Christmas Vacay

This year Christmas Vacation couldn't come fast enough!!!  Our goal was to make it as low key as possible as this would be our last Christmas as a family of 3!

Nathan still had a bit of 'business' to take care of before we could really relax.  Tuesday before Christmas he had another colonoscopy, then on Wednesday morning he had an MRI of his guts to check everything out.  The colonoscopy didn't go quite as planned as he ended up going into A-Fib (atrial fibrillation - an irregular hear beat), so they attempted to wait it out but it never calmed down so they ended up doing it anyways with 12 heart leads instead of just 3.  He has had this many times before when he is dehydrated or if he drinks to much caffeine or a beer or two - however, he's never had it happen in front of a medical professional so I don't think he's been taken seriously when talking to the doctor about it.  So it was kind of a blessing that it did happen as they were able to getting a reading which he can now take to a cardiologist.  The downside - we have to go to the cardiologist. :(  His dad had the same thing and had a surgery to burn the inside wall of the heart which helps to reset the electrical activity of the heart so we'll see if he has to do that or if he can manage it on his own for now.

Wednesday, while dad was getting an MRI, Reid and I went out for doughnuts!!  He was beside himself that A - he got to go in his jammies and B he got to eat his very own doughnut!

Christmas Eve we went to church, then Grandma and Grandpa Robinson's house for dinner.  We did something different and it was so much fun!  We had fondue - cheese, oil and chocolate and of course a table full of Christmas goodies.  It was fun and DELICIOUS!!  After dinner we opened gifts and played well past bedtime.  Finally we put on jammies and headed home.  Christmas morning we woke up and had gluten/dairy free cinnamon rolls which were surprisingly AwEsOmE!!!  We've been experimenting with recipes a lot the last few weeks and we've found some really amazing dishes and some really AWEFUL dishes.  After breakfast we opened our stockings and our presents.  Mister was completely spoiled and got some awesome VTech car tracks and clothes and paw patrol figures to name a few.  We played all day long on Christmas.  Nathan was talking to Talon and Will's dad in the afternoon and it ended up they were home just hanging out as well, so we ended up going there for dinner and the boys had a blast playing!  It was definitely an unconventional Christmas for us but after our 2014, it was perfect!

Monday and Tuesday of New Year's week I went back to work and then had the rest of the week off.  NYE has become more and more over hyped as I get older.  This year we were all in bed by 10:30 and it was FANTASTIC!!  New Year Day we got up and went out to breakfast in our jammies - which Reid thought was so cool.

In between all our outings, we did a bunch of projects around the house.  Here are a few of the finished projects...

I painted this for the babies room.

Husband made this from pallet's we've picked up over the last few months.

Some new decor for the basement.

Soon to be finished, this will be the co-sleeper for baby number two

 Painted the changing table, husband was NOT very happy about this as he made this for Reid room and didn't want to change anything about it.  However I finally convinced him that a dark brown changing table really clashed with my gray/navy theme I was going for.

Nathan was also due for a video, so here's a quick look at our Christmas Vacay.  Hope you all had a great 2014 and blessings to 2015!

Our Monday Beats Your Monday

So it's been awhile...  I seem to be starting all my posts with that phrase in the last year or so.  Hopefully someday that won't be the case.  Regardless, our week has been pretty crazy to say the least.

It all started last weekend when we went to Denver to celebrate the marriage of Mr & Mrs Darnell!  (Sorry no pictures as I got a new phone and all the pictures are on the old phone!)  It was a great weekend being just the two of us while my parents were watching Reid.  Unfortunately Nathan wasn't feeling the best but he put on his big boy pants and we made the most of our weekend away!  On our way home, we were running a bit behind but still on time for our flight.  As we were attempting to check our bag the lady refused to let us check it d/t needing to have them checked 45 min before departure of your flight...  we still had 55 min before our flight left.  So not cool.  After standing in line inside we found out all the KC bound flights were booked for the remainder of the day so we had to fly stand by, BOOOO!  At 1:00 we went to the gate and asked if any seats were open - only to find out that we never got on the stand by list... awesome.  We were starting to get a bit upset at this point.  Long story short they were able to get me on the 1:00 flight but Nathan had to stay behind already not feeling well.  He had no luck getting on the 3:30 flight and it was starting to look like he might be spending the night sick in the airport - luckily he got the last seat on the 5:00 flight.  So after that really, REALLY long day he got home around 9:30 Sunday.  

Fast forward through the next week and he stayed home on the 5th of November as he wasn't feeling well and needed a day to rest.  As the week had progressed he was having more and more problems every time  he ate food.  By the weekend he would eat a small meal, begin to have cramps and need a bathroom ASAP within 30 mins of eating and then continue going to the bathroom every 30 min after.  On average he was going to the bathroom about 25-30 times in a 24 hour period.  He was getting hardly any nourishment d/t his body being unable to digest anything as well as becoming slowly dehydrated.  We ended up getting a juicer and started making juice everyday which seemed to be giving him a little pep in his step again.

Over the weekend I was in a seminar, he took Reid to his parents on Saturday so he could rest while Reid played with his Papa!  (both Gma and Gpa are called Papa around here.)  His mom wanted to take him to the hospital on Saturday but he insisted he just needed to sleep and he'd be fine.  Sunday night was really rough, he had such bad cramps that he couldn't sleep nor go the the bathroom.  Finally he was able to go to the bathroom and fell to sleep out of exhaustion.  He attempted to go to school Monday morning but by the end of first hour could barely keep his head off his desk.  He texted me saying he was going to the doctor and would let me know what they said.  

Within about 2 min of his appointment the doctor said he needed to go to the ER NOW for an IV and further testing.  He stopped by my office before heading to the ER - quite frankly he looked like a skeleton - he was white as a ghost and his eyes were sunken with dark circles around them.  I'm pretty sure I gave him a double take!  So he headed to the ER and I followed shortly after.  By the time I got there he was hooked up to an IV with fluids and some pain meds and had already had an abdominal C/T.  Immediately I noticed there was more color and life in his eyes.  The C/T results came back around 1:30 and showed no cancer, tumors, blockage etc.  It did however show severe inflammation/thickening of the entire colon (large intestine).  Around 3:00 he was admitted to the hospital while we waited for a consult with the GI specialist.  The consult was supposed to happen around 6-7 that night, we didn't see him until 9:30!  He confirmed the inflammation from the C/T scan and finally gave him a dx of Ulcerative Colitis.  This whole episode has been a flare up of the UC and they started him on anti-inflammatories to stop the flare up and let his body start to heal as well as steroids to jump start the whole process.  He'll be on the steroids for about 2-3 months as they have to taper him off.  The anti-inflammatories are more of a long term thing for a few years most likely.  Of course these are the most expensive at $760/month - yes you read that right per month!  Thankfully prescriptions go toward his deductible, we are finally going to get our money's worth for our monthly insurance premiums!!  (trying to look at the bright side here ;)

By Tuesday noon, he was looking and acting like himself again - making jokes and smiling - so good to see that smile!!!  Last night was a little rough as he finally ate again but NOTHING like the last week!  Now we are looking forward to getting back to normal and getting some weight back on him - to give you perspective he is 6'5" and weighed 210 in April 2014.  Monday he weighed 171lbs - that's 40lbs people - 12lbs were lost since Nov 1st.  YIKES!!!

Needless to say Monday was the LONGEST DAY EVER!  We are happy to have daddy home and in one piece again!  

I just want to say Thank you to everyone who has helped out with Reid over the last few days and next few days to come as I'm back to work now.  It means so much to know how many people in our lives are ready to drop everything to help us out if needed.  Thanks and we love you all!

Granny Mae's Pumpkin Patch

This weekend we went back to Great Bend for a wedding reception and decided to make a whole weekend out of it. Needing to get away from the disaster that has been our basement we left Friday at noon just after servpro left with all of the blowers and dehumidifiers. On that note our insurance is covering everything so once we get the adjuster to come look at the basement again we will go through the process of getting carpet again. Traveling with Reid worked out pretty well this trip as it worked out great with nap times. He was really excited once we were 10 minutes out and told him we were going to see grandma and grandpa.

While we were in Great Bend we went a little further north to a pumpkin patch called Granny Mae's in Dorrance. Nathan has been due for a video for a while and so he made one of our outing at the patch. At school he applied for a grant recently and won! What he won was really out of the ordinary. His class won a DJI Phantom Quadcopter aka a drone! So needless to say after having it only a few days so far he needed to get his camera mounted on it and up in the air for some cool shots.

Here is what the Phantom (drone) looks like in the air.

Reid likes to watch whatever daddy is doing. He didn't mind getting close to it!

Video Slider

This post really has nothing to do with Abby or Reid. Just me nerding out on a new piece of hardware. In my video production class we bought a new stabilizer called a slider. We have a really big version of one of these called a track dolly but we needed something shorter and more portable. So we purchased a Glide Gear track slider. The slider can be mounted on a tripod or set on any surface whether its level or not. You attach a ball head mount and your good to go. We just got it at the end of last week and I wanted to test it out a bit so I took some footage in the backyard. Really short video if your interested. Odds are I'll be using it in some of the video we do of Reid so if your wondering how we get a certain shot this is it. We have a busy week, I have 4 broadcasts at school that my video class is doing, we have our sonogram on tuesday to find out the gender, and Abby and I are videoing another wedding this Saturday in KC. Going to be a long week.

Here is a picture of the slider. Link to the site is HERE.

Short video of the slider test.

Wedding and busy weekends!

It has been a while since I have posted and since we last spoke Nathan and I have been busy bees. This summer as we posted we went on several mini vacations that took us to Missouri a few times and also to western Kansas.

Since the last posting we have also been to several weddings. Starting with my brother Jared's wedding in July. Nathan was the guy who actually married Jared and Mandie! Who would have thought that. It was a lot of fun and all three of us got to be in the wedding. Nathan has also been increasing his 'portfolio' if you will in wedding videos. The picture below is from the video he did for Jared.

Randine and Tray also got married this summer in August at a really cool place in Lenexa. Nathan was in the wedding and got this shot. If you follow him or I on Instagram there are some really cool pictures from their pretty wedding. Nathan didn't make a video for this one but we had a really good time and Grandma Boone was taking care of Reid so we got to have some fun together without the kid. 

At the midpoint of August Nathan was in another wedding back in Ellinwood for his friend Dave Waite as an usher and he also made a video for their wedding. So we were off to Great Bend for that weekend and Grandma and Grandpa Boone watched Reid all day while Nathan and I shot video. Nathan does the editing and main shots for each video but I help him out with some creative artistic shots and I always get the footage of the bride getting ready. It's a lot of fun to experience other people's wedding's and capture a moment for them on video that they can keep for the rest of their lives. He made a trailer for Dave's wedding in conjunction with a whole video. 

Oddly enough Nathan just got back from shooting another wedding this weekend with one of his video students from school. It looked like it was a pretty fancy wedding from the pictures he was sending me. Who knows where the whole wedding thing will go but it's fun to make 'em.

Fill in the blanks...

Long time no post people! Here is the latest going on with the Robinson's.

Float Trip Yo

Hello people! Nate here with a blog as Abby has fallen behind. We have a lot going on this month and I'll try to keep up with some videos. Last weekend we were in Bird City for Jared's wedding, this weekend we had a float trip and next weekend we are headed to Lake of the Ozarks.

Leaving this weekend was bad timing and good fun all at the same time. This was the first time Abby has left Reid for a night and we were gone for two! What made it worse is he wasn't feeling the best the night we left, before you start handing out worst mom awards for that one he was left in very capable hands. My mom and dad and Randine all were able to watch him over the last couple of nights.

Anyways... I have never been on a float trip before and neither had Abby but it was a lot of fun. We went to southern Missouri to a place called Shady Beach and we floated on the Elk river. We stayed in a cabin which from the pictures online looked a lot larger than it actually was. Abby and I do not get away hardly ever even on the weekends so it was nice to go somewhere together and specifically just have fun. Next weekend we are going to Lake of the Ozarks with some friends from high school (no kids allowed), a post will follow as well.

I made a short video from the float trip. If your curious what I used it was a GoPro Hero 3, it was pretty cool. Until next time.

Oh Hey...

Sooooo, Easter

 2.5 weeks ago

yeah.... 

Otherwise, we've been super busy with end of the year happenings.  I feel like every night we sit fall on the couch completely exhausted only to get up a few minutes later and head to bed to start all over again.  With how quickly time has been flying, I'm just going to say May is basically over already.  Which then means our whirlwind of June is almost here!  

We are actually taking a mommy and daddy vacation with some friends this year, to say I'm excited is an understatement!  But first we will be throwing a bridal shower for Aunt Dina, marrying off Jared and Mandie (literally - the Husband is officiating!), going on a float trip with some people from my office, then off to the Lake of the Ozarks with the Deschner's, Ruble's and Bauer's!!  Can't wait for summer!  For now enjoy our Easter video...

We Went to the Zoo

The Husband isn't into 'cheesy' things like picinics (his words not mine).  

However, he volunteered to take our own lunch with us to the zoo - all while refusing to call it what it was - a PICINIC!

SO we took full advantage and packed a massive picinic lunch :)  

{That one's for you Husband ;) }

Can we say mini-me??

Once we were finished we headed into the zoo - first up the Giraffes - our favorite!

Look at those chunky legs - I just want to take a bite!!

 We saw some lovebirds

Can you spot the bear?

This was one of his favorites

 We attempted this but trust me this is as good as it gets!

Between snuggles with dad,

and being carted around, Reid really enjoyed himself!

As always here is a little video the Husband put together for the occasion!

Close Call

Saturday was a wee bit chilly, 

but we packed our lunch, grabbed our jackets and hit the road.

However our plans were nearly foiled by little back up in the plumbing Friday night!

After a quick trip to the Home Depot (at 9:45 mind you), we were in business!

The aftermath

Miss B was quite concerned with the entire process

 Everything is dry and good to go now, thank goodness :)

 All is in working order now and our little helper is back to it!

 Tomorrow, pictures from the zoo and a fun video by the Husband!!

Mudpies

Today we played in the mud. 

We didn't worry about our clothes.

We got wet.

We got DIRTY.

We weren't concerned with the mud caked to our shoes.

We worked hard.

We let loose and dug deep.

We basked in the warmth of the day.

We felt the breeze in our hair.

We worked together to start something new.

 We delighted in the little things.

Reid's Irish Jig

So we aren't really Irish, but Reid came up with a little jig for your Monday St Patrick's Day!  Enjoy!

Birthdays

So many Birthdays have come and gone in the last month it's crazy!  Unfortunately I'm really bad at remembering them all...  So here goes!  Miss Gwenna turned the big 1 at the end of  January, Aunt Chrisan had one at the beginning of February, then Aunt (to be :) Mandie had a bday right before the Husband (Mandie you stand the best chance for me remembering your bday since it's the day before the Husbands ;) then Grandpa Boone had a bday on Sunday!  So, Happy Happy Birthday to you all!  Hope you all had a fantastic day and maybe next year I'll be more prompt... (please don't hold your breath...)  Sorry if I missed someone!!

We had a nice relaxed day with the Husband - it landed on a Sunday this year and it's kinda hard to do much when that happens.  It, of course, was pretty chilly that day so we mostly just hung out inside.  Aunt Randine and Uncle (to be :) Tray came over to make pizzas and lounge.  We went to the dog park with Miss B on Saturday - she insists on being half way in the front seat while driving there even though she has the entire back to herself...  She head butted me as she was showing her excitement for the dog park just as I was taking this picture.

Sharing and apple - one of his new favs

Then Monday night the Husband and I got to go to the KU game!  We hadn't been in so long it was fun to get out just the two of us :)

We also got out for a walk in between all this crazy cold weather - it was even warm enough for naked toes!  I can taste summer it's SO close - yet so far away...

Morning waves - this little man has been such a snuggle bug in the mornings.

The Husband and has been doing projects at school incorporating slow motion in a video - I know there is a technical term for that but it seems to have escaped me...  Here is what they worked on last weekend - enjoy!

V-Day Love

I have been waiting my whole life to be able to do crafts with my very own kids!!!  At Christmas we did a little test to see if Reid would even enjoy it and boy did he!  Remember this...  Valentine's was no different!  We painted his little hand and he would open and close it look at me then spread his fingers out and we would press it down and he would just GRIN from ear to ear!!  It was SO much fun :)  We made these for the kids at daycare!

Then I got a steal of a deal on Baby Leggings - 7 pair for $16!  They were running a V-Day special just pay shipping and get 5 pair for free then just $2/pair after that!  So we got some baby legs for our friends over in Eudora!

Reid made sure to sign every Valentine - he takes his signature VERY serious!   We got to visit daddy at work on Friday afternoon and Little Man loved running around the halls of the school!

That night we went to the HS Basketball game and he got to run around with his buddy Talon!  Saturday and Sunday we only left the house once to go to church and the grocery store - it was AWESOME!  Hope you all had a great V-Day!