There's nothing like feeling successful!

So, this morning I woke up after a fairly rough night (hopefully the last of about a week of very little sleep). I got up and fed, bathed, and dressed Ethan. While I was doing that, I had started some apple butter in the crockpot that I had prepared the night before and started softening some pears on the stove for pear butter. Once Ethan was ready for the day, I turned my attention to myself. I fed, bathed, and dressed myself, put on my make up and did my hair and changed my clothes only twice (did I mention today was opening ceremonies day at EOU and it's time for me to be a professional now...). Then, I picked up the house and started some laundry and made our bed. I shut off the boiling pears, left the apple butter on high in the crockpot and had Ethan's lunch made and bagged packed and had him at Sarah's house by 8:15. Just in time for me to grab a cup of coffee and head to my 8:30 meeting. I sat in meeting at EOU from 8:30 until 12:30 or so, came home, collected my son from Sarah, put him down for his afternoon nap after some "mommy time" with a couple of books. I put my softened pears through the food mill and got my pear butter going in the other crockpot. I cleaned the kitchen, switched the laundry and here I sit with a few minutes to myself before I head up to teach at 3:30. I teach until 7:00 tonight after which I am supposed to go running for 30 minutes (straight through for the first time!). Then, I come home, eat dinner, spend some chatting time with my hubby, put the boy to bed and then sit down to veg out in front of the TV until we both fall asleep. I have to say, that is a successful day and it feels great!!!

Just wanted to put it down for the record. :)

The important thing is to strive towards a goal which is not immediately visible. ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Ok, so this will be a very motivating blog as I have just come from a very motivating run!! This is a picture of me running the "Basic 5" 5K race in Boise as a grad student. I was overweight at this point and had been working hard to get in shape. Not too long after this run, I proceeded to get into the best shape I had been in since high school in preparations for hiking the PCT. In fact, I remember a picture (that I couldn't find) of me at the ski trip the winter after this spring photo and I looked great! Even to me! :) So, I made a goal a while ago that I wanted to run this race again. It worked to get me focused on something then and it can work again.

My run tonight was awesome! Just like the last time I wrote, I overdid it and it didn't even feel like over doing it. :) I ran for 15 minutes, walked for 3 and ran another 12 minutes! I felt like I could run for longer! I am very happy that I am going along at this so quickly. I am scheduled to increase my running time on Monday to 10 minutes of running with 5 minutes of walking in between and do that twice, but I think I will see how I feel. Tonight felt fantastic!

I was a little bummed about our plans for the weekend. We were supposed to go camping and welcome in the next 30 years of Sam's life (instead of mourning the passing of the last 30) at Anthony Lakes this weekend. However, the fires have closed off most wilderness areas around us. So, we are staying home. Sam still went riding with Schwartzy (Eric Schwartz--a friend from college and choir/band teacher in Union) and they had a great time. Then, Sam came home and I went for an invigorating run! So...

That's all I have to say about anything! I want everyone who reads this post to go and do something for yourself after reading this. Go hike in the hills, play a game of touch football or soccer with friends, try a new sport like tennis, or just go for a walk out your front door and around a few blocks or so or your local track. You will feel better when you are done!

So, that's all for now folks...I will be running the Basic 5K in March if anyone wants to train and join me and there is also a 10K and walking races if that's more your thing. It'll be fun and I can't wait to run a full 30 minutes without stopping. From there, I just increase my running time! :) YEAH!

Ok, now I'm really done. have a great rest of the weekend rest of your life!

Ski trips are therapudic and everyone should have one!

This year will be the 10th annual Jacobson and friends ski trip! I can't believe we have been doing this that long! Looking back over the years, we have had some fun and crazy times! We started this because it was a cheap and fun way to get away in the winter season and get out and enjoy some skiing and for some of us that went two years ago, that's all the skiing that was done that winter. We didn't go last year. No one else planned it and I had a new baby and didn't have the energy to, so bummer! But, this year is going to be great! I just hope we get a lot of people to go. We have had such fun. Two years ago, our house had a built in wet bar, pool table, and fooseball downstairs. It was awesome. The theme of ski trips is always how cheap can it be? It's so much fun to cram lots of friends in a house and play games, listen to music and do some good skiing! This is the picture from 2 years ago. We had a blast! I was pregnant and so I couldn't ski or hot tub or drink for that matter, but I still had fun. Maggie brought her scrapbooking stuff and away we went and a bunch of us toured the mines on the second day while everyone skiied. It was a lot of fun and I am really looking forward to it this year. I would imagine that at some point, we might want to consider a summer trip to the lake instead or maybe even alternating every other year, but maybe not. We all love the winter so much and have a great time at the mountain.

I can't express how happy I am these days. I don't even really know why. I am just very very very blessed and I see the blessings every day in my life. I complain a lot. I complain too much. My house is never clean, my students never show up, my family is crazy, we never have enough money...etc. That's just silly. I have a wonderful house that's huge. I could be living in a small apartment somewhere or I could be not knowing how I am going to put a roof over my head. I have lots of students! I get paid whether they show up or not! Why complain...I'm just going to take a book and settle in next time! My family may be crazy, but who's isn't? Everyone's family is a little crazy and mine adds flavor to my life. :) No one ever has enough money and what is money in the bigger picture anyway? It's just silly. We do wonderful things! We have a nice home that we are fixing up, we went sailing this summer, we went to the amusement park and rode up the goldola to see the view. I am going on a scrapbook retreat in October. We are heading on a ski trip, we are not wanting. No, there will never be "enough" money, but like I said, what is that anyway?? I have been so blessed with a wonderful husband, an adorable and sweet little boy, a huge and wonderful family, a great home, great jobs, great town,...what more could a girl want? Oh,...and a cat.

Yes, we got a cat. Her name is Lucy and I found her in the paper. She's an adult cat. Her previous owners had her for 6 years and she was an adult cat when they got her so they aren't sure how old she is. She has long orange hair and it will get everywhere I have no doubt. :) She has been declawed which is great for Ethan and great for my furniture. She is very friendly and loves Ethan already. I have found the little one crouched down on the floor of my room looking under the bed pointing and saying "kitty" more times in the last day and a half! It's quite cute. He follows her around and is learning how to pet nice. She's a great cat. She was free and came with a litter box, big box of food, all assortment of sleeping and other can paraphenalia. I'm glad she's here. She'll be a great addition to our family.

Ok, so, that was kind of a weird and jumpy-all-over blog, but I wanted to write since the babe's asleep. Off I go to clean my house...again. :) But hey, I'm happy to do it. :)

A massage is a wonderful thing!

Well, the summer has officially come to a close. School is back in full swing as of today and I have been teaching through CSA for the past few days. So far, so good. :) I haven't blogged in a while and I don't really have too much to say right now. We spent Labor Day Weekend in Goldendale with Sam's parents and had a great time visiting with them. Their home is always so very inviting and I swear it's taken right from a Home and Garden's magazine. The hammock between the two huge trees, the beautiful garden and lawn and all the places one can find to nap or read. It's fabulous! I love going there and we hadn't been there in about a year, so I am really glad that we went.

Sam turned 30 on the 3rd! He's so funny, he's all obsessed about not getting old. He is on his mountain bike a lot lately and has been going running and such. He's a little paranoid about the whole thing. So, instead of having a party like we would on any other year, we are making this year special by heading out to go camping. We are going up to Anthony Lakes this weekend and will camp up there Saturday night. We are driving up on Saturday and will be hiking and biking and hopefully kayaking on the lake. We have lots of people come with us and it's sure to be a great time! So, that has been interested. If he's turning 30 this year, then I will be 28 next month! Crazy how time flies. We've already been married just over 7 years and have been together for 12!! It sure doesn't seem like it, but every year on our anniversary we (mostly at my urging) sit down and look through our scrapbooks over the years. We have done some really cool stuff. We have hiked mountain tops, backpacked for days on end into some beautiful country, skiied many a mountain. We have traveled to Ecuador, London, and Mexico, seen the most beautiful landscapes and slept in snow caves! We have had a lot of fun in life and I am glad that we continue to do so. Every time we got out to do something fun this summer, we kicked ourselves for not getting out more during the year. Not that one can do much with work and life and such getting in the way, but we vowed to get out more this year than we have in the past few years. It's just all about priority, and sometimes about having the time.

I can't believe how much we have done this summer. We had Anna here for 5 weeks, we remoldeled our bedroom, poured concrete in the shop, remodeled the kitchen, went sailing, attended a conference, went to Six Flags in Tacoma, went to a family reunion in Kellogg for a week, and sooooo much more! We logged a few hiking/biking miles, so that was good too!

Now, it's time to make money so we can have as much fun next summer. Sam wants to put in a waterfall and focus on the backyard next summer as our home renovation. So, I kind of like that idea. I hated the waterfall idea at first, but I am getting more and more used to it. We'll fix up the hot tub, put in the waterfall and landscape the back. This house could be sooooo cool! It's getting there. We have done a lot of work to it and I am glad that we have because it's getting to look pretty good. Now if I was just a better housekeeper....man, I suck at that.

Mollie stopped by yesterday...speaking of housekeeping (because my house was a mess!). It was great to see her and Mr. Ethan man misses her a great deal. He had to show her all his new toys and gave her lots of slobbery kisses. By the way, Mollie, if you read this, you left some lip stuff here from The Body Shop. It smells yummy! I'll leave it on the hutch.

The other super cool thing that happened yesterday was that I used my gift certificate that I got from Michael and got a massage! It was absolutely amazing! I loved every single minute of it. It was very relaxing. I have only ever had one other massage and while it, too, was wonderful, this one was amazing! She worked on a couple of pressure points. They are a little sore today like she said they would be, but she promises that tomorrow, I will notice a distinct difference! It was wonderful and something I should do more often!

I was also very happy with myself last night. I went on my run and it felt so good, that I could run forever! I have backed up with my timing so that I am running 7 minutes and walking for 3 because I hadn't been doing it for a while. That's still a long way from running for 1 minute and walking for 9 which is where I started! However, last night, my 7 minutes came up and I wasn't at all feeling like I needed to stop, so I decided I would bump it up to run 10 walk 5. Well, after 10, I was pumped up by my music and only a little tired, but still had a great breathing pattern and felt rejuvinated, so I kept going! I ran for 15 minutes straight before stopping. I walked for 3 minutes and finished up my 30 minutes by running some more! I felt great and I am not even that sore today! I am scheduled to run today too. I will probably stick to my 7 and 3 or maybe even go back to 10 and 5 (which is the most I have ever been at) today though so I don't push anything too hard. That's what has happened in the past. I get all excited and hit the track and can't run for 30 minutes and get disappointed. so, I have made up my own "couch to 5K" plan and will run the Basic 5K in Boise in March. I am pretty excited. I have lost some weight this summer and am continuing to lose, so that is good. I have a plan to purchase a cruise in October (along with my mom's that we kids are getting her for her 50th birthday). However, the actual cruise won't be until October 2007! That's plenty of time for me to hit the road and get to my goal. I am very excited! It's very motivating because if I don't hit my goal weight, my sister's can pay the extra $$ to have the ticket in their name and go in my stead...so, needless to say, I am into the running! :) Anyway, I was pretty excited about my run last night. :) Tonight will be good too!

I have been doing this really weird thing lately with my health stuff. I have chosen someone every day that I will live for that day. I can't wait for the response that I will get when I see people I haven't seen in a while after I am healthier. I love getting that feedback. So, it's a little weird because I am doing this for myself, but also for the ones that I care about. I want people who I haven't seen in a while to notice that I look better. I love that! I have lots of little goals. My birthday is coming up on October 11th. That's the day I had my first weigh-in last year. I want to be able to say I have lost ___ pounds this year on that day and I want it to be a little bigger number than it is now. So, I have 5 weeks to make it happen. After that comes Thanksgiving! My whole family will be here for Thanksgiving and I will not have seen them since the summer time. I want to look and feel different. Not to mention the dreaded "holiday dieting". Then Christman, then New Year's, then the annual ski trip! I want to be able to look and feel different at this year's ski trip. Last year we didn't have one and the year before that I was very pregnant. I want people to notice who haven't seen me in a while. Wow, I didn't quite mean to go off like that, but I am pretty excited about the whole thing and the baby's asleep. :)

Ok, I will stop chattering now. I have to go clean my house in case Mollie comes over today. :) :)

More later,
Jamie

Great disappointment is mine...

I love this picture. This was a hike up a peak Sam and I did when we lived in Boise. That is our dog Annapurna who we miss very much! That was a beautiful climb into the sawtooth mountains and a very fond memory for me. Plus, we both look great in the picture and so does Annapurna. :)

Ok, so maybe not GREAT disappointment. For those who read this blog and know us at all, you know that we don't watch TV. In fact, not only do we not watch TV, but the only channels we get with our rabbit ears are fox channel 11, the spanish channel and OPB. There are a couple of shows we like to watch on certain days. Bones is one of them. I love Bones. I think it's a great show and being a mystery freak (mostly books, but shows and movies too), I love that show! Now, I looked at the calendar on the fox website because I didn't want to miss the first show of the new season. So, I looked carefully and made sure that baby was in bed and things were taken care of so that I could sit and watch Bones tonight with a glass of wine. So, at 7:58, baby in bed, stuff taken care of, and my glass of wine, I sat down to the opening of some stupid singing show take-off of American idol for duets...dumb! So, I thought it was Wednesday when I checked the website and from then on, I thought it was Wednesday. Suck! Now I have to not only sit here and be pissed that I am not watching Bones, but I have to re-live Wednesday! :( How sad for me.

So, I don't get to watch Bones, so you have to put up with the fact that I have some extra time to blog and this just might be a long one. :) Plus, my Aunt Ann says I don't blog enough, so ... here you go Auntie Ann. :) This one's for you...:) (Thanks for taking over the planning of the reunion and don't worry too much! You can hand it back whenever you want to...I'm happy to take it)

Ethan's Dr. called today to let me know that the EEG came back and looked good. He reminded us of the fact that you can't gauge seizure disorders from one EEG, but he said the fact that this one looked good, the seizure was accompanied by a fever and such made things look a lot better. So, we were happy to hear it.

I have officially moved my home studio up to the Community School for the Arts. I have packed up my room and it's all sitting in the back of my car waiting for someone to help me move my new bookshelf up and set it up before I can load it with books. I am going to love working out of that room and having all my stuff in one place. Last year I had to schlepp all my stuff back and forth and that sucked nine ways to Tuesday! It was aweful so I am looking forward to not having to do it again.

So, I heard something funny this morning on NPR. I am addicted to NPR and I love it to death and listen to it all the time! This funny thing was kind of in between the stories talking about the anniversary of Katrina. Anyway, it was a list of things about this year's freshman (in college). It's supposed to help the professors to understand them. For instance, it may surprise you to know that this year's college freshman was born in 1988!! Here are some snipets because I found them fascinating myself and I am only 10 years older than them!
taken from www.beloit.edu:

The Soviet Union has never existed and therefore is about as scary as the student union.

They have known only two presidents.

They have never heard anyone actually "ring it up" on a cash register.

A coffee has always taken longer to make than a milkshake.

They grew up pushing their own miniature shopping carts in the supermarket.

They grew up with and have outgrown faxing as a means of communication.

"Google" has always been a verb.

Madden has always been a game, not a Superbowl-winning coach.

Phantom of the Opera has always been on Broadway.

Reality shows have always been on television.

They have always known that "In the criminal justice system the people have been represented by two separate yet equally important groups." (man, I love that show!)

They have rarely mailed anything using a stamp.

"So" as in "Sooooo New York," has always been a drawn-out adjective modifying a proper noun, which in turn modifies something else. (I like that one!)

They never played the game of state license plates in the car.

They have always preferred going out in groups as opposed to dating.

Crazy, huh! there are lots more...there are like 70 or something and they do one for every in coming freshman class. I think it's crazy cool!

Ok, so maybe I am done blogging for now. I will blog again very soon, though. I am off to read my book since I don't get to watch Bones and I REFUSE to watch some stupid show about people singing duets with celebrities. No thank you.

Off I go ...*trying not to look too disappointed*
Jme

The mind is a terrible thing to waste.

this is one of the pieces of art that I am thinking about for my bedroom! I like it a lot!

Ok, so I have been working really hard to focus on the upcoming changes in my life and schedule and such. First of all, I have moved my business to the Community School for the Arts. That was a HUGE decision. First of all, I haven't been saying very good things about them because I haven't liked the problems they have been making in people's voices. I have had a couple of students come back to the studio after studying a little with students up there and I have pretty much had to start all over again with our studies and get their voice back on track. That's been frustrating. However, as of right now, I believe I will be their only teacher and by teaching up there I gain a work space that's out of my home and therefore gain a bedroom in my home. I don't have to do my own billing or taxes. I will love most of the administrative sides of things as long as I still get to make my own decisions and run it like I would my business, which is sounds like they are going to let me. It costs a little more for my students and I am really hoping that won't be a problem. They have to charge a little bit for overhead and such and my overhead costs was next to nothing and included in my fee. So, I am anxious to move up there and see how things are and get started. I just hope that everything goes ok. I am a little nervouse about the change. I am sure that it was a good decision. I ran all my thoughts and questions through my friends and family and they came up with some good questions for me to clear up before I agreed. Thank goodness for the Goodall's and their smart little minds. :)

The other concern that I have in my life right now (I mean other than the fact that my son has been having seizures, because THAT has been foremost in my mind lately) is going back to graduate school and finishing my degree. I am nervous about how it will play out. Boise State wasn't willing to work with me when I was a student there and I can't imagine they are willing to work with me now. I have only received 2 emails so far and neither have answered my questions and both have been worded quite rudely. the first one I got after sending an email to my advisor to ask about where I was in the big picture and make sure that I wasn't missing any classes or requirements that I didn't know about was replied to with, "I will get to this at my earliest convenience.". That's it...Ok, so, I gave my advisor a week to look into it and when I still hadn't heard, I did some looking myself. I made some phone calls, some emails, talked with people in admissions and such and found out most of what I could. I emailed her letter her know that I had looked and had in fact met the requirements that I thought I had and that I needed to know if I needed to reaudition for the program and such. The email I received in reply was rude and short and basically told me that I shouldn't be talking to my advisor, I should be talking to my instructor. Well, that's just silly. Why would my instructor know if I have taken all the predictive exams and how many credits of what I still need to finish my degree. Besides, I was hoping not to have to work with her because we don't get along very well. I get the feeling she doesn't like me. She is the instructor of the class that I need and probably will have to oversee my thesis recital. That makes me very nervous, but there isn't much I can do about it. If I want to finish my degree, I will have to work with her and that's all there is. So, I emailed her last night and asked her my questions and we'll see what kind of response I get.

Ok, I'd better get going. I was up all night with Ethan (who is feeling better, by the way, but has to have meds every 3 hours) and I have some serious amounts of coffee to drink...

jme

Ethan's second seizure...

Well, today has not been the best day of my life, that's for sure! I was planning on sleeping in a little this morning because I haven't been getting much sleep in the night because the baby's been up. So, Sam and I had it all worked out. Ethan woke up around 7:00 am, usually he's up at 6:00, so this was great! Sam said he felt a little warm and kind of feverish. We gave him some tylenol and took his temp. 100.6 under the arm. Well, about 15 minutes later, he had a seizure. This one was very similar to the one he had before. It lasted about 2 minutes and was the longest two minutes of my life next to the 2 minutes of the last seizure. When he was out of the seizure and regained consciousness, he had a lot of trouble with his motor skills and couldn't grab for his tigger or make a fist to bring the sheet over him or anything. We called the Dr. when they opened at 8:00 and took him in at 8:30. He was a little concered at the close timing of the seizures and said that Ethan had some little white spots at the back of his throat that might be causing the fever and therefore, the seizure. I remembered that we were at Sarah and Dani's house for a visit while Carrie and Tim and the girls were visiting and went over there Sunday and Sarah has mentioned that her kids have been complaining of sore throats. I mentioned this to the Dr. He ended up sending us up to the hospital. Poor Ethan got blood cultures taken and a work up was sent to the lab for a bunch of tests. Then, we went upstairs and the Dr. had ordered an EEG. They gave Ethan medicine to put him to sleep and hooked up 30 electrodes to his head and face and recorded his brain activity for about 20 minutes. So, we spent most of the morning at the hospital. By the time we got home as I was putting him down to sleep, I noticed a slight fever still. I took his temp and it was 102.7! It had spiked high and fast and I was worried about another seizure. I called the Dr. and of course, they were all on lunch, so I called my Dr. cell number which he had given me earlier that day. He told me to bring him in right away for a shot of Rossefin. It's a big dose of strong anti-biotics to get the fever down pretty fast. So, now we are home and Ethan is sleeping peacefully. He isn't warm to the touch and we have antibiotics and tylenol for him. It's pretty scary. It's one thing when you know that it isn't hurting them and that they will grow out of it, but it's another thing to think that every time he gets sick, which has been a lot in his life, there is a possibility of a seizure. I am going to have to go through what to do with all my sitters and nannys to make sure that when and if he spikes a fever when I'm not around, they will all know what to do. That's kind of the scary part too is that it happens sooooo fast! Within 15 minutes he went from alert and eating a banana for breakfast giving no indication anything was wrong to seizing on my bed. Pretty freaky!

I am trying to take some time and calm myself down a little. Sam is napping and I was trying to read, but my mind has been going to fast today, I can't concentrate on my book. So, I thought I would get some of my fears and worries out of my head and onto my blog so I don't have them rattling around anymore.

Ok, I feel better already. My house is an absolute wreck and I have a lot of stuff going on right now with my busniness, which I will have to go into later. For the rest of the day, I am going to try to just chill and see how things go. Off I go to lay on the couch and maybe watch a movie.