Wired: Holter Monitor

This morning, I went to the Heart Hospital to get attached to my Holter heart monitor. I have decided that I got attached to it instead of it getting attached to me. Once you get it on, it pretty much runs your life.

Sure, you can go about your normal activities with it on, but it's right there annoying you every step of the way. You can do anything except take a bath or shower. But everything you do takes more effort.

The Details

So I have seven electrodes stuck to my chest. Each of them has a couple feet of wire that goes to it. They are each color-codes so that if they come off (!!!!) you can reattach yourself. They gave me a diagram that shows where each color should go. Thanks, I say.

So I've got the seven wires that all attach to a recorder box the size of a deck of cards that I can put in my pocket or maybe wear it on my belt. And that recorder has another few feet of cord that also gets stuffed into my pocket.

The extra cording attached to the recorder comes in handy when doing things like going to the bathroom. I won't explain but trust me on this.

But what about all the wires attached to the electrodes? Well, the lady (girl) who hooked me up asked me what I wanted her to do with all the excess. This question sort of took me by surprise because I expected that sort of thing would be decided for me in this situation.

After several seconds of me staring blankly ahead, the girl suggested that I might stuff all the wires into my pants (!!!!!) or maybe she could tape them to my abdomen. Okay, fine, option 2 please.

It actually is a lot less intimidating with everything taped up and out of the way. I thanked her for the suggestion.

The recorder has a button on the side that I am supposed to press when I feel my heart skipping beats or if I have chest pains or nausea or anything out of the ordinary. And if I press the button I have to write down what I was doing at the time and any further explanation about my symptoms.

So far today, I think I have pressed the button about 14 times. Good times.

A Funny From The Waiting Room

So I was a little uncomfortable in the waiting room at the Heart Hospital. I was the only person under the age of 60 I am sure. I had to fill out some paperwork so I sat down in a section of maybe 8-10 chairs that had no people in them.

So I'm sitting there filling out my papers and this old guy sits down right next to me. And I can just feel him looking over my shoulder at my forms. I gave him the evil eye. Ha! He didn't really stop but I felt better.

So not two minutes later another old guy comes up and sits on the other side of me. Helloooo? See all those empty chairs over there? Those are for you!

Follow-Up

Anyway ... I get to wear this contraption until Wednesday. Then I get to unhook myself and take the device back to the Heart Hospital at my convenience. I go next week to meet with the doctor and get my results.

I'm praying that this test will clearly show the doctor what's going on and what needs to be done.

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Easter 2011

We had a good Easter weekend. We colored eggs, hunted eggs, spent time with family, were visited by the Easter Bunny, went to church, and ate lots of candy.

Somehow, I managed not to get any pictures of the kids in their Easter clothes today. When we finally got home, it was Noah's naptime and he was half asleep. It just did not happen.

So here are some pictures of Emily coloring Easter eggs. We did the eggs in stages. We boiled them on Friday night and then dyed them on Saturday morning. We were still in our pajamas. It was a lot of fun.

We ended up with 22 colored eggs. And they are beautiful!




























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Two Hands On The ...

Two hands on the ...




... Bottle!





Sister thought this was soooooo funny.




Easter update coming soon. I promise!

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Poor Baby Boy

Poor baby boy. He has nothing to play with after his bath but the laundry basket.






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It's Funny

Okay, having arrhythmia likely caused by a Mirena IUD is not funny. I will get to the funny parts in a minute.

First, an irregular heartbeat update. After a couple rounds of phone tag, I was finally able to talk to a scheduler from the cardiologist's office.

And let me tell you she was SO sweet. She kept calling me honey and baby while we were talking. I got the feeling she felt sorry for me, like "you poor thing, you're so young to be having heart problems." I kept expecting her to come out with a "bless your heart" (har-de-har-har ... bad joke!) but she didn't.

So the cardiologist wants me to come into the office on Monday to be hooked up to a Holter monitor. This is a small heart monitor that will record my heart rhythm. I will have to wear this for 48 hours.

Then the following week I will meet with the doctor to discuss the results of the test. To me, it seems like an awful long and drawn out process for someone having heart problems. I mean a heart is a pretty important organ. You only get one heart!

Overall, I have felt a little better. I didn't feel like I had as many irregular heartbeat episodes today. That makes me think the problems really were caused by the IUD and I'm feeling better now that it's out.

A Funny Story From Work

I know I don't normally tell stories from the office, but this one was just too good to pass up.

So this morning one of the guys at the office came in walking all stiff-legged like a bow-legged cowboy. We asked what was the matter with him and he said he got into some poison ivy the other day. He had gotten a rash on his hands, around his eyes and nose, and apparently somewhere in his pants. Awful!!!!

I know it's not nice to laugh, but we laughed about that off and on all day. I have not laughed that hard in a long time. Someone would mimic the way he was walking around this morning with his arms and legs out to the side and I would just die in a fit of giggles again.

Something Stinks

Something stinks and it's Noah's feet! Emily and I washed them with a wet rag tonight and then put baby lotion on them. Noah was laughing so hard when Emily was rubbing on his feet.

I love to watch the two of them together. Noah just loves to play with Emily and she loves to play with him. Nothing better than watching brother and sister play.






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Hearts of Gold

Not much news on the heart arrhythmia front. My doctor's nurse did call me back this afternoon, but only to tell me that the cardiologist's nurse would be calling me directly. Well, they never called today.

I continue to have the irregular heartbeat several times throughout the day. I did end up telling a couple of my co-workers what was going on. I figured at least a couple people should know what was going on in case I need help at work. I mean I spend a big part of my day up there so you never know.

My news was greeted with a mixture of jokes and genuine concern. That was to be expected. I think a person has to keep their sense of humor at a time like this anyway.

Show and Tell

Today, Emily took the two birds nests that we found in the cedar trees a couple weeks ago for Show and Tell at school. She said that it went fine and her classmates thought the nests were "fine".

She asked me on the way home how I got the nests out of the trees so that must have been one of the questions the kids had. I told her that they were low enough in the tree that I just reached in there with my glove and pulled the nests out.

But I clarified that if there were bird eggs in the nests, I would have left the nests alone. I didn't want her to think I stole the nests out from under some baby birds. I wouldn't do that. I might have taken pictures of the eggs, but I would not have disturbed them.

Tomorrow is Emily's Easter party at school. She has to bring a dozen filled plastic eggs for the egg hunt and a veggie tray for the snack party. I wish I could go, but I have not worked a full day yet this week. And if I was to make it to the party, I would have to leave work by 1:15pm. Not good.

This Blog, In Print

I have been thinking about this for a while, but I have decided that I would like to print a book of my blogs. I'm thinking I could make a book for each year as sort of a scrapbook for our family.

I was looking through some of my older blog entries today and I almost squealed at some of the pictures from when Emily was smaller. I remember some of those days like it was yesterday.

I need to shop around and see what blog printing services are available. The one I found today would be about $80 per year. That seems a little high. Maybe I can find a better alternative.



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Some Hearts

Some hearts are made of gold or silver.

Some hearts are made of chocolate.

I like chocolate.

Some hearts beat fast. Some slow.

Some hearts beat out of rhythm. Mine does.

For the last several weeks, I have been experiencing short episodes where my heart beats in an irregular pattern. Sometimes it feels like my heart misses a beat and then beats faster to catch up.

At first, this happened infrequently. But over the last week, it has happened much more often.

(TMI - too much information alert. If you'd rather not know the details, you can skip down to the next heart and pick up the story there.)

I feel like this irregular heartbeat is related to some other issues I have been experiencing since I got an IUD put in about 6 months ago. (What's an IUD? It's an intra-uterine birth control device.)

I did a lot of research on the Mirena IUD before I got mine and I talked to several people who had one. Overall, women who had one seemed to be really pleased. I mean what's not to like? Shorter, lighter periods? Very reliable birth control that's hassle free for five years? No daily pills to try to remember?

Within the first few days of getting my IUD put in, I found myself not really feeling well. I had a lot of abdominal pain and bleeding. When I went back for my checkup a few weeks later, I told the doctor about the problems I was experiencing. She suggested I give it more time for my body to adjust.

So that's what I did. I gave it four more months to adjust. So last week I called my doctor about the increasing symptoms and the irregular heartbeat problem. She had me come in to go blood work and everything came back normal.

I was not surprised that the blood work came back normal because one of the main symptoms went away the same day I called the doctor. Of course, right??? I finally have had enough and decide to call and then the symptom goes away. Of course. Make me look stupid.

I had sorta had the same feelings about the erratic heartbeat episodes. Maybe this is all in my head and I'm just hyper-sensitive about feeling my heart beating? Maybe this is a panic attack? I'm not really prone that sort of thing, but surely my heart is not messing up this often.

This weekend, Mike suggested that maybe my blood pressure was high and that's why I was feeling my heart beating like that. So I took out my blood pressure monitor that I used when I was pregnant with Noah and checked my blood pressure.

It was on the low side of normal so no problem there. But there was a strange heart icon at the top of the screen that I had never seen before. I got out my manual and looked it up and it was the irregular heartbeat icon. So it was not all in my head. This was really happening!

So since the blood work was fine, the doctor wanted me to come in today so that she could make sure the Mirena IUD was still in the right position. I told her that I would really just like for her to take the thing out. It's been causing me problems for the past six months and I am just DONE with it.

She said she did not think the Mirena was causing my irregular heartbeat, but she had no problem taking it out. So that's what we did. (I realize I'm making this sound all easy. And the process to get it out is easy. It's just painful. Not nearly as painful as getting the IUD put in. But I can tell you that I didn't want to stand up or even sit up after it was taken out today.)

(TMI Alert - Okay you can start reading again after this paragraph.)

The doctor is also referring me to a cardiologist so that we can try to find the cause of the weird heart rhythm. Her nurse will call me tomorrow to let me know when they can get me in. The nurse said it may take a week or two depending on their schedule.

Personally, I hope it's soon. It's no fun feeling bad.

So stay tuned ...





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New PJs For Everyone

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Noah Fixing the Car

Do we have a future auto mechanic on our hands?




This is the second time this weekend that we have caught him doing this.




Looks like fun, doesn't it?


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Love

I love my children.

This afternoon we went to get their Easter pictures taken with Madison and Mason.

All the kids did really well. It is HARD taking pictures with a baby but they all smiled and got the job done.

We got lots of different kinds of pictures in their Easter clothes. Then they took some pictures of Emily in her cap and gown for Kindergarten graduation. And they got some pictures of Noah in a big bathtub and in one other little outfit.

We will get a CD of the images sometime next week, but I can already tell it is going to be difficult to pick which pictures we want.

Here is a picture of Noah after we got home tonight. He was so tired. He will be ready for an early bedtime.

Emily already had her dress off or I would have gotten a picture of her too. She looked beautiful today. Even the photographer said so.




I LOVE MY KIDS!!!!!!!!!

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Tooth Drama Continues

So this morning, Mike and I got up and made breakfast. I fixed waffles and scrambled eggs. Mike fixed the sausage.

When we sat down to eat, Emily said she wanted eggs but no waffles. The waffles were too hard, she claimed.

Then she decided that she didn't want the waffles or the eggs. She ate maybe two bites, but she was full.

I told her that she could eat. She didn't have to worry about her tooth falling out. It probably would not fall out until next Saturday.

She still didn't eat anything for breakfast and we told her that we were not having a snack before lunch. She will eat if she gets hungry.

And eventually that tooth will come out! It's inevitable.


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Teeth, Only Different

Last time I talked about teeth, Noah was getting his baby teeth. This time, Emily is getting ready to lose one of her teeth.

Nanny noticed that Emily has a big tooth coming in behind her bottom teeth. The tooth in front is getting loose so it will probably come out soon.

Poor Emily is a little freaked out about the prospect of her tooth falling out. Nanny told her that she better not eat an apple so she has decided that she better not eat much of anything. She told us tonight at supper that "Daddy packed too much food" in her lunch today and that she was SO full.

She did end up eating something but she said she was chewing with the big tooth and not the one that was loose. Ha ha!

So want to see Emily's new tooth? This pic is kinda gross because she had been eating. But here goes if you are so inclined.





I hope the tooth fairy is prepared!

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Happy 8 Months Noah

Oh Noah, you are 8 months old! What are you up to now?

• You wear mostly 12 months clothes, but you can still wear a few 9 months clothes.

• You still wear size 3 diapers.

• You are eating a lot of baby food now. For breakfast, you eat cereal and a fruit. When you are home, you eat two ounces of formula with rice cereal mixed with a #2 container of mixed fruit. You still love apples, but you also like pears, apples/bananas/strawberries, mixed berries, etc. You also take about four ounces of formula.

• For lunch and dinner, you usually eat two containers of baby food along with four ounces of formula. You like peas, green beans, sweet potatoes, squash, garden vegetables, and many of the mixed dishes.

• You also take several 6 oz bottles of formula during the day. I think you much prefer FOOD to milk. You just sorta snack around when you drink your bottle. You'll drink your bottle for a while and then get bored with it. Then we'll try it again a few minutes later and you'll take little more.

• You like a lot of snacks. You eat a lot of baby puffs, some baby yogurt melts, and some fruit in your mesh feeder. You are not a fan of anything that is tart. We tried pear juice and that was too tart for you. We also tried some peach yogurt melts that were too tart. When someone else is eating, you want to eat too!

• You go to bed at about 7:30 or 8:00pm. You go to sleep by yourself in your bed. You need your pacifier and a blanket in order to go to sleep.

• You have been doing better with your naps during the day. At home, you are consistently sleeping in your bed for naps. Just like at night, you need your pacifier and a blanket but sometimes you can sleep for 2-3 hours at a time. This is a big difference than last month when you were just catnapping.

• You have two teeth on the bottom and you are getting four new teeth on the top. Just this week, one of the top teeth poked through the gums. I am sure the others are soon to follow.

• You still like to talk a lot. Your favorite word is da da da da da. You say that all the time right now. Sometimes you say ma ma ma when you are eating. You are constantly making sounds and "car noises" and laughing and talking.

• You can sit up by yourself. You and Emily like to sit in the floor and play. I have been putting a few of your toys farther away from you to encourage you to crawl. You have not done so yet though.

• You like to sit in your Exersaucer. You like to rock back and forth and you play with all the toys on the Exersaucer.

• You like to swing outside. You think it is so fun to have the wind blowing in your hair. Emily likes to push you in the swing. That works out great for me.

• Emily just love you so much! She is always telling me that you are the cutest baby ever!!! She is always hugging and loving on you. I love watching the two of you play together. I hope you become best friends.

• You are such a happy baby. You are always smiling and laughing. Your whole face lights up when you smile. I know I am SO blessed to be your mother. I could not ask for a better baby!

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Weekend Recap

We have almost reached the end of a fairly low key weekend. We got out and went to lunch on Saturday, but we were pretty much DONE after that.

We went home and took a nap then we spent the rest of the afternoon playing outside on the swingset and the trampoline. We played a few games of Hide and Seek, had a couple foot races, and played (probably my least favorite game ever) I Spy.

Then on Sunday morning, we went to Sunday School. We had three pretty girls in our class. We were missing some of our friends!

I had planned to make popsicle stick houses. The kind that is flat on paper, not three dimensional. But when I got there this morning, that seemed way too difficult. That happens to me a lot. I look at my bucket of supplies and go "What on earth was I thinking?!?". Sometimes I have to remember that these kids are just three and whatever craft I choose will be mostly completed by me.

So this morning we did some Easter stamping and some sticker fun. The kids loved it. It was easy and fun.

After church we went over to Nanny and Poppa's for lunch. We had fried chicken and it was sooooo good! Can't beat home cooking.

On the way home, we stopped by Home Depot to get a pair of loppers and a hand saw. Last week, we had a company come out and brush hog our place. When they were done, it looked great but it just highlighted for me how many little cedar trees had sprouted up everywhere!

So when we got home, Emily and I took our new tools and cut down a bunch of the little cedar trees and some other little trees. (Dad and Noah stayed inside so that Noah could take a nap.) We found two little birds nests, which thrilled Emily to no end. She said she wants to take them to school for Show And Tell next week. I think that is an excellent idea.

We also found a pecan tree that we did not know that we had. I was chopping down some cedar trees under this big tree and I noticed a bunch of pecans on the ground. That will be exciting when we can go out there and pick up pecans to eat.

This was one day that I wished we had a truck. We could have driven around and gathered up all those little trees that I cut down and hauled them off. I left them all out there for now, but I know I will have to go back out there and gather them up eventually. Oh well. It's good exercise if nothing else.

So that was our weekend. It was nice to be a little less busy for a change. It gave us a chance to get some things ready for this work week.

I hope you all had a fantastic weekend as well!


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Honey Bee Song

The other day, I was surfing iTunes and I came across a song that I just love. It's called Honey Bee and it's by Blake Shelton. I have probably listened to it on my iPhone a dozen times today.

Here's a link to the song on You Tube: Click Here to Listen

So if you're up for some really upbeat and fun music, you should check out the Honey Bee Song by Blake Shelton. I am not normally a big Blake Shelton fan, but I do like this song!

Here are the lyrics. They are just so cute and catchy. Emily and I were singing and dancing to this song in the kitchen earlier tonight.

Girl I been thinkin’ about us
And you know I ain’t good at this stuff
But these feelings piling up won’t give me no rest
This might come out a little crazy
A little sideways, yeah maybe
I don’t know how long it’ll take me
But I’ll do my best


Chorus A:
If you’ll be my soft and sweet
I’ll be your strong and steady
You be my glass of wine
I’ll be your shot of whiskey
You be my sunny day
I’ll be your shade tree
You be my honeysuckle
I’ll be your honey bee


Yeah that came out a little country
But every word was right on the money
And I got you smilin’ honey right back at me
Now hold on ’cause I ain’t done
There’s more where that came from
Well you know I’m just havin’ fun
But seriously


Chorus B:
If you’ll be my Louisiana
I’ll be your Mississippi
You be my little Loretta
I’ll be your Conway Twitty
You be my sugar baby
I’ll be your sweet iced tea
You be my honeysuckle
I’ll be your honey bee


Your kiss just said it all
I’m glad we had this talk
Nothing left to do but fall in each other’s arms
I could’ve said a “I love you”
Could’ve wrote you a line or two
Baby all I know to do
Is speak right from the heart


Chorus A


Chorus B


I’ll be your honey bee

I have not heard this song on the radio yet. I have been listening to KJKE JakeFM (93.3 in Oklahoma City). I LOVE this radio station!!! So I hope they pick up this song pretty quickly. One of my favorite things about this radio station is that they don't have morning disk jockeys. I used to listen to The Twister, but their morning DJ's were so annoying that I got to where I wouldn't even turn on the radio. I would drive in silence rather than listen to those DJ's!

Another thing I like about JakeFM is that they don't play Christmas music during the holidays. They only played one Christmas song and it was worth $$$! That's my kind of station!

So anyway, there's my music pick for the day. Let me know if you like it.

If you’ll be my soft and sweet
I’ll be your strong and steady
You be my glass of wine
I’ll be your shot of whiskey
You be my sunny day
I’ll be your shade tree
You be my honeysuckle
I'LL BE YOUR HONEY BEE!

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Wordless Wednesday

After church on Sunday.



Silly faces.




Can't win this one.




Ha! Little stinkers!

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Where's My Cowboy Hat?

This weekend, Emily and I went to Toys R Us to find a new pacifier for Noah. He is getting to where he really likes the pacifier at times, but it has to be a certain type and shape.

We had probably a dozen pacifiers at our house, but only one that he likes and will take. And then on Saturday night, the pacifier broke. My fault! But we needed to find a new one and fast.

We looked for a new pacifier at Wal-Mart but they did not have the kind he liked. So we went to TRU and found some. We bought four. Just in case.

As we were leaving, I noticed that they had some cute baby pajamas on sale. They were Disney characters and I knew Noah would look so cute!

Here is a few pictures of Noah in his new getup.

Baby Woody!



And the hair sticking up is just awesome!



And as you can see, the toes are king these days as well.



All he needs is a cowboy hat.



Emily just loved Noah in these pajamas. She said that she needs some Jessie pajamas now and I tend to agree.

If you know where I can find some girls Jessie pajamas, please let me know!


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Sweet Sleep

The other day, Noah fell asleep in the car on the way home. I went to get him out of the car and I just thought he looked soooo sweet and perfect sleeping there.

It's hard not to kiss them all over when they are sleeping like this!









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Happy Bunny

Late yesterday afternoon, Emily and I went outside to do some weeding in the flower beds. I had been needing to pull some weeds in my iris bed along the front of the fence to the "garden area."

I put garden area in quotes because we have not had a garden in over five years - since we had kids. Hopefully we will get back to it one day but it will have to be when the kids are bigger and a little less needy when we are outside.

So Emily go out there and start pulling at the weeds. But some of then are hard to budge. And there were a whole lot of them. We decided we needed some help so we went and got the weedeater.

I was going along the flowerbed getting as close as I could to the plants without clipping them. I cut off a few of the leaves. Oopsie. But none of the buds.

As I got close to the far end of the flowerbed, I noticed something hopping right along the fence row. It was a tiny baby bunny! It was brown with a white cottontail. Emily named him Happy Bunny. I probably could have picked him up if I'd wanted to, but I didn't want to disturb him.

Emily said "let's take a picture!" but I didn't have my phone with me. Clearly, she knows how this works. We get pictures of everything!

Happy Bunny didn't seem to know where to go. He eventually hopped into the higher grass away from the danger of my weedeater.

We went back out tonight to see if we could find Happy Bunny, but we didn't see him. Hopefully he is somewhere safe with his mommy.

Here are a couple pictures of our irises.











We have some irises in another flowerbed that are already blooming. I'm surprised I was able to get a clear picture as hard as the wind was blowing today.












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Bowling Fun Pics

Yesterday afternoon, we went to the local bowling alley for some bowling fun. We played with the bumpers up so no gutter balls for us.

Emily really had a hard time getting the ball all the way to the end of the lane to knock over the pins. Next time we go bowling, we will have to practice rolling the ball harder.

Funny story - apparently we go to the bowling alley for birthday parties and not much else because Emily thought we were going to have to pretend that it was someone's birthday in order to go bowling. She asked me whose pretend birthday it was going to be. I told her we could pretend it was hers. Well, she got so upset and started crying!!! She is SO her mother's child. She does NOT like all the attention on her.




Noah sat in his stroller part of the time. We really was not a huge fan of the bowling alley. But just wait till he is bigger.




Me and the kids. I took a cute pic of Mike and Noah, but it turned out blurry.





As you can see, I don't think any of us will be competing in any bowling competitions any time soon.




Winner gets to pick the ice cream shoppe!

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