A Heck of A Year

Well, where to start? I've been under the weather, and am feeling a lot better, but for some reason, my right ear won't clear/pop. I was told by the doctor that I have a "dysfunctional eustacian tube" which is blocked, and that it will eventually clear on its own, but that it could take weeks. I'm on week #3 so far. I'm not sure how much longer to give it before going back to the doctor.

We had something really unusual and sad happen here - but it wasn't anything that involved us, at least not directly. I think I may have mentioned that our property is waterfront property - but it's tidal water. Our neighbor mentioned that he'd been trying to get the city to come out and fix the storm drain, as it was becoming a bigger and bigger sink hole right along the border of our properties. One day we came home from work, and see a back hoe in the yard, with our fence torn down.

I find that this is disturbing because we received no notice that the city would be working on our property, and they certainly didn't notify us that they'd be tearing down our fence. But, since our neighbor had been asking them to fix the problem, maybe they just spoke with him. I can deal with that.

One Wednesday a few weeks ago, I was just feeling so bad that I didn't go into work. My ear infections were killing me with the amount of pain I was in, and my right ear (the one that's still blocked) was draining constantly. Scott was able to stay home for part of the morning, and around 9am he noticed that there was an ambulance in front of our house, and that there was a huge crowd of people in our back yard. The ambulance did not arrive with the sirens on, because we would have known they were here upon arrival. Now, both of our vehicles were in the driveway, so they knew we were home. Not one single person came to the door to tell us what was going on. So we figured it was just an accident.

A few hours later, people in suits showed up. "Oh, man, it's probably OSHA," I said to Scott. They all went out to the back yard, again, no one stopping at the house, and they were looking at the back hoe and the big drain tile in our yard. After about a half hour, they left. As they were leaving, Scott went out to find out what was going on. He was told that a man either had a heart attack, or hit his head. At that point they didn't know what caused his injury, falling after the heart attack, or the fall itself. The police left, but came back to sit in the cul de sac frequently.

We found out later from our neighbor (who's a police officer) that the city worker died on our property. Apparently he died that morning before they even got him off the property - but no one told us anything. This is both very bizarre and very disturbing. Our neighbor wasn't able to find out anything else, but he was given the impression that no one wanted to talk about it, and that the city was being very "hush hush" about it. Given that this was three weeks ago, and no one has ever come to our house or sent us a letter about their activities in our back yard, I guess there's nothing that I can do. I was FREAKING out about it, because I wasn't sure if we could be held liable for anything since this happened in our back yard. But, I guess everyone wants to act like it never happened, so I'll try to go along with that.

The back hoe has not moved in three weeks, and our fence is still torn down. It makes me feel really sad to look out there and know that someone died out there.

In other news, Scott has finished the dining room! Now my table fits in the house! Yay! And the beautiful buffet that Linda gave to us fits in the house! Double yay! He built the sub-floor, drywalled the room, put in recessed lighting, laid hardwood floors, texturized & painted the walls, hung a door, and fixed a ceiling. All in three weeks. He's amazing, that Scott!

Bree is walking more and more these days. At daycare, they're transitioning her over to the Toddler room. I know, I know, in my last post I said that they wouldn't transition her until she was 15 months. Well, it looks like they're going to need the space in the Infant room. So they're transitioning her starting now. She's been spending anywhere from 15 to 30 minutes over there at a time. And Bree LOVES being over there with the "big" kids. Although she also loves each and every one of the providers in the Infant room. She is very attached to two of them in particular - Miss Janea and Miss Barbara. When Bree sees Miss Barbara in the mornings, she holds her arms out until Miss Barbara takes her, then Bree turns to me and starts waving bye bye. Like, "You can leave now, thanks for the ride!" It's really funny.

My dear friend Amy sent Christmas goodies, for which I have yet to thank her - THANKS, AMY! And Bree is in love, love, love with the chocolate & cream cheese mini-cupcakes that Amy sent.

This is Bree in a chocolate cup cake induced haze:

Aunt Amy, thanks for the mini-cupcakes! I'm in LUVVVVV.

Please tell Santa that I've been a good girl all year long, but it's been really hard! There is so much toilet paper to unroll in the bathroom, and so many pots & pans to take out of the cupboard & drag around the house!

Got any more of those cupcakes, Mommy?

Guess who's going to love getting chocolate cake for her birthday? She doesn't know what's going on yet - I've delayed putting up the Christmas tree for a few reasons, but it will go up sometime this week.

I'll post again with birthday pictures. I can't believe she'll be a year old in two weeks. What a heck of a year it's been!