Catching up with The Schiff's

As I said, I"m making it my personal goal to update this at least once a week from now until the end of the year. Let's see how this goes. Anyway, let's do some catching up on the Schiff's. After all, that is what this blog is about, right? Our family and the kids! :) 

A lot has happened since I truly updated this blog... Jesse got a new job! He got hired on with a company after working for a contractor for a year. We get FREE health insurance (amazing) and to top it off, he just got a pay raise. We took a few pay cuts with the past few jobs but now, we're back in business. :) The new mines that he is working at is also a 20 minute drive from home... so much better than the hour drive he was doing. The only downside is that he works like crazy and only gets every other Saturday off (maybe). Sundays are always a day off. The upside to that is more money...which means more things getting paid off... which also means a GOOD Christmas for the boys...which also means tht we are doing very well at the moment. BUT, we all know how our life goes so I don't want to get too caught up in the moment. But yeah, life is good. Let's pray it stays this way. 

Gabriel started Pre-K this year. Seriously! WHAT!? I debated on him going but since his friend Madilyn was going to be in his class, we decided to take the big plunge and send him. It's only 3 hours a day, but heck- he seems to love it. A future blog post about this subject will happen with much more detail. 

A few weeks ago the boys had their friend, Luke stay the whole weekend. It was soooo much fun. I just loved turning the monitor on and listening to Gabe and Luke have a conversation when I put them to bed. It was so darn cute. We had a busy weekend... again, blog post on this will happen soon as well. 

Other than that, it's just the usual grind around this house. Summer has come and gone and it's officially FALL! I LOVE FALL! Who's with me? I LOVE everything about fall... especially the fact that I get to where hoodies and UGGS and not feel bad about it. haha. Lincoln is his crazy, busy normal self. That little boy sure keeps us on his toes. About 2 months ago he fell while playing with Gabriel, hit the corner of our tv stand, and cracked a hole in his head. I. WAS. TERRIFIED. Luckily Jesse was home and was able to calm us both down. I took him to the emergency room and waited 2 hours only for them to tell me that it was already healing and nothing to be concerned about. I'm really glad I sat in a waiting room full of sick people to be told that. YEah, a lot of fun. Seriously though, that little boy climbs on everything. We joke and say that he is constantly trying to find a way to kill himself... but the sad thing is, it's true. Everything he's not supposed to do, he does. We recently moved both boys into their own room (they share). We'd always wake up to find them both standing at the door. We just couldn't figure out how Lincoln was getting out (we never had this problem with Gabe) because he never did this while he was still sleeping downstairs. Well, obviously he was climbing out... so we turned his crib into a daybed. Now, he just climbs into bed with his big bro every night. It has got to be the cutest thing I ever did see. They truly are best friends and I Love that. 

I still can't comprehend that Christmas is almost here! Where in the world did this year go!? I've gotten a little headstart on my Christmas Shopping... but we still have quite a bit to get. I had made a list of specific things I wanted to get the boys... I've gotten most of the things on my list. Now, it's just a mtter of finding little toys here and there for them. Again, this year we aren't buying all BRAND NEW toys. For as much as the boys play with things, we figure buying some used things is just as good. They'll never know- plus it saves us a bunch of money. I mean really, toys are EXPENSIVE these days. We spend a certain amount on each boy (give or take)... so I set aside 1/2 of that amount for brand new toys and the other half for some used things we find at goodwill, savers and swap pages on fb. Gabe really wanted a pirate ship and a big firetruck. I got lucky and found both at the kidsignment sale this past month. I spent 10 bucks on a ship that is normally $45... and 5 bucks on a huge firetruck that I'm sure both boys will love. I also found 2 Imaginext dino's for $5 on a swap site that Gabriel is going to love. One big present that I'd like to get Gabriel is a Tricycle. He seems to really like them now... so we told Santa that's what he wants. haha. :) I'll post more on our Christmas shopping later... once we're all done. Don't want to give everything away now! 

Ummm, did I mention that I had my first Migraine/Sinus Headache last month. OH. MY. GOSH. I honestly don't know how people with chronic migraines do it. I had one for 1 day and thought I was going to die. Literally. Well, more like I wanted to just crawl in a hole and not come out until it was better. This thing woke me up at like 4:30 am... it was the WORST Headache pain I've ever had in my life. I thought I had had a migraine before but after this one I now know I was wrong. Anyway, I took everything I could that day... tylenol, excedrin, ibuprofen and nothing worked. I couldn't even move without my head pounding. I couldn't sleep because the pain was so bad. Plus, I had to take care of both boys who just didn't understand that Mommy was in terrible pain. I took all the advice people gave me... Wrapped my neck and head in a cold towel, took a warm bath, kept all of the lights off, took excedrin migraine, drank caffeeine... NOTHING worked. I just got sick and threw up anything that I tried to eat or drink... which wasn't much bc I didn't eat hardly anything because my head hurt too bad to even walk to the kitchen. So eventually, I was just throwing up water and tea. YUCK! ARound 5 that evening my mom ended up taking me to an Urgent Care Clinic. The PA came in and after discovering that this was my first migraine, she sent me to the ER to make sure it was nothing serious. We had both boys with us and sitting in an ER with them just wasn't going to work. So I decided to just go home and tough it out. Thankfully, my dad met us on our way back and turned around and took me to the ER. We were there for several hours... I got a CT scan to make sure there wasn't anything serious. Thank God it came back clear. The dr. came in, asked me a few questions, and then pressed on all my sinus points. He then concluded that it was a Sinus headache and said the goal was to get my pain level down. Honestly, my pain was at 10! It took them FOREVER to bring me medicine. So there we were... sitting in a dark room because the light hurt. Finally the nurse showed up with a round of meds that was supposed to make me feel better. I got a steroid shot, Zofran, Sudafed and Dilauded for pain. It took another hour or 2 for those to even kick in. They sent me home with some medicine and pain killer to take if it got worse. I came home and sat on the couch for about 2 hours, drinking tea- waiting to feel well enough to go to bed and sleep. I had gotten sick on the way home and threw up.. again. So there I sayt... just waiting to feel better and not throw up anymore. FInally, I made it to bed (Jesse was sleeping and getting up for work a few hours later) and slept the whole night. My mom took th eboys to her house... knowing that I was in no shape to take care of them that night. Plus, it was close to midnight by the time we got home... and the boys were already asleep. They didn't mind getting to have a sleepover with Mama & Papa though. I woke up the next morning feeling much, much better. Never again do I want to experience a painful headache like that one. I honestly just wanted to curl up in a ball, crawl into a hole and never come out. 

Alright, that's about all I got for tonight. My house needs picked up and then I'm going to bed. We're going to the pumpkin patch and a birthday party tomorrow... so I need some sleep! :) 

Have a good one!