Supper Time

Can you tell that he enjoys the cereal? I don't know if he got more in his mouth or all over his hands, face, ears, bib, legs, bumbo, table...................I think that about covers everything. LOL! He is doing so well on the cereal. Now that we're feeding him a bowl of cereal in the evenings he's started sleeping much longer at night. He was waking up for 2-3 bottles a night, but now he's taking 1 a night, if even that. On Tuesday night he slept ALL NIGHT LONG!!!! I was singing the Hallelujah praise all day long on Wednesday! Of course I still got up twice to check on him and make sure he was still breathing. It's completely unlike him to sleep through the night without a peep. So hopefully this sleeping thing will continue. I was beginning to think that I was never going to sleep again!

Ashlyn's first dance class

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaCW1V-c8xk

You'll have to watch it with your head tilted to the side. I videoed it with my camera longways. Sorry about that! She did pretty good until the very end of the song. Then she lost all focus. ;)

Random Monday

I have sooooo many things that I've been meaning to blog about lately. I'm going to try to squeeze it all in on one post.

First things first. My babies.
They are both growing like weeds. Brennan went for his 4 month check up a couple weeks ago and he was up to 16 lbs and 26 inches long. He is going to be tall like his daddy! He's still not a sleeper like Ashlyn was when she was a baby. She had us spoiled! Brennan will occasionally sleep about 6 hours straight, but usually he's up at least every 4-5 hours for a bottle. The past few nights he's been up 3 times to be fed.......somewhere between 11pm-12am, 2-3am, and 4-6am. This sleep pattern has got to stop! I can't take it much longer! I must applaud my husband. He got up with him all three times last night. THANK YOU BRITT!!! I woke up this morning and saw a can of baby cereal sitting on the counter. Brennan isn't eating cereal yet. I mean we've tried feeding it to him, but he doesn't really have the hang of it yet. (Insterted 9/9/08 - *update* Brennan did eat his first bowl of cereal yesterday evening. YAY!) But because it was so early, and I'm always running around like a mad lady in the mornings I thought nothing of it. Then when I got to work it hit me like a ton of bricks..........Brennan coughing up a storm after the 5am feeding this morning + the cereal sitting on the counter = Britt putting cereal in his bottle to try his darndest to get a little bit of sleep! Poor little fellow must have gotten some cereal stuck in his throat. =(

Ashlyn is becoming such a little lady. She moved up to the pre-k class at Abernethy. Her teachers are outstanding, well really all of them are there if you ask me, but Miss Nancy and Miss Linda are GREAT! Ashlyn is getting to the age now where she is all about presence. Her clothes have to be picked out each night before school, and it HAS to be a cute outfit because she's got some boys that she's trying to impress. Lord help me now! The bully from last year is in her class, but guess what.................she likes him now. He's ONE of her boyfriends! How many more does she have I ask? At least one more......Eli is her boyfriend also. This brings me to a totally different subject. This is JB's nephew. Hopefullly Eli turns out quite the opposite of his uncle or we're in some SERIOUS TROUBLE!!!!!! I just can't believe that whole situation. Who does something like that and then has their wife go take the blame? And then on top of it all decides to go back out with his kids and wrecks his car in a corn field. My heart goes out to the kids and to the lady's family who was involved in this horrible accident! Can you believe that I went out with him in high school? We all knew he was trouble then, but if we only knew what we'd be saying about him today. WOW! Back to Miss Ashlyn. She started dance on Saturday. She's taking from Miss Treva. She absolutely LOVED it! Wasn't a bit shy like I imagined she would be. She just went right on in and followed Treva's lead the entire time. I can't wait to see her recital! She becomes a little sassier with every single day that passes. She's started the whole "If you don't let me then I won't be your best friend" thing. Oh the joys of parenthood! I have a feeling that the teenage years are going to be oh such a joy with this one! Can you hear the sarcasm?!

Mammaw's companion, Lewis, had to be put in a nursing home. Mom, the kids, and I went to visit him on Labor Day. That was the most depressing place that I've ever been. Lewis is terribly depressed. It's bad enough that he's in a nursing home, but what makes it SOOOOO BAD is that the facility has him in a lockdown unit. This is a special area in the facility for Alzheimer's patients and patients with mental handicaps. Lewis has very early signs of Alzheimer's, but he is nowhere close to the mental capacity of the people in this unit. I just wanted to walk him out of there. You could just see the sadness in his eyes. I am very fortunate that I have not had to deal with anyone close to me in a nursing home yet. I admire the people that work in that field, because it definitely takes a special kind of person. There were 2 people who did make our day a little brighter. One was a man who joined us in the sunroom. A very friendly man I must add. He was admiring my 2 youngin's. He asked how old they were, what my husband did............He seemed 'normal' so to speak, so I being the peacemaker/friendmaker that I am thought that he would be a great friend for Lewis. Then about 2 minutes later our entire conversation started all over again..........How old is Brennan?, How old is Ashlyn?, What does my husband do?. I kid you not, I had de ja vu with this man probably 30 times. It was the EXACT same questions and stories every single time. Bless his little heart! THEN........Then comes the lady..............the lady who had Ashlyn and myself literally rolling in the floor with laughter! This lady was speaking broken english. Talking to Brennan first, who was sitting on my mom's lap. Brennan was just a grinning at her. We all were really. It was one of those grins where you just smile because you have no clue what the person's saying or doing. Then she did something that was probably the funniest thing I've seen in a long long time. Maybe it was just funny because the day was so depressing, but I could not control my laughter. It's the kind of laughter that you wish you could stop because you know that it's not right to be laughing, but REALLY it IS FUNNY and you the find yourself in lauging so hard that your face hurts and tears are flowing. That's how funny it was at the time. She grabbed my mom's foot and started petting it like a dog. She proceeded to get eye to eye with the foot and talk to it like you would speak to your pet puppy. The look on my mom's face was priceless! I mean what do you do when you've got a crazy woman petting your foot? OMG..........It was the strangest thing ever! They are working on getting Lewis moved to the regular area of the facility. This BETTER HAPPEN SOON!!! I feel so sorry for him right now.

Let's see what else? My dad is doing great! He's feeling much better thanks to the stint. His heart attack has been a real eye opener in the fact that your life can change at any given moment. You never know what tomorrow's got in store for you. Thanks for all of the prayers! If I had the time I'd love to help with some local charity groups in the area. When Ashlyn was in the hospital the was a small quilt lying across the foot of her bed. The nurses came in and said that the blanket was hers to keep. A group called Project Linus donates blankets to all children admitted to Catawba Valley Medical Center. I thought that this was such a nice idea! There are so many kids out there who have nothing. When you are sick and in the hospital it's nice to have a little something extra to cuddle with that some children don't have at home.

I feel the need to spice it up..........my home that is. I've been flipping through the pottery barn catalog and I'm feeling the urge to redecorate. Even though I don't have the money to spend at pottery barn, I can still dream. They do have a pottery barn outlet in Gaffney. Who feels a girls Saturday shopping day calling our names? I know I do! Let me know if you're up for it and when. I'm dying to go. Now I just need to find one of those money trees and plant it in my back yard so that I don't have to worry about bills. If anyone knows where to find one of these please hook a girl up!

TOO FUNNY!

1952

1960

1970

1984

1990

I found this website and it's hilarious. You just plug your

picture in and it shows you what your yearbook picture

would have looked like from 1950 - 2000. Try it out.

http://www.yearbookyourself.com/northlake

Britt 1960

Britt 1970



I'm sure he's going to kill me when he sees this,
but it was too funny not to post some of him too! =)

Kenny Chesney Concet

Getting ready for the concert!

The Girls!

CHEERS!

Britt's crew getting roudy!

Hanna and Curtis

Hanna and Me

Ida and Hanna

This is how we felt by the end of the night! ;)

Last night's scare...

We need to just buy some stock in Frye and Catawba Memorial Hospital because my family has been there enough in the past month to pay for a few of the employees salaries! Yesterday evening I took Ashlyn and Brennan over to my Mammaw Sherrill's to visit her and Lewis. Unfortunately Lewis is having to go to a nursing home today. He is showing early signs of alzheimer's, and Mammaw just can't take care of him all on her own. It was such a hard decision, but it simply had to be done. I truly hate it for him! He is one of the kindest, most sincere people that I know! It breaks my heart to think of him in a nursing home! Well I ALWAYS carry my phone on me. For some reason while I was at Mammaw's I decided to leave it in the car. Once I got back in the car I had 7 missed calls in an hours time. This is the order they came in......Britt, Britt, Joyce (Britt's mom), Joyce, Joyce, Joyce, Kerry (Britt's sister). I KNEW something was wrong. I had 3 voicemail also, so I called and checked them. Joyce's message said for me to call her right away and Kerry's message said that she knew that I was up at the hospital, but for me to call her when I got her voicemail and got a chance. I wasn't at the hospital and I had NO CLUE what was going on! I called Joyce right away and she was up at the hospital with Britt. He was having chest pains and numbness in his left arm. GOLLY PETE!!!! First Ashlyn, then my dad, now Britt! I rushed up to the hospital as fast as I could. The EKG came back normal.........No heart attack! Praise GOD! They ran a few more tests and did some x-rays on his lungs. All of that came back ok as well. The ER doctor seems to think that he's pulled a muscle in his ribs. I, being Dr. Mindy, think that he's just stressed out and having symptoms of panic attacks. Of course he didn't bring any of this to the doctor's attention though! Why are men so stubborn? Anyway, he was sent home last night and seems to be doing fine. He's still having the chest pain, but so far he hasn't had anymore of the tingling in his arm. Please keep him in your prayers. This has been one HELL of a month! Let's hope that this is the last of it! My nerves are COMPLETELY SHOT!!!!

Quick Rant

I am P-I-S-S-E-D!!!! All I wanted was a freakin tan for the Kenny Chesney concert tomorrow night. Is that too much to ask? APPARENTLY!!!!! I called the tanning salon right down the street from work about getting a mystic tan. First off she tries to tell me that before I can do the mystic tan I have to by about $60 worth of products! What.............are you kidding me? This is a one time deal. I'm not going to buy $60 worth of products for one time in a spray booth! So after arguing with her about this on the phone she finally tells me that she "guesses" I can still go in the booth, but that my tan will not meet it's maximum potential. Blah blah blah. I go for my appointment and there are 3 levels. Level one is for someone pale, level 2 is the average level, and level 3 is the darkest level. She tells me that I need level one. This girl is just trying to push every one of my buttons today. I tell her that I'd really like to go with the level 2, but she continues to test my nerves and tell me that with "my skin tone" I need to go with level one! HELLO???? I may not be the darkest right now, but I'm nowhere near paper white! I should have just walked out at this point, but I decided to go ahead and get the level one and just see what it does. It's been 4 hours later now, and so far I can only tell a slight difference in my skin tone! I am FURIOUS!!!!!!!!! I could understand if I were baking under some bulbs, but I was getting spray tanned for goodness sakes! It's not like I'm going to burn from getting a level 2 or even 3 spray tan!

What makes me SMILE!!!

Brennan in his little golfer pants. Too stinkin' cute!

Both of my GORGEOUS babies!!!

What a sweet sister!

Awwwwwww!!!!!

Campmeeting

Our campground family portrait.

Nana and Brennan

Dad and Pappaw. Like fater like son!

Ashlyn and her buddy Eli from school.

Whitney loving on Brennan

Brennan @ 4 month's old

In his own personal swing at the campground.

Checking Rudy out.

Daddy and Brennan.

I'm starting to see the resemblance.

Ida and Brennan

I have more pictures to post. I uploaded some last night, but I have no clue what happened to them. I'll try to get them up tonight or tomorrow. They are PRICELESS!!!

Campmeeting Pics

The Drum Family

Ashlyn and Halle

I'll post more later on. Our computer is still down at home, so it takes me a little longer to download and post pictures. Hopefully I'll swing by Mom and Dad's and get a few more posted this evening.

Where I've been hiding......

As most of you know it's that time of year again. Good old Balls Creek Campmeeting! Probably the best 2 weeks out of the entire year, especially through the eyes of my 4 year old daughter. She can't get enough of it! I almost wish that it went on all year round because this is the best behavior that I've gotten out of her in a long time. All I have to do is threaten that if she misbehaves we won't be going out and she does a complete 180 in a snap. Love this! It's better than the whole Santa's watching thing...........Seriously!!! LOL! Ashlyn is DEFINITELY 100% a campmeeting girl! Brennan is going to be the same way. He's already loving every minute of being out there and he's only 4 months old. HA! I am so blessed to be from the area which I grew up! Nothing's better than having 2 weeks out of the year devoted to good friends and fellowship.....................Gospel singings, sermons, swinging on your front porch people watching, going to the shack for some good ol' greasy campground food, good icecream, cheap toys (which Ashlyn loves the best), saying that you're going to make "one quick round" when really every round ends up being an hour long or more! I LOVE IT!!!! So glad I'm a true campmeeting girl at heart! I'm working on Britt. This is one tough task! LOL!

God Know What He's Doing

I susbscribe to a daily devotional from 106.9 The Lite. This was the devotional that was in my inbox on Monday morning. God is always speaking, you just have to learn how to listen! Maybe I'll post more later about how everything has played out recently, but all I can say is..........GOD IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!

All ThingsIt is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I may learn Your statutes.

(Psalm 119:71)
Did you know that everything you have experienced up to this point in life can be used for good? That is not to say you haven’t experienced hardship. That is not to say bad things haven’t happened to you. But it is to say that God can work them out for good.That includes the experiences of your childhood, whether good or bad. That includes your parents, whoever they may be. That includes your education, your present employment, or your lack of it. He will work all things together for good.I went through hardship as a kid. I came from a home that was broken many, many times over, a home of alcoholism. I wouldn’t wish my childhood on anyone. But God used it to make me the person that I am.In the same way, God has used what you have gone through to make you the person that you are. So let it be worked together for good and accept God’s promise to you: “All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Rom. 8:28). The phrase, “work together” also could be translated, “working together.” In other words, it isn’t over yet. Maybe you are going through a process right now in which God is working things together for good. You don’t see it yet. But you are a work in progress. Be patient. You have God’s word on it: He will work all things together for good to those who love Him and are the called according to His purpose. God is ultimately working all things for good—not just the good things, but all things.

Two Teethies

DO NOT ADJUST YOUR SCREEN!

Those are actually TEETH.....................On my 3 1/2 month old!!!!!

One popped through last week and the other cam through yesterday.

AMAZING!

Thank You!!

Thank you for all of your prayers and concerns with Ashlyn and my dad. Ashlyn is 100% back to her normal happy, wild, sometimes ill/whiney self! I'd much rather see her ill and whiney than in the shape she was in Thursday night! My dad was able to come home from the hospital yesterday. He's doing amazingly well! The EKG that was done on Monday showed that there was no permanent damage done to his heart. PRAISE GOD! Please continue to lift him up during his recovery. I am SOOOO very thankful that Dad is still here!!!! God's not finished with him yet.

When it Rains it Pours

Ashlyn woke up Wednesday night/Thursday morning at 2am screaming and crying with her belly hurting. She also had a fever of 102. I was up for a good 2 hours with her trying to calm her down. I gave her some Motrin hoping that it would help. By 5am when Britt came in from work she was crying out in pain again. I took her to the doctor first thing Thursday morning. Appendicitis was the first thing that popped into my head. The doctor was shocked at how much pain she was in. He ordered blood work and a urine sample. Everything came back with the results that he wanted. He said that more than likely it was just viral. There was only a 5% chance that it could be appendicitis. He told me that if she was still showing the same symptoms on Friday to bring her back in and he would order a catscan on her appendix. He called in some hydrocodone for the pain and sent us home. By 5:00 that afternoon she was worse than she was before. All she did was lay in her bed an moan. I called back up to the doctor's office and spoke to the doctor on call. He told me to take her to the ER and that he would call the hospital and order the CT scan. It killed me to see my child suffering the way that she was! I've never seen anyone in as much pain as she was laying on that hospital bed. It was the worst feeling as a mother knowing that my child is laying there helpless and I can't do anything to take this terrible pain away! They drew blood, started an iv, gave her morphine for the pain................. MORPHINE for my 4 year old!!!, did a catheter, gave her an enema of dye so that they could do the catscan, ran the catscan. She was PITIFUL!!! The surgeon was 99% sure that it was appendicitis. He had the OR room ready, and he was fully prepared to do surgery on my baby. To all of our surprise the CT scan came back normal. Her appendix looked fine. They admitted her for the night because of her pain level. Also they weren't sure what was going on, so they wanted to keep a close eye on her over night. Not the greatest thing in the world, but I was happy that they kept her so that they could monitor her pain level. By Friday morning her fever had broken, and her pain was slowly going away. She definitely had the doctor's scratching their heads. All they could say was that apparently she had some kind of nasty virus. The doctor finally released her at 8pm Friday night. As Ashlyn was being released my mom called and said that she was bringing my dad to the ER because he was having pain in his arm and tightness in his chest. Mom came into to Ashlyn's room bawling. My dad was having a heart attack! They transferred him from Catawba to Frye. I couldn't leave with my mom because I was stuck at Catawba until all of Ashlyn's release forms were drawn up. I have never in my life been under as much stress as I was at that very moment! I felt like my world was crashing down on me. Britt met me up at the hospital to take Ashlyn home and I rushed up to Frye to find out news on my dad. He had a complete blockage in his main artery. There is a 90 minute window whenever there is a complete blockage. He made it to Frye, and the heart team had the stint in place right in that 90 minute time period. If he would have waited a few minutes longer before going to the hospital, or if anything wouldn't have played out the way that it did my dad may not be here with us today. I PRAISE GOD that my daddy is still here!!!! He's been in the critical care unit, but they finally moved him to a regular room last night. They will assess the damage today to see if he has any long term damage to his heart. Please pray for my dad, that he makes a full recovery. Please keep our family in your prayers. It has been one heck of a week! On top of all of this our house was struck by lightning on Thursday night while we were at the hospital with Ashlyn. It knocked out our satellite dish and receiver, our computer modem and speakers, and our brand new remote control gate that we just installed a few months ago. For the love!!!!!!!!

I stole these off of my WONDERFUL friend Moriah's blog. I hope you don't mind girl!

You are amazing! This is one of the perks of having a photographer as one of my bestest!

I had such a great time with you girls last night! I truly needed that!

Ashlyn needed it too! She had a wonderful time playing with the boys!

I say that we start making this a weekly thing. What about 'Wine Wednesday'?

I am blessed with an amazing circle of friends! Love you girls!!!

Cute snapshot with my camera phone

The Butterfly

I will never look at a butterfly the same again. This has always been beautiful creature, but on Sunday afternoon it became heavenly. Ashlyn was sitting at her coloring table in our den coloring Mammaw Cody and Mammaw Drum a picture. For those of you who don't know, both passed away within the past year and a half. Ashlyn kept repeating over and over again, "Mammaw Drum, Mammaw Cody, I love you! You will always be in my heart!" At that very moment I looked up and there were 2 butterflies fluttering by our back door. I just knew that it had to be the two of them together saying hello. I didn't say a word about the coincidence of it all because I knew that Britt would just give me a crazy stare and tell me how lame I am for coming up with such an idea, but in my heart of hearts I knew it was them. Later that afternoon I packed the kids up and went over to my parent's house for an icecream party. Ashlyn and my cousin Keela were swimming in the pool when all out of nowhere a butterfly flew down. I watched in amazement and didn't say a word. Then Keela's parents said "That butterfly is all over Ashlyn. Just look at how it follows her everywhere!" My heart nearly stopped. I felt a sense of peace that I haven't felt since my grandmother passed. She's definitely an angel now with her butterfly wings. She's more beautiful than ever!

Doctor's Visit

I had to take Brennan to the doctor again this morning. He's had this hacking cough for 4 weeks straight. Now coming from a mother who worries about everything under the sun, this was a MAJOR concern! I had ten thousand things running through my mind from 'what if he's allergic to dogs?' to 'what if he has cystic fibrosis?'. I called the doctor's office this morning and they told me that they didn't have an opening until 2:00. I ended taking him at 9:00 as a work in so that I didn't have to be out of work for an entire day. I knew that it would be an adventure, but I took Ashlyn along with me so that I didn't have to back track. She was a hoot! On the car ride there she was singing a song that I'm guessing she's learned at school. Something about your eyes are for seeing, your ears are for hearing, your nose is for smelling, and so on. Then she started making up her own verses. They went something like this...
Ashlyn - Your hair is for...............Mommy what's your hair for?
Me - well, I guess it's for keeping you warm.
Ashlyn - Your bellybutton is for................Mommy what's your bellybutton for?
Me - that's how you were fed when you were in Mommy's belly.
Ashlyn - Your boobies are for....................Mommy what are your boobies for?
Me - (laughing hysterically) Well Ashlyn.......mommies can feed their babies with those. I really don't know the purpose of a man's boob's though.
Let me ask you...........why must doctors offices have play areas? Am I the only one who sees a problem with this? You have a bunch of sick germy kids putting their snotty hands all over the toys and what do you have but a disaster waiting to happen for the healthy kids parents! These are doctors we're talking about. You'd think that they'd have a little common sense! We finally saw the doctor and he listened to Brennan's chest and looked in his ears. He said that there's no wheezing which is a good thing and that his ears looked great. Brennan is gaining weight like he should so there's no reason to be concerned about something major like cf. He weighed 15.2 lbs today. He had gained 2 lbs in the past month! I'm telling you he's a chunky monkey! The doctor seems to think that he has a milk allergy. He told me to try switching him to an all soy formula for 2 weeks. If he doesn't seem to start doing any better then I can switch him back to his old formula and we'll know that's not what the problem is. Hopefully I can get this cough gone for good! Poor baby has to be tired of hacking all of the time.

Caught on Camera

He's been smiling for a long while now, but this is the first one that I've captured on camera.

And another.

I love this picture!

What a rough life! LOL!

And last but not least I got a picture of Ashlyn in her pull-ups

Wednesday night when she was sick. BLESS HER LITTLE HEART!

Just look at those curls..........That all nat-u-ral! No product, No nothing.

Just pure gorgeous locks!

What is a mom to do?

Yesterday, while on my way to pick my children up from daycare, I receive a phone call from the director. Here's how it all went down.

Jamie (director) - Mindy...............

Me - Is everything alright?

Jamie - I'm sure that you are on your way right now to pick up the kids, but I just wanted to let you know that Ashlyn has had diarrhea twice today and wasn't able to make it to the bathroom either time.

Me - I'm almost there. I'm in downtown Newton right now. How is she right now?

Jamie - Well, she's doing ok. She used up all of her extra panties, so we had to put a pull-up on her. She's been crying. I think that she's really embarrassed.



Once we got home she went to the bathroom and sat on the potty for I know at least an hour. Brennan was screaming for a bottle. She was screaming because her stomach hurt. I was there by myself because Britt was working so I wanted to scream right along with them. I gave her a dose of Pepto and the later it got the better she felt. This morning Ashlyn came in Brennan's room as I was getting him dressed. She asked me the funniest question - "Mommy - what if I have to go to the doctor because of my belly hurtin' like it was and I have a baby in it? Wouldn't that be neat?" Then she proceeded to tell me that she was going to have herself a baby sister. Ha! Or wait, maybe she would have a baby brother like Brennan, and she would name him Hessa. ???? Where do kids come up with these things?


Next week I'm going to be in H-E-L-L! Britt is leaving and going to Raleigh all next week. Not only is he leaving, but my friend Hanna is going to be gone to the beach all next week also. You know how you call your spouse your other half, well I guess Hanna would be my "other third". She lives about 2 miles from me and her husband and Britt just started together on the same crew at the sheriff's department. So when Britt's not there Hanna is. She helps me out TREMENDOUSLY with Ashlyn and Brennan. While she is gone I'll be keeping their dog for the week. Soooooooo, next week I'll have 2 kids and 4 dogs to tend to all by my lonesome! If you see the news next week and hear of a woman going mad in Startown it's probably me. I hope that you will all come visit me in the looney bin. =)