Tropical Storm Ida

We survived. Wednesday she started rolling in. It took me over an hour to make a 30 minute drive. Thursday she came in with full force. Schools were closed, everything was closed. We sat through most of the day and the kids played the Wii while we listened to howling winds and watched sheets of rain fall. Our street flooded. Around 3 we lost power.
I have seriously never witnessed wind like this and I lived in MS for years and saw many a storm come through. It was much worse then they anticipated. I was very worried all evening because we have a VERY tall old pine tree in the back yard that was almost bent over by the winds. I was afraid it would fall on the house so we moved the kids to our room (the farthest away) and sat in the kitchen and listened to the raging winds and constant police and fire sirens. Finally we heard a crash and found that our favorite tree (not the one we expected) had fallen against our house.
The kids were devastated. This tree was perfect for climbing. Marcus planned to build a play house in it. It was so perfect our dog could even climb it. Sunday we will be cutting it apart and hauling it off. I now not only have no shade to sit in during the summer or put the kids pool under...I have two heart broken kids.
Our power finally came on at 4. It is still bad here. Flooding and Winds, a lot of accidents. There are still many many people without power. Some lost their homes and their lives. We are lucky we only lost a favorite tree (and a few lawn chairs).

Our house is gamer heaven

I started playing Everquest with my ex when it came out...forever ago. We transitioned guild and all to Everquest 2. When we got separated I turned to World of Warcraft. I was never a "hardcore gamer" I would play for an hour or so and be done. I had a good balance. When I first started playing it was because we had small children and couldn't go out, so it gave me something to do.
Flash forward years later where I have my wonderful husband who plays "Shia" an online game like Wow. I have not touched the game, nor do I plan too. Games can be addicting and I have no want to go back to that lifestyle. Yes I say life style. It erks me to hell when my husband announces we have to be back by 3pm on Saturday because he has a "Guild Event". I will fix this one day, right now I just keep hoping he will get bored with it.
So we do have a nice Tv, we have an X-Box and just got a Wii. I do have to say I love me some Wii but I am adult and know that uhh..real life calls and I have to move on to "IMPORTANT THINGS" unlike my kids. I swear they live and breath video games. I barley let them play anymore. In order for the to get game time they have to bring home the Nobel Piece Prize...and actually DO something to get it (ahem..).
People are by far addicted to games. I have been one of them. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one to step back and find something else to do...for instance I read half a huge book last night..what did you do gamers?

Really Chaos!

It is only Monday and I am already beat. I spent the morning cleaning up a corner of the office...eww. I spent 5 hours on the phone. I took 2 orders and tried in vain to throw together a price book. I came home at 2:30 so we can finally catch up on laundry. Our landry room is TINY and it takes forever to get anyting done. Thank goodness we are getting stackables. I cant stand all the landry laying around. We did some quick cleaning and are waiting for the kids to get home and then we will head back to the office to finish up cleaning and put together a computer desk.
Our weekend away was amazing but I don't have time to post about it now. Be back soon!

My ovary (I though) and court houses

Werid title? Probably but you will see. The last few weeks I have posted about pain from the cyst on my left ovary. As I grew larger the pain from it grew more frequent and intense. The last week it had progressed to sever pain and my midwife informed me..its just round ligament pain. So I took ibuprofenand soldiered through it..until yesterday.
Yesterday I got up, as much as I could made my way to walmart for cleaning supplies for the shop (it's icky) and headed out to drop the stuff off. I then headed to the circuit court in Chesapeake and had to park I swear 2 football fields away. I slowly walked inside, and by the time I managed to get our fictitious name form approved I had tears streaming down my face. People were freaking out at a pregnant girl waddling and crying as I walked out of the building. I called Marcus and thought for sure that that cyst had either ruptured or twisted. Something my midwife had said could happen.
I drove home and even that hurt. We headed to emergency where I was put in a room, a physician assistant came in and pressed on my whole left side of my stomach and I cried more tears of pain. It felt like my side was on fire or like every muscle had ripped. I was then taken to L&D for all of two seconds then to the Midwife Clinic.
They did an ultrasound and the problem dumbfounded the doctor. The baby was not pressing on the cyst, blood flow was fine to the area, they were all stumped while I was curled up in a ball crying again.
Let me just say I have a pretty good pain tolerance, and even in pain I can usually put on a blank face. This pain was like nothing I had ever had in my life.
Finally the doctor came in and pushed on my stomach and side more until he found the "trigger point". Their conclusion is I have a trigger nerve that is being irritated by the stretching of pregnancy, hence why it has gotten worse and worse. The doctor then came in with a really big needle, found the trigger area and numbed my stomach. I would say on a pain scale of 1-10 my pain went from 11 to 5.
They sent us home and I return today where they will go over the labs they took. If they see nothing else wrong they will administer steroid/pain shots into my stomach wall for the rest of my pregnancy...owwwwwww talk about suckage.
I am just happy to be able to stand up straight and at least walk again. I cant even say how much it sucked.
On a positive note I got to see our baby boy though! He was having a dance party in there!

Scared outta my mind

So a few months ago I had talked to a women about buying her sign/graphics business. It was a high price. The women is terminally ill and was looking for someone to buy her out. As much as we wanted it we passed.
She called me back this week and asked if I would like to take over her business with her as a silent partner....I get everything, her equipment, her clients...all of it. She owned the shop 16 years and had a wonderful track record until she got sick last year. It is too good of an opportunity to pass up. My husband and I have some wonderful ideas to add to the business. Next week we start the daunting task of business licensing, registering as a corporation, talking to the IRS for tax ID numbers and all that fun stuff. I feel very overwhelmed, however if we can do it right we could improve our lives vastly. The only down side is the location is in the an adjacent city so I will have to do some driving. However I have no boss...no strings, can it get any better?

Rearing its ugly head

Sooo thanks to our exploding economy (did you hear the sarcasm there?) I was laid off again today. Work in the design field is just not there right now and for once I can actually say its ok.
I plan on trying to rein in some freelance jobs and I still have other options as to places to work if I choose too. You would think I would be freaking out but Im not simply because I have options.
I will still be working for my employer freelance of course, I have to say I am kinda excited to stay home and get some things done before this baby comes out. Oh well, sometimes the cards are dealt and even though its not a great hand you still win one way or another.

Boobs

Did my title get your attention? There is one thing that annoys me and strangely makes me uncomfortable. I see one women every few weeks, she is so tan she looks as if her skin is going to crack and start crumbling away, her fake nails are way too long and she is obviously 45 trying to look 20. The one thing that always gets me is her Boobs, they are really round, and really perky, they look like someone took two balloons and inserted them under her skin and they dont move. She always makes it a point to wear low cut shirts.
Now let me start by saying breasts are beautiful, natural ones in my opinion. When ever I express this opinion I always get a comment such as..that's cause you have them.
I do I am currently sporting a fricken 36 E! Since being pregnant they have increased in size. I am usually a 36 D and I have been...since 3rd grade. My friends have various nick names for me..jiggles, boobs, shortstack and so on. It annoys the hell out of me. I went through years of boys asking me if I could "touch my elbows behind my back" and I lost count long ago of bra snapping tricks. However though I hate them I live with them. I would love a reduction one day, so I struggle when I see women putting creepy substances beneath their skin. Have you ever felt a fake boob...ewwwwwwww
I wish women could love what they have. Granted I understand a women who is as flat as a 2x4 wanting boobies, and if they have them done in a natural way its ok. I have one friend who did this and you would never know they were fake.
What makes me more miffed is when men insist that fake is better. With how many women I know with fake boobs, do men even know what real ones feel like anymore?
I don't get the concept of women wanting to have boobs that are obviously not real. Maybe it is the feminist part of me that rages on this subject.
Granted when I was looking for models for my pin up shoots I offended many plastic barbie doll women when I said I was looking for only natural women ranging from size 6-16.
It is one reason I love Dove. They are one company that pushes REAL images of women. I am also happy that the photography, advertising and magazines are pushing for natural women. Even play boy is moving away from fake breasts. I am not supporting unhealthy life styles when I say I was looking for women size 6-16 either, however I am a true believer that confidence in a women is a beautiful thing no matter what their size.
I am used to people referring to me as the girl with huge boobs, but it's who I am and the only reason I would change it is for health reasons. I just hope that one day my daughter doesn't think the has to go under a knife to make a man like her, or for her to feel more comfortable with herself.