Chirstmas 2009

In order to make life a little simpler I made a smile box scrapbook of our Christmas day! What a wonderful, laid back day we had. With Mike, Candace, Tyler, Trevor and Jen over we had a full house. The kids loved the big pile of presents caused by the shear amount of people we had over. Not much more to say it was just a great holiday! Enjoy the pictures!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Cervical Strain: Neck Injury

Today I thought I would be uploading Christmas pictures to the blog and telling about our wonderful Christmas day. However I feel more compelled at this time to write about the events of Dec 26th instead of Dec 25th. (Don't worry I will get Christmas at a later date but it will have to wait.)

On Christmas we spent the night at Matt's grandfathers house along with most of his aunties, cousins and siblings. (His Grandfather wanted the whole family together, it was a blast). We woke up at the kids normal 7:00am, amazingly most everyone else was up also, so I made a run to Starbucks sans any kids. While there Matt phone's me that Matteo fell and needs Motrin, slight concern runs through my mind. When I get back I found my baby laying on Matt's chest not moving a muscle with ice on his neck. When I picked him up off of Daddy he screamed bloody murder until he manged to get back in the same position and again he stopped moving and just kept saying oww. All I could think about was this is my kid who the day before fell down 3 stairs and stood up looked over said oww and went on playing, this is my kid who chipped his front tooth and I have no clue how he did it because he doesn't ever show pain.

We were heading to the hospital. Matt, Karlee and I took him to Sierra Vista. He did smile once in the car when we put on his favorite song but mostly he was trying to fall asleep, which of course I was not allowing him to do, afraid of a concussion.

We got to the hospital about 8:15ish. They proceed to take is blood pressure which was through the roof and tried to keep him comfortable. Anytime we moved him he just screamed and would hide in his blanket. One of the nurses brought in a TV and VCR and put on Aladdin. That really helped him calm down but not enough that he would let anyone touch him. They did x-ray's which I couldn't be in for because of the pregnancy so it was up to Matt and Karlee to hold him down screaming while they took the films. They came back showing no broken bones so the doctor was leaning towards a really bad muscle strain, and decide it would be best to give him pain meds and see if she could exam him that way.


Pain meds it was, they shot him up and he finally calmed down enough the doctor was able to get a good look at him but he still would not turn his neck to the left. He would looked only to the right. We tried to get him to turn his neck every way we could think of but nothing, he would just reach back with his arms and try to blindly grab at what we had. So....the doctor said if it was her kid she would want a CAT scan just to be sure there was truly no fractures and whatever else the CAT scan showed. Off to the CAT scan we went. This time I did go down the hall with them, because if he didn't hold still they were going to sedate him. Thank God, he held still. They suited Matt up the heavy lead vests and had him stand right by the tube talking to him. And with the pain meds running through his little body he laid there like a champ.

Again we were lucky everything came back normal so he was diagnose with a Cervical Strain Neck Injury. They told us to keep him on Motrin for the next 24hr or longer and with a baby his age we should see improvement by tomorrow. Before we left they gave him the first does of Motrin (on top of his other pain meds) and at 12:30pm we walked out the hospital with a highly doped up 2yr. He fell asleep in the car and then woke up when we got home, still very uncomfortable and not moving his neck. At 2:00pm he feel asleep again until 6:00pm. He was still in pain but wanted to play with is trains so we propped him with pillows laid him in a direction he would see the trains and he drove them around for awhile. At 9:00 we tucked him into bed between us and he as out until 7:00am this morning minus a Motrin hit at 4:00am.

This morning he is doing much better he is actually moving around and playing but will still point to his neck every once in awhile and say owww. So everything seems on the mend yeah!! We are just going to hang low and not making any sudden movements around him.

There you have it our exciting day after Christmas. Here are a few pictures I took last night.

His hospital Tag.



Trying to play trains.

Lynn - 9 months later

Howdy family and friends,

The Hats have come off! I have enough fuzz on my head that I have decided to go hatless….hopefully I will be brave enough to bare this almost bare head at school! Poor Tracy has had to endure my constant fixation with hair, first the disappearance of it and now the announcements as each hair reappears (often she gets more information than she wants)J.

It has been nine months since the diagnosis of breast cancer – what a journey. It did not take long for me to discover others that shared my plight or had far greater challenges and I realized that I have been truly blessed with the family, friends, and medical resources to overcome what was once a devastating disease. The final leg of this journey has been the easiest to manage. I spend about 15 minutes each morning lying on a table having a radiation treatment. At first I spent the time counting the seconds the machine “zapped” each of five tattooed locations. But I soon learned this was the perfect time for prayer/meditation. I imagine I will miss those few minutes of silence come January and I am back in the classroom. The treatments have left me with quite a tan on one side of my body, (the other side is pasty white – ugh)! The area around my clavicle is now peeling, so it isn’t very appealing! Four more treatments left – Christmas eve will me my last treatment – what a great Christmas gift! 2010 will mark the beginning of my journey back to a “normal” life. There will still be tons of doctor’s appointments, tests, treatments, and one more surgery in the spring to remove the port but all of that will occur around my normal work schedule. I have been told to expect it to take a year for my body, energy, and brain to really feel “normal” again. All the stories about “chemo brain” are true – I have been quite a space cadet (although some say they haven’t seen any difference – oops)! Thank you for being there for me, words can’t express how wonderful it is to get a simple card or email on those days when you know you have to go in for another treatment and you would rather stay home tucked under the covers. I intend to “pay it forward” as I discover ways to help others and hope I can “be there” to help you when you need it. In God’s Love, Lynn

20 weeks

So...I am not really one to enjoy pictures of myself when I am pregnant. The funniest thing about that is I love to be pregnant and I love my belly sticking out full of baby and I feel beautiful, honestly, I feel so beautiful when I am pregnant.....however I don't care to see pictures of myself. Yes I am weird. But with that all said lots of people have been bugging me about my belly and wanting to see a picture. 20wks seemed like a good milestone to let my weirdness go and snap a picture for the blog (and I guess the little guy too, for when he is bigger!)


It is hard to believe we are half way through. I love that as am typing this I can feel little man kicking around (he knows I am typing about him). This last week I started noticing my belly when I try to bend or move in certain positions but I kind of love it because I really know he is there.

Serafina loves the baby and my belly she has to hug and kiss it ALL THE TIME, no matter where we are. Then she tells him "I love you baby", as she is hugging/rubbing my tummy. It really is the cutest thing (except when you are in the grocery store line with Sam talking a mile a minute, Matteo grabbing candy off the shelf or screaming and the checker would just like me to hit OK on the pad!) Sam is just excited it's another boy and Matteo is mad my lap size is changing, he tends to pick Nana's lap over mine!

That wraps it for now. Hope you all enjoyed the picture..might be the last one until I am 40wk! HAHA

Under Construction

With every new child comes a little rearranging of the house. Depending on what number baby you are having or space we all have decisions to make. Should so and so share a room? Should we convert the office to a bedroom? How soon should we make these changes, you know the baby will sleep in our room for the first 4 months or more?

Well what to we decide to do in the middle of the busiest time of year?

Looking into Serafina's room


Looking up into the lofts from inside Serafina's room and the new safe stairs!

Remodel. Yes that is right. For those of you who have toured our house you are quite aware of our unsafe steps in Serafina's room that lead to the kids play area's (two lofts, one above the boy's room the other above Serafina's room.) Well they are now gone and new safe stairs are being built.

But that is not all.

Since finding out that we are having another boy that would mean 3 boys in one room ages 7yr, 2yr and 0yr. That didn't seem right to Sam. Poor guy he has enough trouble trying to get a goodnight sleep with the 2yr old then we throw a baby in as well. It seemed like he need his own space. Sooo...when the new stairs are done we are going to convert the loft area over the boys room into a bedroom for Sam. He is so excited to be getting his own space.

Our builder is fantastic and he is pushing to get the stairs in as fast as he can. Knowing perfectly well how it is impacting us during construction. For one Serafina's room is unusable, she is currently sleeping in our sewing room on a toddler bed. Her's and Sam's clothes are strewn about in what ever closet and drawer we can fit them in. Which of course is just an adventure to them and they are totally loving it.

However the one part that truelly has impact us this weekend is that our playroom is totally unassesable. And did I mention it rained a good portion of the week and weekend?! Oh yeah, we have been doing major arts and crafts and legos because those are the things we can find. (Yes I was not thinking before they started constrution so I didnt pull any toys down! Go me) Noni and Nono came and took them for an adventure in the rain stomping in puddles. They all had a blast and we got a nice dinner out just adults! It was like heaven. Noni took cute pictures, I will have to post them after I get them from her. All in all it has been going great. I was sorry I didnt get before pictures or progress pictures during the week. I hope to be more on it this week, only time will tell.

Somedays...

....you just have to strap everyone in their car seats, turn on your music, and drive from Arroyo Grande to Nipomo in order to get a Starbucks at a drive through.

The Purpose of Christmas

I would love to recommend a book to everyone this Christmas: The Purpose of Christmas, by Rick Warren. It is a short read. I am currently reading it with a group of friends as a bible study for Christmas time and am loving it. The book is a great reminder of the true reason for Christmas and God's love for you! So if you haven't read it pick it up, if you have...celebrate with a birthday party for Jesus!

Christmas Letter

This year we decided to tryout a new way of writing the tradition "Christmas Letter", instead of including a letter with our Christmas cards I included our blog address. My thought was family and friends could come here and see more of our little family.

Then I thought, "My goodness, they probably don't want to read the whole blog." So, I decided to write a small Christmas Letter post, then add a link so our loved ones can find it easily!

So, here we are . . .

We hope this Holiday Season finds everyone in the best of spirits. We feel so happy and blessed this year; a new baby is on the way and my mom's treatments coming to an end. We are so thankful for all the good things God has blessed our family with.

Matt is now working as the COO of a new company called Azzule. Azzule is a QA/Food Safety compliance data management company, in the food industry. Matt helped to create with is boss and co-workers from PrimusLabs.com. Around June of this year Matt made the official switch over to the new company. He still spends a portion of his time working for Primuslabs.com, but spends most of his time growing Azzule. He of course loves his new position: finding it challenging and rewarding.

Sam is amidst is second grade year at The Laurette. He has a fantastic teacher and classmates. Second grade has proved to be a bit more challenging then First grade but Sam is learning how to cope. His reading has grown leaps and bounds. Starting just at grade level, he is now approaching a 4th grade reading level. However, what we are most grateful for is that our adoption of Sam was finalized in July of this year.

Serafina continues to hold true to the meaning of her name: Fiery Angel. She is a social butterfly, and loves to mother everyone she comes in contact with. But don't think she doesn't have her own opinion on this! She has spunk and will let you know it. She was so excited this year to get her ears pierced, that is her big news.

Matteo. What to you say about him. Our two-year-old. Loves trains, planes and water. Giving him any of those 3 things to play with and he will be happy for hours. He spends his days being Nana's or my shadow, helping us fold laundry, making dinner, whatever he is all for it. He is just a little love.

As for me, I am still here keeping us all running together. I have enjoyed all the time I have had with my mom this year and am going to miss her so much when she goes back to work in January. I am also so happy to be pregnant again and feel our new little guy growing. What a blessed year it has been.

We hope that you all remember the importance of the season and are able to party with your loved ones. Merry Christmas and God Bless.

The Regusci's

3rd Annual Family Compound Thanksgiving

We have had such a wonderful Thanksgiving break. There are so many things to be thankful for but mostly for being able to have so many family and friends around to help celebrate. On Thanksgiving we held our Annual Family Compound Thanksgiving and some how managed to increase the number of people from last year's 20 to 30 this year. And amazingly enough we were missing to very special people this year, my cousin Tyler who is away at college for the first year and good old Uncle Jon, who also is away at college. We missed you both!!

It was a beautiful day here and we had awesome food prepared by all who came. Because we were all having such a great time we didn't get many pictures. But here are a few to give you a feel of our Thanksgiving feast.

Enjoying a break from cooking


Rainbow Jello

Jamie's Norman Rockwell Turkey

The Boys Cooking


The Fest!

Then on Friday we decide to start a new tradition in our family. Remember our 12 dollar, 125lb pumpkin we bought for Halloween. Well with the Christmas decorations making their way out we need to say good bye to the pumpkin. We knew our goats would enjoy munching on it but how to get it down the hill to their pen?! For those who have been to our house they know the "hill" we are taking about, vertical straight drop. And thus we began:

The Annual Pumpkin RollThe kids helping Matt push it across the flat part of the driveway

Serafina's turn to push by herself.

Sam's turn to push by himself. This was the push that sent it down the hill.


And the pumpkin takes flight.

The pumpkin decides to go off roading.
(note my dad's car in the trees, yeah next year we will make sure no cars are parked at the bottom of the hill. At this point we realize Matt's and my car were down there too!! Luckily the cars were spared!)


The pumpkin in its final resting place. It hit a rock when it went off road which split it open. It also ran into our shed busting one side of the door. The thunk sound it made was wonderful, and luckily Matt managed to fix the door!

Matt moving it into the goat pen. It was still heavy even with part of it missing!

We are looking forward to next years pumpkin roll and learned a few lessons with this first one!! I am also hoping that Trevor and Jen decide to bring their big pumpkin over for use to roll down the goats. That way we can get a pumpkin roll on video!! YouTube baby!

Oh deer...

No that is not a typo in my title.

It was bound to happen.

We live on a country road, between hills, with lots of wild animals.

Turkeys, foxes, deer, etc.

It was dark..no street lights....


Then there were a pair of eyes...right in front of my car...deer eyes.


I couldn't swerve in either directions....I did hit the breaks, trying to slow and give the deer some time.

But the deer was frozen by my headlights....

We hit it.

My mom and I were in the car, it was a big thug we didn't know what to do but the car was still driving and we were just a few feet from our road. So we headed home. Matt said we did the right thing.

The next morning we looked at the damage done to the car and found this:

Dent in the hold and the silver panel thing broken and lose.

And the bumper was out of whack too.

I assumed this was going to cost a pretty penny to fix, and with the headlight out and that silver piece flapping every time we went anywhere it was not an option to just leave it ugly for awhile. Oh and the poor deer did die, he was on the side of the road the next morning. He was young had about 2inches of antlers starting to grow. We were thankful he was not a full grown deer and that we were not in my dad's mustang.


The story doesn't end here.

Yesterday (2 days before Thanksgiving, our one day with no kids) we stop by an auto body shop to get a rough estimate. Basically will it be more than $500.00 because if it is we will turn it into insurance. Well duh, it is going to cost more that $500.

As the man was looking at the car, he turns to me and says "And the car is driving fine?"

To which I hesitate and say "Yes it has been."

Why would he ask that, what does he see?!?

My mom and me drive off home (in my car) to call the insurance company and get the ball rolling. We are about 3 miles from home when all the electrical in my car shuts off. Ok weird. But we can make it home. About 2 miles from home at the corner of Corbett Canyon and 227 (for those of you who live around here) The engine cuts off and seconds later as I am trying to coast us to a safe spot, the steering locks. Yes locks. Poor mom we were headed straight for a small ditch and she had no clue I still had breaks (Thank the Lord) So she was freaking and I was freaking for other reasons. But we managed to stop the car in a somewhat safe spot.

Then we had to call AAA for a tow.

Called Betsy and Karlee for a ride home.

Come to find out my alternator was shot.

The repair my said it could have been the deer, but they cant say exactly.

I am blaming the deer.

That has been our Thanksgiving week excitement. Oh and the best part of AAA was when the guy ask for landmarks around me or weather I was in a residential area or business. I had to laugh and answer him, "I am staring at hills, cows and horse!!" Yeah for living in a small rural town right!

Hope you all have a great Thanksgiving

90% Sure

It's a BOY!!!!


Can you believe it. I can.

Try as hard as I might I was trying to hide the fact that I was breaking out like a mad women (which I did with Matteo and didn't with Serafina), peeing every five minutes weather I drank any liquid or not (which I did with Matteo and didn't with Serafina), and the fact that every time I insisted it was a girl something inside of me said no its a boy.

My OB would only give a 90% answer because I am still on the early side for determining gender (16wk) and the baby is in a breech position which can make it a little difficult. However with Serafina he gave us a 75% girl call at 16wks and well he was right. He does check one more time to make sure there are not surprises. But his accuracy right is pretty high.

So there you have it, intelligender was wrong. That is now 2 people (myself and a friend) who have had false results (her said boy and it was a girl). So sad.

I am very excited. I think Matteo will be an awesome big brother to a boy. And well it gives us a good excuse to try for one more!!

Oh and the baby is doing great also. Everything looks great. After the appointment I went and did the huge 2nd trimester blood draw (filling 5 vials of blood) to check all mine and babies levels and stuff. Everything is just moving right along.

As for names we are now saying anything right now because we really haven't talked much about boys name. Wehave one in mind but not officially decided, so you might find out before he is born or you might not just depends on if we keep thinking or not. Once we make a decision we are normally not good at keeping it a secret.

(Oh and for those who are wondering my mother-in-law is still invited to Thanksgiving)

Bathing Beauty

Serafina has been loving bubble baths lately. We fill the tub to the brim and she floats around. The other night I walked into and all I could see was her face. It cracked me up so I had to take a picture and share.

Four

Has it sunk into to anyone else out there that I am going to have four children. Three seemed normal, it seems like the average family at our church has three, no one looks at you funny for having three. I thought four was still pretty normal also, you know like on a bell curve you are approaching abnormal but are still with in range. Once you got up to five or more that's when people start looking at you asking if you are done but the more I think about and tell people this is number four it seems to be a pretty big leap. I mean lets really think about this:

1. We will no longer fit in a four door sedan car or smaller. We are destine to drive an SUV, minivan, full size van or bus. And don't think about leaving that 3rd row of seats at home because you actually have to use it, no huge trunk space for you.

2. Can someone explain school drop off to me? How do you, in a timely manner (under 30min) get your 2nd grader to class and picked up when you have to unbuckle (from car seats) your 4yr and 2yr old and now infant and then walk on to campus? Do you stop carrying the 2yr now so he will walk when the baby comes. If so that will be a long walk?!? I am starting to see why many large families home school.

3. Laundry - lets not talk about that one....I think it has been 2wk or more since I washed the kids sheets and we are going to add a fourth bed?!?

4. What if it is a boy, that is 3 boys. Did you hear that 3 boys. My mother-in-law bless her heart believes it is a boy, if she is right, we might dis-invite her to thanksgiving. We only want positive girl vibes and she is messing up the feng shway(sp?) of it all. Three boys, heart be still.

5. Can you imagine flying somewhere? SIX plane tickets. You are talking a small loan to fly somewhere. Not to mention flying with 2 adults and 4 children, that is a 2:1 ratio, 3:1 if someone has to go to the bathroom. Sorry to any relatives that live further then a car drive, it might be awhile until we come and visit.

6. Do people still invite you over for dinner when they find out you have 4 children?

7. What do you pay your babysitter? A small house payment?

Just some food for thought. Four. To be honest I am really so excited. I can't wait to have a tiny baby around the house again. And all my thoughts will be for nothing as soon as little nut is here because I know God has a plan and it all works out.

By the way the countdown has started: t-minus 7 days until we find out what sex little nut is. And please don't get me wrong, we will love it boy or girl. But 3 boys?!?!

CHOO - CHOO Matteo is TWO!!

My little guy is turning 2!! Tomorrow is the official day but spent last week celebrating train style. For those who don't know Matteo is obsessed with trains. He will spend hours playing trains, reading about trains and watching train movies. But don't let it be a Thomas the Train movie, oh no he likes the movies with REAL trains in them. He is a crazy dude. We celebrated on saturday by taking La Condessa, a private rail car operated by the Santa Maria Valley Railroad on a little trip through the Santa Maria, Gaudalpe area. Matteo was in heaven and spent pretty much the entire time out on the deck wathing the rails and how everything worked. One of the best things about it was we had the opertunity to pick up frieght along the way so Matteo and all the kids got to watch the train couple up witht he frieght. What a day. For more picture of the day click here. My dad did a great job and finding the best pictures! I jsut uploaded a couple family shots.





So in order to truly ring in his birthday we start the week off with an Amtrak train ride to Santa Barbara. We went last Monday to avoid crowds and had the time of our lives. Matteo adored the train with his favorite part being the doors that went between the two cars. We spend most of our time walking between cars and he would belly laugh every time. Once in Santa Barbara we head off to the Zoo and of course rode the train there, the highlight of the zoo trip!! The following are pictures from that day:

Papa let Serafina have desert after breakfast on the train!


Waiting for the train.

Matteo made sure he read up on the Train and the Saftey info.

On a walk.

This bird was really cool, we got so close and it never flew away! The kids were not to sure.

Another train!

Serafina doing a happy dance at the end of the day (past her bed time!!)

Well I can't belive it my baby is two. And soon there will be a new baby in the family. They all grow up so fast. Happy Birthday Little Man, we love you so much!!

Halloween

Another great Halloween has come and gone! The kids had a blast and for the first year we actually went door to door!! Our good friends the Long's (the cousins, if you recall from the ear piercing) invited us down to their neighbor to trick-or-treat. The kids had a great time. There was about 8 kids in our group and they they loved running up and down to every house. Their neighbor was great fun as many of the house went all out on decorating and the adults passing out candy were even dressed up and acting their parts, it was great. Before that we did the traditional village trick-or-treating and of course New Life's Fall Festival.

The funnest thing was both big kids wanted to put on their costumes at 7:30am, I decided it was a battle not worth fighting and they wore the costumes from 7:30am until 9pm!! Starbucks loved it as did the gym!

Serafina waiting for her brothers to come so we can get pictures!




The clan: A dog, Batman, and a ladybug. I was told that lady bugs like to sit on plant so she had to sit on the pumpkin.



Matteo even got into trick-or-treating. He walked around with his bag open.

Daddy, Sam and Serafina and the start of the haunted house!

Carving Pumpkins

Before we get Halloween pictures this evening I thought I should post pumpkin carving pictures from last weekend. We had a great time and keeping with tradition Trevor and Jen came down to join in the fun. I think now I will let the pictures say the rest because there are so many cute ones!

Sam mucking out his pumpkin. Each child had a pumpkin, Matt assisted Sam, I assisted Serafina and Jennifer assisted Matteo (he only did stickers on his personal one, but then helped carve Trevors)

The group hard at work.

Serafina mucking out her pumpkin. She was more into then I thought she would be!

Matteo and his sticker pumpkin.



Helping Trevor, this was to much fun for him. He loves to get dirty.


Taking his hand at carving.


Being Darling.




The kids doing the poking of their designs. What concentration, both kids did most of the poking on their pumpkins, I was quite amazed compared to last year!



Serafina got into the craving part of her pumpkin also. That is the difference between my kids though because you wont find a picture of Sam carving he was on to something else by then! They crack me up.




This year not only did we carve but we also bedazzled our pumpkins with a little bling!


The pumpkin carving group.

Matteo enjoying a candy corn shot! (Orange sherbet ice cream and milk, rimmed with yellow sugar)

For dinner Nana prepared Sluge Cups



and Spaghetti and Eyeballs...yummy!!



A close up on the eyeballs.

Hope you all have a great Halloween. I would say I need to go get kids up from their naps to get them in their costumes but my children have been wearing theirs since 7:30 this morning. Starbucks appreciated it!