Okay, photos for the last two months coming right
up!
In early December Joe and I flew to Las Vegas for a get-together
with his family. Unfortunately I forgot the camera at the crab-feast
dinner Friday night (at which the entire Chandler clan was present).
I also failed to get even one good picture of Linda (Joe's mom -
yes, there are two Linda-in-Laws). But I did capture some other
nice moments.
Joe and I took a tour on Saturday of his old haunts. I thought I would share with you a panorama of Vegas, and a photo of his old high school.
Vegas, Baby!
Joe's old high school.
Joe and I drove up to his Uncle Paul's place on Sunday before we
flew out. Paul Chandler (the third), his son Paul (the fourth),
and his wife Leanne (the only), live at Overton Beach Marina (at
Lake Mead) of which Paul (III) is the manager. Joe and I had to
drive into the national park, and through the Valley of Fire to
get to the Marina. It was gorgeous! The rock walls of the canyon
were full of little caves. I want to go back there soon and explore!
When we arrived at Casa de Chandler, the guys were using the cherry-picker
to string up Christmas lights, and Leanne was in the living room
yelling at the TV. The Miami Dolphins were playing (don't ask with
which team). Leanne is apparently a HUGE Dolphins fan. I had her
pose in her cheery holiday Dolphins hat!
Caves littering the National Park.
The Chandlers and the Cherry Picker.
Leanne, Dolphins fan!
Joe and Paul (III) caught up outside beside the fire pit while Leanne,
Paul (IV) and I talked inside. Luckily for Leanne (she was gracious,
but I could tell she really wanted to watch the game) Paul and Joe
came inside and announced we were GOING JET SKIING! Paul and Joe
and I hopped on some SeaDoos and went out onto Lake Mead. The water
level in the lake is extremely low right now, and while trying to
access little-known parts of the lake, Paul got hung up on the bottom.
He is a professional, however, and rocked himself off the obstruction.
Because the water level is so low, a town called St. Thomas (which
was flooded and lost beneath the lake when Hoover Dam went into
operation) has been uncovered. Of course I begged to explore, and
we walked around the ruins for a couple of hours. It was really
cool. Then Joe and I ran off to try to catch our flight back home.
Joe, Paul, and Paul Jr. check out the SeaDoos.
Paul takes it out for a spin.
Joe captained our SeaDoo.
Paul got stuck. He tries to rock his way out.
The ruins of the city.
Joe had Christmas week off, and John flew into Sacramento for Christmas
(on Christmas morning). We went straight down to the hospital to
bring mom her Christmas Stocking. We then hurried home to open the
plethora of gifts beneath the tree. What a smorgasbord (spelling courtesy of Dayment)! There were computer parts, food savers, a freezer,
gift certificates (Jody, see the results below), and geez I can't
remember everything else. Oh yeah, a crash-test dummy toy-set for
John. And a silverware set which turned into a brand new microwave
(we had a silverware set)! The week was a pretty lazy one, with
lots of visits to UC Davis, lots of stops at car part and car audio
stores, and lots of Joe spoiling Tricouni.
John is as bad as Joe when it comes to
computer games, only he plays solitaire.
Joe and John... doing boy things (looking at
Joe's truck).
Joe tops our first Christmas Tree.
Our new microwave. Thanks Dad and Janice!
Tric nuzzles *mutilates* her Xmas Hedgehog.
Joe and Tric playing ball. They really get into it.
Best buds. Notice the lack of room for, say, me?
Joe heads off the problem at its source.
Joe. Tric. Cheese Whiz.
Joe and I took the opportunity a few weeks ago to drive East to
the Snow. Tahoe and the surrounding area received truck-loads of
snow in early January and we wanted a piece of it. So did the rest
of Sacramento. We pulled off the road on some random exit like "Crystal
Springs Road" and found tons of people playing and sledding and
building snowmen. Flakes were falling out of the sky, and it made
me miss winters at home A LOT. Well, not winters at home, but the
one week of winter where it dumps snow and everyone pulls out the
sleds and the chocolate and marshmellows. That was last week for
you all, wasn't it? Juneau got like 3 feet of snow last week, and
pretty much every office/school/function in the city was shut down.
Except of course for the state offices. Sorry guys!
Lovely winter weather exiting Sacramento.
Tric trots through the snow.
Back in her element.
Mr. Bundled-Up.
It was like a duel in the snow. Fifteen paces, turn,
run. Maybe more like chicken.
These guys wanted to take the snow home.
Linda (Joe's Linda-in-Law, or Jean's mother)
finally came home from the hospital two weeks ago, after more than
a month recovering from her original surgery and the consequent
surgery. When she got home we had her open her Christmas gifts,
including the Christmas box from the good folks at the City and
Borough of Juneau. She got some really cool stuff, including a SET
of singing stuffed dogs. They bear a striking resemblance to the
two other singing stuffed dogs she already has. This set sings the
Sonny and Cher song "I got you babe". We laughed hysterically for
a moment, and then I realized with a shudder of spine-chilling fear
that this was becoming a habit. She has almost a whole chorus of
singing pooches from CBJ. By the way, I think the group "think"
might have worked( see the January 15 entry). She perked up considerably that morning
(seriously, around 11:30 am), and seems to slowly be getting better.
Thank you!
Linda with her CBJ goodies!
Carolee and Paul R. sent Linda a
gorgeous welcome home bouquet.
I'll close with a pregnancy update, since I get a lot of questions about it. Let me see if I can cover most of them.
Do you get any strange cravings?
I did around week fifteen for garlic stuffed olives. It lasted
about a week and a half, and I have about five jars of them in
the closet now. What is rational about filling the cupboard with
ten jars of olives? I don't know? Anyone want some? After that
I think it was chocolate, but I denied myself and the feelings
passed. You'll find out why further down.
Is it a boy or a girl?
Our ultra-sound got pushed back so we don't know yet. I have folded
however, so we are going to find out. Joe refers to it as
"he", and mom calls it "Joey" but keeps throwing
out girl names, and between the two of them I'm afraid Le Bebe
will have a complex. We should know in two or three weeks.
By the way, if it is a girl, I think she (I) would prefer purple
or green cute things over pink. =P
Can you feel it moving yet?
Sometimes I think I do. I did around 15/16 weeks. It was like
a butterly in my stomach. Then I think the baby moved up and the
movement stopped until the last couple of days. In the last couple
of days it seems to have suddenly woken up. And I think its pissed
off..
Do you have morning sickness?
I did bad for the first like sixteen weeks. During the last month
it has slowed down, but I still get surprised some days. I think
there may be a correlation with lack of sleep. I had horrible
insomnia for the first trimester. Then I got two weeks of
blessed repreive from the insomnia and the sickness. In
the last two weeks my sleep has been really intermittant and the
pukiness seems to have picked up again.
My personal favorite: Have you gained weight?
Yes, okay!!! Yes I have! In the first three months I gained something
like fifteen pounds (I felt sick all the time and food helped).
In the next month I gained like seven pounds. So that's 22 pounds.
Are you happy?! I haven't been to the doctor's in five weeks now,
but as far as I can tell from my home scale, I've gained 0 pounds
(or less) in the last month plus. By the way Amanda, I finally
broke into the pregnancy clothes box this week. What a godsend!
Thank you!
I've decided the weight question is kind of like
the proverbial traffic accident. You don't want to look, but you
have to, and you can't help but know the gory details. So I decided
to post a photo, of me at 5 months with twenty pounds added to my
@$$.
20 weeks and 20 pounds. Enjoy the wreckage.
January 24, 2005
I just got home from work and don't have the energy
to post all the photos (that I have edited, cropped,
and just need to put into the web editor by the way).
But I wanted to put something fun out there tonight, so BABY NAME
SUGGESTIONS! Give 'em to me! Our ultrasound got delayed, so it will
still be a couple of weeks before we know if its a boy or girl.
The most recent submission.... WOLFGANG, courtesy of Jody
W! Give me your treasured, your wierd, your wacky!
January 15, 2005
Happy New Year everyone, and welcome back!
I will probably be working on this site throughout the weekend because
I've been remiss, but wanted to make sure I put the important news
out there right now. Linda came home from the hospital the night
before last (finally). Her condition hasn't changed much in the
last few weeks. She had been placed on a feeding bag (TPN)
and then removed from the TPN because she looked like she was improving.
Unfortunately she can't seem to keep food down, so they hooked her
back onto the TPN a couple of weeks ago. The doctors believe
that all the radiation and chemo has made it hard for her internal
organs to heal and its going to take a long time before things work
correctly. They thought that getting her out of the hospital environment
might help her heal faster, so here she is.
The last couple of days have been an immersion in Things I Never
Wanted to Know. Like how to do a heparin or saline flush, inject
drugs and vitamins, and hook up liquid proteins to a Pik line. In
fact, its 10:15 a.m., and time to disconnect her from the pump,
so I'd better get going. Good thoughts people. We're all ready to
see her start to get better. Maybe if everyone thinks really hard
about it all at the same time it will happen. What do you say 10:00
am (Pacific) Monday? Thanks!
