Thinking

This last Friday, we went over to my parent's house for some grilled out hamburgers (seriously, are there many things that top that? I think not) with Bryan and Jessica. We taught them the card game GOLF, and got all caught up on life happenings :) While Bryan (who's in the police academy) and Jessica (who's finishing up nursing school) were catching us up, Chris leaned over to me and whispered "Wow, we are really boring", to which I "uh-huh"-ed...

Lately I've been thinking about medical school again. Since I was probably a Sophomore in HS, I have loved the idea of being a doctor, but I could never get used to the idea of 17 years in school (or is it 8? whatever :) My heart's desire is to have a ton of kids and stay at home with them (that's obviously not working for me at the moment), but that was my reasoning for not continuing school. A very close second is to be doctor. I have to catch myself before I travel to the land of "If Only"... If only I would have stayed in school I would almost be done with med school right now. But when I look back on my life I see so clearly where God has led me to where I am today, and I can't argue with Him. But that leaves me with today. What choices will I make today? Should I go back to school? When I was pregnant, I saw a light at the end of the "work" tunnel. In November I was going to quit (I put work in quotations, because I know motherhood is more "work" that I can imagine, but I'm talkin' about the 9 to 5 business) and stay at home with my kid. Now everything has changed. Is this an open door for me to continue in another dream? I know He has led me thus far and won't leave me now, but sometimes I find it hard to decipher if my own thoughts are overpowering His voice...  We shall see... One day at a time.

On to my better half... Chris didn't pass the sheriff's dept test, but he went straight home to apply for the police department. I thought he had soley wanted to do sheriff's, but when I asked him he said "I just want to be in law enforcement".  I think he would be amazing at either.  He has such a big heart for people (I mean c'mon, he voluteered with the youth from the time he graduated high school until about a year ago, now that takes a special kind of heart, I think). He takes the police test on May 5th.  We are so grateful that with all of the layoffs he is still employed.  Once again thought, one day at a time :)

We both know that God leads us, our prayer is that we would listen and follow.

The Nitty Gritty on Chris and Ginny (well it kind of rhymes :)

I (Ginny) figured that since this blog is titled "The Story of Us", it might be fun for a little "Get to know the Shields".
My friend, Sarah, did this a while ago, and I think it's fun to read about other married couples :) And if you don't, might as well just close this page on up ;)

♥ What are your middle names? Lee & Elizabeth
♥ How long have you been together? since July '04
♥ How long did you know each other before you started dating? long story... We met in HS, but went our separate ways (since he wasn't interested :) Met up again in '04 and started dating in oh, about 2 weeks :)
♥ Who asked who out? he initiated the first date
♥ How old are each of you? almost 27 and almost 25 (him and I respectively)
♥ Whose siblings do/did you see the most? probably mine
♥ Do you have any children together? not yet
♥ What about pets? 2 dogs
♥ Which situation is the hardest on you as a couple? I don't think one takes precedence over another... life is hard, and a good foundational marriage takes work :)
♥ Did you go to the same school? No, he went to South, I was homeschooled.
♥ Are you from the same home town? Yes (which makes holidays a lot easier... or harder ;)
♥ Who is the smartest? He has more street smarts, and random facts smart (I'm still waiting for him to win us a million dollars on some game show), I'd say I'm more book smart.
♥ Who is the most sensitive? Depends. Sometimes I cry at the drop of the hat, but I also tell him to suck it up sometimes :)
♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple? Hmm... we like to try different local joints.
♥ Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple? Does a cruise count? If so, the Carribean.
♥ Who has the worst temper? I don't think we really have bad tempers...
♥ Who does the cooking? Mostly Ginny, but he is king of the grill, and he'll randomly cook us up something if I'm working late
♥ Who is more social? Him :) I'd probably be a hermit curled up with a book and my dog if I didn't marry him
♥Who is the neat freak? GINNY!
♥ Who is the more stubborn? GINNY!
♥ Who hogs the bed? the bed is too big to hog, but Chris hogs the covers in his sleep.
♥ Who wakes up earlier? Chris
♥ Where was your first date? Starbucks, then sat down by the river and talked all night
♥ Who has the bigger family? Ginny
♥ Do you get flowers often? No (Chris doesn't either ;)
♥ How do you spend the holidays? dividing up time between the families (my least favorite thing about being married)
♥ Who is more jealous? Ginny; Chris is so laid back I'm suprised he doesn't fall over backwards.
♥ How long did it take to get serious? not too long :) Ginny knew within the first few dates that we were gonna get married, took Chris a little bit longer, but not much. Got engaged November '05.
♥ Who does/ did the laundry? Mostly Ginny, but Chris is always willing to help if I ask.
♥ Who’s better with the computer? Chris is better with the Mac, Ginny is on a PC at work all day
♥ Who drives when you are together? Chris (I submit to his, uh, questionable driving because I refuse to be one of those women who chaperones her man... It's a submission thing for me). Once in a blue moon, Chris just doesn't feel like driving, but mostly he does :)

Unexpected

*heads up: this blog is long, and hardly any detail is spared, read at your own risk ;)

I'm sure most of you know by now, but last Wednesday (the 8th) while I was at work I started to bleed. My wonderful "motherly" coworkers sent me home immediately to rest and get a call in to my OB. At first it was very light, but as the evening progressed, so did the bleeding. My doctor said it is normal in early pregnancy, but if it got to be a lot and with cramping to go to the ER. On Thursday morning the nurse at my work gave me a sono to confirm there was no heartbeat. She measured a 6wk baby, so it was obvious since 3 weeks ago she measured a 5 1/2 week baby with a heartbeat. On my way home I text Chris to let him know (even though Wednesday evening we were pretty sure, but still hung to a small piece of hope), and he was immediately on his way home. So many thanks to his boss, Jim... Chris doesn't have any time that he can take off except vacation which you have to schedule in advance, (it's basically like a prison/grade school out there: you can't leave, and if you do, you get infractions, and so many infractions will get you in big trouble). But when he went and explained the situation to his boss, Jim immediately said "go home". So Thursday consisted of letting family and friends know (through texting), and numerous phone calls to my doctor (actually her nurse), which I will vent about in a bit :) Thursday night was the hardest for me inbetween 1-2am. Everything was quiet, no distractions, and plenty of time for my mind (and heart) to really grasp the concept that my baby was dead. I asked my sister-in-law (Megan) who miscarried a year and a half ago if she felt like there was a huge red stamp on her forehead that says "failure" and "miscarried", and she confirmed that my feelings were completely natural. I know in my head that there was nothing that I could have done differently to change the outcome, and I think that has been a huge factor in me handling this loss relatively well. But still, I feel as though I will always have a scarlet letter...
A quick intermission about a nurse with no compassion: I called my doctor on Thursday to let her know what the sono at work had shown, so she tells me to go to the ER and have my blood drawn, then have them fax the results to her, then come into the office Friday and have blood drawn again (to make sure my hormone levels were going down). Well I have no idea, so I ask Megan if that's what she had to do, and she said "absolutely not". I did think it was weird that the nurse told me to go to the ER, but I've never experienced this so what did I know? So by about the 3rd phone call to the nurse she finally said "well you can come into the office here and have your blood drawn". Well gee thanks, because right now I don't really feel like sitting in the ER for 3 hours... Bad experience #1. On Friday, I called the doctor again asking if they could just do a D&C and get it over with. The nurse told me no since they had to compare my blood levels, but to go to Wesley and have a sonogram there, and have those results faxed to the office. So when I went to get my blood drawn, and I asked to speak to the nurse. I asked her if this sono was going to speed up the process, and she basically said "Well it's just to ease your mind", "So it's basically pointless because you won't do anything until Monday?" "Yeah". It's a good thing I wasn't thinking too clearly, cause I thought of a LOT of things to tell her after I had left... None of them nice. Bad experience #2. Enough said about the nurse.
Saturday evening: Chris went to go play hockey at 7:30, about 8pm the bleeding started to get pretty heavy, Chris had a feeling he should quit early, so I get a call about 9pm saying he's on his way home. I tell him that we should probably go to the ER since the doctor said to (and the PA from my work suggested the same thing). We arrive at Wesley around 10pm, and what a blessing, my other sister-in-law, Jessica is a nurse there, and she had just gotten off work an hour earlier, but her and my brother came back to the hospital and hung out with us for a while. It was nice to have someone there that knew what was going on :) They did a pelvic, drew blood, did a sono which confirmed that I had passed almost everything, so in a way it was good that everything happened naturally. We (I) were (was) discharged at 2:30am, and headed home to a soft pillow, warm bed, and my dogs :) The bleeding and cramps had gone down significantly at that time, so I knew the worst was over. The ER told me to go ahead and keep my doctor's appointment on Monday (which was suppose to be my initial OB visit). So yesterday, Chris met me there, and we met the doctor finally. It's unfortunate that her nurse and I didn't see eye to eye, because I liked the doctor. But doctor/nurse is a combo, and I can't really have one without the other, so I'll more than likely be changing doctors next time around. She did apologize for the way the nurse handled everything, so that was a little bit of redemption. I had more bloodwork and she did an exam to check things out. Everything was fine, and she said it's best to wait at least one cycle to start trying again, but if it happens before, then there's nothing to worry about. Today, I got a call today from the nurse saying my blood levels have dropped to 900 (from 7500 and 6700 Thursday and Friday), which is a good indicator that everything has completely passed. Physically and emotionally I think I am doing quite well. I feel exausted when I wake up, but I think it's just my hormones going crazy :) My personality is that of, I found out, I grieved, and now I'm ready to move on. Not in a harsh, cold-hearted way, but this part of my life is over, I'm not going to dwell in it. I'm going to grow and move on.

So that was our Easter weekend. We did go to dinner with Chris' parents Saturday evening, then to my parent's house Sunday afternoon and had family time :) I couldn't ask for a better family (immediate and extended :)

I can't thank you enough for all the prayers that you have flooded our way. I know that is a big part of the reason that we have handled this so well. We couldn't ask for better friends either :)

Catching Up

The last couple of weeks, nothing "exciting" has really happened that I thought was interesting enough to blog about.  But as I was emptying the camera this evening, I thought maybe the tiny events that have happened lately might make up a semi-interesting, decent length blog :)

Just a reminder, did you send your Red Envelopes to the President?? There's still time if you haven't :)  http://www.redenvelopeproject.org/

If you remember the blog about when we first found out we were pregnant, you might remember I was ecstatic to receive a bouquet of flowers because honestly, it just doesn't happen that often ;)  But about a week after that, I received another bouquet, this time it was the chocolate covered strawberry kind :)  Oh yes, the hubs scored big on the Fresh Fruit Bouquet!

The week/weekend of March 18th, my uncle (Vern), cousin (Renee), her husband (Nick) and two kids (Cory and Madison) came to visit from Texas.  The weekend was packed with a trip to the Zoo, Exploration Place, family dinner, and family breakfast the morning they left.  The last time we all were together was Chris and I's wedding (3 years ago!), so it was great to spend some time with them :)  Here are a couple pictures from the zoo :)

Not the greatest picture of the little ones, but wrangling 6 children 

under the age of 6 is not exactly in the "easy" category!  

  

Ava (my niece) being all "cowgirl up" :)

If only they each played with their own toy (I think this picture was staged :)

but in true sibling manner, they always want whichever one they don't have at the moment

A few snapshots from the snow day we had a week ago.  All of the "kids" (my siblings and their significant others), met up at Mom and Dad's house.  Since they live on a street that dead ends to the river, we have our own personal sledding hill.  We don't have the danger of highway traffic (for those crazies who sled off the highway banks), but we do have the river at the bottom of the hill.  Surprisingly, in 20 years we've only had one incident that involved the neighbor kid and the river :)  This afternoon, Bryan got pretty close to going in, the sled did, but he was able to retrieve it :)

preparation...

picture doesn't show it well, but he's flying off the "ramp" :)

true surfer at heart

I think Megan got the raw end of this deal :)

Now for my favorite part... The part I like to call "Design on No Dime".  Lately I've wanted to change things up in the house, curtains, bedding, rearrange furniture, etc.  I've just gotten bored with everything.  But redecorating the whole house isn't really in the budget right now, so I decided to just swap things around.  The bedroom curtains are now in the living room, and vice-versa.  I switched pictures and wall art all around, so at least for now, it's satisfied the bug :)  Here are a couple of "after" photos.  If you look at my very first blog, you can see that the "after" pictures for that blog are now my "before" pictures.  Can I confuse you more??  How about I just post the pictures :)

ahh, soothing blue tones for a relaxing bedroom

can I just say how much I love my church pew??

Well judging from my camera, I think that's about all that's happened around here :)  Maybe something "exciting" will happen in the next few weeks............

An Email to Make a Day

About a month ago, Chris applied to the Sheriff's Department.  For the last couple years he has said that he feels called to help people, although he couldn't really put his finger on exactly what that meant.  When he found out the SD was hiring, he prayed about it a while, and just felt a strong desire to apply.  Well a long time has gone by, but today he got an e-mail with a date to come in and start the testing process.  So April 18th he'll be doing a basic math and reading comprehension test, and if he passes that, he will be invited to stay for the agility testing, fingerprinting, and first contact interview.  To say he's excited would be an understatement.  So we'll see what God has in store for us in the next few weeks!  Prayers tossed our way welcomed :)