I have been assaulted, had numerous bodily fluids thrown, aimed, and splashed on me, and yet I keep coming back. I love my job, and wish I could write more about it. I never have a boring day at work, and I seem to learn something every shift. I am hesitant to write too much, due to the HIPPA laws, and the high profile cases that we see, but I tonight I am tired and I want to share a little about my day.

This morning started out rough. My first patient was a LOL (little old lady) having a stroke. As I was getting report from the ambulance crew, she grabbed the scissors off my tool belt and stabbed me in the ass. Luckily for me, they were blunt bandage scissors, and didn't break the skin. The neurology crew came in right after, and I told the doc he wanted to stand on her affected side, because she was still quite strong with her other hand. He ignored me, and was promptly punched in the testicles. I laughed out loud.

Some people are really bad liars, and they lie about weird things. My patient this afternoon, could have lied about how he fractured all the bones in his feet, but instead he admitted to climbing 18 feet to the top of his roof, during a blizzard, to clean off the satellite dish, because his beloved 'Judge Judy' was fuzzy. He could have lied about his intentions to quit smoking instead of trying to convince the ortho doc for 45 minutes, that smoking is actually making him healthier. When we asked about his occupation, he got those shifty eyes and then said he was in "web design". Uh hmm, and I'm really a jockey. Whatever.

"Huffers" come in all shapes, colors, and ages. Paint, gas and glue, are no longer for the bored teenager.

Emma is having a little issue lately. If she is running around the house, she goes straight to Dawson's underwear drawer and pulls out a pair of undies to wear on her head. She grunts and groans until she manages to get them on, and then is content to run around and play. Sometimes they get pulled down over her face, but she keeps them there until she runs into the furniture. When I put the laundry away, she gets a little overwhelmed with all the underwear choices, so she will wear one on her head, and carries a back-up.

We headed down to the airport this morning to pick up my mom and littlest brother, Will. I had not seen Will in almost 2 years, and was blown away. He is so tall and manly. I always forget that I am as old as I am. On the way to the airport, Dawson picked Bon Jovi, his favorite, to listen too. My boys can't watch a show, or listen to anything without picking who they are, like, "I'm Diego, I'm Spiderman", ect.. So as soon as we got rolling this morning, Dawson spoke to be Bon Jovi, and Dylan spoke to be on drums, I complained about having to be Ritchie Sambora, and so they called me Ritchie for the rest of the morning.

Will brought his friend, Esau, to Utah with him and it made Emma pretty nervous when they sandwiched her on the way home. She looked way to nervous to cry, she just moved very slowly and had her bottom lip out the whole time. She warmed up to everyone pretty fast after we got home.

Hannah came over and had made a treasure hunt outside from the Leprechaun. The boys had a great time following the clues, and finding the treats.

This was my weekend to work this month, and Dave just called me to say hi. He said at church today, a guy came up to him and was laughing, and said. "Your son is so funny." Apparently, Dawson and this guy were both at the sink, and Dawson met his eye in the mirror and said, " My sleeves are rolled up, because my church shirt is getting to small for me, but I am hoping the Easter Bunny will bring me some new church clothes." The guy told Dawson that he knew Dave, and would tell him to buy him a new shirt. Dawson said, "okay, thanks."
In Sacrament meeting, Dawson came running up to Dave and said, " I met a guy in the bathroom, and he was going to tell you to buy me a new church shirt."

Today we finally had a weekend together. It is so nice to be home with everyone. The boys decided they wanted to go to the museum, so after Emma's nap we went down to the Gateway. The museum was really crowded, but the kids' didn't seem to mind. Dave and I had a great time playing with them on all the exhibits. We also had a ball watching all the parents, and musing at the different parenting styles. There were some ultra hyper parents chasing around their kids' with the hand sanitizer, and one lady that sat in the corner asleep. I guess we are somewhere in the middle, I mean, I did take away the shoe that Emma was sucking on, as soon as I saw it.
Dawson and Dylan's favorite part of the museum, was the Life Flight Helicopter. They had a great time pretending to fly it, talk through the radio, and taking care of patients in the back. Emma really liked the vegetable garden and the big plastic horse, I think she sucked on every ball in the beehive as well.
Emma has become quite the social butterfly. She blows kisses to anyone who looks at her, and she is pretty fearless, as long as she can still see us.

Today was a much better day. Emma is giving me some breathing room, and the boys only had a few time outs. They are trying to earn some swimming goggles to wear to the pool. Dave bought some at Costco, but the boys have to earn enough money to buy them from us. They are just hanging up on our bulletin board for encouragement. The boys can earn $1 a day if they don't argue to much and do some chores. Dave bought them about 2 weeks ago and so far, Dawson has $3 and Dylan has $2. They have to earn $5 each in order to get them. They might be to small for them by the time they get the full amount. Anyway, we had a pretty good day. Dawson had a good day at preschool, and Dylan and I played some football and watched a few more home videos. We picked up Dawson from school and he told us a story about his friend Colby, showing him his chicken pox. I guess we will see if the vaccine works.
We were downstairs playing dinosaurs when we heard the garage door open. The boys both jumped up and ran around crazy, looking for a hiding spot from Dave. Dawson wanted me to tell Dave that, "the boys were so terrible, I threw away their goggles, and gave them to a stranger danger." They love to tease us.
Tonight after Emma was in bed, Dawson and I played Sequence for Kids, while Dave helped Dylan with his homework. Dawson is very competitive, and loves to beat me at games. I love to tease him, and on our first game I only needed one more animal to win, so when I drew a card, I made a big show of smiling and saying "Yes! the one I needed." Dawson went into full blown panic mode and dropped his cards, and folded his arms, and proceeded to pray for me to lose. "Dear Heavenly Father, thanks for this day, please bless my mom will lose....." when he ended his prayer, I told him Heavenly Father can't even help you now, and then I beat him 2 more times. I feel a little bad though, maybe tomorrow I will let him win.

Family Home Evening

My kids, subconsciously or not, have really made me pay for being gone all weekend. Emma won't let me put her down, and she had to be included in my shower this morning. She was really persistent and kept banging on the shower door until I let her come in. She kept putting her hand under the water and then rubbing my head, like she was trying to wash my hair. She was also really cuddly and kept burying her face in my neck. I think she missed me, and I missed her terribly. The boys seem to be arguing more frequently, and it is driving me crazy. They argue over everything, and continuously tease each other. I would take some credit for having them so close together, if I hadn't been on birth control. I hope it is just a phase. I can be so mad at them, and then out of the blue they are really sweet again.
My work-out this morning was especially harsh, after having skipped 3 days, and I could totally smell all the drawn butter I consumed this weekend, in my sweat. Despite being butter, it wasn't a good smell.
The afternoon was long and painful, with many arguments and back talk. I kept telling the boys we were going to have to cancel Family Home Evening if they didn't knock it off. By 7:30 when we sat down for F.H.E, Dave and I were both on edge. Dawson chose the song 'Families Can Be Together Forever' and I almost cried thinking about being in this current phase indefinitely. We had the boys pick a story out of the hat- Esau and Jacob, which totally fits personality wise with the boys. Anyway, Dave gave a short little story, and tried to explain the moral of it, when Dawson said, "look, I am making an A out of my leg and arm."
I started to snicker a little bit, and Dave said "what is the last thing I just said?"
Dawson thought for a minute and said " the next person that gets off of the couch is going to bed?"
Then I laughed out loud, and Dylan started to laugh. David asked him what was so funny and then asked him the same question. Dylan thought for a minute and said "the next person that gets off the couch is going to bed?"
Now I was really laughing, and I couldn't remember the last thing that he said either. We finished up Family Night with some home videos. It made me sad to think this phase of our life might ever come to an end. I love my sweet and rowdy little boys, and my precious baby girl.

Chicago

Hannah had a big hair show in Chicago this weekend, so my mom and I decided to meet there and have a girls' weekend. We had a great time. Thursday night I met my mom in the airport and we took a taxi to our hotel. When we pulled up at the hotel, my mom put her hand on the back of the front seat, through the plexiglass, and then asked the driver if she should put the money through the ashtray. She didn't realize that her hand was through the plexiglass already. We laughed so hard, and could tell we really stuck out.
Friday, we roamed around the city and went down to the Navy Pier to explore. It was freaking freezing, but fun. We stopped into Bubba Gumps for some shrimp, and not long after we were seated, Debra Messing and her family sat down right behind us. Hannah and I had my mom pretend to take a picture of us, and had her focus on the movie star instead.(see Hannah's facebook) Later we went to the movies, and saw 'The Other Bolelyn Girl', it was a terrible story(based on truth), but great acting.
Saturday we went to lunch at Joe's. It was the fanciest meal I have ever had. We originally were just going to hit the Red Lobster, but it was closed down, so we told the cabbie we wanted crab, and he took us to Joe's. We had a fabulously gay waiter who gave us the low down on Wicked!, which we saw on Saturday night. It was a great show, and I immediately downloaded the soundtrack to my ipod. We hit another movie after lunch, 'Juno', which would have to be in my top 5 movies.
It was a great weekend, and I had a wonderful time hanging out with my mom and sis.