Merry Christmas!

It's been a hectic few weeks - as I am sure all of you have been dealing with as well. Since my Mom can't drive anymore and for the most part is house bound, I've been doing all of the shopping and running. It's not a bad thing, I've learned to really make the most of my time. But it's really hard on my Mom, she's been so independent and so gung-ho her whole life and now to depend on me (and others) , it's very hard for her, but we are making it work.

This Christmas was very nice - we went to my brothers house this morning and watched my niece and nephews open their presents so fast that they couldn't believe that that was "ALL" they got. LOL - I remember those days. But I think that they all enjoyed their presents and their day. Then later in the day my brother, wife and kids came over here to open their presents from Mom and I - I think that they liked them alot. I made clocks for the kids - all of them...

Football clock for Chad - the blue and red are for the NY Giants.

Tinkerbell Clock for Kaylie - I used a scrap book kit to make it.

Baseball for Kody - I actually had to make the baseballs for the numbers.

I made two other clocks as well - one was also football - but with a leather pattern paper and cool stickers. The other was WWE Wrestling for Zach - that one made me sweat. I bought a WWE Magazine and cut stuff out of it and created the clock face out of it. Not easy - but I think that he liked it. I have to get pictures of those two!

This Christmas has been a blessed one in so many ways. I've realized how truly blessed I am to know the people that I do and to have had them come into my life. Utica is way more than just a place to live to me. It's my HOME! Because I lived in so many different places I never would feel comfortable saying what my home town was - well I have the answer now - it's Utica. And unlike that man from Queens who won't accept the opening Senate seat being vacated by Hilary(ous) Clinton because he doesn't "Do Utica" - I do Utica - I live here, I appreciate it here, I love the people here and I'm staying here.

Merry Christmas all and I hope that you also had a blessed, safe and wonderful Christmas.

Funeral Home Humor

Well - I don't know if anyone else has noticed this. But on Delaware Ave in Buffalo, there is a Funeral Home by the name of Amigone. Do you get it? It took me a little while - made me crack up when I finally got it. AmIGone - too funny!
Anyway - looking at their website I saw that they do take their business very seriously! But it is nice to be able to find the humor in anything that I can!

Mom's HOME!

Mom - Thank You God! Is finally home from Buffalo. She has been at Millard Fillmore Gates Hospital since Tuesday the 4th! But the seizures are now under control - with medicine. The neurologists there are actually saying that these are not seizures but can't tell us what they are and the seizure medicine helps tremendously - they added to the one she does take (Lamictal) and added Topamax - the first week she still had the seizure episodes but they were a lot less traumatic - only lasted at the most half an hour and she could just take tylenol and go to sleep. Since they increased the Topamax to 50mg a day - the seizures decreased to about 10 minutes in length and she sleeps when it's over - no harm, no foul. But, again Thank You God!, she hasn't had any seizures in two days!

She called me from the hospital yesterday, Friday, and said that she was 98% sure that they were going to discharge her. It was about 3:30 - I was able to get on the road by 4 - had to change my clothes, get coffee and get money. I got there at 7:30 - it would have been faster - but the weather and roads were not cooperating. Imagine that! Upstate Ny - having snow???? Actually it's beautiful out, though a tad cold. But, I digress, when I got to mom's room - she still hadn't heard from anyone about leaving. I went to the nurses station and Virginia was very helpful and went through mom's information but it didn't say anything about discharge - so I went back to Mom's room and decided that I would call the Holiday Inn and get a room. I did that - and not more than 10 minutes later the Hospitalist came in and said "Do you want to go home???" LOL - we both jumped at that. He made sure that she got her meds and the nurse gave us more meds for mom in the morning - so I wouldn't have to try and get the extra Lamictal and Topamax. So I cancelled my room and we drove home. I'm insane! We didn't get out of there until 10 pm. And because of the lack of medicines for the morning - I decided to drive home. And once again, God was watching over us big time. I was exhausted but we did get home at 1:30am.

I pray that this will continue to go well.

View from my office

The snow is so deep on the bushes that it almost looks like the snow
is deeper than my window! I love it when it's like this!

Six inches of snow overnight!

This is the heaviest snow I've ever tried to move. My snow blower
isn't powerful enough to move it!

The start of Christmas cookie making

These are the Peanut Butter Kiss Cookies. The Pecan Sandies (aka Nut
Balls) are in the refrigerator for a few hours.

Buffalo

When I drove into Buffalo yesterday morning at 10:30, I was once again mesmerized by the downtown area and the beautiful old houses. My mom is at Millard Filmore Gates Hospital and I have a set route that I take because it's easy and I can get there from memory now. I take Route 33 west form the thruway - to Goodell Ave to Delaware Ave and head north. I've stayed at the Holiday Inn a number of times and feel comfortable there. As I was driving down Delaware Ave to the hospital I fantasized about living in the city of Buffalo. It's big enough to have that city feel, plus it's close to Toronto and close to Niagara Falls. There are so many beautiful buildings, Mansions actually, that have been transformed into offices downstairs - and I kept thinking that if I could live upstairs it would be really cool to live there. Well this morning changed my mind in a hurry. It was COLD!!!!!!!!! LOL - I know I live in Upstate NY - I should expect that. But it was really flippin cold!!!!!!!!!!!! Actually what I learned is that the wind blows off the lakes and it just takes the breath out of you. I walked out of the hospital this afternoon to leave and a gust of wind hit me and I couldn't breath. What a feeling! Plus it snowed last night - so the wind blowing the snow all over blinded me as I walked to the parking garage.

But, that all being said, Buffalo is a beautiful city. They are going through rough economic times - worst than us in Utica at this point. The price of gas is almost .50 cents more per gallon and the prices at the Walgreens next door to the hotel were exorbitant! I keep track of prices and some of the items were $2 to $3 dollars more than at home. Another good thing about Buffalo are the hospitals... Millard Filmore Gates is a huge Neurological specialty hospital. And a funny thing happened last night...my brother called and said that a person we both know was going to be sent to MFG with 2 brain aneurysms. He asked me to call her husband and help him out with directions. I've known this couple forever it seems like. And they have the same last name as my mom, the hospital was a tad confused about two women with the same last name from Utica. But it all worked out well - the lady had her aneurysms repaired last night - one had bled a little, but she can see and she seems to have no mental deficits from the trauma of it all. The aneurysms were behind her eye and one was on her ocular nerve. Praise the Lord that she made it to the hospital and by 3am they had it all fixed! I spoke to her this afternoon and she was doing well. I helped her hubby get to the hospital this morning at 7 this morning because he got lost - thank goodness for my laptop, google maps and the love of reading maps. I'm familiar with my small route, but somehow helped him to get to the hospital.
Enough of my rambling...Buffalo is a beautiful old city and I hope that I can go there in the summer and spend more time seeing it's treasures. But Utica is my home and where my heart is...