The surgery

Eric's surgery went really well. On Friday, Eric woke up and was crying. He wouldn't stop. So, as soon as it turned 9:00 I called the doctor and they got me right in. Turns out, he had a really bad ear infection. The doctor had me give Eric two big doses of antibiotics every day, to make sure he would be well enough for the surgery. Primary Children's called me on Friday, and our scheduled time for surgery was 7:30. Eric was pretty exicted that he was going to have his lump removed. I didn't tell him everything that was going to happen, but he knew that the doctor was going to put a mask on him to fall asleep, and when he woke up, the lump would be gone. He was really good throughout the entire day. The Primary Children staff was wonderful! We never had to wait for a long period of time to go to the next "step" of the process. Eric was really excited when they gave him pajamas to wear. His absolute favorite was the socks, and that he would be able to go to sleep with socks on.

They gave him a Valium for kids to relieve some anxiety about the surgery, and for being separated from me. He was so 'loopy' about 15 mintues after they gave it to him. He was so funny. They put him in a wagon, and he was swaying back and forth, etc. He was cracking us up. Dad was able to make it right when we got Eric into the pre-operation waiting room. The anethesiologist came and took Eric in the wagon. As he was about to leave, he told Eric that they were going to see some puppies. That was not a good thing to say! I had to immediately correct him that they were going to see kittens, not puppies, there will be NO dogs. Eric was already a little apprehensive when they took his vitals, because he remembered when he had to get stitches from the dog attack.

The surgeon came and talked to us after the surgery was completed. Eric did really well, he fell asleep really easily. They took out a 2 in x 2 in lump, that he said was a fiboris mass. Most of the time they are benign, but the pathologist has it now, and will call us back in 2 days. We're glad he took it out though, because it would have continued to grow. I'm glad we got it out when it was smaller. Eric was pretty upset when he woke up. They only let me go back to the post-op room with him. He was really upset that he had an IV. He has never once complained about where he had the surgery, but he complains about his hand where the IV was. I was able to calm him down enough to go to ANOTHER room, where Zac and Dad could join us. I was finally able to get Eric to drink some apple juice. His throat hurt really bad from the tube. After he drank he started to act like he felt better. He was still pretty out of it for awhile. He tried to sit up, and he grabbed the oxygen mask, where he had the laughing gas come out of. He picked a bubble gum flavored gas. He put the mask on his face (it wasn't hooked up to anything), we asked him what he was doing, and he said "Mom, this smells SO good".

We had to wait for awhile to make sure that he didn't throw up anything. Luckily, he did great. We got him in the car, and he asked me if they took his lump away. I told him that they did, and he got this huge smile on his face and threw his hands in the air and said "Yeah! It's gone!" He did really well the rest of the day. I made him lay either on the couch or in the bed. By the end of the night, he was very wound up, and back to his usual self. He even helped me make some cookies! :)

Eric's Surgery

So we just got back from Primary Children's. They were really good over there! The doctor listed off about 5 things that Eric's lump could be, I could not tell you what they were if I tried, but his surgery is scheduled for Monday. We are going to meet with the surgeon before hand, and when they put Eric under, they will put the laughing gas on him, but he gets to pick the flavor of the gas! Rootbeer, strawberry, etc. They will make sure he's out before they even attempt to put an IV in him. They told us that they will have a pathologist on hand to test the lump as soon as they get it out, and the surgery should only last about 10-15 minutes. He also told us that they will use the disolveable stitches for him.

I won't find out the time of the surgery until Friday. It will be a same-day surgery, and luckily, Zac has Monday off already. My boss is being really good about letting me take whatever time I need off as well. That's all I know for now!

Sick Weekend

What a long weekend! I got the intestinal virus that is going around this past weekend. I spent most of the weekend either laying in bed, or throwing up. HORRIBLE! Zac was really great though and watched the kids for me. He wouldn't let them come into the room at all. I feel like I didn't even see the kids this weekend! I stayed home from work yesterday, and today I am feeling pretty good, although, I am still a little queazy.

I think I got sick from Aubrey. Wednesday night she threw up 3 times, ALL OVER! I had to give her 3 baths during the night, and Zac would change the bed sheets while I was bathing Aubrey. We eventually ran out of bed sheets, and Zac put down some towels for her to sleep on. How miserable.

I took a boot camp class on Friday, and it worked me! I am still sore! About 15 minutes into it, I realized that I was not in good enough shape for this class, but I stuck it out the full hour. When I went to pick up the kids at the gym's kid care, they told me that if you weren't already in the best shape of your life, this class will be hard! But LISA....I am proud to say, that I have finally done a full man's push-up! I have never been able to do a man's push-up. The women's push-up's are easy, but my feet would always slip out when I tried to do a man's push-up.

I got a center piece for my table for the upcoming holiday - Valentines Day - I got this big candle holder that has a candle in the top half, and I put the Valentines peanut M&M's in the bottom half. It looks great! However, somebody keeps on eating the candy. I caught Zac red-handed last night. I was blaming the kids, but it was Zac the entire time!

Tomorrow is Eric's appointment with Primary Children's...I will write how it goes, and anything that I find out.

4 day weekend

These pictures are for Zac's dad. Zac told me to post them. For Christmas Zac made me curtain rods for our house. He bought all of the metal, and welded it at work. He did them custom for each window, including my kitchen window which is 2 windows in the corner. We bought fabric for me to make the curtains now, but Zac and I have different ideas of what the curtains should look like. Zac also made a snowblower at work, so he wanted me to post those pics too. It is a pull start, not electric. He and his coworkers apparently get really bored waiting for the funerals to end.

On Wednesday night, I got a really bad migraine. Thursday morning I still had a headache, but I couldn't justify staying home from work for a headache. On my drive into SLC, a wave of dizziness came over me, and I couldn't see the lines straight on the freeway, and I started to see the black circle coming (like when you pass out). I was in the car pool lane with the kids, and I pulled over to the shoulder. It took me about 10 minutes before I could see straight again. Then at lunch, I was just walking to my co-workers car, and it happened again! She grabbed my arm and said that my eyes were completely dilated. When I started to feel normal again, she said that my eyes were back to normal. Thursday was the big snow storm as well. So I had two coworkers drive me and the kids home. I just couldn't risk starting to blackout with the kids in the car, and with the bad road conditions. I had one drive with me, while the other followed behind in her car to give the one driving with me a ride home. It was extremely nice of them to do this. Luckily, I have Friday's off, so I could rest for the day. The doctor finally called me back and he told me that I was just having a really bad migraine with all of the symptoms, and it was lasting for a couple of days. I also decided to get off of caffeine right at the same time, and that may have contributed to it. So goodbye Mountain Dew, it was not worth it to drink it.

Saturday morning I decided that I was feeling good enough to go up to Idaho, so I went and got Devin and we made a weekend of it. Zac stayed home with the kids working on homework. We stayed at Grandma and Grandpa Parry's house, and went to Jake's reception and saw all of the Idaho people there. We were able to make it back to Grandma and Grandpa's house in time for the BYU game. Thanks again Grandma and Grandpa for letting us stay with you. We had a great time!

When I got home on Sunday, Zac wanted me to look at Eric's lump, it had almost doubled in size...so we went to the doctor on Monday, and we now have an appointment for Primary Childrens Pediatric Surgery next Wednesday for our consultation before surgery. They didn't want to do just a biopsy on Eric. Because it grew so much, they are just wanting to take the entire thing out. The doctor said it is most likely a cyst, but he doesn't want to take any chances. That was pretty much our week!

Our weekend

I was able to get the kids into the doctor on Friday. We switched to a new doctors office that is right by our house, Alpine Pediatrics. This doctor told me that Eric's lump was definitely NOT excema, but he wanted me to watch it for the next month. We measured it's diameter, and I need to measure it regularly to make sure that it is not growing. If it starts to grow, I need to get in immediately, but if it stays the same, it is just something that I will always have to watch on Eric. Aubrey on the other hand is anemic. We have to take her to American Fork Hospital to get her exact level of anemia to see how high a dose of iron we need to give her. This doctor was really good though, he was very thorough with both of the kids. I only brought Aubrey in to get her immunizations, and he decided to test for anemia because in Dec 2005 she was borderline anemic. I don't know how this girl has anemia. She eats everything in site, and her favorites are fruits and vegetables.

Zac and I got our first babysitter this weekend that we had to pay for. I had one of the YW come watch the kids while Zac and I went to a movie. She did good with the kids, however, I forgot to tell her that we had cats....I didn't think to tell her, because they hide out in the basement and hardly ever come up. After she put the kids to bed she put in a scary movie, and turned out the lights. I guess right at the scary point in the movie, she sees something white move out of the corner of her eye, then Buster runs straight at her with Maebe following behind. When they see her, they immediately run downstairs. She said that she screamed so loud that she woke up the kids.

Eric is now a Sunbeam in primary. I peeked in on him during Sharing Time, and he and the kid next to him had their foreheads together just laughing....they were paying great attention to the songs. Eric's good friend Zack, got Thomas the Train for Christmas also. So on Friday they had a playdate where Eric brought over his Thomas and the tracks, and he and Zack made a huge track. They played for hours. Eric begged us to let him take two trains to church, so we put them in the diaper bag. During sacrament, I hear Eric yell to Zack (who is sitting about 15 rows behind us) "I have my trains! Where's your Thomas? I want Thomas stickers too!" He was so loud. When we were home, Eric got the train going around in a loop (it's battery operated), and he went upstairs. I could see the train from the kitchen, and saw Buster, our cat, slowly creep up to the train. He would get close to the train as it was leaving him, and as soon as it started to come back, Buster would back up. Finally he got brave enough and he was chasing the train around in a circle. I wish I would have gotten it on video. Aubrey was squealing watching the cat.

New Years Week

This past week has been very slow moving. It has been great! It's nice to not really have anything going on. On Friday, Zac's sister and boyfriend came and watched the kids so we could go to the movies. We saw Night at the Museum. It was very entertaining! For New Years, Dad's family had a party that started at 2pm and got over at 5 pm. What a weird time for a party! We played the usual bingo, etc.

New Years Eve we did absoultely nothing. The kids both fell asleep for the night at 5:00pm. So Zac hooked up the DVD player in our bedroom, and we just layed in bed and watched movies. On Tuesday, I had mutual with the girls. We were showing them some basketball drills, and about 30 min. into, one of the girls goes "Are you Sister Nielson?" I didn't understand, then realized it was the first time they had seen me since I cut my hair. They thought I was a guest person teaching them basketball drills. Open your eyes girls. That shows how much they pay attention.

Eric has this weird lump under his armpit. We noticed it about 3 weeks ago and I thought it was a bug bite. It still hasn't gone away, and it is the same size. (The size of a lima bean) We took him to the doctor on Tuesday to have it checked out. The doctor wasn't available, so we had to see the Physician's Assistant. He said he had never seen this before, but he didn't want to do a biopsy on a 3 year old, instead he gave us some cream for it. When I got home I looked at the cream and it was for excema! HELLO! A lump is not excema! Even in the brochure that was included with the cream for excema, it did not have 1 picture that showed it reduces the size of lumps. So I am taking Eric to another doctor tomorrow for a 2nd opinion. And this time, I am seeing the DOCTOR. I'm sure the lump is nothing, but with my families luck, I'm not taking any chances.

Zac starts school today, he has got a full load of classes. I am pretty much a single Mom until the weekends. He comes home after I go to bed during the week. He is getting excited though, we can finally see the finish line for his degree! Then off to law school. He signed up for the ACE program to help him study for the LSAT.

My basketball season starts tonight. When we were doing our practices, etc., Zac was home...but now I am going to have the kids. Hopefully they will stay away from the court. This is just church ball, but our team is good. One of the girls played basketball in college and is currently a coach for the highschool, and almost everybody else has played in highschool, with me being the exception, but I am the tallest! But in all honesty, I can block the shots pretty well, that is why I am playing. Making the shots is another story.