Trip #2 Hospital

So after our awesome trip camping, we come home and get a very sick O'lena. Come to find out...after a lot of poking, prodding, an enema, and an overnight stay in the hospital, we originally water intoxicated her. Meaning: we gave her too much water and not enough electrologists so she crashed. She became hyperglycemic and because of the enema (the dr originally thought it had something to do with her bowels...it's a long story) she became extremely dehydrated. It got pretty scary there for a minute because she was becoming unresponsive. In the end was got a bill and the advice "just give her some Gatorade." Soooooooooooooooooooooooooo when the pediatrician says "Oh they just need milk and water, they dont need any juice." I kind of classify Gatorade as juice!!! I wish they would have said..."Hey, you know they are like little athletes and need some electrolyte help once in a while." But some lessons you learn the hard way. By time we left she had received several bags of fluids, bag of sugar water, some antibiotics, and she was back to her normal self. Probably better because all her levels were up and regulated.

Here are some pictures of the whole ordeal. They gave her a teddy and blanket for comfort. The staff at The Children's Hospital were awesome! I have never had a better experience there. The chairs Derick and I slept in leave little to be talked about but everything else was great.
Daddy and O'lena watching Elmo. Daddy eating him M&Ms and O'lena eating her gold fish. Yeah, that would be the "comfortable" chair. Here she is in the heaven sent play room. By the morning of the next day she was feeling better enough to not be in the bed any more so they allowed us to go to the playroom. She was so excited to see all the toys she goes "oooooooooo...ooooooo..oooooooo!!!!"
Here she is riding in the wagon a bit before we got discharged. She got really bored towards the end and we walked her around a bit. She was having a good old time in it with her bear.
Yeah, I have decided that even though the staff was great, I don't like having my baby in the hospital. I remember walking around while laboring and seeing the baby beds that they have (the look like medal cages) and thinking to myself "I hope I never have to see my baby in there." I dont want to see it again. It was awful as I imagined it would be. Thank God I have an awesome mother and husband. I wouldn't been able to deal with out them. She get gatoraid now at least once every couple of days. Probably more than is necessary, but hey....

Trip #1 Camping

So back in....ummm...when was this again? It has been so long that I can't even remember. Not in April...No wait it was the first week in April! Anyways, Derick O'lena and I went camping with our friends "The Popples." I tease them and call them the Umpoppables like that TLC show. Yeah I watch alot of TLC. I think it is the only channel I really watch. I enjoy their programming. Derick sometimes gets sick of "Say yes to the dress" and he thinks "Sister Wives" are nuts but I think they are fun. But I digress...

So we went camping with the Pobbles...They have become our new camping buddies when we are not with the family. They are good camping people. I am excited because we have already planned our next trip to St. Augustine and we are camping on the beach! That will be a new experience.

This time we went to Hillsbrough River State Park. It was BEAUTIFUL! I really like this place. And come to find out it was only like 10 miles from my apt in Tampa. I spent 4 years there and never knew it existed. This park had so much to do. A lot of hiking, a fort, hiking, bridges, fishing, hiking. They had this massive pool, the biggest pool I have ever seen outside of a water park. It was amazing, but it was out of order because they were doing maintenance on it.

Here are some pictures from our trip.
I say some...i mean a lot. Chrissy takes more (and better) pictures than I do.

There is where O'lena eats her meals. I'm not quite sure if she likes it or not. She just kind of deals.
Yes, this is where we put her while we were setting up. Yeah she dealt with that too.
On morning we were up before our camping buddies (this is a switch from last time because we were sleeping sleepertons before) and Derick REALLY wanted to go fishing so O'lena fell asleep and daddy fished and mommy got to hold her baby.
This is daddy try to have O'lena fish. Again O'lena dealing with her parents.
This is my favorite picture from this trip! This is what we did instead of being able to go into the ginormous pool. It was a bit cold but once she got in she was fine. Quinton, the Popple's son, was not so into it. She looks like a model striking a pose here. She is so stinking adorable.
This picture shows how long her hair is getting. We have to put it up everyday because it gets into her eyes and nose and mouth and food and anything else. Dealing yet again.
This is our friend Chrissy and I on one of the trails there. They had a bunch, but alot of them where closed because they were flooded because of all the rain they were having then. We were lucky too because they just had tornadoes a few days before knocked out some power lines and they had no power for three days prior to our arrival. They had just got it back on a couple hours before we got there. They guy when I was checking in was like..."Yeah every one was primitive camping even if they wanted too or not." There was no running water. I think i might have went home. I don't mind camping but I dont like primitive camping.
Here are Chrissy, Quinton, O'leeny, and I on the bridge in front of the fort. You can see it in the background there. That was really cool. We had to jump some fences to get to it, but it was well worth it. Maybe next time we can go while it is open and actually see inside.
The kidos on one of our hikes. Yeah, we all love her car.
O'lena bike riding.
Derick and I posing in front of the Hillsbrough River. It was running so fast, but the scenery was amazing! Like I said it was beautiful!
Derick, O'lena and I on one of the bridges. I think this picture is cool.
O'lena and mommy swinging. We like to swing.It was a great trip. We cant wait for St. Augustine!

toooooo much

There is too much to add!!!! There has been so much happening. I AM going to finish posting all of it this week. Look forward to seeing about all of our trips!

Babcock Ranch just 4 weeks later

The family went to the closet real ranch near us for a fun fill quick trip. It was totally awesome, beautiful, peaceful, exciting and fun. We got to stay the night in the Cypress Lodge which was the home of Mr. Babcock before he died. It was very nice in the ranchy kind of way. They fed us dinner Friday night and then went on a tour of the property the next day. O'lean had a blast because it was new and she could just run around and play.

Here she is knocking on the door. She just learned how to do it and was practicing. She knocks on all the closed doors now expecting someone to open.
So this lodge was pretty much on an island surrounded by a swamp. And what animal happens to lives in swamps? Yep-er-roony alligators. The Lodge had a wraparound porch that look down onto the swamp and there were two adult alligators and i think 5 or 6 babies. It was really neat. They just hung out until one of the boys would catch a fish the babies wanted or even catch the babies. Yeah, big momma didn't like that one. Here is a picture of one of the babies. I could have watched them all day. I think i pretty much did.
So the boys thought it would be fun to fish of the balcony until Bryan caught an owl. Well actually the owl caught Bryan. He grab his bate and flew into a tree and proceeded to get the hook out. It took him about 10 minutes but he got and then took off. I tried to take a picture but it was too dark.
Here is the fam sitting down and eating dinner. Just wait until you see what we had....
Did I mention it was a cattle ranch????!!!
Beat steaks ever!
Like I said we got to go on a tour of the property on Saturday. It was really nice. It was torture for O'lena because she just had to sit there but it was nice for the big kids. Did you know that the Babcock Ranch has the largest herd of Cracker Cattle in Florida? I was paying attention!

They even let us touch a baby alligator. It was pretty cool. O'lena was like, "giveme that alligator." Yes, O'lena is wearing camo. We are on a ranch!
I think everyone can agree we had a nice time. I would defiantly go again, just to hang out with the gators.

Moving and a shaking

Always moving and shaking. Here are some fun pictures from the last couple of weeks. I was camera happy.

I got my hairs cut. Do you like? I like every 3rd day. This was a day I liked.

Here is Leeny looking cute in the morning.


I went on a search for a table and chair that she could use for herself. She is getting too big for high chair...she's a big girl now!

Here she is sooooo cute with her piggy tails!!! She normally only let me get one tail in but this morning she just sat there playing with a toy so she got to look very cute.

These green things were from a presentation that I had to do at school that morning, so I put them on here when I got home. She left it on her head for awhile. She was adorable.

Daddy and O'lena reading a book, getting ready for bed.

So where got to church this morning and O'lena had fallen asleep in the car and Derick tried to get her out, this is what she did. Yes, she was fast asleep.

So I have been looking for toddler toys for her. She is getting older and bigger that she needs more things to do. I have been looking for a Cozy Coup, those are the Flenstone looking cars, but havent been able to find one on Craiglist. I did try my hand at garage sale shopping yesterday and found these! I felt proud.... all for under $20!

Derick harvested his garden and filled out box. Everything looks amazing. I cant wait to eat it. There is collards, lettuce, and carrots.


We went and ate dinner with our friends on Friday. It was past O'leeny's bed time so we broke out the big stroller and had her lay down in it. It took a few minutes, but she past out and sleep most of the time through dinner. It was great to see our friends too. It really hit me how much we all have changed. We are all married (or almost married) and got kids...man how do things change!
Well thats about it. She is doing well since being sick and we are doing good too. I decided to participate in lent this year, which is a Methodist thing. It is giving me a chance to force myself to live more Mormon. Is that an oxymoron? I have given up coffee, tea, alcohol, and TV (which has nothing to do with the word of wisdom, but i just wanted to.) Yes, I know the true purpose of the seasona nd I am trying to use my time that I was watching TV to spend time with my family and God. I was doing well with living the LDS lifestyle, but have been somewhat lacking recently, this is my push to get back on track. Hopefully I will keep it up after Easter, except for the TV part. Well I am allowing myself to watch TV on Sundays because there is a deaf guy on Amazing Race and Marlee Matlin is on Celebrity Apprentice. Derick says he is giving up being nice. I hope he is joking.

O'lena ear drama

Yes, I know with tubes you still can get ear infections, but come on!! It has only been three weeks!!! We took her to the Dr today becuase she has a pretty good cough and it is keeping her up at night...oh yeah thats not fun either, because she gets mad and doesn't want to go back to sleep so she throws a tantrum for a couple of hours...yeah...so the doc says she has some eye junk, some nose junk, some ear junk, and some lung junk. The poor girl is just junky! She is back to being crabby too. I was really enjoying the happy and fun O'lena but oh well. So ear infection in the right ear, but now because of the tube it drains out, it is like snot coming out of her ear. Pretty gross. Back on antibiotics, but refused to have the kind that tears up her butt so we are trying just ammoxisilian (sp) again. We will see what happens. We may have to get a bit radical and start trying the herbs and stuff.

So did you know that i have a couple of brothers? Just a few, Derick has more..no wait we have the same about, he has more sisters....anyways...the baby turned 16 and the oldest one turned 18 this past weekend!!!!! Can you believe it! I cant...i got two graduating from high school here in June too!!!! awwwwwwwww

Other exciting news too...we have a new Bryant! Wesley (Derick's brother) just had his first baby girl Ava. We are so excited for him. This is grandbaby 13 for grandma and grandpa Bryant. Very cool.

Fun pictures....

Oleeny and daddy taking a bath. This is their favorite trick!
Yay O'lena!

Jim helping with the painting! Thanks Jim. I didn't get a pic with Kevyn, but he helped out a lot too! Thanks Kevyn!

Daddy and O'lena at India Fest. We had a nice time with our friends Rob and Kristin and their new baby Beck.
Here is new mommy Kristin with cute baby Beck! Too stinking cute!

Florida home

Before
After

No matter which way you look at it, our house now looks like an official Florida home! One story, pastel colors. It wasn't intended to be that way, it just ended up that way. Derick was awesome and painted it in four days, with some help from me, our friend Jim, and brother Kevyn (i did all the red! and the mail box) It does make me happy to look at though. I have caught myself going a round the circle a couple of time just to look at it. It think it is a huge improvement too. We still have a lot of work left, including the yard, but maybe we will finish the bathroom first.... na yard first...na bathroom...na yard