Poor Joel

If you were to spend any length of time with my family, at some point someone would made the comment "Poor Joel".  It has become a family joke.  And yes, it has to do with my husband, Joel.  

Here's the scoop...

Several years ago my grandma Cowell was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.  She happened to live in a nursing home in West Des Moines, which made it easier for her family (us) to visit her.  My grandma Cowell was a wonderful, fun lady.  I always stayed at her house for one week every summer.  It was a time for just grandma and me.  Seeing her reduced to a dying woman who couldn't even remember her own name was heartbreaking.  Needless to say, it was hard to visit her.  One day my whole family went to say "HI!".  Nothing like being bombarded with a group of smiling giants when you don't know who or where you are!  

By this time grandma was bedridden.  We all filed into her room and formed a semi-circle around her bed.  Then, with smiles plastered on our faces, we willed grandma to remember who we were.  Sadly, she did not.  My mom went around the circle saying our names and how we were related to her, hoping for a response from grandma.  Here was Larry, grandma's son (and my dad).  Nothing.  Next was Salli, Larry's daughter (my sister).  Still nothing.  Then Aaron, Salli's husband.  Nada.  Down the line we went.  Finally it was my turn.  My mom "introduced" me and I smiled at grandma.  Nope, no recognition.  Then Joel was introduced as my husband.  An amazing thing happened.  Grandma's eyes lit up like she had just seen an angel! And here's how the conversation went down...

Mom:  "Do you know who this is?"

Grandma: "Oh yes!  It's Joel!"

Mom (said with glee):  "Yes, it's Joel.  He's Sara's husband."

Grandma (with a concerned look):  "Joel.  Poor Joel"

Mom:  "uh...."

Grandma Cowell didn't live much longer.  But she will remembered forever for many reasons; one of which is that, in a moment of clarity, she remembered Joel...and felt bad for him. 

A crack in the bone

I've been doing quite well with the running this spring.  I was faithful at getting outside and running a few miles 4-5 times per week.  Some days I only went 2 miles, others I ran longer.  And then I'd also go to the Y for strength training and other classes.  I was starting to feel my ab muscles come out of the fridge!  Yea for me!

So then a few weeks ago I decided to run pretty late at night.  I hate running after eating but I really felt like I needed to.  So off I went.  I figured if I started to feel sick, I'd just walk.  No big.  I pushed myself and ran 2 miles, even feeling a little 'off'.  The next morning was a Monday, my day off.  I got up, got the kids ready, and went off to the Y like normal.  I noticed that my right foot hurt a little but figured it was fine, maybe a strained muscle or something.  Later that day I happened to have a doctor's appointment.  By then I had changed out of my tennis shoes and into flip flops.  As I glanced down at my foot, I realized my right foot was super swollen.  Oh crap.  

Off the doctor I went and mentioned that my foot was enormous a tad swollen.  She pushed on a few spots and I almost jumped off the chair.  Not good.  So she sent me for an x-ray.  Working in radiology gets me some perks.  I had the x-ray then walked into the reading room and made the radiologist look at it right away.  The x-ray was normal.  No broken bones.  Then he told me stress fractures don't show up on x-rays right away.  They take a few weeks to show up.  Well, that's just dumb.  I figured I'd wait a few weeks and see how my foot responded to Aleve.  It didn't.  It was still super swollen and painful.  So painful that I had to be put on Vicodin just to get through the day. My doctor felt that seeing a foot surgeon was a good idea.  

So off the foot surgeon I went.  I really thought he's push on my foot and say it was a tendon or muscle issue, get some physical therapy and time.  I was prepared for that.  What I was NOT prepared for was for him to push on a few spots on my foot and announce that I have a stress fracture in 2 places.  As if that wasn't bad enough, I get the pleasure of wearing a boot for the next 6 weeks.  Oh, and no exercising whatsoever.  Shut. The. Front. Door.  I asked him what he meant by "no exercising".  He literally means NOTHING.  No elliptical, no running (well duh), no biking, no classes.  So what can I do?  I can ride a stationery bike at a slow pace or walk slowly.  Are you kidding me?  And the 2 races I'm signed up to do in a few weeks.  Nope.  Not so much.  Oh, and I'm not supposed to drive either.  Joel's response to that?  He's not driving me around like Miss Daisy.  :)  I've gotten around that by taking off the boot to drive.  

The only good thing about the boot?  At least it's not a cast.  :)

Some days...

• I want to strangle my dog for pooping in the house.
• I feel like screaming at the top of my lungs.
• I want to go somewhere by myself and just listen to nature.
• I want to tell my kids that whining/complaining/being fussy is going to put mommy in an early grave.
• I want to strangle my husband for various reasons.
• I want ask all my patients that show up late for their appointment what was so important that they needed to waste my time.
• I want to ask the Title XIX patients how they can afford a better phone/purse/clothes than me.
• I want to clean my entire house from top to bottom then take pictures for memories' sake.
• I want to hug my kids the entire day.
• I want to eat an entire pizza and big vat of ice cream without gaining an ounce.
• I want to spend time with my best friend, and only my best friend.

I have many good days, some bad days, and a few really bad days.  No matter what happens, I love that I have a family who loves me, friends who like me, and a dog who tolerates me.  Life is good :)

The new addition...

We have a dog.  Yes, you read correctly...a DOG!  For the past few years we've known we would eventually get one but my standard answer was always "when Noah is older".  So did Noah miraculously potty train himself and both kids become independent?  Nope, not even a little.  However, my sister and her family got a dog so...we needed to one up them :)  They got a beautiful golden retriever for free.  We paid for our dog, however she came with training from a prison.  Who wins for coolest story??  US!  Boo-ya.  Go Team Jernstad!

So about the dog.  Her name is Bella.  She's a terrier mix of some sort.  (Read: Mutt)  She's 16 months old but she still kinda looks like a puppy (see pics below and you'll understand what I mean!).  She's a "medium" size dog, so about 40 lbs or so.  We researched dogs forEVER and came across Bella while looking at websites for area shelters.  She was at a county shelter in Newton.  So off we went to look at her.  We immediately fell in love.  She was great with the kids, excited to have human interaction but calmed down very quickly.  The shelter people told us she needed to complete her prison training.  Shut. The. Front. Door.  What?  Did she commit a crime?  Will she be out on probation?  Apparently at this particular shelter, dogs go through obedience training at the state prison.  The inmates train the dogs in basic commands and work with them to break bad behaviors that may prevent them from being adopted.  The shelter told us that Bella had just started her 4-week stint but if we wanted her to skip the training, we could take her home right then.  We opted to let her do it.

So fast forward to this past weekend when we were able to pick her up from the shelter.  My kids were thrilled out of their minds.  We have spent the past few days running around outside with her, cuddling on the couch, and taking walks.  Well, let's be honest...it's more like a crawl.  My kids aren't exactly fast walkers.  Add a leash in there and we're tripping on each other.  Joel has taken Bella on a few runs, which they LOVE.  By the end of the day Bella is wiped out.  Good thing she's still young.  :)

She's so eager to show her skill of sitting.

Sniffing Noah's hand.  She probably licked his hand the next second.  

You can kinda tell how big she is.  Sorta.

See what I mean about the puppy face?  I mean, seriously.  How could you not love this face??

More Ponderings...

Today was one of those days that self-introspection was needed.  We had a busy, busy weekend so my kids were off the wall crazy.  Luckily, Mondays are my Yoga day at the Y so it was nice to have peace and quiet, even for just an hour!

I always feel a little stupid while doing Yoga.  I've only done it a few times so I'm sure I look pathetic, but besides that, I'm not really into the whole "balanced aura" thing.  Still, Yoga does really force you to think about your life.

So as I pondered things, I started thinking about friendship.  What makes a friend?  Is it being the same age/gender/marital status?  For some that's all it takes.  For others, they yearn for something deeper than just the superficial statuses.  In grade school all it took to find a best friend was sharing the same toys.  In Jr. High, it was mutual hatred for something.  Be it boys, a certain girl, parents, life.  Jr. High was always awkward.  Then in high school, friends were made by liking the same activities.  You're a band geek?  Me too!  Let's be friends.  At graduation you'd swear you'd always keep in touch, but reality sets in.  Now looking back, I'm only close friends with one girl from high school.

Now in my 30's, friendships are made a little differently.  It seems that I'm drawn to those women who are in the same life position as me.  Married with children, have a career (even if it's a staying home with the kids), active, likes to goof off and have fun.  You'd think that'd be easy.  Nope.  It's amazing how much harder it is to make friends in my 30's!  I thought I'd join the church play group.  Nope, meets on a day I work.  So I thought I'd go to a women's retreat.  Couldn't do it.  I'm not into the whole "let's hold hands and rejoice that we're women" thing.  The only girl I want to hold hands with is my daughter.  After that, it's just weird.

So as I pondered while in the downward dog pose, I thought of all the friendships I've had over the years.  It took me a minute, not because I've had that many good friendships, but because I never think well with my butt up in the air.  Once we moved onto a different pose, the pondering commenced.

I'm in a stage in my life where friendship is more important to me than it ever has been.  My stress level has skyrocketed over the past few months.  Joel can only listen to me vent for so long before he starts to get that glazed over look.  We all need girlfriends who can understand how frustrating it is to work out constantly and not lose weight.  Or make an awesome dinner, only to have your 5-year-old gag while eating it (that happened tonight!).  And who doesn't want to share the awesomeness of pedicures with a close friend?  It's always nice to have someone with you when you can't understand the technician.  Between the 2 of you, surely you can translate.  :)

As my Yoga class came to an end, I thought to myself, it's time to work on the friendships I have and appreciate those who make me who I am.

And I also need to work on my Yoga poses.  I look ridiculous.

You're standing on Jesus!

Joel has an enormous family.  He's 1 of 6 kids, and the only boy.  You can imagine how awesome it was to be the only girl marrying into that family.  Truly, his family is great though.  His family is also quite fertile.  Three of his sisters have 5 kids each.  Some quick math and you can see that's already 15 grandkids for his parents.  Add in our 2, plus another 2 and you get...19 grandkids.  Yep, fertile bunch.

So his family likes to get together for every most birthdays for the 19 grandkids.  The problem is that no one has a house big enough to hold everyone.  Our house is the largest and that's just sad.  Still, we all pile on top of each other to have family togetherness time.  It's exhausting stressful suffocating wonderful.  :)

Last night happened to be one of those birthday party get togethers.  It was for Joel's nephew, Nathan's 14th birthday.  Nathan's mom (Joel's sister), Annette and family live in BFE the Indianola area on a big huge acreage so there's a ton of land, but a small-ish house.  As usual, we all crammed in there, hoping everyone had showered recently.  I'm glad to say no one smelled.  Yea for us...and soap.

Because they have so much land, and it was the day before Easter, it was decided to have an Easter egg hunt.  One of Joel's many sisters went out to hide the eggs while Joel and I entertained the kids inside.  Instead of being enthralled by Joel and my skills, the kids just wanted to crowd around the front door waiting for the signal that the hunt to begin.  This of course meant that all the kids were falling and stepping all over each other.  At some point in all the raucous we heard a little voice scream, "NATHAN!  You're stepping on Jesus!"

After a moment of silence we realized that a Easter decoration showing Jesus rising from the dead had fallen off the front door and Nathan was stepping directly on Jesus' face.

Oops.

After saving Jesus from Nathan's shoe print, the hunt commenced and all was well.  Next year perhaps we'll put away the Jesus decorations before the kids take over the place.  Did I mention there are 19 of them?

Happy Easter all!

Easter Goats

I know that most people think of bunnies when they think of Easter.  I don't have any stories about bunnies, although we did have 2 for a short time.  They just sat in their cage and pooped...a lot.  It was always gross to clean out their cages.  Perhaps that's why we only had them for such a short time.

However, I have a story about goats.  As in...when I was growing up, we raised goats.

Yep, sure did.  I can't remember when we got our first goat.  I just remember having them.  Now before you think I grew up somewhere in Podunk country, let me just say that we only had the goats in the summer.  One of the men in our church was a farmer.  He always had baby goats that needed to be fed and cared for.  Apparently goats are born in the spring?  That may not be true.  I'm going with it though.

So as soon as school was out for the summer, the goats would arrive.  I can't remember how many we had, maybe 4?  We had a pen in our back yard.  Oh yes, the goat pen.  We lived on an acreage so we had plenty of space for a pen.  It was a pretty big area, fenced in and even complete with a little house for them.  So we had goats.  Because they were baby goats, they had to be bottle fed.  Remember those old Pepsi bottles?  Ya know, the big glass ones?  They aren't made anymore.  Something about the environment, although HELLO!  We were reusing them!  We were being "green" before there was an app for that.  But I digress...so each morning we'd get up, make a bottle up for the goats and go feed them.  Their milk was made from powdered milk.  I'm sure there was something else in there too but I was like 8 when this was going on.  My memory is only so good!  We'd have to attach a nipple on to the bottle and off we went.  At the time I never really thought of how large that nipple was.  Now I think, DANG!  Those suckers were huge!  The goats would gulp down that milk like they were starving.  I remember my sister and I going out to feed the goats.  For some reason we got such pleasure out of feeding them.

I've been asked why in the world we had goats.  Honestly, I have no blessed idea.  I'm sure our parents wanted us to learn about livestock or something.  Maybe be comfortable around animals??  Whatever the reason, we raised goats every summer.  We never thought that was odd.  It just...was.  Now I look back and think...huh.  We raised goats.  And fed them milk from Pepsi bottles with HUGE nipples attached.  Perhaps that is a tad...odd.