Crazy & Blessed

Here is a little background info on the growing Rasmussen family:

March 2008:After a particularly horrid airplane trip, Lance and I agreed that we were more than happy to stop procreating. We considered ourselves blessed beyond belief with our two awesome kids and did not want to push our luck. We even pinky swore on it. I even went so far as to donate all things "pregnancy and baby" to the Goodwill.

While Lance and I always wanted a family, neither of us ever envisioned being at the head of a large family. A family of four suited us perfectly. We were completely satisfied with our gorgeous girl and our funny little man. End of story.

November 2008:I had gone back to work full-time and planned to quit soon so I could watch my best friend's baby, Ryder during the week. The day Ryder was born, Lance's company shut its doors. I was days away from putting in my 2 weeks notice. Lance and I were both excited for me to once again be home with the kids full-time.

So, at this point is quitting my job while Lance is unemployed considered an act of faith-- or is merely illogical and impractical?

We were fasting and praying over this particular issue when both Lance and I individually felt impressed that we needed to have another baby. I think both of our reactions were something like, "Um... that wasn't the question." No jobs + No insurance + No money= Get Pregnant????

But that was exactly what we did. Within days, I put my notice in at work. Within weeks, Lance had a new job, and within a month, we were expecting a third child.

I am officially in my 2nd trimester and the baby is due on September 20th. The kids are ecstatic and I am busy shopping garage sales and Craigslist-- trying to replace all the gear I so happily got rid of last year.

To All You Critics...

I have been begging Lance to do this for the longest time...

Messy, Scruffy, and Shaggy

The Solution

Happy, Clean-cut Little Boy

Lance really wanted to try to grow Tobin's hair out and since I am terrified of using clippers, I told Lance that he was in charge of Tobin's giant head.

As Tobin grew shaggier and scruffier, I begged Lance to end the experiment. He finally complied when the cowlicks took over the kid's head. Hopefully, we won't be experimenting with Tobin's hair again anytime soon.

Self-Diagnosis at Its Worst

As a follow-up to the post regarding our new roof, I thought I would share a story:

The first day that Lance tore off the old roof, I was climbing up and over the pile of rubbish in our front yard when, well-shod as I was, my heel was pierced by a 22 year-old roofing nail. It went ALL the way into my heel through my flip-flop-- about 3/4 of an inch into my foot.I quickly pulled it out and was surprised at how little it hurt and how quickly it healed. Everyone I spoke to cautioned that I should immediately get a tetanus shot since I had no recollection of when I received one last. I hate going to doctors and never, ever go if I can avoid it. But just to be on the safe side, I did a bit of light reading on tetanus (big mistake).

This is some of what I learned: Symptoms of tetanus manifest themselves in 5-14 days and include: Muscle tightness, difficulty swallowing, headaches, and most importantly- tightness of the jaw. As a disease, it is fatal in about 50- 60% of the cases.

Well, wouldn't you know it that my back and neck start to feel tight and five days after the incident of the nail, I wake up in the middle of the night with a massive headache and difficulty swallowing. I was scared but forced my self to go back to sleep. A few hours later, I awake with my jaw being ON FIRE!! I couldn't even open it all the way.

Okay-- so what would you do here? Seeing as how this is a FATAL disease, I wake up Lance and drop the kids off at my friend's house (did I mention it was 3 am?) and off to the E.R. we go.

There is nothing like walking into the ER and declaring that you have a disease that was all but cured an entire century ago. A very smug doctor said after looking into my ears and throat, "I doubt you have tetanus. You probably just slept on your back funny." (Naturally, that would explain the lockjaw and difficulty swallowing!) Well, of course at that moment, I was secretly hoping that I actually DID have tetanus just to prove Dr. McSmuggy wrong!

Epilogue: It has been several weeks since my embarrassing trip to the ER. Turns our McSmuggy was right-- I strained a muscle in my neck.

Lesson Learned: DO NOT USE THE INTERNET TO RESEARCH A DISEASE YOU FEAR YOU HAVE. It will inevitably convince you that you do,in fact, have typhoid, rabies, tuberculosis, etc...

I REALLY owe one to Lance for being so patient with me in the ER and for Brittany for taking my kids in at 3 am.

Our Favorite Roofer

Lance was a professional roofer by trade before we moved to Florida. When we renovated our home, we chose not to replace the roof and have thus pushed our luck with it over the past 4 1/2 years. When our living room ceiling began to turn to mush after each tiny little drizzle, we knew we had to intervene before Hurricane Season.Lance tackled the tear-off and replaced the underlying plywood, the chimney, the tar paper, and then re-shingled. ... all in one LONG weekend! It is so great to have a handy husband. This project would have cost us nearly $10k if we had a roofing company do it.Thanks to our friends who came and helped out-- some staying until almost midnight one night! Brad, Jordan, Phill, Ariel, "Engine Pull" Jared, and especially Andrew-- who was Lance's right hand man.The kids and I stayed busy feeding the workers, refilling the cooler with Gatorades and in general, staying out of the way. I was also on Bengay duty at the end of the day.

It rained yesterday and we stayed dry and the living room ceiling remained "mush-less". The new roof looks awesome. Good job, Lance!