E-Bay Trivia

I found an interesting bit of trivia in my surfing today and thought I would share it with y'all. Prepare to be grateful. Ready? Alright. Did you know that the first item sold on e-bay was actually a broken laser pointer? Yep, that's right. In late 1995, the found of e-bay, Pierre Omidyar, had originally purchased the device as a toy for his feline companion, and when it went kaput, he decided to post it on the world wide web to see if anyone wanted to purchase it. The going price for the broken pointer was an astonishing $14.00. Apparently the bargain hunters hadn't caught onto the trend yet. Soon afer this, e-bay as we know it know exploded onto the scene. I'm not sure where the pointer that began it all actually ended up, but many satisfied buyers all over the world owe the buyer a debt of gratitude. Ah, the call of commerce.

Haircut

Before I could secure Ammon's permission to buzz Jeremy's hair during the hottest part of the summer, I had to promise to let it grow out as soon as the colder air of the winter set in. Well, I let Jeremy's hair grow as long as I could stand, but once the hair around his ears had grown about an inch past the tops of his ears. He had started to look rather shaggy, so while his father was at work on Wednesday, we ventured to the beauty college where Emily's sister works and had her trim Jeremy's hair. He looks so handsome and grown up, and I managed to snap this picture, and even caught him by surprise a little bit, as you can tell by the look on his face. I was really proud of how good he acted, and that he sat all by himself. I asked him at the beginning of the haircut if he wanted me to stay with him and stand by him, or if he wanted me to go over to the waiting area and sit down, and he said 'I can do it all by myself, mommy'. He's such a big boy, that little son of mine.

Asthma

Well, I promised I would post after our doctor visit on Friday, and as most of you have already heard what the doctor had to say about our dear Kadon, I'll simply do a quick recap on here. Kadon does in fact have a form of asthma, although at his young age, the doctor doesn't want to be too hasty and actually diagnosis him with asthma for a variety of reasons. Not the least of which is that puttting the big red 'A' in his chart at the ripe old age of 18 months will haunt him for the rest of his life, but also that there is a large chance that as he grows and matures, his lungs will also grow and mature, and hopefully he will grow out of his troubles. It appears as though Kadon's trigger for his asthma, which mostly manifests itself in coughing fits during the night, is the cold air that comes around this time of year. Kadon has been waking up several times a night for the past several weeks, usually following a fit of coughing, and has also been coughing whenever he is exposed to cold air during the day. While we have yet to decide how we are going to avoid exposing him to the cold air his poor lungs apparently don't handle very well, we have started doing breathing treatments with him twice a day, which is what you see in the photo. We hook the mask you can see up to a compressor, which turns albuterol, the liquid medicine he has been prescribed to help open up his airways, into a gas, which he then breathes deeply into his lungs. It then forces his entire respitory system to sort of 'unclog', which makes it so that he can breathe much easier. So far we haven't noticed him actually wheezing or rasping at all, and he doesn't seem to have any trouble running or playing like a normal toddler, so we feel blessed. Hopefully we will be able to keep this contained with a simple cough syrup before he goes to bed, and eventually a single breathing treatment before he goes to bed at night. Although he isn't a fan of the breathing treatments at this point (an 18 month old being forced to hold perfectly still with a mask over his face for 8 minutes isn't a pretty picture) the doctor assures us that with time he will grow used to the procedure and stop fighting it. We have noticed an improvement in his attitude even in the short time that we have been doing it, and we have noticed a DRASTIC improvement in his sleeping schedule, so for now we will definetely stay the course. More than likely, we will continue to do the breathing treatments once a day through the winter for the next several years in order to keep him comfortable through the cold months. The doctor is hoping that by the time he is 4 or 5 he will outgrow this unfortunate disease!

September Snowfall

Ammon and I awoke early this morning to a somewhat startling and unexpected sight. We looked out our bedroom window and saw the field behind our building completely covered in snow! It's the 22nd of September, for crying out loud! I mean, it has been slightly cold for the season, and rain was expected for the next couple of days, but when the rumor of snow was circulated last week it was laughed off with disbelief! When Jeremy got up this morning he was very excited to see the covering of white on the ground, and Kadon kept looking at the ground and attempting to say 'snow'. It was really cute, so this morning, as I was cleaning after breakfast I let the kids go outside on the patio to play in the years first snowfall. Kadon thought the snow was a lot of fun until he realized how cold his hands were going to get. I went to the storage closet and fished out our bag of winter hats and gloves (it's so early in the year I hadn't even gotten it out yet! Luckily it has been cold enough that I had gotten out our winter coats last week!) and he was a little bit happier after that, but then we had the inevitable problem of not being able to efficiently being able to pick up the snow with a layer of fleece covering his fingers. Ah well, here's to a season of snow, even if it is two months early! Hopefully it will melt soon, and we'll at least get a reprieve before it sets in for good!

The Time is Today!

September 21st. I have been waiting for September 21st for four long months. Tonight my favorite show, the only show that I actually watch on a regular basis, is returning after the summer hiatus. I am planning to put my kids to bed early and plant myself in front of the television from 8 until 9 pm, and I will allow no interruptions! We also have some pretty serious inspections going on tomorrow, so I have been doing a lot of cleaning for that, and have managed to plan accordingly so that I don't have any cleaning to do tonight and I can veg out guilt free in front of my show. It has been a long and busy week, and I am really glad that today is Thursday and it is almost over. I will be even more glad when tomorrow is Friday and Ammon and I get to go out for a date and we don't have anything planned all weekend long. It feels like we haven't seen each other in at least a couple of weeks! With Ammon's parents being here, and the hectic weeks we've had since they left, we feel like we've barely had time to breathe! It will be nice this weekend to sit back and relax. In fact, I was invited to attend the relief society conference in Salt Lake this weekend, and I turned it down in favor of staying home and spending some much needed time with my family. Anyway, Kadon is sick (again!) and screaming at me, so I'm going to cut this short today, but I'll try and do more tomorrow after we take him back to the doctor. I'm worried about asthma, and am going to get him checked out, so I'll post what we find out hopefully some time this weekend.

Mario Kart

I haven't been diligent about posting lately, it's been a really busy week between all my many obligations, so I thought I'd put up this cute picture of my two oldest boys playing nintendo together. We had let Jeremy stay up late one night while Mary and Russ were here because Ammon wanted to spend some 'quality time' with him, and this is what they ended up doing. I think they spent about fifteen minutes playing Mario Kart together, and never even made it around the track once. They had a great time together, and I enjoyed sitting back and watching them giggle together.

Pretty Pedicure

Last week, to belatedly celebrate my birthday, my father had the brilliant idea that my mother and I should go get tandem pedicures. Never having had a pedicure before, and always eager to take advantage of my father's generosity, I was anxious to oblige his goodwill gesture. Hence, last Thursday morning my mother and I ended up in side by side pedicure chairs getting our feet pampered. I have to say, it was one of the most divine, relaxing experiences of my lifetime, and I wish that we would strike it rich soon so that I could justify the megabucks to get it doe on a regular basis. Plus, the girly pink I chose to adorn my toes makes me feel all warm and fuzzy every time I look down too!
I know it's been a while since I posted, and it seems like all the sudden my life has gotten really busy! Ever since Mary and Russ left earlier this week I have been kept running with various activities during the day. On Tuesday I started a new Institute Class on the Doctrine and Covenants that is being taught at the stake center out in Hyrum. I didn't think it would be very crowded, and several of the ladies in our ward, including a couple of close friends signed up to take it. Well, apparently your breathe the word 'nursery provided' within earshot of relief society, and the stampede begins. The poor nursery leaders were inundated with the 'children of Israel' and I believe the final count for the first week was 35 children. Even Kadon stayed in the nursery most of the time, and I have high hopes for the next 9 weeks. I'm really excited about the class, and am hoping to learn a lot about the book that I am the last familiar with. Ammon also took a business trip this week, and our women's ensemble got together this morning to practice, and I'm watching my friends little boys tonight so she and her husband can get out for a hot date. The chaos never ends for the weary, apparently!

To Sleep....

Just wanted to post and let you know we're all still alive. I'm hoping today is going to be a good day, because even though Kadon got up at the far too early hour of 6:15, he went back to sleep and none of us got up until about ten minutes to eight. I'm glad that Kadon finally got a good night's sleep, he was getting more and more cranky as the days went on. Now if only I can get him to take a good nap this afternoon....
This morning Mary and I are going over to my good friend Laura's house and we're going to sing in a quartet that we started up. Our first sopranon is out today, so Mary is being kind enough to fill in. We're working on a beautiful piece that at some point we should be able to perform it in sacrament meeting. Then Mary and Russ are heading to the temple to do a session, and we are all going out on a double date tonight. We're going to see the movie Invincible. It is a sports movie, which Ammon is really excited about, but it's one of those feel-good sports movie that the rest of us should like. Anyway, have a great day/weekend everybody!

Labor Day BBQ

On Monday, labor day, we had a BBQ that we invited my parents too. We were able to borrow a grill from one of my neighbors, and we grilled Cornell chicken. My parents were planning to be there at 5 o'clock, and at 4 o'clock, we were all sitting in the living room, and Mary and Ammon decided that the coffee table needed to be refinished to match the dining room table. They hauled the table downstairs, and while I chased the kids, chatted with my mother and tried to generally control the chaos; Russ entertained us all with his singing between turning and basting the chicken; and Ammon and Mary sweated over the coffee table. They were even able to get the neighborhood kids involved! It is now Wednesday, and the coffee table is still sitting out on my patio. Mary is going to put one more coat of varnish on the table this afternoon, and we'll let is it sit outside and cure until tomorrow night, and should be able to use it my Friday morning. I'm glad that they decided to get it done, because it looks really great, and I know it will give us many more years of use. When we get some photos of it completed, I'll post those too. Hope you all can forgive me for not being more updated on here!

Mayan

On Saturday we drove down to Sandy, just south of Salt Lake City, and visited a really interesting restaurant named 'The Mayan'. It's done in a jungle theme, and the tables are meant to look like they're amongst this forest of trees. In the front of the restaurant, they have a huge diving pool, and some cliffs about 30 feet high that they stage a diving show from about every 30 minutes. We got a table about halfway up the height to the diving platforms, so we had a great view of the divers on their way down. They serve Mexican food, which is actually really reasonably priced, considering the show that is provided with dinner. Kadon liked the diving so much that between shows he would clap his hands and point at the pool, hoping that another diver would come out. Luckily for us, in between two of the shows, a diver and a coach used the time to practice a new dive. This poor man dived for at least 25 minutes straight, but at least it provided entertainment for my one year old! All in all, it was a very long drive for a meal, but it was still a lot of fun!

Playground and Picnic

I know I haven't been updating normally, so I will attempt to provide a synopsis of what we have been up to. Since Mary and Russ have been here, Ammon was able to take an extra couple of days off around the labor day holiday. On Friday we took a picnic lunch and Russ's RC plane to a park and played fora few hours. The plan was to let the kids watch the plane fly, but it wasn't working properly, and only flew for about five minutes. The kids had a great time at the playground, though. It was a little bit different playground than what we're used to. Mary surmised that it must have been a playground meant to be accessible to handicapped children. They had some really interesting toys, and my kids had a really great time playing with the different things.

Table Refinishing

With the help of his parents, Ammon refinished our table yesterday. Mary started out sanding the original finish off the table, and then helped Ammon finish the job. After that was finally
completed, Ammon fine-sanded the table again, and then added a lovely stain that Russ was able to find at the local hardware store. Russ was able to locate a stain that was nearly an exact match to the one that Ammon and Mary sanded off. After the stain was applied, and had dried sufficiently, Mary instructed Ammon on how to apply the first coat of varnish. With Russ and I standing by as sentinels of imperfections, the first coat turned out beautifully. Mary applied a second coat about an hour later, and just before dinner, Russ went outside and applied the third and final coat of varnish. The table turned out beautifully,and I am thrilled that I can actually wipe food off of it without having the sponge stick to the surface of the table!! We are really appreciative for the help they have given us, and will cherish this table for many more years to come.