Big Hiccups

You guys. My Favorite Toddler spent the night at my house on Friday and it was SO MUCH FUN!!! I want to do it again, and again, and again.

The plan was to pick him up after work on Friday and head to my cousin’s basketball game about an hour away, but since Minnesota has decided to SNOW EVERY DAY this winter, we changed our plans because of the awful traffic. Instead we headed straight to McDonald’s and had a fun time at the Play Place. Then we went to my house and played on the drums, played piano, played “Ka-chow” (the name of a car from the movie Cars), and played hide-and-seek. In the middle of a game of hide-and-seek/Ka-chow, Favorite Toddler came out of the bathroom (where he had been “hiding”) and said, “I had a BIG hiccup!”

In his toddler mind, “big hiccup” = throw up. And it was big. The poor buddy had puke down his shirt, and there was a big pile in the bathroom, as well as a trail down the hall where he had run to tell me about his big hiccup. You may be aware that I have the strongest gag reflex in the history of the world, so of course I gagged REALLY hard at the smell. Then I started laughing because I knew that I was going to have the hardest time cleaning it up. I pulled off Favorite Toddler’s shirt and let it soak while he watched me attempt to clean up the mess. Within about three minutes, I threw up ALL over. It was hilarious….especially when Favorite Toddler kept saying “You have big hiccup, too!”

It was already a little past his bedtime (shhh…don’t tell his parents), so I was thankful that we hadn’t already gotten into pajamas and that we hadn’t gotten into bed yet, because cleaning up hiccups in bed would have been a NIGHTMARE. Instead, it was about as straightforward as it could have been – on the tile of the bathroom and wood of the hallway. After the mess was cleaned up, we got into our pajamas and settled down with a VeggieTales movie, and fell right asleep. At breakfast the next morning, when asked by my roommate what we had done the night before, Favorite Toddler said “I had a big hiccup, and HB had a big hiccup in the bathroom!”. It was too funny.

Sunday morning, I got a call from Favorite Toddler’s mom, who was VERY sick with the flu. I picked up her kids to take them to church (her husband is the pastor, so he was already there with other responsibilities). At church, her husband and I commented that our stomachs both felt a little funny, but didn’t think much of it………

Until a few hours later.....when I got BIG HICCUPS for the rest of the day. Seriously. It was SO miserable. It was accompanied by a nasty fever, severe chills, and general WANTING TO JUST SLEEP SO THAT I WOULDN’T FEEL SO DISGUSTING. Ugh. Thank GOODNESS my sister is a doctor – she called in a script of the MIRACLE drug Zofran so that I would stop retching and actually get some sleep. My wonderful friend (who has a three-week-old baby) picked up my meds and some ginger ale for me. And I survived. It actually left about as quickly as it came, and I am feeling almost completely better. Whatever that bug was, it was nasty!

I think the best thing I'll take away from this experience is Favorite Toddler's euphemism for being sick. "Big hiccups" is a much more pleasant way of putting it! But I sure hope I don't have any more big hiccups in my near future!!

Kidney Humor

I have a medical history that is somewhat more eventful than most, including severe kidney complications. Because of that, I spent many years in and out of hospitals as a youngster and I have some pretty sweet scars stretching across my mid-section to prove it. My little sister never went under the knife, but we shared many years of taking nightly “kidney” medication and we now share a love for kidney humor.

“Kidney humor...."?? Yes, kidney humor. Trust me, there is such a thing. Have you ever seen the picture of me as a toddler in nothing but a diaper and shoes holding a bag of my own urine that is connected to a tube coming out the side of my body? Now that’s funny (probably not so funny to my parents at the time who had one very sick little girl on their hands).

My little sister is “my kidney”: should I ever have the need for a transplant, I have appointed her to give me a kidney, and she has (willingly?) accepted. So we make kidney jokes, and we laugh extra hard at the episode of 30 Rock where Jack is going to give his dad a kidney. We've also been known to say "I love you with all of my kidney".

And because of all this, my day was made when my sister emailed me the following picture:


HA! Greatest kidney humor ever!

via

A New Approach

My sister shares some incredibly encouraging thoughts on scripture reading. I definitely need encouragement in this area, and she expresses much of what I've thought or felt in a new way. Here is her conclusion:

I like the food analogy. There is a time for feasting. There is a time for life-changing, emotional encounters with God's Holy Word. It's like Christmas dinner (which, some would argue, can be a life-changing, emotional experience itself). And when the time comes for such an experience, it should be treasured, celebrated, enjoyed, and valued. But it might not be the norm. And it certainly isn't necessary on a daily basis.

Sometimes you just need a piece of toast to hold you over until dinner.

The funny thing is that these "forgettable" meals are actually the important ones. They are the life-sustaining ones. You can live without an annual Christmas feast. You can't live without all of your forgettable meals. You would probably only eat on holidays and even then, you wouldn't be able to enjoy it. Your stomach would be so shriveled - so familiar with your starvation-that the feast would sicken you.

So, here's to a new approach to Scripture in 2011! May it be a life-sustaining year. And may it prepare me for the feast, should it come.

2010: By the Numbers

States Visited: 6 (HI, WI, TX, CA, LA, IL)

Countries Visited: 3 (Finland, Lithuania, Latvia)
Weddings Attended: 5
Trips to the Cabin: 12
Triathlons: 0
5Ks: 3
Trips to Green Bay: 2
Football Games (in person): 4 (3 pro, 1 college)
Blog Posts: 99
Half-Marathons: 1

Funerals: 2 (both of my Grandmas passed away this year)
Books Read: 13
Times Pulled Over: 0 (WOO HOO!!)
Dates: 1
Resolutions Kept: 1 (half-marathon)

.....and MANY babies born to good friends!!

New Year, Similar Intentions

I had some pretty simple resolutions as I went into 2010. Read my Bible, run a half-marathon, and possibly complete another Olympic triathlon. My bigger focus in my resolutions/intentions revolved around the core values that I developed for myself around this time last year.

I'm really thankful for the focus that having core values has provided for me over the last year. Because of that, I intend to approach this year with pretty much the same resolutions/intentions (read my Bible, run a half-marathon, possibly complete another Olympic triathlon, and focus on my core values). There are a lot of little things I need to improve on (drink more water, work out more consistently, eat a more balanced diet, etc......), but I always try to implement too many changes all at once and then none of them stick. So.....small, consistent changes are what I'm going for.

I do have one BIG goal for 2011........to not use a credit card. This will be a STRETCH goal for me, but I need to make this change. I think that if I can maintain some discipline in this area, it will spill over into other things I desire - less clutter, less materialism, fewer piles of clothes all over.......

Oh, also.....I'm still single. Which means I'm still waiting. And I know that waiting is not unique to being single, so I thought I would share a quote that I came across that I thought was encouraging.

"To wait is not merely to remain impassive. It is to expect -- to look for with patience, and also with submission. It is to long for, but not impatiently; to look for, but not to fret at the delay; to watch for, but not restlessly; to feel that if he does not come, we will acquiesce, and yet to refuse to let the mind acquiesce in the feeling that he will not come." - Dr. A.B. Davidson, Waiting on God (quoted in The Hidden Life of Prayer by David McIntyre)

So, here's to a great year - one full of love, belief, hospitality, generosity, service, prayer, and joy!