Blue Balls

Sorry I am a bit behind here! Ardyn is getting better with a schedule... all on her own. Now she has an actual "bedtime" and she is sleeping about 10-11 hours each night, 7-8 hours straight and then eating and sleeping for a few more. That is nice. Now I just need to make myself go to bed before 2am, but I am so excited to have a moment to myself and be able to accomplish something, that I haven't forced myself to bed before 1am yet. Baby steps. She is also taking an afternoon nap that amounts to about 2.5 hours each day, which is nice. If we go somewhere, she sleeps on the road, otherwise I might get some time to do laundry and dishes, etc at home. Also nice. Of course, just when a shedule starts to happen, I will be going back to work. December. That's the target back to work month. Mid December. I am working on freezing 4 ounce bottles of breastmilk and giving up Ardyn in little doses, like when Evan took her with him for an hour yesterday. It was the BEST and strangest feeling! It was only the second time I had ever been away from her in two months. Neat. I did laundry. And Dishes. I vowed to paint my toes, but no such accomplishment happened.

New on the homefront? Boyd has a tumor. Worse this time. If you remember back in 2005 he had a colon polyp that we had surgically removed. Now it's a full blown tumor. Cancerous? We are unsure. We need to have it removed before it blocks him up and he can't poo.... the vet has referred us to a animal surgeon in Rockford who can remove the tumor with laser surgery, because it's now wrapped around his colon. Ugh. Evan took Boyd to the vet Saturday morning and had to tell me the news later that day. I got some serious teary eyes, because it's a difficult decision to determine if you want to treat it, if you want to know if it's cancer, and hoe much money you will spend before you determine that it's better not to spend. It's a bunch of decisions that I never wanted to make. But I knew it was coming. He is almost 11 years old. So this week I make myself a dentist appointment, and reservations for dinner out on my Birthday, and call the vet to see when we can get in up at Rockford to have a consultation. Evan thinks that we should take Ardyn with us. I thought that was a bad idea, but then he commented that it's a long trip, and will be a long day, and she will need to eat, and I realized that and also decided that it might be nice to have someone so small and sweet to take my mind off the fact that my very first baby might be dying of cancer and that I have to make the decision as to whether or not we can afford to deal with it. Honestly, I don't want to know if it's cancer because if it is, we won't treat it. I assume that if we can afford the surgery we will have the tumor removed and see if it grows back or not. Hopefully it won't and he can have another good 5 years of life. The vet in Walnut, who I trust and has tons of experience, tells us that he thinks it isn't cancerous based on the way it feels, which is what he told us about the polyp a couple of years back.

So besides that, let's see... Friday night mom and liz came over and we ate from Main Street BBQ in Wyanet. I love it there, but again (it happened once before) they forgot to include BBQ sauce in any of our meals, tartar sauce for my mom's catfish... etc. So we had to go back up in the rain and get the sauces. While our food sat at home getting cold. That was annoying. Mom brought over cupcakes. I carved a pumpkin that turned out TERRIBLY. Evan brought down fall decorations and I decorated for Thanksgiving. We didn't get Halloween Accomplished this year. Too much going on. Saturday, Evan and I went out for dinner at Red Lobster, and took Ardyn. She was very well behaved. We also went to Bergners where Ardyn got a Thanksgiving Bib and Evan got his winter coat at 50% off. I also got a couple of blazers and a dress off the clearance racks, and I was astounded to see that I am down 1-2 sizes smaller than I was before I got pregnant. That was awesome to try on things and have them all fit instantly. Neat-o.

Sunday we hung out around home. Evan took Ardyn to his parents for a while and I stayed home ALONE! Today Ardyn and I went to Princeton, ate lunch at Quizno's, visited my hairdresser Kelly and made an appointment for December, and washed my car. Then we went to Wal-Mart and bought a birthday gift for one of my co-workers, as I had her name in our yearly drawing. I came home, wrapped it up, and put the load of towels in the dryer with the new dryer balls that I bought at the mart. interested to see how those work. Planning on using them on baby clothes since you can't use fabric softener, and hoping that they help them from sticking together as they do.

So that's really it. I have a ton going on in the next few weeks, everything from a Computer User Group Meeting, Trick or Treat, Flu Shots for Evan and I, A Visit with my Endocrinologist in Peoria, a Dentist Appointment for a routine cleaning, a hair appointment, Ardyn's 2 month vaccinations, Dinner out for my birthday, my work Christmas Party, two days of testing out the daycare we have chosen for Ardyn, Taking all my stuff back to my office (including my mini fridge) in preparation for returning to work, Pictures at Sears on Ardyn's 3 month "birthday" that we will use for Christmas Cards, preparing to host thanksgiving at our house, A Card Making Class, and a Vet Appointment for Boyd. So if you don't see much blogging, apologies, but it's about to get hectic!