10 years

The Exuma Islands, a place we have dreamed about and talked about for over 10 years. We sat at Willow River State Park, drinking strawberry daquiries one hot summer day dreaming about sailing around the Exuma Islands. This was before we bought our sailboat and sailed for 2 months in the Florida Keys and realized that we were not ready for the cross ocean venture.... However, our 2 month sailing adventure on our teeny tiny sailboat made us both realize that we should spend the rest of our lives together. We knew we would get married near or on the ocean, a place we both love. So on Friday December 13th, 2002 we got married on the ocean pier at Sandals Resort in Montego Bay, Jamaica.  It was the best decision and we loved every minute of it. I remember saying as we left the resort, "we will have to come back to Sandals on our 10 year anniversary!" 

December 13, 2012 we celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary not only at a Sandals Resort but a new Sandals Resort that happened to be in the Exuma Islands, a place we have been talking about for 13 years. We knew this was the resort to be at.  

The anticipation of leaving about killed me. I literally did not sleep the whole week before we left. I had never been away from the kids for more than 3 nights and we were going to be gone 7 nights and 8 days....it was so difficult. I cried about it, worried about it, stressed about it.... there was no fun part of the anticipation of this trip.  We had a good plan, detailed notes, friends stepping in willing to help and Grandma so we knew the kids would be fine. 

Once we arrived at the resort and handed our glass of champagne I was able to relax. We had a few hitches early on in communicating with my mom and the kids back home but we got that figured out with in the first few days. We spend the majority of each day at the beautiful beaches & fabulous pool drinking dirty bananas.  Man, they were yummy! We loved all the different restaurants and tried a lot of different foods we wouldn't normally try. We also took many many walks up and down the beaches, a lot of the talks would either end up being about the kids or about how we need to buy a bigger sail boat and so another sailing trip someday. Both topics made me smile & feel happy! 

We took one excursion, a boat trip to some of the outer islands to snorkel, swim, feed the iguanas & pigs and mostly get a glimpse of the beauty of the cays of the Exuma Islands. The water was amazing! We saw Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's private island and home. Stopped at a lot of islands and got to swim, hike and look for shells. We (mostly Jacques) also got to feed the wild pigs and iguanas,  I took pictures. Although it was cool to see them on these uninhabited islands, they were kind of scary and I stayed my distance. We hiked to the top of this cliff where on one side it was the Atlantic Ocean and the other was the Caribbean Sea.  While the Atlantic Ocean looked so deep blue and rough, the  Caribbean Sea was calm, beautiful and peaceful.  This day trip was definitely the highlight of our trip! 

 We went to the french restaurant at the resort for our anniversary and had a wonderful dinner and dessert. It was definitely our favorite night of the trip. We talked a lot about how our life has changed in the past 10 years but really how much it has stayed the same. We may have built 3 houses, moved 3 times and had 3 kids but we still have the same dreams and goals. This makes my heart smile. 

The time came to say good bye to this beautiful week and amazing island. And even though we had full bellies from all the food and drinks, a tan from all the sun, we were feeling a little empty with out our three favorite people. We got home at 9pm and when we pulled into the garage and waved at them with the door open, there were tears of joy! It had never felt so good to hug our kids.  It was great to nurture our relationship and have some "us" time but it was good to be HOME! 

~It's My Life

Still believers

I don't know if you know this but this is my absolute favorite time of the year, Christmas time. I love the decorations, Christmas cards, gift buying, wrapping presents, the whole shebang but mostly I love  living the magic of the season through my kids' eyes. Each year, I wonder how many more Christmases until the magic dies down and when one of the kids tell me they know about "santa" or "elfie."I think my heart will break. This year I was starting to question Wylie's beliefs about Elfie, (our Elf), until yesterday . . .

Our Elfie comes to us on December 1st every year, well this is his 3rd year joining our family.  Our Elfie is a friendly Elf who sits in places that he can be seen the most and in places where we spend the most time because he just really wants to be part of our family this time of year! 

So yesterday, Elfie was sitting in the plant on the window ledge behind the kitchen sink. Last night, Wylie said, "mom come here." He was in the bathroom crying. I said, "What's the matter?" and he answered, "mom I accidentally touched Elfie." He was devastated. I was so relieved that HE STILL BELIEVES. I just quickly said, "if it were truly an accident Elfie will know that."

A few hours later I am getting ready for bed and doing my nightly Elfie duties, I noticed a letter sealed in an envelope for Elfie. So I opened it and this is what it said:

My heart just melted. It was then that I noticed  there was another letter on the counter also. The other letter said the following and was from Kasey: This letter also filled my heart with smiles.

Fast forward to this morning. Elfie was in our dining table center piece with a little note of his own for the kids.

                                       Dear kids, I got your notes, Thanks! Wylie, it's ok! Luv Elfie

Wylie woke up and was so happy that Elfie said it was "ok" and also laughed that Elfie spelled "luv" wrong. A few minutes later Kasey wakes up, reads the note and started crying. I asked her why she was so sad and she said through some serious tears, "That note I left was for when we see Santa tomorrow, Elfie wasn't suppose to give it to him, I was!" Oh boy, one kid elated, one kid devastated.  So I quickly tell her that if she asks Elfie really nicely maybe he can go through all of Santa's letter and get the letter from you tonight and bring it back to us tomorrow. She is convinced that there are way too many letters and that Elfie won't find it.  Who knows though, our Elfie is one good little Elf! Until tomorrow morning. . .

                                                                 ~It's My Life
                                                               

Catching up

My last post was titled "Overwhelmed." Today I sit less overwhelmed and a tad more confident in our new gluten free adventure. It has not yet been 90 days, although it seems like it has been 190 days. It is definitely still a day to day challenge but the thought of going grocery shopping at three different grocery stores no longer makes me almost cry. The hardest challenge for us and for Wylie mostly is finding snacks that taste good and budgeting the expensive change.  I have baked a lot of breads, cookies, cakes, etc which all have turned out great. Most of our dinners are turning out to be good now as well. I still look up a lot of things as I am not confident in the "hidden gluten" list.  Most importantly is that we believe it is making a difference in Wylie's day to day living. He is not complaining and in tears on a daily basis from stomach pain.  This is why it is easy to keep going and going. I see progress and he feels better!

I guess I also missed a Halloween post.  Once I printed off the gluten free candy list we started celebrating. We realized he did not have to miss out on too many of his favorite candies and/ or chocolates.  The weather was great on Halloween and we all went trick or treating together while my Dad stayed at our house and passed out candy to the trick or treaters. It was a fun & tiring night for all.

Oh shoot, I also missed the entire month of November and now I am trying to remember what we were up to.  I must get my memory from my Dad (hehe).

I had a few personal highlights this month:  I had my Twilight party for the final Breaking Dawn movie.  It was a fun night, full of laughs and one that we all can look back on and laugh at our patheticness.  I also got the great news that Mister Jon Bon Jovi was starting his tour early on in 2013 and also bought some tickets to a few different shows.  So far to date, I will be going to Nashville with Jacques to sit 5th row. It will be his 1st JBJ concert and my . . . . 21st! I will also be going to the St. Paul show (sitting close enough to hopefully be sweat on) and to the Des Moines show.  More to be announced in the weeks ahead!

We also had a few things that were not quite as fun. Tori had another surgery to put tubes (3rd set)  in her ears and do some prep work for a potential future surgery to her ears. She did great and was so brave! I was very proud of her. We also hosted Thanksgiving again for my family, which turned out  to be a big flop. Wylie got the stomach flu the night before Thanksgiving, Kasey got the flu Thanksgiving night and I got it Saturday morning.  My brother, his daughter and his girlfriend went home early and I missed out on my black friday shopping that I had been looking forward to for the past year. On the bright side, the cousins got to spend some time together and we did get to  enjoy a good Thanksgiving dinner together which included with plenty of laughs and lots of wine!

~It's My Life~ 

Overwhemled

Well who would have thought, me spending countless hours reading about food and recipes, learning about a handful of grocery stores (which I normally hate) and spending hours upon hours grocery shopping (which I hate even more).  Who would have thought I would actually be "cooking" on a daily basis and baking almost as often? I have been known to speak of my displeasure of cooking in general. Just don't like it, never have.  I have been known to say, "I would rather clean toilets, than go grocery shopping."

Whether it be my punishment for not cooking all these years or just  a mean way of  showing me that I too can enjoy cooking, the time has come and it is now inevitable, I MUST LEARN TO COOK AND LIKE IT! Why you ask? Here's why.

 Wylie has been struggling for almost 5 years now with stomach, gastrointestinal issues that have progressively gotten worse over the years. He has gone through more tests in his short life than Jacques and I have both gone through together in ours. The last rounds of tests were done 6 months ago. He had a colonoscopy and endoscopy done along with more rounds of blood work. The doctor was almost certain that he would test positive for Celiacs Disease. Luckily, the test came back negative. Good news=no disease. Bad news=no explanation for his pain, lack of growth, skin sores etc. The doctor did notice several irritated spots on his intestines however. That combined with a variety of other symptoms made him think that Wylie may have a high intolerance for gluten.  After a second opinion of his tests we were advised to go on a 90 day gluten free diet.  I was instantly relieved to have a possible answer to his problems and for a chance for him to have pain free days. It wasn't until about the second minute that I realized that this would be a huge challenge for me, I must learn to cook.

Overwhelmed would be a great word to describe how I felt. It took me 4 days before I even moved forward with the planning because each time I would get reading, it would get more in-depth and more complicated. I needed time to process (aka whine) for a while.Thank you to all my friends who listened and were there for me to vent too.  After that, I got right down to business. Reading, reading and reading more to learn about what gluten was exactly and what foods it was in. To sum it up, I felt like I learned it was nearly in everything. Again, overwhelmed.

<-------- a list of things that contain gluten (OVERWHELMED)






Took it literally two days at a time that first week. Wrote down what we would eat at each meal and made grocery list. Oh, I almost forgot. Forget just running to Target quick to grab your grocery items. Oh no, now you need to run to Trader Joes, Target, Fresh and Natural Foods and County Market and even then you will not have found everything if you are just a beginner at this. I literally left Fresh and Natural in near tears the first time. It was last stop of the day, I had been to the above listed stores to get our items for the week.  I spent 1 1/2 hours at Fresh and Natural  the first time I was there and left with 3 bags (not even all the way full) and spent $149.  See picture below of what $149 got me. Again... overwhelmed.

Moving forward because we have no choice. We made some foods that were definitely NOT good, some foods that were okay, still not good but not terrible and a few things that were decent (good but not great).  It was a glum week and I had to try my hardest to keep my spirits up for Wylie.  He was being a trooper and trying everything, although not holding in his true thoughts for some of the foods. Week two went a little better. I have found baking is not too bad, now that I have the main 16 ingredients needed to replace flour (partially joking). I learned what xanthan gum is and where to find it in the store. Week two went a little better than week one. We had 2 or 3 meals that were good and only 1 or 2 that were bad. I baked cupcakes for Wylie to take to a birthday party and those were great! As was the pumpkin bread I made for the kids. I made a meal so complex (to me) that it took 45 minutes to prepare and another 45 to cook. Thank goodness it had wine in the ingredient list because I sure needed some to get through that meal.  No Kidding there.  

So anyway, we are making progress, slowly but surely. I am hoping this next week, week 3, will be better yet. Oh gosh, that reminds me, I better make my weeks menu and grocery list. It is my new Sunday night activity while watching football.  Wish us luck and most importantly hope that this will help Wylie feel better, which is ALL that matters. I will do anything for that kid! 

~It's My Life

Another road trip

We took another road trip this time to visit my grandma.  It is a trip that the kids look forward to from the second we leave the time before, "when are we coming to see Great Grandma again?" We get up early, drive 5 1/2 hours, visit with great grandma (3-4 hours) and drive 5 1/2 hours home. Each trip we seem to stay longer and longer at great grandmas as it gets harder and harder to leave. This time we didn't even leave  until 8pm, which got us home close to 2am.

Our trips in the past we have stopped at Treasure City, a store with "treasures" for all ages. The kids get $5 each and it takes them a good 30 minutes to decide what to pick.  This trip, I decided to change it up. I convinced them that it would be worth it to stop at Animal Land, in Bemidji, instead of Treasure City. Animal Land is advertised as a place to  being able to walk with the deer, feed the bears & kangaroo's etc. They quickly agreed that this would be a good trade off, if they could get a souvenir at Animal Land... Fair enough I thought.

The kids enjoyed feeding the bears, kangaroo, porcupines, raccoons, etc. but  I walked around so sad for these animals. It was a place that I was not proud to be at  and was certainly not happy to support. I had to explain to the kids that we would not be buying a souvenir from this place but would stop at the gift shop in Great Grandma's town and they could pick something out.  They were fine with that after I told them that, "mom doesn't like the way these animal have to live day to day and I don't want to support it." 

Almost to Great Grandma's and Kasey asked, "Mom are we finally going to get to go see where Great Grandpa is?" This is something they have been asking to do the last many trips up north.  My grandpa died in 1994 but the kids have recently (last year or so) wanted to go see his "stone." While we were there we talked about Great Grandpa and a little about death but mostly made it a happy experience and emphasized that great grandpa is so happy we stopped by.  Tori has always talked about great grandpa and has been emotional about how much she loves and misses him. Something I have not been able to understand since she has never met him and I don't talk about him often enough for her to have this bond. I have 2 pictures (one in my room and one is in Jacques' race room) of great grandpa yet she tells me "that does not look like "my" great grandpa." I think to myself, ya but it is and move on.  So we get to my grandma's and we decided to show her some pictures of great grandpa. When we ask her, "does this look like great grandpa? " She says, "no." She says no to the fist several pictures (all of which are him in his elder years).  Then we show her a picture of great grandpa when he was much younger and we ask, "does this look like great grandpa?" With a big smile on her face she says, "yes!" Tears filled my eyes.  

We leave the cemetery and finally head to see Great Grandma. We bring the rest of the bouquet to her. She is all smiles when Wylie, Kasey and Tori barge though the door and in unison say, "hi great grandma" in their loudest, yet calm voices ,(they know they get away with it here as she is so hard of hearing).  We visit with Great Grandma, show her the photo books and scrap books of recent trips, birthdays etc and have dinner together. She always treats us to dinner at Dairy Queen. I go pick it up and we have a picnic on her living room floor on a towel. It's perfect.  Time keeps ticking and it gets later and later yet we are not getting ready to leave. I don't know if the kids think about it (probably not) but I do and each time we go I can just only hope that  it isn't the last trip we take to visit Great Grandma. I think this is why I am not so much in a hurry to get back in the car and head home as I used to be.  

There is an endless amount of love for Great Grandma and it melts my heart each and every time we go visit and I  see my kids' face when they talk to her, hug her and say good bye.  I am so happy that my kids know this kind of everlasting love and have gotten to experience it with my grandma.  

~It's My Life~ 

Family Reunion

We ended July with another road trip. This time we headed to Indian River, Michigan, which is near Mackinac City.  Three years have come and gone and it was time for the Sieburg family reunion. I had to do this road trip alone with the kids since we had just gotten back from Hilton Head, SC.  Jacques could not take more time off of work.  We packed in the car and started east.  The kids did great, as always, in the car. Professional road trippers.

This was our first year at Indian River. Previous years we were in Brimley, Michigan in the upper peninsula. It was a nice change. I personally liked being closer to the shores of Lake Michigan.  The kids and I spent many of the days at the beach. You can never go wrong with the beach, sand toys and snacks! 

Our other time was spent at the lodge catching up with family and watching the olympics til midnight each night! One day we went putt putt golfing and did bumper boats with my 2 cousins and her son.   Tori was not a fan of either activity, Kasey LOVED the bumper boats and Wylie loved the putt putt and boats! My cousin, Philip, challenged me to a game of  putt putt and we tied.... 3 years.... REMATCH!  

One of the most memorable things for me was Tori's confusion with my Uncle Will. If only I had a video to capture the moment.  My dad was out golfing and my Uncle Will was sitting outside when Tori ran up to him, crawled up his lap and started hugging him and kissing his cheek.  I instantly knew that she thought it was my dad, her grandpa. She backed off a bit, took a real good look at Uncle Will and said, "Grandpa, where is your mustache?" Takes another look around at him then says, "You have a different watch." Then looks at his hair and says, "your hair looks different today."  I said, "Tori this is Grandpa's brother, my Uncle Will." She says, "no it's my Grandpa!" The confusion went on for a little while until my dad came home from golfing. I had my Dad and my Uncle Will sit next to each other outside and sent Tori out to see Grandpa. When she saw them both sitting side by side, she instantly knew which was her grandpa and ran and hugged him and then said, "he (pointing at Uncle Will) looks like you." At bedtime that night Tori said, "this was a confusing day!" The similarity between the two made it easy for Tori to be extra comfortable with Uncle Will, even calling him Grandpa Will! Such sweet memories......... PRICELESS actually!

 I enjoyed all my conversations and time with my Mom, Dad,  aunts, uncles and cousins. It is a week I look forward too!  Time came though to say good bye.  We gave out all of hugs and "see ya in 3 years," and got in the car.  Tori was in tears already,  I look back at Wylie and he just breaks down crying and as I pull out of the lodge, Kasey falls apart. So I pulled off to the side of the road down the street and we just all cried together. We talked about how special this time was and how lucky we are too have such a wonderful family that loves us all so much and that we love so much and that IT IS OKAY TO BE SAD.  Once we gathered ourselves, we headed home. . . . . and again they were great road trippers for the 11 hour drive!!

Until 2015.



                                         ~ It's My Life~

Road Trip

The day finally came to pack in the car and leave for our trip to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. The kids could not contain themselves as they packed for the 9 day trip. After all, the packing and anticipation is half the fun, right?  June 28th, the day before we leave the car is packed full and ready to go. Time to go to bed and set the alarms for 4:30am with hopes to be driving out of the driveway at 5am and getting to Hilton Head at Noon Saturday.

June 29th, alarm goes off and we are up. No problem waking the kids up, I think they were sleeping with one eye open all night. They woke up full of smiles, grabbed their pillows, ran down the stairs, shoveled in their breakfast, went to the bathroom and were in the car buckled ready to go at 4:56am. I finished grabbing last minute things, phone chargers, my pillow, my book (like I would have time to read and relax), my laptop etc. I am in the car and ready at 4:59am. So we are all in the car ready to go, except Jacques. One would think that it wouldn't take long just to get yourself in the car, keep in mind I packed everything the night/day before. All he had to do was remember himself and get in the car.        ( hehe sorry Jacques) Well, last minute he decided that he wanted to bring the fishing equipment. So we all sit in the car while he get's the fishing poles. Of course they need to be tied down on the top of the car, but where are those extra tie downs?? That wasn't so bad but then he forgot where he put the tackle box, so we wait again. . . no it didn't take "that" long but when the kids have been waiting for 98 days and in the car ready to go...the minutes seem like hours..... But finally at 5:11am we are ALL ready and pull out of the driveway..... and in the end it did not affect of ETA, we arrived at noon, right as scheduled.

We are lucky that we got our kids accustomed to road trips early on in life. They are all star road trippers. We made it over 5 hours for our first leg of the trip with out stopping. Made a quick stop for gas, potty break and back in the car. Next leg of the trip we made 3 1/2 hours, fueled up, pulled out their lunches, which I packed the day before, and we are off again.  Point being, we are an efficient road tripping family- We made the 22 hour drive in 27 hours. That includes a 3 1/2 hour sleep break for myself and Jacques. Even though we are awesome road trippers and actually enjoy it we were still so excited to pull into our condo and see the ocean!!

We spent the majority of our trip at the pool and walking the beach looking for treasures, aka starfish, sand dollars, shells, crabs etc. We went crabbing a few times, got a lot on the lines but never was able to net any. Never did do any fishing, after all that last minute packing of the fishing stuff. Oh well.  The kids loved the pool and made leaps and bounds with their swimming skills.  We walked around Caligny Plaza, the shopping/dining/entertainment area on HHI. It was almost too hot to do anything but be in the water so some of our "other activities" were put aside. We enjoyed going out to dinner a few times (5 actually) since we rarely do that at home. Saw a band, magician and went alligator searching. Finding only one alligator in the water about 20 yards from us. Still pretty cool.  The highlight of the trip for Jacques and myself was the dolphin cruise. We took a smaller boat with just 4 other people out for 2 hours in search of dolphins. We saw many dolphins, got a great tour and got a good speed ride at the end. Lucky we had a good captain. He let all the kids take a turn driving the boat. Best quote of the trip came from Tori on the cruise, "I don't' see what the big deal is about these dolphins." The entire boat and the captain all got a good laugh out of it. The kids' highlight was probably meeting new friends (who are now pen pals) and the pool time. The 7 nights, 8 days went by so so fast.

The ride home went as smoothly as the ride there. We actually managed to make better time. Kids were so excited to see the pets and Grandma (who was pet/house/garden sitting).  We unpacked the car, checked the garden and updated Grandma on the trip!

The kids are ready to see where we pick to go next year- We are hoping to take the kids to the Florida Keys but we'll see.... another trip to Hilton Head Island isn't out the running either. Time to plan. And we all know, planning and anticipation can be one of the best parts of the trip!


                                    ~It's My Life~