Monday, April 25, 2011

April - Country Music, Kam's first Easter and another surgery

Back in November Marie told me that George Strait, Reba McEntire and LeAnn Womack were coming to Salt Lake for a concert on April 2. George Strait and Reba are two of my absolute most favorite people in Country music. I have ALWAYS wanted to see them in concert. George doesn't come to Utah very often (maybe every 10 years) so I knew that we had to jump at the opportunity. We wanted everyone to come (all of the Nate's siblings) but it ended up that it was just as the parents going so we jumped online and bought tickets before it sold out. We bought the cheapest ones so we were in the upper bowl at the Energy Solutions Arena but the seats were still fabulous. We had a good view and could see everything.

LeAnn started. She only sang for 30 minutes and the band was so loud we couldn't hardly hear her. But she was still great. I like her music and she was fun to watch.


Reba came out after that. She sang for almost just under 2 hours and put on an awesome show! She sang new and old songs so it was great to hear the old stuff. She ended with the song Fancy as her encore song. She left and for a minute we didn't think she was coming back but then a the music video started showing on the jumbo tron and then a really old fashioned taxi drove out onto the floor and she got out in a sparkly red dress and sang Fancy while the music video kept playing. It was really cool! Marie said that Reba used to put on a HUGE show with tons of props and costume changes and stuff. That would have been cool to see but she definitely put on a good show for us.




Melissa Peterman joined Reba during the show and they did a little impromptu skit. She is so funny! If you don't know who she is, she plays Barbara Jean on the REBA show on tv. She also hosts the "Singing Bee" right now. She is hilarious and her and Reba play off of each other so good. She came out with a Jazz hat and a Jazz flag as a cape and a jersey on. She of course threw each item into the audience as they bantered back and forth. I think the funniest thing was she was holding a Budweiser bottle in her hand and taking sips from it. She looked at the guitarist and handed it to him and said "have a few of those and I'll start to look like Faith Hill". Hilarious! Then she handed it to Reba and said "look at that... The Queen of Country is holding the King of Beers!" Those two are just too funny.



George came out last. He sang for about 2 hours too. It was a little over 4 hours of country music! Some people don't like that he just hangs out with his guitar and sings but that's what I love. I love that he's just natural like that. He has seriously the most amazing voice! He sang good old songs and new ones too like Reba did. I'm pretty sure there isn't a single George Strait song that I hate. There are 1 or 2 that aren't my favorites but I still listen to them. One thing he pointed out was that he was singing a lot of #1 hits and the next song he was going to do wasn't one, but it's one of his favorite. It's was Amarillo By Mornin'. I had no idea that wasn't a #1! I thought for sure it was! That's one of my most favorite songs of his. Oh well... I'm just glad I got to hear him perform it live. He is just amazing to watch and listen to. I'm so glad we went!





On April 15 Kamry had to have tubes put in her ears. She got another ear infection (not as bad as the first one) but at that point I decided (along with the Dr and Nate) that we just didn't want her to deal with it anymore and we should put tubes in her ears. It was an easy breezy surgery - seriously in and out in 15 minutes but the thing that bugged me was that it was her 3rd surgery before her 1st birthday. She was such a trooper through it. A little later in the day after she had a good nap and you wouldn't have even known she had just had surgery that morning.

Nate was sitting by her on the bed when the anesthesiologist came in and was talking to us. All of a sudden we hear a noise and Nate seriously grabbed her right as her feet were leaving the bed. She would have landed on her head if he hadn't caught her. It's amazing how fast your parent instincts are. He seriously looked away from her for 2 seconds to look at the anesthesiologist. Luckily he caught her and everything was fine. Whew!

April 20: Nate and I went and got the ultrasound to find out what we're having. Darn baby would tell us! It kept it's feet crossed under its butt so we couldn't see the "necessary area" to see the sex of the baby. It was frustrating but we tried for about 40 minutes to get it to move and it just wouldn't. I even got up and walked around, emptied my bladder and came back. Still no luck. I guess we'll just have to try again. I for sure want to know what it is because if it's a boy I need to prepare myself with some boy clothes. Oh well... I guess we'll find out later.

Kamry's first Easter was fun. I got her this cute little basket from Smiths Marketplace and filled it with snacks that she can gum and eat. There were little cheese puffs (almost like cheetos), Apple Wagon Wheels and Yogurt drops. I also got her one of those little cups you can put treats in and she can reach in and get them but it's not supposed to let anything spill out. Hopefully it works. I guess we'll see. She had a ton of fun opening her gift too. She was good at grabbing the paper and ripping. She would just get distracted and try and eat the wrapping paper instead of continuously ripping at the presents. We just kept pulling the paper out of her hands when she would rip it off and then she would start over. It was cute to watch.


She is going to be crawling so soon it's insane. She started getting herself on her belly and she can now roll from her back to her belly like a champ. So full of life. It's awesome!


This was one of her gifts.


She loves the little piano. The center part lights up when the music plays and she grabs at it. It's so funny!


Daddy was playing with her one night on the couch and she was just all over the place. It was hilarious to watch him. He doesn't get to see her really active like that all the time so he was just getting a kick out of it. We let her stay up until 10 that night because she was having so much fun.


On April 23 we went to Ogden for a Memorial Service for a guy that Nate worked with that passed away. It was crazy. I think he was maybe 32 and one day he didn't show up for work. Joe Cardall went to check on him and when his truck was home but he didn't answer the door he called the cops. They went in and found Jimmy dead at the kitchen table. Preliminary autopsy showed it was some abnormality with his brain. We haven't got the final results yet from his brother but hopefully they can pinpoint what happened. He was so nice. He was just at our house talking to Nate for a while the day before it happened. He came a couple weekends before and helped us tile the kitchen too. He also gave Nate this really cool gun from like the 1870's. It's stock is broken and needs to be fixed, but it is an awesome gun. He was a really nice guy and I know Nate is going to miss him. He really liked Jimmy. But his brother put on a really nice Memorial (I think it's also called a Wake). They had a video thing of Jimmy going and they displayed a lot of items that he had made from wood and stuff. He was really talented.

Anyway, since we were going to be in Ogden anyway we took Kamry back to the NICU at McKay Dee to see everyone. It was a really busy day so we didn't stay long and we only saw a couple of nurses that we recognized. We're going to take her back again on the evening shift sometime to see them again. They all couldn't believe how big she was and how good she looked and of course they thought she was just adorable. We also donated Kamry's preemie clothes to them so they were excited about that. I kept one outfit for her memory box, but gave everything else.



April has been a pretty eventful month. We are also moving back into our house this coming weekend. The sale we had fell through so we've decided that we might as well be living in it since we are still paying the mortgage. It will be good to get Kamry home again and get into a routine at her own home. I graduate next month and am looking for a job so it's going to be a busy life when I get a job.