Light up the Night Walk

Janice and Kyleigh participated in the annual Light up the Night Walk at Angels Stadium to earn money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society tonight since KDOC was one of the sponsors. I went over for the prewalk party, but David picked me up once the walking started since I wasn't up for a 5K this year -- maybe next year.

This picture of Janice and one of her coworkers. The little boy is about four months younger than Kyleigh.

And of course, what's more fun than running off and letting mommy chase me! The banners you see in the background were just the right height for Kyleigh to walk under.

EMS Elephant

I finished this little guy last night. Would you believe it took five different grays to stitch him! He's another of the EMS Baby Book Zoo Animals. I'm starting the polar bear tonight.

David's picked up a cleaning bug from somewhere, not that I'm unhappy about it or anything! Monday, he scrubbed, mopped and waxed the kitchen floor and cleaned out all the buckets (trash can, recycling, cans, and bottles). Yesterday, he cleaned everything off the floor in the bedroom and shampooed the carpet. I haven't done any investigating to see if he's done anything today yet.

Busy Saturday

Janice and Kyleigh met us for breakfast this morning at Norm's. Kyleigh really likes hot chocolate--I think she ate most of my whipped cream and between Janice and I about 1/2 cup of chocolate. She also liked Grandpa's pancakes with grape jelly. When she finished eating I held her for awhile and then let her down. Instead of going to Mommy, she went to an older man sitting at the table behind us and held out her hands to him. He held her for a few minutes and when he set her down, she went over to one of the waitresses and asked to be picked up. After that she went to an empty booth and crawled up on the seat (she really had to work at it) and sat up like a big girl.

I went with Janice and Kyleigh to swimming lessons. Kyleigh fussed from the time the instructor came to get her through most of the lesson. But even though she's fussy, she still does what the instructor asks her too and she is learning. Janice is going to try to change the time of the lesson because right now it's at 10:00 and that's nap time.

After that we went shopping, first to Target to find me some slippers and then to Babies R Us to buy three kinds of diapers and wipes. Then we headed for Sprouts, but decided to have lunch first.

Sprouts is in the Village and parking near the store is almost nonexistent, so we parked at the other end of the mall and walked. We investigated a craft tent and discovered that they were having the Parenting Magazine Parent and Child Exposition so we decided to check it out. We entered Kyleigh in the Cutest Baby Contest and they got some really good photos of her. She probably won't win, but we do get a mocked up magazine cover with her picture on it for entering.

We finally made it to Sprouts and while Janice went to get the car, I watched Kyleigh. She wanted out of the stroller so I leaned over her. I had a bandaid on my arm so she started to pull it off. I figured it had been on long enough so I let her take it off. She touched the bruise and then stuck out her tongue, wet her finger and proceeded to try to wipe the bruise off. Just like mommy does!

EMS Seal

This is another of the EMS Baby Book zoo animals for the WOCS 3rd Challenge. I enjoyed stitching these so much that I've signed up for two more: Elephant and Polar Bear.

Today, I had to do an autologous blood donation, which means I donated a unit of blood to be used during my surgery if needed. I was afraid that I wouldn't pass the pre-screening and that I'd be kind of woozy afterwards, but everything went really smooth. I even made it back to work for a couple of hours afterwards. They gave me the ball that they had me squeeze during the procedure, so Kyleigh now has a new pink bouncy ball.

The only problem I had was that couple of minutes after I took the pressure bandage off, I had blood all over me. I waited the four hours they said to, but I guess it wasn't enough.

Really Busy Day

The car got a workout today. David took me to work in the motorhome, because it's Thursday and we have to move it off the street on Thursday mornings. I spent most of the morning in a meeting. Then he picked me up in the car at 11:45 and we went to the Pasta Connection for lunch. It was the first time we'd been there in several years and it was a fairly good meal -- the bread was really good.

I had to take a class on knee replacement surgery this afternoon and David went with me. The class was very interesting and among other things, I learned that I need to cancel my dentist appointment next week. The class was supposed to go from 1:00 to 3:00 so I figured I'd be back a little late for my 3:00 meeting. Unfortunately, the class went til almost 3:30 so I was a lot late to the meeting.

David picked me up at 5:00 and took me to my Social Ministries Board Meeting at the church while he met Janice, Chad and Kyleigh for dinner. We finally got home about 8:00.

EMS - Giraffe

This little guy is part of the EMS Baby Book Zoo Animals series. It's a free series from the EMS Cross Stitch Board. I stitched it for the WOCS 3rd Challenge.

Today is my mom's 86th birthday. I didn't get a chance to call her today, but I did talk to her a few days ago. With the three hour time difference, it's hard to find a good time to call her.

Little Miss Happy

This is another of the free Mr. Men/Little Miss charts. This is Little Miss Happy and this time I made her into a card, because I felt she was just a little too small for a square.

Today was a really rough day at work. They did a network upgrade and installed new hardware over the weekend and the financial system wasn't working this morning, plus it seemed like every other person had a major problem. I had to leave at 2:30 for a doctor's appointment and by that time, I knew my blood pressure wasn't going to be good.

The appointment was to verify that I was healthy enough for my knee surgery later this month. The internist did an EKG and reviewed my medications, suggesting a minor change to my insulin. The good news is that even though my blood pressure was high, I can have the surgery.

Little Miss Naughty

No, I don't mean Kyleigh! That's the name of this little cutie. I just finished her a few minutes ago. She's one of four free Mr. Men/Little Miss charts that came with one of my British cross stitch magazines, but I can't remember which one. I stitched her on a 7-inch square of white Aida so she can be used for a little girl's quilt for WOCS.

Spring Flowers

This is the free cover kit from Cross Stitch Crazy #111. For being so little, it gave me an awful lot of trouble and is definitely unique. First, I accidentally stitched both colors in the base with the same color so I compromised and stitched two colors of the flower in the opposite color. Then I had to frog the blue stitches several times and finally, I cut too many rows of when doing the finishing, but if I hadn't told you all of this, you probably wouldn't have realized it as I think it turned out okay.

Cute Chick

I finished this one, appropriately titled "Cute Chick" on Saturday. It's the free cover kit from Cross Sttich Card Shop #65. It's supposed to be an Easter card, but I think it could cheer up a sick child any time of the year.

I had started back on Boo Club and got most of Fright done, when I discovered that I have to rip out the GHT so... I put it down again and since I'm too hot and lazy to kit up anything, I've continued stitching the cover kits. I won't run out anytime soon, either.

I got to spend some extra time with Kyleigh yesterday. I usually see her for a few minutes before and after church, but our Social Ministries Board is collecting kitchen items for Sheepfold, a local shelter for abused women and children, so Janice decided it would be a good idea to go to Walmart and do some shopping after church. We went to the Village and discovered most of the stores didn't open til 11:00 and it was only 10 til, so we walked the length of the mall, stopping to watch the dogs in the pet shop.

We went to Sears and Penneys where Janice and I each bought a couple of tops on sale. Then we stopped at a toddler play area in the center of the mall (that's two we've found within walking distance in the past two days). Kyleigh really had a good time climbing on a lady bug and a turtle and crawling through a log. She did a lot of running around and also played with some turning blocks on the wall. After that we went to McDonalds and Walmart and then Janice drove me home. Kyleigh fell asleep about two minutes into the drive, poor kid was exhausted.

First Swimming Lesson

Chad's mom had offered to pay for the lessons and found a private swim school that gives private lessons and will teach the child how to get comfortable in the water, do the survival float and to be able to get to the side and climb out. Since Kyleigh is so in love with the water, this is a must.

Kyleigh had her free evaluation this morning and did really well. They warned Janice that she'd probably cry when she first got in the water, but the only time she even fussed was when the instructor tried to lay her on her back. She said she wasn't going to have her put her face in the water quite so soon, but Kyleigh did it herself. The lesson today consisted of "chasing a toy" from one floating platform to another and trying to get her to lay on her back and kick--she got better at this toward the end. When she got to the platform in the middle of the pool, she'd stand up and smile and yell across at mama and me. After about 15 minutes, she was done and the instructor brought her back across the pool. Of course I took my camera and here are just a few pictures. In the first one, she's waiting for the lesson to start--we had a hard time keeping her corraled.

Here she is in the middle of the lesson.

Here she's all done and the instructor's bringing her back across the pool.

And finally, she's ready to climb out. Lessons learned -- bring two towels next time and a plastic bag to put the wet suit in.

Janice has signed her up to continue with lessons, so guess what I'm going to be doing for the next few Saturday mornings! I think Chad's mom said she was going to pay for two months worth to start.

A new Sprouts opened in the Village yesterday so after swimming we went to Walmart and then to Sprouts. I was amazed at the prices and the variety. There's more variety than Mother's Market where we've been shopping and Sprouts has a full meat counter.

Since Kyleigh was getting hungry we went to Chick Filet for lunch and let her play in the Toddler playroom for a little while. She fell asleep on the way back to my house and didn't wake up while we unloaded the car. I guess we wore her out.