Happy New Year 2009!

New Year's Eve is one of my favorite days of the year. I think I'd love it even if it wasn't my birthday. I don't feel the need to celebrate my getting older (because, as I've told my kids, I'm 21 again until Justin is 21), but I do want to do something fun that night.

This year my mom came over around noon with a German Chocolate Cake and a gift. When she handed it to me she said she bet I couldn't guess what it was. I took it out of the bag, and it was wrapped in tissue paper. I felt it, and said, "I know what it is." Natalie was sitting next to me, totally excited that I was opening my present and about to guess at its contents. I said, "It's a box! Oh, it's just what I wanted!" Natalie looked at me, rolled her eyes and sighed. (Yes, she already does this, and well, at age 5. I just wish Kent had snapped a picture of that moment. It was hilarious!) She didn't appreciate my humor, apparently. So I finished opening it, and it was a lighted mirror with 2 mirrors, one of them 8X magnification. It's great for plucking my eyebrows, but it's a little too much honesty when you're not looking your best.

After my mom gave me my gift, the kids were chomping at the bit for Kent to give me my gift from him. He gave me Guitar Hero- Aerosmith. Yay! He thinks it's the dumbest thing ever, but he doesn't have to play it. He can go on upstairs and play Rock Band. After I opened that gift, Trevor ran to his room and came out with a book he'd written a couple of years ago and his light-up fan thing... best description I can come up with right now. It's kind of like a lava lamp with a bunch of "bristles" sticking out of it. Then Drew joined us, saw me open Trevor's gift, and he ran upstairs. He got a travel game that he'd just got at a fast food restaurant and a golf ball, wrapped them in a blanket and brought me my gift. To make it extra special he put the golf ball in his mouth just before giving it to me. What a thoughtful young man he is.That night we hosted our annual New Year's Eve party. I did a terrible job getting invitations out this year. I started passing them out on Sunday. I meant to give them out at least a week earlier, but got busy and forgot about it until it was too late. Whoops! Anyway... We started at Arriba's Mexican Grill, and after we were done there we came back to the house to play board games and have dessert. I served my famous homemade Perfect Chocolate Cake. I also made salsa, but we were all stuffed from dinner so didn't end up eating any of that. We played Apples to Apples and Imaginif. Here are the people that came to the house... Marie and Kevin Willis had to head home after dinner, but it was fun to visit with them at dinner. Kent and ILori and Kris BreonJenn and Derek DeTemple Joseph and Shanna Johnson

After everyone left I got out my new game from Kent and played that for a while. Then I played Rayman Raving Rabbids TV game. Before I knew it it was almost 3 a.m.! Wow! Time flies...

I slept in the next morning for obvious reasons. Then I started cleaning and reorganizing my office. I made a trip to Target and got some storage boxes so that I could get that all done. Things were going well until about dinnertime last night. That's when my voice decided to take a vacation from me. Natalie kept telling me to clear my throat so that I could talk. When it didn't work she got pretty upset at me. I kept taking my Mucinex and saline nasal spray to see if that would help, and we even slept with a humidifier. However, this morning my voice was still gone, and now my lungs were starting to hurt... not a good sign for an asthmatic.

Nevertheless I took Justin to his doctor's appointment (follow up with his podiatrist for his Sever's disease and plantar fasciitis), then to Target to get some more storage boxes, and birthday gifts for one of my sisters, my mom and a niece. On the way back home we stopped at Arby's for a roast beef sandwich, and I decided I'd better stop at urgent care so I could get a hold on this as my lungs were really starting to hurt. I'd brought a book with me (good thing because the wait was over an hour and a half), Justin walked over to the gym, and when he was done Kent came to get him. When I was finally able to see the doctor he diagnosed me with acute laryngitis (no big surprise) and bronchitis, which given the sore lungs, wasn't a surprise either. I'm supposed to not talk for 2-3 days, rest and drink lots of fluids. I guess he missed the part about me having 4 kids. The older 2 can read, but the younger 2 can't. He gave me a couple of prescriptions, which meant I had to make another trip to Target. Hopefully I'll start to get my voice back soon. I literally make no sound. There is an occasional squeak, so I know my voice will eventually come back. But it's frustrating to "yell" at the kids and have almost no sound come out.