Better Late Than Never....

...for a birthday party! Little Bit's birthday party had to be postponed for about 3 weeks because of the unfortunate incident leading to the hot pink cast. Apparently inflatable bounce houses casts don't mix! I'll be honest, we probably could have gotten away with canceling the whole thing and she would have never known the difference. But we went ahead and got a giant princess cake and carried on. She jumped and ran around like a maniac with 12 of her friends. Thankfully she didn't re-break her arm. But she did manage to act like a turd some and cry and pout at her own party. Seesh. And so goes the drama of a 4 year old!

I went a little overboard on the cake size. I wanted to make sure I had leftovers. Well i have leftovers for a week and I even gave some away!

Every little thing gonna be alright...

If you were to ask Little Bit what my favorite song is, she would triumphantly shout "Three Little Birds!" It's not. But hey I'll go with it. Everyone can use a little Bob Marley in their lives (in more ways than one, HA!). I do love that song and we jam to it quite frequently. Especially strolling through the Walmarts because that place sucks the life out of you.

So anyway, that Rastafarian got it right. Every little thing IS gonna be alright. I FINALLY got a call from my plastic surgeon, actually he had to leave me a message. And in not so many words he said "this my message to you-ou-ou." (wow, i'm totally on a roll!) No really he said that the lymph nodes that the general surgeon removed and the margins that he removed were cancer FREE! I've actually listened to that message like 10 times now. He's a strange dude. One of those people who leaves awkward pauses in the middle of a conversation so you aren't quite sure if he's finished talking, just thinking, or pausing for dramatic effect. But despite the oddness he's an excellent doctor and my face is pretty much going to be scarless. He also fixed up Jackie the Ripper, I mean my general surgeon's scar on my neck because it bothered him. If I had a lot of money I'd go to him in a heart beat and say, "work your magic!"

So things are on the up and up. In the middle of all the madness, Steven got a new job. He'll be starting as an in house tax guy for a large corporation right after tax season. Maybe it's now starting to rain good things. He hadn't been looking for a new job, this one just kind of found him.

Thursday marks the great cast removal! My girl has been such a trooper with that cast. Once aunt Laura fixed her up with some tape few weeks ago she hasn't complained one single time. So hopefully this Spring we'll be back to our regularly scheduled program of normal craziness.

Through all of this unpleasantness though I was reminded time and time again how lucky I am to have such an amazing husband, little girl, mom, friends, family, cyber friends, neighbors, co-workers, you name it. I have NEVER been one to keep how I feel or my drama bottled in. I share it all with my small world. I figure why suffer alone and on the other hand why just share your joys? To everyone I am grateful. I'm grateful for all of the thoughts, prayers, well wishes, food (my friends seriously know the way to my heart, HA!) flowers, cards, my uncle for offering to shave his head if things didn't turn out the way I had hoped, and just listening.

Love Me.

So now I'm off to party Bob Marley style! Kidding mother.

Top o the Morning

Here are some fun facts about leprechauns. A leprechaun's principal occupation is that of a shoemaker. Hence, the tapping sound you may hear when one is in the vicinity. According to legend, the little suckers are aloof and unfriendly, and live alone. They keep a secret a pot o gold with them at all times. If you are lucky enough to catch one, he can be forced (but you have to threaten him with bodily violence) to reveal the whereabouts of his gold. BUT you must keep your eyes on him AT ALL TIMES. If you look a way, even for a second, he'll vanish along with the hold. AND the craziest thing about leprechauns. They are major pranksters. Case in point:

Can you believe the little devil TPed Soph's room while she was sleeping!!! Her exact words upon waking up were, "This is UNBELIEVEABLE!" And "we are NEVER going to be able to get that toilet paper off the fan." According to Little Bit, the leprechaun had entered her room searching for gold. When he didn't find any, he got ticked off and "trashed the place." Pesky leprechauns. Next year we'll be making a trap.

On the Eve of Four

Four years ago today we got the news that you would be gracing us with your presence the following day. That night I had my first ever panic attack. I felt my chest tighten. My airways constricted and I began hyperventilating. I knew that in less than 24 hours life as we knew it would never ever be the same. In those few minutes that I was sure I was going to die and Steven had the phone in his hand ready to call 911, a million things went through my head. From the absurd like, "what if the doctors are wrong and you turn out to be a boy?" To the more profound, "will me we make good parents?" The questions and the unknown were a lot to bare.

The next morning came. And at 12:05 pm you came screaming into the world. In some ways you haven't stopped since that minute! And life as we know it did change. From 12:05 pm on March 16, 2006, it was as though someone finally pushed our "go" button. Apparently, that "go" button doesn't come with a companion "stop" button.

We can't imagine you stopping. Just yesterday we were laughing with Grammy and PapPap about how we couldn't really wrap our heads around a time when you didn't talk. Seems as though you've always been voicing your opinion on everything.

You are so many things to us. Our princess who longs to live in a castle and marry a prince. Our tough cookie who can walk around with a broken arm for a week. Our little girl who likes nothing more than crawling into our bed a 2am and family movie nights. Our adventurous one who can dive off diving boards and climb rock walls. Our opinionated one who says she's rather die than eat a fish eyeball or go to church. And our only one who can act spoiled and bossy.

You are so many things at once. And tomorrow you will be four. For four years we have watched you grow and turn into a little kid. No longer a baby but a beautiful strong willed little girl. I will never worry about you getting lost in the shuffle of this world. You will always make yourself heard and I know that you will always come up swinging (and probably shouting obscenities). You have your daddy's loyalty. My devil-may-care attitude. And you are your own biggest fan.

You are going to be just fine in life. So happy birthday my sweet princess. And I've got news for you. Your prince has been here the whole time :)

Almost 10 on Tuesday

1. Our girl is on "vacation" at Grammy and PapPap's for the week. I miss her terribly. Maybe it's because of the whole surgery thing going down on Thursdays that's got me all sentimental. Now I can guarantee you that she isn't missing us. In fact when I talked to her was on her way to go visit her great grandma and ride her "cool chair" that goes up the stairs (a la the Gremlins).

2. So here's the deal for Thursday since a lot people have been asking. I check in at nuclear medicine at 7:30 where they will inject the area around my ear with some lovely radioactive dye. This is for the sentinel lymph node biopsy. Then I set around for a few hours and let the dye work its magic. Around 11am I get put under. The general surgeon will use a geiger counter type device to find the closest lymph node and surgically remove it and ship it off for testing. A plastic surgeon will come in a remove about 1 cm of tissue around my ear where the mole called home. Then hopefully I'm finished and can put all of this behind me :) If that lymph node comes back with cancer I am going to be pissed.

3. We have a little get-away planned for an after tax season/my birthday celebration. We are going to load up and head to Columbus and spend a night or two at an indoor water park called Ft. Rapids. Hopefully I can squeeze in dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and a stop at the outlets in Jeffersonville.

4. I went to a meeting this evening about signing up Little Bit for pre-k. I can't believe my baby is going to be four next week AND starting pre-k next year. After that is kindergarten! Lord help me.

5. I finally located the paint color I have in mind for Soph's room. Click here to check it out! This particular color is a Walmart paint. Has anyone bought paint at the Walmarts? I'm sure it's fine and probably cheaper!

6. So I signed back up for Netflix and I'm on a documentary kick. We watched Food Inc. the other night. GAG A MAGGOT. Actually, I think I might take my chance with some maggots. Up next is The Cove which just won an Oscar and Born into Brothels.

7. Ok gotta cut this short...Lost is coming on and it's a Ben episode. His are usually pretty darn good!

But here's one of my girl being silly.

The Broken Arm Saga

So completely ignore that previous post. I guess I had been operating on the "no news is good news" state of mind when I hadn't heard back from the radiologist about Soph's arm on Tuesday. Turns out, there was a failure to communicate! Normally, once the urgent care takes x-rays and sends them on to a radiologist to look at, the radiologist's office faxes a report back to the urgent care and then mails the report. Well in our case that fax never got sent! So it wasn't until THURSDAY that the snail mail delivered the original report to urgent care and we found out that yes in deedy do, we have a fractured arm. Luckily an hour later we were able to get into an orthopedist's office. And an hour after that we had a hot pink cast!

Can you believe that we let our girl walk around with a broken arm for a freaking week!? Can you believe that this girl is tough enough to walk around with a broken arm for a week!? She is one tough cookie! And I'm sorry but that's the cutest cast I have ever seen!

It's not a bad fracture. If she were older it wouldn't have even been casted. But this way she isn't restricted. Except for gymnastics. And her birthday party. :( You can't jump in inflatables with a cast on your arm. You might knock another kid out! So those are on hold for awhile.

And luckily she only has to wear it for 3 weeks. So it could be worse. It could be six weeks. It could be a cast up to her elbow. And it could be the middle of July and 90 degrees!

So this one goes down in the record book. Under the "broken bone category." The "my parents didn't believe me" category. The "doctors SUCK" category. And the "my chronically ill dog obviously wasn't that sick if she can break my arm" category.

Description of Injury

So Monday I took one Sophia B. Carr to the Urgent Care for an injury that happened on Friday evening. (i know good mom right?) I had all but decided NOT to take her (I know good mom right?) until I got a call around noon from day care telling me that Sophie had screamed bloody murder when a kid accidentally grabbed her right arm. So we went. And we waited. And finally it all went down like this:

Super nice Doctor: So do you want to tell me how you got hurt?

Little Bit: (Speaking 90 miles an hour) Wellllll.....I was runnin' and Stella was chasing me and I ran into mommy and daddy's room, and Stella knocked me down, and I crashed into the wall and hurted my arm.

AND Stella is our puppy. We use to have Oscar but he's up in heaven so now we have Stella.

Super nice Doctor: Oh gosh I'm sorry to hear that.

Little Bit: Yeah, it happens.

And there you have it Doc. I bet you didn't know you were going to learn a very important life lesson when you went to work this morning.

Turns out that I wasn't too bad of a mom. No broken bones!

On why I hate the snow...

These were taken awhile back and I'm pretty sure that I posted them on facebook but I thought that I would post them here as well.

Notice that I'm not in any of these pictures. That's because I quit hanging out in the snow many moons ago. There was a time (maybe a few years in high school and college) that I thought I needed to be a great skier. Scratch that, I wanted K2 skis, a cool Columbia coat, and cute black tight ski pants.

Now I realize how insane it is to sit on a ski lift, at night, with the wind ripping your face off, while your fingers get frostbitten. Cute or not, it ain't worth it. And I bet I couldn't get those tight ski pants on if I greased myself down in Crisco! And I never became a great skier. I sucked! I had to talk to myself the entire way down the mountain: "If you want to go left, put your weight on your right." "Now to go right, put your weight on your left."

In fact, the last time we went skiing was probably 7 years ago when we were engaged. We went to Seven Springs with Steven's sister and his cousin. 5 minutes after exiting the car Steven I had already gotten into an argument. And less than an hour into that little trip, my skis were kicked to the curb and I sat inside the lodge by the fire. Thus ending my skiing career.

It pains Steven that tax season coincides with ski season. That is perhaps the one good side of tax season. Otherwise, he'd be dragging me around from one ski resort to the next.

I think I'll let these two share the winter sport activities together. While I watch from afar and take pictures or hang out at the bar.