Number Geek Alert!

All of the good birth date numbers are running out!

I'm just in a panic!

But today is a really good one...

12-11-10

So if you are due to have a baby...run on out TODAY and have the little one!

Hurry!

Your child will thank you :)

I've Got a Thing for Steve Urkel!

I am OVER sagging (oh, like I ever enjoyed it?!)

My boy is trying to get into the sagging action.

"This belt just doesn't keep my pants up."

Well, let's be on our way to Kohls Mr. Skinny Bottom!

Did you see this news story out of Memphis?

I just love this school principal!

It will be worth the click (and even the commercial)

Click here and watch 'em be Urkeled!

A Season of Gratitude

Today I give thanks for my job and for Brian’s job at the fire department.

I see so many suffering around me…out of work and on the edge of financial disaster.

My heart breaks for them.

I know many of you are in a difficult place.

Praying for the people around me who are struggling.

Praying for my blogger friends who are trying to make ends meet.

Praying for our country…

Gotta Love... Halloween

Gotta Love...

my sweet girl's smile

pumpkin families

California in October and wearing tube-top sundresses

Gotta Love...

my sweet boy's morning wild curly hair

carving a cool pumpkins

the early teen years

Since I whined in my last post...

I thought I'd lighten up and re-run of one of my favorite posts

"I never give advice but..."

Ladies, please hear this… avoid tummy tattoos before your child bearing years!

Years of experience in L&D have taught me that...

delicate rings of tiny flowers become…

Christmas wreaths!

tiny fluttering butterflies become…

hawks!

a simple little name becomes…

a billboard!

I think the look on her face says it all …

“My tats are going to be destroyed by this pregnancy!”

P.S. That tattoo of the little man mowing your... ehem... hair is funny, but you may find it a bit embarrassing when you go to have your baby!

P.P.S. I may be missing my target audience with this post ")

P.P.P.S. I actually have seen some amazing works of art, as I see a lot of "canvas" in my work ")

Please...please...let's get it over with

Is it just me?

Or are we getting bombarded with more political commercials than ever this year?

I am seriously getting exhausted with this election year.

Think I will not listen to the radio the next week. UGH!!!!

Cannot wait for election day...so I can vote and finally have a voice in my country's future.

And so that the commercials will STOP!!!!

We're in Counseling...

Is it wrong to admit...

...that during surgery, it grosses me out to watch the scalpel on the skin?

Yep, it is true. When I scrub, I focus on the skin just to the side of the scalpel, just millimeters to the side. After that initial incision I am just fine.

I know, as a nurse I am supposed to be strong and handle anything that I do and see.

Well, we nurses have our weaknesses. For some it is m-eeewww-cus, other it is vomit, some it is the ol' "code brown".

For me...yep, the skin incision.

Hey...at least I don't faint at the sight of blood! LOL :)

10/10/10 ... it's your birthday

Is it just me?

Wouldn't it be great to have 10/10/10 as your birthday?

How cool would that be?!

Yesterday at work, I met a little fella and a little gal who will hear how awesome that b-day is many, many, many times during their lives.

I am not usually a numbers geek (math...EEK!)

But I think that certain dates are fun (yep, geek)

I will only get to be numerically delighted two more times... 11/11/11 (my girl's 13th b-day by the way) and 12/12/12.

Oh, there will be other numbers...but none as beautiful as 10/10/10 (sigh)

(okay, it's just me)

A Walk to Remember 2010...was amazing

A Walk To Remember

We Walk For The Steps They Will Never Take

Our Fifth Annual "A Walk to Remember" was a huge success.

Nearly 700 parents, family, and friends came to honor their babies.

There were many tear, hugs, and much love that swept over the medical center grounds.

The service was lovely. Our honorary family spoke of their daughter with Trisomy 18, whom we supported through our palliative care program. They shared of the precious 34 hours they held and loved on her. There was not a dry eye in the auditorium.

It was a privilege to validate the lives of the many babies represented through "the reading of the names".

As the group walked around the medical center moods brightened and many stayed to share memories of their babies and enjoy refreshments.

I was touched to see that so many parents had huge walking teams who came to support them.

A Walk to Remember gives bereaved parents a chance to talk of their babies each year with family and friends.

When a baby dies, many people do not see the loss as significant.

"Well, at least you didn't know her."

"You can have another one."

From the moment a couple finds out they are pregnant, they are parents.

No matter how many weeks or months the baby was in the womb or days the baby lived, they were and always will be the mother and father of a baby who will always be precious to them.

This month, National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness, reach out to those you know have lost their baby.

Always remember...

A Walk to Remember

Each October walks are held throughout the country to honor

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month.

Sunday is my hospital's A Walk to Remember.

My bereavement colleagues and myself have been working hard for months to provide this beautiful event for our families who have suffered such a tremendous loss...the loss of a baby.

We will start with a remembering service, including a reading of the name of each baby being honored.

Then, a bag-piper will lead us in a procession to an open lawn.

There, he will start playing Amazing Grace...

and doves will be released.

A special bereaved family will lead us around the hospital for a one mile walk.

We will come back for refreshments and professional photographs.

We are expecting nearly 700 people to come and honor their precious babies.

It will be a bitter-sweet, incredibly meaningful day.

All of my friends who have lost a baby, through miscarriage, stillbirth, or newborn loss, are in my thoughts and prayers.

I remember you and your babies.

Texting...It Keeps Our Family Close

I really never thought that I would like texting.

I thought that it would be a negative for my kids.

I worried that it would isolate our kids from us...

fingers to buttons and nose to screens?

But...

Texting is wonderful for our family!

It draws us closer when we have to be apart.

I use to refuse to text because it was a hassle with my old phone.

Now I have my QWERTY keyboard with buttons.

Love it!

Firehubby and I text and touch base at times during the day when he's at work...

We send love notes:

"Miss us so much babe, luv u"

"LFY"

"AYIR"

Parent together:

"Do you want to take her 2 swim tomorrow or shall I?"

"Is (insert video game name) appropriate for him?"

"He wore his new Vans to camp!!! #$@%"

We also text to keep in touch with the kids...

My boy:

"David's dad driving me, will be @ house soon"

"Can I walk the dog with Hannah?"

"Hey mom"

My girl:

"I forgot my gym shoes...will you bring them?"

"Luv you mom"

"I need to stay over for band today"

We do keep the kids texting under control with a little white lie...

We have unlimited texting for the entire family, because it is the best deal.

But, we tell our girl that she is only allowed 15 texts a day (sending and receiving)

And we tell our boy that he has 30 a day

We'll keep it up as long as we can! LOL!

I Want to Keep my Job...so,

Recently, my employer made an announcement.

"No staff member shall tweet, facebook, blog, or any other form of social networking, about patients. This is a violation of HIPAA and you could face discipline or termination."

We were told that even if we thought we were changing detail sufficiently, the medical center would assume we were not.

So, sadly, my days of posting Stories from the Delivery Room are over.

I have taken my posts down.

It has been a pleasure sharing my adventures with you.

My writing on being a firewife and mom shall continue.

(By the way, life has gotten in the way of blogging. As always, I have missed you.)

~hugging~

When you hug your kiddos are you usually the first to let go?

That used to be me.

Now, I remind myself to hug as long as they need.

Especially at my kid's current ages (11 & 13), it makes for a special moment and connection.

I often get the sweetest smiles after.

It's easy in this rushed world to hurry things up...

sometimes even affection.

Don't forget to hug someone you love today :)

for sweet Jennifer

Do you know Jennifer from the blue sparrow?

She the loving mother of a baby in heaven.

His name is Bryston.

I've been following her journey of sorrow, heartache, remembering for the past year.

She has touched my heart.

She is a firewife and has a deep desire to become a nurse.

Jennifer...this is for you.

(credit amazing artwork of talented David Sandum from his website)

Last Day to Vote for Rachel :)

Thanks for all of your support in voting for Rachel.

You can vote once a day and today the voting will close @ 5 pm pacific time.

If you haven't had a chance to vote yet, I would really appreciate if you would consider it

:)

http://1043myfm.clearcontests.com/front/image_contest2.asp?s=A6889271C4BCB3A3557BA5BEA5B19D84939EB49BB6B4678DD1CF8B998EAFA6BDBD777CA6CCC6C2BCA1897D685F7F718B7FA4BC6F91796F66A6B5AF948C6A618499A7A0737C7D64687267916E9791B58DA0626A

Rachel Made it to the TOP TEN!

Of 250 contestants trying to get their dream wedding,

RACHEL MADE IT TO THE TOP TEN!

(see her inspiring story a couple of posts below)

Will you help make her dream a reality?

Click on the link below...take a moment to register... get your email confirmation...

And then vote each day this week (or just once if that is all of the time you have :)

Thanks...such a simple thing to vote...but a huge gift for a wonderful woman!

VOTE HERE:

http://1043myfm.clearcontests.com/front/image_contest2.asp?s=A6889271C4BCB3A3557BA5BEA5B19D84939EB49BB6B4678DD1CF8B998EAFA6BDBD777CA6CCC6C2BCA1897D685F7F718B7FA4BC6F91796F66A6B5AF948C6A618499A7A0737C7D64687267916E9791B58DA0626A

Giveaway Canceled...But So Very Proud of a Special Lady

As I lay down to sleep tonight and prayed and contemplated my day I realized that the giveaway that I was planning on behalf of Rachel (see my last post) might be viewed as "vote buying".

Of course, I would never want to do anything to jeopardize Rachel's chance of getting her dream wedding.

Her strength of character, selflessness, and love speaks for itself.

I hope that I have not caused you any inconvenience.

Please consider will taking a moment to vote for Rachel.

She truly is a special sister and mother.

Thanks,

Julie

The Gift of Life-the Love of a Sister/New Mother

Meet Brook.

She is winning the fight against Leukemia.

You may know Elaine at Matter's of the Heart...she is Brook's lovely sister.

Meet Rachel.

She's also Brook's sister.

Just after Rachel delivered her baby she found out that she was a perfect bone marrow match for Brook.

Without a second thought, Rachel prepared to donate her marrow, Brooks only chance for living.

But, Rachel was faced with a dilemma.

She could choose to go through a procedure where she could take medication and then have blood taken to extract the marrow. The problem with this choice was she could not nurse her precious baby for a period of time.

The other option was to undergo a painful operation to have her marrow extracted. This would allow her to have minimal interruption to her nursing.

Rachel made the sacrifice of her own comfort and did what was best for her sister AND her baby.

She went through the surgery.

In my eyes Rachel is a true hero.

This brings me to today.

I have the opportunity to do something special for Rachel.

You see, she is getting married soon.

With the economy being so bad, planning a wedding is tough.

Well, Elaine found this awesome opportunity for Rachel…an opportunity to win the wedding (plus a honeymoon!) of her dreams through a local radio station.

The catch…she needs people to vote for her online.

So, I’m in!

I am eager to help this sweetheart :)

I can vote each day to help her.

Easy peasy!

If you want to help, you will need to confirm your email, that confirmation will probably go to your spam box.

Once registered you can come back and vote for her once a day until the July 16th.

If she makes it into the top 10, then the voting will begin again, with the winner announced July 23rd with a week to plan the wedding.

Here is the link:http://1043myfm.clearcontests.com/front/image_contest2.asp?s=A6889271C4BCB3A3557BA5BEA5B19D84939EB49BB6B4678DD1CF8B998EAFA6BDBD777CA6CCC6C2BCA1897D67657F77897FA4BC6F91796F66A6B5AF948C6A618499A7A0737C7D636D7069916E9791B58DA0626A

Thanks!

(p.s. It is great to be back!)





Summer Bloggy Break

~Taking a break~

*See you soon*

(you may see me commenting here and there...after all, I can't take a break cold turkey ;)

Protected-return of the missing post

Is it really Tuesday already?

Wow, time flies.

I’m joining Mr. Daddy and Rachel from Once Upon a Miracle for True Story Tuesday again today. Pop on over to their blog and read more great stories.

Okay, time to tell you about a scary, scary thing that happened to me…

Do you remember the lost boy from about a month ago?

If not, click here

Well, shortly after I got back from Seattle, a neighborhood came by to tell me some bad news.

“Someone found the boy again,” she said.

“He was on Main St.-ALONE!”

(Now, to get to Main St. from my house, you have to walk down 10 houses and turn right. Then, go down 15 houses and turn left and go down 10 more houses.)

A man on Main St. had found the boy wandering about and was dialing 9-1-1 when a woman pulled up to his front yard and rushed out of the car.

She identified herself as the boy’s grandmother and upset that the little guy he had gotten out of the house again.

“His father died the other day,” she told the man before she loaded the boy into her car.

Yes, the boy’s father, one of the new renters down the road… was dead.

(BTW- I believe that a death in the family is not an excuse for not watching over defenseless little children. This family is extremely fortunate that they are not mourning two family members now: the father and the little boy)

Let’s pause and I’ll set up a timeline here.

(It’s important so that you can understand what happened.)

Saturday #1 Lost Boy

Saturday #2 Police officer at my door (?)

Saturday #3 Boy’s father dies

Wed….boy found on Main St.

Saturday # 4 Return from Seattle

My prior post was about Saturday #1.

At 7a.m. on Saturday #2, my girl comes upstairs and tells me that someone is knocking at the door. Looking out the peep hole, I can see a man who is wearing a black t-shirt that seems to have an iron-on badge on it, and khaki pants.

He looks like a police officer, I don’t answer it.

He stands there and continues knocking.

I pick up the phone and call Firehubby, who has gone to work.

“There’s a guy knocking at the door. It looks like he may be a police officer.” I whisper, “If he identifies himself as an officer, I’ll call 9-1-1 and be sure that he is really a police officer.”

Firehubby agrees with the plan and stays on the phone with me.

I peek out the blinds to see if there is a car in front of the house. No, none. But, while peeking, I rattled the blinds. When I looked back through the peep-hole, he knocked again. I know he saw me.

A few minutes later, he went away.

I thought maybe it was an officer doing a follow-up on the lost boy. I was not overly concerned about what happened.

Okay, follow me here…there is a reason I am giving all of this info.

So now we are back to Saturday #4-return from Seattle:

After I found out about the lost boy and the death of his father, I headed to yet another neighbor’s house to find out what had happened. I had suspected that the mother may have been a druggy because of her lack of maternal instinct and her demeanor, and I wondered if drugs were involved with his death.

Sure enough…illegal drug overdose had killed the lost boys father.

Here is where it gets scary for me:

“Julie, remember when you asked me if I had a knock on my door a couple of weekends ago?” my neighbor asked.

“Well,” he said, ”my son-in-law told me he was up with his baby and (saw the lost boy’s father) go to your door at 4:30 in the morning. He saw the guy knock on your door and then leave.”

Then the neighbor told me his son-in-law saw the same guy go to my door around 7a.m. and leave again.

I had CHILLS.

The lost boy’s father (the guy who later overdosed on drugs) had come knocking on my door at 4:30 in the morning.

The guy would have just watched my husband leave for work.

Do you think it was a social call?

Me neither.

The guy knew I had called the police about his son, the lost boy.

No one from the lost boys house had come to talk about what had happened.

I would have let them know that the reason I called 9-1-1 was because his child was in danger and for all I knew, he was frantically searching for his son.

And I also found out that, with the type of work the guy was in, he likely carried a gun.

Thank GOD that I did not hear the knock on the door.

I would have been scared to death.

I would have called Firehubby, who would have turned right around and raced home.

There might have been a horrific confrontation.

I also would have called my next-door neighbor, my protector when my husband is gone. He would have come to the front yard.

That confrontation could have been equally horrific.

I am thankful that I had the wisdom not to open the door to the guy at 7a.m.

I truly think he wanted me to believe he was a police officer.

I also see God’s provision/protection in the fact that between Saturday #2 and Saturday #3 we had no idea that the guy had been to our home.

I don’t know how I would have functioned in my home.

If we knew what had happened, Firehubby would have gone down to the guy’s house and defended our family by confronting him about his inappropriate visits.

Thank God that did not happen.

I don’t know why the son-in-law would not have mentioned the early morning visits before the guy had died…but I am actually so thankful that we did not know.

The lost boy’s mother will be moving in a couple of weeks.

I am thankful that this brief chapter of my life is coming to a close.

I thank God for the protection he has given my family…

and I pray for protection for the lost boy and his brothers.

Summer Bloggy Break

~Taking a break~

*See you soon*

(you may see me commenting here and there...after all, I can't take a break cold turkey ;)

Seattle 2010

We did it!

For the first time in 5 years we got away together...just the two of us.

We had a wonderful time in Seattle!

*Caution...you are about to see the overuse of the word amazing!

We stayed at the Inn at the Market.

We had the most wonderful view from our room!

We enjoyed some fine Washington wines...

and the most amazing treat from the amazing shop,

the Chocolate Box.

Whale watching off of the San Juan Islands was a dream come true.

The Orcas changed course and went right under the boat.

That is Brian at the front right getting a spray from the blow holes!

Amazing!

Can you guess where we took this photo from?

Yep, the space needle.

Wow, what a view!

We spent much time at the Public Market.

The flowers, fruit, seafood, wine, cheese, fresh breads...

amazing!

I'm hungry just writing this post :)

Not to mention the hours spent gazing at this amazing view...

We had a chance to meet some bloggy friends.

It really is wonderful to see people in person.

I'm telling you, it felt so natural to hang out...

like we really have know each other for a while.

What a great experience.

(Just like when I met Tarah, from Eyeglasses and Endzones, after I went to the Mayo Clinic in MN, last summer.

She is another of my bloggy friends who I will always feel a special connection to.)

I am so excited that I got to meet the Mighy M Family :)

(Thanks for letting me steal photos from you blog :)

How did I not get pix of you?

And my pix of the kids were blurry...darn!)

What a little cherub!

She is just darling...we became BFF's :)

Brian and Mr. Daddy from Once Upon a Miracle.

Couldn't be a nicer guy.

Rachel, from Once Upon a Miracle, with Itty-bit.

Oh my she is just awesome!

How I wish we lived nearby...

I think we would spend a lot of time together!

Oh yes, and Mr. Itty-Bit!

He is my other new BFF.

We had so much fun at dinner!

Here he is posing for me.

*AMAZING- the funny thing is that I didn't realize that I had written "amazing" so many times until I read my post over the first time. LOL!

In the week since I've been back I have been:

• Thanking God for protecting me from a crazed psycho drug addict freak (come back for True Story Tuesday to find out what the heck I am referring to)
• Getting the kids settled and ready for the final weeks of school
• Working in L&D
• Catching up on my bereavement role
• Having an emergency root canal!

Glad to be back

I will be by to see you very soon :)