I am A College Student ....

I just wanted to give a quick hello to those stopping by from ICLW ...  (waving) ....  You can read many ICLW Welcomes from the past, my last one from August is pretty good...  You may look at me now and think, she's got no idea what I am going through, she's a mom of 4 boys, how can she relate to the struggles of infertility (since most ICLW'ers are those struggling) ... but I do understand.  If you take a moment to read one of my intros, you'll find out how. I'm actually embarrassed to say I forgot about it :(

I don't have time to write up a September Welcome.... I apologize for that, I may not even have time to DO my ICLW :(   Which stinks because I enjoy it so much.   However, I barely have time to sleep right now.... 

WHY?

Well because on the 19th, I officially became a College Student.   Now I tried once before, after my first marriage broke up, but I failed.  I was a single mother then, I ended up with 2 concussion during that time, and there were other issues (I won't go into right now) .... and I threw out my back.    So I'm trying again.  Maybe I wasn't ready then, but I am now :)  I'm buried in homework, but I'm still excited.  I'm sure that feeling will falter .. but ...  I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. 

As a lover of books....  this is the library and I find it BEAUTIFUL ...  lol..

All of that is the library .... 

Books cost so much more then I ever expected and just getting what I needed for class - ugh.   The first week of class was fun.  I have English, Introduction to Multimedia and a College Success course that I have to take being a new student.   I am in school every day from 1 to 3:30 and then on Tuesday's and Thursday's I'm in school from 5 to 8pm.   (Dennis has class from 8am to Noon.)  But I am really loving it.  I have been at home with the kids for so long, it feels good to get out and be around people, and empower myself to fulfill my dreams of what I want to do. 

When I took the above two pics, I was walking from my night time class in the art building at the end of campus - and I got in the van because Dennis had come to pick me up, and he says "Only you would stop to take a couple pictures walking from class" ....  yep, that's me.... 

I also have to share my first assignment from English ...  it was signing a contract for English saying we read the Syllabus and understood and agreed ... apparently he felt there was a lot of wasted space so he had us use emoticons and describe why we picked that one about particular English subjects...

The babies also started school on Monday ...

Dennis took this one....  

I took these...

Nathan was so excited he wouldn't sit still for a minute so I could take a picture... LOL.. he LOVES school!  Kaedyn did okay ...  the first day he was pretty excited....  the second day, (pic below) he got mildly upset when I went to leave but I managed to distract him...

The third day ...... he CRIED .... and I almost did too...  breaks my heart.

Anyway - I'll have to share some of my homework.  For example, we have had two assignments now in Multimedia where the first one we had to exam the ARTWORK on CD and Album covers from 2000-present and 1960-1979 .....  and find something we liked, and why it appealed to us.  And one BAD cover either CD or Album.  I almost picked Kelly Clarkson - My December for my favorite, but I went for this amazing Evanescence cover.  If you want to check it out, here it is....  then we had to do an AUDIO one with commercials and how the industry uses audio to catch our attention in good ways.  So I got up after class was over and said "I'm surprised you didn't give us a bad one too," and she said "That's a good idea!" and I'm like... great - I just got the class more homework! LOL...  SORRY CLASS!  But she used my favorite commercial as the example.... you know, the little boy who dresses up as Darth Vader (youtube link) and tries to do all sorts of things and starts a car in the end (with the help of his Dad of course).  So I had to think of another one....  so I was thinking of the one I used in class, but I figured everyone would use it, so I was thinking of this Kotex one...  and I also thought of this Huggies one.....  but I went back to the Kia one that I thought of in class, that one of my BFF's said too...  and when given the choices I thought of ... Dennis said the Kia one too.   So ...  I picked it and did my Audio Assignment ...    LOL ... 

Not to mention Kaedyn had surgery and there have been appointments up the yin-yang...  I currently have a sleeping Kaedyn beside me while I watch THE TALK from this week and work on homework...   Nathan is sleeping, Noah is watching TV he taped this week ... Cal is being the typical teen and holed up in his room playing Modern Warfare 2...... cuz he doesn't have MW3 .. ha ha ...  

Anyway - I've been pretty busy with homework.   So that's my excuse!

Now, back to work... 

Noah's First Day ....

Noah had a back to school night where we went in and met his teacher and saw his classroom.  In Wisconsin, all classes are inside a building, here ...  the doors open to the outside, there are these portable trailers on the school grounds and some classrooms are in there.  Well, Noah is in one of these portable classrooms this year.    He is in Mrs. Leonard's class this year...

 Noah's desk tag.....

 Put all his supplies in his desk ....

 Noah by his desk.....  (Kaedyn in the background, actually Nathan is behind Noah too)

 Noah pointing to his name in his class list...

 Noah's class

 Handprint wall....  with all the kids names ...

 Noah's name...

Here he is the first day of school.....

 His super cool backpack that Papa got him....

 Running into his classroom a few minutes late the first day... LOL...

Will it ever stop?

I got sick in January ...   started out with pain in my right side, then turned into a major flare up of my CFS ... my diabetes being out of control, though it's never been IN control.  My kidneys ache, my liver continued to ache... my liver enzymes were up, and it was concerning .....  my body was objecting, and I had to put on a brave face, and muddle through the pain to keep going as best I could to keep our lives as normal as I could....

Then ...  they increased my metformin to try to get my diabetes under control, but my body was rejecting it, when I told them - they gave me the long lasting metformin - which I could tolerate the dosage ... but then it seemed as soon as I got up to where she wanted me, my liver enzymes shot through the roof ... they are suppose to be no higher then - about - 60 .... mine were almost 500 and almost 300 ...

I get a phone call from Dr. Divine ...  she told me to stop taking any and all over the counter pain meds (tylenol, ibuprofin, etc) ... and no more metformin ...  my diabetes is out of control.... what does that mean for me????

INSULIN .....

Yep......  not so happy about that.  Went through the training and broke into tears because she was gonna make me do it...  but I did it.  This is what I came home with ...

 Needles, insulin, new meter and supplies.... and a large needle disposery ...

This is the new meter ... she had me "try it out" in her office because the needles are so tiny that most people can't use it because they end up "milking" their finger forever...

The box is of course the needles, and the insulin is below it....

She HIGHLY suggested that I get these fast acting glucose tabs to have on hand - so the red bottle is in my diabetes supplies, and the orange one is in my purse.  There is more of a likelihood of my sugar dropping from accidently giving myself to much insulin and passing out ... especially with my rotten brain ... I have been forgetting everything - and there are some nights I don't remember if I took my pills.  HOWEVER ... I think I'll remember poking myself.   Anyway ...  there are other ways my sugar can drop too - so I got them.

I started out with 20 units at night, then it got up'd to 30 units at night, and then to 20 units in the morning and 30 at night ... I was suppose to call on Thursday to see if I should up it more over the weekend (which is going to be a yes) ... but I talked myself into calling on Friday because then I'd have Thrusday's numbers too, and I remembered Friday morning - she's not in on Friday's...   soooooooooo .....  oops.  I'll call her Monday morning while I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off...... yep....

I'm so sick though, I really worry about how I'm going to handle everything - or if my body is just going to give out on me.   I've been in the doctors so much this month so far, had two ultrasounds, a CT scan, I have had so many viles of blood taken that I have lost count ..  I have been in Urgent Care which involved me getting poked FOUR TIMES for an IV - and yet another time for a blood draw even though they took about 10 viles of blood while poking me for IVs....  (cry) ...

This is where they finally ended up getting my IV - in my hand - she put this thing over it so it wouldn't get messed up when I had to get up and pee ...  

 Here are two more IV tries....  in the crock of my elbow and in the middle of my arm...

 and of course the back of my right hand which spurted blood all over the place....

 Don't......... I .............. looooook........... happy?   (and tired?)

A week later, my arm is still bruised BADLY ..........

Yeah .......  luckily, my liver levels are down, but the various pain issues, are.....  NOT ....    UGH...

I have appointments with a few specialists right now to try to figure out what IS wrong....   My CFS is acting up badly, I've got hair falling out of my head, either I'm exhausted or have insomnia, never a happy medium... my arms have been hurting so bad that I can't lift them up above my shoulder (I'm lucky if I get them up that high) ...  and now, thanks to the injections, my thighs hurt a lot :(   But my blood sugar is FINALLY coming down - which is a-maz-ing...  it's the first time I've actually seen a noticeable difference...  I kept thinking the metformin wasn't working .... and it seems, I was right.

I remember freaking out while I was pregnant with Kaedyn seeing my sugars get over 200 for the first time... I've seen 550! LOL...  seems to me .... I'd like to see those numbers....  ha!

Anyway - enough of this....

Three Year Ol' Burfdae Boy ....

So ...... we are a struggling family of six, don't have funds to throw huge birthday bashes with tons of fun and kids, though ... it might be nice!...  I doubt I'd ever end up on OUTRAGEOUS KIDS PARTIES where parents blow tens of thousands of dollars on a child's birthday party ....  hell, if I had that kind of money, I'd put a down payment on a house, get a nice new van ... something that wasn't gonna go down the tubes in one day!  Heck, I was cringing at the money we spent on food!  LOL...

There were no fancy decorations .... no balloons or streamers ...  not even a cardboard "Happy Birthday" sign.  Nope... on his birthday, I went into urgent care and didn't even get to tuck him into bed!  He spent every moment of his birthday getting into trouble...  between the eggs - only one broke ...  they were finding eggs on Diego - or something like that ....  and the spraying cooking spray on each other thinking it was so funny!!  ...  not to mention the typical everyday theatrics of pure childhood naughtiness..    Our friends Cara and Kerry brought over cup-cakes, a card, and three dollars of Kaedyn's very own over :D   The plan was, take me into urgent care where they'd probably just tell me they were clueless and then come home, give them cupcakes, and a bath and tuck them into bed...... didn't happen like that, I got taken into urgenct care and my pulse was so high they decided to keep me, put an IV and well, that's another blog...  anyway - Daddy came back to give the boys a bath and Nathan his medicine... and once they were settled in bed, he gave Cal instructions and headed back to me, so no cupcake for the boys :(

Here is the card from our friends :)  And his 3 dollars!!

And the adorable cupcakes they got him...

On Saturday, 9-10-11 ....   we had his party.  Just a little party with some neighbors, Ashley & Nana and Papa.  I joked we were going to have his party on 9-10-11 at 12.... LOL, thanks to his Auntie Sarah - she said it first, I just thought it was funny ....  ANYWAY - we told everyone to just come over whenever, around dinner time...

We got some salsa bean dip, veggies, some croissant sandwiches, some crackers, meat & cheese ....  some fruit, amazing bacon wrapped jalapeno stuffed chicken ... and of course - CAKE!!  We found an AMAZING cake.....   COOKIE MONSTER ...

I asked the lady in the bakery .... who was rather.... um..... cantankerous ...  she saw me standing there, and standing there... and standing there..... and she makes a phone call, and when she gets off the call, after a few more minutes, she goes "can I help you with something?" 

Um... no, I was just standing here for fun.......... "Yeah I'd like you to write something on the cake"

"I can't write anything on the cake, I'll have to write it on the board" ....

I realized there wasn't much clearance between the cookie monster frosting fur and the cake top.... "That's fine," I told her.

"What do you want it to say?" 

"Happy 3rd Birthday Kaedyn," I told her, "and I'll have to spell his name for you because it's spelled differently"

So she takes the piping bag and writes on one side, and then switches to the other side, and asks me how to spell it, and then she hands it to me ...   and this is what it says...

 Not only does she write "Happy 1st Birthday" but she writes his name ON the sticker! What the heck people!!  Yeah , let's just write on a sticker that makes a great picture - don't even ASK me if I want the sticker off!  If we pull it off, it's going to says "Kaedun" ... UGH! ... I saw this immediately and looked at Dennis, told him under my breath ... and he goes, "we'll get some frosting and fix it at home" .... I seriously want to make a complaint....  i

Doesn't change the fact that the cake was a bit amazing.....   And I do find it a little funny because I found this AMAZING blog called  CAKE WRECKS  ... Husband & Wife, Jen & John, decided to create a blog which celebrates amazing cakes on Sunday's and has a little fun with cake blunders through the week.   And trust me, some of them are hil-ar-i-ous!  You really MUST check them out!

The party was fun though, but it was super hot in our apartment - so instead of dressing the kids up all cute, I figured I'd let them be as comfortable as they could, in just their diapers...   with that said, here is my mostly naked birthday boy reacting to seeing his cake for the first time ......

He gasped and covered his mouth with his hands.... it was PRICELESS .... then he was saying "Cookie Monster" in his own way ....  cuz nothing comes out super clear from his mouth...

Then when I was taking pictures of the cake ...  (excuse the blurriness but it was my cell phone cuz the batteries died in my camera so I was charging them quick... and he was in motion)

 Yep, that's right........ Mr. Kaedyn was eating his name on the "White Cake" sticker....  AND getting a little cookie monster fur too...

Then he objected to me covering it back up .... now, I don't know if he's thinking .... "How do I get back in there?" or "Are you looking at me?"

 "Kaedyn, wheres' your cake?"  ..... As if I needed to ask....

 We blew out his candle....  (disregard the white, it was Daddy's attempt to fix the cake, I was to shaky to do it... but the frosting was to thick and hot.... it didn't work)

 This was him taking a DEEP breath to blow out the candle...  ROFLMBO!!!!

 2nd try ....

 3rd try is a charm!!  LOLOLOL

 And he got it that time!

Our friends & neighbors came over, Ashley stopped by, Nana and Papa came over for a few minutes....  there was crackers smooshed everywhere, frosting all over the floor and the kids...  it was fun.

Ashley gave him an outfit, that he wore today ....

 Super Kaedyn & Super Nathan ...

 He's getting so big

 Always in motion ......

 And he got a Dinosaur book from Nana and Papa which they already abused well loved and I need to fix... 

But for the last picture......... I want to share....... Kaedyn telling me how old he is....  (I won't mention I had to bribe him with chocolate..just to get the picture.) 

 He'll get his present from us next month :)