Saturday's Protege Passengers and Mother's Day

Here is a list of Saturday's passengers in our Mazda Protege:1. S - He wasn't sleeping in the car, just in the picture! :) He and Boo were great male cheerleaders for me at the race. Seriously, I got a second wind after I passed them cheering. :)2. A - I raced for a cure (breast cancer) on Saturday! Yeah! It was a 5k and I did it in 33:55, including the time that it took to get to the starting line, since there were so many people and so many people walking. My goal was 35 minutes, so I was really happy about this. I am hoping to do a couple more 5k's and possibly a 10k this summer.3. Boo (in his car seat of course) - We have started to take him to uncrowded public places, especially those that are big and/or not enclosed.

4. Old, broken toilet - S and H replaced our middle bathroom toilet a few weeks ago. Our new toilet is very nice. It got Home Depot's highest ratings. Apparently it is not too difficult to replace a toilet, at least not for these two! We were going to have the plumber come out and fix the problem or replace the toilet if need be, but it ended up that that would cost around 500-600 dollars at the very least! S told me that if I could wait a few days with a broken toilet, I could pick out whatever toilet I wanted and he would replace it. I couldn't resist the offer, so I picked out a somewhat higher end toilet from Home Depot with an elongated bowl (much better, by the way) and it is supposed to be able to flush 30 golf balls in one flush! (Not that we need to test out that feature!) Anyway, all this means is that our old toilet was sitting in the garage for all this time (since the beginning of April) and we have finally gotten rid of it. It fit into the Protege and was taken to the dump.

5. 2 destroyed studded tires - These were also in the Protege at the same time as the toilet. We had tried to put these tires back on for the winter, but the car place said they were worthless. We made it fine through the winter without any semblance of snow tires, so thank goodness for flat driveways! 6. A 10 ft tree - We purchased an Ash Patmore tree after some research. It is a really nice tree, and hopefully it will grow to be about 45 ft tall and 35 ft wide. We stuck it right in the middle of our front yard. We did manage to fit it in the Protege, through the sun roof. We got all kinds of funny looks and pointing fingers as we drove through the city, but we made it home in one piece, and now it is planted. Admitedly, it did look pretty funny and I laughed the whole time we were driving around with it (excluding the time I spend telling S to drive slower so the leaves wouldn't get wind-whipped). I think our transport was successful, but time will tell for sure.

7. 2 bottles of Germ-X - We never leave home without it!

8. A bunch of papers - For some reason, we can never get rid of all the papers that invade every area of our existence.

9. Diaper Bag

10. Water Bottles - I have still not given up on bottled water. You can get after me for not being "green", but I still cannot stand the taste of tap water. One of these days I will actually buy a water filter, but I have to taste that water first too. I still only like Kroger bottled water. I guess I am picky...

11. Stroller - Massive.

12. Infant Front-to-Back Carrier - Which Boo has not yet liked.

13. 5 disposable pillows - From the hospital. They should work nicely for guests, I hope.

14. First Aid Kit

15. 3 Stakes and a bag of rope - For the tree, which we have not ended up using, even though S expended a lot of strength cutting the wood with a saw at Home Depot.

16. 40 pound bag of red mulch - I really wanted the colored kind. It looks pretty bright in front of our house. Hopefully as we get some more things planted out there it will all look nice.

17. 2 oxygen tanks and a portable tank - I am so paranoid about always having enough oxygen with us. We have run out in the car more than once!

18. Feeding pump backpack - This is new, and fairly convenient, although it is much less accurate in volume delivery than when it is on an IV pole, as it is at home.

19. Oximeter - aka. Beeper

20. Chewy Chips Ahoy and grape juice

On a side note, Mother's Day was good for me this year. Looking back, last year I wasn't sure I would have another Mother's Day with little Boo. He was still less than 2 pounds then. I couldn't even imagine having him at home with us! This year was so much better. S said it was "my day", so I did not have to worry about feeding Boo. This is always the big stress in our house, as it involves thawing milk, making sure the pump has enough battery, and carrying the IV pole all around with us, wherever we take Boo in the house (up and down stairs many times, since his room is upstairs, but not any of his fun toys, which are too big for his room). I also got to sleep in.

We went to church all together, but Boo and I left after the sacrament because all I could hear was COUGHING! I am sure that mostly everyone was just clearing their throat, but coughing is not what you want to hear when you have a child who needs desperately to stay healthy. (We just got the bill from our influenza hospital stay which was 6 days long - $19,400!) Really, the money has nothing to do with why he has to stay healthy. If he gets sick, surgery will be pushed back another 4-6 weeks and he could very well need to be hospitalized again. I don't know if I could deal with that. Plus, who wants to be sick?!We also went to Temple Square for Mother's Day to see all the flowers and the temple. Boo doesn't get out much, as I have already mentioned, so this was a fun trip for us. Unfortunately, when we took him out of his stroller in the Visitor's Center, he had VERY poopy pants (boopy bants), so we had to cut our visit just a little short. We walked around once and then we skedaddled. He was a very good sport.

Anyway, today S brought some beautiful roses home for me. That was very sweet. He knows I love flowers, yet he views them as so impractical as they are short-lived. So I am glad to have them. They have completely changed the feel in the kitchen!

I just love being a mother! I am so glad to have Boo and to be able to experience life with him. And I am so grateful for my good mother who raised me and is so kind and loving and caring. And I am glad that my husband has a good mother as well who cares about us very much. Hope everyone else had a good mother's day!

P.S. Boo learned how to give "High 5" on Sunday, so we have been having a lot of fun with this. I think this is the very first thing he has learned to do, in terms of on command and knowing what he is doing. So if anyone ever needs a "High 5", you know where to go!