In sickness and in health

Yuck.  I feel like death.  I knew this was going to happen.  Jesse was sick last week, and my co-workers are dropping like flies.

I have not been able to work out all week, which already makes me feel horrible.  Yesterday, as soon as I got home from work, I curled up on the couch with a pillow and blanket and didn't move until 8 pm.  Then at eight o'clock, I took a shot of Nyquil, slathered some Vicks on my chest, and climbed into bed.  

Jesse said I smelled like an old woman.  Which in my Nyquil induced state, I took as a compliment.

I woke up this morning and felt like a three hundred pound man was sitting on my chest.  It hurt just to cough.  I was really considering calling into work, but it's the end of the month and heaven forbid we don't hit our numbers.  Luckily I hit all of my goals today, so if I still feel like death tomorrow, I will not be going to work.

Anyway, I made it through the day and even came home and started the laundry and cleaned up the kitchen.  Now I'm curled up on the couch with 'The Monster', and Jesse is picking me up a sandwich and cup of soup from McCallisters.  yummy...

The rest of the night will be made up of  last night's episode of "Parenthood" (my favorite show on television), the IU and Purdue game, another shot of Nyquil, and most definitely some more Vicks.

Gosh, I don't just smell like an old lady, I am an old lady!

The coolest kids I know

This weekend we got the chance to babysit the most adorable children in my whole-wide world.

My niece and nephew.

I'm pretty sure my brother and sister-in-law really needed a break, and we are always up for babysitting.  Plus, we got to keep them for the entire night!   It cracks me up to think how incredibly excited we were about spending our whole Saturday night babysitting.  Wow!  We are really getting old.

Anyway, they were perfect little angels!  Taylor just wanted to play inside the dog crate.  The only time he ever came out of there was to get more of his toys to take in there to play with.  And Maddie just sat in her little bouncer thing and smiled a lot.  She did not cry one single time. 

This baby stuff is easy. The kiddos were asleep by 9:00.  Taylor woke up at 7:00 and Maddie slept in until 8:00.  Is it normal for kids their age to sleep that long?  Probably not...You can go ahead and start calling me the baby whisperer.  I think I've got the touch.

I was kind of sad when we had to bring them back, and I miss them already!

She was very concerned about what I was doing.

 Taylor getting ready to climb into the dog's crate.

I got one of them to look at the camera.  Let's try again...

The ladies kept calling Taylor's phone. This must have made Maddie extremely happy.  Maybe I'll give it one more try...

Nope...Oh well, they still look adorable!

I made that blanket for Taylor right after he was born.  See...I dabble in a little bit of craftiness! :)

Best day ever

Okay, maybe not ever... but it has been an exceptionally good day!

So, one of my New Year's resolutions was to quit spending so much money at Starbucks. Well, I am proud to say that I have only been to Starbucks twice since January 1st.  I pass it every single day on the way to work, so I think this is quite an accomplishment. 

This morning though, I had to stop.  It was finally warm enough to have an Iced coffee, and this makes me extremely happy!  It was heavenly and everything I remember it being. And it put me in such a good mood for the rest of the morning.

Then, for lunch I got to indulge in some soup, salad, and bread sticks at Olive Garden!  The girls and I from work met a dear friend for lunch, and I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that we laughed for an hour straight.  This was such a treat for me because I usually spend my lunch breaks eating at my desk, switching between facebook and the current celebrity gossip.  Gosh, I'm lame...

So, to end the best day ever, my husband cooked dinner and is currently downstairs doing laundry.

Yep, I'm a lucky girl....

My Broken Heart

Seriously, my heart really is broken.  It doesn't quite function like it should.  I have been thinking about it quite a bit lately, so I thought I'd write it down and share my story.

When I was about 23, I had just come back from overseas, when I started to experience some chest pain.  Turns out, the doctors believed that I had a virus that settled in my heart and started attacking it.  All together I ended up spending about 15 days in the hospital, and never really got any clear answers.

It was believed that I got the virus from drinking the water.  I never intentionally drank the water, but I did shower in it and use it brush my teeth.  Brushing my teeth with unsafe water, was probably a horrible idea.

Anyway, after it was all said and done, the doctor ran some tests to see how much damage the virus had caused.  I had some scar tissue in my heart, but the damage was minimal. Although, my heart rate has not been the same since. The doctor just kind of told me that the heart is a muscle, so it will get better with time.

Several years later...

I hadn't had my heart checked out in a few years, and I was starting to experience some shortness of breath and having a little bit of chest pain, so I went on down to the doctor's office for a check up.  She immediately scheduled an Echo (heart ultrasound), and sent me over to the hospital for my test.

The echo didn't take very long, but I had to wait about 4 days before I got back any results and it was extremely nerve-wracking!  Then my doctor (not the nurse), calls and leaves me a voicemail saying that she would like to go over my test results with me.  

This can't be good.  The doctor only calls when there is bad news... Plus, she called at 4:57 and their office closed at 5:00, so I had to wait until the next day before I could call her back.  That is such a horrible thing to do!

Well, I got a hold of her first thing in the morning, and she definitely did not have good news.

"Valerie, your echo shows that you are in the first stages of Diastolic Heart Failure."

I'm sorry, what?  Heart failure?  I don't think so...

Unfortunately, she was telling the truth. She set me up an appointment with a Cardiologist and scheduled a stress test.  The Cardiologist didn't seem too overly concerned, and just mentioned that my heart was a little bit stiffer than it should be.  It seems that most of the doctors I encounter, don't really take any of it seriously because it seems hard to believe that a healthy, twenty-something woman, would be suffering from such horrible heart problems.

So, I took the stress test and had to wait a few more days to get the results.  Finally, the other day a nurse left me a voicemail saying, "Your stress test came out okay."

What?  Okay?  Okay as in, not quite great, just okay?  Or okay as in, everything's fine and okay?

Well, I still don't have any of these answers yet, but I can assure you that I have lost quite a bit of sleep over it.  I do believe though, that I have handled all of it pretty well.  I am able to laugh and joke about it, and just believe that whatever is supposed to happen will happen. My mother, on the other hand does not quite feel the same way....

I'll keep you posted.

Happy Valetine's Day!

This has been a great Valentine's day for me so far!

My husband asked me last week what I wanted for Valentine's Day, and I told him that I only wanted the house to be clean when I came home this weekend. You see, I had to go out of town for work, and there is nothing worse than working all weekend and then coming home and having to clean up the messes left behind by your husband and dog. (I know this because it has happened on several occasions)

So, I get home and there is a Valentine's Day card taped onto our front door. With a message saying something sweet, and then a note on the back saying "Go inside to get your next clue." So, I walk inside and the house is sparkling clean! This alone makes my heart melt.

Anyway, there are clues posted all over the house!  One of them said something like, "I hope you are able to take a look at yourself and see how pretty you are." Another said, "Maybe you should put on something more comfortable".   (I hope he wasn't disappointed when I put on a pair of sweatpants)

So each clue led me to a different clue...

Which ultimately ended with me getting an Ipod shuffle(which I really wanted), and a planned, relaxing evening with the man I love that involved take-out chinese, sweatpants, and a new movie.  No housework required!

So, it is now early morning on actual Valentine's day and I am extremely excited to see what today will bring...

I'm a slacker

Sorry for not writing sooner, but I have had a bad week.

I've been irritable, moody and feeling bad about myself.

Everyday has been a fat day.  I hate all of my clothes. I hate the fact that I have drill this weekend which means working two weeks in a row without a single day off. And I haven't been particulary happy with my authors this week either.

I even started going back to the gym this week, and not even that has helped with my piss-poor attitude.

The other night I got home from the gym and immediately began cooking dinner. (Which I really didn't want to do, nor did I have the energy to do) I made smoked sausage, scalloped potatos and green beans.  I personally thought it was delicious, but when my husband took his first bite he said, "Well, it's not horrible by any means.". 

What?  I wish you could have seen how huge my eyes were at this point.

So, we sat down to eat dinner and I was silent most of the time.  Stewing over his mean comment (which he was oblivious to)... 

Then when we were getting up to take our dishes to the sink, he blurts out "That was okay, but I don't want to have it on a regular basis or anything."

Ugh...so that's basically how my whole week has gone.  I've been stuck in our ice-rink of a driveway on multiple occasions, lost my badge to get into our building at work, and have dealt with the fact that the heater is going out in my car.

But then yesterday I got an email from an author that really made me smile:


Dear Valerie,


Holy Holy you are AWESOME!!! You are like my own personal Christmas morning back from when I was a child and got my first mini trampoline under the Christmas tree! You have made my day super special and I thank you!


Sometimes it's just the small things that can turn your whole world around.

A day in the life of...

I feel old.  Seriously, my life revolves around work, cooking and cleaning, and sleep.  I mean, I don't want to live like I'm 23 again, but I think I need just a little more excitement.  Or maybe just some sunshine...

Here is what my day was like yesterday:

7:00am  -  Went to work
6:00pm  -  Left work

6:15pm  -  Stopped by the grocery store to pick up some things for our pitch-in at work tomorrow

7:00pm  -  Finally made it home

7:05pm  -  Dishes (Because we were at the IU game the night before so I didn’t get to them.  And I don't    have a dishwasher L)

7:20pm  -  Made the food for the work pitch-in

7:45pm  -  Made dinner

8:15pm  -  Sat down and ate dinner with my husband

8:30pm  - Cleaned up the kitchen

8:40pm  -  Finally got to sit down on the couch.  We played Golf on the PS3 and of course I lost, but I just had to play one more game….

10:30pm- Folded the laundry

10:45pm- Collapsed into bed.

I know that you're probably super jealous of my day yesterday.  I don't blame you...It was actually a pretty great day. Maybe excitement isn't always a good thing...

Isn't it funny how you always want what you don't have?  When I was 23, I yearned for stability. Now that I'm a lot older, I yearn for excitement and spontaneity.

I think maybe I know what I need....

Girls Night!  Good wine, great friends, and boy talk.  The perfect cure for my winter blues.

Hoo Hoo Hoo Hoosiers!

Today was an amazing snow day...  I woke up at my normal 6am and sat around the house in my pajamas until 4 o'clock.  It was GLORIOUS! (in a sing-song voice type of way)

I finally got up and showered because Jesse called and said he got us tickets to the IU game. (If this phone call would not have taken place, I would probably still be in last night's pajamas.) Now, Jesse seems to get IU tickets all of the time, but I usually don't enjoy going to the games.  Why you ask? Mainly because he gets really good seats (I know, terrible right?) that always end up being bleacher seats, and I. HATE. BLEACHER. SEATS. I also get anxiety when I am in crowded places.  I don't like for people to touch me.  And I don't like when people don't pay attention to where they're going. And I don't like sitting shoulder to shoulder to a stranger.

Never the less, I said yes this time.  We had amazing non-bleacher seats.  Ninth row. Right on the half-court line.

And during the first minute of the game, I remembered the real reason that I don't enjoy going to IU games....

Because my husband is like the crazy, annoying mom at a Jr. High basketball game.  I'm not kidding...  He yells for the players, yells at the refs, and stands up every other play.  I really do like seeing him so happy and into the moment, but I'm also a little embarrassed by it.

Anyway, it was an awesome game!  We barely won, and we beat a team that was ranked 20th in the nation.  So I guess I should probably tell you... and  I'm a little shamed to tell you, that by the last ten minutes of the game, I was acting like the crazy, annoying mom at a Jr. High basketball game.  I was yelling for the players, yelling at the ridiculous referees, and finding it extremely difficult to stay in my seat...

So maybe I will say yes next time Jesse asks me to go to another game... And maybe I will learn to appreciate his enthusiasm and team spirit.

And maybe in my next post, I will tell you about how my husband acts when he actually gets to shake hands with the IU players and coaches...

Here's a hint - Like a thirteen year old girl at a Justin Bieber concert... Sorry to give it away, but I couldn't think of anything that rhymed with 'Bieber fever'!

Aww, he's so adorable!  :)