Books Read 2011

Books Read 2011 (Items in bold are books I highly recommend)

1. Dixieland Sushi by Cara Lockwood

2. Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls

3. Courting Trouble by Deeanne Gist

4. Women Who Run by Shanti Sosienski Loved this book! So inspiring to read about these amazing women who fought to bring women's running into theolympics or to fight a personal struggle. I truely enjoyed reading each story. And the interesting one was of the man who had a sex change to a woman. Reading how estrogen slowed him down was fascinating.

5. Without a Backward Glance by Kate Veitch

6. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

7. My Name is Memory by Ann Brashares Amazing book! I've recommended this book to everyone I know. Such a great story/plot. At first I was disappointed with the lackluster ending but later learned that this book is supposed to be Part 1 of a trilogy. I can't wait till the next book comes out.

8. Ape House by Sara Gruen (A little disappointing, I really liked Water for Elephants and had high hopes for this book.)

9. Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier-Again I was hoping for an exciting story, it seemed a little slow. Apparently this book is historical fiction but I sort of wished it was spiced up a little.

10. Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins This was a cute teen novel. My friend recommended it to me so I requested the book from the library. I didn't find it amazing, but a cute story.

11. The Book of Tomorrow by Cecelia Ahern. I liked the book, it wasn't as amazing as it sounded like it would be, but it was entertaining. There were some twists in there that I liked.

12. The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes. Very cute book! I thought it was creatively written and kept my interest throughout the book as it followed inhabitants of an apartment building.

13. Mile Markers: The 26.2 Most Important Reasons Why Women Run by Kristen Armstrong. I didn't like the layout of the book in that it wasn't chronological. So it took a bit to get used to kids ages changing etc. But for the most part it was a book about friendship and the bonds you make while running. I had an issue with Kristin saying she's not a runner, etc when she's super fast, spits out 2 hour runs on the weekends often, qualified and ran the Boston Marathon and made an ultra-marathon (trail one nontheless) seem easy. For me that is a super runner, something I don't think I'll ever be...so I was really mad that she says I'm not a runner and here I am saying I"m a runner but can't even imagine being at her level.

14. These Hidden Things by Heather Gudenkauf Very good book! I whipped through it in 4 days which recently is amazing for me. Some of it was predictable but it still kept my attention.

15. The Last to Know by Melissa Hill This book kept me guessing the whole way through. I loved that.

16. Sing You Home by Jodi Picoult It was interesting, didn't have the usual Jodi Picoult drama in the end. It was a good read though I was expecting a bit more to be played out.
17. The Boy Who Loved Tornadoes by Randi Davenport
18. The Midwife's Confession by Diane Chamberlain
19. The Pile of Stuff at the Bottom of the Stairs by Christina Hopkinson
20. Sweet Valley Confidential: Ten Years Later by Francine Pascal. I was a huge Sweet Valley fan when I was a little girl. I saw this book and was hoping to bring back those memories. Not so much. Total twist on the plot that I remember. Maybe if I had read the college years it would have made sense but all in all it was eh.
21. The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb by Melanie Benjamin
22. The Luxe by Anna Godbersen: I picked up this book because of the beautiful dress on the cover. I loved it. It's a young adult book and it's best described as Gossip Girl in the 1800's.
23. The Sleeping Beauty Proposal by Sarah Strohmeyer
24. The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry
25. Rumors by Anna Godbersen Sequel to Luxe.
26. Bossypants by Tina Fey Funny easy read.
27. Envy by Anna Godbersen
28. Then Came You by Jennifer Weiner This was a great book. I felt I haven't read a really good Jennifer Weiner book in a while but this one was really good. I loved how it was a story about one baby told by several "mothers", egg donor, surrogate and actual mother. It was cleverly written and kept me captivated.
29. Splendor by Anna Godbersen Final Luxe series book. I really liked the series and would recommend it at a fun, easy read.
30. The Lies we Told by Diane Chamberlain
31. The Carrie Diaries by Candace Bushnell
32. Still Alice by Lisa Genova I loved reading the book in the affected patients perspective. Not that I'd know what Alzheimers is like but I felt it could quite possibly have portrayed the disease very well.
33. Forget Me Knot by Sue Margolis
34. Before the Storm by Diane Chamberlain
35. Is Everyone Hanging out Without Me? by Mindy Kaling
36. Sisterhood Everlasting (The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants #5) by Ann Brashares Wow, just wow. Not what I was expecting when I picked up this book, but a very good read. Like the twists Brashares did.
37. Secrets She Left Behind by Diane Chamberlain

Adding to my books read 2011:

Books Listened to in 2011

1. Love and Impossible Pursuits byAyelet Waldman

2. Between Georgia by Joshilyn Jackson

3. Ines of My Soul by Isabel Allende

4. Geek Love by Katherine Dunn
5. Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving

My Son's Choking Story

My son’s choking Story

Wednesday July 6, just under a week after E turned 2.
Was a normal evening, called DH on my way to spin class and hung up as he was picking up E. I turned off my ringer because I knew he had both kids. After my hour long class I looked at my phone to 7 missed calls and a text that DH and E were in the ER. I ran out of the gym and called to find out what was going on.
Apparently my DH walks in the door of daycare with our daughter to pick up E and as soon as he walked in the provider comments “He’s choking!” DH runs over grabs him, holds him upside down and tries to pound the food out. He was eating strawberries (cut up). As he was trying to get the strawberry out, provider was trying to sweep the mouth. DH felt E go limp and they called 911. DH is not sure about timing of things but E got a little blue but then started to moan and some of the strawberry dribbled out. Police/Fire and Ambulance came and by the time they arrived E was crying. They put him on oxygen and DH and E went to ER to be seen. Daughter was removed from the room by provider’s children so she didn’t have to see what was going on.
I picked up Daughter and then headed to the ER, got there about 1.5 hours since the incident. E was groggy from Benedryl, they gave that to him just in case he was having an allergic reaction to strawberries (he’s not allergic). And they had an oxygen mask on him because he wasn’t getting 100% oxygen. X-ray’s showed cloudiness in the lungs which could be more food or fluid. They gave him some albuterol (asthma) treatments to open his lungs up to get more oxygen. And in the meantime we were waiting for a team of pediatric respiratory specialists to come up in an ambulance from Santa Clara to transport him to that hospital.
We waited 2 hours in the ER till they showed up and were able to load him into an ambulance. Daughter was really good sitting with us, I wasn’t too worried at that point because E seemed allright, just a little out of it probably because of Benedryl and bedtime. DH rode in the ambulance down to Santa Clara while I followed with Daughter. Grandparents were waiting at Santa Clara to take her home. 10pm we check in to SC Pediatric ICU and 10:30pm Daughter was taken home. X-ray’s were reviewed, his lungs were listened to and they made a decision that they wanted to do an endoscopy (look in his lungs) to make sure that the cloudiness they see and raspiness they hear wasn’t food particles. 11:30 they take him in to surgery (as they called it). They told us 1.5-2 hours, but 3 hours later they finally come out. They said they had cleared out the lungs and that during the procedure he had vomited and coughed so he may have aspirated more food so they’d keep him on a ventilator for a little while with tubes in his lungs and stomach to clear things out. They said a strawberry was a very hard thing to deal with. If it was a penny or a peanut they could go in there and simply remove it, but when they looked it was just mushed strawberry and seeds so a lot to clean up. We then had to wait another 1.5 hours to see him in the ICU and I finally was able to run home at 5am to change out of my workout clothes and grab some stuff from home.
Thursday July 7.
Most horrible day for me. Seeing my son on a ventilator with many wires and tubes coming out of him was the hardest thing for me. I cried pretty much all day. The nurses were awesome and would come and explain what was going on and give me hugs. They were very doting on me considering I was also 35 weeks pregnant. My friends were wonderful and brought us food/meals/snacks etc. Things I didn’t even think of until they were put in front of me. My parents drove up to see what was going on and to help out if they could. What was really difficult was that I kept thinking, you choke, they clean up the lungs and then you go home. But seeing E on 3 different sedation meds so that he wouldn’t touch anything, then occasionally having them suck things out of the lungs and seeing him struggling to wake up and us having to pin him down was heartbreaking. He was so strong and wanted to wake up that Thurs night they had to pump him with a lot of drugs to get him to sleep. Daughter was not allowed to see him in this state. When she visited, DH and I went outside and hung out with her instead of her coming to the room. The nurses insisted I sleep in the parents room near the ICU because I was going on 1.5 hours of sleep in 2 days. DH stayed in the room with E and I snuck in 5 hours of sleep.
Friday July 8
Mornings orders were 7am take E off sedation meds, let him wake up a bit then remove tubes. I asked how long it would take for him to wake up and they said not long. Sure enough, 15 min after the meds were turned off he was struggling. DH and I pinned him down until the nurses could come in and remove the tubes. So 7:20 he was off the ventilator, breathing on his own, just had an IV in. The first words he said was…”Dada”. I got to hold him for a while and we all took turns holding him that morning. He was very groggy and was only awake for 30 min max at a time. He was running a fever which was expected, could be the start of pneumonia from the fluid in his lungs. He talked a little and then started asking for food. He had a horrible cough too. Funny, he didn’t want jello or soft foods, he wanted my turkey sandwich and chips. I didn’t want to give him hard foods yet but the nurses said it’s fine, let him eat whatever he wants. We watched a lot of movies with him and let him nap a lot. He was visited by his sister and when she walked in the room, he rolled over and tried to sit up…so sweet! That night he slept well. DH and I well…the parents room wasn’t available so I stayed up till 1:30am until my back was killing me in the chair. I woke DH up and I took my turn sleeping in the pullout chair bed thing. I slept for a good 6 hours.
Saturday July 9
E was back to normal in my mind. He wasn’t talking as much as he used to, but he was definitely ready to be out and about. We took a walk to the pediatric play room and walked the halls. He tried to escape down the elevator and put up a huge fight when we tried to get him back in his room. Our goal of the day was to get him to take his antibiotics orally (he’d been getting them through IV) so we could go home. That evening they released us to the regular pediatric ward. They wanted to monitor us another night. So annoying. He was ready to go, we were ready to go…we spent most of the day hanging out in the hallways because he hated being cooped up in the room. The nurses were great and got us a normal sized bed for his room so I could sleep with him. Turns out toddler and a pg woman in a hospital bed is very uncomfortable. Especially when they come in and check on him every 4 hours. So I switched with DH and he took the bed while I took the pullout chairbed which for some reason in this room was uncomfortable.
Sunday July 10
We were finally released! 9am and we were out of the hospital. Instructions were to give him antibiotics for a week. Antibiotics that is horrible tasting and kids hate. Great! No restrictions on him, he could play/eat anything/swim etc. DH and I decided to keep him home for the week to monitor him. The grandmas were more than willing to help out. Especially since I had only 4 work days left till maternity leave.
And when we got home, first thing he asks to do…jump on the trampoline and then run a race. All things that made him cough (normal) but doctor’s encouraged to work his lungs.

Aftermath: Antibiotics did not work for him. He gagged and threw them up twice. So doctor switched up the prescription at the follow-up appointment on Tuesday. New antibiotics were easier to get down but has given him diarrhea which sucks! I’ve had to do more laundry then I’ve ever done. Plus he has a horrible diaper rash and cries when you change his diaper and this morning I had to steam clean the rugs because of his poop. He’s been off the antibiotics for 3 days and we haven’t really seen an improvement in the poop department. But other than that he’s his normal self. Eating everything, making us yell chew chew chew at his every bite and just being him. Like I said, I never knew that this would be a 4 day hospital ordeal. I thought choking was simple but I was wrong. I’m so glad that he’s back to normal and I hope that I never have to go through this again.

Running Talley 2011

As of yesterday I've beat my running mileage from pregnancy #2. I have run 178.82 miles this pregnancy and I have just over 8 weeks to go. This is a mile over my mileage from pregnancy #2.

My yearly mileage is up to 130.89.

So far I feel allright. I'm very slow running and I don't know how long I can keep it up. I may have to drop my runs to 2 miles and under but I'll keep going as long as I can.

Children's Books List

It gets asked often, what are your kids favorite books. I'm going to start trying to keep track of my (and theirs) favorites. I'm sure I'll leave some out, but slowly I'll get them all listed.

Llama Llama series by Anna Dewdney
Bear Series ie Bear Wants More: by Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman
The Little Mouse The Red Ripe Strawberry and The Big Hungry Bear by Audrey Wood
Bark George by Jules Feiffer
I Ain't Gonna Paint No More by Karen Beaumont and David Catrow
Knuffle Bunny Series by Mo Willems
Edwina the Dinosaur Who Didn't Know She was Extinct as well as the Pig/Elephant books by Mo Willems
Duck! Rabbit! by Amy Krouse Rosenthal
Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen
Olivia series by Ian Falconer
The Berenstein Bears Books
Good Night Gorilla by Peggy Rathmann
Fancy Nancy by Jane O'Connor
All the World by Liz Garton Scanlon
Diary of a Worm/Spider/Fly by Doreen Cronin
The Napping House by Audrey Wood
No, David by David Shannon
Little Critter Books by Mercer Mayer
Clifford the Big Red Dog Books
Diary of a Wombat by Jackie French
Pinkalicious by Victoria and Elizabeth Kann
The Baby BeeBee Bird by Diane Redfield Massie
Ladybug Girl Books by Jacky Davis
Sandra Boynton Books
The Tushy Book by Fran Manushkin
Tumble Bumble by Felicia Bond
Ten Little Ladybugs by Melanie Gerth

Another 5k, 30.5 weeks pregnant

I ran another 5k this last weekend. It was one I signed up for back in early December when I had *just* found out I was pregnant. My friends were signing up for the half marathon and because I didn't want them to find out just yet that I was pregnant I said I signed up for the race too. Note that I said race, not half marathon. In talking about this race, a coworker of mine decided this would be her first half marathon she'd run. I also wasn't announcing my pregnancy at work so I just forewarned her about training schedules and what not to make sure she could fully commit to running it. Fast forward 5 months later and it was race day.

The weather predicted pouring rains, in June?! But luckily it turned out to be a cloudy, muggy morning but dry! (Nice compared to the torrential downpour the day before.) My coworker was ready for her half and my 2 other friends decided to run the 5k with me even with my warningly low pace.
The race was a little disorganized and I wished they had water at the start because I was thirsty! The half started first at 8am and I was able to see my coworker off. Thirty minutes later was the 5k. I guess because of the high number of 5kers they did staggered starts. We were in the third "wave". The race was nice, fairly flat, views of the bay not so bad. The race was longer than 5k according to my GPS. 0.14 miles longer in fact. But I finished fine, ran the whole way with no pain.
The end was another pain in the ass. No signs on any of the tents and lines were long to pick up the swag. So after waiting in the wrong line for 15 minutes we got into another line for the stuff we wanted. Seriously, how hard is it to write a sign?! Once everything was picked up, we watched more of the race, especially to see my coworker cross the finish line (with great time) and called it a day.
Overall, great time! Hopefully over time the race organizers will become more organized but I think this is only the 2nd year. Oh and results are totally confusing. And I believe inaccurate. There were two times listed. Not chip time and gun time, but Net time and Official time. Their description of what those meant.

Net Time is the time a person actually crossed the start line minus their finish.

Official Time is based on USATF rules. Official time is the gun time minus the finish time. This would be your official time for qualifying for a USATF race.

I feel net time is more accurate to what your race time is. I mean if it took you 2 minutes from gun time to pass the start it doesn't make sense to add that to your race time.

5k at 28 weeks pregnant

A little over a week ago I ran a local 5k. I've been meaning to run this race but haven't gotten around to it in the 5 years I've lived in the town. I showed up Sunday morning and did race day registration. I was very impressed on how well the race was run. I was in and out of registration quickly. They even had D-Tag race chips! I didn't realize how laid back the race was and they allowed dogs and strollers. The website wasn't very explanatory or beneficial to use at all. The map they gave me was confusing so I figured I'd just follow the crowd. It wasn't a very big crowd but it was nice.

The race was great, families were running it, kids, etc. The course had it's hills, but I felt good and was able to keep up a pretty good pace. Must have been that race adrenaline. I finished with my kids and hubby cheering me on (surprise!) with a time of 35:15, 11:22 pace. :) I was very happy considering my running pace has been in the 12 min mile pace recently.
My friend ran the 10k and said it was great. They had a couple of water stops (one for the 5k) and water and snacks at the end. I'm totally excited about doing this race next year! I'm thinking 10k, double jogger and a single jogger. Gonna have to recruit hubby to run it with me.

Books Read 2011

Books Read 2011 (Items in bold are books I highly recommend)

1. Dixieland Sushi by Cara Lockwood

2. Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls

3. Courting Trouble by Deeanne Gist

4. Women Who Run by Shanti Sosienski Loved this book! So inspiring to read about these amazing women who fought to bring women's running into theolympics or to fight a personal struggle. I truely enjoyed reading each story. And the interesting one was of the man who had a sex change to a woman. Reading how estrogen slowed him down was fascinating.

5. Without a Backward Glance by Kate Veitch

6. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

7. My Name is Memory by Ann Brashares Amazing book! I've recommended this book to everyone I know. Such a great story/plot. At first I was disappointed with the lackluster ending but later learned that this book is supposed to be Part 1 of a trilogy. I can't wait till the next book comes out.

8. Ape House by Sara Gruen (A little disappointing, I really liked Water for Elephants and had high hopes for this book.)

9. Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier-Again I was hoping for an exciting story, it seemed a little slow. Apparently this book is historical fiction but I sort of wished it was spiced up a little.

10. Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins This was a cute teen novel. My friend recommended it to me so I requested the book from the library. I didn't find it amazing, but a cute story.

11. The Book of Tomorrow by Cecelia Ahern. I liked the book, it wasn't as amazing as it sounded like it would be, but it was entertaining. There were some twists in there that I liked.

12. The Brightest Star in the Sky by Marian Keyes. Very cute book! I thought it was creatively written and kept my interest throughout the book as it followed inhabitants of an apartment building.

13. Mile Markers: The 26.2 Most Important Reasons Why Women Run by Kristen Armstrong. I didn't like the layout of the book in that it wasn't chronological. So it took a bit to get used to kids ages changing etc. But for the most part it was a book about friendship and the bonds you make while running. I had an issue with Kristin saying she's not a runner, etc when she's super fast, spits out 2 hour runs on the weekends often, qualified and ran the Boston Marathon and made an ultra-marathon (trail one nontheless) seem easy. For me that is a super runner, something I don't think I'll ever be...so I was really mad that she says I'm not a runner and here I am saying I"m a runner but can't even imagine being at her level.

14. These Hidden Things by Heather Gudenkauf Very good book! I whipped through it in 4 days which recently is amazing for me. Some of it was predictable but it still kept my attention.

15. The Last to Know by Melissa Hill This book kept me guessing the whole way through. I loved that.

16. Sing You Home by Jodi Picoult It was interesting, didn't have the usual Jodi Picoult drama in the end. It was a good read though I was expecting a bit more to be played out.

Currently Reading:

The Boy Who Loved Tornadoes by Randi Davenport

Adding to my books read 2011:

Books Listened to in 2011

1. Love and Impossible Pursuits byAyelet Waldman

2. Between Georgia by Joshilyn Jackson

3. Ines of My Soul by Isabel Allende

4. Geek Love by Katherine Dunn

Currently listening to: Last Night in Twisted River by John Irving (20 discs, yikes!)

A place that means a lot to me

http://ucanr.org/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=4935

http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/05/15/2389519/agritourism-blooms.html#storylink=misearch

Check out this article to see more about a really cool place to check out.

What I hate about maternity clothes

I've been in maternity clothes for 3 out of 5 years...well, I may be over exaggerating. But 3 pregnancies and I have some complaints.

• Why do pants not account for growing butt and thighs? There is elastic for your growing belly but pants are not roomy for thighs and butt.
• Why do large pants think that I have a huge crotch? My crotch goes halfway down my thighs if I wear large pants.
• Shirts need to get longer and roomier in the belly area throughout the pregnancy. Not having to buy larger sizes that fit your belly but not your shoulders.
• I hate that there are only a few colors/styles of shirts. I get so bored of the 5 styles to chose from.
  
• I hate that maternity pants don't have pockets or belt loops.
  

This is all I can think of right now but I'm sure I'll come up with some more.

Loving the Library

I love my library. I actually regularly frequent two of them. One in my town and one across the street from my work. Back in February I had a coupon for a local bookstore where I pretty much got my books for half off. While choosing my books I came across a ton of new books I was interested in reading but they were still in hardcover. Well, over the next few weeks while going to my library for movies, cd's and whatnot while looking at the New Book Shelf I have found pretty much every book I was interested in reading. Thus, the last 9 books I've been reading have been all from the library. This is good and bad. The good, I didn't have to buy those new books. The bad, I haven't read the new books I bought in February.