Home now!

Ross got out of the hospital today.
Once we got home I dropped him off and went to get his scripts.
What a nightmare! Apparently whatever painkiller they perscribed is very rare to have it in a liquid form. I went to four Pharmacies before finally finding one that carried it!
But, now that we are home I am just trying to take advantage of the opportunity that I have have to work un-interruped, just as soon as I post this pic....

Surgery is over... everything went well

Ross just got out of surgery and everything went ok.
I didn't get a chance to speak to the surgeon so no one has told me the details like whether or not they pulled the two partial teeth or whether or not they had to cut into his jaw from the outside. I'm sitting right here next to him, but they have an icepack strapped to the side of his face so I can't tell. He is in that drowsy state of half consciousness and I'm a nervous wreck.
They told me that if he has to vomit that we have to cut the wires so he can open his mouth or he will drown. Everyone I know vomits after anesthesia, including me! I am so worried. I'm having to write in the blog right now to keep myself busy so I don't just sit here watching every breath Ross makes and giving myself an ulcer.
I've actually been a nervous wreck for hours now. There is a Carlsberg promotion down in downtown Miami and Ross had all the signs and glasswear for it. He didn't have to be there, but the stuff that was in his truck did. So, we came up with the idea for me to drive down to Miami during the surgery to drop it off.
Well, this hospital is in North Broward and the bar that I needed to get to is in the middle of downtown Miami so I knew it would take about an hour each way. The surgery was supposed to be two hours long so we figured it would help me not be so nervous.
WRONG.
As I am getting onto the turnpike there comes on a news report about power outages all over Miami. The reports just keep getting worse and worse. The southbound traffic was mild but the northbound traffic just kept getting heavier and heavier. So, I get to Miami and the drawbridge that is on the street I need to go down is out, assuably because of the power outages. I really don't know my way around Miami and Ross is the one I would usually call for directions. Finally, I finagle my way around the traffic and find the bar, drop off the stuff then start heading back. Worst traffic I've dealt with in years. It took me two hours to get back and about mid-way back the gas light comes on. I'm 6 lanes over from the exit in dead standstill traffic!
Plus, the neighborhood that I'm in is one of those that they tell tourist never to get off the highway in. The actually tell people that they are safer running out of gas on 95 than to try and get off! So, I'm mildly panicking at this point.
Then, BING the check engine light is on. Then I look and the car is on HOT ok, major panic now. I worked my way over to the right lane and see that the next exit has a gas station right of the exit. So, I risked it. I pulled in and got gas just as if I owned the place. I didn't open the hood or even show any indication that something was wrong with the car. I got back in, got back on the highway and guess what.... I guess being calm does actually pay off sometimes because the temp gauge starting going back down.
It went back down to normal temp and I just kept truckin'. So, I'm back at the hospital and I race up to Ross's room figuring that because I am an hour late than he would have been out of recovery.
He wasn't.
Panic again. The nurse (great nurse...from Germany... name's Ana) told me where to go to get to the surgery waiting room. I get there and there is no desk, no nurse station, no no one anywhere for me to ask to find out if Ross is ok. I'm running up and down the halls like a mad woman and finally a nurse appears out of a room.
She told me Ross was fine and that everything went well.
WHEW.
He is going to kill me, but I've taken pictures of him to post here :)

Money.... no, INSURANCE... rules the world

I completely understand that health care is expensive and that the doctors and hospitals have a difficult time sometimes getting folks to pay their bills but some of the things we've encountered in the past couple of days are just downright ridiculous.
I was at work when they took ross to the hospital, but he was admitted to the Emergency Room and they asked him for payment BEFORE anyone ever saw him. He is there with a very serious break, can't speak but relates to them that his pain is a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10 and they ask him for money rather than giving him meds!
Then, yesterday morning the surgen came in to examine him. He looked at him for a couple of seconds and then asked him about his insurance. We weren't sure wether or not Ross's insurance had taken effect yet so Ross told him the situation. He tells Ross that he better get it straightened out or that he was going to have to come up with some way to pay before the surgery could be done.
So, this morning I call the surgen's office and pretty much got put off by his staff. I told her that we DID have insurance (his work confirmed that we did) but we just didn't have the number yet but would have it by the end of the day. I explained that we were just waiting to hear back from the guy in the benefits department. I told her that I didn't want Ross's surgery to be delayed because of payment, and she said that the best way to make sure that doesn't happen would be to send a deposit of two thousand dollars and then proceeded to give me the doctor's name and P.O. Box.
I asked her was it standard proceedure to ask an insured patient to send a two thousand dollar check prior to surgery. She didn't have much of an answer for me. She just kept stressing over and over that the surgery was going to be over ten thousand dollars. I kept answering back saying that we have insurance. It mattered none to her.
I told her I would send the check but pointed out that I felt as though we were being treated like a charity case. She at first got offended and began to tell me the doctors impecible record and whatnot. I told her that I just felt like they were stalling the surgery or putting other people ahead of us strictly because of money. At some point during the phone call I think she realized that she needed to make sure that we were taken care of so that they will stay in the good graces of Blue Cross. By the end of the call, she was giving me her direct line and telling me over and over that if I needed anything to please call.
It is just pathetic that the doctor is more worried about his payment than he is the patient. He didn't explain anything to Ross. He didn't tell him what the surgery would entail, how long it would take, how long the recovery usually is, or even what he was going to do. He only talked to Ross about how he was going to get his money. I don't think that is the role a doctor should be taking.
I don't know if it was because they finally got confirmation that we do, in fact, have insurance or the comotion I caused this morning, but the doctor and his staff lady both called today and checked in. Both being very thorough about everything now.

Sorry about the rant.

Ross is being a real tropper. He is able to swallow a little better today than he was yesterday so he is a little more comfortable. His IV was hurting him so we got the nurse to move it to the other hand. He talked her into letting him take a shower after she took the one out and before putting in the new one. I think this made him feel much better. He had been here for close to three days and had arrived straight from the rugby field. He said he was feeling so gross. He even brushed his teeth a little. Now he has on the gown and is ready for the surgery tomorrow.

It is kinda cool that the hospital has wi-fi so I'm able to get work done and update this blog while sitting here keeping Ross company. Plus, it will give him something to do when I'm gone. Play computer games or catch up with friends on facebook.

Ross

Brandi stopped by the hospital yesterday to bring Ross "something for the pain"

(don't worry....he isn't drinking it... he's got pain meds. I took it home with me to save for later)

Rugby is a dangerous sport....

I'm writing this while waiting for my friend to pick me up to drive me across town to pick up Ross's car. Why? you might ask.
Because Ross broke his jaw today in a tournament. Two breaks and lost two teeth. He said he took a knee to the face. He has to spend at least two nights in the hospital. He is there now and has to have surgery tomorrow. So please keep him in your prayers tomorrow.
His face is pretty swolen and he is in a lot of pain but was handling things like a trooper. They've given him morphine.
Tomorrow they are going to have to re-align his jaw and wire it shut. They said he will have to drink through a straw but I'm not sure for how long. I guess it is a convienient thing that he lost a front tooth.
I'll update more when I can.

Little Helper

Lily loves to help and participate in things. She is so cute. If I tell her that I am going to take a shower she runs into the room saying "sha, sha, sha" and then will go pull the towel off the rack and hand it to me saying "taw, taw, taw". I'd written before about her being the toilet paper concierge, well, she still does that too so I'm beginning to wonder if I'm grooming her for a career as a bathroom attendant. She will literally stand outside of the shower waiting for me to get out so she can hand me a towel.
She loves to do things for us. She will throw things in the garbage for us and put our shoes in the closet, help me load and unload the dryer and dishwasher. The other day I was watching at the window as Ross was walking across the backyard with an arm-load of sticks and there was little helper Lily two steps behind with a couple of sticks in her arms too.
So precious.
This one is where I found her the morning after we got the bowflex. The night before she had been helping Ross put it together. Check out the little screw driver!


This one was just funny. Those are Mr. Potato Head's glasses.

The other night I got a cute video of Ross and Lily playing with a balloon and Lily was laughing so hard she had to take breather breaks.
She was squealing and giggling and laughing so loud. If you don't have volume on your computer this video is worthless, but if you can hear it, it will make you smile.

Neglecting my blog!

I've really been neglecting this blog!
I just got back from Las Vegas and after being home for three days, can finally say I've gotten back on track. Well, I would have been caught up last night except that just as I sat down to the computer to catch up on emails I get a call from Brandi.... at the hospital!
Last night Todd got jumped by 5 or 6 little punks. I really don't know what their motovation was. Brandi said that they were at a gas station visiting his sister (she works there) and Brandi locked the bathroom key inside the bathroom. So, Todd was looking in the car for some tools so that he can help his sister out by gettting the keys back out. Brandi said that out of nowhere these guys just came up and knocked him out. She said that they were hitting him with beer bottles, trash cans, milk crates, anything they could find.
Brandi got their plate numbers and the police were called, but who knows what will happen with it.
They took Todd in the ambulance and he was bleeding pretty bad. Both of them were covered in blood and Todd ended up with 5 broken bones in his face!
Yikes.
He still won't find out until Friday wether or not he will need a surgury.

So, Vegas.....


We had an afternoon flight so decided to start drinking. We played rummy and by the end of the flight I think we may have annoyed the flight attendants. oops.


We tried to get a picture of how huge this show is, but this picture doesn't do it. We spend an entire half day wandering around looking at the stupid map before we even realized that we were in the wrong building! This show was at least 3 gi-nor-mous buildings and thousands of exibitors. This picture would be the only one you will see of me in heels.

The second night there we went to a party hosted by Sailor Jerry (a company who conviently sells clothing AND rum!) at this little hole in the wall punk bar off the strip and had a blast. My definate favorite night. We hung out with the designer who designed the dress that I was wearing and met so many really fun, rockabilly type people. oh, and did I mention that the booze was free?

So, the next day I didn't make it the whole day at the show. I made Tonya quit early and go back to the room for a nap. After the nap we bundled up (FREEZING in Vegas!) and took ourselves out for a nice healthy Valentines Day dinner of chicken wings and beer at the House of Blues.



Then we just wandered around and checked out some different casinos and stuff. At the Excallabur we found a really run down arcade and played around like little kids. Tonya doesn't like gambling and I don't have any spare money so we just had to play other stuff.
Here is Tonya inside the claw machine.


Did I mention it was FREEZING? Us Florida girls just aren't prepared for this type of weather. There were snow flurries that day and I've only got a jeans jacket!


We had a blast though. Looking forward to doing it all again in August.

More catching up

I'm just going through my 'January '08' file and posting the stuff that I haven't gotten around to yet. This is Brandi's boyfriend Todd's youngest son TJ. He is 13 and has just moved in with them. He's a sweet kid and I think it has made Brandi just slightly more responsible these days....maybe.

Sandy Bum. When Brandi was getting Lily ready for the beach while I was at work, she got her swim suit all wet. So, we did what any self-respecting redneck would do...

I know you probably can't read it in my blurry picture, but that shirt says "you can sell it on eBay" Ross calls me a nerd, but yes, I have an eBay shirt.


Lily has gotten so much more personality lately. She loves to read books and she loves shoes too. This picture is very fitting. Reading a book wearing a stiletto. She hasn't figured out how to walk wearing two of them so she just wanders around the house wearing one.
The other day Ross found my flip flops under a bush in the back yard!

getting caught up ....again

Sorry I haven't posted in awhile. I've decided to add on yet another venture. This time I really put thought and planning into it before jumping in. And, I made a pledge to myself to cut back on some of the other things in order to really get focused on the important work. (this is all about my web-work stuff...not the family stuff....not cutting out any of that!)
I'll tell you about my new project in a later post...no time now, just getting caught up on some pics before Lily gets up.

We made Brandi babysit so we could go out and celebrate a friend's birthday. I had realized that in going through all of our pictures the other day in order to get photos for the lawyer (green card renewal) that Ross and I hardly ever get our picture taken together. My drunk ass must have told everyone that because all of our friends kept taking our pictures. Two of them actually printed them up for us and one gave us one in a frame even! We've got great friends.

I am highly allergic to poison ivy. Lily came home from Tennessee back at Christmas with a small spot of it on her arm. Just a couple of applications of poison ivy cream and it was gone. Then, somehow, three weeks later I'm covered in it! all over my arms too.

On the way to Aunt Brandi's to go to the beach ... so cool.

While we were at the beach that day there were some girl scouts walking down the broadwalk with a wagon full of GS cookies. I've never seen Brandi run so fast. It was kinda funny to see a girl running up the beach in a thong yelling for cookies! I thought she might tackle them. We gave Lily ONE and she loved them. Thankfully Ross showed up just in time to distract her.

He actually took her in the Water! I never swim in January, must be that African blood.

No WAY

Lily's new word is "no"

Our day goes like this...

"Lily, are you ready for breakfast?"

"no"

"would you like a banana?"

"no"

"wanna take a bath?"

"no"

"Lily, come here"

"no"

"Lily, please let go of Zelda's tail"

"no"



It is somewhat annoying sometimes, but now it is funny because Ross taught her to say "no Way!"

I got a video

Silver Lining

Monday morning I woke up and it was NOT a good day. I had stayed up late the night before paying bills and balancing the checkbook so I was tired and feeling depressed about how broke we are right now.

So, to make matters even more depressing I needed to go get tampons and not only do I not have any money, but my stupid car is broken down again. I dumped a couple handfulls of quarters in my pocket and strapped Lily into the bike trailer.

About halfway to Walgreens I realized something. I wouldn't trade this for the world! All morning I had been dragging around depressed for all the wrong reasons. We could totally have more money in the bank and a good car to drive but I'd have to give up this life to do it.

It is January and Lily and I are riding along the deserted sidewalks of our safe neighborhood wearing shorts and tanktops while all everyone else is stuck at a job. On the way back from the store we stopped off at the park.

I'm glad I'm broke.

Day after Christmas

See what no naps does! Look at those bags!




David's birthday. We went to Bass Pro Shop to get bullets and an airsoft automatic rifle for David's birthday present. It is kinda a tradition to go out and let David pick out his own birthday gift. When he was little it served two purposes. 1. he got the opportunity to get whatever it was that he really wanted and didn't get from Santa. 2. Everything goes on sale the day after Christmas.



We had greasy chili cheese dogs and sodas for lunch ....mmmmm



We tried to get Lily to take a nap but it didn't work so we left her and Ross at the house and went to the home-place to go shooting.



Daddy had brought all of his guns and Richard had given him a new one for Christmas. Richard and David both brought their guns so we had a huge arsenal to choose from. However, we forgot to bring targets. So, we found some plastic plates and pinned them all over the trees to use as targets. Sherah is the best shooter in the bunch, David is probably the worst. The video here is Sherah and I having a shoot off. We both have the same kind of gun except that the one I am shooting is a magnum and the one she is shooting is not. Check out the flame that comes out of mine, and also notice how long it takes Sherah to decide to actually pull the trigger!






After shooting up over a hundred dollars worth of ammo we headed back.



We loaded up the car for the drive back to Marietta then went for dinner. We went to a noodle place that was really yummy and sort of a cross between fast food and restaurant. It was empty wich was good because Lily is at a stage where getting her to sit down is damn near impossible. The video here shows how Lily behaves while in public.



After dinner we got on the road to Marietta. We arrived at around 2 in the morning or so. I felt so bad because we woke Kathy up in the middle of the night and then she got up again two hours later to see us off. She is great though, had cookies for us and presents for Lily. Two hours wasn't much sleep...but felt good to get it.



Then the dreaded flight. This time with hardly any sleep and a cranky kid.



They overbooked the plane and moved a bunch of people off the flight, thankfully not us! We got off without much of a hitch other than sitting on the runway forever. This seems to be the norm these days. It is sad.



Once back it was hectic because I had to go in, drop my luggage and head right back out to get to work. By the time I got Lily to the babysitter and then to work I was two hours late! Yikes.



Then ....vacation over.

Christmas Day

This is where David lives. Notice the ghetto fabulous refridgerator and various other trash on the front porch! He rents the 2nd floor of this house but it is his buddy who lives downstairs and since Dave's apartment is small, he set up the Christmas tree in his friend's house downstairs.


These are the scariest steps! They are very steep and warped. And when you get to the top it feels like the stoop is going to fall off the house! But that is the only way into David's apartment so Lily and Joe had to be carried.


Lily dumped out her stocking on the floor. She got a bunch of candy that I took away from her (bad mommy!) a bunch ball, silly putty, silly string and the Pokey Little Puppie book.


She didn't like the silly string. It scared her.


We saved all of Lily's poopy diapers from Christmas eve and David gave them to Richard as gifts. He wrapped them in such a way that when the box was opened, so was the diaper. GROSS! The funny thing was that he didn't seem to notice that David was putting on a gas mask as he was unwrapping the box.
Then we got ready and went to have Christmas dinner at Aunt Marie's house. That was so much fun and so nice to see everyone that we hadn't seen in years. Ross was meeting all of these folks for the first time. Aunt Marie has a bonus room over her garage where she has some toys and things for her grandkids and Lily was in heaven there but when we had to have her with us in the main part of the house she was a terror. Her behavior on Christmas day was the worst that it has been in months. She was completely out of control. It was tiring.
David, Richard and Ross went for one more round of frisbee golf while Daddy, Lily and I stayed and had ice cream cones.
Then on the way home we drove by some guys house in Hendersonville who puts up so many lights that he actually charges people to drive through his property! It was fun, but I've seen almost as many lights in my neighborhood for free (but they don't have a santa there giving out candy canes either). Lily slept through it.

Monday of Vacation

We did a whole lotta nothing on Christmas eve. We ate way too much junk food and laid around on the couch. We played Frisbee golf. That was fun. The weather wasn't too cold like we had expected to it was good weather to run around outside. We really had to trick Daddy into watching Lily because he swears up and down that he doesn't know how to babysit! We put her down for a nap, quickly told him that he was in charge and ran out the door.
I must admit...I am TERRIBLE at Frisbee golf. See, we even have it on video...

All the holes are par 3 and just like regular golf, getting a higher score than 3 is bad. Well, we shot 11 holes. I got a 6, 8, 2 9s, an 11 and the rest were 10s! As you saw in the video, I only could get the stupid thing to go about 5 to 10 yards at a time.

That night we went to the Opryland hotel to wander around and see their Christmas decorations. I don't have any pictures from that either so I'll have to wait until Daddy downloads his camera. At the end we let Lily loose in a hallway of the hotel and she ran and ran until she fell over.

Forgot to post these from the Parade

I just realized when working on my laptop that I had downloaded the pictures from the Candy Cane parade to this slow computer rather than the desktop wher I usually put my pics. So, these are from the Candy Cane Parade that Lily and I went to before Christmas. It is on the beach and was very fun. I don't have any friends with babies so Lily got to hang out with the adults. Tony held her the whole time and we took a bunch of pictures of them together to try and convince his wife (she wasn't there...she had to work) that they should have a baby too. I hope it works.

More Vacation

Once we got to David's house we had a hard time getting Lily to sleep so she slept in between Ross and I. Ugh. I hear about people who sleep with their babies all the time and cannot fathom how they do it. Neither Ross nor I got any quality sleep.


So, the next morning, Sunday, we went to church at Denton's Chapel. My family has been going here for generations and generations. The sister of my great great grandmother Lillian whom Lily is named after, was the first child ever baptised in this church and everyone in my family since has been baptised there too. So, it was really special that we got Lily baptised there as well. Both of my dad's sister came too. We were called up to the front at the beginning of the service and Lily did the funniest thing. She saw the baby Jesus that was set up in the front of the church and kept saying "Bay Bee, Bay Bee" over and over and then started to fuss because I wouldn't let her get down to play with him. Once the minister put the water on her head she froze. She looked right at him in such a serious face and looked as though she was understanding what he was saying. The whole experience was really nice except that Lily was so squirmy and loud during the service that I had to take her out. The church is teeny tiny (42 members!) so there weren't many places to go. We wandered around the big room that they use for banquets and such and it was really neat to see that they still had pictures of my Grandparents on the wall there. They were really active with the church and I know they loved it so it made me smile to see their pictures on the wall even though they both passed away over 10 years ago.
(that picture of the church here is an old one but it looks exactly the same at that)





After Church we drove down the road to see my Grandparent's house. My dad and Aunts sold it after they died and now it is up for sale again. The realtor happens to know my dad and Aunts (everyone knows one another!) and she goes to Dentons, so she offered to let us in to look around. It is the house that my Dad & Aunts grew up in and I have quite a few memories there too. The people who are selling it did a bit of work to the place. they added two bathrooms (there was only 1 before!) and cut out a bedroom. Added a porch and re-did the floors. We went into the basement and saw a beam that had markings of mine and David's height when I was 11 and he was 6. And Brandi, Richard and my height when we were 18, 16 and 6. So, we got a marker and marked Lily's height too.

Then we went across the street to take a look at what my dad calls "the home place" which is the family property that really is still in the family. We lived there when I was 4 but I only really have memories of the place from the outside. All the years growing up when we would go up to visit Ganny & Grandad there were people living there that were renters so we never went in. It is pretty run down now. It needs quite a bit of work if someone were to want to live in it. The funny thing is that I always thought the house was brick but it turns out it is faux. What a let-down!


We got a picture of Lily standing next to her Great Great Great Grandma Lillian's grave


Then on the way home we picked up food from a yummy fattening place called Fat Moes. Mmmmm

Back from Vacation

I am going to have to write about our trip in several posts because I just don't have the time to do it all in one.
I am so behind on work and it just makes me tired to think about how long it will be before I get caught up. I think I'm going to hire a babysitter to come over one day just so I can work.
Anyway. We went up to Tennessee for Christmas making stops in Huntsville and Atlanta.
We left early Saturday morning and flew to Atlanta. Lily was confused about the early wake up but did great on the plane. We got to the airport way early and it was surprisingly empty so Lily had a blast running up and down the long rows of chairs and pointing at the planes outside.
She was squirmy on the flight but it was only and hour and a half so we got through it pretty easily.
Daddy met us at the airport and we loaded in and drove to Huntsville. Lily started saying "Joe" (my dad's dog that used to be mine) within the first half hour of the trip. It was so cute.
Once in Huntsville my whole family came over to Grandma's house to have a little Christmas celebration. It was so fun. It is so nice to be able to be somewhere that I can just put Lily down and know that she'll be ok no matter if I'm in the same room or not. We don't really have that here at this age. Lily ran around and tried to get into as many things as possible. My cousins and Aunts tried their best to kiss her and hug her but she is too much on the move.
Lily must have been very good this year because she got so many great things. She got two new baby dolls, a cool blinky noisy key, a dress and three hats!
We stuffed ourselves and Lily refused to eat anything. Aunt Gertie dipped ice cream cones for all the kids and Lily had her first one ever. She wouldn't eat it at first but then once Ross taught her to put her finger in it then lick her finger she discovered that she liked it.
After the party we got back in the bronco and headed to Nashville.

Lily's new boyfriend

I absolutely love the way Lily says 'baby'. It sounds like "bay bee" with the emphasis on the 'bay'. Any doll or stuffed animal, as well as real children are identified as 'Baby' along with a finger point. So, the other day when I was dragging my suitcase out from the top of the closet and had to move the Gigantic Raggety Ann & Andy dolls (all four of them... for some reason I have Brandi's too) I figured it would be time to let Lily play with them.
Well, Zelda ate the legs off one of them when she was a puppy, so that was the real reason they were in the top of the closet. And, because they are so old and are really really cherished toys from my childhood, I only gave her one Andy doll (Brandi's of course) to play with. She LOVES it!
Every night part of our routine is to pick out a baby from the basket and put it in the bed with her. I have been struggling for three days now trying to reason with a 17 month old about the size of the doll and how a smaller doll would be better to sleep with.
So worth it...
One of my Aunts made these dolls for us. I need to find out which one and see if she still has the pattern. I would LOVE to make these precious dolls.

Man am I irritated! I've either got some sort of bug on BOTH of my computers or all the crazed Christmas shoppers have taken to the internet and slowed my connection to a crawl. I've been trying to upload these damn pictures for two hours now (well not 2 hours straight, but while I work in a seperate window) and they are still not up. Hopefully I can get it to work in the morning.

Getting involved in Politics

I've been trying to decide which political candidate to vote for. I'm still undecided but I am really trying to narrow down my options. Because of the stupid way our system is set up, I had to pick a party in order to be able to participate in the primary elections. Although I still disagree with some of their party values, I've changed my affiliation to Republican. So, also because of the stupid way our elections are handled, I've only been paying attention to the republican candidates for now because I have no say in how the democrats narrow down their choices. I spent my birthday watching the YouTube debate and taking notes. I still need to look up a few more things online but I've pretty much narrowed my decision down to three.

One of those three is Senator McCain. Yesterday I met up with my Aunt and cousins down in Miami to go hear him speak at a town hall meeting. It was pretty cool because the amount of political things I've actually participated in prior to this has been very limited. I had a question prepared and was ready to ask it but someone else got my question before I could get the courage up to ask it.

The only un-cool thing was that most of the questions proposed to him were asked in Spanish. He had a translator in his ear to translate it for him but we just had to figure it out by the answer he gave. Maybe next time I should go to the English speaking one.

Senator McCain was a POW with my uncle and my aunt volunteers for his campaign so he came over and talked to us after the meeting.

We got our pictures made with him. There was some other weirdo in the pic too, but I cropped him out. In the pic: my cousin Sandy, Me, my cousin Pamela, Senator McCain, my cousin Christian, and my aunt Charlotte.

Getting so mature!

Lily's vocabulary is getting so big and she is learning things so quickly. She will say or do things that just amaze me every day. She has turned into quite a copy cat too. Yesterday she came in the bathroom while I was peeing and pulled off some toilet paper, wadded it up and walked over to the toilet and tried to reach in to wipe for me! I quickly stopped her from being so "helpfull" and then she decided to sit on her little toilet and picked up a magazine. I guess she thinks that is where you are supposed to sit to read!
She tells me when she is hungry by saying 'eat, eat, eat' and that she wants juice or a banana. And she tells me when she has pooped too.
They say that putting words together is the next step in learning language so I can now say that she is at step two because she says 'all gone' when she has emptied her cup or finished her plate. Ok, so it sounds more like "gon, go" but I understand it.