Blaaggkk!

That's how I feel about drinking the barium solution for my CT scan. Just the thought makes me want to puke! I hope I don't have to do that again.

Last night I enjoyed an evening of wine and water with my friend, Mylitta. We sat in her hot tub and enjoyed each other's company while catching up on our lives. We haven't spent any real time together for quite a while (other than between services at church) so it was nice to relax and chat.

Besides the CT scan my day is being filled with preparations for out trip up north tomorrow. This will hopefully be a relaxing vacation. I need to finish the laundry and run some errands so I'd better get off this computer!

More surgery

Oh my gosh, I hate having surgery and I really have it way too often. I am scheduled to have exploratory surgery on July 31st to see what is causing the pain in my right side. I've had this pain for almost a year, off and on. Nothing seems to make it better and I can't really determine what makes it worse. When they were looking at my ovaries via CT scan they noticed a spot on my liver which may be a hemangioma (a wad of blood vessels) which is no big deal. They've now done 3 different diagnostic tests and still can't decide if that is what it is. I am having another CT scan tomorrow to see if it's grown in the past 4 months. When the OB/GYN does my surgery she'll also check out the spot on my liver to see if she can tell what it is.

I did get some good news though. In the time span of one month I've gone from pre-menopausal to post-menopausal. The OB doc says that when hormone levels get to where mine are they rarely go back so since I missed my cycle this month she says I should consider myself done with perimenopause! I guess this is pretty rare, except in cases of early menopause like mine. Now, as for the night sweats/hot flashes, I could continue to have them, although they haven't been as bad the past couple of weeks. We discussed Hormone Replacement Therapy and if the sweats/flashes get worse I'll go ahead and try that. It seems that the bad risks from HRT are really aimed at women over 65 who have been on hormones for more than 5 years. Since I'm 20 years away from that and she thinks I probably only need to be on HRT for a year the risks are very low for me.

I need to run to the hospital and get the barium for my CT scan tomorrow, get the oil changed on my car and the tires rotated, so all will be done when we leave again on Saturday. Guess I'd better get out of the house!

We're back from Wash. DC/NYC!

OUR TRIP (The condensed version)



We had a blast visiting Washington DC and NYC! I know I'm exhausted from all the site seeing, but it was so worth it! On the first day we went to see the Arlington National Cemetery. Very moving, but don't know that I want to be buried there. This is part of the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. We also visited the Women in Military Service Memorial located at Arlington.






Then we walked across the bridge to the Lincoln Memorial. We also saw the Washington monument which is on the opposite side of the mall.






We visited the Vietnam,Korean and WW II memorials. This is a great view of the WW Memorial









Next was a great tour of the Capital, hosted by Sen. Hatch's office. This is a view of the ceiling of the rotunda, where Presidents are laid for viewing after they die.











The next day we went to NYC with a friend and her two daughters. We actually stayed in Jersey City, in the Hyatt, which had a wonderful view of the city. Our first stop was the World Trade Center. Very sobering. It is, however, amazing that only the actual site of the WTC buildings still looks destroyed. All of the surrounding buildings, which were also terribly damaged in the attack, have now been restored.




Our next visit was to the Empire State building; long lines but a nice view of the city. We also went to Times Square, which the Chelsea loved. We also went to see the musical "Mamma Mia!" It was a fun show to watch, with the story based on songs from ABBA, an '80's pop group. You can see the advertisement in the lower left of this photo. Later we took a horse and buggy ride around Central Park. It is such a beautiful area right in the middle of all the chaos which is NYC!





We took a boat trip out to Liberty Island and saw the Statue of Liberty. You can no longer go inside the statue due to security reasons.











We also went to the Washington National Cathedral. What a beautiful church! When we got there they were having a noon service and I wanted to take communion, but since I wasn't there for the whole service decided against it. The church and the grounds are so amazing! I took this photo of the Last Supper and plan on enlarging it to 11 X 14, framing it and putting it in my dining room.











Our last tourist stop on this trip was to the Air Force Memorial. What a beautiful design. It represents the plumes from the AF Thunderbirds when they are doing their demonstrations. If you've ever seen the Thunderbirds perform at an Air Show you'll know just what I mean.














I also loved the statues of the Air Force Honor Guard. Since I am still a member of the Honor Guard here it meant a lot to me. As my friend pointed out, of all the different things they could have commemorated at this site they chose the Honor Guard. I plan on enlarging this photo, framing it, and giving it to the local Honor Guard flight.









This was definitely a trip of a lifetime, one of many we've been fortunate to go on! I can't wait to print out all my photos and get started on a scrapbook of this trip. All this was made possible by our friends who put us up while we were there. Thanks so much Nasima and girls, and the Kepharts! Mary and Chelsea

We've been busy!

On Wednesday Chelsea and I left to go to Cedar City for the Utah Summer Games. We drove down with two mom's and 3 other girls so the SUV we were riding is was more than full! We got a condo in Brian Head to stay in, and the best part was that it was free! That saved us a big chunk of change because the hotels are extremely expensive during the Games because people usually book a year in advance.

Chelsea's team lost their first game 1-0. They won their second game 2-0 and lost their third game 1-0, which meant they were out of the running for a medal. We went to the Opening ceremonies on Thursday and were part of a new Guinness Book of World Records record. We were the largest group ever to play "Simon Says". It was fun and the fireworks were fantastic!

We got home yesterday and as I was checking my email I saw that I had won and Ice Cream Social for my whole neighborhood! I had submitted an essay on my neighbors and why we deserved to have an Ice Cream Social and Dreyers picked my entry. I will get a "Party in a box" which includes invitations, bowls, spoons, scoops, napkins, coupons for free ice cream for my neighbors, % off coupons and on top of all that they are Fed Ex-ing 12 of the 2 qt. ice cream containers packed in coolers with dry ice! I am so excited because I really do have great neighbors. I am going to invite about 15 families and the fire fighters who will be on duty that night, as well as the local police officers. I am going to the city to see if I can close off my street. It is a dead end anyway so I'm sure they won't mind! We are going to have music and hopefully loads of fun!

I went to the Dr. on Monday to check out my night sweats and it is most likely my hormones. They did blood tests and my levels are all showing that I should be post-menopausal, but I can tell you my body doesn't know that. My hormones are really out of whack! I have an appt. in 2 weeks with an OB/GYN as a follow-up for the pains I've been having on my right side so maybe all of this is related. So we'll see.

We got notified that we will get to tour the US Capitol while we are in Wash DC but couldn't get into the White House. Oh well, we'll at least walk by and take photos!

I think that's enough info for now!

My daughter is a college student!

Or at least she was! We just got paperwork today that said WSU has awarded her 4 college credits for her Principles of Engineering course! Not too bad for a 9th grader! Typically you can't do concurrent enrollment until 11th grade but they made an exception because this course is often taken by 11th or 12th graders and the school made the argument that if the older kids can get college credit for this course why can't the younger kids? It's the same course taught by the same teachers, with the same requirements. Guess it worked! And the best part is it didn't cost me anything.

Chelsea got back from Band Camp on Thursday and they had a blast as usual.


This is the group of kids she hung around with. She didn't have any photos of them actually playing their instruments although she did say they practiced around 6 hours a day. I went to the final concert and they sounded pretty good so they must've actually played for a few hours a day! I'm just glad she had fun and isn't too cool to do these sorts of things! And yes, I did notice there are 4 boys and 4 girls!





Friday we went to a Scrapbook conference and met up with Cindy, Savannah, and Paxton. The girls hung out in the hotel room and the pool and Cindy and I shopped and cropped. I didn't do too much shopping or even cropping but the projects we did were cute and fun and I am motivated to get some cropping done tonight!

Well, I want to get the paper read before I go pick up Chelsea from a sleepover and head off to church! Later!

Home alone

Well, Chelsea left for band camp on Monday, so I'm home alone until Thursday evening when I go to pick her up and watch their final band concert.

After dropping her at the school on Monday I went and got her truck registered. She is now the official owner, with her name and mine on the registration and title! After that I took the truck, loaded with stuff for the church yard sale and dropped off tons of stuff. Then the truck wouldn't start! I think its the fuel pump since it eventually started that evening and then once I got it home it wouldn't start to put it in the garage (yes, believe it or not there is now room for two vehicles in my garage!). Then on Tuesday morning it did start again. It's now parked in the garage until my mechanic can get to it. I really can't complain because we paid only $500 for the truck and the book value is $1180, so we have a long way to go before we are losing on the deal!

Yesterday I got up, ran 3 miles, finished mowing the back lawn (there is a section Chelsea refuses to mow because a few weeks ago there was a snake there;we have an irrigation canal near our yard where there are snakes!), then mowed the front lawn, cleaned up the grass, trimmed the trees in the back and did laundry. I took a break after that and got some layouts ready for a scrapbook conference I'm going to this weekend.

I'm being lazy today, with nothing much planned. I will be doing an exercise video, "Dancing with the Stars" workout which a friend loaned me, then I'll head out to the base to have a thyroid test done. It's been a year since my last one and I've recently been having problems sleeping, waking up feeling like my body is on fire and unable to sleep. Although it's almost certainly periomenopause it could also be a thyroid problem so I'll have it checked. If anyone has any ideas on how to relieve the hot flashes at night please let me know. I don't really have them during the daytime, though.

Oh, and just for the record, Mike and I are no longer seeing each other. I really have no idea why, as he hasn't really said and I haven't heard from him for about 3 weeks. Those of you who know me know that I do love him, but that I am also okay with being alone. I don't really mind spending time alone and I will not beg anyone to be with me. I know that the right guy is out there and I'll just wait until he comes along.

Photos!

As promised here are some photos of Chelsea's visit with her aunt, uncle and cousins from her father's side:




This is Chelsea with her cousins, Jonathan, Tariq, and Jasmine








The next is of her uncle William, Chelsea, Jasmine, Jonathon, Tariq and aunt Dionne. Dionne is her father's sister.














Here is Chelsea with her aunt and cousins. As you can see Chelsea doesn't get her height from her father's side. Jonathan is 13 and Jasmine is 19 and both are way shorter than Chelsea.



I do have to say that this was a wonderful visit and as you can see everyone was very happy and got along really well.

Work!

Boy did I work yesterday! I decided that since we now have two vehicles we should be able to park both in our two car garage! Little did I know just how much work that would entail. First Chelsea and I completely emptied the garage. Then we swept and vacuumed it out. Lots of dead spiders and webs, cottonwood from our trees and other dirt, etc. Then we started the sorting. Our church is having a yard sale this month so we separated out all the stuff we didn't want and loaded that in Chelsea's truck. Then we threw away a bunch of other stuff, fulling our garbage twice (good think the garbage truck came yesterday!) and then we cleaned and put away the rest. I am proud to say that our garage now holds Chelsea's pickup and my car.

Speaking of my car, I picked it up from the body shop today and the bumper looks good as new. But I had to look at the door ding from a parking lot incident the day before we left for Las Vegas. Someone with a white car opened their door pretty hard against the driver side door. And of course they didn't leave a note. So maybe later in the summer I'll take it to Maaco to get it fixed. It is much cheaper to have work done there and since it's small it shouldn't cost too much.

Chelsea is at a birthday party so I think I'll go downstairs where its cooler and sort out some scrapbooking stuff. I am hosting a crop at my church tomorrow night so I should have something to work on.