8 posts tagged “me”

I don't really know what to say, it's been so long.  I've just only now read all of the well wishes and prayers that all of you have sent me through some of my cousin Netta's posts and my daughter Danielle.  The pm's were amazing and I wish I had the energy to respond to everyone the way that I should. 

Here's the story in a nutshell.  I was released from the hospital after my 3rd surgery (where they took out more of my stomach and now it's the size of a walnut).  It was on my birthday, April 10.  On April 10 my stomach perforated at home.  I'm not sure what happened.  I'm so used to pain that I didn't know it was really any different than my regular pain so I waited almost too long to get to the hospital.  I waited hours.  By the time I got back there, my body was racked with poison and I was dying.  The surgeon knew I wouldn't live without surgery but he also didn't think I'd live with it.  It had only been 10 days since my last surgery and my insides were like the consistency of gum.  He didn't think I could be closed back up successfully.  There wasn't a lot of hope for me, from what I understand.  Everyone was trying to get used to the idea that I would die.

I don't know why God chose me to live.  I don't know why I'm so blessed.  All of your prayers and all of my family and friends prayers were answered.  I'm really not supposed to be here.  I'm humbled by the outpouring of love from all of you.  Thank you just isn't enough but I don't have any other words. 

I've been out of the hospital for a week now.  Today is the first day I've felt like being on the computer.  I promise to keep up with everyone as much as I can now.  I've missed all of you so much and I just can't wait to see what's going on with you.  I trust that it's been good (or at least I'm praying it's been a good life for all of you).  I love you all, and again, THANK YOU and HUGE ((HUGS))

 

It's Tuesday, I know, I know:-)

 

In keeping with current events, I've decided to bring you ********drumroll please********    - Me and my drug allergy bracelet.  Kind of....  different:-)

There is a new group that I joined called Me and My Monday.  The idea behind it is that on Monday, we should come up with a new picture of ourself and something that we own or something that belongs to us at the moment.  I'm not good with contributing to groups like I should be but I will at LEAST try because I think this group's concept is interesting and different.  Check it out and join if you like!  And for now...  I present to you....

 

Me and MY....  Hands!

Admittedly, this wasn't taken today like the group would prefer but these hands DO belong to me!  lol

 

This weekend Ben and I celebrated our 5th anniversary!  Truthfully, with all the problems we've had in the beginning of our marriage, neither one of us thought we'd make it this far.  I know 5 years isn't an amazingly long time to be married but for us - we feel like we've really accomplished something!  So to celebrate, we decided to spend the weekend at the Southern Hotel Bed and Breakfast in Ste. Genevieve Missouri.  We had a BLAST!  As much as I adore my girls, it's been so good to take time away from them and spend QUALITY time with my husband with no interruptions and no phone ringing and no tv AND, most importantly, NO WORLD of WARCRAFT (Ben's vice)!  We had the quiet time we needed to get to know each other again.  Sometimes life just gets in the way and I think because of this, sometimes married people don't have a lot of quality time to spend with one another.  It's so important though...

 

 

 

 

The Southern Hotel was built in 1790 and is still standing!  Amazing!  I felt like it was haunted *insert twilight zone music*.  This is an absolutely beautiful place and the breakfasts were TO DIE FOR!  The owner is a recently widowed man (his wife just died in December) and MAN!  Can he COOK!  The first morning we had the fluffiest omelet that I've ever eaten stuffed with French farmers cheese.  I can not begin to tell you how rich and delicious it was.  He also served gooey butter cake BEFORE breakfast with the best coffee we've had in a very long time.  Visiting Ste. Genevieve was like taking a walk through the movie "It's A Wonderful Life" with Jimmy Stewart. 

 

This was a little weird.  These 2 claw foot bath tubs were side by side in our room which was called "The Button and Bow Room".  I like my privacy while bathing so I wasn't excited about the arrangements.  lol  I just made Ben leave the room when I "bathed".  lol  Oh and the toilet was also in this room but it didn't have walls, only the little divider you see behind the bathtubs.  Also not amused by the toilet arrangements.  I wouldn't even let Ben use this toilet.  He had to use the "shared" restroom down the hall.  lol  Aside from this, there were no complaints about our room.

 

This was the armoire (sp?) in our room.  I believe the owner said it was made in the 1800's.  I loved this piece of furniture.

 

This was our canopied bed.  It was made in the 1700's, if you can believe that!  The down comforter was the best!  I don't know if you can see but there's actually a picture of one of the women who used to own this bed.  She wasn't the original owner - I believe the picture was taken in the late 1800's.  I'm a little supersticious so this was also a little creepy!  I felt like she was watching me so I had to take the picture down and lay it face down so she couldn't see!  lol

 

 

I guess my favorite part of this weekend was that it snowed and looked so beautiful!  Have you ever noticed how quiet it gets outside when it snows a lot?  It was so peaceful and I was NOT ready to come home and leave all the prettiness behind.  Besides, we only had mud here at my house:-(  All the snow's melted here now.

 

 

On Saturday, after breakfast, Ben and I visited Crown Valley Winery.  I think it only costs around $5 a person to taste as much wine as you can legally drink.  lol  We bought a case of some of the best wine I've ever tasted.  I've been here once before when we celebrated my Mom's 60th birthday with her sisters.  If you ever find yourself in Missouri, I'd HIGHLY recommend taking a tour of this winery:-)

This is Gracie.  She's completely blind from malnourishment for the first year of her life.  She's 3 (if I remember right).  She VERY friendly and gets around pretty well for not beeing able to see.  She has a HUGE running area and sees by using her feet to feel.  You can't really tell that she's blind because she gets around so well but you can see the cataracts if you look at her eyes.  They're looking into getting Gracie the eye operation that she needs to hopefully correct her eyesight.  Did you know that all tigers are born blind?  I didn't know this until Saturday when I took the tour.  Through the right kind of nutrition, their eyesight slowly developes after about 3 months of age. 

 

This is Alexis.  She's a 5 year old lion who was abused.  She's pretty friendly for all that she's gone through.

We also visited a tiger sanctuary owned by Crown Valley Winery.  They are a complete non profit group who are so dedicated to the care of these big cats who would otherwise be dead if the winery hadn't rescued them.  They rescue these large cats from different drive through animal saffaris.  The tigers and lions are also rescued from petting zoos who kill the animals after they turn 6 months old.  The tigers and lions that we saw were rescued from severly abusive owners and they were ALL malnourished and near death.  100% of the money that the winery collects from the tours go directly for the care of the animals.  They're fed only bison and elk, raised by the winery also.  Lions and tigers only live 5 years in the wild in a natural enviroment but in a controlled envirment, they can live to be 18 to 20 years.  

 

 The NEXT time we visit the Ste. Genevieve area, we're going to eat at The Crown Ridge which is located on the premises of the tiger sanctuary.  They were booked with reservations all weekend so we couldn't go.  Apparently they're wonderful to be completely booked!  This is located in a small town in the DEEP country but people from all around St. Louis make the 2 hour drive just to eat here.  Beautiful place!

Other than taking slow drives through the snowy country and visiting antique stores and the winery, Ben and I just kicked back and relaxed.  We played Dominos (I won!!!!!) and took some time to read to each other (which is something we always liked to do).  Oh, and we ate...  A LOT!  lol 

This past weekend Ben and I were able to get away from home to celebrate our 5th anniversary and Valentine's Day (a few days early).  Every year, we try to go to a Valentine's weekend that The YMCA Trout Lodge offers.  It's beautiful!  We pay $250.00 for the entire weekend, the room and all meals along with most activities are included.  There's salsa dancing, yoga, couples counseling, bike riding, hiking, ping pong ball or whatever else you can think of that you'd want to do.  We didn't choose any of those.  I just wanted to get away from the stress of trying to raise the kids Savannah and time to get to know my husband again.  I forgot that I actually knew how to LAUGH with him!

On Saturday, the weather was uncharacteristically warm.  We had sunny skies and 70 degree teperatures!  It was nice enough that even I wanted to go for a walk.  I tried to look at nature with "new eyes" so that I could see the beauty in all of the ordinary.

 

My favorite part of the weekend (other than sleeping as late as I wanted and the naps that I took) was that Ben allowed me to have an hour long Sweedish massage!  This is only the third one I've had in my life time but OMG!  If you have never had one of these, PLEASE treat yourself to one!  I felt like I'd had 2 days of really deep, good sleep by the time the lady finished with my massage.  I almost BEGGED to get to stay longer!  I definitely didn't want it to be over with BUT!!!!!  I had a pedicure to get to!  lol  I'd never had a pedicure and I didn't think I would like it, actually.  I don't like feet!  I couldn't imagine someone being in my feet's business for a half hour or longer!  lol  Now, I'm adicted!  I think every other week, I'm going to have to have a pedicure.  I believe it's necessary.

While I was busy being pampered, Ben spent some extra special time on his extra long nose hairs.  They needed a little attention and I was luckily there to catch some of it with my camera (after my pedi)!

On Saturday night, there's a local winery that brings cheese, crackers and all of their different wines in for tasting.  After everyone's tied a good buzz on with the free wine, a formal dinner was given for all of the couples.  They served prime rib, wild rice, steamed vegetables, salad, home made bread, and cheese cake.

 

 

 

 

Dancing all night followed the dinner.  We didn't dance.  We were tired and didn't want to feel pressured with all of the activities that they encouraged everyone to participate in.  To me, it's not relaxing if I feel like I'm racing against the clock and feel pressured into doing everything available.  We just wanted to chill out and hang back.  Actually, we went back to our room and played DOMINO'S!  hehe  We're just too old to be ALL that romantic!  Domino's is good though.  We play up to 500 and who ever wins has to do something for the other person.  The last time, I won.  I chose the movie and Ben had to see JUNO, which was awesome, but not something that he wanted to see.  This weekend, I TOTALLY lost and now I have to see some retard movie (I'm sure something like Star Trek 95).  PLUS, I lost another game and I have to go see Blue Man Group with Ben.  They're ok and I can tolerate them so I guess it won't be so bad:-)

We got home Sunday and naturally, it hadn't been nearly long enough to be away!  lol  Chaos met us as soon as we opened the door to see that Savannah did her usual Savannah things.  Ahhhhhh....  This can't go on forever:-)   

Half of us are sick and the other half are trying to come down with this horrible nasty little bug.  Ben is getting it for a second time.  It's weird because he completely recovered from the nastiness and now he's got it worse than he did the first time.  Cold sores and all.  Gross.  Need I say more?  lol  Lysol wipes are not working.  I can't sterilize anymore than I have. 

So I was lollygagging around the internet and I found this for my husband.  This grey blob guy really bares a striking resemblance to my little man!  It's a good thing Ben thinks this is as funny as I do or I'd be in some serious trouble!  lol

 

So in other health related areas...  I had my second iron treatment today.  Apparently, my body is developing reactions to the iron because my blood is still so unhealthy.  I had a severe reaction, initially I broke out into some major hives.  They gave me steroids to counteract the reaction so I'm pumped up on iron AND steroids!  I seriously feel like even I could go to the gym!  lol  Anyway, they're going to keep up the treatments because I really can't live without them and they have ways around the bad reaction.  We shall see:-)  Thanks for all your well wishes and prayers!

OK.  I FINALLY got to go fishing on Sunday!  YAY!  I am amazed that in the middle of October, the temperature was in the mid-eighties.  As you can see, the leaves on the trees here haven't begun to change color and they seem to be holding tight.  I could have donned my typical fishing attire - the bathing suit, but I was afraid that the weather would quickly turn just as soon as I thought I had hope of getting a mid-October tan. *lol*

 

Ben didn't have a problem wading out into the Meramec River.  I tried to but the water was just a "tad" bit chilly.  I think if we'd arrived toward noon,  the sun would have been hot enough to take the chill off the water for me.  We arrived near 4:00 and the sun wasn't as hot at that hour.

I can't think of ANYTHING I enjoy more than hanging out by the river, listening to the current push the water roughly over the rocks and fallen trees!  PLUS, there's always the possibility of actually catching the mother load of fish.  I did say POSSIBILITY.

 I had dreams of pulling in a fish like this one. *lol*  I don't know what I would have done if I actually WOULD have accidently reeled this baby in, but a girl can dream, right?  I probably would have thrown my pole at Ben and screamed for him to "HELP ME!!!!!!", which is what I do when I catch a bluegill.  Sadly, neither Ben or I caught anything worth mentioning.  I was the only one out of the two of us that caught a single thing, actually.  My widdle fishey was almost the size of a minnow and YES, Ben did have to take the little guy off my hook so we could release him back into the wild green river!  Maybe he'll be bigger by the spring and I can catch him again!

Audio: Share a song that reminds you of a current or past relationship.

This was Mine and Ben's wedding song.  We'll be married 4 years February 20.  It still gives me goose bumps...

 

Love Is All    By:  Marc Anthony

 

 

"All the passion, that turns to ashes only to rise again..."

I love you  honey and thanks for putting up with me!