Never Again...

On Wednesday I was running around doing errands all morning long, just a normal morning. I arrived home about 12:40, brought in my things from my car and called my sister Chelsie to discuss my morning. Benton left as I arrived home, he had to run some of our garbage to the dump. I was looking in the fridge trying to find something to feed Cambree for lunch.

As I was talking my words began to slur. It was the craziest thing. In my head I knew and understood that I was slurring my words really bad but as I was trying to repeat myself. I couldn't verbalize what I was thinking. Chelsie of course was trying to understand what I was saying. At first she thought I was laughing or crying but as she tried to understand me she realized something was wrong. She hung up the phone with me and frantically called Benton to tell him to turn around and go home because I needed help.

I couldn't comprehend what was happening. Why couldn't I speak? I must have blacked out because when I woke up Benton was home trying to talk to me. He couldn't get me to respond so he went to find Cambree so he could stick her in her car seat to take me to the hospital. As he was walking away from me I woke up. I tried saying his name but what I was thinking was coming out all mixed up. I yelled for him and was asking him to come help me while sobbing. I tried wiping my tears from my face and realized my body, face, legs, everything was numb. I couldn't stand up, I was stuck helpless. Benton came to my rescue and was on the phone with 911. The operator asked "Does she have an onset headache?", "yes" I replied, "Is her body numb?", "Yes it is", "Is her speech slurred?", we replied "Yes". Benton also said that half my face was slumped. Then within minutes 2 ambulances were at our new house telling me I probably had a stroke and needed to go to the hospital.

We spent the next 5 hours in the Emergency Room. Benton called Chelsie, who dropped everything to come get Cambree so she wasn't stuck at the hospital. I felt back to normal except a splitting headache. They first had me get blood tests, a Cat Scan, a chest x-ray and finally an MRI. Luckily they said I didn't have a major stroke. The test showed it didn't leave any long term damage. With a mini stroke or a TIA, unless you have the symptoms at the hospital it is too hard for them to determine if that is what actually happened. The doctor said our technology for that still isn't good enough to let us know what actually happened. What happened to me matches exactly what the symptoms are for a TIA (transient ischemic attack or mini stroke). They referred me to go see a Neurologist within 2-5 days. I will call on Monday to schedule an appointment.

I am so thankful I did not have a full blown stroke and that it didn't cause any serious damage. I know Benton and Chelsie have been traumatized by this, which is understandable. My family as well as Benton's have called me daily to check on me, they have all said they will be calling in periodically to make sure I am alright.

Today I drove past a funeral progression and it hit me hard. I of course began to cry and it finally sunk in how serious what happened on Wednesday really was. I love all my family and friends and I promise you I will go to the doctor and figure out what happened to me so it doesn't happen again.

Our Holidays!

My parents as well as my brother, Thomas were able to come to town for Christmas this year. It was perfect timing for me, I always had a babysitter if I needed one since we were in the middle of moving!

We ate at Market Street one day, which is one of my favorite restaurants. Here's my mom, Thomas and my dad...

 

Cambree enjoying a healthy and filling lunch of ranch dressing...

 

When we were leaving the restaurant there was a table of about 15 people and Miss Cambree stood there and blew them all kisses while laughing, she thought she was hot stuff...such a silly girl I have.

On Christmas Eve morning we went to Benton's moms annual breakfast. We were a little late since we dropped off a load of our stuff to our new home!

Cambree and I all ready to eat some breakfast!

 

Nanny Linda gave Cambree a Baby Alive doll which eats bananas and drinks juice. Cambree is in LOVE with it, she loves her new baby!

 

Cambree loves getting attention, here she is acting silly and of course I thought she was just too cute not to get a picture of.

 

That night we had dinner at Chelsie's house with my mom's brother and her 2 sisters. It was nice hanging out and enjoying each others company! I didn't get very many pictures but I thought this was cute of Chelsie and I with our little girls!

 

On Christmas morning this is what I woke up to...

 

Once our sleeping beauty was awake we opened presents! My parents and Benton and I went in on this chair for Cambree, she LOVED it!

 

My sister Karly gave her this cup and of course she tried to drink out of it once it was opened, where's the milk?

 

I think she enjoyed opening presents but she didn't quite understand it. She loved sticking her hand in her stocking to see what else was in there.

 

On Christmas day we went back over to Chelsie's for a ham dinner. I am so grateful my family was able to spend time together this Christmas.

Family picture with us and my parents...

 

Emma and Cambree wearing matching sweaters...

 

Cambree was exhausted on our way home, I love a sleeping baby.

 

Happy Holidays, hope yours was as good as ours was!

 

BiG GiRl!

I finally broke down and put Cambree in a front facing car seat. She has really enjoyed her rear facing car seat but I just felt it was time. She is old enough and almost weighs enough, just a pound off...good enough right?

On the day after Thanksgiving my friend Cortney and I went shopping. Cortney drove us so Cambree got a glimpse of riding in a front facing car seat and she loved it! She kept saying "What's that?!" and pointing to everything. It seriously was too cute! So this past week I broke down and opened the big car seat that I ordered for her back in June.

 

As you can see she's waving and saying "See ya!"

 

I think I waited longer than I needed to because I just want her to stay little longer, any ideas how to freeze time?

Third times a charm...

Hopefully that saying is true, otherwise I might just have a break down. The Carnahan family is moving again! We are closing sometime this month, which means we have moved 3 times in just 13 months. I understood why we moved the first 2 times but this time is just annoying.

Moving into a home site unseen turned out really bad for us. We had to deal with a LONG list of problems with our rental house. We had security & safety issues. I was upset with our landlord because nothing was taken care of. We had to fix everything and hope he would pay us back for the expenses. He had never rented the home before, let alone been a landlord. That should have been our red signal to get out of there!

Then the first week we moved into our rental home in Millcreek we got a knock on the door. Benton was home and was greeted by a man looking for Ryan (our landlord) to serve him papers. We tried figuring out what type of papers he was serving him by looking online. That's where I found out he had problems paying his mortgage. I called the city trying to figure out what we could do. Ryan assured me everything was fine, he was getting his loan re-modified. About a month later I received a letter in the mail from a law firm talking about different options, don't worry it was addressed to Ryan or current resident. I immediately called Ryan asking him what was going on. He said we'd have at least until February to live here if the loan modification wasn't done. I was done.

We started looking for homes to purchase, while trying to figure out how we could get out of our lease. I looked at over 50 homes in person and we looked at hundreds online. On our last time we looked at homes I told my realtor that if we didn't find anything I was done...there just wasn't anything out there. Which is surprising because I thought it was a buyers market...that's not true. On that day we walked into a home in Bountiful and I had "the feeling", this was our home. I put on offer on the house without Benton even looking at it. Later that day he drove up and looked at it and fell in love just like I had. We are officially in contract with the sellers. We have been for about 3 weeks now. We've had some hiccups on the way but we are finally all in agreement and waiting for all the paperwork to be done. The day that the sellers and us as buyers came into agreement, we got a letter posted on our door stating our rental home was going to be sold at a public sale on Dec 28th, which is our closing deadline. I can't wait to move into my new home and get away from all our troubles at our rental home. It seems like it was all meant to be. I finally see some light at the end of the tunnel. Except now I have to begin the moving process.

Now for those of you who haven't moved in a while, let me just explain to you how much work it takes to move.

You have to:

-find boxes, buy tape,and have a good marker
-de-clutter and go through your things you want/don't want to keep
-drop any items off at goodwill
-pack EVERYTHING in your house
-call and change your address with credit card companies, employers, post office, dentist/doctors office, family & friends and anyone else you can think of
-cancel utilities in your name
-set up utilities in your name
-clean your old home for new tenants
-find a new place to live
-rent a moving truck
-unload all your boxes & find a new home for each item
-clean your new home after moving in
-set up times to have your TV/internet installed
-and anything else I forgot!

You do all of that while trying to fit in your normal life and on top of that enjoying the holidays. Once that's all said and done I WILL NEED A VACATION!

At least someone's enjoying all this...

 

 

It's Your Birthday!

Benton turned 29 years old yesterday. It's his last years in his twenties, so crazy! He was able to get off work a little early so we could go out. We dropped Cambree off at Chelsie's house. We were ready for a night on the town!

 

We ate dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. I had to talk Benton into it. He wanted to go to Crown Burger, which I love but I wanted to go some where more adult. Cambree can be difficult to take to restaurants, so I thought it would be good to go to a nicer place without her. We can take her to Crown Burger anytime. Benton was fine with anything, I just wanted him to have a nice dinner...so that's what he got! Shrimp Scampi and Chicken Madeira!

 

After dinner we went to the dollar theater in Sugar House and saw Crazy, Stupid, Love. I really enjoyed going to a movie with Benton, it's been way too long!

Happy Birthday Benton, we love you very much! And we hope you enjoyed your day!

18 Months!

Cambree just keeps getting older and older. I love the age she is in now, but I am sad by how quickly our time has past. Every stage she has been in I've thought was my favorite stage. I have loved every moment I've had with her since I had her 18 months ago. I look at her and I am so grateful she is mine. She is such a fun little girl, I want to remember her this little forever. So for my sake, I'm going to write all about Miss Cambree!

Breakfast is Cambree's favorite meal of the day, or that's when she eats the most. She eats like a bird. She weighs about 19 lbs, I'll get her stats when we go to her check up. Thank goodness for pancakes and fruit, otherwise she'd starve!

 

M&M's are her favorite! If you ever want to get on her good side, just give her some M&M's!

 

Cambree is in the stage now where she wants to do things herself. I'll ask her questions and she will answer me. Not sure if she knows what I'm saying, but it's pretty cute. If she sees us drinking a drink she will want ours instead of drinking out of a sippy cup. Sadly I think she'll want to get rid of the sippy cups sooner than later.

 

Her hair is finally coming in! It's getting thicker and thicker. I look back at her pictures and can't believe how little hair she had. It has a little curl, just like her mommy!

 

She LOVES to play. I bought her a little tent this past month and she loves it. She actually carries it from room to room by herself.

 

and the cheesy smile...

 

She loves to play in her room with all her toys. She loves these blocks our good friend from Illinois, Barb gave to her. Both these pictures were cute so I had to show both of them.

 

 

playing under the Christmas tree...

 

Thankfully she has some teeth coming in. She has her bottom 2 and 1 is poking through the top! Yay! Everyone always wonders what she eats since she doesn't have teeth, but she's never had a problem eating anything. She is in the process of getting a molar on each side. You can see her top tooth coming in if you look at this picture closely...

 

I have not put Cambree in a forward facing car seat yet. I know I might sound crazy but she LOVES the car and doesn't know any different. She loves her car seat. If we ever have it in the house it's her favorite place to sit.

One day she disappeared, I found her in my room all excited that she found her car seat.

 

She plays in it and also watches tv!

 

 

Our little missy still takes 2 naps a day. About 1-2 hours in the morning and afternoon. I love my sleep so I guess it's not a big surprise that my daughter loves it as well. We still put her to bed between 7:30-8 and she sleeps till 7:30 the next morning.

 

We couldn't imagine not having her in our lives. It's hard to remember what life was before we had her. It's just so much better with her in it! Love you Cambree!