When do we build the ark?

Last night Omaha was hit by this freak storm. No tornados, just hurricane-strength winds. It hit right before rush hour. I was stuck at work under my desk, waiting for the all-clear. Rog was at home watching our street flood. Some reports are saying the gusts reached 90 mph. Trees are down all over the city. Power was out to an estimated 125,000 customers. We were fortunate enough to have our power restored round 3 AM Saturday morning (only about 10 hours without power.) Some people still don't have their power back. It might as well have been a tornado. I've downloaded some photos of damage at our house. We had a lot of limbs down. Some aluminum trim, the length of our back porch came down along with all the drip-edge extenders that direct the rain onto our rainhandlers. Our lawn is completely covered in Maple leaves. I don't think a person should have to rake their leaves in the Summer. I'm a firm believer of raking in the Fall, thank you.




Many of our purple cone flowers were sheared off.




This one survived, but looks a little sad. They were just
getting ready to bloom.



More headless victims.



Our house looked like it was painted with Maple leaves.



This was the street in front of our house. That's part of our tree.



This is all the neighbors trying to unclog the drain so the water could
find its way to the creek behind the houses across the street from us.



The water was up over the sidewalk. Rog wouldn't let me come home until
the water subsided some. Apparently one of our yard waste cans blew into
the street and washed away. We couldn't find it. Most likely it washed into
the creek and Roger will find it in Bellevue when he goes back to school in
the fall. Omaha has had nearly 9 1/2" of rain in just the month of June.

Biker wedding

How do you tickle a 2-year-old's fancy? Take him to a biker wedding! Last weekend, my older sister, Sheri, got married. I've uploaded a few pictures. Jude had never met his aunt Sheri, so he refused to dance with her, but Eli took the "pretty lady in the white dress" for a spin. He definitely gets his rhythm from his dad (or lack there of, as the case may be.) Jude was more interested in sitting on the motorcycles. If you'll notice, he is not sitting on the same bike in the 2 pics posted. He was quite impressed when they all started up and took off! I was sure the noise would scare him, but he only squealed and pointed. The little girl, is our niece, Leah (my younger sister, Carrie's oldest daughter). She's 11 years old now. I can't believe it. I haven't seen her since Christmas. Roger kept the secret that she was here (visiting from Denver where she lives with her dad), so both Sheri and I were surprised to see her. The boy in the last two photos is one of Carrie's other kids, Zach (aka, Eli's identical cousin.)

My camera loves my rose bush

Monkies

His brother keeps dropping hints

Zoo-riffic

To celebrate Memorial Day, like zillions of other greater-Omaha area residents, we went to the zoo. This was Jude's first time to the zoo. I know, we waited a really long time, but he is very interested in animals right now. We were very excited to go. His favorite attraction was by far anything that had wings. He loves birds. He spent a very long time watching the bird entitled "Crazy Bird" (in the attached web gallery.) He also blows kisses to helicopters and airplanes. We are not sure why. Eli, of course, loved the train ride and exploring the Lied Jungle. I took about a hundred pictures. I love my camera. Please, follow the elephant hiney to my link and view the other highlights from the Zoo...

Scary stuff, but we're okay

Over the weekend, Jude fell with a Lincoln Log in his mouth. He perforated his soft palate and tore the little piece of skin that connects your upper lip to you gums. He was not a happy camper. We took him to the doctor on Monday along with Eli who was having his annual physical. The doctor was very concerned about his injury and sent us to an ENT (Ear, Nose and Throat doc) who had us admitted to Children's Hospital on Monday night. He spent the night and had a CT scan done early Tuesday morning. They were concerned about damage to his veins and/or arteries in his neck. They wanted to rule out the possibility of neurological damage or blood clots or ruptures that could develop.

Very scary for us. Very tough, too. Believe me, you don't want to spend any amount of time in a hospital with an active toddler attached to an IV. It looks like he's o.k. We came home this afternoon. Roger took the night shift and I came to the hospital as soon as I was safe to. You see, yesterday was a very long day for the Jaegers visiting doctors. I went for my annual exam at 8:30 am. I had a sore throat. Strep throat. Eli was diagnosed with an ear infection at his well-visit. I couldn't go to the hospital until I had been on the antibiotics for 24 hours. We've picked up a total of 6 prescriptions from Walgreen's in the last 2 days. Thank goodness for generic drugs.

We left our house at 1:30 pm to go for Eli's visit. I didn't see home again until 6 pm. Jude didn't get to see home until more than 24 hours later. We spent about 1 hour at the pediatrician and 2 plus hours at the ENT office before going to the hospital. The hardest part was being home and not with Jude when he was being put under anesthsia for his CT scan. Thank God Rog is here to help juggle all this parenting stuff.

Here's to meeting your healthcare deductibles early in the year!

Finally

After 9 years of perseverance, Rog finally received his master's degree. It was a perfect day for an outdoor ceremony at Doane College in Crete, NE. Roger's parents joined us and we watched Rog proudly strut his way down and receive his collar. A few rows behind Rog was also a very pregnant Deanna Rundle (John's wife. Bill's sister-in-law) who was receiving the same degree (Master's in Curriculum and Instruction.) We're so proud of our Rog!



Awaiting the placing of the collar.

Now that's a proud mama!

Baseball movies!

I clap my hands and get all excited every time I watch these. Roger laughs at me for it. It's just a video, honey, he's not really hitting the ball anymore, he says. It happened a few days ago. I know, I'm silly, but I'm his mom!

Baseball!

Eli got this great baseball/toy/thingy for his birthday from Grandma and Grandpa Hird. It's from Fisherprice. It's called Triple Hit Baseball. It pitches these soft balls on three different settings. It also has a tee. Eli and Jude both are having fun with it. Jude even hit one ball off the slowest setting. We were quite surprised. I have some video of Eli I'll try and post later.

They just won't stop growing

We celebrated Eli's 6th birthday last weekend. It was a 2-day event. Grandma and Grandpa Hird came on Saturday and we all went to the Children's museum (along with cousin Zach). Then we had a yummy dinner at our house.

On Sunday, Grandma and Grandpa Schmidt came along with more friends and family. We had a party complete with Hotwheel's pinata and lots of balloons. Eli was quite surprised when we went to pick up the balloons at the party store. His eyes just lit up when the man behind the counter handed him 1 dozen helium balloons. He's never got to hold that many at once! Mom and dad got him a camera so he can be a shutter bug just like mom.

Music to my ears?

We attended Eli's Spring concert entitled "Bugz". It was cute. Eli sang all the words and knew all the hand gestures. We were very proud. Jude on the other hand should have had a sitter.





Jude chills out on the ride home. He looks cool, but was very grumpy.

House for sale

Hey, it's never been this clean! Yes, it's official, there is a sign in our yard proclaiming our house is for sale. Jude's first reaction to the sign, "Wow, cool!" We even got new carpet in the basement to celebrate this special occasion. I took a bunch of pictures yesterday and now am going to convince my realtor that he should use mine and not his. It won't be completely official until the paperwork goes through on Monday, but we do have that sign in the yard. Now comes the hard part, keeping the house clean 24-7 with three boys and a dog.

What a weekend! Roger cut the quick on one of Sadie's nails and she bled all over the back steps. Now we have to clean that up. Jude got a hold of something blue (a crayon?) and chewed it up and and left blue marks on the livingroom carpet. Vinegar and water really does work for getting stains out. Roger is cleaning the yard and garage because those things still aren't finished. I wanted to help, but Jude is running a fever again. He had the stomach flu and an ear infection last weekend. He's on an antibiotic, so I don't know what could be causing the fever today. I never thought it was possible to be this busy. Anyone know someone who wants to buy a house?

Our lives take so many turns

It's been a long time since we've posted, it seems. There have been so many changes in our household, it's quite overwhelming. As many knew, and a few other's did not, Roger and I were blessed with the news in January that we would be welcoming our 3rd (completely unexpected) child into our lives in September. Just as we got used to the idea and had shared our news with many family members and friends, I suffered a miscarriage. We were left wondering just exactly why God has blessed us and then taken away from us.

Just two days after we found out we would not be having a baby, I was given a promotion at work. Two weeks after that I underwent a D & C to remove the unviable fetus as I was not passing the tissue from the miscarriage. Three days later I began training for my new job. That was 2 weeks ago.

My new job title is Group Housing Coordinator. It's a totally new department to our office here in Omaha. They moved the department from Salt Lake City. We had no policies in place and no training manuals. We are building this department from the ground up and are basically flying by the seat of our pants to learn the functions for this position. There are 10 people in my department. I have to work weekends again, but hopefully I can change that when we expand the department.

There is a lot of work to be done, so I imagine we will expand once we all get comfortable with our duties. The only other hurtle will be the fact that there is no space for us to expand into. It's a great position to be in as I could transfer to a hotel that has the Group Housing Coordinator on property. I'm thinking somewhere warm. How's Hawaii sound?

Finally, we are very close to having our house ready to put on the market. We just had the upstairs carpet cleaned today and will have the downstairs carpet replaced on Monday. We rented a storage unit last weekend and took a bunch of stuff there this week. We just have a bit more de-cluttering to do and some outside painting and yard maintenance. Maybe we'll have it on the market in 2 weeks. I hope.

All of this has been a good distraction from this sad thing that has happened to us. Everything happens for a reason, I believe. It may just take us a long time to figure out why.

Those photos that will come back to haunt you when you're an adult

You mean this doesn't require and advanced degree?

Roger tried on his new cap and gown. He will graduate with a Masters in Curriculum and Instruction in May. We are so proud. It's a lot of work to master the fine art he demonstrates in this photo, but did we really have to pay all that tuition?

Jude's wisdom about birthday candles

But it makes her coat so shiny

Don't try this at home. He is a trained dog-food eater.

Jude's birthday party

Saturday, we celebrated Jude's birthday (he'll be 2 on Thursday the 28th.) We started the day with a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Schmidt who brought presents and haircuts. Jude really, really needed a haircut. Later in the afternoon, we were joined by Aunt Carrie and Aunt Alli and all the boy cousins: Jesse, Aidan and Zach. Shari Hudson and her two kids Owen and Maggie (who just started walking) rounded out the fun. Curious George was our theme. Everyone had a good time wearing George masks and acting like monkies (like they needed help.) Jude got some nice presents he really seems to be enjoying. His brother seems to have a problem with stealing Jude's presents. I think grandma and grandpa are going to need to bring another set of blocks, so Eli can have his own on his birthday. I'm going to attempt to upload a bunch of photos now.