If she had the proper words to say,

I had my annual girly appointment today (my yearly violation). It went well, and the new doctor was extremely attentive. We talked over several things, and she also surprised me by giving me the referral to urology straight away (I have an appointment with my regular doctor next week to discuss my bladder, as well as other issues). She told me that there was no point waiting the extra week just to get the referral going (which involves a wait process anyway), and I easily agreed. This appointment was the first among the many I scheduled two days ago. One down, eleven to go!

I spent a large part of yesterday afternoon working on some sketchings for syven. I'm not really good at drawing, but I've got the mainframe of some ideas I'm mulling over. I took my clipboard and worked on the drawings some more while waiting in the doctor's office and referral office, too.

It's Thursday today, but it really feels more like Tuesday to me. I just can't believe that the week is over tomorrow! The weather has been so sunny and warm, and I feel like I was constantly scrambling to catch up this week. Jack has a soccer game tonight, and then I'm making a spicy pasta dish tonight for dinner. I made it once before, having found the recipe in my Taste of Home magazine, and it's really yummy. The cream cheese lends an unexpected soft flavor to the sauce, and I'm excited to make it again.

The weather should be absolutely gorgeous all weekend. Philip is off, and I'm sure the boys will all be outside for a large part of it. I've got two cookies orders to ship off on Monday morning. I hope to bake tomorrow and have the decorating done by Saturday morning so I can play, too. We have no plans otherwise, so it should be relaxing and easy. :-)

Finally, finally, the boys got their H1N1 vaccines. I'm glad I can now cross that off the list of to-do's.

I wrote last week that we were headed to the clinic right after school, and we did go... but they had closed just five minutes prior. The next day, I took the boys even faster after school (we only have a 20-minute window from when they get home to when the Immunizations clinic closes), but it was fruitless, too. They had closed that day at 11:00am instead. I was ticked, having just been there at 4:05pm the day before, and there was NO notice posted of an early closing the next day.

So we had no choice but to wait over the weekend. Today, we didn't even let the boys get out of their snow gear - they went straight from the bus to the car, and then we were on our way. Philip had a dental appointment earlier in the afternoon, and he'd picked up the H1N1 forms at the desk so that I could fill them out on the way. I did that while he drove (about 2 minutes, total), and we arrived at the check-in desk with 15 minutes to spare.

Philip went first, and he was done before the boys had even shrugged out of their coats to watch. We'd decided A.J. would go next, knowing that if he freaked, they could go ahead and do Jack's in the interim. A.J. was shaking, and he asked the technician to show him the needle so he "could see how big" it was first, but we nixed that idea, shuffling him into position even as we said no. I stood in front of him, and I had him squeeze my hand, and he turned his head away from the tech, looking squarely at Philip and squeezing his hand with his other one. The tech told him to count to 3, and he was done before A.J. got to '2.' All told, it was probably 20 seconds, and then he was done. It sure beat 20 minutes of hysterics, and we were SO proud of him! Jack went last, and he was fine.

On the way out, A.J. was still professing how easy it had really been, but that he was still feeling nervy/shaky. I have a cousin with a pronounced fear of needles, and I really hope that A.J. only continues to get better and better with each one in the future. Poor kiddo, but at least it's over!

It's not even midnight, but I'm headed to bed. Well, I will be as soon as I move Jack out of my spot. I washed all his bedding today before I left for work, but Philip didn't think to push the loads through the laundry while I was gone, so his comforter wasn't yet dry when we got home from swimming - he's sleeping in my bed right now instead.

I washed all of our bedding yesterday, and I'll do all of A.J.'s tomorrow. I did a large decluttering of Jack's room yesterday as well (it wasn't my intention, but it just sorta... happened... after I moved on from cleaning out the bath toys!), so I'll be focusing on A.J.'s in the same fashion tomorrow. All of this will be later in the day on my new "day off" though, as we'll be getting an early start in the morning.

A.J. has a 7:55am doctor's appointment. Not because anything is wrong, no. He just has to have a physical and a physician's summary done before he can head off to summer camp in July. This early appointment was the only time they could squeeze him in before the camp deadline, and I needed to have time to have the forms then notarized and mailed back to the camp as well. I think we might grab breakfast after the doctor's appointment because we'll all be hungry by then, too. ;-)

For now, it's soooo time to sleep. I've worked hard today, logged a LOT of hours in the sun, plus a couple playing hard in the pool, and I'm zonked. ZZZZzzzzzzzz...

(I need an updated usericon for A.J. Both of my current ones are several years old. *note to self*)

A.J. and Philip are at the Urgent Care Clinic right now. The boys were playing outside, in our yard, the neighbor's yard, and over at the park, and all was quiet. Philip was home from work and had fallen into a snooze on the couch. I had candles lit, and it was serene.

Then the garage door burst open, and a tearful, dirt-streaked A.J. hobbled in. He yelled for me, and as I entered the dining room, he was removing one of his shoes. His sock was soaked in blood, and he gulped as he told me that he'd stepped on a plank, sending a nail through his shoe and into his foot.

OUCH.

It was still bleeding heavily, so we applied pressure for a bit with the already-bloody sock. Philip woke up, ran into the dining room, assessed the situation, and then changed clothes to take A.J. in. I grabbed A.J.'s current shot records from his baby album, we wrapped paper towels around the puncture wound and carefully put his foot back into the bloody shoe, and then he limped out to the car with Dad.

His shots are current, so I don't know if he'll need a Tetanus shot or not (he's had several doses of DTaP). However, we can't properly clean a puncture wound like that, so it's just best to let the professionals do their job. They've been gone for over an hour now - hopefully they'll be back home soon.

I'm sure A.J.'s foot is going to be mighty sore the next day or so. Poor kid. :-(

It was snowing this morning when I took both boys to school. Absolutely crazy, and so WRONG. It's April, for crying out loud.

Jack had a fun playdate at Caleb's house this afternoon while I was at work. He's got playdates scheduled for these two weeks while his regular caregiver is away on vacation. It's nice that folks are willing to help us out like this, too.

I need to call someone about the lawn. I intended to do that yesterday afternoon, but it was raining all day long (a nice, soft rain, but still - all day long), and it drained me of my motivation. And then the snow today. Who knows what the ground/grass is really going to be like after all this?

I had a very vivid, strange-but-good dream about posthaste and her baby Soph today. I was repeating the dream to myself while I took a shower this morning so that I wouldn't forget the details. I'll have to tell Jess about it - hopefully she'll get a kick out of my REMs. ;-)

I'm hungry. Oh, and it's time to go pick up A.J. from school soon. Afterwards, I'm taking both boys to the base clinic to update their immunizations. Jack is already in tears of the prospect of new shots, but it's an evil that must be done. :-/

BENIGN! Test results are "mostly" benign!

Of the three biopsies, two results came back benign, and one came back low-grade. As such, the treatment at this time is to allow my body a chance to "fix" it on its own, and I will go in for follow-ups throughout the year. If the test next year reveals the same results, I will have more aggressive treatment afterwards.

But for now? Benign, folks!

I've never been so happy for such a weird-sounding word!

Well, the pregnancy test was negative (honestly, we'd have been gobsmacked if it had been anything else!), so the colposcopy was a go. I've just returned home. During the procedure, the doctor took a biopsy of three locations, and I will know my results by next Wednesday.

I feel a bit dizzy, but that's about it. I'm going to make Jack some lunch and then go lay down, I think. (I don't think I can properly describe just HOW badly I'd like to blow off making lunch and go out to eat, but I'm going to do the right thing and just eat here.)

It's been raining all morning and looks to continue throughout the day. What a day for a test like this, I suppose. However, it's also a great day for napping...

The dinner fairies can arrive any time now. I'm immensely not in the mood to cook. :-/

After the crying jag this morning while watching Steve Irwin's memorial service, as well as the inevitable tears of fear for myself this afternoon, I had worked myself up to quite the lacrimal headache by 2pm. When I picked up Philip from Runza, he was kind enough to allow me to lay down for a nap while he got ready for work tonight, and he picked up A.J. at 3pm. I woke up from my nap at 5:30, and my head does feel better after the ibuprofen and tear-free hours of sleeping.

But I don't want to cook. Nonetheless, there is a package of chicken thawing and leftover mashed potatoes that are calling my name, and I'm sure that the boys will be hungry within the hour. Life goes on, right? It doesn't stop just because of one lousy test result. I'm going to make that the driving force of my days, I think.

*gets to getting on*

I learned the results of my bloodwork at my appointment later this morning. My sugar was fine, my blood pressure perfect, and my cholesterol was "better than perfect." Yay! And the doctor sighed when I told her that the guy who'd called yesterday had been adamant about my not having water. She said he does it all the time, no matter how often she tells him he should tell folks that "water and medicines - with the exception of diabetes pills - are okay" when they ask. Ah, well. I've had a ton of water already today to make up for not having anything last night.

After my last three pap smears resulting in 'abnormal,' my doctor tried very hard to get a good sample. She took a longer sample than usual, she said, so that there wouldn't even be a way for the sample to be "insufficient" in certain cells, either. Let's hope for good/normal results this time.

A very nice guy had checked me in for my appointment, and we chatted a bit while he took my history. When he left me to undress, I was surprised to find that the gown barely covered me. He'd told me to leave it open in the front - well, no worries there! The tiny garment would barely close over my breasts. I ended up not having a breast exam anyway (I'd had one at my regular check-up in February), so I could have had the gown on open to the back, but I didn't know that until my doctor came in. I've lost weight since my last appointment, but the little gown certainly didn't make me feel like I had! My doctor told me that they seemed to be having a gown shortage, and she couldn't understand why - surely folks wouldn't want to steal flimsy hospital gowns?

My tummy feels blah this afternoon. I imagine it's from not eating earlier, and I didn't sleep too well, either. Jack had been begging for us to eat at La Mesa, so we went there for lunch (Philip wanted to continue sleeping, having only gotten home at 5:30 this morning, then having to get back up for a meeting at 9, only to come right back home when the briefing was cancelled). The food was okay, I'm sure, but my tummy just wasn't interested. I sipped my water more than I ate, and Jack ended up leaving quite a bit of his enchilada and beans for later as well.

We stopped by Wal*Mart on the way home to scope out printers for Philip's mom (we tried to talk her into one while we were there in July, but she insisted on keeping the one she had - heehee). I picked up some milk, and I found a cute, cheap shirt for Halloween for Jack. He loves it because it's orange - of course!

I picked up A.J. from school, and I've opened the mail. My Coca~Cola® Bottle Opener Keychain came, and it is HUGE! Very nice, but much larger than I'd pictured it. I also received some lovely thank-you notes in the mail. No bills - just fun stuff. :-)

I only have 58 minutes left to eat. Boo.

Or drink. That's going to be the toughest thing. I already took my nightly Zyrtec so that I wouldn't need that illegal sip of water later on, too.

*sigh*