Who Pooped Here

I laughed when my mother arrived yesterday from Glacier National Park with this book. See Dan it must be fate ;)

Update On Our lives

Since it has been quite awhile since I updated my blog I thought I would sum it up in one entry...

Mom Gets Married
Memorial weekend my mother finally got married. I now officially have a step father. Now the funny side to this story is that he is Shannon's Cousin and now step dad also. The other weird side to this is that both my mother and mother-in-law are named Mary. Now after getting married my mother's name will change and there will be two grandparents whose names are Mary Soderlund :) Boy our kids will be confused which grandma we are talking about.

Downstairs Unpacked
Well we finally kicked things into gear at home with unpacking. The great news is we cleared out the recroom and setup the tv, surround sound, couch, etc and have a really nice room to enjoy now. Maybe we will be able to have that house warming party this year!

Kai's First Word
Kai has been sounding like he is trying to say words for awhile but I think it now pretty much official that he is saying kitty. You ask him where the cat is and he runs around sounding out "kitty kitty kitty"

Wisconsin Cow Parade
Umm boy how to explain a cow parade. Actually this was a really cool experience here is an excerpt from thedailypage.com

I missed the first Cow Parade in the U.S., the one in Chicago in 1999. But I heard about it, and the concept -- Chicago-area artists decorating life-size fiberglass cow forms -- grabbed me. Something about the fancifulness of it led me to purchase a couple of miniaturized Cow Parade figurines. But that was that.

Since then, other Cow Parades have followed in cities like New York, Atlanta, Houston, Las Vegas, Portland and even overseas, from European cultural capitals including Prague, London, Geneva, Monaco, Dublin, Brussels and Florence to such far-flung destinations as Auckland, Sydney, Tokyo and São Paolo.

Now, at long last, the cows have come home, to Madison, the capital of America's Dairyland -- one of seven cities now hosting Cow Parades. (The others: Athens, Buenos Aires, Edinburgh, Lisbon, Mexico and Paris. How's that for heady company?)

Some of the artwork was astounding, check out the pictures here

Update

My allergy may not be just an allergy after all. I had some lab work run and right now it looks like my thyroid is a bit off. How much off I don't know.... but my white blood cell count is high also.... I am concerned that I may have a hyperthyroid issue which would explain a lot, including the rash. I should know more over the next few weeks, and will keep everyone up to date.

So fricken itchy..........

So over the past week I have learned that I am now allergic to the sun. I have a ton of allergies and luckily most of them present themselves in a manner that I am able to live with. During the spring when the trees are pollenating, my eyes itch and I have a runny nose. I can deal with that. I am allergic to penicillin and sulfa drugs; when I take these I turn into a red, itchy, swollen mess, which is a pretty serious reaction. So to say the least, I don't take these drugs, and therefore I can deal with that. But to turn into a swollen itchy mess just because I took my kids outside to play, that is where I draw the line. Apparently my snow white skin that I inherited with pride from my Scandinavian heritage, really doesn't like the sun much. I have always known that my skin was fair, so that really isn't a big surprise. I burn to a crisp in the time it takes to tie a shoe if I don't wear sunscreen, and for me getting a tan is a joke. I just burn, peal, and turn white again. But with all of this I never expected to be this sensitive to the sun on this level. I should have known it was going to happen since my mom is also allergic to the sun but I always thought she had more fair of skin then even I did. How wrong I was. So where do I go from here........ will I finally turn into a vampire and curse the sun..... Unfortunately not. With Jas and Kai having so much energy to burn and a dog who needs exercise I will be braving the outdoors just as much as ever. I now just need to figure out how to still stay out of the sun at the same time. Sunscreen and big hats will have to become an addition to my checklist for leaving the house.