Friend Makin' Monday

If you are new to FMM, head on over to Kasey's All That Is Good and follow the prompts! Kasey is out of town with her family so she has guest bloggers filling in, this week it's Kelli at Outside My Kitchen Window check them both out. Anyway, onto today's FMM! Kelli says...

So, here's today's subject:

Tell us about your BFF...where did you meet, was it BFF at first sight, how long have you been friends, etc.

What makes him/her your BFF...what is it about this person that makes him/her so special to you?

I have a few BFF's, the older I get, the more I collect ;). None are really above another, so we will just start listing in order of when I met them! First is Amy - we met in the high school youth group at Bethany Bible Church in Phoenix. Back in the mid 90's. Holy crap! Anyway, we didn't really hit it off and become close until years later when college was over and it was time to move on to marriage and kids. She was my matron of honor, she was my labor coach with my daughter, I was her labor coach with her first son...even if we don't talk daily or weekly, we alway just pick up where we left off and it just fits.

Then there is Catherine - I met Cat at the same time I met Amy. We all went to church. We all used to hang out and do stuff. Cat and I became pretty close right off and I am so grateful for all of her support and encouragement through everything over the years. She is a rock. We still have one night a week that is our night. We do dinner and hang out. We have done that for at least 7 or 8 years. She is my girl.

Then Holly - ah Holly. Holly is my doll. She is quite a bit younger than I am and when I met her she was only 12 years old. She was friends with my little brotehr so she became more like a little sister to me. Our relationship quickly changed and we became like sisters. As time went on and things fell apart in her life I took on more of a mothering type role. Now, all these years later - we are best friends and sisters. She lives in Virginia now and I miss her like crazy. But we do talk frequently and keep in touch as much as possible through everything else going on in our lives.

Within the last few years I have met several other women who are my support in this motherhood thing. Harmony, Kristy, Erica and Jen are my girls. We all know that no matter what we have each others backs. Its an amazing thing to find women who support each other and are not into tearing each other down and being hateful as some women can be.

So this post is to my girls, you all know who you are and I love you and am so thankful for your friendship! MUAH!

The Lake

So today we decided we wanted to get out of the house, but didn't know quite where we wanted to go. So, we loaded the cooler with soda and water and hopped in the Jeep and took off. Just started driving north. After a while we ended up at one of the lakes here in the Valley. Bartlett Lake. Now, I have lived in Phoenix for most of my life and had never been to this particular lake (that I remember anyway). So we just decided to take some pics and drive around looking at all the gorgeous scenery. Here are some pics from our little adventure today.

Desert At Night

As promised, here are a few more pictures from last night. I really like this park and I think it will become the backdrop for some photoshoots in the future...like when its not a billion degrees outside ;). It really is gorgeous, I think anyway!

Happy 4th of July

We had a great 4th. We had some friends over who have 3 sons, they all get along great with our daughter so it is always a good time. We had a bbq early in the day, then the kids all played in the pool. After that we all played around with our camera's before leaving for the fireworks. We decided to head to this park called North Mountain Park in Phoenix. It overlooks the city and you can see straight down to downtown Phoenix and all around. It was a great spot to watch the fireworks, no crowds and close to home. Before the fireworks started, we broke out the camera's and took some great city shots. This one is one of my favorites from tonight.

I will share more tomorrow! I hope everyone had a great day!

I Am Not Worthy

I feel truly blessed to have made such amazing friends here in blogland. People who notice when I haven't been around and posting, people who make the effort to see where I am and if I am ok. Truly blessed I tell ya. One of those blessings is Carissa over at Sugar Boogers & Tantrums, y'all should check her out if you haven't yet! So she bestowed this award on me:



and now I'm required to nominate 7 other bloggers who I feel have a Kreativ blog, and they are supposed to nominate 7 others too. (Be sure to leave a comment on their blog about the award.) After they accept the award, they are then asked to write a list of 7 things that their blog readers may not already know about them.

Here is my list of 7 Things you may not know about me

1) I am a photographer, boudoir in particular.

2) I took care of my MIL while she was dying of brain cancer up til the day she died in my home.

3) I took care of my GMA who is bipolar and has Alzheimer's until I just couldn't do it anymore. That was just over 2 months ago.

4) I want to live on the beach. Not near it, on it. =)

5) I would like to have gastric bypass surgery in the next year or two.

6) I smoke cigars occasionally.

7) I would love to write a book.

Ok there are my seven things, you know if I get anymore of these awards I am not going to have any secrets left! ;)

Now onto the passing it on part:

Anyone I haven't given an award to recently, this is for you! Please consider yourself awarded.

Where Does The Time Go?

I have been so crazy busy for the last couple of weeks that my blogging has taken a backseat. Its funny how that gets away from you and by the time you realize it, its that much harder to get back in the saddle. Have you noticed that?

Anyway, things are crazy, its summer time. Its 101 degrees right now at 845 and its miserable here. Its officially monsoon season and so instead of being a 'dry heat' its hotter than hell with humidity to top it all off. Ugh. I have been asking myself for the last few days why in god's name do I live here in the summer!?! Ick. I guess the answer would be that I am not made of money and can't afford to have 2 houses and move 2ce a year! lol

I will be getting back to my regular posts and commenting hopefully tomorrow since there is nothing going on! haha

Award Time - Honest Scrap

"The Honest Scrap award comes with a caveat or two. Firstly, you have to tell your readers ten things about you they may not know, but that are true. Secondly, you have to tag 10 people with the award. Thirdly, let all the people you've given the award to know that they've gotten it (comment on their blogs or something). And finally, make sure you link back to the person who awarded you."

I got this award from Linz over at Goodbye, Martha. Linz bestowed this fun award on me early last week (Monday I think) and with everything I have had going on, I am just now getting a chance to accept it and pay it forward. Thanks so much for thinking of me Linz!!

Ok onto the task! I have to tell y'all ten things about me that you may not know, but that are true.

1) I was born in Connecticut. Yep, I am true 'Yankee' lol.
2) I was engaged three times and married the third one.
3) I have 2 tattoo's that you can't see unless I decide to show them ;)
4) I have several body piercings that you wouldn't expect from someone like me.
5) I believe in ghosts and haunted houses. Yes, my house IS haunted too.
6) I didn't vote for Obama.
7) I filed bankruptcy 7 years ago.
8) Before I met my husband I didn't want to get married or have kids.
9) We have been TTC # 2 for 3.5 years. Sucks.
10)I was home-schooled in the ATI program with Bill Gothard.

Now to pass this wonderful award on to ten other fantastic bloggers! Ready? Here we go!

1) Stacy over at LipGloss and RazorBlades
2) Shelly over at Shelly's Story
3) Angie over at Angie's Spot
4) The Obnoxious SAHM
5) Erica at But Mommy
6) JJ at I'd Rather Be Laughing
7) Erin at It's All About Alex
8) Liz at Sugarplum Creations
9) Amanda Jo at A Special Blend
10) Heather at Mrs Southern Bride

Now go check them out and leave them some comment love! I am off to let them each know they I have given them an award!

Writers Worshop

Mama Kat from Mama's Losin It wrote:

Choose a prompt, post it on your blog, and come back and sign Mr. Linky!!

The Prompts:

1.) Grab your current read. Let the book fall open to a random page and share two “teaser” sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.

2.) What do you aspire to be?

3.)Share a piece of unsolicited parenting advice...only I'm soliciting it.

4.)Tell us about your blogline...how long have you been blogging, when did you start, what were/are your goals for your blog, etc.

5.)If you had 5000 dollars to give away or donate to a charity...explain what you would do with it and why.


These are great prompts this week, I think I am going to choose #2 What Do You Aspire To Be?

I aspire to be a better mom. I know we all make mistakes and its all part of the process of parenting...feeling your way, learning from your mistakes. But I hope that I am making better choices and being a better mom everyday than I was the day before.

I aspire to be a better wife. Sean works really hard to support us and I am able to stay home with our daughter. There is a lot of room for improvement and I am really trying to work on building up our relationship. Aside from being parents, we need to work on us as a couple and I have a lot of work to do in this area.

Extreme Makeover: Me Edition

Ok I know I am like 4 days late with this, but better late than never ;) I am going to be catching up on the prompts from all my favorite daily blogs from last week while I am on doctor's orders to be 'resting'!

If you haven't played EMME before, head over to Amber's blog at {AEFilkins} she has all the instructions and the cute little button you can grab too.

The task for this week is :

This week's question:
Brought to you by Connie at The Young and the Relentless

Post a picture of the contents of our fridge to see how much healthy food is in it.

So here are pics of the inside of my fridge and freezer - not all bad stuff, but certainly room for improvement!



















So there you have it. We try to eat healthy and each time I go grocery shopping I buy less and less of the 'bad' processed foods and more of the fresh, healthy foods. I am shopping less of the inside aisles and staying on the outer perimeter. Finally. After how many years of nutritionists telling us (as American's) to do this if we want to eat healthier. Anyway, I am definitely making progress and that is the more important thing.

Head on over to Amber's blog if you want to participate in the next EMME! See ya in a few days!

My Night In The ER

Ok, so this is not exactly the post I envisioned coming back with, but oh well.

For the last 4 days I had been having a pain in my chest (around my heart) that I thought might have been just from sleeping wrong or even just indigestion. It was hard to take deep breaths but I was ok with shallow ones. Then yesterday afternoon it started to hurt worse and I was even having trouble with shallow breathing. Also the pain was extending down to my shoulder and upper arm. Last night after Sean put Hannah down he came out and I told him what was going on and since he works in the ER and sees this kind of thing everyday I was hoping he would tell me it was just indigestion or something. Wrong. He was very concerned because all the questions he was asking and the answers I was giving did not indicate a small problem.

We called my mom to come sit with Hannah and we left for the ER. Luckily there was no wait and they got me right in to a bed. They took blood, started an IV, did an EKG, chest xray and then we just had to wait. The first EKG was abnormal - mild heart attack. They ran all sorts of tests on my blood to check for heart disease and everything came back fine for that. He also thinks there may be a tiny blood clot. They did another EKG right before releasing me that came out normal.

I was released after 1 am with the instructions to come back to the ER if it gets worse. I am on drs orders to rest, take baby aspirin and follow up on monday with my doc and then get a referral to a cardiologist for a treadmill test and other heart testing.

I am still in a lot of pain when I breathe otherwise I feel ok. So if I am not posting as much, this is why. I am still really uncomfortable and of course - kinda freaking out. I will keep everyone posted after I see my doc on Monday.

Any positive thoughts and prayers would be much-o appreciated!