Dis N Dat The twins in their new jammies... it's getting chilly at night!

Noa loves to sit and watch those real medical trauma shows with me. Yesterday, I told him my good news about landing a job in the E.R. and he was so excited, he said "You're going to be on TV!!"

He thought that all traumas get videotaped and broadcast!

Ha'aheo's volleyball team had their first games today. They don't keep score, so I can't tell you if they won or not, but they were fun to watch. Here he is about to spike the ball (I'm not sure if that's the correct term?)

  ¶ 2:37 PM 10Mana'o

  Let me work with Noah Wylie and George Clooney Well what do you know?
For weeks I have been job hunting, to no avail.
It was really frustrating and shameful. Like, no one wants me?
Then these past three days have been a whirlwind of events:
First the job offer on Wednesday...
Then last night, my OB/GYN called to offer me a job with them...as a receptionist!(?!?)
(I politely declined)
And then today's interview with E.R....
It went pretty well, though I made a very embarrassing misstatement about Nitroprusside drip. It was all after the fact though, they already had said they wanted me.
They want me!!!
I now have two jobs. hehehe. What now?
I'm in such total disbelief.
HR has to meet over it on Wednesday, I will hear Thursday or Friday whether I am really hired or not.
Barring any huge (and unknown) criminal history or HR snafu's,
I am Sandy, E.R. Nurse!!!!!!!  ¶ 10:56 AM 16Mana'o

  Moot point All the stress of deciding may be all for naught, as I have my E.R. interview TOMORROW morning at 9, and as I review emergency medicine, I am realizing that I won't know diddly-squat tomorrow.
She's gonna grill me
and I'm gonna crack under the pressure.
There's just too much to remember, I can't even scratch the surface. Wish I had more time to prepare...  ¶ 4:45 PM 10Mana'o

  WHAT?!? WHAT?!? WHAT?!? My cell phone has been lost for the past two days. I finally get it and check my messages...
"Sandy, this is _____ . Call me if you want to work for me in the E.R."
That's it.
I'm TORN. Torn, torn, torn.
I LOVE E.R.
It pays more
But the hours are perfect with the job I just got, I'll get sleep.
If I work for the E.R. I'll work overnight 12 hours until 7am then have to stay up with the babies all day
But this is IT, E.R. could be my entire career, I could have my foot in the door, just like that!
And this job I have now, I have no idea if I will be happy or miserable. Geriatrics was the ONLY thing I have said "no way" to and here I am about to work at a retirement community! And the pay isn't so good, but the stress level not so bad...I think.
What now?? Please tell me what you think I should do!  ¶ 9:51 AM 10Mana'o

  The Interview First off...what to wear? The white one had a small stain in the most unfortunate place on my chest, looked like something was showing through, and I happened to have a $10 off coupon for The Gap so to the mall we went today : )
Ended up wearing gray slacks, the top on the left, and black pumps.
Now...to the interview:

"What if you came across a patient who was sitting in his chair, was sweaty and clammy and not responding normally?"
uhmmm....
I sat there and thought to myself "I'd run out of the room yelling 'Help! I need a nurse!' oh, I'M the nurse? Oh yeah, what would I do?" hehehe. Just kidding.
But I did feel the sweat circles start to form on my shirt under my armpits when she asked me all those questions.
She was happy with my answer, saying that many people have forgotten to tell her the first step that is to lay the patient down and elevate the legs--they went straight to saying they'd take the patient's vitals.
Whew!
She also must have been impressed with my resume, because she looked it over and said "Wow!" I may not have had any experience, but I did a lot of extra that makes me look good (took Advanced Cardiopulmonary, Dean's list, active in Phi Theta Kappa, got the Nightingale Award for Clinical Excellence 2002...so I am disappointed that wasn't enough for the hospital to hire me, so what if I haven't worked in two years? If I applied straight from school, I woulda been a catch, eh?)
and....after almost an hour of interview, she offered me the job!!
Woot woot!
The pay is piddly though. I have never had to negotiate before, I just sat there wincing at her offer, and accepted it. As the interview went on and I got bold and asked for a measly dollar more, (which is still not enough for all the years of pain and misery caused getting my degree!), but she agreed and said after three months probation we could renegotiate.
AND THEN, after she left, I had to do the tax forms and go over the entire handbook with someone else, who was telling me everything that just freaked me out. I wasn't so sure I wanted the job anymore! I will be CHARGE nurse. Me??? I will have to supervise the nurse's aides, who will probably resent my position and TEST me. I will have to case manage about 60 patients. I am wetting my pants. I can barely case manage my four boys! hehehe.
Best thing though, is that these clients are well off and in denial---they don't want anybody looking all medical on them so NO SCRUBS! I have to wear "professional" outfits, which also means I get to go S-H-O-P-P-I-N-G!! Most of my closet consists of casual surfer chick clothes or stained stay-at-home-with-twin-terrors clothes.
I really honestly truly do appreciate all of your sweet thoughts and prayers. Before I left for the interview, I clicked back on my comments to feel all that support again and it just lifted my spirits. You guys are THE BESTEST.
oh wait,
I'm a professional now.
You guys are the BEST. (not bestest, but yeah, you ARE!)  ¶ 7:42 PM 16Mana'o

  I GOT A JOB INTERVIEW FOR TOMORROW!!!
It's absolutely perfect, two nights a week--EXACTLY what I wanted--and instead of an overnight shift like at the hospital, it's 2-10pm so I can get decent rest at night and still be able to care for the babies during the day, and we won't have to hire a sitter.
Also, when I hesitantly asked her what kind of experience she was looking for, she replied that normally it is nurses with a lot of experience that apply, but she prefers new nurses as they don't come set in their ways and are easier to train. She LIKES to train new nurses. She said that before she knew I was a grad nurse!
Now, if only I can get over the I-totally-suck-at-interviews hurdle, I'll be set. Please please please please pray that this will work out!!! Tomorrow, 3:30 pm.
I'm sooOOooOoooOooo nervous.
  ¶ 10:58 AM 18Mana'o

  E-I-E-I-O
Can you please tell me how farmers do it??
As I've already mentioned, I'm some kind of quasi--vegetarian, meaning I eat no beef, pork, or seafood, and if I think about it too much, I can't eat chicken or turkey either. The only way I got myself to eat "fowl" is by convincing myself that they are stupid and ugly (and therefore deserving to be eaten???) I know, it's strange.

I've asked a hypnotist we know to please hypnotize me to be able to eat meat, because I know it's just a mental block--me thinking of them in their beautiful alive animal form. But he says he can't think of a way to do it. When people have fears, he hypnotizes them to a time that they were traumatized by that fear and gets them over it that way. So, he can't figure out how to do this one...what, make me HATE animals so I can eat them? So whenever I see a cow I'll go raging after them with a knife because I hate them?! It's tricky, I guess.

Yesterday, middle son "rescued" a baby chick that was running around without his/her mommy and it was a rainy day. He brought her to the house right at lunch time...while we were eating Chicken Pot Pie and Chicken Noodle Soup. *me, looking at super soft cuddly adorable fuzzy baby chick, then looking down at yummy chicken lunch, and then back at baby chickie apologetically* Now that I am caring for this baby chick, I know without a doubt they are absolutely NOT ugly and NOT stupid (she's escaped several different enclosures) so I guess that now makes me a certified true vegetarian, because I can no longer eat something so darn adorable!  ¶ 12:42 PM 12Mana'o

  It's All in the Details "J" is a friend from high school. She is a flight attendant and had a layover here on Maui. We went to dinner tonight and spent some time reminiscing. I laughed when she brought up the Chinese Fire Engine Drills we did, because I remembered that too. (Where everyone gets out of the car at the stop light and runs around the car and gets back in before the light turns green again.) What I had completely forgotten about--which had me in HYSTERICS as she told it--is that once, another friend "A" had insisted we take off our bras, so we did. Then she said we had to wear it on our heads. We did that too. Then we conspired to lock out "M." So we hit the next light, and when "M" got out of the car, we locked all the doors and she was left frantically trying to get back in, in the middle of a very busy Waikiki street, with a bra tied around her head like a head band! I was rolling. That was so much more funnier than my memory of plain ol' Chinese Fire Engine Drills!
Then I reminded HER of something I wasn't gonna soon forget: When I was a brand new mommy, she and "A" came to visit us late at night and I said baby was sleeping, they begged to go in the room to "just look" and promised me over and over they wouldn't do anything, until I finally relented. The next thing I know, baby Ha'a was up and smiling with them--they had picked him up and woke him up! I was sooooo mad, because I was hardly getting any sleep at all. I vowed revenge when they had their own babies. (Even if I now have to fly to Cincinnati and San Francisco to wake up their babies!) Well, now they are both engaged ("A" is the one I had to hang up on while discussing wedding plans because E had his seizure) So I reminded her about that because pretty soon, vengeance will be MINE.  ¶ 11:05 PM 8Mana'o

  Just Stab Me in the Heart and Make Me Bleed Last night, the twins and I were cruisin' on the bed. I was watching E.R. and they were playing. At one point, E nestled to my side and started to watch with me. He saw a lady doctor in her lab coat and looked at me. He pointed to the screen and--obviously recalling his horrible and painful ordeal last week--said "Mommy....Aunty Boo-Boo" He said "aunty boo-boo" over and over, making me wanna just hold him to me endlessly and protect him forever more from anymore aunty boo-boo's bearing pointy needles.

*************************************************************

To end on a positive note, insurance claims guy came to look at our flood damage and okay'd us to replace not only the kitchen floor, but some cabinets, the parlor floor and all the way down the hall! I'm so happy to get something new. I wonder if they'll let us choose entirely different stuff?  ¶ 11:33 AM 9Mana'o

  The Road Not Taken Most of the time, I am just marching merrily on through life without much thought. I'm not a deep thinker.
Sometimes, though, something hits me that I end up pondering for a while.
Today I was thinking about life choices. You know, when you hit a fork in the road and have to choose one way to go? Can you imagine how many of those you have come across in your life? Can you even begin to imagine how different life would be if you chose the other one instead?
So I sit here thinking "How did I get here, right here where I am?"
Here's a big one I am not even sure I ever told hubby: I promised myself to someone else. You know with your first love, you think it's going to last forever. I was with this guy on and off since sophomore year. Sometime around my senior year, he had to go on a mission for two years. We agreed that I could date others but when he came back, we would get married. How I could promise that, I don't know, but I did. Obviously, it didn't happen. (Never thought much about it, but saying it now, makes me feel pretty badly; that was a crappy thing to do to someone.) How different would my life be if I chose that road?? I can't even begin to imagine! (I wouldn't be on this island, I wouldn't have my four wonderful boys...on and on.)
What about career paths? I did so poorly in college the first time around that I quit. The only reason I got into healthcare is because I signed up with a temp agency and they sent me to work as a clerk in the laboratory at the hospital. I saw the phlebotomists at work and thought to myself "I can do that" so I took a phlebotomy class and did that. Then while doing phlebotomy at the same hospital, I saw dialysis technicians and I thought "I can do that" and so on...it was a long, tortuous route to becoming an RN.
What if I applied myself in school the first time around and did well? Where would I be now?
What if I never wasted so much time partying?
What if I played sports instead?
But in the end, I am happy with where I am and who I am so it was all meant to be, right?
So many "what ifs"
I bet we all have them. What's yours?  ¶ 10:58 PM 13Mana'o

  Future Tommy Lee(s) I don't have a musical bone in my body, but these boys always wanna play ANYTHING. They love to get to their brother's ukulele or the guitar, and today, they snuck into grandma's house to play drums. They turned up the amp and rocked out. Somehow, they pressed a button that made a voice go "1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4" and I kid you not, E was keeping time there for a minute!
So now, for a limited time only, you can send just $14.95 and get your very own autograph from the future rock stars that will soon be worth hundreds, if not thousands! (How's that for a new money venture? I can just be my kids' manager hehehehe.)  ¶ 3:55 PM 10Mana'o

  Why Do I Even Bother With Despair? Have you ever gotten surprise mail? Had no idea what it could be about?
Can you imagine opening it to discover a generous check from an anonymous donor? (How can a check be anonymous, you ask? He/she/they gave the money to the church treasurer to write a check to us, I am just floored/awed/humbled/appreciative)

Add that to another spur of the moment gift from Aunty from down the street and we've got ourselves through our first month of mortgage increase. It hung over my head every single day of being still jobless.
It's amazing that no matter how rock bottom we hit, we are always ending up completely provided for.

Call me crazy, but maybe this provision is just telling me to have faith.Maybe I am not getting offered a job because I am meant to stay home with the twins. Who knows? However, that would mean needing a miracle every month!

This week was a good start, though. It started with a phone call from my Dad saying "Go to Sears, there's a brand new TV waiting for you to pick up" (to replace our broken one)

It's the blessings that are now falling down like rain

How can I keep forgetting that no matter how many times we fall down, He is always there to pick us up?

Thank you guys for praying for us.  ¶ 10:36 PM 17Mana'o

  Camp Maui Memorial

E has been crowned Our Little Seizure Prince. First prize was a stay at Camp Maui Memorial. He won merit badges in Scare-the-Living-Daylights-Out-of-Your-Family and Act-Like-a-Belligerant-Drunk-on-Your-Medication.
The medication, which they want him to take for TWO or THREE more weeks, makes him completely out of his mind. He can't even walk straight. He staggers, he fights me for everything--with punching, hair pulling, and lots of tantrum throwing. He's so uncoordinated he can't put his two hands together straight. The whole time of his hours-upon-hours of crying and screaming, I have to remind myself that this is not his choice, he doesn't like this either, he can't help it.
Poor kid went through so much: Horrible meds, CT scan, Xray, blood tests galore, SPINAL TAP, and two failed attempts at eeg. All CLEAR. Praise God. So it wasn't any of the Big Baddies that were gonna kill him, just a lowly virus causing the seizures. But since they were atypical (so many grand mals and one lasting over five minutes), we have to see a Neurologist.

Let me tell you a horror story: We're in the E.R. and the nurse comes with meds in his hand. I ask him what it is, and he says "we're giving him 110 mg or Phenobarbital and two grams of Tylenol." simple. Just like that. I was like "WHAT!?!? TWO GRAMS?! Are you sure???" and he thinks for a second, says "Yeah, that does sound like a lot, let me check." He comes back to tell me it was TWO GRAINS ordered, not two grams. Two grains is 120 milligrams, two grams is TWO THOUSAND milligrams, double the ADULT dose and would have been very toxic to my child. Since that moment until he got discharged the next evening, I was the Worst Patient's Mom EVER. I questioned everything. Why? How much? why? A pain in the behind. I wanted to be completely sure of everything. I know they hated me.

Here, Z is paying a visit and he came bearing a gift of Jello. The doctor walked in as he was in Daddy's lap and says "oh WOW, you're looking better!" Ummm, look on the hospital bed, Doc, wrong baby!

On a positive note, this might possibly be the worst networking ploy ever, but my former classmate was working in the e.r. and I asked her if they were hiring. She brought her boss in to meet me and I had a mini-interview right there--next to my passed-out-son, in my off-the-shoulder top, jeans, and slippers. (Not sure if I should do it though, my friend said they just throw you in to the wolves and start yelling words at you that you have no idea about and expect you to do it!)

Well, glad to be home and I thank you for your thoughts and prayers : )

  ¶ 6:42 AM 21Mana'o

  Old Friend With Good News A close friend from high school called to say she was getting married! I was so excited for her. She's been in and out of serious relationships but has never gotten married.

What strikes me everytime she calls, however, is how wide the chasm is between a single person and a married mother of four. I really DO want to hear every detail about her fiance and wedding plans, but I have hungry babies--one with a high fever--and two boys with homework to complete.

Yet I hate to be a wet blanket, so I always try to hold up the illusion that I have hours to talk about any little thing. We enthused about the beauty a beach wedding, we debated over anthuriums floating in a glass bowl versus roses floating in a glass bowl, we discussed when her bridal shower should be...all the while I am trying to feed the ragdoll-fever baby that is refusing to eat, motion wildly to middle son who is watching tv to go do his homework, or eat, or whatever.

I felt like a silent traffic-controller/mime/charades-player. It was tough. And I do it everytime. She probably thinks motherhood is a breeze! Surely she thinks I have it together, to be able to gab forever, just like old times.
Actually, most likely, she doesn't even realize how hard it is. She doesn't have a clue!

Well, maybe, until I was suggesting maybe she should have her bridal shower two nights before the wedding instead of flying in a week before when Elijah started to convulse from a febrile seizure and I yelled into the phone inexplicably "Aiiiyyeeeee!!!Gotta go! BYE BYE BYE BYE!" and hung up on her!  ¶ 6:40 AM 25Mana'o

  Some Sunshine Peeking Through (What's the opposite saying of "when it rains, it pours?")

Scrub, shine, and gleam
it's like a dream
MY HOUSE IS CLEAN!!!!

('tis a rare event, indeed)

*doing the happy dance*

Insurance guy, I love you
He filed the claim, our flood will be covered!
AND I forgot to even mention before, hubby banged a car on our anniversary. It's just a minor dent and scrape and I found out yesterday that insurance will cover it and since it is less than $1,000, our insurance rate should not go up.

Also, I called Human Resources and asked to speak to the Nursing Department Head to inquire about the status of my application and she said that my application hadn't even been forwarded to the floor I wanted to work on yet, because the accredidation team was there and so everyone was busy with that and no one was doing their regular job for two weeks! She said she was gonna send it now. PLEASE pray I get the job. I don't even care what floor.

okay, well, this is just an update post, I guess!  ¶ 6:31 AM 10Mana'o

  When It Rains, It Pours... As we were just coming home this afternoon, I walked into the garage and I saw water pouring out of the SEAMS of my house. It looked like a waterfall. It was surreal. What in the world??
I ran to the door and realized I was locked out because I didn't have the key. I had to break into my own house through the window...with a SKIRT on!
I finally get into the house, and have to slosh through water that is inches-deep to find the source...a pipe that broke under the kitchen sink.
Just then the phone rings, and it's a friend from church. I tell her what is happening and the darling comes over to help with clean up.
All the while, I am trying to think positively:
Sweep-slosh-sop-sop "well, at least I can strike mopping the kitchen off my to do list today!"
"hmm, maybe insurance will cover this and I'll get a new floor for free?" (unlikely, I find out, and insurance guy not answering his phone)
Also, the kids had a lot of fun, with a pool for a kitchen for a while there.
After that...not much positive thoughts.
What to do now?
Our main bathroom has no functioning toilet
Our main TV completely died
and now our kitchen's gonna be moldy (and has no hot water!)

and guess what?
We are hosting the 40 Days of Community at our house TOMORROW.

I'll just be Scarlett O Hara and say fiddle dee dee. I'll think about it tomorrow (and tomorrow and tomorrow)
Here is a pic from AFTER we dried the floor, the water would still seep up and make more wet spots.
Can you see the warping?
*******************************************************

BTW, Maddy's bday party scavenger hunt was a smash hit. Everyone had a lot of fun. Most of the hints were from y'all. Thank you.
Here's a pic of bday girl and some guests having a shaving cream fight:

Noa

...even the babies got into it. Here they are, rinsing it off at the water faucet.

  ¶ 11:29 PM 13Mana'o

  Portraits I thought the man that accosted us while we were on our way out of the store simply could not believe what beautiful children I had and he just had to ask if he could please take a picture of them. I thought he saw their adorableness. What else could it be? Surely he thought they were the cutest kids he had ever seen!

Ah, but in reality, what he saw was me. And stamped on my forehead was a blazing sign that said "I'M A SUCKER!!!"

And dollar signs glowed in his eyes.

He smooth-talked me into "reserving" a sitting for only 13 dollars, and we would get a FREE 10 x 13!!! Seriously, who could pass that up?

I am strong. I know their tricks. I will not even look at the other poses he takes, I said to myself. I will take the "free" picture and run. And besides, the boys haven't had a picture together in a long time. So I agreed.

And the pictures were SO adorable! I didn't even care for the free pose that had all the boys together, I wanted the individual ones instead. What does a penniless person DO at this point??

boop boop beep beep bah bee boo boo beep bah boop (dialing Nana and Papa's house...)

and viola! My very own portrait package of the boys, circa 1930's (lol!), compliments of Nana and Papa. LOVE YOU and THANKS!


(I'm having a hard time scanning the pics so this is all you get for now, maybe by Monday I will have it done)  ¶ 8:47 PM 13Mana'o

  Productivity Cute puppies, yeah?
MAN, the things I did in two days! If only everyday were as productive.
Things I've done:
* Finished bathroom flooring (now only if we can magically get the toilet in...)
* Scavenger hunt list (thanks for hints)
* Wrote paper on the brain and seizures.(Half-hearted work but it's DONE)
* Studied for AND took my Pharmacology test (Whew, that was tough)
* Took the babies to story time at the library (No small task)
* Started and finished reading Shopaholic and Sister (this series is getting predictable, she's out-of-control in her spending, which gets her into deep trouble, but happens to miraculously end happily and in her favor...no wonder she never learns her lesson!)
* Went surfing with hubby today, and since I was having a really "off" day and kept eating it, I jumped into a four man canoe with a beach friend there and had more fun catching waves that way.
* Started reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves (about punctuation, something I need to learn more about!)
* Learned how to scrape up meals with practically NOTHING LEFT in the icebox (sniff, poke, yeah, this tomato is still good)
* Shuttled sons to Taekwondo and the skate park and THEN had to help them with their homework until past bedtime. (something's gotta change there)
* Meeting tonight for church
* and all the while, changing a million poopy diapers in between.
*oh, and our nephews got new puppies, but they work all day so I check in on them to make sure they have water, food, bathroom breaks, and love : )
Whew! Now I need to catch up on blogs and relaaaax  ¶ 11:44 PM 9Mana'o

  What is This World Coming To? Nick and Jessica The cutest couple is (reportedly) getting divorced...

...and the strangest couple is having a baby!

"TomKat"  ¶ 6:36 AM 9Mana'o

  Suggestions, please
Maddy, the sweet girl that comes here to help me with the babies, has her birthday party on Saturday.
Originally, the plan was for a scavenger hunt at the mall. I had a lot of ideas, no problem.
But yesterday, her mother called to tell me they were changing it to a barbecue at the beach, because she wanted to be able to invite more people.
I now have three days come up with a list of things for them to hunt down and get at the beach.
(In addition to my paper that is due this week and Pharm exam)
So I am turning to you for help with the clues.
It can be creative! It can be silly! Or anything! please???
It can also be things they have to do, as long as we can see it.  ¶ 6:27 AM 7Mana'o

  A Peach Encounter Why did my babies have to bathe in the kitchen sink tonight?
Good question.
Let me take you back to two weeks ago to a tiny little understatement.
I think it started with the bathtub moulding, which was so waterlogged, it was starting to rot away. I got sick of looking at it and had a new mission. I tore it out. I hit Home Depot for a couple of items and saw SELF-STICKING vinyl flooring. Is this a new invention!? How EASY it would be--just peel and stick! YES! We need new flooring! AND it was only 60-something cents a piece! It even said right there on the box you could do it all in one day! I went home and begged hubby, convincing him with the easy-ness ("you don't have to saw any pieces, all you need is a box cutter!") and the cheapness "Our bathroom is so small, it'll cost LESS THAN 30 DOLLARS to do the whole bathroom!" That, my friend, was the understatement of the year.
Then I realized we needed a new shower curtain first, so we know what color to get to match everything. oops. 25 dollars out.
Then we went back to Home Depot and had to get a wastebasket to match. 7 dollars.
Then we went to choose the right flooring, and we didn't like the 60 cent ones, we had to get the nicer ones...60 dollars
Then I had an inspiration, PAINT! Paint is the cheapest way to change a room, right? It's ONLY 20 DOLLARS! (And we chose a really outrageous orangey color called Peach Encounter that coordinated with the orangey flecks in the greenish/brownish flooring we chose.) 20 dollars out.
Oh, and I need paintbrushes, the pan and roller...15 more dollars.
We went home, took out the old flooring, and realized we needed to prep the floor. There's actually something called floor prep. Hubby had to go BACK to Home Depot and buy it, and buy the tool to scrape all the old floor glue or whatever, and changed his mind about the flooring itself and went to exchange the color. I have no clue how much that ended up costing.
But there were several more trips to the store to follow, for the NEXT TWO WEEKS.
He's had to take the entire toilet out to put the floor pieces in, and now he can't get it back in! And we had to get new moulding. And adhesive for the moulding, and there's a tool to buy to apply that too.
It all started so innocently and now it's this horrible cash-eating-anxiety-producing-frustration-inducing machine
So tonight, he was doing his best to get the toilet back in and that is why the babies ended up bathing in the sink.
...and he was still unsuccessful.
The bathroom, it is evil. It is mocking us.
I refuse to let it defeat us.  ¶ 11:17 PM 20Mana'o

  Weekend and Tags Now that I have had $100 basically fall into my lap...what do I do with it?
On one hand there is a three-inch stack of unpaid bills,
and on the other hand the 83rd Annual Maui County Fair is in going on.

So, what do you think we did??
Let's just say, the fair was really fun. hehehe

The highlights were...the hypnotist show by Clarke Tuitele "The Hawaiian Hypnotist" (having them think their shoe was their cell phone and answering it, then it turned into the most wonderful smelling perfume...haha! Seeing all of them smelling their shoes like it was sooooo sweet-smelling was classic!)....Winning the twins a couple of Elmos at the dart balloon game (The first win was no big deal, but then we blew at least 15 dollars trying to win the second one. Frustrated, I whispered into the game attendants ear, if I could please just give her five bucks for another Elmo and she said "Here" and handed me three free darts, which I still missed, then gave me an Elmo as if I won, God Bless her)...and the last highlight of the evening came when we laid our towel down to change the babies diapers. I finished changing Z, and hubby was still working on E when I said Noa and I were going to visit the potty. We came out to a frantic hubby, who lost Z. He thought there was no way Z could have walked away that fast so figured someone must have taken him. He ran towards the exit to catch the culprit and I ran around the area where we were in hopes he wasn't far. When hubby was near the exit, someone whistled to him and waved him over...hubby's nephew's ex-girlfriend found Z all the way by the Ferris Wheel! He wasn't even aware he was lost and wasn't scared. What's even more embarrassing is that he has on a pink "LOST KEIKI" bracelet on his arm, which he adores and refuses to let me cut off, and he went to church with it on today!

Now, I'm aiming for the longest post ever, because I have been tagged twice and am going to do them right now. Gold ribbons for anybody who can hang on until the end of it!

From Tee : The 23rd Post Meme
The rules are:
Go into your archive.Find your 23rd post.Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions.Tag five other people to do the same.
Okay, in this post, I was complaining about how everything was going wrong, procrastinating in school, babies' sick, and more bills than money...wow, so it's the same thing happening over and over eh. Here's my fifth (and sixth)sentence:
"They won't eat and it's stressing me out. I even let them have some french fries today just so they'll get some calories, but they didn't want it anyway."

and NOW, a tag from Cara
Fifteen Years ago: 1990:I was dating hubby, and taking a class in Phlebotomy, which began my career in healthcare.
Ten Years Ago: We were married and Ha'aheo was almost four years old. I was working as a Dialysis Technician and we just moved to Maui from Oahu
Five Years Ago: Ahhhh, the best time! Noa was three, in preschool, and I had my (easy) pre-requisite classes and got to have lots of free time and fun, surfing with my friend Jean and doing whatever.
One Year Ago: The babies were one, and I was (am?) a mess, an overworked, underpaid SAHM. Biggest difference is, I was still nursing then and they still woke up every two hours. Things are much better now!
Yesterday: Hubby and I celebrated our 11th Anniversary. Happy Anniversary, hubster.
Five Songs I Know All The Words To: Eentsy Weentsy Spider, Wheels on the Bus, stuff like that
Five Snacks: Nutter Butter, KitKat, McDonalds Hot Fudge Sundae, Snickers, any fruit.
Five things I'd do with 100 million dollars: Tithe, Pay My Bills, SHOP, buy new house, take care of family's debts and wants.
Five places I'd run away to: North Carolina, New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, the mall
Five things I would never wear: fur, spandex leggings, neon, fishnet stockings, g-string bikini
Five Favourite TV Shows: House, Grey's Anatomy, Laguna Beach (overaged dork!), that's all I can think of
Five Greatest Joys: God, My family, the ocean, not having stress, free time, getting good grades.
Five favourite toys: Computer/Internet, Digital Camera, my surfboard...don't know what else
Five Current Reads: Bible, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Basic and Clinical Pharmacology, The Fundamentals of Anatomy and Physiology, Some Girls
Five People I am tagging to do this: I think almost everyone has done this, if not, then I am tagging YOU.  ¶ 1:54 PM 12Mana'o