Wish Us Luck

At 9am this morning I'm heading to the allergist with Tyler for his flu shot. Since he has an allergy to eggs (they grow the vaccine in eggs I guess) they will give him the shot, and then observe him for about 2 hours. I'm pretty nervous about the whole thing, and have almost cancelled the appointment a couple times...but I guess I'm going through with it. I will let you know later how it goes!

Tell me what you think...

I received this email from Mike earlier today.

so, i noticed earlier today that in one of the stalls in the crack line between the tiles on the wall there is a bunch of scribble stuff. stuff that's typical in many bathrooms across the country. one such line reads "Just say 'Jaquie'". i have no idea what that means, nor do i care.......or that's what i thought.so, a few minutes ago i go back to the same men's bathroom and it's a full house. there are 2 guys occupying 2 separate stalls, and then i walk in as another gentleman heads to the urinal. so, there we are. 2 guys in when me and the 4th guy walk in. as all 4 of us, apparent strangers (possibly the 2 that were in there already knew each other, but i don't know) are taking care of business when all the sudden i hear "Jack!" and then someone else (maybe a Canadian) says "A". it takes me about 2 seconds to put Jack and A together, look at the wall, and realize they just said Jaquie....like the wall says to say. now, at this point all those news stories about tapping your foot in a mens airport bathroom come flooding back to me and i'm reaching for my 9mm, but wait, i don't own a 9mm. so i'm just scared. i finish up and take off!so, what the crap does "Just say Jaquie" mean? is it something i want to avoid? i sure want to avoid it again!MIKE

Brooke's Got Hooks

Hello everyone, I hacked Crystal's account and gave myself access to post. So, here' goes.

Earlier this year I rebuilt a sewing machine desk (sewing is over-rated) to be a fly tying desk. This allows me to lock up my stuff and keep the desk in the living room. Well, with that much easy access to the desk, I get more time at it. One day earlier this year, probably around March, I left the vise on the desk and went off to do something else. When I came back, I found Brooke tying her first "fly." Notice, there's no hook, she's tied right to the vise.



Shortly after that I started letting the kids use hooks and she loves tying now! All the kids like to tie flies! It makes me proud! I've created monsters!






For more great fishing stuff visit my blogs:
Lucky Drift Fly Fishing
Guys, Flies & Pies

First Snow

Wow! I can't believe it's November 17th and I'm just now blogging about snow! Last year we had our first snow on October 12th. I woke up this morning to white rooftops and a little bit of snow on the ground where there is dirt. There were a few flurries yesterday, but nothing stuck until overnight last night. It's beautiful. Here is the view from my kitchen window, and my strawberry patch, and my peach tree.

Milk, Eggs, and Soy...OH MY!

Well, it's been confirmed by an allergist that Tyler has some food allergies. We started to be cautious about a month ago when we tried to give Tyler some formula for the first time and he broke out in hives, and vomited, and had a little bit of diarrhea. We took him to the pediatrician to find out what he was allergic to so we wouldn't make him sicker. I am still nursing him, but it's nice to have something for a backup when I'm not home, and haven't had time to be hooked up to the milker machine. So, she sent him for a blood test, and it came back definately allergic to eggs, but the milk and soy were negative. I later found out that if you try to do an allergy test too soon after a reaction, the results can be false. So we took him on Wednesday to the allergist and they poked his poor little back with 6 different things and we watched for a reaction compared to the control they did. The egg flamed up almost instantly and got pretty bad, and he was trying to scratch himself and I felt so bad. The milk and soy were not as severe a reaction, but still, he had one. So until I'm done nursing him they told me to limit my intake of milk, soy, and eggs, and of course keep Tyler from having any of these foods also. If we avoid all of these things, he could quite possibly grow out of it. I don't know if anyone remembers, but Seth had a milk allergy until he was about 9months old, and now he's grown out of it just fine. So, eggs are in just about everything, so I'm on the search for some good egg-less recipes, especially for a cake for Tyler's first b-day in January. Any suggestions? Oh, the allergist said that "they" (i'm never quite sure who "they" are...but we all seem to care what "they" think) are recommending kids not have peanut butter or fish for 3 years. I new the peanut butter could be bad for little kids, but I didn't realize 2 year olds should avoid it. He said that the earlier you expose kids to foods, the more likely they are to have an allergic reaction. Scarey huh! Peanut butter is a huge staple in my house.

I was emailed this crazy story from 13wham news about an egg allergy. I hope we never have to deal with this. http://www.13wham.com/entertainment/weirdnews/story.aspx?content_id=886f8ddb-fb89-4b50-a840-815ed674685e

This is poor Tyler after his first Big reaction. Poor Baby

Funny Email Joke

The Lone Ranger and Tonto went camping in the desert. After they got their tent all set up, both men fell sound asleep.
Some hours later, Tonto wakes the Lone Ranger and says, "Kemo Sabe, look towards sky, what you see? "
"The Lone Ranger replies, "I see millions of stars."
"What that tell you?" asked Tonto.
The Lone Ranger ponders for a minute then says, "Astronomically speaking, it tells me there are millions of galaxies and potentially billions of planets. Astrologically, it tells me that Saturn is in Leo. Time wise, it appears to be approximately a quarter past three in the morning. Theologically, the Lord is all-powerful and we are small and insignificant. Meteorologically, it seems we will have a beautiful day tomorrow. What's it tell you, Tonto?"
"You dumber than dirt. It means someone stole the tent. "

Halloween

We were quite the party animals this year for Halloween. We started out with the Trunk or Treat at church on Sat, Oct 27th. We had a great time! The weather held out so the kids were able to trunk or treat outside.

Next, on Monday, Brooke dressed up for her dance class.

Tuesday was Brooke's class party at school,

and then Wednesday of course, was Halloween. Both of the boys had a party at school and then we went trick or treating that night. The weather was beautiful for us! I remember all those years as a kid when we had snow and our winter coats squeezed on over the top of our costumes! Here are some great pictures from the course of our events. The funniest thing to me about this whole holiday was Brooke. I have a bin of costumes and she decided to wear something different each time we dressed up! She's so funny. Halloween day she was a Buffalo Bills Cheerleader.

Tyler wasn't so thrilled about the whole getting dressed up thing. He wore Seth's turtle costume, and it was perfect for him because of the way he crawls. It was hilarious.

I bought the skeleton shirts for the boys at back to school time because they thought they were cool. So it made their costumes really easy to finish. I just sewed some felt bones to some black sweat pants and then painted their faces! They were pretty creepy, which is exactly what they were going for!