Humpty Dumpty

So, around October 2, I started having some pain in my lower back. I assumed it was from sleeping wrong or something. It's happened before a couple times. When it has, I just get some heat packs for a couple days and it goes away. Well this time it didn't.
After a week, I called the doctor, whose first appointment was a week away. I went to the appointment, and some X-rays were ordered to see what was causing the pain. I had those done the next day. That day was Halloween. I waited to hear the results on those tests. The pain didn't really get better or worse from when it first came on until this point. I found that sleeping in our glider rocker helped make it better, but still it hurt to sit, stand, or walk. I was on an Aleve regimen until my doctor appointment, when I was switched to Tramadol. Then around 6:30 on the morning of Wednesday, November 5, I slipped on the first step from our main level downstairs and fell down on my rear. That's when the real pain started.
I was up because Megan was awake and wanted to watch a Dora or Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. I had taken my medicine for the morning and was headed downstairs to get her situated. When I fell, I was able to roll over and crawl to where the remote was. Then I laid there for a while, hoping the pain would go away. It didn't. Katelyn eventually woke up and joined Megan on the couch. I had her get the phone so I could use the intercom and get Cassi to come help. She got ahold of my mom, dad, and sister; and called 911 so an ambulance could take me to the ER.
My brother-in-law came over to help and the girls were shuffled to school and Amy's house. My family all stepped up, and with the big ambulance parked at our house, our neighbors and ward members called to see where they could help too.
At the hospital, they took more X-rays, and I was diagnosed with "acute chronic low back pain." It seems I may have had something from birth, where a few of my lumbar vertebrae aren't lined up exactly straight. It's not to a degree where surgery is an option or would do much. When I eventually got the results from the first set of X-rays, it listed the same thing, including "mild scoliosis with minimal degenerative change." The minimal degenerative change just means that I've aged since birth, so that's ok. :)
I was discharged after only about 4-6 hours in the ER, with a prescription for Valium, Vicodin, and Naprosyn. After a day on those medications, I started feeling much better. I spent the rest of the day in bed, and felt better enough the next day to wander to my office and get at least half a day's work in. Within a few days, my back has felt TONS better. I have sciatic nerve pain, I think aggravated or caused by my fall.
I've seen my doctor since. She told me that walking would be a good start for therapy. I took that as an ok to go ahead on a quick vacation to Disneyland this past weekend. (Look forward to a post on that soon.) I've also started real physical therapy. I am learning exercises and posture skills from physical therapy to let the nerves heal and strengthen my back muscles. I'm walking with only a slight limp now instead of a much more significant one I've had. So, this LONG story made only a little longer, I'm feeling about 80% normal and looking forward to making it all the way back.
This post wouldn't be complete without a HUGE thank you to my family, friends, and all who have helped out, thought about, been concerned about me.

Happy Halloween!

The girls couldn't wait to wear their costumes this year. Fortunately, Katelyn's preschool had a little Halloween party on Thursday, so their wishes came true. Katelyn chose to be a "Nice Witch," while Megan will tell you over and over that she's a Butterfly. Too cute indeed!

Dancing Queen

One of the reasons we were so excited to move to Arizona is that Katelyn could take dancing lessons at my aunt's studio, and have Amy or Kaley as her teacher. She has lots of fun in Amy's class, and even got to perform at the Arizona State Fair. Here's the full dance. She's the tall one in the middle.

It was a fun family outing.  Katelyn was excited to wear bright pink lipstick, and Megan danced along from her chair.  Afterwards, they each got to pick a ride before we had to head home.

Katelyn turns 5!!!

Wow. I can't believe that 5 years ago today Katelyn transformed us from a couple to a family. We'll post pictures and stuff of her day, party, etc. later, but I wanted to write before I went to bed how proud we are of both her and Megan. We're extremely blessed to have such beautiful, intelligent girls. It's always a roller coaster when it comes to kids, but we love them so much. The last 5 years have seen amazing changes in our lives. Then, we were in student housing, I was almost finished with school, and Cassi was holding down the fort from the OR at Utah Valley. I was just an intern, not expecting to stay in Utah or with Novell, but now am amazed at what we learned and how many life-long friends we made because we stayed for a while longer. Now Katelyn is in pre-school and dancing, and her life is getting busier every day. Katelyn really is our pioneer, guinea pig, and little mother. I'm greatful to be her father. Today we took her to see Wall-E. She got tired in the middle, and asked if she could sit on my lap. I look forward to those "payoff" moments when you know the bumps and bruises are worth it. Happy Birthday, Katelyn.

Love,
Dad

Visitors

Visitors are always fun, right? Well, the people kind yes. Other kinds, not so much...more on that later.

First, Cassi's posted already that her parents came and spent a few days soon after we were in. It was fun to see them, show them the area (though I didn't really show them anything - they loved to go driving and discover), and of course show them the house. They got to be here for Katelyn's first day of preschool, and I know Katelyn liked that.

This week we had a visit from Steve and Georgia (great friends from Springville), who were visiting one of their kids and his family who just moved to Scottsdale. We were so glad they came over and caught us up on all the happenings in our old 'hood. Here's a shout out to anyone planning a trip to the Mesa area: Come on over!

Finally (and I've been meaning to post on this for a while) are the non-human visitors...scorpions. Arizona Bark Scorpions to be more specific. In all the years I lived in AZ before starting BYU and living in Utah, I never saw a scorpion, except maybe at the zoo. We figured that since our house is 16 years old, that any groups of scorpions would have been persuaded to move on by now. Apparently that isn't the case; they've been happily living in our cinder block fence, venturing out for food at night. We think our sellers moved out around July 31st, and we didn't start moving in until August 13. So the house was empty, and under new "micro-management" for a couple weeks. I don't want to alarm - we didn't have an army to conquer. But one scorpion is almost enough for a pregnant wife to say "I'm not staying here, let's not move in." :) After a couple treatments by the pest control people, and now the weather is cooling down, we (knock on wood) don't see any in the house anymore, and we only see a small number along the back fence at night. The back fence residents will be eliminated when I finish getting my hunting tools together. I'll post another night about our ward's scorpion hunter. For now, I'll just say that she's given Cassi hope, and fired me up to start handing out the eviction notices.

Our house

I finally have a picture to share of our new house. We still love it and we love being here. Oh, and I should add that the van is not mine. My parents got to visit for a few days, and that's my mom's van. We do realize though, that our time is soon coming to be van owners, just not today. I didn't add any pictures yet of the inside...it's still a work in progress! Most of the unpacking is done. I'm still working on the organization and decorating.

Katelyn loves school

Katelyn goes to preschool 4 days a week for 2 hours at our elementary school. I think she asked every day for about 3 weeks if it was her turn to go to school. Finally the day after labor day she had her first day of school. I didn't let her know that on the first day it was really just an open house and I was staying the whole time. She still loved it anyway.


Then she finally got her "real" first day. I don't think she even really looked back. She just said "bye mom" and kept walking.


Now Megan wants to stay too. She often puts her backpack on to drop Katelyn off. Last week, Megan almost walked in while saying "Megan go school". I had to carry her crying all the way back to the car. It's actually a little nice to have my clingy Megan want to do something without Mom or Dad...if only it really was her turn to stay at preschool!

What Car are You?

I found this quiz on my brother's blog, so here are my results...

I'm a Porsche 911!

You have a classic style, but you're up-to-date with the latest technology. You're ambitious, competitive, and you love to win. Performance, precision, and prestige - you're one of the elite,and you know it.

Take the Which Sports Car Are You? quiz.

We are alive!! Warning....long post!

Wow. Time has gotten away from me. I know I haven't blogged in....forever. To my credit, I have just barely gotten settled enough to have my own computer ready. There is so much to say...so little time. I don't even know where to start, so much has happened. We officially did sell our UT home on July 14th. That was the first of not-so-smooth transitions. The movers came a day earlier than I expected. Then we ended up (while the movers where taking stuff out of my house) almost not selling the house. We had to put more money in because the buyers didn't have enough. Ugh. What else are you going to do on moving day? Just give in and walk away. Then we spent the remainder of that week in a hotel so Chris could finish the work week in Provo. Then Friday, July 18th we left UT and headed to my parent's house in Las Vegas. Chris left the next day to get to AZ so he could start working from home the following week. I spent the week with my family including my sister, who also came. We ended that week with my mom's birthday on July 25th. It was a really fun week. That's when the "fun" began. Now, I have to interject that we thought we were closing on our AZ home (the one that we wanted) on Aug. 1st. We found out on July 25th that the appraisal of the home came back $44K less than our asking price. Waaaayyy too low. Lower is better, but not that low. Both realtors felt that it was unfair and we asked for an appeal. As we were waiting for the new appraisal number to come back, we were unsure if we were going to have to start over or just wait this one out for....who knows how long. It ended up that the new appraisal came up $10k and the sellers came down $27K, then we compromised on the rest. We closed on our AZ home Aug 12th, after almost one month of being in storage. I have to admit, though, that the time went pleasantly. We were all ready to get into our home, but being with my family for a week and then living with the Partridge's made everything so easy. Well, after getting our home on Aug 12th, we had to wait until Aug 18th for the moving company to bring our things. This is when I lost it. I was going to rant on and on about the not-so-good experience I had with Global Moving and Storage, but it now seems not worth it. I thought I had done such a good job researching companies and getting one that was good and had high Better Business Bureau ratings and good comments. I just didn't feel I got the service I was told I was going to get. And in the end there were broken things that I specifically didn't want broken, boxes that were so mushed and cruched it was like they played soccer with them. So, all I have to say is never use that company. We are here now and settled and loving it! We love our house! The girls love playing with the cousins as much as they can get, and they love that it is still summer...and Katelyn hopes, it always will be. The girls have adjusted really well. We just so grateful we are finally here.

So, for the next bit of news about our family is that we are having another baby! I know, for some this is new news and for some this is old news. But we are so excited! We just found out this week that it is a BOY!! What? What do I do with a boy? I have all girls stuff. Everything is pink. I am getting really excited though. It's almost the excitement of a first baby because you need to buy everything new. Katelyn was with us in the ultrasound and her comment was, "But I though it was a girl, oh well, I guess it's a boy." She is so excited too. I'm going to have 2 little mommy helpers. The baby is due to come February 3rd...or, you know, whenever he feels like it!

Oh, there is so much more to say, but I'll stop for now and try to get some pictures together to show next time. I just couldn't wait any longer to post something!

Houses, houses, houses

I don't have any pictures to post today, but it's been a few weeks now, so I had better post something, right?!? We are moving forward with selling our Utah home and buying one down in Arizona. We went down last week to Arizona for our final push to find a house. We walked through seven houses, one that Cassi had been through before. We came down to three really good options, and decided on one to make an offer on. There were a lot of things going for this house.

1. The location is perfect. We will be in the same Jr. High and High School boundaries as Amy, and we're close enough to the Elementary School boundaries that we might be able to do a waiver.
2. The layout is very nice. It has 5 bedrooms, so there's one for me to work from home in, away from noise or commotion from the rest of the house. The girls can share a room downstairs, and have a playroom too. There's a separate family room and living room and dining room - all things I especially wanted as we looked for houses. The backyard is big enough, but not mammoth. Finally, it has a 3-car garage. I don't plan on getting a 3rd car for a long time (if ever!), so we will make good use of the extra storage space.
3. The house had a great feel. It's nice to find a house that has been taken care of, and this family has done that here. I enjoyed seeing the Family Proclamation displayed, as well as other family/church-centric decorations. We got to meet them a couple times as we saw the house during the week, and they just have to be good people.

We made an offer the day we decided on it, and it was accepted! I'm going to be careful about posting pictures of it after we've signed papers and have the keys in hand.

This past week has been busy packing here in UT. As we got ready for the drive back, Mom and Dad offered (and we accepted the offer) to let the girls stay in AZ with them this week until they come up to Utah for the 4th of July. We (and I really mean Cassi, since she's been home the most and has put in the most work on it) have packed a lot of boxes this week, as well as gotten really close to booking a company to move all this stuff down there. It looks like our house here will close somewhere around the 25th of July, and then we will close on our house in AZ around the 1st of August. It's been fun, and I get more excited each day to get down there and start our new adventure in the new house.

As far as progress, we have the inspection done, and soon will get the appraisal. Then we'll lock down the price. (If it appraises less than we offered, our realtor is going to work to get them to lower down to the appraisal.)

Well, it's late/early. Tonight (July 3rd) we get to bring the girls home. It's been really nice to have the extra freedom to pack and focus just on the house. but we're really excited to see them and have them back with us. It's amazing how you miss them when they're gone for just a few days. All the reports from Grandma and Grandpa are that they've been great, so we'll have to find some prize for them when they get home.

Vacation - Day 15 (June 14)

Today is traveling day. As all good things must come to an end, so must this vacation. We had a LONG way home, since check out is at 11 am, and our flight didn't leave until 9:50 pm. We did a pot-luck/clean-out-the-fridge breakfast and then loaded the cars up, took a few last pictures at the condos, and then left.


All the kids like the Sugar Cane Train, so we did that one last time. Scott and his kids set the record for most trips on the train this vacation with 6. Ryan was close behind at 5. Katelyn and Megan and I only hit it 3 times, but still that's not bad. With the "Frequent Rider" passes we got, we had to go twice to make it worth buying the tickets, so we did our jobs.




Katelyn gave us one last "Shaka" before we left the train yards and went for lunch.


Hawaiian tradition says that when you leave the Islands, you throw a flower (or lei) into the ocean. If it comes back, so will you. I don't know what the tradition says if it doesn't come back. The girls always enjoy participating (plus if we tried to take the leis home, they'd just die on the plane anyway). I think everyone's came back but Cassi's this time, so we're taking an average that we can come back someday too. :)


After the leis, we made one last voyage: Kihei. Grandpa Long has asked Grandma-ma almost every day if we were going to visit Kihei. They've stayed there on several of their trips to Maui. She didn't know we had any plans of doing it until today. So, for Grandpa, I took a couple trips as proof that we visited Kihei.



Also in Kihei, I saw this evacuation route sign. Ryan asked if it was the route in the case of a volcanic eruption. I think rather it was for a tidal wave, as the arrow points in the direction of the volcano!


Next we made our way from Kihei to Kahului, where the airport was. We still had a few hours before heading to the airport, so we went to the Queen Ka'Ahumanu Center (mall). We thought there would be a play area there for the kids. We were right - kind-of. There was a play area, but it was under construction. Oh well! We had lunch in the Queen's Market (food court) and then drove to the airport.



Here's to the end of the trip! We made it to the airport and kept everyone happy until the flight. I put on a movie (Meet the Robinsons) and we had not only our kids, but a lot of kids from other families come over and watch it. I think all the parents were okay with the little extra noise from my laptop considering how much less noise and movement there would have been otherwise.


Since our flight left so late (almost 2:00 am MDT), all the kids did great and slept almost the whole time. My seat was broken and wouldn't stay upright, so sorry to the little girl behind me . :)

(Obviously when we got home it was really June 15, but for me it all still felt like just one day, so I'm keeping it included in this posting.) We made it home, and to church (for the whole block) and then crashed a little at home. We tried to have bedtime be 5:30, but the kids only saw it as a nap. We finally got them down to bed and us to bed around midnight.

Well, we all had a wonderful vacation, and will hopefully remember it forever. Hawaii is a beautiful place, and the culture is just something I get excited about. We have to go back to the real world of kids, callings, work, finding a new house in Arizona, etc. But we sure hope to return someday, because really "no ka 'oi" (it's the best) .

Vacation - Day 14 (June 13)

How much pizza does it take to feed this family? Let me show you. We tried really hard to only buy enough groceries to last us while we were here, so that we aren't throwing away any food as we leave. I think we did a pretty good job this year, which is partly the reason for Pizza Hut tonight (not to mention that everyone likes pizza).


Despite being Friday the 13th, there wasn't anything scary about the nights activities here in paradise. Amy handed out the "Sandy Awards" for the sandcastle contest. The Starfish group (Megan, Joshua, and Blake) got "The Handy Helper Award - Super Starfish" for using the most tools - we had a sifter! The Turtle (Katelyn, Bryson, Benjamin, and Hyrum) got "Most Detailed - Totally Awesome Turtle." And The Whale (Nathan, Bradley, and Brock) group got the "Maui-Wowie Whale" award.


We also had the awards ceremony for the Scavenger Hunt. Cassi and I did the scoring. I'm happy to say we didn't fight about any of the scores, but we did have to sell each other on why each score was given. And it was close. The final score had a 2-way tie for 3rd place between my family and Scott and Amy's family, with 47 points (78 is the total possible, but noone was going to get it). Second place was a 3-way tie with 49 points between Ryan and Jennifer's family, Mom and Dad and Grandma-ma, and Chase and Kaley. You can probably figure out that the winner, then was Brett and Stephanie and Hyrum, with 50 points. It was very close. Cassi and I made a video to show everyone's pictures, the individual scores, and the final results. Everyone had a fun time with it. For prizes, Cassi and I got a can of Chocolate-covered Macadamia Nuts for each team for completing the challenge, and the winners got a souvenir wood picture frame (since the point of the hunt was to remember the trip).

Vacation - Day 13 (June 12)

Well we are certainly feeling that the end of the trip is nearing. Nevertheless, there is still fun to be had! Today was a pool/beach day, and for dinner we wandered over to Front Street in Lahaina. The Hard Rock Cafe is across the street from an awesome sunset view. We snapped a couple family pictures before and after dinner. The location where the HRC stands now was once a hospital here in Old Lahaina. If my Hawaiian history is correct, Lahaina was once the capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom. I think it was Kamehameha I who united all the islands under one rule and moved the capital to Honolulu (but that part needs some fact-checking).



Did I say the sunset view amazing or what?!


If you just look down from the rock wall (where we took our family pictures), you can usually spot some of these little black crabs on the black lava rocks.


Where would Katelyn be without her cousin Bryson? I just don't know. She wanted to take this picture with him while we were all together across from Hard Rock Cafe tonight. She loves all her cousins, of course, so a little later she took this picture with Benjamin.


From the same little spot (back behind the Crazy Shirts store there's a small porch that literally goes to the edge of the ocean), I snapped this picture of the dusk sky. I couldn't believe how awesome the torches and store-backs looked up against the night sky.

Vacation - Day 12 (June 11)

Amy and Scott were in charge of this trip's sandcastle contest. Each group drew out of a hat what their assigned task was. My group (all the littlest kids) made the starfish. Everyone did a great job, but I think it's clear that we won (even though Katelyn and Cassi helped make the turltle).



Megan mostly sat in this chair the whole time because she doesn't like to touch sand very much. She is getting better, but had some fun with Cassi here.


Katelyn kept trying to get some water in this pail, but if the wave was too big (for her), she went running away.


After lunch we had some pool time. We've been to the pool almost everyday, and didn't have any pictures yet, so we took some today.



Dinner wrapped up the day at Cheesburgers In Paradise. It's a nice little restaurant we go to whenever we come to Maui (I learned from the menu tonight that there is one in Las Vegas now - I may have to check it out). I always get the Island Style (teryaki cheesburger with a grilled Maui pineapple) and a pineapple smoothie. Because of our large group, we went for an early dinner, but that cut into Megan's nap time. So, she spent the first half of dinner asleep on my shoulder. Both girls ended up with a new pineapple piggy bank. Megan will be more excited to have one when we get home.