{adios, stones! & more :) }

i'm finally getting back to normal! yay! i went in 2 tuesdays ago to get my lithotripsy done. justin had to work, so my dad took me to tucson and my mom stayed with the kids. all went well-as far as he could tell at the time. i'll go get an xray tomorrow and have my post-op appointment on monday to see how everything really went. while doing the lithotripsy, my doctor pulled the tube (horray!) and replaced it with a bag. a bag?? yeah it was weird. it was taped to my back and since they don't stitch up my kidney or back, it was going to still drain for a day or so. and that's exactly what happened. in less than 2 days, i was no longer draining any yummy fluids, so we got to replace the bag contraption with a bandage (thank you to my medic husband to patching me up so beautifully!).....

after i got the tubes out, i felt SO MUCH better! still tired, exhausted and overwhelmed, but all in all: good. marisa flew in tuesday night and my parents left on wednesday morning. of course that was super sad. i hate saying goodbye to them. i hate even more watching my son cry after nana when they walked out the door. fortunately, na was there to distract him :) we hung out and did a few errands and i'm pretty confident i over did it. {note: at this point, i was still instructed to not lift more than 5 lbs for another week, so i was feeling much better, but still couldn't hold my babies. or do much of anything-making me feel somewhat worthless (i know better, but in an exhausted state-that's how i felt), so i was getting pretty frustrated and overwhelmed....} so we took a break and i rested the rest of the day. the next day we did some more 'going' (justin was off of work these two days so he was there to help with me and the kids!) we ended up driving through a neighborhood that a couple of our friends live in (and that justin and i both would like to live) and i made a few calls for rent houses. long story short-we ended up going to look at the house (fast forward a few days), and now we will be renting a house come mid-december!!!! {also, insert lots of stresses and emotions trying to finagle (sp?) how it was all going to pan out with our hopeful texas trip and christmas coming up....all the while-having a low grade fever and not feeling as great as i was pretending to}

unfortunately, marisa found out she had to leave early. she was originally going to stay until thursday (when kaysey gets here!!!!!), but had to leave sunday. i was SUUUUUUPER stressed. i didnt' feel 100% and i wasn't supposed to lift anything until tuesday. in no way was i upset about the situation b/c i was so incredibly grateful that she was able to come help out as much as she did, but i was just an emotional wreck. although i knew God wouldn't give me more than i could handle, i just didn't think that i could handle it! sadly, we dropped marisa off at the airport early sunday morning and i drove back to sierra vista and had to lift my babies.

as any parent knows-after ANY time spent with grandparents, they are just plain rotten after! (and that's okay!). so that was exhausting-they were very needy and my little priss just wasnt' having me not holding her ALL.THE.TIME. i had a fever and my side was throbbing. i just prayed that my kidney wasn't going to fall out (dramatic, perhaps?!?). low and behold, God gave me the strength and energy to get through the day! each day has been better and better. although i can't honestly say that my side doesn't hurt. besides that, my energy level is completely back and we're back on track getting those babies back to their normal routines.

so there's that. the purpose of the blog, though-is about the kids! i missed them so much while i was "healing/recovering". even when i was out and about with them, i still missed them b/c i could just pick them up and snuggle them! ian was so sweet-he still will lift up my shirt occasionally and "kiss mommy's owie" (he does it, and then has to tell me what he did). this kid talks so much and is just hilarious. there is a contact commercial on tv with a man who says "my brand!" and it's really drawn out (if you've seen it, you know what i'm talking about-otherwise, just take my word that it's really cute)....so ian hears this commercial and starts cracking up and saying "my braaaaaand!" over and over.

he is singing along with songs more and more. he's such a quiet learner. he listens and absorbs, then blows our minds by revealing everything he knows all at once. he is amazing. i'm the mom- so of course i believe this, but i'm pretty sure he's brilliant ;) he baffles us daily with his sentences, memory, and complex thoughts (you can see the wheels turning as he relates things together, then tells us about them). he is also rotten (refer back to being with the grandparents) and doesn't always want what we give him {"no want blue bowl, i want orange bowl"....cause it reeeeeeally matters what color bowl he has}....oh good times! :)

cecilia has come so far in the past couple weeks. she 'jumps' (bounces up and down), dances (pretty much the same), is talking a lot more (basically she repeats most things she hears-ie: we had on mickey mouse clubhouse the other day and they said "say ohh tooooodles" so, little miss stinker says "ohh tootoo"), she knows ian's on-going 'joke': "ow, my back hurts" and she'll say "ow, ba hu", she'll sign "more", "thank you", and i've gotten her to "please" a couple times, but that's about it. she LOVES baby dolls now, it's so sweet! and she is still so happy! almost always. the other times-she's a stinker. she's learned the 'i'm going to go limp the minute someone reaches down for me so they have to pick me up' or the 'i'm going to go limp so you can't put me down, but if you go ahead and lay me down b/c i won't stand, i'm going to throw the biggest fit ever'. she's become a much better eater (yay!), but now thinks she needs me to feed her more than ever.

ian also got sick the other day-like threw up in the car kind of sick. it was so sad. we have no idea what caused it and it was short lived, but it was so sad b/c you could tell he thought he had done something wrong. and we were in the car. bless his heart. we weren't far from home so we came in and ran the bath immediately. my rock star husband got him out of the car, stripped him, brought in the car seat and cleaned the car. (i think i've said it before-and in case i haven't-throw up is probably my least favorite thing about being a mom. i'll clean it up b/c it's my job and i'll do anything to protect my kids....but that doesn't mean i have to like it). we had him eat some toast, then that came up again. after that, he's acted perfectly normal since then. no fun (also not fun to try to get the throw up smell off of the car seat straps!)....

okay, wow....ramble much? i'm done. i must get to bed and get ready for tomorrow when my sister gets here, YAAAAAY!!!! (and THEN stephen, terri & stevie will be here next week!!!!!)