The Smith's Journey

Follow us on our journey through family life. No matter where we live you will be able to keep up on our happenings. Have fun and remember to leave comments.

Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Photo's - finally!

Well everyone this is going to be a long entry to my blog. There's so much to catch up with! I'll start with the house photo's. Sorry it's been so long, I keep waiting for the house to be tidy but there's never a time of that one! But I have taken the photo's of the outside. I'll download the photo's then do the explainations. Obviously the front of the house is the front (strange that!).

The next photo shows the two windows of the girls bedroom (the sunniest of them all!) and one of our bedroom windows. Photo number 3 is the dining room window on the left and the french doors in the lounge, the deck is quite small but we've got plans for that. The next photo is of the right side of the back yard and the one beside that is the left side of the yard. As you can see we have a rather large back yard! When we first moved in Terry put the trampoline down the back of the yard (close to the swings) but the girls hardly played on it, so the other week Emily and I moved it closer to the house - now they play on it. Emily said that it was too far away from the house!



This is a photo of the vege garden that Terry has started digging. We're going to put potatoes and kumara in there this year and build a higher garden for lettuces etc next to it. We'll raise it high enough to grow carrots in it as well. The soil is quite cloggy so we're looking at getting a rotary hoe.


The photo below the vege one is facing the house. It looked clearer on the camera, our other bedroom window is on the left corner and next is Aimee's bedroom. Then its the bathroom, loo and laundry.


This is a photo of the kitchen towards the back door. As you can see we have a lot of cupboards. Next to the fridge is the hot water cupboard with lots of room for airing clothes, and then the cupboard closest to camera is the pantry. There's a door to the hall on the other side of the fridge.


Our house is quite small considering the size of the property, just over one acre, our lounge is very small for being a lounge. We don't have a lot of room for changing the furniture around which is highly frustrating as we like to change furniture around every so often. I didn't take a photo of the lounge 'cos of all the washing. I know, I know, nobody would mind about that. But I would so that photo will come later. I'm a lot happier with all my books unpacked. I'm getting frustrated because we still have a box in our room with all our wall photos etc in it. Well I think that covers the house. Oh, forgot to mention that we're getting double glazed windows put in and am going to shorten our bedroom window on the south side of the house and re-brick the wall. While we're doing that we'll try squeezing in some pink bats. We've been blessed with having a friends help in installing the windows which is going to save us about $4000.


Now the next thing in the time line is Aimee's birthday. We had a party at Rachael and Neal's. As we were in the middle of moving it made it much easier. If I've told you all this in an earlier blog then just skim past this. I can't remember if I've blogged this. I definately wouldn't have put photo's on - I think! I've included a photo of the fairy outfit that Gran & Poppa sent over from Aussie. She went to church wearing it too!

This is our beautiful 5yr old. She's so grown up now. But she is still an angel when she's sleeping.
This is the fabulous, wonderful cake that Jo made. Aimee loves Strawberry Shortcake.
I will check through the other blog entries whether I've blogged other birthday pics.

Now the next 'big' event has happened very recently. I have been waiting a few months for an operation - Laparoscopy, hysteroscopy, D & C, and insertion of a Mirena. Very routine surgery. I've had it before. It came up for the 16th August (Terry's birthday), so we got to the hospital at 7am, (I am not a morning person - don't think I ever will be), I think we waited about 2 hrs before we went to pre-op. Anyway short story is that I had the surgery and went home a few hrs later. That night I had a look at the incision in my belly button. I saw what looked like a tiny bit of fatty skin. Thought nothing of that. I woke up at 5am with a bit more pain than expected. Again thought nothing of it and took some painkillers. While Terry was taking the girls to school I had another look at the wound. There was a lot more of that fatty looking stuff coming out of the incision. I told Terry to take me to my GP. We saw the nurse first and when she had a look she said "Hmmm, I think I'd better get the doctor." So our doctor came in for a squizz, she said "Oh, I've heard that this could happen but haven't seen it before. You'll have to go back to the hospital." So we arrived at the hospital, eventually we were seen by a lovely doctor who told us that the 'fatty stuff'' was fatty tissue from under the skin. She tried with local anaesthetic to 'poke' it back through. Much to say that Terry had his hand squeezed so tight that I think he would have lost his hand completely. The doctor gave up and bought in the 'big boss' doctor. He walked in and took a look and like so many before him said "Hmm, never saw this before, heard it could happen though. You'll have to go under general anaesthetic to get it sown back in. Its the fatty tissue that protects the bowel. It must of come off during the surgery."
Nobody's fault, just my body doing this really freakish thing that no doctor has seen before!
So I went back under the knife and this time they kept me in for the night. Why is it that you're at the hospital 'cause you're unwell and the nurses never let you sleep the night through! I had a lovely room mate though. An elderly woman called Joan. She warned me before sleeping that she's been said to snore. I told her how use to that I was because my hubby snores too. Well, I haven't heard someone quite so loud as her! I had the Mp3 player up to top volume trying to drown her out with the music. I envisioned myself throwing my pillow at her but it hurt too much to move so I turned the music up even louder! Eventually I did drop off and then awoke with a fright hearing 'Smoke on the water' come on very loud in my ears. I'm really sick of hearing that song as it's one of Terry's favourites. I did drop off again. Till I got woken at 5am by the nurse telling me I had to have an antibiotic and painkillers but had to have something in my tummy. So I find myself dunking a couple of biscuits into a cup of milk at 5am so I could have these tablets! Why they couldn't wait till a more decent hour I don't know. I'm sure the nurses just get bored!!
As for hospital food - let's not go there!
Anyway, I got home just in time for Terry to go to soccer and lovely Jo took the girls to her place so I could get some rest. She even had the two younger girls stay the night with them. Em was picked up by Terry and I was in bed by 7pm that night. It's wednesday and I'm still a bit sore but my 'fatty tissues' are staying where they're meant to and I'm not so tired now. Well that's about that! The girls sound like they're getting colds and I am hoping they're well enough to stay at school till week's end.
This has been a very very long blog so thank you for taking the time to read it. Oh, just about forgot - belated happy birthday Scooter, same to Steve (21st) and Rach (20th).
That's all for now folks.

Saturday, August 04, 2007

August already!!

Wow! Time flies even though you don't do anything except day to day living!
I apologise yet again for not being more up to date with postings.
We haven't been up to much. My last seizure was 2 wks ago. They've upped the meds again and it's a continuing wait for us to see if it works. Waiting is a very trying thing but of course it teaches patience as well. Not that I ever ask for learning that one!
Aimee is doing really well at school, her teacher is wonderful. I've met a Mum of a boy who's in the same class. She happens to live down the road from us and to have epilepsy as well! I have been praying for a while to find a friend who has epilepsy. Someone to be able to relate to each other. Not having to try explaining feelings or the seizures themselves. Hers are a result of head injuries and mine is one that your born with so there's a few differences. She has a daughter 4yrs and a 5mth baby called Jessica. We're both really excited at having found each other.
I have just had a twitch in both legs and that gets me a bit concerned so I'm going to cut this update short and take myself off to bed. Will post this much and finish it another time.