New baby!!

On Mother's Day, Rachele started having contractions, which were about a month early. But the doctors thought they might have miscalculated her due date, so they weren't too worried about it. When Rachele went in to be checked out, though, the nurses said that yes, she was in labor, just not enough in labor. So for the last 19 or 20 days, Rachele has been having contractions, and anytime they were really bad, she'd go in to the hospital, only to have the nurses scoff and tell her she was having "stomach cramps"...as if she'd never had a kid before and didn't know what contractions felt like. Sheesh.

Anyhow, last night the contractions were really strong, so Rachele and Tree went yet again to the hospital, and this time they admitted her! Things progressed very quickly, and at about 3:12 a.m. today, Bran Cormack Pambrun was born. Rachele and Tree plan to call him Cormack, though Dave and I really like Bran. I have a feeling the poor kid is going to be confused about his name for a while...lol

And, just in case you haven't gotten tired of seeing his picture on Facebook, I'll share a few here. :-) (Sorry, they're not in chronological order...oh, well. :-) )

Iris was very disappointed that Bran was a boy. She very badly wanted to have a little sister. But she still wanted to hold the baby, and seemed to warm up to him pretty well. :)

This is when Bran was just a few minutes old--he still had the baby goop on him! One thing I noticed today is that he's got really long fingers and toes--he's gonna be a little monkey for sure! :-)

Here's Rachele and Bran just after he was born. She looks pretty tired, but she's so happy he's finally here!

Tree sure is a proud daddy. :-)

Bran being weighed. He's just over 7 pounds, and definitely a boy! Not real happy about being on the scale, though...lol

Here's Aidan with Bran--proud big brother!

 I don't care what people say, that looks like a smile to me!

This is Daniel with Bran. He thought he was going to break the baby...lol I've never figured out why guys always think that.

Okay, I think that's enough for now. Hopefully I'll be able to get more pictures of him soon and get them posted. Talk to y'all soon!

Hmm, isn't this where I'm supposed to write stuff?

So....yeah, that whole "updating more often" thing kinda didn't work so well, did it? *sigh* But I'm back, and ready to give it another shot!

I have started paying the school back and now only owe them $89, and I'm registered for classes this fall! I'll be taking World Literature Survey, College Writing II, Intro To Public Speaking, and American History I. Next spring, I'm planning on taking Astronomy for one of my sciences. I'm not sure what else I want to take, for sure, but since I'm going to be working toward an English degree (so I can hopefully go into editing), I'll be taking a LOT of English classes over the next couple of years. I've also applied for financial aid, and so far it looks like I'll be eligible for enough grants to cover my tuition and books--I just have to wait to find out if it's been approved for sure.

Still working with the Census. I'm a crew leader for the Non-Response Follow Up operation, which means my crew visits households that didn't mail their census questionnaires back, or else didn't send them back on time. So far, most people have been very cooperative, which is a pleasant surprise! This operation is scheduled to end in mid-July--at least, as far as I know for now, but it could change at any time. I don't know if they'll keep me on afterward, but if not, I'll probably go to the temp agency I worked for last summer, and see if they've got anything for me. Hopefully by that time, Dave will be working from home, and I won't have to stress about working very much while I'm going to school.

Speaking of Dave, he goes in for surgery next Thursday. His right hand has been giving him some problems for a few months, and has gotten progressively worse. It's numb on the outer side, and he can't spread the fingers apart. He's got very little strength in his fingers, and has lost muscle mass in the area between his thumb and forefinger. He went in for some X-rays, and apparently his ulnar nerve is impinged. So when he goes in next week, they're going to shift that nerve out from behind the elbow and use the tissue in his arm to create a sort of pocket to hold the nerve in place, and they're going to do the same thing in his wrist. It's an outpatient surgery, so he'll be coming home the same day, but will have a brace on his arm for about a week or so. After that comes off, he'll have physical therapy for a few weeks to strengthen his hand. Meanwhile, I brought home a stress ball yesterday so that he can start working that hand and try to regain at least some of that lost muscle mass.

Our son Daniel is apparently engaged....again. It's funny--his one year anniversary would have been next Friday. I haven't heard much about this girl. I know her name, what her job is, that she has 2 kids, and that Dave knows her parents from his folks' church. Daniel has been dating her for a whopping three weeks, and just moved in with her yesterday. I found out today (not from him, but by poking around her page a bit, since I could see that he'd commented there) that the wedding is July 31st. I don't plan to say anything to him, because I figure it's his job to tell me, if he even wants me to know. I don't think I can congratulate him, though. I think he's moving way too quickly. They don't even know each other. She doesn't know anything about him, except the act that he puts on while he's first dating someone. The thing is, he can be kind of a jerk at times, and he's very impatient. And he hasn't figured out that when a girl says "I don't want to talk about it right now," she really doesn't. He doesn't know how to allow a girl the space she needs to be able to think about things.

Ugh. I guess what I'm really trying to say is that I just wish he would take his time so the two of them could get to know each other. I really do want him to be happy, but I'm afraid he'll end up hurting another young lady, her kids, and his own daughter.

I've been finding recipes on this recipe site, and have found some pretty tasty ones. I want to make something like these chicken wings, but I'd rather use the sauce on something with more meat to it! lol

Oh--I finally got my birth certificate, so as soon as we get the money back together, we're going to apply for our passports!!!! Just one step closer to our trip to Scotland! :-)

Also, Rachele is apparently further along in her pregnancy than we thought--Tree called me today to say that she could be having her baby anytime in the next few days! Looks like I'll have to go pick up some more yarn on payday this week so I can make a blanket for her. We still don't know what she's having, so her blanket will probably be in purples, blues, and white.

I think I've gotten everyone caught up on what's been going on around here, so I'll go for now. I think I'm going to just have to make a point of posting at least something on here every week. Happy Mother's Day to all of my mom friends!

New Year's Resolutions...

First and foremost, I resolve to update this blog a little more often! Sheesh...October, I posted last? (I would say I've been busy, but that's only partly true. Mostly it's that I didn't think I had anything worthwhile to say.)

I resolve to lose at least 20 pounds--I'll be doing a workout video, walking every day (hopefully, anyhow), drinking more water and making sure I eat healthy foods.

I still owe a little bit of money to one of the colleges here, so I resolve to get that paid off, and look into getting a degree--probably in business, possibly business management or human resources.

Last but not least, I resolve to get any handmade Christmas presents done and mailed in PLENTY of time for Christmas! lol (One of these years, it'll happen, I swear! ;-) )

Photo dump next time, honest!! G'night for now, y'all. *hugs*

Smelling the flowers...

So, I noticed something today--my youngest daughter, Heather, made a cute little foam flowerpot in church this morning. And after showing it to me, she promptly smelled it, even though it couldn't possibly smell like a flower. And I realized that, no matter where she is, or what she's doing, she has to smell every flower, whether it's real or not. It's kind of cute, and a good reminder to me to slow down a bit, and use my imagination a bit more! :-)

As far as how everything else is going since my last post...

My son Daniel is going through a divorce, after being married for about 3 months. Unfortunately, they had issues that they just couldn't get past. It's really incredibly sad to me, because up until the time they got married, they seemed very happy together.

I went back to work for a while at the Census, first as a clerk, then as an enumerator (this time locating various types of group quarters--convents, prisons, group homes, etc.), and then as a clerk again, checking in all the work that the enumerators had done. They're out of work again at the office, though, until close to the end of November. Since I just can't wait that long to be working again, I'm looking for other places to apply at, one of them being the DMV (department of motor vehicles, just in case anyone reading this doesn't know what DMV stands for), and one being at a check-cashing place.

Dave is working on being able to work from home, which would be awesome--he has been so frustrated with not being able to work. It has made him feel pretty useless, which I can completely understand. I'd love to be able to work from home, but that's not going to happen for a while.

My oldest daughter, Rachele, found out recently that she's pregnant, and possibly with twins. Every so often, I think I would like to have another kid...and then realize that, no, really, I'm good with having grandkids! lol Seriously, though, I hope Rachele has a safe pregnancy, without all the complications that she's had the last couple of times.

Last night, Iris (Rachele's 3 year old daugher) woke up from a nap that she'd taken on my bed, and said to Rachele, rather indignantly, "Mommy, someone peed in my pants!" Rachele came out of the room laughing, and told us about it, so when Iris came out, I asked her, "Iris, who peed in your pants?" She then informed me that the fish did it! Evidently, she'd had a dream about the fish that she'd seen at the Chinese restaurant where we had lunch yesterday. lol

Oh, and today, I learned how people make fancy marbles. :-)
Later tonight, I'm going to do a photo post--I'll possibly have pictures of Daniel's wedding (because, well, I want to share some of them), some of me that I took (because I was bored and someone let me play with the camera), and some others that I just want to share. So there. :-)

Where am I going?

As you probably know, I was working for the Census for a while, then after work ran out, I was unemployed for about a month. I started working for a temp agency about 2 weeks ago, and am currently a greeter and "ups" counter at a car dealership. Basically, I greet customers who come onto the lot, make sure a salesperson helps them, and then I make sure the salesperson enters the customer's information into the computer. It's interesting work, and quiet, especially compared to home! lol And I'm getting paid $9.00 an hour to stand around most of the day. :)

The thing is, I'm looking for a permanent full time job. The dealership is fun for now, and the guys are all nice, but it's not what I want to do long-term. I've gotten discouraged about putting in applications, because I'm either not hearing back, or getting the "thanks, but no thanks," or the job isn't what I thought it would be. I applied at Kohl's about 2 1/2 weeks ago, and hadn't called to check on it, because the lady I interviewed with said it would be about 2 weeks before I heard back. So yesterday I called, and they hadn't even called my references yet! The guy I spoke to said that he would do that and call me back this Friday after 5. We'll see, I guess.

I also just applied at Hobby Lobby for a co-manager position. I think I could do a pretty good job at it, except that after looking more closely, I have to have previous management experience. So I doubt I will even get an email from them.

I just want to be able to do something with my life. I don't want to be stuck as a cashier forever, but that's all I really have experience with, and can't seem to get further ahead than that.

My Trip To Riverfront Park...

And my trip to Jackson, Wyoming, in which my car felt the need to introduce itself to a guardrail. More on that in a bit. Be patient. : )

Back in early March, I think it was, we had some really great weather for a week or so, so I decided to take Heather to Riverfront Park, which is more of a nature-type park than a play park, about 2 miles from our house. There's a decent size lake there, picnic tables, barbecue grills, a bunch of trails through the trees, and of course, the Yellowstone River flows alongside the park and through the lakes there. There are a bunch of Canada geese that live there just about year-round, and we always take a little bit of bread to feed them.

This guy got close enough to touch.


After we ran out of bread, we went walking along one of the trails to see what we could see.

There's a muskrat living in here somewhere. We keep seeing him poke his head out of the water, but he didn't stay out long enough to catch him with the camera.


This is the top of one of the cottonwoods that grow all over the place here, but mostly I was taking a picture of the sky. It was just incredibly blue that day, with no clouds anywhere.


This is one of my favorite pictures of Heather. She had just stepped out of a break in the trees, and the sunlight was kind of hazy around her. I thought it was kind of ethereal. : )


I'm going to add a few other pics that I liked, in no particular order, but were also seen on our walk in the woods.

View of the lake from the bridge--I liked how well the trees and sky were reflected.


A bird's nest in a tree.


A dried berry of some sort. There were a bunch of these on bushes all over the park, but this one stood out for me because it was the only one in that area.


I'm pretty sure this is another view of the lake where the muskrat lives. Or it might be another lake. Same park, though.


................................
Okay, now for my trip to Wyoming. (See? Told you I'd tell you about it!)
Towards the end of March, I was asked to go to Dubois, Wyoming and Jackson, Wyoming to train some new crew leaders. (I was still a recruiting assistant at the time, and didn't know I would be giving me the same training shortly after my return.) Actually, what I was doing was training them to take fingerprints--they would get the rest of their training from someone else.

Anyhow, I headed out, and after being on the road for about 45 minutes, I managed to wreck the car. The road had been dry up to that point, so I was driving the speed limit, but I came across a curve in the road that had a small patch of ice on it. The car slid (by the way, I HATE anti-lock brakes), I corrected it, ended up going waaaaaaaay over to the left (thereby freaking out not only myself, but also the driver and passenger in the oncoming pickup truck), corrected it again, and was then introduced to the ONE AND ONLY piece of guardrail on that stretch of road. The bumper was pretty well mangled, as seen below:





After calling Dave and apologizing profusely for wrecking his car, and calming down a bit, I continued into Wyoming. The drive was pretty uneventful, but I ran into more snow:



As a matter of fact, I got stuck in Thermopolis for a night because the pass was closed and I couldn't get to Dubois until the next day. But they did open the pass up late that night, and the next morning I headed out bright and early.

Believe it or not, on the other side of the pass, the roads looked like this:


After doing my training class, I continued on to Jackson. Lots more snow on the way:

See that orange pole? It's attached to the top of one of those green poles that you see along the side of the road. That's how deep the snow was right there.


And this is more of the snow.


The weather cleared just a bit, and I managed to take one picture of some of the stores there in Jackson before it got nasty again. All of the stores in that square looked like that--I love the river rock facing.


So, I spent a night in Jackson, then headed back to Dubois for the next night, and there I saw the giant Jackalope. I took pictures!


What're you lookin' at?


And a more normal sized specimen:


After spending the night in Dubois, I drove back home. I stopped in Cody for about an hour and visited the Buffalo Bill museum. I took a couple of pictures there, but I think I'll save those for a photodump post.

I think that's about it for today. The next post will be of my son's wedding! (Why yes, that was a week and a half ago, what's your point? lol)

Have a good one!

Hmm...long time, no post...

Sorry about that. There's actually been a lot of stuff going on, I just didn't get around to posting here.

First things first, I suppose. My son moved out just after Easter--and it was a fight to get him to stay that long. Things are certainly quieter around here with just Dave and Heather in the house with me.

Also, at the end of March I started working as a crew leader for the census. I've had about 10 people under me, and it's been interesting, to say the least. I've been in charge of approving their payroll and making assignments, and also I've been doing address canvassing myself. The canvassing work is cool--we have hand held computers with maps and address lists for the different areas, and our job is to make sure that all the addresses are located correctly on the maps, and to make sure that all addresses are listed correctly; for example, if an address is a home, a group-type home, uninhabitable, or if it doesn't exist. We also have to add, delete, or rename streets if what is actually on the ground doesn't match what's in the computer. It might sound kind of boring, but it really is interesting to see more of my town and state.

In April, I got to go with Dave to meet up with John (a friend from the Museum of Hoaxes) and his family in Fairmont Hot Springs. It was a lot of fun--they're great folks! I had crocheted a small mushroom and hedgehog for John's daughter Sydney--it was a hit! : ) I suppose now would be a good time for some pictures...

First, I want to introduce Phoebe! John brought her for me, and I know that Dave's posted a picture of her already, but I haven't, so you get to see her again--so there! lol


Sydney and her new friend...cute, yes?


Anne, Sydney, hedgehog, and John


This was actually taken on Friday, before heading to Phillipsburg to visit the sapphire mine. I wish we'd managed to get one that included all five of us!


This is a post in front of The Sapphire Gallery. There were several of these, and I thought they looked pretty cool.


These are just a few of the very cool gemstone carvings that could be bought at The Sapphire Gallery. There were carvings ranging from really tiny--under an inch--to really big--a foot or so tall for some really neat obelisks. You'll just have to take my word for it, though, because I didn't manage to get pictures of those.


John, Anne, and Sydney looking for raw sapphires. At this place, the people who work there wash and sift the gravel for you, and then you go through and pick out the raw sapphires. Raw sapphires (at least these ones) look like blue-green bits of broken glass that have had the edges smoothed out. I will get some pictures of ours and post them another time.


This is from The Sweet Palace, which is a candy store next door to the sapphire place. Both sides are lined with bins of candy sold by the pound, and there is also an old-fashioned taffy-pulling machine (don't know if I got a picture of that or not) and a TON of custom chocolates. One of them (that I didn't get a picture of, and should have) is called Miracle Max's Magic Pill (or something like that). I thought that was pretty cool!


On the other side of the store there were a bunch of toys and puppets. Notice the dragon in the front there? He was about a foot and a half tall, and cost something like $69!!!! Yeesh!


Candy bins on the other side of the store...


Closer view of the candy jars...


This is the counter of the restaurant across the street where we had lunch. It's supposed to look like an old-fashioned soda shoppe. They had some great little hamburgers served on a skewer, and shakes made with ice cream (as opposed to a mix).


These safes were in just about every building. Dave was saying they're a holdover from when Phillipsburg was a mining town and everyone had to lock up the gems, gold, and silver. I just thought they looked really cool. All of them are painted like this, but with each business's own logo on it.


And, on our way back to the hotel, Dave and I found the road to Wisdom. We did not take that road...


Okay, I think this is long enough for today. Next time will have my trip with Heather to Riverfront park and my trip to Wyoming, in which I wrecked the car and encountered a giant Jackalope!