Amundsen House of Chaos

Let's face it, when you have a kid who survived a stroke, life is always going to be a little chaotic.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

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Wednesday Night Fun

Have I ever mentioned how much my husband LOVES fire? He does. His favorite thing(or one of them anyway) to do in summer is to have fires. Scratch that. His favorite thing all year is to have fires. We are the family out roasting marshmallows in 5 degree weather in the winter. Anyway last night he decides to build a fire. The kids are asleep and our friends have come over to hang out for a bit. Then Colby decides at 9:00 that he's missing out on the fun and needs to wake up. So he comes out to play with J. and W. who have been having fun in the garage while we chat. All in all a good night with good friends.


Me and my insane husband. Please don't hurt your eyes on my neon legs.


Sgt. Johnson trying to be rude! I believe he was doing something was his middle finger but I didn't get the right angle. Darn!


And the boys hanging out in the garage. I think this is around 10:45. Watching Curious George on the tv. They are way to cool to smile for a picture.

Monday, July 27, 2009

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Say a prayer

I follow MckMama on her blog and her baby boy is not doing well. Can everybody say a prayer for them.


Prayers for Stellan


Having had a child in a similiar situation (walking the line between life and death) I've become rather attached to little stellan. His life has inspired many in a short amount of time. If you want to read more about them you can visit her blog. But for now I'll just continue to pray for their support and comfort and healing. Thanks for letting me pass that on.

Monday, July 20, 2009

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Not My Child Monday

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Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.


Today is Not My Child Monday instead of Not Me Monday. Something a little fun and different and boy do my kids have a bunch.

My Riley would never color on herself, repeatedly, every day for the last 3 weeks. Not Riley. She would never color the wall on the stairs from the bottom all the way to the top and come find me and tell me "I colored pretty mommy". This same child would not force us to paint the stair way wall because the permanent marker wouldn't come off. (I swear I threw away all the permanent markers just so this wouldn't happen!) Not my child.

This same child would never get into the butter and smear it all over marshmallows and eat them in the middle of the kitchen. Yuck that would be disgusting. Riley wouldn't do that.

She also wouldn't smear all of the diaper rash cream into her shirts and shorts three days in a row! Ruining three outfits. That would be ridiculous. Where she got these diaper rash creams I have yet to figure out. The one I bought because the other three mysteriously disappeared is still safe, very high up in Colby's dresser. Are you starting to see a trend here?

Riley also wouldn't stash fruit snacks, bug juice and water bottles in her toy box in her room. She is not a squirrel who is getting ready to hibernate. I swear she is not! You might think so after this last week though.

Jahnna would never walk out of Sam's club with her father telling everyone standing in line that they didn't have a receipt making it seem like they were stealing something. My child has more respect for adults than that. She would also listen when I tell her that she doesn't need to tell every single person in Wal-mart that her brother had a stroke and is in a wheelchair. Even when he's not there. This would not cause people to look at me like my child and I are both crazy. My child wouldn't do that.

Jahnna would never stick stickers on her headboard at night with chapstick while she was supposed to be sleeping. Whose child would do that? Not mine.

At last Colby would never proceed to scream his head off at his nurse (who has worked with us for 18 months) for 3 hours just because he doesn't feel like he needs to have a nurse. He wouldn't purposely throw up so that Mom would have to stay by him for a few more minutes instead of getting dinner on the table. (He told me yes when I asked him if he did it on purpose and then grinned! Stinker!) Colby also would never wake up every hour of the night because he is thirsty. No child in the world is that thirsty. Especially when they are on enough sleeping drugs to knock out two adults for 48 hours. My children always sleep through the night regardless of them having a stroke or being totally healthy. Riley wouldn't wake up three times a night for the last week either. That would be beyond ridiculous for a two year.

And finally Riley just brought me an empty cup and told me it was all gone. When I asked her where it was she did not bring me a fish net and say "It's in the net" And that was just while I was typing this. I'm almost afraid to go find where the water went.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

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Where have we been?

Goodness time flies when your not doing anything! The last few weeks I've been hanging out with the kids and haven't had a whole lot of time to post anything.

We've had a bit of fun. We went to the car show and hung out with John over the 4th of July. Well we were actually there the third but he had to work the booth on the 4th. Jahnna went with him Thursday morning and had a blast playing guitar hero on the big tv in the back of the army H3 hummer. There was a traveling drill sgt there who was challenging kids to push up competitions. It was the usual army booth but we hung out and strolled around looking at the cars with Grandpa Amundsen and cousin Kaleb. Then on the 4th we went over to Grandma and Grandpa Amundsens for a tri tip bbq and fireworks. The kids had a ton of fun. Colby got fussy and had to sleep during the fireworks. I think the noises and lights are a little to much sensory overload for him still.

Last Saturday I took Jahnna and Colby to the local swimming pool. They are awesome and open it up to people with disabilities and their families from 10 - 11:30 saturday morning. It was packed! Colby loved it for an hour and then went to sleep for the last half hour while I held him in the warm water. Jahnna was a little fish. I was trying to teach her how to float on her back but I had to hold Colby with my left arm and try and support her with my right arm. (I did used to teach swim lessons so it's easier for me than it sounds) Anyway she wasn't having any part of that and promptly decided to sink. She's flailing (is that a word or did I just make it up?) around and I just look at her and tell her to put her feet down. We were in 2 feet of water and she's drowning. The kid is 4 feet tall. She just had her doctor appt so I know she's exactly 4 feet tall. She stands up and it comes up to her hip and she stomps her foot and says I'm not swimming anymore. So much for persistence. Anyway the pool has life jackets out for all sizes so her and Tia went over and got themselves life jackets. Then she was unstoppable. One of these days I'll get her into swim lessons but for now we'll be headed back on Saturday. I might even be brave and take Riley one of these weeks. She loves Fwimming. That's how she says it!

Colby got his 4 year old shots last week. Then he didn't sleep for the rest of the week. Finally last night he slept his usual 4 1/2 hour stretch and then was back to being up every two hours after. That's such a blessing when he's been up every hour for the last week. He's in the 5th percent for height but he finally passed the 36 inch mark! Hallelujah I thought he'd never be 3 feet tall! But he's in the 50th for weight. I was shocked to find out he's gained 3 kilos or 6.6 pounds in the last six months. For the first year after his stroke he stayed the same 12.8 kilos. I thought he'd never gain or grow. But he finally has! The doctor asked me if I was sure I wanted to give him all four shots at once. I said you better because if we do it one at a time he'll have reactions to each one and we'll just drag it out so this way we'll just get it done and over with all at once! Poor kiddo. He's such a trooper he started to cry and I said we're all done and he didn't even shed a tear!

Riley had her appt the same day. She's in the 50th percent for height and the 5th for weight. Funny that they are opposites! She got two shots. Screamed for a second. The nurse said do you want a sucker and she said Yup! Then she was good to go. I'm excited that she to has put on 6 pounds in the last six months and has hit the 2 feet mark! I was a little worried about her for awhile. They started talking about failure to thrive and that nonsense and I figured we didn't need to add a third kid with a medical diagnosis.

Well that's about it from here. Oh Colby is back at preschool and is doing so much better on the bus ride home. He doesn't cry anymore. I think the antidepressant change was a good thing. And he's finally on the division of services for people with disabilities (dspd for short)waiting list for funding. It's need based so there's a chance he might never get it but at least if your on the list then you might get it some day. They help with things like diapers and respite services and stuff like that. Anyway really that is all. I'll end with a pic of John playing guitar hero. It's a rough life at the car show!

Monday, July 6, 2009

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Not Me Monday



It's been a couple of weeks since I did this so you'd think I'd have more to say but I don't. So here are mine.

I didn't totally steal the post two below this one from another blog and repost it. I wouldn't dream of doing that. (All thought I did give credit to the original poster!) I wouldn't think that everyone needs to read the parents of special needs kids bill of rights and shamelessly promote it on facebook either!

I wouldn't change the name of my blog from Amundsen house of Chaos to Amundsen house of peace in an effort to calm down our crazy life. Not me that would be kind of silly don't you think!

I wouldn't forget to bring the camera to take pictures of the kids on the fourth of july. (Hence the reason there are no pictures with this post!) Then I wouldn't find it this morning while packing Colby's backpack for preschool and realize that I had the stinking camera all along. I also wouldn't put Colby to sleep during the fireworks because he got so spastic and was screaming so much I couldn't hold him. That would be horrible!

I also wouldn't be around anyone who had bought illegal fireworks in Wyoming and brought them back to light off on the fourth! All thought I gotta say that Ladybugs are my new all time favorite firework! To keep from incriminating the guilty I will just say Thanks for a great show!

I also wouldn't stay home from the city fireworks and tell my girls that the 1/4 of the fireworks we could see over a neighbors house was all they would see if we went down to sit on the hill down the street. Who would tell a lie like that to their children!?!

And last I wouldn't let my two year old steal everyone's drinks at the cruise in car show this weekend. She would have enough manners to realize that she had her own drink and she certainly wouldn't leave floating deposits of crackers in at least three other recruiters drinks! Oh and lastly I would never have said that the traveling drill seargant was kind of a goofball and snicker about his push up contests behind his back! That would be so rude!!!!

Ok I guess I had a few more than I thought. Happy Monday everyone and I hope you have a fabulous week. I'll post pictures from the car show as soon as I find that camera again....

Thursday, July 2, 2009

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I Am A Worm

I've been trying to figure out a way to post a video of Riley on here. It is so funny. Unfortunately I just found out that the recorder we have is meant to just be a point, shoot and view with no software to convert it off the little mini discs. So I'm looking at some other options.

Anyway Riley has been so funny lately. The other day she was doing her "I'm Riley" routine and John told her she was a worm. So she says I am a worm. Very pronounced with deep breathes in between each word. Then John tells her he is a king. So she says You are a king the same way. Then she says I am a worm you are a king go to work. When she's being onery now she will look at you and say You are not mommy you are a worm. She has dubbed Jahnna the dancing princess and Colby is a prince. I've got to figure out a way to get the video on here and as soon as I do that I'll get it posted. Kids are funny and Riley is a worm.