I am currently in bed with the flu. It is no fun. I started coughing a little on Friday morning, and it got more intense throughout the day. By Saturday, I had a fever of 101, body aches, congestion, and still had a cough. I literally spent all day in bed. I went to Urgent Care at about 5PM last night. Their computer system was down, and I ended up waiting for an hour and fifteen minutes. The nurse that helped me wore a yellow face mask the entire time because she was pretty sure I had the flu, and she was preparing to leave for Asia for a month-long trip.
Today, I am feeling much better. My fever broke at around 11 last night, and now I'm back down to my usual, colder-than-normal 97.6-98 range. I'm on Tamiflu, which btw is super expensive, and I am also taking Advil PM. Man that stuff works.
Ben and Roman cleaned up the entire downstairs for me. :) I was hoping that my keys, which have been missing since Thursday night, would have turned up, but they did not. Yikes!
Mom is doing much better too. It's nice to see her smiling again. The doctor finally gave her good news on Thursday - the cancer was all removed! For those of you who don't know - she was diagnosed with breast cancer on October 30. They did one lumpectomy, and reported that they did not get everything and had to do a second one, and take out lymph nodes too. The second one was very painful because they took lymph nodes from under her arm. Becca and I stayed home with her the day after because our dad had to be at work. The doctor called her and said that the cancer had all been removed and that the cancer had almost lead to her lymph nodes - the blood vessel leading to the removed nodes had cancerous cells in it, it the node did not. It was caught JUST IN TIME. We are so thankful because one of the two types of cancer that she had was a very aggressive, invasive kind. The kind that is not comparable to a mole.
Due to the nature of her second kind of cancer, they gave her the option of undergoing chemotherapy treatments as a safety precaution, to help insure that there aren't any rogue cancer cells in her body. She will have 9 weeks of chemo, and then 6 1/2 weeks of radiation. The chemo will definitely cause her to lose her hair. She has already gone and picked out a wig to wear, as well as some hats.
She has been so brave through all of this. I don't know how she does it. I feel like I would be a wreck. I feel like my own selfish vanity would have taken control at this point, and I would be wallowing in the despair of being bald. But that is not at all how she is handling it. She is excited. Excited to have a way to protect herself from it returning. And I know that she chooses to have this demeanor partly for our sakes.
The house is in the process of being Christmas-ified. It is so much fun decorating a HOUSE - OUR house. I have dreamed of this for so long. I will post pictures soon!
Nap time!
Sunday, December 9, 2012
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Office!
Another project that I worked on one weekend - striping my office walls!
I kept seeing it on Pinterest and had to try it!
I kept seeing it on Pinterest and had to try it!
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Doorknobs
Having come from two places where changes were forbidden or would have to be undone, we have been absolutely loving spending our weekends working on little projects around the house!
One of the first things that I started on was the door hardware. When we moved in, the typical, brass hardware was everywhere. Being inspired by Pinterest and my parents' house, we decided that we would switch everything over to oil-rubbed bronze.
I originally found a pin on Pinterest telling me that I could simply use metal spray paint to change the knobs! We went on a Lowe's run, and grabbed the necessary spray paint, and tested it on a closet doorknob. The end result was, well, spray painted. It definitely did not look as nice as the knobs that the lady on Pinterest had painted (Eek! #pinstrosity). So, we looked into buying them.
We used the website ebuilderdirect.com and got the dark oil-rubbed bronze hardware, and oh what a difference it has made! It looks so much classier to me. And it was so easy to install! Some of the bigger projects that we are working on are things that I can't really help a whole lot with, but I could do this!
One of the first things that I started on was the door hardware. When we moved in, the typical, brass hardware was everywhere. Being inspired by Pinterest and my parents' house, we decided that we would switch everything over to oil-rubbed bronze.
I originally found a pin on Pinterest telling me that I could simply use metal spray paint to change the knobs! We went on a Lowe's run, and grabbed the necessary spray paint, and tested it on a closet doorknob. The end result was, well, spray painted. It definitely did not look as nice as the knobs that the lady on Pinterest had painted (Eek! #pinstrosity). So, we looked into buying them.
We used the website ebuilderdirect.com and got the dark oil-rubbed bronze hardware, and oh what a difference it has made! It looks so much classier to me. And it was so easy to install! Some of the bigger projects that we are working on are things that I can't really help a whole lot with, but I could do this!
Friday, November 23, 2012
2012
I realize that I am probably one of the worst bloggers ever. But it's ok, because we have had a crazy year! 2012 happenings:
-Ben graduated!
-Ben got a job!
-I moved from fifth grade to third grade
And the most exciting thing that happened this year...
WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!!
I have had the house-buying itch for a long time, but the timing never seemed just right. When we first got married, we lived in a three bedroom/one bathroom house in north Charlotte, right near Concord Mills mall. It was an older house with a good bit of land. We were cozy and excited, but the house came with some problems. The house had a lot of issues typical of an older house, but the realty company was not very easy to work with regarding repairs (we once waited for a month to have a key brought to unlock the dead-bolted back door). The landlord was a sweet, older woman who wanted nothing changed about the house that she lived in with her now-deceased husband. We were told not to paint the walls any color but white, and we were forbidden from hanging photos or using the fireplace.
Once our lease was up in March of 2011, we decided to move to a smaller, but more updated apartment near UNCC. The people that worked in the office were great, the community was nice and the maintenance & landscaping staff did a great job keeping it that way. I put in our first maintenance request, and had someone at the door within the hour! It was amazing! But, like the house before, there was a downside. Parties. College-aged neighbors with no regard for others. Alcohol-fueled fights in the parking lots. Then the car break-ins. In the year and a half that we were there, all three of the cars that we owned were broken in to. We started feeling anxious and questioned our safety, but it still didn't feel like the right time to move.
Two things happened in the summer that changed that. The first was Ben got a job shortly after graduation. Let me tell you, having TWO incomes was an amazing change. The second happened sometime after our anniversary, at about two in the afternoon.
We knew that some of our neighbors were into some sketchy things. It worried us, but we didn't feel we were in serious danger until that day. I went out with Allie to help her at her dress fitting. I got back home at around 3:30 to find my neighbors all in a panic. Apparently, the neighbors that I spoke of had been robbed at gunpoint. They had been thrown onto their dining room table or into a bedroom, and robbed. Ben and I saw this as our cue to exit, and fast.
We didn't spend very long looking at houses before finding "the one". It is 3 bedrooms, a bonus room, and 2.5 bathrooms. It is on a half acre with half of the backyard fenced in. It is in Matthews, and we loooove the community. One of our favorite things to do on the weekends is to visit the farmer's market.
[Side note: if you are looking for a house, I strongly suggest Devine Realty!]
Shortly after, Ben got me two puppies for my birthday! We named them Chewie and Obi. Chewie is calm, sweet and loving, while Obi is outgoing and curious.
That has been our year so far! Lots of changed, but we are loving it!
-Ben graduated!
-Ben got a job!
-I moved from fifth grade to third grade
And the most exciting thing that happened this year...
WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!!
I have had the house-buying itch for a long time, but the timing never seemed just right. When we first got married, we lived in a three bedroom/one bathroom house in north Charlotte, right near Concord Mills mall. It was an older house with a good bit of land. We were cozy and excited, but the house came with some problems. The house had a lot of issues typical of an older house, but the realty company was not very easy to work with regarding repairs (we once waited for a month to have a key brought to unlock the dead-bolted back door). The landlord was a sweet, older woman who wanted nothing changed about the house that she lived in with her now-deceased husband. We were told not to paint the walls any color but white, and we were forbidden from hanging photos or using the fireplace.
Once our lease was up in March of 2011, we decided to move to a smaller, but more updated apartment near UNCC. The people that worked in the office were great, the community was nice and the maintenance & landscaping staff did a great job keeping it that way. I put in our first maintenance request, and had someone at the door within the hour! It was amazing! But, like the house before, there was a downside. Parties. College-aged neighbors with no regard for others. Alcohol-fueled fights in the parking lots. Then the car break-ins. In the year and a half that we were there, all three of the cars that we owned were broken in to. We started feeling anxious and questioned our safety, but it still didn't feel like the right time to move.
Two things happened in the summer that changed that. The first was Ben got a job shortly after graduation. Let me tell you, having TWO incomes was an amazing change. The second happened sometime after our anniversary, at about two in the afternoon.
We knew that some of our neighbors were into some sketchy things. It worried us, but we didn't feel we were in serious danger until that day. I went out with Allie to help her at her dress fitting. I got back home at around 3:30 to find my neighbors all in a panic. Apparently, the neighbors that I spoke of had been robbed at gunpoint. They had been thrown onto their dining room table or into a bedroom, and robbed. Ben and I saw this as our cue to exit, and fast.
We didn't spend very long looking at houses before finding "the one". It is 3 bedrooms, a bonus room, and 2.5 bathrooms. It is on a half acre with half of the backyard fenced in. It is in Matthews, and we loooove the community. One of our favorite things to do on the weekends is to visit the farmer's market.
[Side note: if you are looking for a house, I strongly suggest Devine Realty!]
Shortly after, Ben got me two puppies for my birthday! We named them Chewie and Obi. Chewie is calm, sweet and loving, while Obi is outgoing and curious.
That has been our year so far! Lots of changed, but we are loving it!
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