Matthew turns 4!

Today - Feb. 28 - was Matthew's 4th Birthday. We had his friend birthday party a week or so ago, but today we celebrated at home. Scott had to go into the clinic today to get a hard cast on, and that ate up a lot of the day, but we were still able to have some birthday fun.
I got a Lego Army man set to use as a cake topper for Matthew's cake. Matthew really liked putting it together and did an excellent job!! He was so good at putting the regular Legos together, even though the age on this set of legos said 6-12. Good job bud! He's getting so grown up! Here's the jeep we made.

He and Anna worked on putting the little Lego Army men together.

Here's our cake with the Legos on top and the traditional number made out of jelly beans that Matthew likes!

We made a little treasure hunt for Matthew to find his presents. It started with a photo in a card that showed him where to find his first gift. He had a fun time with it I think.

On the treasure hunt...

Each gift had a new picture leading them to the next gift. It was fun.

Opening some of the gifts!

And time for cake!
Matthew thinks about blowing out the candles while we sing.

Here's a reenactment of Matthew blowing out some candles. :)
He didn't eat much cake...he never does, but Anna did, and some of the rest of us.

And here is Scott, with his new hard cast on. He seems to be feeling a lot better and I'm hoping he can rest a lot and get better fast. The doctor told us he won't be able to walk or drive for 4 to 6 weeks...and my due date is now 5 weeks away. Time to come up with a backup plan for getting to the hospital. :( We're happy things are moving along with his leg! And Happy Birthday Matthew!!

From birthdays past...

In honor of Matthew's 4th birthday, here is a look at some pictures of Matthew from birthdays past! He's celebrated his birthdays in some different places, but we should be here in Colorado for a while. Love you buddy! Happy Birthday!

Matthew when he was born
(California)

Matthew at his 1st Birthday
(Okinawa)

Matthew on his 2nd Birthday

(Rhode Island)

Matthew on his 3rd Birthday
(Okinawa)

Matthew on his 4th Birthday
(Colorado)

What We've Been Up To...

Things have been pretty low key around here. I think I officially have no energy left and don't stir much off the couch. When I have to go to the store I think about it for a long time first and must gather my emotional energy before I head out. Scott's mom is here from Portland helping us out, and the kids are very excited to have her play with them, since I am sort of a dud these days.
Scott is feeling better little by little. Each day it seems like he feels a little better and can do just a little more without too much pain. So that's good. He's been able to get a work computer and get a little bit of work done from home, so that's promising. In a few days we'll go back to the clinic for a check up and a new hard cast for him. And I think they'll take a few X-rays to see how things are going. Progress. Hooray!
The kids are having fun playing with grandma! Anna likes to play doctor sometimes. Here she is a few days ago putting a cast on her leg (from her doctor kit), just like dad.

She wanted to make sure it was taped on so it would be secure.

She also finally let me take a picture of her in front of the flag from Matthew's party. She didn't strike quite as convincing a pose as Matthew did. Like with anything, she has to do it her own way.

And speaking of Matthew's party...

Matthew wanted to make some signs of his own to show people how to go through the obstacle course. We had made some signs for the house and our different games that looked like this one (below). But Matthew wanted to make some arrows and signs of his own to help people find their way.

One of the signs we made for the party. Apparently Matthew felt they were ambiguous and insufficient.

Here is one of Matthew's many signs. He told me what to write and then drew some pictures (and had me draw some too) to represent the different parts of the obstacle course. He also enlisted Grandma in his sign making.

This is Matthew's "FOLLOW" arrow. He made several of these and placed them all around the obstacle course. If you look close you can see where he wrote Follow on it. It's actually my fault that the word is upside down (the F is also backwards) 'cause I didn't realize which way it needed to point before I helped him write it. He figured out that letter F needed to be first and sort of figured out O and I helped him with the other letters. He was very industrious about making all his signs, especially since his party is over, but now we have nice directional signs and explanations all over the basement in case you get lost in the middle of the obstacle course. Matthew is always thinking of the little details!

In the Army

Today (Saturday) was Matthew's 4th birthday party - his birthday is actually in a week or so, but this weekend worked out best for us to have a friend party. We invited everyone a few days before Scott got hurt, and I thought about canceling when I realized Scott wouldn't be able to help with anything, but we decided to go ahead with it anyway, and I think it worked out.
Matthew has been telling me for about six months (since Anna's birthday in August) that he wants an Army themed party, so that's what we did. We jokingly tried to get him to have an Air Force party instead, but he was pretty insistent on Army. :) I started out thinking I was going to make it so cute and creative, but limited by circumstance and energy level, I'm not sure I delivered on that. In any case, here are some pictures from our party. Thanks Michelle and Angie for all the cute ideas! And thanks to Scott and Mom Guptill for helping me to execute it. Here's Matthew posing by the flag. I was thinking of having all the kids pose here so I could send a nice picture as a thank you later, but the younger kids (Anna included) did not want to pose there. :)
Scott ran the recruiting table where he issued the kids helmets and dog tags. Originally I was going to have him dress up in his uniform to look very official, but since he has a huge cast on his leg and is very unshaven from being stuck in bed for over a week, I thought I wouldn't pursue that angle. He would have been the least convincing recruiting officer ever. :)

In lieu of a cake (and there were some cute looking tank cake ideas out there) I made these cupcakes with army men on top. I used the green and black spray paint food coloring to try and make it look camouflage-ish. It sort of worked. I thought it looked good.

For our first activity we went down to the basement to run the obstacle course. Scott's mom (who is visiting to help us right now) and I set it up the day before and I think it was a success. The kids went across our treadmills covered with blankets, climbed over the back of our couch and bounced over the futon mattress, through a few box tunnels, into a tent filled with balls, through more tunnels and under a folding card table with a blanket over it. It wasn't very high tech or complicated, but I think it was age appropriate and the kids seemed to love it! Here's Anna trying it out the day before.

Our next activity was "target practice" which was just throwing some camouflage colored Easter eggs and beanbags into some different boxes with targets taped on. I know, it sounds completely brainless, but the kids totally loved it! We gave them little hero medals for completing their training.

Next we went out to search for soldiers (Easter egg hunt style) in the backyard. Luckily it was warm enough for a quick visit outside. They searched for some Army men in the yard.

We also had the water table set up, and filled with beans and hidden Army men for the smaller kids to sift through. They liked that too. This was sort of a repeat of a hunt for gold nuggets activity we did at Anna's birthday last year, but it still worked.

Finally we took a few swings at the tank shaped pinata courtesy of Party City. I got a ton of camouflage stuff from there. Here's Anna giving it a go. I had to rip the pinata apart in the end, but we eventually got to that candy. Typical.

After our games (which all went by super quick for our short attention span crowd) we had some sandwiches and then cupcakes. Here is Matthew blowing out his candles. These four candles singed the poor Army man on his cupcake, but I think he's going to make it. It's sort of a Guptill family tradition that Matthew never eats his birthday cake. The reason being that it is so quickly followed by presents. Once the presents come out the cake is quickly forgotten. Same thing this year. :) He always likes getting sung to though and blowing out those candles.

And here is Matthew opening a present. You can see Scott in the background. He ventured downstairs for the party, which I appreciated since it isn't that easy or comfortable for him to get around. He even made it down to the basement to check out our obstacle course. :) I didn't get a lot of good pictures 'cause I was running around doing party stuff and kept forgetting to take pictures, but we all had a good time, and I think the kids had fun. We'll probably have a little family party for him in a week or so, but today turned out well, and I think I'm getting slightly less anxious about throwing friend birthday parties...slightly.

Fun according to Matthew

 

Matthew is excited for his upcoming Army themed birthday party (he's going to be 4).  I bought some things for his party today.  When I got on the computer after getting back from the store, he had this to say...

Matthew:  Are you trying to find something fun to do for my birthday?

Me: Yes, what would be fun?

Matthew: "Fun" is when you DO something.   And "do something" is when you play with Transformers.

He doesn't have any Transformers.  But he's hoping for some for his birthday as you can guess.  We'll see if he gets any.  :)

Surgery Day

Here is pre-op Scott.
Does he already look uncomfortable?

Today was Scott's ankle surgery. It went well and we're glad to have it behind us. Hopefully now he can just get better and better. We were supposed to show up for the appointment at 6:15 am. We got there at 6 and they got us all situated. I stayed with him in the prep area til about 7:30 when they wheeled him off to the OR. Scott had a general anesthetic (which he was very happy about) as well as a local for his leg.
At 9am the surgeon came out and talked to me (after the surgery was over). He said things went very well and showed me some post-op X-rays. Scott got two screws in his ankle, which he will probably always have. The doc said it was a bit tougher than the normal ankle surgery and that Scott will need to stay off of it (no weight bearing, no driving) for six weeks. I was a bit nervous about that, 'cause pre-surgery he had said two weeks. And I am due to have a baby in seven weeks. I was hoping Scott would be able to drive me to the hospital when I go into labor, but I think I need to come up with a backup plan in case he can't. Our hospital is about 30 minutes away and on a military base, so it could be a little tricky.
Part of Scott's ankle bone had completely broken off and is now back in place and being held there with the screws. Another part of bone had been totally crushed (the doctor referred to it as "kibbles and bits") and they somehow got that little part fixed up as well (by crushing the bone some more and sticking it in the hole to heal). They made an incision a few inches long to get in there, so he will have a little scar. Everything looked good on the X-ray to me and they all seemed very happy with the outcome, so hopefully everything heals up strong.
I didn't get to see Scott for a couple more hours and even then there were a few post-op things to work out (some numbness and nausea) but the doctors and nurses got everything straightened out and Scott all squared away. I took him home at about 2pm. He wasn't feeling the greatest on the way home and wanted to go straight up to bed. I think he'll be sleeping for a while.
All in all things went good. The doctor was very happy with the way things turned out and we'll be heading back in a week or so for our first follow up. I'm hoping Scott is feeling a lot better and stronger (and happier) by then.

Valentine's Day

I had big plans for Valentine's Day, as I always do. But it didn't exactly work out as I planned. I was planning to make waffles or crepes with strawberries and whipped cream, but since word got out that Scott was hurt, the ladies at our church insisted on bringing dinner for a few days. I was embarrassed about that at first 'cause I usually just like to do things myself, but they really did insist and I was secretly really happy and grateful that they would do that for us. I've been feeling very stressed and exhausted ever since Scott got hurt. So it was very nice of them and very welcome. I already had a roast I had bought to make stew, but by the time I realized that I needed to use it, it was too late for the slow cooker and too late to make stew. So I ended up making pot roast in the oven and I didn't really know what I was doing. It turned out just ok. :( Also I had plans to have chocolate fondue after dinner, but the pot roast took so long that Scott thought it was too late for my dessert 'cause the kids had to go to bed (curse you pot roast!!). I was kind of sad about my dinner plans being derailed, but I think it was my own fault. Oh well.
I was very happy though because I had intended to make Valentine sugar cookies with the kids and I did accomplish that. Hooray! The cookies even turned out good. Possibly my best sugar cookie venture of all time. I didn't make the frosting from scratch, but all things considered I thought it was a success. Here are some of our cookies, pre-baking (above). They look like hearts!! That's a huge rolled cookie breakthrough for me!

Anna and Matthew were pretty interested in eating all the flour that I had used to roll out the dough. I think they thought it was sugar, but they didn't seem disappointed after tasting it. Hmmm

Decorating the cookies!

Grandma Guptill, who just got into town to help us while Scott is hurt (BIG THANK YOU!!) also helped us with our decorating and the kids liked that. I think hers were probably the classiest looking cookies! She also helped the kids getting the appropriate amount of frosting and sprinkles on their cookies. A very important job!

Matthew definitely had a method. It involved as many conversation hearts as would fit on a single cookie.

It was easy to pick out all the Matthew creations. It was lots of fun decorating and we watched Cinderella for a little Valentine Day movie night. Very fun. Also I was happy because I got Sees Candies for Valentine's Day. A new Sees shop just opened in Colorado Springs a few days ago, so it was very exciting for me. I hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day!!
See Valentine's adventures from years gone by HERE and HERE.

That's curtains

I was going to post about trying to fix up the curtains in our house on Tuesday, but that post was "overcome by events" (Scott's trip to the ER). And it did seem kind of frivolous in light of those more serious events. But in an attempt to feel a little normal, here is the post about the curtains. Are you excited?!?
I have been meaning to work on some little curtain problems in the house, and I figured I might as well get to it. I bought sheers for a lot of curtains in the house and they all had these little black labels. I was so eager to get them hung in the first place that I didn't take out the tags. But they are pretty conspicuous so they needed to come out. I finally got around to taking them off. I had to pick them out and then resew the seam since they were sewn right into the stitching that makes the rod pocket (curtain terms...bla!)

Dining curtains before

Next I decided to tackle this annoying problem. My sheers hang down below the panels in the dining room. They are both supposed to be the same length, but the panels are hung from a few inches higher. We didn't want to get long curtains for the dining room, so we decided to try and make this work. Even if they are hung at the same level the curtains are still shorter for some reason. I couldn't think of a good solution that I could execute, but my mom recommended folding over the top of the sheers and sewing it up there, taking off a few inches. After measuring, I knew it was going to be close, but I decided to try it.

And after

The two are pretty much the same length now. If you look really closely you might be able to see a bit of sheer sticking out somewhere, but if you look at them from above, as most adults do, it looks pretty good I think. I'm no perfectionist when it comes to things like this. So it was a good solution. Thanks mom!

And my last project: the curtains for the master bath. These hang right above the bath tub and are a bit shorter than standard curtain size. I bought longer curtains and tried to cut and hem them to a good length. The curtains left by the previous owner are on the right and my new ones are on the left. I think mine might be a bit too sheer. I'm trying to figure out what to do. Don't look too close at my hemming job. I am not a sewing expert. Despite the fact that my mom sews very well, I didn't have much interest in sewing when I lived at home, so I just self taught myself when I was older. And the result is often not pretty. :) This was the only curtain Scott could admire, and only because he could see it from the bed. Poor Scott. I hope his leg can get better soon. It's a good thing we are done with most of the heavy lifting for this move, 'cause I can't lift much these days and now neither can he.

Getting back in alignment

The kids watching a show while we wait for Scott at orthopedics

We took Scott to the fracture clinic on base to get his leg looked at. At least, that's what we thought they were going to do, just evaluate it and give him the go ahead to get surgery. It ended up taking 4 1/2 hours, so of course, the kids were totally melting down by the end. But even worse, Scott's poor leg got put "through the wringer" as one of the orthopedic docs put it. Even though they had us bring in his X-rays from the civilian hospital, they still wanted him to take some more. That's fine, I guess they wanted their own X-rays or more thorough ones, but they took off his splint and then wanted him to crutch across the hospital to X-ray. I thought Scott was going to pass out from pain when we went over there. Out of the splint his leg was just flopping and completely unsupported. Scott asked for a wheelchair ride on the way back. Unpleasant.
Then they took Scott back to orthopedics for a while...or several hours. I guess they were casting him or waiting to cast him for a lot of that time. The kids and I were in the waiting room. When they did cast him I guess they wrenched around on his leg (without pain meds) for a while to realign his ankle or something. Scott's been in almost unbearable pain with a splint on and pain meds and today he had neither while they were "working" on him, so you can imagine how awful it was. When they were done, one of the ortho docs came to explain to me what happened, but I still don't really understand what they were doing or why. He said they needed to "reduce" his ankle. I don't know what that means...I asked if it meant getting some of the swelling down, but the doc didn't really explain. Then they just pointed us in the direction of the casting room where we found Scott. Based on the state we found Scott in, I think "reduce" is just a euphemism for some kind of medieval torture. I think they might have tried to take some years off his life, Princess Bride style.
They wrote him a prescription for some pain meds, which I quickly went to get, while Scott tried not to pass out on the table. It was a bad scene. Finally we got out of the hospital and headed home. After a few hours at home, some rest, new pain medication and not having to move his leg for a while, Scott was feeling more comfortable. The good news is that they gave him a hard cast (but at what cost?), which should give him more support. They also scheduled him for surgery on Tuesday which is great!! I'm really glad they were able to see him and get him in for surgery soon. I'm hoping this means he will start to feel better soon...and that he'll be heavily medicated for whatever comes next.

Update on Scott's Leg

Scott's trip to the ER didn't end the way we were hoping. It turned out he broke his ankle in two places and has a hairline fracture on his fibula (outer leg bone) AND a torn ligament. The word is that he is probably going to need surgery in the next few days, once the swelling goes down.
It is a huge bummer 'cause he is out of commission for a while and in a lot of pain. Also he can't drive for a while since it was his right leg. And I don't like driving in snow, so we will be holed up in the house hermit style til spring. Just kidding. I think I'll be driving him to work for a bit. I don't know how long it's going to take Scott to get back to semi-normal function, but I have a feeling it's going to be a while.
What do we learn from this? Snow is nothing but trouble...and mailboxes should be closer. Like at your front door! Come on!!

A Bad Slip

in which I am the worst wife ever

Scott got home a little early from work today and decided to walk to our mailbox to get the mail before coming in. The mailboxes in the newer neighborhoods in Colorado Springs are kind of apartment style - every 10 houses or so there is a big mailbox with a box for each house. So we have to walk three houses or so to get the mail.

I heard Scott drive up, which was lucky, but he told me he was going to shovel the walk before coming in, so I wasn't expecting him to come back in right away. Anyway, he walked to the mailbox and slipped on the icy snow on the way there. He said he heard something crack or pop in his leg while he went down and he couldn't get back up or put any weight on his leg. I guess he was trying to call me, but my phone was in my purse and off! (worst wife ever). I had turned it off at church and forgot to turn it back on. And we don't have a house phone.
Luckily(?) I happened to walk outside after a few minutes to get some things Scott had left in the car and saw him laying in the snow. Scott said it had only been a few minutes but I still felt terrible that my phone was off and I was oblivious while my husband was freezing in front of our neighbors house. Both kids were in dress up mode in the house (wearing only underwear) and it was 5 degrees outside anyway, so I just left them in there. Scott was already on the phone with 911 and they were already on the way to our snowy neighborhood. A neighbor was bringing out a blanket for him and pretty soon the paramedics came. They moved him into our house out of the cold - he was pretty frozen by then (worst wife ever). Even one of the paramedics slipped while trying to bring him in the house (he was ok). It was so slick. Scott slipped while wearing his big heavy duty uniform boots from work. They brought him into the warm house and were able to check out his leg. They ended up giving him some pain meds and taking him away in an ambulance to the hospital. I felt bad that I didn't go with him - I stayed with the kids. Scott said I should just stay til he knew what was going on or needed a ride home. He knows I don't like driving in the icy snow, but I would have driven him or gone with him! Poor Scott.
Right now Scott is still at the hospital waiting for an X-ray on his leg. Hopefully it turns out ok.
I don't have a positive opinion of snow or living with snow and this doesn't improve my opinion of it much. Hopefully Scott's leg is ok and we have no more snow related injuries in the near future. And I'll have to be better about leaving my phone on. :(

Basement: Day 4

Ready for more exciting pictures of the basement guest room?

Right side of basement before...

To create order out of chaos requires energy (that's physics!)

I don't have a lot of energy so I can only create a little bit of order at a time. I spent hours on the basement today going through old files and organizing, organizing, organizing. Sadly the basement doesn't look that much better.

...and after day 4

I feel like I'm carving a guest room out of a raw piece of wood or something.

Maybe that's why I'm so proud of every tiny bit of progress I make. We are planning to get a bigger table in here as a desk, but it's all dependent on us getting a new dining table from Ikea, which we have to drive to Utah to get...and I won't be able to go after a few more weeks when I am "too pregnant to travel" according to my insurance. So it might be a while. At least there is room for a bed now.

And the left side of basement before...

...and after Day 4
Not much left to do over there...except set up the bed.
Matthew is enjoying the open space for now.

All Dressed Up

After church last week Matthew told me he wanted a white shirt with a tie like daddy. I happened to see some little shirts and ties in his size while we were walking through Walmart last week so we got some for him. They didn't have white shirts in his size, but he seemed ok with it. Usually I just have him wear a polo shirt to church when he was smaller 'cause I didn't see little tie sets in his size very often (not at the BX in Okinawa anyway). He was very excited for his new church clothes and he looked very nice. He had a good time at his class again. I think the structure of a class suits him a lot better than the chaos of nursery.

Anna, on the other hand, seems to be doing well in nursery. She goes in there and doesn't cry and participates when they do songs and activities. She does stand around staring nervously at the crying children though. I asked her how nursery went today and if some of the kids cried.

Her response was this:
Anna: ALL of the kids cried!
Me: Did you cry?
Anna: No! Not me!

She's tough. In any case, church is going well so far. I did have to walk little people to the bathroom way more times than I would have liked and carry kids into and out of church over the ankle deep snow. That wore me out a little. But I am so glad I got to sit quietly in my classes (and appreciate the lesson) without having to wrangle a child. Of course, that will all be over in two months when our new little one comes, but I'm liking it for now.

Sledding

We got some snow this week and weekend so we decided to try some sledding. We went to a little park around the corner from our house and got a little bit of sledding in. The kids loved it! Here they are taking a run down the little hill together.

Anna waits for a turn

Here's Scott getting ready to go down with Matthew

We had fun. I'm sure we'll have more chances for sledding. Maybe soon.