Shadee

Most of you know that Will and I have a dog named Coach. We love him. I also have another dog named SHadee. I've had her since I was 12 years old. She has been living with my mom for the last 5 years, but that was the dog I grew up with. She is 14 1/2 years old. Yesterday, she was not having a good day, she wouldn't eat or drink anything, and things were not looking good. My mom woke up this morning and went to check on her and Shadee did not make it through the night. My mom could not bear to tell me the news this morning before I had to go to school, so she called me after she knew my day was over and just told me the story I've just passed on to you. I knew this day would come, and some of you might think it's a little dumb to get so sad about a dog, but that's to bad. She was a good dog, and we will miss her dearly. It was better off for her to go, she couldn't hear and she had slowed down alot in the last year. Hopefully I can get a picture of her and post it on here. Anyways, just wanted to share the news. Most people who have a pet know how near and dear to our hearts they are. They truly are one of the family.

Shadee
1994-2008

Doctor's Appointments

Okay so I've started going to the doctor every two weeks now. My last appointment was on the 4th of September. As I have reported in previous blogs my pregnancy has PERFECT to date. Except for a little bit of swelling of my ankles (due to being big pregnant in the heat of the summer) everything has gone swimmingly. Well on the 4th I didn't expect any different. This would be my last appointment before she would start "checking" me, and so I figured it to be rather uneventful, as had every appointment since my 20 week appt. Well, I was wrong. It started with the usual, pee in the cup, get your weight, go to your room, lay down, listen to the heart heart get your blood pressure and wait for the doctor to come in. She comes in asks if everything has been going okay, what questions you have up to this point, feels around on your belly a little bit, and you're good to go. It usually takes all of about 15 minutes total. This one however threw me for a loop. I did all the first things, (cup, weight, heartbeat) then it came to the blood pressure. My nurse took it and took the cuff off and said, have you been having blood pressure problems?? I said, "no". Course I'm thinking "how the heck should I know? it's not like I check it all the time, and I haven't felt any different at all......" but all I said was no. She said, well, it's really high for you so lay down on your left side for awhile and the doctor will be with you. So the doctor comes in asks all the usual questions, and then leaves. My nurse comes back and says, okay, you have to do some more blood work and we're going to need you to do a 24 hour urine collection. Go to the lab and they will tell you what to do. Now blood work I understand, but I'm not 100% sure what is meant by 24 hour urine collection, course I can draw my own conclusions, but you see what I'm getting at here....... The lab tech draws my blood, and then she hands me a blue bag. She says in the bag is a bowl for you to catch your urine in, and there is also a brown jug for you to pour it in when your done. Mind you, I am processing what she is saying, but I thinking do you people seriously expect people to do this? Then she goes on to say, you have to get every urination into the jug. Oh yeah, the jug must be kept in the refrigerator, and when you bring your jug back up here, it has to be kept cold. I'm am to start this on a Sunday and bring it back first thing Monday morning. So I have to miss church Sunday because in case I have to pee I can't be to far from home cause it has to go in the "jug". It's not like I can just tote my jug with me to church........ HAH. I tell Will before I start this, okay the brown jug in the fridge is not juice, please be aware of that. So I sit around all day Sunday just waiting to pee in my jug..... oh how eventful that was. The most exciting part was peeing in the middle of the night trying to make sure you get it in the bowl then having to go to the kitchen and pour it in your jug before you can go back to bed. All the while I thinking, I really hope nothing is wrong (in case you didn't know, these are tests that they make you do when they think you have pre-eclampsia, which can lead to strokes, kidney failure, death to the mom or baby or both if it is left untreated, so it is rather serious, as I'm trying to make jokes about it), but at the same time I kind of hope that they find something is wrong because then all this trouble I'm going through is all for naught......ugh! So Monday morning, my 24 hours is up, and I get ready, get my jug of pee, go to my grandma's get her ice chest, fill it with ice, put my jug safely in the chest so it can't tip over and it is being kept nice and cold. I return it to my Dr.'s office and am told that I will be notified of the results. So I'm thinking (I do alot of that) that this could be potentially serious, so they'll probably be in a hurry........... I did not get any results until Friday. Everything with my jug of pee came back fine, all is normal, so I went through all of that for nothing! Tomorrow is my 2nd appointment in 2 weeks. After this I start going back every week that means that it is getting ever so close! I can't wait. I'll post again after my first experience of "getting checked" and let you know if anything else is going on..... (Don't worry, I won't get to graphic!)

August, 2008, New Job, Great First Impressions

So after my four days off from our return from Florida, it was time to get to work. Teacher inservice started on August 7th, at 9:00 a.m. I was soooooo excited about my first day that I lasted all of 45 minutes at it. Let me explain...... We were all to gather in the cafeteria at Stonewall for our first of several meetings that morning. When I say "WE" I mean everyone in the whole school. Everyone that is affiliated or on the payroll at Stonewall was there. I was sitting at a tabl chumming it up with my new colleagues, and all was going great. Then we had the annuities portion of our meeting. This is when things took a turn for the worse. It wasn't that the guy was boring or anything like that I was just suddenly not feeling well. I was feeling all weak, and shaky. I started trying to get a little more comfortable in seat, course we are talking about lunch room tables, so there are no backs or anything. Then I was looking at the speaker and all of a sudden I could not hear anything he was saying. I could see him, and see his mouth moving, but other than that I felt like I was in a tunnel. Then the next thing I know, there was about 6 people leaning over me asking me if I was with them, if I was okay, I had no idea what had happened. Lo and behold, I had passed out in front of EVERYONE on the first day. They had called the ambulance, I got to ride to Valley View Labor and delivery, I was there for about 15 mintues, when Will arrived, and then Mika arrived shortly after, they monitored me for the better part of the day, I had no contractions, no dilation, nothing like that. I was finally released, and was told that any number of things could have made this episode happen. Maybe my blood sugar bottomed out, maybe the baby was laying on something wrong and cut off blood flow, to my important parts, maybe I hadn't had enough water, maybe I hadn't had enough protein, who knows. I'm doing great now, and have had no more episodes even remotely close to that, but needless to say, I'll never live down my first day as a teacher at Stonewall High School.

July-Independance day Storm, and a wonderful trip to Florida

On 4th of July weekend, we made our usual trek to the lake. We finally got the whole crew ready and made our way to hang out at the beach for a day of fun in the sun, socializing, swimming, etc. there were so many people with our crew it took 3 boats to get us all out there, but we made it. after all the preparation time, and the trip over, we got there got on our rafts got drinks, books, frisbees, lifejackets for floating, sun screen, sun glasses, beach toys for the kids..... you name it we had it. Jeremy and Will were fishing and I decided to join in, so Will rigged me up a pole and I began to fish, it wasn't 10 minutes into fishing and had hooked the big one, man was I excited, Will and Jeremy were exicted too, they were yelling, keep the rod tip up, keep pressure on it, get him get him! I reeled and reeled and fought and fought. Finally the end was in site, and I just knew it was huge! Well, it was a huge, Goggle Fish....... yeah, you heard me right. I had caught a wonderful set of goggles that someone had lost probably in prehistoric times. I just laughed, and then my nephew (who is five) loving looks at me and says, Aunt Story, you're supposed to catch a REAL fish, like my daddy and Uncle Will. Thank you Gehrig for you infiinite wisdom and honesty! Well out of nowhere a storm rolled in on top of us, and t was time to get the heck out of dodge. It was lighting all around, campers where losing their tents, Mika, John Wingard and little Abbey almost got taken out by a rouge air mattress (not a floating raft mind you, but an acutal air mattress from a tent that someone had been sleeping on) were it not for John's cat like reflexes, little Abbey would have been knocked to kingdome come. we were alot faster getting out than we were getting there. That's for sure. It was a rough boat road back we got soaking wet with rain, and John even got struck by lighting! Yeah, that's right! He's alright though. I was just hoping that my little Dillon didn't have brain damage from all the bumps! We all made it back safely, and it's truly a miracle.

Well, since Will and I had both changed jobs, it had allowed us to have some unforseen time off, so we made an impromptu trip right before I started my 3 trimester to see Will's family in Florida. We were so excited. This would mean fishing on the Gulf of Mexico, whipping butts in rummy, seeing Matt and Alexa's precious baby boy Brayden, and just catching up with everyone if only for a precious week. We could not wait. We made it safely, and I learned that flying during pregnancy was no different than flying not pregnant, (even though this was not my first time to fly pregnant, in this first 6 months). We made it to the Gulf and I scalloped for my first time, and we got a little fishing in. It was a shame that mother nature did not quite cooperate with our fishing trip, but oh well, it was still good fun with my wonderful in-laws. Then we went to sneads to meet Brayden and pay a visit to Alexa and Matt, we also go to to participate in Will's cousin Emily's birthday party, we had a lot of fun. We made it back to Oklahoma on Sunday, Aug. 3rd and I had 4 days til I had to report to my new job at Stonewall.

June-Rather Uneventful, basically the same

June was just another month for us. I was slaving away at the accounting firm, hating every minute of it, Will was happy and loving his job at the Vo-Tech. The good thing that I can say is that I reflected back on my pregnancy to date, (I was arond 20 weeks) and I thought I could not have had an easier pregnancy than what I was having so far. I had had NONE, ZERO, ZILCH, NADA, morning sickness praise the Lord, I had only gained 11lbs, HALLELUJAH! Everything was going swimmingly. We were still in our little house with none of our own things, but we were together and we loved each other and loved admiring my baby bump. that was slowly getting bigger, and bigger. We had decided on a name, Dillon James Maxwell. Dillon is Will's grandpa's first name, and James was my dad's first name. We love the name and love the sentiments. Will and I were both named after people in our family so it's only fitting. By this time, Dillon had started to move around in his little home a lot and we got a kick out of feeling him all the time. It's an absolutely amazing experience.

Gehrig's T-Ball team was in full swing and we made it to all but one game. It was a fun time and he made vast improvements from last summer, even though his little team was not very good.

We spent a lot of weekends at the lake, and found a place we would like to have, but oh yeah, we don't even have a real house to live in, so I guess a lake house is out of the question for the time being.

The end of June brought some excitement and sadness all at the the same time. While on a trip to the city for business with the accounting firm, I got a call. (side note, last year I completed all of my alternative teaching certifications and have been waiting for a good time to get into teaching). The call was from a long time friend and mentor of mine telling me about an opportunity that was going to be coming open for a teaching job in my field at Latta....... WHAT!?!?! you are kidding me! what an opportunity. I jumped on it as fast as possible. I would be close to my house, I would be going home to my alma mater, I know a bunch of the kids, I know a bunch of the teachers, it would be teaching exactly what I want........... Well, snap back to reality, remember the saying if something sounds to good to be true it probably is?? Well, this is one of those cases. I thought I was a shoe-in, no so much. They hired someone else. I was beyond devastated. How could that happen? Wouldn't they want one of their own? However, the next day I interviewed for the recently vacated job of the person that accepted the job at Latta. it went really well, course I was very guarded because I felt the same way I did when I left the Latta interview. After two weeks of waiting, I was offered the High School Business and Computer job at Stonewall.......... I turned in my 2 weeks notice at the accounting firm, (they took it better than I expected) and I was a happy girl.

May 20th, 2008 "Are we having pink or Blue?!?

Well it is the 2nd biggest day you look forward to when you find out you are pregnant, the first being the obvious, your precious baby's birthday. I was 17 weeks, and my mom, Will and I made our way to my doctor's office in the city to find out i we should buy pink or blue. We all made speculations all the way to the city and everyone was anxious. We could not believe the day was finally here. Our lives had been a whirlwind since we found out, with both of us changing jobs, moving, and a trip to florida thrown into the mix, the time was flying by. We get to the office and my appt. was at 12:30, we got in early though! The ultrasound was wonderful, the tech was very thorough, measuring baby's head, legs, showing us the heart, the kidneys, the liver, the placenta, hands, fingers, feet, everything but what we really wanted to know! She was killing us with the suspense. Since the day I found out I was pregnant I just had a feeling I was having a son, I don't know why, call it a mother's intuition or call it just plain lucky guessing, but I just knew. Will thought so too. We have so many girls on my side of the family though, it was hard to believe that I may actually have a boy. Everyone was keeping their collective fingers crossed. Finally the tech (whom I must say, was none to thrilled about all the excitement we brought into the room) said, would you like to know what it is? and of course it was a resounding yes, and she said, well, there's HIS penis......... just like that....... with just as straight a face as if she had said something like, "we started another war in the world today" Then she was not so impressed with Will's touchdown dance that he debuted for everyone to see. All I could do was laugh and look at my baby boy on the screen. My first thought was well, I've known this the whole time, I don't know why I was shocked. But I was shocked. I just thought it was a boy, but in the deepest part of me, I thought maybe it was just wishful thinking or something. I knew Will wanted a boy so bad, and bless his heart had spent the whole trip up there that day talking himself into a girl. My mom already has 2 grandkids, one of each, so her response was she just wanted a healthy baby. I knew my nephew Gehrig would be ecstatic since he only has one little boy cousin out of 10 cousins....... We left that day with some great pictures of our son. It was so great to not call him an IT anymore.

April-May 2008 Living arrangements, yeah, that could be a problem

Like I said, during this transitional time we had some wonderful help from family and friends. Roger and Debbie strong have a game room that is detached from their house. They were gracious enough to let us stay there until we could find a rent house in Ada. Well, after a month of looking, and no luck finding a clean rent house, we were at our wits end. We were spending tons of money eating out since the game room was not equipped with a full kitchen. We were sleeping on an air mattress (which we were incredibly thankful for), and I knew as I continued to grow that this would not be adequate sleeping arrangements, and we were living out of a suitcase. Okay, something had to give. In steps my mother......... what a wonderful, well-intentioned woman she is. She has been a God Send and made a wonderful sacrifice for us. We had had no luck selling our house, and that did not seem to be changing for awhile (for a number of reasons, to come in later blogs). Anyways, my mom had her own house, yes it is tiny, yes it isn't ideal, yes it's barely big enough for 1 person much less Will and I and a newborn baby, but she offered to let us live in her house and she would move out until our house sold. We almost couldn't accept the offer because we did not want her to be put out of her house, but it was the best solution any of us could come up with and it saved us from having to pay a rent house payment and a mortgage payment all at the same time, so we accepted. She moved in with my grandma, and that is the arrangement to this day. We will move out as soon as the house sells. That's the deal. THANK YOU MOM! ~We Love You!~

March, 2008, To move or not to move? that is the question

Well, as if the Maxwell's needed anymore changes in their life, things were about to get alot more interesting.....

So as you read below, we had just found out we were having a baby. Will and I were living in Mustang, and we were working together on a government contract for the Chickasaw Nation. We had always said that we would love at some point to move back to Ada to be around my family or to move back to Florida to be around his. Now we were not planning on doing this anytime soon really, we had just bought a new house. So the plan was to be out of the city by the time our first kid started pre-school. So you're thinking that gives us a good 4-5 years right?!?!? WRONG! An incredible opportunity showed itself to Will in Early March. He was offered a job to work at the Vo-Tech in Ada, this included a raise to move to Ada (which we didn't think possibe) a chance to be arond family, and a chance to get back to small town living. Sounded to good to be true, but to good to pass up. These are the kind of jobs that you don't get until someone retires or dies, so it was a must do. There was a problem however, I didn't have a job, and we hadn't sold our house in the city. So what do we do?!?!?! Well, I had to stay behind in Mustang for a little bit, and Will moved to Ada. Thanks a million to family and friends who helped us out during this time. The plan would be I would join Will in Ada when I A. got a job, or B. we sold our house, whichever came first. So we put the house on the market Will moved to Ada, and I stayed. When we first started dating he was living in the city and I in Ada, so it was just like old times, except now we had been married 2.5 years and I was 8 weeks preggers....... Through a sheer stroke of luck, on April 22nd, I was offered a job in Ada. I knew it was not something I wanted to do forever, or maybe not the ideal situation, but it would get me back with my husband and that was the goal for both of us, so I accepted a job at an accounting firm in Ada, and we lived in Ada during the weeks and at our house in Mustang on the weekends. We always thought that getting jobs in Ada would be the hardest part about moving here, but that is not the case. I'll explain in following blogs! Stay tuned

February 17th, 2008 (sitting 'round waitin' on two pink lines)

Wow, where do I start? Will and I were currently living in Mustang, Ok at this time. It was the Sunday night before President's day, and my dearest and bestest friend of all Beverly Medcalf was living with us while doing a rotation there in the city. Things were great, but they would only get better. That Sunday for some unknown reason (unknown at the time anyways) I felt different. We were having a three day weekend, should be plenty of relaxing time, and let me tell you I was relaxing..... ALL the time. I couldn't stay awake. It was the weirdest thing. Well, a neighbor couple and Will and I had started a tradition of having Sunday dinner, the only thing that got me up and going that Sunday was knowing that it was my night to host dinner at the house. Beverly was not home from the hospital yet, and I had started dinner. Will had run to the grocery store to get the last few items for dinner and I went to the bathroom to take a quick shower and get cleaned up before our guests arrived. (Let me just make a side note and say that Will and I had been trying to get pregnant since August of 2007). Anyways, I was in the bathroom and I realized that I was a day late, and knowing that this was the first month that Will and I had been aware of every aspect of my cycle this month, I had this feeling that the chances were good. However, in the back of my mind I thought that I had invested a small fortune in pregnancy tests over the past 7 months, so I would not be surprised if there were not two pink lines this time as well. On the 13th of February I had taken an early detection test waited the alotted amount of time and there was no second line. Hmmmm, not surprising I thought, but oh well, this has been going on for 7 months. Well, for some unknown reason instead of discarding the test, I put it back on top of my bathroom cabinet. (gross I know!) So on Sunday the 17th while in the bathroom, I decided on a whim to take the last of the tests that I had in the cabinet. (I really like peeing money down the drain I guess, ha, I thought to myself.) So I sat down and did my little thing, proceeded to put it on top of the bathroom cabinet so it would rest flat as usual and felt the other one (from 4 days prior) there. I took it down and replaced it with the newly taken test and took a glance at the old test before I threw it away in the trash. Well, crazily enough I saw the faintest pink line on that early test, but thought well, that's just because I let it sit for four days, it can't be yes. (While reading this you may be thinking this has been a long process, but peeing on the new stick and putting it up to wait the time, and looking at the old one to throw it away, took all of about 1 minute. You have to wait 3 minutes or so...... so they say. So I am kind of having these thoughts like, oh my gosh, what if it really worked this time?? No it couldn't have worked......etc. I get in the shower and wet my hair (probably at about the 2 minute mark now) and I think Ican't wait anymore, I'll just take a look and see......... To what did my wondering eyes did I see?!?!??!?? TWO PINK LINES STARING BACK AT ME. HOLY CRAP! I thought. Then I grabbed that little bar in the shower to steady myself......... I thought I was going to fall over. My legs were shaking. I was ecstatic, shocked, scared, in disbelief, everything all at once. I know I'm still home alone, but I also know that I'm supposed to host a dinner party and act as if nothing out of the ordinary is going on..... how in the HECK am I supposed to do that. I was hoping that Will would get home before the guests arrive so I could tell him....... I rush to finish my shower because I figure it's safer if I am on dry land. I'm in my bath towel and I hear the front door open. I run out of the bathroom fling the bedroom door open and met Beverly in my bath towel, (okay, sooooo not Will). So Beverly instantly questions the stupid grin I have on my face and why I am acting so weird, I just say something like, just excited for the company tonight. (Even though I don't think she bought it!) I go back to the room and my head is spinning with thoughts. "How am I going to Will?" I always told myself that I would tell him in some cool way, but at this point in time all my ideas have left me, and all I want to do is show him the test and jump up and down. I throw on some clothes because it is now time for me to compose myself and host a dinner party. The guests arrive before Will does (just my luck). I'm thinking, okay it's a three day weekend for everyone, we could be up for awhile, I just want everyone to eat and leave so I can tell Will that he's going to be a dad. Will finally shows up (I say finally like he was gone forever, but it was probably like 30 minutes :) ) We eat dinner (I have no idea what I cooked.....) We got dinner cleaned up and everyone sat up til around 10:45 pm, Beverly was tired and ready to get ready for bed, our guests were debating on rather to stay and play Scene It, or go home..... I'm thinking, I love you guys but please go home...... lucky one of the guests had a call of nature, the kind that you don't want to do when you are a guest in someone's home when your home is right down the street. So they decided to call it a night. YES! So it's finally time! Will is laying on the coach watching something on the History channel, I go to the bedroom get the test (the new one that was bright pink WAY before the time was up) and I walk into the living room and stick it in front of Will's face (I know not exactly the cool way to tell him that I was hoping for, but I had kind of lost my mind) He takes the stick and studies it for what seems like a lifetime (around 10 seconds........it was like something out of a movie, you actually hear the clock ticking in your head you know?) He turns to me and I know I have a goofy grin, and in what is classic for my husband looks at me with a smile on his face and says, "Who's is this?" I start laughing, and say, "what do you mean who's is this? It's mine, you crazy!" He starts dieing laughing. (Some women might get offended at this, but after knowing my husband for a collection of 5 years, I know that he laughs hysterically when he is happy, (obviously) and when he is scared to death) He looks at me after his little guffaw and says are you serious? are you serious? and I shook my head, he gets off the couch hugs me and we are laughing so loudly that beverly comes out of her room and says what is going on, Will had the stick and waved it and said, well, he just jumped and waved the stick....... Bev started going crazy and we had a mini-jump-a-thon right there in the hall by her bedroom. We immediately want to call everyone in the world and tell them our news, but we realize that it is 11:30 now and our news can wait til the morning. So we decide to go to bed......... I don't think either of us fell asleep til around 3:00 am.... if that. We just laid there and thought about how our life had changed in a matter of a few minutes, and how happy we were about it. We knew the next day would be a great day as we shared the news with family and friends.



Thank goodness there is no more sittin' round waitin on two pink lines, at least not for a few years anyway.

Finally Blogging

Let me just say that writing in this blog has been a long time coming. I think I originally started the idea for this around May..... well, it's now September and I'm finally blogging. Maybe I had a case of writer's block...... Maybe I've had a so much going on in the last seven months (note following blogs that will update everything). Maybe I've just been putting it off, who knows but for what it's worth it's time to get some things down on paper. So here it goes!