Interview

So I told my friend Christy that I'd be up for an interview from her which I thought would be fun so I got my questions this weekend and here they are!

1. What is the worst and best parts of motherhood?
Okay so for me I feel the best part of motherhood is the fact that everyday for the rest of my life I have three faces looking at me daily so full of love. They love me so unconditionally and I love them the exact same way. I would say the worst part of motherhood is the fact that I don't have the freedom that I once had. I don't get to wake up in the morning when I want to and I have three children who seem to constantly have a need for something from me.

2. What is your biggest fear about raising a child with NF1?
My biggest fear about raising a child with NF1 is actually two fears. Since everything is seemingly unknown about this disease I fear that if she does develop tumors on her body that she will grow up being made fun of by her peers and that it will affect her self esteem. My other fear is that when she does decide to have children or not that if she does have children that the child that she carries does not have NF1 that is a severe case. There is a 50/50 chance of her passing this disease on and it tends to be a more dominant gene.

3. What career did you want to pursue when you were a kid?
I always wanted to be a dolphin trainer at Sea World growing up. I have always loved dolphins but never been a good swimmer and I came to find out that that is very important for dolphin trainers! I did get the opportunity to swim with dolphins when I was 14 in Hawaii and it was so incredibly awesome and I want to do it again! I still love dolphins and actually got a dolphin tattoo on my 18th birthday!

4. What is your favorite junk food, and how often do you indulge?
Lately my favorite junk food has been a Snickers bar. I usually eat them when I get to work so I have about three a week and I usually pair it was a Mountain Dew! Perfection to me!

5. If you won $100,000, how would you spend it?
If I won the money I would pay off my current debt, buy a new car (Nissan Armada!) and put some into savings to purchase a house!

Well that's my interview so if anybody is up for an interview just let me know and I'll see what I can come up with!

Life = Busy

The days just seem to get busier and busier for me! I never feel like I have any free time and now my life is about to get 100% busier. Why you ask? Well I accepeted a full time job position at a preschool here in town! While I am excited as to what this job can offer us it's still a little daunting for me. I haven't worked full time in almost six years! It's going to be incredibly hard to leave my kids in the hands of a daycare provider for the first time ever. I have never handed my pride and joy over to someone I didn't know and honestly I'm scared. Not so much for the boys as they seemed to care less if I stayed or went when we met with the daycare provider. But scared for Taylor. She is such a momma's girl and still so young. I'm not looking foward to being apart from her all day long :-( I know it will all be an adjusting period and life will go on. I just wish financially I could stay home all day with my kids but that is not the case. I was hoping that Connor would be able to go to school there with me but it is a Montessori Center and the lady told me it is a three year program that starts at age 3 so the fact that Connor is almost 5 he's missed out on almost all of the program, but next July when Zachary is three he'll get to come to school with me so that's exciting! I start work on October 1st so this next week I'm just trying to be around the kids as much as I can playing and laughing with them! In other news Taylor has started her monthly visits with the physical therapist and we just had one last week. She said that Taylor is progressing very normally right now and her only concern was that she seemed to have a slight head tilt to the right so she gave me some exercises to do with Taylor to help stretch out her neck and back. A few weeks back my mom had a dermatologist appt so she took Taylor along with her to get a doctor's opinion on Taylor's hand because it looked like she might already have a tumor and low and behold the doctor confirmed that it was a fibroma tumor. He said that as of right now we should just leave it as is and as she gets older if it starts to seem to effect her or bother her then we can remove it. It was sad to get this news because now there is no denying that she does in fact have neurofibromatosis. I was enjoying living on the hope that possibly she doesn't have it! Taylor is a growing girl though, we had her check up last week and she is 14lbs 8 ounces! Still on the small side but so were the boys so no worries there!

Cuteness Overload

So my parent's got a new camera which means I have taken over using it whenever we are at their house! I want a new camera now! The picture quality is so much better than mine! For the past few weeks when we go out to my parent's on Sundays for dinner I've been having photo shoots with the kids and it's been fun..... for the most part! Zachary didn't enjoy one aspect of it as you can see!

Taylor was really enjoying the red licorice!!

Holy cuteness! As soon as I put this outfit on her I wanted to start taking pictures! She looked so adorable! It's actually a shirt that is a size 3 but it fit her as a dress so she will wearing that for a long time!

Daddy took this picture and him and Connor were being silly together! I love how it turned out!

Zachary being silly!

Taylor in another one of her super cute shirts!

Connor playing a little peek a boo

She loves sitting outside watching all the kids and dogs run around!

Okay so my dad has this ski mask that he has had forever and Zachary absolutely despises it. As soon as he sees that someone is wearing it he instantly freaks out but Connor got such a kick out of wearing it! So here is Connor wearing the hat.

And here is Zachary's reaction to seeing someone in the hat, priceless if you ask me!

Have I told you my son is Crazy!?

Okay Zachary is my special child. I believe he is going to be the one to give me hell through all childhood! He is extrmeley stubborn, extremely opinionated, and an extreme annoyance to his older brother! Zachary is also extremely prone to hurting himself. He likes to do this cry where he doesn't breathe and then he passes out because he didn't breathe. Yeah great fun in my house when he does that! I've actually called 911 on him back in September for that because he honestly scares the s**t out of me when he does that! I can think of at least five incidents in the past 6 months where he has gotten hurt, started crying, and passes out. I've decided already that this kid will not play football when he gets older! Anyways moving on to last Saturday night. I was on the computer editing pictures for Taylor's 365 project, Asa was outside, and the boys were jumping on my bed. Zachary somehow manages to fall off the bed and instantly starts his cry where he is about to pass out. I drop the computer on the floor run over there and pick him up so that I can blow in his face to get him breathing again. When I pick him up he won't stand on his legs at all. I got scared picked him up got him somewhat calmed down and then took him outside to Asa. Asa looked over his leg said that nothing appeared broken so I took him back inside and set him down on the couch to watch TV. After 20 minutes or so I tried to stand him up to walk and his legs were all wobbly and he would instantly start crying. I decided I should take him to the emergency room. So 8 o'clock saturday night I take off to take him over to the hospital. Three and a half hours later, multiple x-rays later, I was informed that there were no broken bones and he more than likely tore some ligaments on his foot and basically sprained his ankle. They wanted him in a splint for 2-3 days and then let him slowly get used to putting weight back on his feet. So this is what he's looked like for the past few days, wobbling around the house! This morning I took it off and he appears to be walking normally and everything looks good! On a side note I would say as of right now he is 99% potty trained!! He goes without a diaper all day and will tell me each time he has to go pee and we've only had one accident in the last week! Yay!!

A Year Passed

It's amazing what a difference one year can make when you work hard! The thing that sticks out most to me in this picture is how big my arms look back then! I was just going through some pictures tonight and came across this so I thought I'd share!

I'm Back!

Okay I'm back and hopefully in action! I had a completely hellish week last week but now we are moving foward so now I have a tad bit more motivation to blog! In my absence Taylor learned how to sit! I worked with her hard for over a week because I'm neurotic and right when she turned six months and she wasn't sitting up and I know that with neurofibromatosis there can be developmental delays I went full force into wanting her to sit! I was constantly propping her help and slowly but surely a week later she got the hang of it which makes me happy! I am staying busy trying to keep up with my Project 365 for Taylor over at flickr! I'm trying to work on my photoshop skills so some of these pictures are edited not the greatest cuz I lose my patience after working on a photo for so long! The boys are doing good, I'm working on potty training Zachary right now. He went pee in the potty once yesterday and once today. I had him without a diaper for four hours this morning and finally he went pee in the potty! I knew he was holding it in so Asa and I are going to try to go full force in this potty training thing and hopefully he'll start to get the hang of it quickly! One less diaper to change would be nice! Taylor had her genetics tele medicine appt last week and while it went good the doctor didn't tell us much that we didn't already know from all the sites we've been to on the internet. He did take a look at quite a few of her spots and he said that we are going to need to come see him in person in a year over at OHSU and he wants to do a full exam and have one of his genetics opthamologist do a vision test on her then as well. And Asa and I are still discussing about the gene testing. I thought it was agreed upon that we would do it but now he is saying that he doesn't want to so him and I need to discuss that more in depth. So for now with Taylor we will just continue to do her monthly visits with the early intervention center and go from there!
Okay so I totally stole this idea from another photographer but it was so cute and I think it's absolutely adorable! Gotta love baby butts!

Taylor's first tattoo! She actually got one on each arm. She could care less about it as seen by her expression but Connor sure got a kick out of seeing her with a tattoo!

It's amazing what fixing my hair and putting on some makeup will do to my mood! I've been feeling all sluggish and in mommy mode so I decided to jazz it up a little!

My boys being super cute!

Gotta love the big cheeks! I love when I take her picture and her cheeks pop out like that! Zachary has those same cheeks and I remember when he was first learning how to eat real food I couldn't tell if he had food in his mouth or not cuz his cheeks were so big! Obviously I'll have that same problem with Taylor :-)

Because I'm Insane

Day 1 of 365, originally uploaded by amberdean.

Okay so I've been working myself up to this for about 7 months. But I've finally decided to participate in a group on Flickr It is called Project 365 Kids and you take a picture of your child daily for an entire year. While the task seems daunting to me it's something that I know I will love to look back on when it's over. So join me if you'd like! I'd love the comments to keep me motivated! To start the day off I wanted to use some of the boys body paint soap in the bath tub but it didn't work out the way I wanted it too so I settled for this instead!

Neuro-What!?

As some of you know and some of you don't know my life in this past month has been a mixture of ups and downs. I have been knocked down from my pedestal of thinking everything is fine and I have healthy children. By this I mean that we had Taylor's 4 month checkup about 6 weeks ago. Two days before her appt I was in the gym working out reading a Parent's magazine. There was an article about certain birthmarks on babies and what they mean. Well I came across these café-au-lait spots and realized that these look a lot like some that Taylor has on her back and on her chest. At the appt I talked with my doctor about it thinking that it wouldn't be a big deal but it turns out I'm wrong. These café-au-lait spots are a symptom of neurofibromatosis which Asa's uncle has. When we realized that Taylor is having symptoms of something that is in Asa's family I have started to worry constantly. I have been seeing the kids pediatrician for almost five years now and I have never once seen that concerned look on his face that he had that day. Right now we are busy reading all information that we can about this disease and getting appts set up for Taylor. Once a year she will have to go in and have her vision checked and this last Friday she had her first eye appt. Everything checked out good that day but the doctor also said that he wasn't necessarily expecting to see anything. He said that the Lisch nodules in the eye (extra pigment in the eye) that are associated with neurofibromatosis don't generally show up until a child is between 5-7 so while it was a little comforting to hear that so far she has no problems with her vision at her age but he wasn't expecting to see a problem. Then this past tuesday we had an appt with the early intervention center because people with NF1 tend to have developmental delays. At that appt we were informed that she is behind in certain areas that other children her age do. But there is no way to link these delays she's having to having NF1. They gave me a list of activites that I need to be doing with her to help strengthen her body. They say that she needs to build up her core muscles more and she tends to be a bit lazy and I need to work on more tummy time with her and getting her to put weight on her forearms which she hates doing! With this early intervention center they want to see Taylor once a month for a minimum of 1 hr till she is 3 years old! And today I got the long awaited phone call from the genetics dept at OHSU We are going to be set up with telemedicing through them meaning that Asa and I will go over to the local health dept and we will be able to communicate with the genetics doctor via web cam and talk with him about our concerns and where we should go with all this. I'm hoping that he will want to do some genetic testing because as of right now with NF1 there is no certain test that says yes this is what you have or no this isn't what you have but if she goes in for genetic testing and they find out that she does in fact have the gene for NF1 then it is a more likely scenario that she does in fact have NF1 so that appt is in about 3 weeks.
So there you have it, I'm still a little shell shocked that something could be wrong with my daughter, my little girl. And I find myself thinking about the future, her future. If she does have NF1 if she chooses to have kids she will have a 50% chance of passing this disease on and if she does in fact pass it on her children might not have a mild case like she seems to be having. While I know that I need to focus on the present and not so much about the future I can't help it when my minds wonders sometimes.

Video time

Sorry for the lack of blog posts lately, I seem to be so freakin' busy nowadays! But I did manage to take a few pictures and videos this week since I know that's what you all want to see is more pictures/videos of my kids ;-) Next week I shall have a more interesting/sad/hopeful/nervous/a lot of emotions blog post because it's been something that I've wanted to talk about for quite some time but haven't but next week I shall so stay tuned.... On a side note here a few videos of Taylor and the first one she is totally Asa's child. All of my kids (including Asa!) have an obbession with hair and nobody's hair is as good as mommy's hair. While it constantly annoys me if the boys try and run their fingers through my hair with taylor she is just a baby and I love how excited she gets so it's okay for now! The second video is just her talking a little in the bathtub. I was hoping for more talk from her that's the most I got! Enjoy :-)

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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

Zachary's Birthday Party!!

My little guy turned two on Saturday!! Where have the years gone!? We decided to do a party at the pool for him like we did last year and it was awesome! Everyone was there for over three hours playing in the water and eating good food! Got some awesome pictures and we actually bought an underwater disposable camera that I'm going to get developed this week and I will post those pics when I get them. So without further adieu pictures from the party

Zachary was not in the mood for anything when we first got to the pool, he was very clingy to me and wouldn't talk to anyone or even look at him. So during presents this was the best attempt at a smile I could get! After he ate some food though he was good to go and enjoyed himself!

He was doing good at opening the present not so good about sharing the presents with his brother later!

Connor and Daddy having fun in the pool

Connor was so happy that his best friend Makayla was able to come to his party and they had such a good time playing together that after three hours there both of them still didn't want to leave! In this picture I was trying to get the three kids to jump in the pool at the same time but Corbin decided to jump a little early so that is Corbin in the water right next to them!

Most of the family enjoying the water together!

Ready, Set, Catch!! My kids love to be thrown into the air!

Connor getting thrown by Gregg!

Connor being cute :-)

Zachary riding on mommy's shoulders

Zachary's new bike!! His feet are just a little bit too short for the pedals but hopefully soon!

Fourth of July

We had a busy fourth of july here. It was such a nice day that we decided to take the kids swimming with some of our friends. The pool wasn't too busy at all and we ended up spending two hours there! Taylor decided that that would be the prime time to fall asleep and she slept in the pool for about an hour and a half. After the pool it was off to an awesome bbq with the family at the park. The kids all had a blast playing together and it was a great time just spent hanging out! After the bbq it was again off to a friend's house to watch the fireworks. We stopped and got a few for the kids to do and by the time the firework show started at 10pm the kids were exhausted and falling asleep! By the time we got home it was almost midnight and I was exhausted but all in all it was an awesome day!


The best shot that I could get of my kids together with their patriotic shirts!

Taylor sat in her chair almost the entire night! She was not startled at all by the fireworks she just sat around and watched everything going on without a peep out of her!

My boys and their sparklers! Zachary was a little afraid of all the noise and fireworks going on!

The fam damily together! But if you notice there was a firework going off in the bottom right corner and that is where all of my kids eyes were instead of on the camera!

A few milestones

My little Taylor is getting so big!! And techinically she's not so little anymore! She's tall and skinny according to the charts at the doctor's office :-)


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Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

This and That

I know it's been awhile since I've blogged, everyday life gets me so busy! We haven't been doing much in the Dean household. I've been taking the kids swimming quite a bit since the weather has gotten nicer. We have a new activity pool that is outside and has a water slide and all sorts of fun stuff for the kids and my boys absolutely LOVE it there. I even took Taylor in last week and she enjoyed herself! But to someone's request here are some pictures of the kids from the last few weeks!

Taylor's first time outside in my parent's hot tub with the family! She liked it in there too! As long as it's not too windy she's okay but as soon as the wind picks up it is no longer fun!

My boys enjoying their ice cream sundae on Father's Day! Connor is still talking about that nice man who gave him the ice cream sundae and how we need to go back there to get another one!


Taylor in one of her super cute bikini tops! She loves to sit in that chair! As long as she is sitting up able to look around at the world she is most likely happy!


Zachary being cute, and yes I know he needs a new haircut, it's on my list of things I need to do!


Taylor hanging out waiting for mommy to quit taking pictures of her! I swear when I put her in that outfit everyone thought she was a boy! I went to a baby shower that day and not one person thought she was a girl!



For some reason Connor is looking so big in this picture! He is having such a good time making his sister laugh and cooing at her!

Taylor's first taste of baby food, she wasn't too sure of this new idea and after a couple spoonfuls she spit it back up!


Again looking super cute in one of her bikini's!

Me, me, me

It is very rare for me to post pictures of just myself but today my friends is a special day. I am a daily step on the scale kind of person and today when I stepped on the scale to weigh myself I have officially lost 50 and a half pounds in the last 15 months! I am so incredibly happy with myself that I can accomplish weight loss and do it in the same year as having a baby. My self esteem has improved in leaps and bounds which for me is a good thing. A little insight on me is that I have never in my life felt completely confident in myself. For many years in my childhood a person wrecked my self esteem. I got told on a daily basis that I was fat, I was ugly, I was worthless. I felt like such a bad person and that I didn't deserve happiness. I kept it all inside and took the pain out on myself. I did things that to this day I still have the urge to do when things get stressful. So after Connor was born I basically just let my body go. I kinda just assumed the weight would come off and when it didn't I just again assumed that this was the way it had to be. Exercise had never been a word in my vocabulary in those years. Then I got pregnant with Zachary and the weight gain continued. I felt gigantic and so not happy with my body but I didn't know what to do to change it. When Zachary was about 6 months old I got a coupon for a free one week trial to my parent's gym so I figured I'd try it out and so I went. 5 of my 7 day trial I was there and I was a little shocked that after each workout I was feeling a little bit better about myself and was starting to have a clearer image of what I wanted to accomplish within myself. Once my one week trial was over I took another break from exercising but I found out about a job opening at our local pool/fitness center. I got the job and the second day on the job I was in the fitness center working out. I have to say it was incredibly embarrasing at first. Here I am well over 200 pounds busting my a** on the treadmill. After a few weeks of just walking on the treadmill I mustered up the courage (cuz no one else was in the room at the time!) to actually try running on the treadmill. And once I took up the running that is when I really started to see the weight come off. I lost 25 pounds in a matter of two months but then the unexpected pregnancy came into the picture. Since I was so focused on weight loss and seeing other moms who were pregnant and exercising I made a goal within myself to continue to exercise. I exercised until I was 7 months pregnant and then I got lazy and did nothing at all the last trimester. I was anxious for her to be born so I could go back full force into working out and when she was 3 weeks old I made myself find the time to go in and exercise. I'm very happy that I can motivate myself and that I am realizing that I am worth it as a person and that I do have something to offer this world. So with my weight loss goal closer than ever I'm very happy with my body and what it can accomplish, so yay to me!! :-)

Slowly but Surely

Slowly but surely Taylor is putting on some weight! The first shot was taken when she was 6 weeks old, the second shot is 12 weeks, and the third shot was 16 weeks. I can't believe how tiny she looked at six weeks!

Hmmmm

So I decided what the hell I'd give Connor a haircut a few nights back and since his cousin just got a mohawk he wanted one too so we gave him a mohawk. After it was all done he whined and said it looked different than his cousin but I tried to explain to him that he has lighter hair color than his cousin so it might look different because of that. That answer seemed sufficient enough for him for now :-) I actually really like the mohawk and I think he looks good with it!

Zachary decided that the prime spot to fall asleep in would be with Taylor and he had to have his hand over her like that. She was sleeping peacefully until Zachary started moving too much and then she awoke as he fell asleep. But at least she was all smiles after waking up!

I always love all the pictures I see of little baby feet so I thought I'd try my own version. Taylor didn't want to cooperate too much but two out of three sets of feet aren't too bad for getting a good shot ;-)

Nothing new to report with me. Same stuff different day. Still taking the kids to the park and to the pool quite a bit, I gotta do something to occupy these kids time cuz if we sit at home all day and do nothing they aggravate eachother and therefore aggravate me which makes no one in the household very happy :-) I'm excited for this weekend, hopefully the weather will start to clear up cuz Asa and I are supposed to be going to the outside activity pool with my brother in law and my niece and nephew! Shall be fun!

All about Taylor

When did by little newborn turn into such a baby! She is growing up so quickly and I'm happy to report in the last 3 weeks she has put on 2 pounds! She's finally growing and starting to fit into ALL of her 0-3 month clothes! It's about time since you know technically she could be in her 3-6 month size at this time! She is doing awesome all around. She loves to watch her big brothers play and sing songs to her. She loves to be involved and sitting up watching everything. She loves her binky and her sleep at night! She is a perfect baby to me and only cries when she is hungry or needs to be held, all in all can't complain about anything with her!

This girl is getting cuter and cuter by the day! I love to make her smile!

She is starting to get the big cheeks like her brothers!

Lovin her bumbo!

This is what I love about finally having a daughter! I couldn't resist and had to try on her swimsuits today and she was all smiles threw all of her outfit changes so mommy could get some pictures!

Her first trip to the swimming pool. It was so busy so I think she was too overwhelmed to know what to do with herself. She fell asleep after 30 minutes so we didn't stay too long!