Mr. Mann the saga continues

So after my mini vacation with the girls I came home to a very stinky and sore Mojo. He is suffering so bad with these allergies. Hair is missing from his ears, he has huge open sores on both ears, sores all over his belly. I just couldn't take it anymore and took him into the vet.

They did several skin scrapes again hoping for mites, nothing. So we have decided to put him on antibiotics, back on steroids for relief. She also gave me a medicated shampoo to use. Then she is going to try and find the best allergy test for his age so hopefully we won't have to test him but one time.

So far we are on day 2 of meds and he is feeling so much better he was so full of it last night and almost no scratching. He has however wet on the floor 2 times, he hasn't done that in months, but the steroids makes him have to go more and he forgets to let me know. But if it makes him better I can deal with it for a little bit.

Girls Weekend!

So we did it we accomplished our girls weekend. No kids, no husbands. We all met in Orlando, Sheri's home, she met me at baggage claim first, showed me where to get Dana and then we picked a meeting spot, she headed off to grab Amie. We met up headed to the van and were on our way to Daytona. Sheri is an organizational god. She had the van loaded with chairs, drinks breakfast and lunch foods.

It was amazing how fast we were all gabbing you wouldn't have thought we had never met in person before. It was so easy. We had wonderful conversations, great food and drinks. :) We had a blast at Bubba Gumps not only was the food to die for, it was Sheri's' 21st birthday so she got sang to and they tried to get her to dance, it was a riot and we so should have gotten something for all our correctly answered Forest Gump questions.

Saturday we checked out and went to Sheri's house and got to meet her family and play in the pool. Her house is awesome the pool is steps from the back door, I would kill to have one. Her family is just great they are full of life. We had a wonderful time.

Sunday Sheri drove me around Orlando to see the sites while we waited on my take off time. I can say I am pretty sure I would melt if I lived in Florida it is hot and I got burnt to a crisp. I can't wait till we decide to do it again maybe NC, maybe New Orleans, NY? Who knows but we will be doing it again.

Orlando/Daytona Bound!

So after 7 years a dream of my is finally coming true. I will explain, when Haley was a baby she had reflux and it scared me so I went online to do some research and found a parenting site that offered support. After a month or so I ventured out of the reflux forums and went to a playgroup October 2001 - December 2001 babies. I met a group of women that I am proud to say are friends for life. And from our Little group we grew and more ladies joined and I gained more close friends. After that site went way downhill, we moved over to a private site. We talk daily we know almost everything about each other sometimes maybe too much, LOL.

So tomorrow I am heading to Orlando by myself to first meet Sheri who lives there, we will be collecting Dana from Colorado and Amie from NY and heading to Daytona for 2 nights, then back to Sheri's' for a night and heading home on Sunday. I can not believe I am finally getting to meet them, I hate that so many of the others couldn't make it, I hope we can start this as a yearly tradition and change the place each year. Who knows I just know we are going to have a blast. Pictures to follow in a later post.

VBS for adults too

So 2 weeks ago Amanda played a flute duet with her friend Erin at Erin's church which Erin's father is the pastor of. Now you have to picture my family doesn't like to dress up, I have a nose ring and both dh and I have visible tattoos. We are used to going to church in places where we can wear shorts and flip flops. But for Amanda we did what was required and went.

We were so amazed and pleased with this church. The pastor is great this is a Southern Baptist Church he preaches straight from the bible, so we liked that. The music was ok old hymns from the book. The duet was amazing. So dh and I talked after and thought maybe we have been trying to go about finding a church all wrong. Maybe we are trying to find a church that fits us, instead of us going where god wants us to be. Sure Beulah has a ton of old folks who may look down on us for a nose ring and tattoos, but the pastor and his wife didn't heck they have been beyond nice to us. So last Sunday we went again and we still like it, even Haley sits with us and can make it almost 1 hour and 15 minutes without being loud.

So this Sunday we embark on our biggest adventure yet, we are all somewhat socially awkward but Sunday evening starts Vacation bible School and Haley is all signed up, Amanda is signed up to help and they are holding an adult class inside during the same time, so dh and I are going to it. I will be missing Thursday since I am heading to Orlando to hang with my girls, but I am scared and excited to start meeting some of the people of this church.

Camp

Well Amanda left Monday for camp, now mind you her church camp is way different then the church camp I attented when I was a kid.

My camp was a Friday the 13th camp, you know cabins on the lake, looked like you might get hacked to death by Jason at night, there was a bath house full of spiders you went to, to shower or use the bathroom. And no heat or A/C. I loved it though I went 4 years for a week each time. I repelled down a mountain, went playing in the river, we camped out under the stars one night, we went mud sliding in the rain. It was always fun and I hated to have to leave.

Enter Amanda's camp, they are at Libery University a Christian College in Lynchburg, VA. Sleeping in dorm rooms, yes the horror they do have to share a bathroom with all the girls on their floor but no bugs.

On Monday as we were waiting for her to load the bus, I looked down and see my dear daughter in flip flops, she is 15 so she did all her own packing, so I say you did bring some other shoes right? Sure she says I brought my gold flip flops too. Great!!! So at that point I should have went straight home and got her shoes and socks but I didn't. Later that day I FedEx'ed them to her. Of course she needed them Wednesday and they arrived just in time.

She is having a ball at camp, she is with her friend Erin, and from the updates and pics on the website I can tell she is doing well. I look forward to hearing all about it Friday when she gets home.

I miss her terribly, it is funny how I feel about her being gone, I am not sure I will survive when she leaves for college.

Getting Healthy

Well I am sure you can tell by the pictures of me I am a big girl. But I wasn't always, as a matter of fact I was a bean pole until I had my first child. I am not sure what changed but once I had her the weight never came off and even about 15 more pounds added to that. Then got pregnant again and added another 15 to that. So my all time high was 190 pounds. I lost 20 pounds on weight watchers several years ago, but then hit a plateau and just refused to exercise so I stopped losing and ended up gaining about 15 back.

Then I became diabetic and you would think I would have worked super hard to get myself on track, but no not me I sulked and refused to accept it s real. But it has started to become real to me. I am tired of feeling dizzy, having stomach issues and tired of being freaking tired. So I have been trying hard to work on things. And in the last couple of months I have lost 8 pounds. We as a family are walking at least 3 -5 times a week, and plan to start hiking every weekend. I am eating better, limiting my sodas, low carb foods and just not over eating. I feel better already and I can not wait to see if the weight continues to come off.

South Mountain

Since neither Mark nor I have local family who ever want to get together on holidays we decided to find a place to take a hike. We picked South Mountain, only about an hour and 15 minutes from our house and free. The place was jammed packed, but we found a parking spot and started hiking. We decided to go look at the waterfalls. 80 foot drop, we made it to the base of the falls which was 1.5 miles and then stopped, this was up tons of stairs so maybe next time we can make it to the top of the falls. All in all we hiked about 5 miles and it was awesome. We may make it a weekend thing from now on.

Mr. Mann

Well his real name is Mojo, but since we got him he has been called so many things, Mr. Mann, Bubby, Momo he is just so dang cute to have 1 name.

The story of how we got Mojo is pretty awesome. On October 10th Haley turned 7 and for her birthday she got Nintendo Dog for DS the Chihuahua version. That night she adopted a little girl tri color Chihuahua. I announced to the family if anyone ever wanted to surprise me with an awesome gift, it would be a little tri color Chihuahua. So the next day we went grocery shopping at Walmart and as we were leaving like every weekend, someone was sitting in front of Staples with puppies to sale or give away. They looked small so I asked dh to stop imagine my surprise when I saw a tri color Chihuahua. I was in love we bought him and brought him straight home.

He was 7 weeks old and such a little lover, he loved to be snuggled and held. I started taking him to work with me everyday and he would sleep on my desk between my arms as I typed. He has been so good until about 3 months something changed. He started to change and disliked everyone but our family and a select few in my office. He now barks at all strangers and growls, has to be muzzled to go to the vet. He also has allergies and wow has that been a ride, poor little guy scratches himself all up, but I am happy to announce we see it improving so maybe he is out growing it or the special food is helping. But he is still my Little Man and I wouldn't change him for the world.