky whenever I hear from him. The hardest part for me is to see how it is affecting the kids. I think it is the hardest on Tommy. When ever he is too happy, he will all the sudden get really sad and say "I wish daddy could be here". Sometimes he bottles everything up and just explodes and gets mad at me. Georgia has been acting out and challenging me. She doesn't really express her feelings but she REALLY has been testing her limits. I didn't think Katherine would notice at all, but I think she actually did regress a little. She is fine now, but...

6. Number 4- So as I alluded to earlier, I am pregnant... with number 4. We knew after Katherine was born that our family was not complete with 3 kids. We were thinking we would adopt a child a few years down the road. Well... Our plans changed when I got a positive pregnancy test. I have had a really hard time telling people, I can hardly wrap my mind around being 25 and having 4 children. I hate when I go to the store now with 3 kids and people make comments. Pretty soon I will be hugely pregnant walking through the store with 3 kids and people will just think I am bat-shit crazy.
I am really ok with having another kid in the family. Dealing with all the pregnancy stuff with Dan being gone is really a challenge. I have had some morning sickness, but the real evil has been the fatigue. I could sleep 16 hours a day or more. But my kids don't, I have to be up, I have to do some laundry. I can wear dirty sweats 6 days a week, but I have to have clean clothes for the kids.

7. COLLEGE- I truly think it is college that gets me pregnant. I have enrolled in college 4 times, coincidence that I have 4 kids??? I don't think so. So I am in college now. It is free as long as I stay full time. It is online, and I have about a year and a half until I graduate... The school I go to is really flexible with family schedules. This time I am determined to finish!

Well that's the last 3 1/2 months of my life... Hopefully I will get another post in before another 3 months goes by... Maybe some pictures too!

Man, I hope I get laid tonight

"Dan, my mom reads this!"

"Ok, is she aware we have three kids and are currently married?"

"...sigh... Ok, but you have to annouce you are ghost writing this."

(Kim reads the previous three sentances)

"DAAAAAN!"

HEY! I'm Kim's husband Dan and I am ghost writing this blog. Do not adjust your computer screens, you just read that. That just happened. Really.

So, Kim got really into blogging a few months back, but it has been a while since her last post, so I decided I should do it. Now, the bad news. I am not equipped with a vagina.

Why does that matter? I don't know. But I thought it best YOU know. If I did have one, that would be weird.

So, I went in to this diatribe on FiST duties, but that got boring and I deleted it. Check out NAVMC 3500.7 Artillery if you are interested. Anyhow, Kim hasn't been up to too much. The kids are good. My job has been extremely bogged down in admin stuff lately, so I could use a break.

So the baby has been getting in to stuff. Georgia has gotten past her monster phase. The more things change I suppose. Kim loves me. She just told me.

Well, now I see why I didn't start a blog. You people are getting this for free. That's crap. You all OWE ME!

Love,

8====>

Dan

P. S. Check you out some FOTC
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pY8jaGs7xJ0

News article

Today I ran across a news article that was picked up by newspapers across the country. There was a very graphic article about a Marine that was KIA. This article included a pretty graphic picture of 2 Marines taking care of him during his last moments. Their justification of running the picture was to show the reality of war.

Defense secretary Gates, and the family members of the Marine asked the associated press not to run the photo. But the AP Editors decided it was necessary.


The caption of the photo reads as follows:

In this photo taken Friday, Aug. 14, Lance Cpl. Joshua Bernard is tended to
by fellow U.S. Marines after being hit by a rocket propelled grenade during a
firefight against the Taliban in the village of Dahaneh in the Helmand province
of Afghanistan. Bernard was transported by helicopter to Camp Leatherneck where
he later died of his wounds.

My heart aches for the family. I know a journalist job is to take pictures and journal everything. But I think discretion needs to be used in what is published. I think it was incredibly disrespectful for them to run the photo.

I am not including a link, but if you want to see the article I am sure you can search it and find it.

In wars past photo journalism has played a role. There are pictures of us dropping the bomb on Hiroshima, Planting the flag at Iwo Jima, and pictures of the destruction at pearl harbor. So why is this one different to me?

I feel it is disrespectful to mass release a picture of such an intimate moment as this. Especially against the Families wishes, and against Secretary Gates wishes. I feel the picture maybe should have been archived if it was truly taken for historical documentation, but not necessarily released in such a public fashion.

I am very interested in other perspectives on this issue.

Dentist

I love my new dentist!!!

So I decided I was going to find a new dentist in town here in Jville. I LOVE my dentist in Virginia but it is time for me to take a big girl pill and be realistic about my time and find one in town. I asked around, called around, and got recommendations. I went into one dentist office in town Anderson and Slack. Everyone in town recommends this office, but I did not feel comfortable at all. I don't know why... But THEN I found :

Karen J. Armstrong, D.M.D.
Bethany K. Tant, D.D.S.
General Dentistry
(910) 346-5600

I have never been so impressed in my life!! First you drive up to this cute little house looking thing. At first I thought it was a little odd and I was slightly worried that it would be a dentist chair set up in someones living room. I was totally wrong but it is a very cute place :)

So then I walk in it is the largest most inviting, professional waiting room I have ever seen! When you walk in to the right is more of a traditional waiting area and then to the left was an area for children with video games, and a train table and movies. I loved it because I was actually ok with letting my kids play without annoying the adults in the other side of the waiting room. They had coffee and tea, and even a little table to sit at. All that in addition the the professional part of the waiting room.

The receptionist was incredibly friendly. She even called me at 8:15 because I thought my consultation was at 9:00, but it was really at 8am! They were still willing to fit me in at 9 for my consultation, which I was SO happy about.

So I had a fabulous consultation, they were very friendly and knowledgeable. I got to see before and after pictures of procedures in their waiting room. I definitely decided that I was ok with bringing my family here for their cleanings.

I know I am going on and on but I was really happy :) during my kids cleanings the hygienists were amazing. I wish I had gotten their names. The one who got Georgia was incredibly patient and actually got to clean her teeth. (She has been to 3 other dentists with no luck) Georgia was then so excited to get a prize from the little prize Machine they have.

Tommy did amazing as always. His hygienist was wonderful as well. He is starting to get his adult teeth in and is expected to start loosing teeth soon!


When I heard Tommy was getting his adult teeth I started to get very nostalgic. He is in kindergarten, loosing teeth... He is growing up so fast on me. It feels like he was just born... and now he is such a big boy! So much has changed in the last 5 years.