It could be worse!

You know how they say when it rains it pours? Well it's raining. Why does everything happen all at once? First our microwave died. Again. This is the third time and it's 2 years old. Then the other day in the blizzard we were in our car and heard a big pop like a rock hit the windshield and where there use to be a small chip was now a crack that extends from one side of the window to the other. Then the top rack of our dishwasher broke. Again second time and it's 2 years old. Our car registration has expired and now our propane tank is almost empty. And just when I'm thinking things couldn't possibly get worse right now, i flash back to last year at this time and remember, yes, it could be a lot worse. We were in Primary Children's Hospital with RSV at this time last year. I was going through my pictures and it all came rushing back to me. What a nightmare that was.

For some reason my kids always wait till the weekend to get sick and this was no exception. When we got up sunday morning chandler had a fever and cough and I was worried enough that I didn't think it could wait till the next day. We took Hayden and Gracie to Grandma Dixie's and headed to the clinic in Park City thinking we would be home later with an antibiotic. When the Dr in Park City said her O2 was too low and he started talking about chest x-rays and IV's and calling the ambulance to take her to primary's I started to panic. We thought she was sick but this sick? She was in no obvious distress so we decided to take her to Salt Lake but we opted to drive her ourselves and went in to the ER at PCMC. Oh Lordy that was an experience! We had only been to the ER once with our kids so far and that was when Gracie split her chin open a couple years ago in Delta. There were probably as many people in the whole Delta hospital as there were in just that ER waiting room at Primary's. I think we both walked in their with our mouths wide open in shock. We were not the only ones with a sick kid that day. It was definitely RSV season. Thank goodness the Park City doctor called ahead because they put the O2 on her immediately and we didn't have to wait nearly as long as some of the other people did but we were still there for what seemed like forever. After telling our story about 15 times to about 15 different doctors and nurses, they admitted us and we went upstairs. They say that babies can get RSV till they're about 6 months and Chandler was 6 1/2 months. I think it was a pretty mild case because I saw how sick those other babies were and she was nowhere near as sick as them but her O2 sat just wouldn't come up. We checked in on Sunday night and checked out on tuesday morning. Greg was just about to have a nervous breakdown when they released us. He had gone home at night to take care of the big girls and get Gracie off to school and had to worry about getting substitutes to cover his classes and well he's just a little high strung when it comes to most things. Especially the health of his 6 month old daughter. I think he was coming to get us weather Chandler was discharged or not. We ended up going home with oxygen and then kept it for about 3 weeks. It was a huge tank in the living room with a tube that was like 50 feet long and wrapped around just about everything in sight. At least she wasn't crawling yet. She liked to bite on the tube and would pull it out of her nose and put it into her mouth which was really gross especially when she was eating babyfood. All in all it was a terrible experience but it could have been a whole lot worse. She was surprisingly pleasant throughout the whole ordeal. The nights in the hospital were pretty bad but that was due to really bad roommates. One who snored like a buzz saw and one really young inconsiderate couple who didn't care that there was only a curtain separating us. It was a far worse for us as her parents than it was for Chandler thank goodness. So when I'm thinking things are pretty crappy right now I remember last year and count my blessings that we are all healthy and happy and together.

Enough already!

Well it happened! The swingset is officially buried. You can't even see the top of the slide anymore. Now we're just sitting and waiting for the Butikofers trampoline to be covered too. On Sunday morning we woke up and our driveway was gone! The wind blew so bad overnight that there was a huge drift that had filled the whole thing up. Greg tried to run to the grocery store and got the durango stuck so he pulled it out with the jeep. Then he got his plow truck out to try to clear a path and got it stuck too. Thank you Tim for rescuing him. He said he couldn't even get the door to his truck open. So 3 hours later he finally made it to the store. They even cancelled church! And it's suppose to snow again on wednesday! Will it ever stop?

This is his plow truck right after Tim pulled him out. She's a bute huh?

Ohhhh Snow!

In response to Addison's last comment I apologize for not having a very exciting or blog-worthy life. All we do around here is sit and watch it snow. I feel like a hermit most days because unless I absolutely have to, I don't leave the house. I don't like driving in stormy weather anymore (you only have to total one car in a snow storm to learn that lesson) so I just avoid it all together. The storm we had the other day was a doozie. We get drifts at the front of the house when it's really windy, which it usually is, but today when I was shoveling I noticed how deep it was. Our front porch is about 3 feet or more above the grass and the snow is now above the level of the porch and I'm worried the window wells are going to fill up and disappear! Greg got a truck with a plow on it and has become a little obsessed with clearing snow. At the first sign of a snowflake he is outside pushing it around. Wouldn't it make much more sense to wait till the storm is somewhat over? Oh well, it has been handy because our road isn't maintained by the city so we're pretty much on our own when it comes to snow. Plus he rarely gets this excited over stuff so we will humor him for now even though it's an old beater that gets like 3 miles to the gallon. I'll get a picture if he parks it long enough. Here are some of the crappy snow. The swings on our swing set are buried so is the teeter-totter and most of the slide. If it gets covered I'm outta here!

This little birdhouse sticks up at least 3 feet and it's almost gone. I have bulbs planted under all these drifts. It will be July before I see those puppies!

before shoveling and..................after. It's hard to see how deep the drifts are but all I know is I'm sick of it and it's just suppose to keep coming.

So this is what we're doing these days. Chandler has discovered that she can pack a stool around with her and stand on it to get into even more mischief than she did before. I did buy one that is a little more sturdy than the ones she kept falling off of and it's just the right size for her to carry wherever she goes. Plus when she gets tired she can just sit down and rest a while.

For those of you who missed the screams!

We hit another milestone last night. Gracie lost her first tooth. Or I guess I should say Gracie's dad pulled out her first tooth and she wasn't a very willing participant. She has had a loose tooth for quite a while now but refused to wiggle it or try to make it looser. So yesterday when I saw her permanent tooth poking up behind her baby tooth we decided it had to come out before her new one comes in too crooked. Neither Greg or I had braces when we were younger so we are praying that our kids won't either. So we talked her into letting Greg try to pull it out. So he tied some floss around it and yanked it right out. It went flying and it took a while before we actually found it. But you would have thought we chopped her arm off. She immediately started shrieking and then when she saw blood the volume and intensity actually doubled! I wanted to get a picture right away but she said no because she looked "hideous!" We shouldn't have read that Junie B. Jones till after her first tooth fell out. We did get a picture (obviously) and made a couple phone calls so she could cry to someone other than us. This all happened right before bedtime so it was a while before we could get everyone settled enough to go to bed. She was still pretty upset when she finally went asleep but she put it under her pillow even though she was afraid of the tooth fairy and when she woke up this morning and saw there was 2 dollars right next to her tooth she was very happy. She even took her tooth in a baggie to show her friends at school. I even caught her smiling in the mirror to see her big gap. I'm not sure what our lives would be like without the added drama that 3 little girls bring to our house but I'm glad we don't have to find out.

It's the country life for me!

Greg and I made a quick overnight trip to Logan this weekend for some training meetings for his town council position and can I just say "HOLY COW!" I cannot believe how much that place has changed! We lived there for quite a while and I loved it the whole time but my goodness it has grown. We were actually there about a year and a half ago and even since then the change is remarkable. I hate to say it but I have really settled into the laid-back country way of live a lot more that I thought I had. It was such a quick trip but while Greg was in his meetings I drove around to check stuff out and I kept catching myself going 20 mile per hour so I could take in all the new changes. I have always said that I would move back there in a second if I had the chance (even though I know Greg never would) but now I'm not so sure if I would. I have a lot of great memories from there and I love to visit every now and again but I don't see me living in the "big city" any time soon. I'll take "dog-patch", as my dad calls it, any day.