And the award goes to.....

Just a small shout-out.......the company Peter works for won Seattle Business Magazine's "2015 Manufacturer of the Year" award for Large Firms.  Congrats!!

[below is the link to the article...hoping it works, as it's my first time adding a link on a blog post :) ]

Seattle Business 2015 "Manufacturer of the Year" award

Goodbye Expander, Hello Headgear!

Yesterday I took Clifford in for one of his many Ortho appointments. I had to bump up his appointment that was scheduled for next week to now after we noticed the skin on the roof of his mouth was starting to grow over one side of his expander (ouch!). Plus it was time for him to get fitted for his headgear. So I pulled him out of school early and off we went. The doctor decided that it was indeed time for the expander to come out, which made Clifford very happy. They numbed up the area that was growing over the expander and snipped the metal piece off, leaving behind the two metal teeth caps which is where the head gear fits on (Clifford decided to keep the metal piece and has it hanging in his room!). As for the headgear, they gave me the run down on how to insert it. Easy Peasy. Clifford is suppose to wear it right after he comes home from school until he wakes up the next morning. He was concerned about if he had friends over or goes outside to play. The nurse and I assured him there was a little leeway on this, though I joked if he keeps getting lippy with me that I'd make him wear it in front of his friends LOL. He's looking at wearing this for about six months, so basically at the end of the year we'll be all done with phase one for Clifford. The nurse did explained that typically at that point the doctor will re-evaluate him and see if we're done for now or if we'll need to go straight to braces. Last summer at our first evaluation, the doctor did say braces would come when Clifford was 13....I'm holding him to that. Peter and I just paid off off the remaining balance for phase one two months early, so it would be nice to have some breathing room, especially since Kristjan's turn is potentially right around the corner (it's really hard to believe that a tiny piece of metal can cost so much!). Also during our visit, the nurse noticed Clifford's mouth/lips were super dry. I explained to her that we just couldn't get it to heal up with anything (vaseline, coconut oil, etc). It's been like this for months and months, but our primary doctor wasn't too worried about it and we were told to keep re-applying vaseline. So she had our dentist, who happened to be working that day, come take a look. Turns out he has some sort of fungal infection going on. It's nothing contagious, but does require a prescription. So at least that will finally get taken care of.

So that's the highlight of that. We get to skip the month of May for any type of dental appointments (yay!!, since we've literally been there at least once a month for general check ups or ortho appts). Next check ups are in June :)

Dr. Teng taking a look at Clifford's mouth

 There on Clifford's right side of his mouth you can kinda see where the skin is growing over the expander. It looked way worse in person.

 Peter trying his hand at putting the headgear on.

 Clifford's new look! In the end, he'll have an (even MORE) amazing smile :)

Mason Lake

We just (barely) completed our April backpacking trip. It was originally scheduled on our calendar for earlier this month, but due to my Grandpa's passing, we needed to push it back to this last weekend of the month. We left immediately after the boys' flag football game on Saturday, arriving at the trail head a little after 4 pm. In less than two hours, we made the 3.4 mile hike to Mason Lake. There was about 6 inches of snow, but not once did anyone complain about this. In fact, the boys loved it, having little snowball fights with each other during the last mile of the hike, and even making a snowman while Peter and I set up camp. I had issues again with not being able to sleep during the night, as well as keeping warm. This is getting old. I'm not sure how to remedy this, but something's gotta give. Other than that, this trip was great.

Kristjan "ready" to go for our hike!

 Lots of awesome pics of us and the view

Sheeba loves going on hikes.....and gets lots of compliments on her doggy pack

 Peter rockin' the kilt! Our boys now want one, especially when they learned how quick and easy bathroom breaks on the trail are ;)

 Walking in a winter wonderland!

 Mason Lake.....we've arrived!!

 Family Selfie

Pics of camp life

Getting ready for bed

Clifford discovers camp robbers

 Views from the morning on our hike out

Grandpa's Funeral

Last Thursday (April 16), we attended my Grandpa's funeral and said our final goodbye. We pulled the boys out of school early the day before so I could make it down to Yakima in time for his viewing. It was really hard to see him. They had him dressed in his blue jacket (It was his favorite, always wearing it, even in the cold winter months. I'm sure he has a few brand new jackets hanging in his closet, but he'd never wear them. Only that blue jacket lol. I remember as a teen teasing him about it lol). They had him holding the bag that contained the ashes of their dog Tipsea, who had just passed away a month prior. He always complained about that dog, but I know deep down he loved her. I had brought with me two pictures (one of me with him, the other of him and the boys), each with a small message written on the back. I couldn't bring myself to put them in his jacket, so Jane did it for me. With only 10 minutes left of the viewing, Peter and I were the only ones left and I was able to have one last moment with my Grandpa, to say one last goodbye.

The funeral was.....nice. I feel it was very heavy on religion and scripture, which, anyone knowing my Grandpa, was not a religious man. He never went to church, never believed in this. I'm sure he was looking down at this, rolling his eyes at us. It started off with a prayer and song, which was fine...it was simple. I didn't care for the speech that was given by my Grandma's friend/pastor(??) (who, as good intentions that she had, stated in her opening that she hadn't really even known my Grandpa...to be honest, I think the first time she ever met him was back in March when she officiated my grandparents remarrying each other). Honestly, I would have much rather have heard more about the man my Grandpa was. Out of the entire thing, I did enjoy my Grandma's short personal eulogy of my Grandpa. It spoke to exactly who he was...a man who was a hard worker, who'd give you the last dime in his pocket if you needed it, whose dream in life was to win the lottery and buy a Cadillac :). I didn't care for the ending of the funeral, where it ended in a prayer where we all joined in hand holding and was given by some guy (from my Grandma's church) who had never met my Grandfather. I felt like we were ending a random church sermon. I'm sorry, but this just wasn't my Grandpa. I was also a little hurt that nothing was mentioned about me. I heard two (out of the three) of my brothers' names mentioned during the funeral, sympathy even addressed to them. The (dead) dog got more shout outs than I did, for goodness sakes! (I was even upset over the paper obituary that was submitted, which had no mention of him having grandchildren or great-grandchildren). I mean, after all, he raised me. It just hurt. My feelings on this funeral are just so mixed...There's no re-dos for this....

Afterwards, there was a gathering at a house out in Selah put on by another church friend of my Grandma's. My Grandpa's family (Uncle Ted, Uncle Luke and Aunt Sib), stopped by for it. I enjoyed their company a lot. I was honestly hoping to hear stories they might have to share about my Grandpa, but that didn't really happen. They did share stories about their younger days of living in Yakima, which I enjoyed nevertheless. My Aunt Sib did offer me to stop by sometime and she would give me a picture she has of my Grandpa (he didn't really have many of his younger days, that I'm aware of).

I want to say the day after the funeral is when I officially stopped crying. The hurting feeling inside has eased up a bit (as far as the feeling of losing someone....I still have a little bit of anger over other family issues that came about after his passing, but I guess I'll eventually get over it). It's hard visiting my home; I kept expecting to see my Grandpa sitting at the kitchen table or to walk down the hall to the living room to see what we're all up to....

Clifford and Kristjan, looking really nice all dressed up

 My brother Roddy with our boys

 Peter (who was one of the pallbearers) and our boys, right before the start of the funeral

These are a few (ok, a lot) of my favorite pictures of my Grandpa....

My Grandpa and me as a baby....he called me his "Little One".  When I was a little girl, every Saturday morning, on his payday, he'd bring me a whole pumpkin pie just for me. It's my favorite pie, of course :)

 Me and Grandpa for my high school and college graduations

Grandpa on my wedding day. The first two pics, especially the first, are my favorites of him. I wanted him to walk me down the isle. Him dressing up and wearing a tie was a big deal, if I recall...but he did it for me :)

 Grandpa holding his first Great-Grandson Clifford....followed by his second, Kristjan Glenn (when I found out I was having another boy, I was excited because I wanted to use my Grandpa's name for his middle name). BTW: see the jacket he's wearing??? ;)

 Misc pics of Grandpa with his boys throughout the years. I know he adored them.