Christmas in February

Or as Brian Regan would say, `Happy Holidays--cause there's always another Holiday close by`. For Christmas, Tyrel gave me tickets to go see our favorite comedian, Brian Regan, and we ventured to Blackfoot, ID tonight to watch that show. We've heard some of his classic stuff before but we both agree that he is 100x's funnier in person. Tyrel anticipated that he might be hurting from laughing by the end of the night, so we stopped by Walmart on our way and got him some Aleve. Laughter is certainly a good form of medicine--just not to someone who just had their gallbladder removed. Ty was holding his side most of the night, but he did admit that it was well worth the pain. As we drove home trying to make everything funny like the comedians do, we realized that we are not comedians but we still laughed a lot. It was just a great night!

We are grateful for our good friends, the Frongners, who watched our little comedian so we could go out for such a fun evening. Ivan was really on a roll today. First off, I got out Ivan's dress up clothes and asked him if he wanted to be a pirate and he responded, "I want to be a fart!" No Ivan a pirate..., "I want to be a pirfart." no a pirate, "i want to be a pirate." Third time is always a charm. How he got fart from pirate, we will never know.

After that Ivan and Tyrel were playing while we waited to get Tyrel the "good drugs" Tyrel kept saying "Ivan does your (random body part) hurt?" Ivan thought this was funny and started saying back. He finally said "Daddy does your butt hurt." That got us rolling.

We were also informed that Ivan gave the Frongners a good chuckle...when we dropped him off a little after 4:00 he hadn't taken a nap, so I warned Kristen that he might be cranky and need to go to bed early. I guess he was fine and happy, but he took going to sleep early quite literally. As they were eating dinner around 6:30-6:45, they noticed Ivan was closing his eyes while he chewed his pizza...then his head started to bob while he was chewing with his eyes closed. They watched in amazement for a few minutes as he bobbled around, but apparently, he was out cold. When they picked him up to clean him up and put a diaper on him, he was gone! Dead weight flopping around while they prepped him for bed and he stayed that way until we came to get him at 11:00. Funny! Tyrel asked me why we paid forty dollars to go see Brian Reagan when watching Ivan is free and oh, so funny.

Gall-darn-it

Ty and I had an adventure today...we discovered these little cuties! At about 1:00 am I decided that I had never seen Ty in such horrible pain as he was in so we broke down and took him to the ER. There they gave him several doses of morphine which did alot of NOTHING for his pain. He was able to calm his breathing and relax his body but he was still in excrutiating pain. I swear for 2 hours while the nurse asked him to rate his pain on a scale of 1-10, he kept claiming 10. They finally admitted him to the hospital patient floor and gave him the button pain killer stuff...i guess it's morphine at a higher dosage and he just pushes a button when he wants more. He LOVED that! Turns out he had some gallstones clogging some duct (don't ask me...I was pretty tired) and needed to have his gallbladder removed. He was finally able to fall asleep at about 4:30am. He got an ultra sound done at 8am, saw the Dr. at 11:30am, had surgery at 12:30pm and came home at 5:00pm. Pretty amazing eh? We thought so. It was a long day, but hopefully this will mark the end of that horrible pain for Tyrel and hopefully he will recover quickly--we need our Superman back on his feet soon!

Just a little shout out to those of you who helped us out so much today...

THANK YOU! WE LOVE YOU!

THANKS JEN!

Where is Blankie?

I caught Ivan singing this today... (to the tune of Where is Thumbkin?)

Where is blankie? Where is blankie?

Here I am! Here I am!

Poor kid! We decided that we needed to take his blanket away permanently. No blankie = no thumb sucking (he only does it when he has his blanket). No thumb sucking = happy mommy and happy dentist! So I told Ivan that his blanket went on a trip and would be gone for a long, long time and that he could make his blankie happy if he stopped sucking his thumb. The last two nights he's slept without it --it was more difficult to get him to go to sleep but he did it! I hope he can move on quickly and not be too hurt that we took his beloved blanket away.

Here's a little picture tribute to his old friend.

Who Needs Sunday School?

I certainly do! Last Sunday we had a lesson on managing family finances. I've heard this lesson several times and even took a money management class on campus, but we still have a lot of room to improve. After Sunday school, we discussed re-evaluating our budget and cutting a few more expenses. One of the first things we said should go was...movies. Ty and I love movies and don't usually have a problem slapping down $20 for a movie we really love. Simple enough, right? Well--not really! Today I ran to wal-mart to grab 3 things: a wallet, jerky, and nuts , but what is the first huge display when you walk into that evil store?....High School Musical 3!!!!! So I texted my good husband "HSM 3!!" and he texted back, "need or want" of course I said, "need" but I knew better. I did walk around the store with the DVD in my hands until it was time to check out but I never could justify buying it. The bad part about all of this is, Valentine's Day just passed and my birthday isn't until September! Do I really have to wait that long to get it? Probably not, but I will have to save up my monthly allowance for a couple months to get it. Bummer! Why couldn't we have had that lesson next week instead of last?

Pay it Forward

I'm a little behind the times on this one...seems like everyone has already done it, so I hope someone out there still wants to pay it forward. So this is how it works: The first 3 people to leave a comment on this post will receive a handmade gift from me during this year. When and what will be a surprise.There's a small catch...You knew there would be, didn't you? Post this on your blog then come back and leave a comment, telling me you're in. Fun, huh? Remember, only the first 3 comments receive a gift. Give it a try!

Sweetheart Dance

Our ward is awesome! We just got back from our super fun valentine's day dance that our ward put on. Ty and I were surprised at how much fun we had. It was great to get all dolled up and break loose on the dance floor (we really have no idea how to dance-we probably looked like monkeys on drugs but all is well!) We weren't supposed to but, we let Ivan come out and dance with us--and I'm glad we did. He had fun dancing with his friend Emryi.
I think Emryi needs to teach me her moves...she seriously can dance better than I can. I didn't know 2 year olds had moves like that! Way to go Em! Speaking of teaching dance...our friends Jamin and Chara tried to teach us all some basic swing steps but Tyrel and I together have 4 left feet .... but we sure had fun trying.

There were also some quality games planned for our entertainment. One that we played went something like this...

1.) Ty had to eat 2 saltines then whistle the tune of a familiar song
2.) I had to guess the song then pop a balloon by sitting on it (not as easy as it sounds...especially in a dress)
3.)we had to place a racquetball between our lips and move across the gym without dropping it and make it to a chair where I had to sit on Ty's lap to let everyone know we were done.

This should come as no surprise, but... WE SPANKED EVERYBODY!!!

Funny that I mention spanking... that leads me to telling you about the poems we were prompted to write. So when we first walked in, we were to take two slips of paper: one had a normal word and one had a romantic word. With those words we were supposed to write a cute poem just for our spouse.

Ty's words were: Tweezers and Romantic

Every morning...
Tweezers pull your nose hairs
After a night of snoring
I think we make the best of pairs

Every evening...
I fail at being romantic
But you still make me feel like singing
May you never snap my elastic.

Mandy's words were: lust and blanket (those words alone should be warning enough, but in case you need more...this poem is not G rated)

I have a need
it is a must
It is only you
I love and lust

You and I should
get inside a blanket
But be careful,
I might want to spank-it

I'm not sure how it all happened, but we were invited to read some of our poems aloud and I was forced to read mine...in front of an LDS audience (my Bishop and his wife were there). So embarrassing! Anyways, as the night was coming to an end, Bishop approached me and read me the poem he wrote to his wife--it was a little dirty also--come'on people, it's Valentine's Day! It was a little uncomfortable, but it did make me feel better (I think his wife was super embarrassed, but hey, so was I).

Overall, it was a FANTASTIC evening. We shared lots of laughs, and maybe even bonded with our ward in ways that I would have never imagined.

GREAT JOB ACTIVITIES COMMITTEE!

Sorry mommy!

After sneezing a very messy sneeze, Ivan says to me from across the table, "Sorry Mommy. I blessed you on my oatmeal."