quarter of a century.

next week, ill be 25. that's a quarter of a century. holy shit! also, in two days, Katy will be two. were having a birthday party tonight for her with her favorite nurse who won't be here on her birthday.
on the 29th, Landon will be one. where did the past year go!? Abbie will be 7 in June. and! Ryan and i will be married a year in July! ah! its been such a good year! until we found out Katy has cancer.
but, were getting through. I asked Katy what she wanted for her birthday and she told me "to not be sick momma!" if I could only give her that gift!
she is doing very good. she's tolerating the chemo well. her doctors don't hide anything from me. they tell me when shes not doing well. I catch them late at night in the cafeteria a lot when I'm getting coffee or ill see them in the hall on my way and we'll sit and have coffee together. her oncologist said depending on how well she's doing, if theirs any cancer left, etc. she could go home before the end of summer. but dont get my hope up.

Katy update.

I'm so far behind in updating my blog. I decided that I wanted to go back to school for nursing. Which after Governor Corbett getting Boyd into office, was probably one of the smarter things I've done in the past 8 years. With budget cuts, positions are going to be cut and my position is high on the list.

Class, a new house, 4 kids, and also finding out that were expecting our fifth child in mid august had made our lives crazy.

Those aren't the only things, though. If you follow me on Twitter, you know Katy has been sick.

In February I took her to the doctors because she was having balance problems and they told me nothing was wrong. Towards the middle of February I noticed it was getting worse, so I took her to the emergency room. Once again, nothing is wrong. Finally, at the end of February they did an MRI and found a tumor on her brain stem. They took a biopsy a few days later and we found out that it was indeed cancer. She has a brain stem glioma. Until last week she was monitored closely by her oncologist to make sure the tumor didn't grow. There were no empty beds open on the oncology wing and she didn't feel comfortable admitting her to the regular floor of the childrens hospital. Last Monday, April 4, Katy had a seizure. I called my professor and explained the situation as to why i wouldn't be in class. I called the ambulance because their was no way we were sitting in the waiting room. That night she was admitted to the pediatric oncology wing.

Today was the first her surgeon had available to operate. He doesn't normally operate on Tuesdays but felt she needed this tumor out now. The two residents came in at 5am and took her to pre op to prep her. They wheeled her back around 6:45. We talked to the doctor sometime after 1. He said they didn't get as much of the tumor as they would like, but they got the majority of it. Her heart rate and blood pressure started to drop so they felt it was safer to just stop there. They're going to monitor the growth over the next few weeks/months.

Katy is currently sleeping. She's spending the night in the PICU for observation.

I have a meeting with her oncologist at 4:30.

I think that's all. I'll try to keep the blog updated, but it'll just easier to follow me on Twitter @rnicole8604

Loooong overdue

I'm sorry about the silence on the blog. I've been so busy and just haven't had the time for the blog or Twitter. I'll hopefully be around more after the holidays.

Here's what's been going on:
 
-I got married and spent a week in France for our honeymoon. It was absolutely amazing!   
-I started school. I decided to stay with my current district for at least this year. I'm going to start looking for jobs in the spring. 
-we realized that we outgrew our house.. Even with my sisters family gone. 
-we started looking for houses, almost bought a house in Tennessee, but it was sold before we got a chance to put an offer in on it.
 -I decided I would rather not move out of state and started looking at homes closer to where we live. 
-we found a house we liked in palmyra It's only 4 bedrooms, but overall it's much bigger than our current house. If needed it has an office on the first floor that could be turned into a bedroom because it most likely won't be an office.  
-we put an offer in.. And got the house!!! :)
-we moved the third weekend in October and have been painting and unpacking since we've moved. We did get some painting done before we moved, but not much.  
-the only bad thing about the house is we moved to a new school district. But I have no doubt that Abbie will do fine. She has developed into a social butterfly and interacts well with others. 

This is what's best for our family and it's best we moved while all the kids are still young and while Abbie isn't too far into school. I would have loved to wait until the end of the school year because I don't want her to have to try and make all new friends in the middle of the school year, but that's just too far away and it was best we get the move done now.

-I just realized Landon turns six months old in two days! 
Where has the time gone. He is growing up so much. Give me some time and I'll put together an update on the kids too!
And Preston is going to be three in three months. 
My kids are growing up so fast :(   

Months of crazzyyy = new babyyy

Hey it's ash! 
If you read my last post, you know all that's been going on, if not, I'll try to do my best and tell you and you can go back and read it all. 
I moved to binghamton for a job. Had an amazing time there. I met an amazing man from Hershey, he's friends with my brother. We've been in a relationship since valentines day of this year and we are so happy together. I moved to Hershey over the summer, we started lookng for houses, found one and just recently found out that we got it. I was only supposed to have a short term sub job but it turned into a permanent position in the same district as rebecka. I told you I was expecting a child in november. We thought around the 13th. We later found out I was about a week ahead putting my due date at November 6th. 
Okay, I think that's everything from that post. 

In July I had an amniocentesis done. I did not want to have it done, but my doctor and boyfriend, both having medical knowledge (not in the same field), convinced me to have the amnio done. I had it done and my doctor called me and told me I should come in because he needed to talk to me and that my boyfriend, and to protect his privacy will be referred to as A from her on out, should come with me if he was not at work. Unfortunately he was at work in the middle of a surgery. Luckilly I was in Hershey that day so it would literally take me less than five minutes to walk from our apartment up to his office. 

When I got to his office, the receptionist said he was waiting for me and took me right back. I KNEW this couldn't be good. She took me directly into his personal office. This made things even worse. 

My doctor came in and had a horrified look on his face and he started off with "good afternoon Ashely" and continued with some medical junk which I'm pretty sure I zoned out during. He then got down to business and pulled some stuff out of a mamilla envelope and said "I have unforunate news, your sweet baby test positive for downs syndrome on your amnio." after that I'm pretty sure I just zoned out. I broke down. I put face in my hands and just cried. I cried for hours. Until this day I had no idea whether I was having a girl or a boy. I decided I wanted to know. We were having a boy. I decided on a name. I don't rememer what is was. But I changed it. 

On July 28th or 29th, really don't remember because I was so out of it, I was rushed to the ER by A because my blood pressure was so high. My doctor had been monitoring it and had been slightly high at previous appointments. I also had protein in my urine. 

I was admitted to the OB floor for monitoring. I started having very few contractions on the 31st. My blood pressure was getting extremely high. My doctor decided that if they didn't deliver the baby our lives would be in danger. They rushed me off to the OR.

At 11:37pm Conner sudhir was born at 14 weeks early. He was 1lb 11oz and 14in long. I spent an hour in recovery then was rolled into the NICU for a very brief moment to see him. I didn't remember what he looked like. I think I went to see him the next day, but i'm not sure, I was on a lot of medicine. They were still having trouble keeping my blood pressure normal. It wasn't as high but it was still high. I was on meds for that and a high dose of pain meds. 

After that first full day I spent almost all my time in the NICU with him. But when you have two other kids at home, a bf, an apartment, and a new job teaching a grade you've never taught before, it's hard! 

Conner is over 4lbs, eats from a bottle and isn't on any oxygen! He is coming home next Friday! That means we have to be moved into our new house by Friday.

They checked a few weeks after he was born and he showed no signs of downs syndrome! The test was a false positive! :) 

Today was my last day of work until the week before thanksgiving because Conner is going to need so much individual attention. The week of thanksgiving I'm going to do half days. My district is very understanding. Conner is going to be seeing a ton of specialists here at Hershey because he was premature. He already started seeing some during his stay at the hospital, but i'm sure he'll be seeing more. I know for sure he'll be seeing therapists. We already have an appointment set up with a pediatric neurologist for the Tuesday after he comes home. 

I'm so excited for him to come home! I've been waiting for this day for 2.5 months! I can't wait to hold him all the time! I've loved holding him since the first time I held him at 3 weeks old! 

I just thought I'd update you all! Have a good weekend (:
I'll try to update next weekend when he comes home and let you know how it's going, it'll probably be after a feeding in the middle of the night (;      

Wedding!+ honeymoon

We had an AMAZING wedding! I could not have asked for a better day. It was hot as hell but that's what you get at the beach :)
the honeymoon was amazing as well. More on that and the wedding later. But were home and had an amazing time! :) I need to catch up on my sleep + go through all the gifts, then I'll tell you all about the wedding and our time in France! :)

Wedding week!

It's wedding week! And things are crazy! Extremely crazy!
I got a letter from domestic relations saying that abbies father wants 50/50 custody.. Uh, no. He doesn't live in the same school district and. he hasn't had anything to do with her in I don't know how long. Why now that she's six? So pissed. I just opened the letter. I think it came friday. I'll keep you updated.

a year of crazy!

Hey it's a Ashely!
It's been forever since I've blogged and you probably don't remember me, but hey, that's ok :)
Anyway, I've had a crazy year and figured I'd update you incase you do remember me. If you remember after I graduated in December of 2008 from Penn State I went back home for the holidays and broke up with Natalie's dad because of many problems, it was for the better and the 3 of us couldn't be happier. Natalie is my younger daughter, she's going to be 2 this summer and Megan is my older daughter who will be 5 in September. I eventually returned to State College and had a long term substituting job until the end of the school year. In April I had to resign from my position because of health problems and move back home to New York. I was extremely sad about this. I started looking for jobs around my hometown doing anything in the school that I was qualified to do, I was willing to go work at McDonald's part time. I willing to do almost anything. I found a job in Binghamton and moved there in August and made some amazing friends. The last 11 months of life have probably been the best except for my 4 years of college. I couldn't ask for better people to meet. It was just my kids and I until I got a roommate in December who was going to be my student teacher in January. It was amazing. She's moving out at the end of the week and I'm moving out at the end of the month. I'm going to miss Callie (Cal) so much. We would stay up late talking about our problems or talking about just anything. We would go to dinner, go for ice cream, go for car rides, and go for walks together. She's like the sister I left back home. We were always together, except when she was with her boyfriend.

From the time I split with Natalie's dad until Valentine's day of this year, I remained single. It was just my kids and I. It was amazing and I couldn't have had it any other way. My boyfriend is amazing. We're only dating 4 months, but I'm moving down to Hershey to be with him because we're together every weekend and the drive is insane and it gets annoying. Also, we're expecting a child together on November 13th of this year. Before you ask, I was on the pill. But both of us couldn't be happier. I have a long term sub job down there for the first 6 weeks of the school year which will take me to the first week of October and then I think I'm going to just sub at the schools around him and then look for a job while I'm off with the baby. We definitely can't live on what he makes.. some people say we can, but we can't.

I think that is all.. wow. I'll hopefully try to post more, but I doubt that :) have a lovely summer. :D

confessions.

I don't always get along with my boyfriend like I should. We fight too much. But we make up super fast. And that's one thing I really like about him :)

I cry almost daily because my kids stress me out. I'm not perfect, therefore I don't react to them the way I should sometimes.

I tell my boyfriend I'm ok when I'm really not.

I let my kids stay up too late and I myself stay up too late.

I don't always eat healthy because I don't always have the time to, but I try to feed my kids as healthy as I can.

I try to be the best person that I can.. but that doesn't always happen. People get to you and you breakdown. You snap.

update.

Wow, i can't believe it's been so long since i've updated! I've been soo busy! Everyone is doing really well here!

Abbie is turn 6 in nine days! I can't believe she's turning 6 and she's going into 1st grade next year! I feel like it was just yesterday I was sitting in my bathroom with a positive pregnancy test and crying because I had no clue how I was going to balance my freshman year of college and a newborn, but here we are, 6 years later, and she's a healthy little girl and she's so smart. I'm so proud of her! She lost 1 tooth and has 1 loose one! She's going to play soccer in the fall and is just finishing t-ball!

Preston is doing fabulous too! He definitely calmed down a lot. He doesn't run around the house like a maniac. He plays with his sisters really well and can hold Landon really well, I'm really impressed! He's only 28 months old so I can't start him in pre-school yet this year, but I could next year if I wanted to but I don't think I will. I can't believe I'm already thinking about pre-school for him! geeze!

Katy is doing great too. She's walking everywhere and never stops. She has almost all her teeth I think, she never lets you look in her mouth so I never get a chance to look. She talks all the time. She says "mama" "dada" "caca" -cat "baba" -bottle "ball" plus some other and her gibberish :)

Landon is doing as good as a 2.5 week old can do! I can't believe he's 2.5 weeks old already. He barely cries. Only when somethings wrong or one of his sisters or brother bothers him. He eats like a champ! When he's awake in the middle of the night for a feeding he goes right back to sleep when I rock him. I am so in love with this kid! :)

Ryan is doing great. He is doing great with the kids. If i need a break he has no problem taking them to the park or letting me go to the bedroom for a little and playing with them. He's wonderful with them! He does not have a full time teaching job for next year so in a way that's good because it will save us money because he will be able to be home with the kids if he's not working. He's looking. I'm looking for a new job!

I'm doing great. I'm doing like 15-20 of the 30lbs I gained in the pregnancy. We walk everynight. It's great. I got a job offer at a school a little farther away but making more money. It would probably be more in the long run.. I have to figure it out. I'm not sure if I'm going to take it or not. I have to figure out what the area is like and at my district I didn't plan to go back to work until the 27th of September because I used 2 weeks of my maternity leave and was going to use the remaining 4 at the beginning of the year. I just need time to figure it out.

My sister Caitlin, the one that has lived in my basement for almost 2 years now, is moving out finally! Why? She's going back to college. She dropped out after she Brandon and Emalle even though she swore she wouldn't. She was majoring in nursing. She's going to Penn State main campus, with my brother, to major in Pre-med. Even though she'll have to go 4 years there and then 4 years to med school and then do at least a 4 year residency and not be done until she's 32, she's still going to do it. She really wants to do what's right for her family and I'm so proud of her! Because of Penn State UP rules, she'll have to live in a dorm for her freshman year and her boyfriend, Brandon, and Emalle are either getting an apartment up there or living with the family he has up there. Then her sophomore year they're going to get an apartment or some sort of off-campus housing. I could not be happier for her! :)

I forgot to mention, in 24 days, Ryan and I are getting married! :D

Hope you all are having a fantastic summer so far! :D

Landon gerald :)

After an almost 19 hour labor, I'm happy to announce the birth of a precious baby boy! 

Landon Gerald was born today, may 29th, at 4:49pm. He was 8lbs 1oz and 20in long. He has beautiful blue eyes and and a ton of hair! 

I could not be happier! 

No baby!

No baby yet. I'm thinking by wednesday. Ryan says by Friday, which is my birthday. Whatever.
We have decided on names.
If it's a boy it's going to start with an L. And the middle name will start with a G. Any guesses?
If it's a girl it's going to start with an S. And the middle name is going to start with an N. Any guesses?
What do you think I'm having?
Birthday?
Weight?
Length?
:)

Here's mine:
I've changed to boy. Not saying the name!
I'm guessing the 26th. 7lbs. 1oz. 19in.
Hoping for blue eyes too :)

Another baby update :D

I had another doctors appointment today, and I was 2cm dilated. I'm supposed to "relax and take it easy" until I deliver! 
He gave me a note and I'm off work until our first inservice day of next year! That made me pretty happy :) 
I'm thinking I'm going to go either this week or next!! :)   

Baby update!

-Everything is fine if you were wondering.. :)
-at my doctors appointment yesterday I was 1cm dilated! I've been feeling some pretty strong contractions every now and then but I don't think it's anything to be worried about!
-I'm due in 3 weeks and 3 days. That's pretty exciting. :)
-I'm pretty convinced that s/he is going to make his/her appearence before then.
-I'm also convinced s/he is going to be a big baby.
-Ryan thinks it's a boy. I think it's a girl. I hope it's a boy. But I really don't care. :)

Happy mothers day!

wordpress. a new start.

http://rebeckanicole.wordpress.com/

MOVING!

I think I'm going to try out wordpress. Once I have it set up with a post up I'll post the link :)
Be careful though, the link will change because mommymoments.wordpress.com wasn't available. i know, i was mad too.

• this weather sucks really bad. we've all been going for walks lately and now we can't.

• 119 days until july 10th, my wedding date.
  
• 80 days until june 1st, my due date.
  
• 76 days until may 28th, my birthday.
  
• 71 days until may 23rd, katy's birthday, and ryan and i's anniversary.
  

• i've been sick. a lot lately.
  
• i hate my job. it sucks. my school sucks.
  
• i have the best kids. i love them.
  
• i have the best fiance ever. he treats me amazingly (is that a word)
• this isn't a real post, but i don't care.
  
• i need to do laundry, but i don't care.
  

:)

you are... :)

730 days
17,532 hours
1,051,200 minutes
and
63,072,000 seconds old!
That's 2 whole years broken down little buddy!
Happy second birthday Preston!
And it just so happens we got to spend the day together today :)
I love you my little sweet prince!

formspring.me

What one thing are you exceptionally good at?

loving my family!

Ask me anything

formspring.me

When was the last time you received flowers?

Sunday :)

Ask me anything