The Bell

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Pictures of the kiddos

So most people check out the blog to see daily updates on the kiddos so here are a few pics.

Alex got a new batman mask this weekend.

Have you ever seen such a smile?

So this was Addie's reaction to the mask!

She was one tired girl and Alex was still going strong last night. Nothing more precious than sleeping children!

Slowly coming out of the rut

Well I worked until 10 PM on Friday night. Working 7 hours straight on the phone with IBM support. At 10 we had what we thought to be an entirely working system! Well I came in yesterday morning to see that a few things are still broke. Hopefully we'll get that resolved this week and I can get past this. A big thank you goes out to my cousin Tanis and my Granny for watching the kids for me while I worked. They have been such a great help to me and have bailed me out of many jams lately.

Saturday afternoon I started getting a sore throat and then by 7 PM I started having cold chills. I froze or burned up one or the other all night long. Most miserable I've been in years. I continue to have a sore throat and my ears are hurting. I am taking some antibiotics so I'm seeing small signs of improvements.

Addie was feeling just fine Saturday morning and I have not seen any signs of her running a fever since. Thank you to everyone that uplifted us up in prayer. I could definitely feel the difference.

Monday Joseph had his wisdom teeth extracted. He did very well. He's a bit sore but overall doing much better than I did when I had mine removed.

Monday night as I was fixing dinner Addie and Alex were playing on the porch. They would run to the window and yell thru it. I love you Mom! Well that says all you need to know.. I am truly blessed!

Tina

Stuck in a rut

I posted last week that I was spinning my wheels. Well I think I got stuck in a rut. At this point I'm not sure I can dig out of it! The major project I was working on took a major nose dive this afternoon and is broke beyond repair. Now I've worked on it for months and now support is telling me the only way to fix it is to rebuild the environment. Needless to say I'm beyond aggravated over the entire thing. I've had a ticket opened with IBM for months now and have been working with support to resolve my issues and upon following supports recommendations my project took a nose dive. If you can't trust the people you call for support to help you then what are you suppose to do? To top that off Little Miss Addie is at home sick with a fever. Which makes me feel bad that I'm not with her when she's sick. Her daddy gave her some Tylenol and she's laying down sleeping. Please uplift her in your prayers. She ran a fever last Friday also so I'm concerned as to why she'd be running a fever again. So I guess my entire message was to say I really need your prayers of encouragement because I really feel overwhelmed right now!
Thanks,Tina

Spinning my wheels

It's been one of those weeks where I feel like I've done nothing but spin my wheels at work. Nothing I seem to be working on seems to be making any real progress. I have a bunch of projects that I need to get done but can't seem to get anywhere on any of them. I've been working really hard barely leaving my desk for lunch or breaks but not really seeing any benefit from it. I'm hoping next week all my hard work comes together and I can get some of these projects off my plate.

This weekend I hope to get Joseph to work on his graduation invitations so we can get those in the mail and have that behind us. Ashton is going tomorrow to get her pictures taken. We're going to try to do some neat photoshop stuff to create her invitations. I'll try to post our photoshop work when we get her pictures back and have everything in order.

Alex and Addie are doing well. Alex had some sort of allergic reaction earlier in the week that caused him to have a rash all over. The rash is now gone but now his skin looks really dry where the rash was. Hopefully we can lotion him up this weekend and he'll be back to normal. Addie came home this evening running a bit of a fever. We gave her some tylenol and she seems to be doing ok. Keep her in your prayers that she's not having a repeat of the virus/flu she had a few weeks ago.

I changed the background of my blog today. I haven't found one background that I just look at and say "oh that's the one". Hopefully I can find one that fits soon. I've seen a few on some of my fellow bloggers websites but don't want to steal their theme. So if you have one of those "too cute" sites give it up! I wanna use it. lol

Have a great weekend.
Be blessed and Be a blessing. Tina

Typical day for a Mom or at least me!

I found this on another blog and thought it fit perfectly.

Recently, I was diagnosed with C.A.A.D.D. - Child Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.This is how it manifests:I decide to do the laundry. As I start toward the basement, I notice that there are Cheerios all over the floor and my house keys are in the cereal bowl. I decide to pick up the Cheerios before I do the laundry. I lay my keys down on the counter, put the Cheerios in the trash can under the counter, and notice that the trash can is full. So, I decide to takeout the trash.But then I think, since I'm going to be near the mailbox when I take out the trash I may as well pay the bills first. I take my checkbook off the table, and see that there is only one check left. My extra checks are in my desk in the office, so I go to my desk where I find a sippy cup full of juice. I'm going to look for my checks,but first I decide I should put the sippy cup in the refrigerator to keep it cold. As I head toward the kitchen with the sippy cup a plant on the counter catches my eye--it needs to be watered. I set the sippy cup on the counter, and I discover baby wipes that I've been searching for all morning. I decide I'd better put them back in the bathroom,but first I'm going to water the plants. I set the wipes back down, fill a container with water and suddenly I spot the TV remote, left on the kitchen table. I realize that when I go to watch TV, I will be looking for the remote, but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I'll water the plants. I splash some water on the plant, but most of it spills on the floor. So, I set the remote back down, get some paper towels and wipe up the spill.Then I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do. At the end of the day: the laundry isn't washed, the bills aren't paid, there is a warm cup of juice sitting on the counter, the plants aren't watered, there is still only one check in my checkbook, I can't find the remote, I can't find the wipes, and I don't remember what I did with my keys. Then when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled because I know I was busy all day long, and I'm really tired.I realize this is a serious problem, and I'll try to get some help for it ... but first I'll check my e-mail.

Paperwork Finished!

Applied for Alex's SSN today. That was the last of the paperwork we had to do to finish up all of our adoption related tasks. We started our adoption application in December 2006 and a little over 2 years later we have finally completed the last of the paperwork! It feels good to be able to say we have all our paperwork done. Considering we started our paperwork for Addie's adoption in 2004 and we were still working on finishing up her paperwork prior to bringing Alex home we've been doing adoption related paperwork for almost 5 years! Needless to say I'm at a loss. What do I do from here? Oh yeah I have two graduations coming up and two kiddo's planning on attending college. Joseph and Ashton will be graduating in a little over a month and I think they've both finally decided what schools they want to attend and what career paths they want to take. I think Ashton is going to get a Surgical Assistant degree and Joseph is planning on getting a Criminal Justice Degree. Now Jonathon works at the Sheriffs office dispatching and answering 911 calls and wants to be a police officer and now Joseph is coming along wanting to follow a similar career path. You know I never say that career path for either one of my boys but if that's what makes them happy then I wish the best for them.

Last but not least I really never get any good pictures of Johnny and I ran across this one just now. It's a few years old but it's a great picture of him and Joseph together so I thought I'd post it since I don't have any other pictures of him on my blog!

Weekend

Had a lazy weekend. Spent most of the weekend just lazing around the house. It snowed most of the day Saturday and was cold so didn't spend too much time outside. I was finally able to get a picture of Alex with his U.S. Citizenship paper so I thought I'd share some pictures with you today.

Here's Mr. Alex holding his U.S. Citizenship papers.

Of course you can't take a picture of one without taking another.

They had to have thier picture taken with Paulie. This picture doesn't do Paulie justice. I think she's the fatest beagle you'll ever see.