Last Night

Today I have been thinking a lot about God. I don't consider myself to be deeply religious but I did grow up attending church and believing in and loving God. There have been many times that I have felt His presence or influence in my life and accepted it as normal. There are times that I am taken aback by His work though and realize that He really does work miracles. Case in point; last night.
I am a nurse at a busy children's hospital that is connected to an equally busy adult hospital in fact the ERs are just a short hallway away from each other. Last night I was helping out in the ER early in my shift. It was fairly busy and getting close to midnight. A team of doctors and nurses had just finished performing a procedure on a teenage boy. The boy's father left the room to go to the restroom and he collapsed either in or near the bathroom. A nurse quickly helped him get up and into an empty exam room and alerted other staff about what was happening. The father was complaining of chest pain, was diaphoretic (sweaty) and clammy. A team made of nurses, doctors, respiratory therapists and a nursing assistant went into action. Within minutes of his fall he had an IV started with blood work drawn, he was hooked up to monitors and had oxygen applied via nasal cannula and an EKG was performed. The doctor looked at the EKG for 5 seconds and announced that we needed to get this man to the adult ER NOW. He was having a heart attack. They rolled him out and down the hall to the adult ER. His wife accompanied him there after being assured that her son, who was stable, would be well taken care of and would not be left alone in the room. From the time of the man's collapse to the time he was wheeled into the adult ER about 10 minutes. He likely was taken to the cardiac cath lab within the half hour. I was able to follow up with the nursing staff later that night and found that the man was doing well.
At first I looked at the event as a tragedy. Here is this 50 something year old man suffering a heart attack, his son is in the hospital, his wife is torn about who to be more concerned about. But what if he hadn't been in the hospital when it happened, what if he had been at home? Would the paramedics have arrived and get him to a hospital in time? Would he have just died in his sleep? Maybe there was a reason his son was suffering last night. Maybe he was suffering so his father could be saved. It wasn't his father's time to go, he needs to be here still. He needed to be saved. I am in awe of His work. I am confused by the way He does his work but it saved a life last night and for that there are many who are thankful.

I heart Facebook

I just had a friend from Kenya contact me through facebook. He moved back to Kenya about 5 years ago. We kept in contact for awhile through e-mail. But he didn't always have internet access, then I lost his e-mail address when I changed service providers. The last time I had heard from him was almost two years ago. Apparently Facebook has made it's way to Kenya, he created a profile, looked me up and added me as one of his first FB friends. I love Facebook!

Mini vacation

We took a mini vacation last weekend to see Lake Superior. Oh we met up with friends too but the main attraction, in my perspective, was the lake. Growing up I lived 5 blocks from Lake Superior, our lives revolved around the lake even without trying. We spent many days at the sandy beach torturing our bodies "swimming" in the 60 degree water then building sand castles and eating food that was just a little sandy. We also visited the rocky beaches often, throwing rocks, eating more picnic meals and collecting the beach glass. My favorite place is a rather secluded rocky beach that we had to walk through yards to get to. I took my kids there last weekend.

Our hotel room had a view of the lake. That's an understatement, we were a mere 200 feet from the lake. Maya and I watched a ship come in with lights on around 10pm while the other kids slept. In the morning we raced to the canal to watch a ship go through and under the lift bridge, a first for Hannah and Elias.

I hadn't realized how much I missed the lake as an every day occurrence until a recently. One day I was driving around running errands, it was 55 degrees and windy, a typical spring day near the lake. Suddenly all I wanted was to go to the lake to sit and lose my thoughts in the water. Of course the lake was 2.5 hours from home and I had children coming home from daycare and school in about an hour. I did the next best thing. I went home, booked a hotel room and called a friend to let her know we were coming to visit. I'm glad I did.

I will never go to Chuck E. Cheese's again!

About 3 years ago I took Maya and her friend to Chuck E. Cheese's (CEC) just for fun. I hadn't been inside one since I was little so I wasn't exactly sure what to expect. Well the restaurant was older and therefore a little dingy. It was small and very crowded with all the games inside but the girls seemed to have fun. I bought pizza, pop and a bunch of tokens we spent a couple of hours there. A CEC you are awarded tickets when you play a game the tickets can then be turned in for cheapo prizes. The girls were pulling tickets out of the machine like crazy. Chuck E. Cheese even made a couple of appearances and tossed tickets out to anyone willing to gather them up off the floor. So by the end of the night we had a lot of tickets. Shortly before the girls ran out of tokens the mom of two adorable kids gave me her tickets (about 10 in all) before they left and I added them to our stash. Her kids were little and hadn't done many games, mostly just rides. As the door shut behind that family a woman, who was sitting close by me, came over and told me that the tickets we had just received had been stolen from her son. I told her I didn't think so because I had noticed that family playing some games earlier in the evening. She tried asking me just how many tickets I was given and how many my girls had. Ignored her and gathered up my girls as soon as they were done. We fed the tickets we had through the ticket counter and printed a receipt. The girls had collected around 300 tickets, enough for a couple of nicer prizes. As they were pondering over their choices the woman approached us again and asked "Just how many tickets do you have?" as she tried to look at my receipt. I ignored her. She went to the 19 year old manager and complained. He came over and told me there was a problem. I explained how the girls got so many tickets and offered to show him my receipt for all the tokens I bought. He admitted that he didn't think we had done anything wrong. The girls picked out their prizes and we left quickly.

Fast forward 3 years. Our Girl Scout troop decided to spend their hard earned money at a day at Chuck E. Cheese's. I convinced my co-leaders to go to a store in a different suburb than I had gone before. The evening started out okay. The restaurant was bigger and cleaner than the one I had been to before. WE got our food fairly quickly and then the girls and Hannah and Elias started playing games and the trouble started.
1. A teenage girl approached Maya asking her if she could have her tokens. My refused then turned to me and told me she wasn't sure what this girl was asking her. The girl took one look at me, said "Oh?!" and walked away.
2. Elias found me after about a half hour and told me another child had taken his cup holding his tokens and tickets. He had set it behind him on the seat of the driving game he was playing. The boy just walked up and took it while he was distracted.
3. The same teenage girl walked up to the ticket counting machine I was using, reached around to the front and hit the print button. I called her on her scam. She said "Oh, my bad." I told her it wasn't her bad she did it on purpose and that I had seen her trying to scam my other girls all evening. She walked away. I did get my receipt and finished counting my tickets.
4. A girl walked up to the table one of my co-leaders was sitting at with all the tokens (before we ate) she was eyeing all the cups with tokens. My co-leader asked her is she could help her - the girl gave her a disgusted look and walked away.
5. At the end of the day several of the Girl Scouts reported kids trying to take their tokens or tickets, kids pushing their way to the front of the line to play a game, and people (adults and teens) asking them questions they felt uncomfortable answering - how old they were, where they lived, what school they went to etc.
Apparently Chuck E. Cheese's attracts people who do not have the same morals that I have. Therefore I will never go to a CEC again.

He Bikes

Yesterday afternoon I finally fixed Elias' bike. The chain kept coming off and this time it was really stuck between the gear and the bike frame. I got it apart, got the chain back on, and tightened the wheel up to the frame and made some other adjustments. The back wheel now spins perfectly.

I had taken the training wheels off weeks ago but Elias still needed to practice balancing before he could practicing pedaling. Elias, happy to have his bike back, started coasting down the driveway with his feet inches off the ground. HE kept veering off to the left, I reminded him that he needed to look up and steer. He still veered off to the left. He blamed the bike. "The bike doesn't have a mind of it's own. It does what it is told to do." I told him. He grumpily agreed but still was blaming the bike under his breath. I went off to investigate the lawn mower.

After awhile I noticed that Elias was now coasting down the driveway, turning onto the street and pedaling a few feet before losing his balance. He even started on the street, pedaled a few feet and lost his balance, falling into the grass. He was yelling at the "stupid bike." "That's right," I said " the bike is saying to itself that it doesn't like this boy riding on it so it's just going to keep pushing you off." He giggled at that and went for another go at it. He continued for awhile until I told him to come in for dinner. He was furious at the bike at this point and shouted over and over that he was going to put his training wheels back on. I kept silent and just led him into the house.
After dinner there was still enough time to go back outside. I went to work in the garden, Elias started back up with trying out his bike. The dinner must have worked wonders because after a few minutes he yelled at me to watch. He was riding. More than a few feet, he was riding down the street. He turned himself around and started up again. Again he rode down the street again, and again and again. He did it all by himself. I never even got the chance to run down the street behind him holding onto his seat. Though I supported him from afar and encouraged him he did it himself.

That's Elias. He can't stand to be wrong or not be able to do something and he won't give up until he can get it right.

Way to go Elias!

Oh! I figured out the trail-a-bike problem and attached it to my bike too yesterday. Hannah and I took a few trial runs down the street and back. She loved it. Now that Elias can bike on his own we can go on some bike rides around the neighborhood. Now we have a whole new batch of parks and playgrounds we can get to without driving.

Happy Birthday Maya!!

Ten! Ten years ago today at 1:28pm, 33 hours after my water broke, 2.5 hours after I (completely exhausted at this point) started pushing Maya was born. All 10 pounds, 2 ounces of her. I can't believe she is already 10!

Yesterday she had a slumber party with a few friends. I took them all to a giant indoor playground, then we walked around a nearby park. Maya opened her presents while we waited for the pizza to arrive. We watched Hotel For Dogs (very cute) with our pizza then they ran outdoors for some fun in the back yard with the dog while it was still light out. I got to read my book while they played outside. Cake and ice cream didn't happen until about 8:30. They exhausted themselves out enough during the day that they only stayed up until 11:00pm.

We won't be celebrating her birthday with extended family for a few weeks so I gave her my present last night as well. A digital camera in her favorite color, purple. She has been using it non-stop since she opened it. I love that she can take as many pictures as she wants but only prints the ones she really wants.

Everyone was awake by 7:30 this morning so on account of the short night of sleep and the busy day yesterday we took it easy today. We watched Hotel For Dogs again with lunch and had cake and ice cream again since it's her real birthday today. She got to blow out her candles again too.

Happy Birthday Maya!

Devestation, Fustration and then Happiness

I had known that my blood pressure readings were high the last couple of years. I just sit in my chair of denial and tell myself that it was because I was nervous to visit the doctor, or I had just taken the stairs instead of the elevator to get to the doctor's office. Three weeks ago I was at the doctor again, my blood pressure was high 136/84, they re-checked it 15 minutes later and it was still high 138/88. Hypertension is diagnosed after 3 BP readings of 140/90 or greater. I was getting too close to that. I have family members with hypertension and will likely develop it someday. I am making changes in my like to keep that diagnosis as far away as possible.

I am now on a low sodium diet. Sounds easy enough until you go to the grocery store and look at the sodium content of all the foods you normally eat. I cried through that first grocery store visit. I am on a 1200-1500mg sodium per day diet. I felt like a commercial for sodium:

Tomato sauce - 450mg

Bread - 130mg

Deli meat - 290mg

cereal - 250mg

soup - 500mg

cheese - 730mg

Finding that you can't eat a lot of the foods you normally would eat - Devastating!

The good news is that I can eat raw fruits and veggies, meat that I prepare myself. I can eat most bread, eggs, rice, and shredded wheat is sodium free as well.I found low sodium peanut butter, unsalted nuts, and chocolate is very low in sodium as well. My mom even found low sodium tortilla chips - they taste great. However, it all comes at a price. Low sodium foods are more expensive than their sodium filled counterparts. Who knew it cost more to NOT ADD an ingredient.

I have found that I still can make my kids mac'n'cheese or chicken nuggets and I'll just make myself some parmesan noodles or an egg salad sandwich. We all still eat fruits and veggies and salads on the side. I can make more foods from scratch though that is tough for me time wise some nights.

I've been working on this diet for nearly 3 weeks. I have also been working on fitting more exercise into my week, everything from walking the dog, taking the stairs at work and running around on the playground with the kids. All of this has lead to more energy, less bloating and feeling happier all around. In addition I am pleased to report that when I last checked my BP at work it was 122/73 and I have lost 3 pounds. I'm feeling great!

Enjoying the weather

We have been enjoying the beautiful weather lately. We went on a day long excursion to the zoo a couple of weeks ago, took the dog to the golf course to run around one last time before they opened for the season, we had an outdoor Easter egg hunt and egg toss, we are going on walks in our neighborhood about 3 times a week and the kids are riding bikes almost daily.

I decided not to sign Elias up for baseball this summer and he and Maya decided they don't want to do any other organized sports this summer. I told them that meant they would be required to get out and exercise on their own or as a family at least 3 times a week. They agreed that this was an o.k. plan. So far we are succeeding in this plan. All three kids will continue to go to swimming lessons this summer accounting for a fourth day of exercise.