3/13/08

Well "Hola" everyone! I have to apologize profusely for the lack of updates this last year (my younger sister even chewed me out about it), but I have been busy. My daughter Armina Yuri was born in late February of last year (ironically enough the same birthday as my nephew Junior who passed away and my half-sister Amanda...it was sort of funny actually). Labor was long and drawn out with me on oxygen the entire time (I was induced because my amniotic fluid was low). Turns out my daughter didn't want to be born until summer no matter what we did, so she grabbed the umbilical cord on her way down the birth canal. So everytime I had a contraction she'd lose oxygen. Anyway, 27 long grueling hours later Armina Yuri was born by Cesarean section. And ever since then my life has been taken up by a rolling, crawling and then walking-at-nine-months, curious, little terror whom I do love, but who drives me crazy upon occasion. I was one of the lucky ones who got a kid who didn't sleep until about three weeks ago. She still goes through periods where she won't sleep at all for a night, but she HAS gotten better. So between trying to keep her from killing herself or others and trying to keep my house clean (varied success there...good lord that child is a handful), I've been so busy I haven't even read a book except for the seventh Harry Potter book in over a year and I've watched "Finding Nemo" so many times (Armina loves the vibrant colors) that it'd be enough to drive someone else nuts.

And then in January I had the unexpected (VERY unexpected) surprise of taking a pregnancy test and finding out I was pregnant again. So, my second child is due in September (we don't know what it is yet mind you). So, it's going to be even MORE fun trying to update anything seeing as how I'm going to have a 19 month old and a newborn quicker than I think.

Well anyway, here is a picture of my one little rugrat taken at about nine months.

Ain't she a cutie!

In other news, we recently lost my husband's grandfather to cancer. It was hard seeing him go like that. I really liked the man. He knew a lot about...well...pretty much everything and he was always very patient in explaining something that you might not understand, without once making you feel stupid. He and his wife Molly (who passed away in 2004) were accepting of me from the moment they met me and while they were a bit odd (who isn't) I liked them both a lot. Anyway, Skip, if I could I'd raise a glass to you, but I'm sure you'll forgive me if I raise a coke to you instead seeing as how I'm pregnant (and yes to all you health conscious out there it IS a diet coke...I don't like to pump unnecessary things into my body when pregnant :-) and say that you will be missed dearly and I hope that you are happy where you are now.

Well people on that note, I shall bid a fond adieu for now. I've got housework to do and a baby to put down for a nap. Take care and thanks to all those who still visit the site from time to time. I WILL try to update this turkey someday I promise.

2/18/07

I mentioned the word "hectic" in my last update. HA! Nothing compared to this last year. I found out in May of last year that I was pregnant and since then I've been pretty much taken up with that sorry to say people. For those of you out there that think nine months is plenty of time to get everything done? It ain't. Not even close. I'm just happy I got the basics of diapers and a crib ready for the baby when she comes a this point. Cleaning out a room for the nursery just ended up not happening, but that's okay. I got our storeroom mucked out a lot and hopefully when it becomes an issue in a couple of years we won't have too many problems getting everything organized in there. Actually, the only reason the webpage is being updated today is because my daughter has decided to be a little snot and is now 3 days late and so since I can't sleep more than ten minutes at a time anyway I figured I'd get up early and update the webpage.

I'm hoping the baby will be born soon. I've been walking to help things along, but have had not a whole lot of luck with that this last week. My poor husband is ready to bounce off walls he's so hyped up, ready at any minute to have to take me to the hospital while I, on the other hand, am getting depressed that the child is never going to get here.

So, anyway, Armina Yuri Buswell will be born sometime soon. When I get pictures I'll be sure to post them when I have time so that people can see what she looks like.

In other news so that I can catch you all up, my sister-in-law Jenn not only had one boy she had two. Twin boys Cody and Braden were born at the tail end of July last year and are growing like weeds. Jenn did great carrying the twins. They were still born a bit premature, but they came out of it okay and are doing fine. It's going to be sorta neat that Armina and the twins will only have about six months between them. I can only hope that the kids get along okay as they grow up.

And that is about what my life has been like, other than work and a whole bunch of family issues that have arisen with some of my in-laws the past six months or so, but I don't want to get into that, so I'll leave the updates on a happy note. Thanks for caring enough to read this stuff *laugh*.

03/01/06

Well it has been a hectic couple of months. The weather up here has been going hay-wire this winter. We're going through constant freeze and thaws. It'll be up in the 40's one day and down below zero the next. It's nuts. It's also been playing havok with people's allergies, mine included. So, I've been sneezing my way through the winter.

My family back in Pennsylvania is going through a rough time right now, and I'd just like to send my prayers their way as I write this. I hope everything works out there soon.

My step mother passed away (my father's second wife in Maine) about three weeks ago, so I'm trying to help out my dad and half-sisters as much as possible. I can not imagine what it would be like growing up without a mother or father. My mom and dad were far away from one another, but at least I could call my dad on the phone and talk to him. My sisters are adapting as well as can be expected. Amanda got a new dog for her birthday that she named "Sweetie". She implied she wanted me to post up a picture of Sweetie here, so here you go all, here's Sweetie in all of her 'pre-flight' glory (long story)...

I just wanted to thank my friend Leeanne for all of her help when it came to Sweetie. You see, we had to fly Sweetie out of Alaska to Maine because it was the cheapest way to get a pure bred dog (250 bucks to fly it vs. 500 to 800 for a pure bred puppy in Maine. Guess which one we chose?). Unfortunately, my husband hates dogs with a passion that is rivaled by few things, so my friend Leeanne who found the puppy in the paper was awesome. She went out and got the dog, kept it at her house for a lot longer than we thought it would take to get a dog flown out (about two weeks) and had to deal with the fact that her husband hated the dog being at their house (which makes me feel very very very guilty). Overall, both Tim and Leeanne were great about everything, Tim for his patience and Leeanne for just being very awesome. So, I wanted to thank both of them for their help. It made Amanda's year to get Sweetie, it really did. She's enjoying the puppy, and so is my dad and other step-sister, Ruth, so I'm thrilled it all worked out for them. One thing is for sure. I do NOT want to fly an animal out of state ever again if I can help it, but I'm glad it all worked out.

In other news, we found out that my sister-in-law Jenn (Clark's brother's wife) is pregnant again and so we've all been celebrating the to-be-new addition to the Buswell clan up here. My other sister-in-laws are praying it's a girl, my brother-in-law Cliff is praying its a boy. Personally I'm just praying it's healthy. I can spoil a boy OR a girl, so it's no difference to me ;-). My nephew Ryan has decided if it is a girl it will be named Rachel and if it is a boy it will be named Colten. Period end of subject. We're all pretty impressed that a soon-to-be four year old could come up with names like that and none of us (especially his mom and dad) are opposed to the names right now, so Ryan might get his way ;-).

Other than that, my computer died so I had to get a new one. I just couldn't do ANYTHING on my old computer anymore it crashed so much. After it killed every single back up for my website that I had, I decided that was it and Clark and I went down and bought a new computer. It's beautiful being able to update my site without the computer kicking itself off about five times and such. It's taken me a while to rebuild some of the code I had lost and all, but I think I'm finally starting to catch up. I still need to rebuild the chronology page that I almost had finished and rescan all of the covers, but at least I recovered some of the updates I had done.

And that's about it from my life for now. I hope everyone's having a good time of it and if not, stick in there, it'll get better.

12/05/05

I have found that I have become addicted to a show that a lot of people may not have heard of before. It is called "W.I.T.C.H." and is a cartoon based on a series of young adult books in Italy. It is a very awesome series that follows the adventures of five girls. The girl in the banner for this site is called "Will" (the "W" in the word W.I.T.C.H. is for Will by the way) and she's like a young red haired version of me. She's not really a social critter, has problems making friends, is pathologically shy when it comes to talking to the opposite sex and is obsessed with frogs! How can you not love a person who loves frogs??? So, she has inspired me to create a new banner for the "My Life" section of the site. Fun times await ;-). I encourage everyone, especially women/girls (because trust me the show is mainly geared toward females) to tune into toon Disney and give the show a try. You also want to check out The Magic of Friendship: The best site for W.I.T.C.H. on the web for further information on W.I.T.C.H. Very awesome site run by some very nice people =).

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving. As you can tell looking at the page, I was bored with the old design, so I'm trying something a bit different. I'll change it back given time.

Well, the age of the flu is upon us, and I was not lucky enough to dodge the germs this season. I've been sick with a cold/virus for a good two weeks now and the doctor was kind enough to tell me that basically I have to suffer through this. So, I'm not thrilled. But, what can you do?

It has been a hectic, and frustrating, time for me. My 2002 Ford F150 pickup, the warranty out two weeks on it, blew a slave cylinder in the transmission. We felt that Ford should fix the problem seeing as how the problem the truck developed shouldn't have happened after 100,000 miles let alone with the 28,000 miles we had on it. Ford, after the salesmen who sold us the truck actually went to bat for us to get it fixed, were still being a-holes about it and the service department decided to be complete jerks about the entire thing. The service department wanted 100 dollars just to look at the truck no matter what. So, we told Ford where to stick it and went to our local mechanic. It cost us 700 bucks to repair the truck, and my advice to everyone? NEVER BUY A FORD!!!!! I can't say anything nice about the company now. I mean, obviously there are some SERIOUS problems with the trucks they are putting out (I've talked to five other people who have bought Fords since 2000 who had major problems with the transmission as well...interesting huh?), and obviously the company isn't big on FIXING the problems that are obviously factory defects. So, buy Chevy. Thank you that's my advice for today.

I was also attacked by a dog on Halloween and got bitten in the parking lot of the local grocery store (it wasn't serious, but it broke the skin), so I had to go in for a tetnis shot and missed Halloween completely. Not fun, but we got through it.

Thanksgiving was good, but hectic. We had my husband's entire family over to our house for the holiday. I brined and roasted a 22 pound bird and it turned out great (the show "Good Eats" on Food Network? Watch it seriously. Great show!). So, at least the holiday was worth the crap that had been going on.

Even with some of the nasty stuff that happened, I'm still thankful for what I do have. My husband, my cat, my dad and family, a roof over my head that is on my own home and food on my table. It's actually quite a bit to be thankful for.

I hope you and yours have a great holiday season. Count your blessings, hug your loved ones, and may the new year coming bring you joy. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.