Best Holiday Ever

It is not a secret that I LOVE Halloween, it is by far the best holiday ever. This year Lily wanted to be a mermaid. I will NEVER sew a mermaid costume again as long as I live! But It turned out ok and Lily loved it.

Poor Sam, after all the time I spent on Lily’s costume I didn’t have the energy to do more and just bought Sam’s at the store. Thankfully he is easy to please and was thrilled to be Spiderman. His costume originally had a mask. For the last month he has run around the house in it like a Mexican wrestler, so when Halloween came it was nowhere to be found. It worked out for the best to just paint his face, I don’t think that he would have kept it on anyway.

We carved pumpkins this year. Keith’s brother Dallin came over and helped. He carved the princess and the frog pumpkin for Lily and a were wolf one. Keith carved the ghost for Sam and the Skull and cross bones. I carved the Jack skelington. It was so much fun! And the kids loved it. Totally going to become a new family tradition.

The Good Halloween Witch.

We started a tradition a few years ago when Lily became old enough to make the connection between trick or treating and gorging herself on candy until she is vomiting on my bedroom floor. After the kids come home from a very productive night of candy gathering they are allowed a few pieces of candy and the rest gets set out for the Good Halloween Witch. She comes during the night and exchanges their candy for a present. And Daddy wakes up with a sugar hang over the next morning. If anyone divulges this secret to my kids I will hunt you down and make you cry! And before you think that I am cruel, I do keep the majority of the candy tucked away for the kids to have later. This year I was kind of lame and didn’t get real toys for them. I ordered some Halloween books that I then forgot about and found Halloween morning and the PJ’s were in the Christmas stash. But the kids loved it. Thank Heavens they are still young enough to be easily entertained.

Mecham update

It has been a busy couple of weeks here in the Mecham house. Last week someone broke into the house. ( while the kids were napping and I was in the shower). Luckily they only came in and took my new cute little pink laptop and some jewelry and left before any of us realized what was going on. Then the vacuum caught on fire. Yes, they catch on fire if you suck up too much baby powder that your two year old decorates his room with. Things got better from for the rest of the week. Keith came home yesterday and is not set to deploy again until next year. Finally the big news, we had our ultrasound today. We are having a very active and healthy baby boy!!! According to dates I am due December 25th, but by size I am due December 31st. so we are just trying to hit all the holidays in December. When you get stressed out just take a breath and realize that everything works out in the end if you just breath threw it. Life is good.

From the mouths of babes

Today I noticed that Lily was calling Sam “Alice”. When I asked her why she was calling her brother by a girl name she answered. “Because maybe if he was a girl and didn’t have that odd extra finger down there, he wouldn’t be so mean to me.” How can you argue with that?

RN

It is finally official, I am an RN!!! I took my nursing boards on Sunday, ( yes I know it is odd they held NCLEX on Sunday) I spent the next two days crying knowing without a shadow of a doubt that I failed it miserably. Then Monday night, just before midnight my buddy Danielle from nursing school called me and told me that my nursing license posted on DOPL. (The department of professional licensing.) which means I PASSED. I seriously thought I was going to have a heart attack. I am so happy. I just wish Keith were home to celebrate with me. I will stay working in women services float pool on the maternity and labor and delivery units for IHC. It all still feels like a dream.

The cat is out of the bag

The cat is out of the bag and throwing up violently all over the carpet. We are pregnant! Baby Mecham #3 is due Christmas day. Yes it is a shock and surprise but we are happy for Lily and Sam to get a new baby brother or sister.

MY Little Peanut and the peanut

In January Sam got pneumonia in the upper lobe of his right lung. They treated it and all was well, except he still had a lingering cough and was wheezing more and more when he would play. When I would listen to his lung sounds there was little to no breath sounds in the entire right lung. We took him back to the Dr., they said it was probably asthma and we started doing nebulizer treatments three times a day. After months of treatment I was still not hearing and increase in breath sounds and took him back again and again and again. After being blown off as a crazy over protective mother with a stethoscope they finally took me seriously and ordered a chest fluoroscopy (like a chest x ray video so they can watch the lung expand) We scheduled it at the Primary Children’s at Riverton. It was shocking. When the image came up my heart sank. Even with him screaming his guts out with three people holding him down, his right lung did nothing. There was no air going in at all, but there was air in there that could not get out. They told me to wait in the waiting room while they called our pediatrician. Before I know it a surgeon was calling me telling me to bring him straight to Primary Children’s same day surgery to be prepped. Before I even made it home to call Keith, an anesthesiologist, same day surgery, our pediatrician, and another surgeon were calling me. It was a crazy and over whelming time. We got him up there, all checked in, dressed in his itty bitty hospital gown, and played in pre op waiting for an open OR. Note to self Versed and Sam don’t mix. They gave it to him about 20 minutes before they took him back to calm him and decrease the anxiety of a stranger taking him away from his parents. Yah, not what happened, it made him angry and freak out. We walked down to the OR with the anesthesiologist, gave Sam one last hug and handed him over. We had to bolt out of there as fast as we could. I could not handle hearing him screaming for us in the OR and there was nothing we could do.

About an hour and a half later they called us in the waiting room. The PACU nurse said “I have an angry little boy here that wants him mommy.” This was hard to hear over his very horse screaming in the back ground. We ran down the hall to the PACU, to find a half naked screaming and confused little boy on a big adult stretcher, pulling at IV’s and monitors. Keith picked him up just in time for them to say that only one parent could be back there. I didn’t even think about it and told Keith I was not leaving. Poor Keith, he didn’t argue and handed Sam over and went back out to the recovery area, I know that it was one of the hardest things he has ever had to do. After a quick breathing treatment we were able to take him to recovery to see daddy. What a wonderful and sweet husband I have, he loves his kids so much. They came out and told us what they had found, a peanut, yes a freaking peanut. They said he probably coughed while eating it and sucked it down into his right bronchial around Christmas time. Some scar tissue and inflammation formed around it and completely blocked off his right lung. They were able to remove it and clean out the scar tissue without any problems, they even gave us the peanut in a specimen cup. After a few more hours in recovery they agreed that we did not need to stay overnight as planned and sent us home around 1100 pm. Now Sam is doing great. I can’t believe how fast he recovered and was back to running around like a crazy man. I am so grateful to the amazing and wonderful nurses and staff at Primary Children’s. I am so grateful to have a healthy little man again. It is defiantly something that I never want to go through again. Thank you so much for all of your prayers and concern, and a huge thank you to Dallin and Jennifer for helping us with Lily. We could not have gone through this with out you.

Birthdays and Easter

It’s that time again, Just as we recover from Christmas and winter we have Easter and birthdays. Sam’s birthday was March 23rd, but Keith was still deployed. So we took advantage of the fact that he is young and would not know any different if we just moved it back a little bit. We celebrated it the day after Keith got home, ( the day before Easter ) at Grandma and Grandpa Mecham’s house. I went the fast and easy route this year with cakes, so nothing fabulous this year. Little mister Samuel turned 2 this year and Lily turned 5. I can’t believe how fast it has all gone by. My babies are not babies anymore.

Easter!!!! I had to work Easter Sunday, and the weather was not really ideal for Easter egg hunting so we moved Easter to the Friday after. We took the kids to my parents for a egg hunt in the back yard and pictures. They were so cute. Sam got his first little man suit, I loved it!! but it almost looked like he needed a Louisianan accent while wearing it.

Lily’s birthday we actually managed to do on her birthday. I had my first day of nursing precept up at Labor and Delivery in Ogden, so poor Keith had to take care of everything on his own. She loved her party, and she make a killing in gifts. I am so grateful for so much right now, my hubby is finally in the same country as me, my kids are growing up, I am almost done with school. Life is good.

The kids and Keith's uncle Ron trying out Sam's big boy bed.