Detroit Rock City......

Having just spent the month of November in Detroit, Shauni thought that it might be good idea for me to share some of my experiences.

Here are some fun facts about D-town:

-The only major U.S. city that looks south to Canada

-Ranked as the United States' 11th most populous city (the metro area has a population of 4,425,110)

-Detroit street lights blink yellow and red, they both mean that you can go.

-Home to the "Michigan left" (this is not a political statement, it's a driving maneuver)

Once inside the Michigan state line, we spotted a Big Boy restaurant from the freeway and had to stop and partake. Although their signature sandwich looks just like a Big Mac, they claim that "The Big Boy"came about first. Upon further inspection and deliberation, I was pretty sure that they ran across the street to McDonalds to pick up my burger. However, the chocolate malt was excellent and made the stop worthwhile.

This milk was purchased at a Walmart in Detroit. For those of you who hate skim milk, you now have another option.
This is one of the many hospitals in the DMC system. "Receiving" is a level I trauma center and provides the residents with some interesting learning experiences.
This is a tunnel which connects some of the downtown hospitals together. Kinda reminds me of space mountain....
Most of my days were spent in the OR. This is retrograde drilling of a talar dome lesion.
Lateral ankle stabilization. You can really appreciate some good anatomy here, Shauni thought it was gross.
My homeboy Jason trying to blend in here in D-town.
GM's world headquarters are in Detroit. Jason & I went up to the 70th floor only to find out that there were no windows, so we walked around the halls for a few minutes.
On our way back home, we stopped for dinner/gas at the Iowa 80 truck stop. It claims to be the largest truck stop in the world.
It must be true if its painted on the floor.

Just some of the amenities that can be found here. I also saw jeans for sale, I guess you never know when you might need a new pair of those....

Blessing #14

Technology

I am so grateful for modern technology. I know I sound like Kip
Dynamite, but seriously I feel so blessed

that even though I am hundreds of miles away from my family, my
husband and many of my friends I can still easily keep in touch. I am so grateful
that this morning I was able to video chat with Colby and the boys could
show him their basket ball metals and Abbi could wave to him.
I am so glad that I can pick up the phone and call someone
anytime, and they can answer on their cell phone while they are
grocery shopping. How cool is it that my brother in law Mike can post
pictures on his blog while he is in Africa
and I can see them minutes later in Des Moines??
I often take for granted all of our modern convenieces,
but they are such a blessing! Whenever I think of technology
I think of my Grandpa Stewart. A couple of years ago my parents gave him
a CD for Christmas. He had no idea what it was.
When they explained it to him he said, "OH, so that what that
slit in my dashboard is for?" He is a crack up!
Here is a tribute to technology (mostly for Colby)

that I got from youtube.

Blessing #13

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

I am so grateful to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The gospel has been such a blessing in my life and a strength to me through difficult times. I was able to attend the adult session of Stake conference tonight. After half an hour of wrestling Abbi in the meeting (she still isn't nursery age, darn it!), I took her into the hall. A sweet Sister in my ward immediately came and took her from me and said, "you need a break, I'll take her." I can't tell you how much that small act of service meant to me or how much I really did need a break. I feel so lucky to know that there are wonderful church members like this all over the country and wherever we move we will have a ward "family."

Blessing #12

A Home

I am so grateful that I have a place to live. Whenever the weather starts to get cold and rainy, I always think about those who are living on the streets and have nowhere to go to escape the elements. Too many times I have taken this simple luxury for granted, but it really is a blessing.

(I have to add that our home normally doesn't have caution tape and plywood on the grass, I took this picture when they were doing roof construction. Which makes me think that I should add "I am grateful for a roof that doesn't leak" to this post.)

Blessing #11

The Adams

I am so grateful for this sweet family and the good friends that they have been to us. I am extra grateful for them this month for letting Colby stay with them and taking such good care of him while he is in Detroit.

Blessing #9 and Blessing #10

Carter Benjamin

I am so grateful for this sweet little boy, his cute little dimples, "tight squeezes" and luvs.

Ammon Colby

I am so grateful for this one and his spunky attitude, witty sense of humor and amazing creativity.

I LOVE having these boys and I am so grateful for the adventure they bring into my life. I love the soccer games, dirty little fingernails and mason jars filled with salamanders and crickets. I love the little treasures I find in their pants pockets when I am doing laundry and the lego creations that I absolutely can not touch. We are truly blessed to have these two little boys in our family.

Blessing #8

Celebrations

I am so grateful for all of life's little celebrations. I can't imagine a life without Halloween parties, Easter egg hunts and Thanksgiving dinners. Yesterday we had a very special celebration at our house. We celebrated little Miss Abbi's first birthday. We were also very grateful to have Grandma Stewart here to help us celebrate.

I decided to have a Pinkalicious party, based on this cute book.

What would a pinkalicious party be without a pink tutu,

and lots and lots of PINK food?

Pink cupcakes were also a MUST. (for those of you who haven't read Pinkalicious, it is about a little girl who turns pink from eating too many PINK cupcakes.

We added a few PINK decorations and we had a perfectly PINKalicious first birthday party.

The little birthday girl was not as into the party as I thought she would be. She struggled to get away while I was reading Pinkalicious to the party guests,

She wandered, played and gave hugs to the party guests while the other kids opened her presents,

(although she did return to see her loot after it had been unwrapped),

and she wouldn't touch her birthday cake (I mean literally wouldn't touch it with her hands, she leaned over it and took little bites of it and after a couple minutes she pushed it away).

Happy Birthday Party Abbi!

Blessing #7

My Mom

My mom is the best! She would do anything for anyone. She flew into Des Moines late, late last night and spent all day today helping me get ready for Abbi's birthday party. I am grateful for my mom every day, but especially this week when I really needed some company and she came.

Blessing #6

Unseasonably Warm Weather

The last couple of weeks we have been blessed with nice, warm weather. I am so grateful we have been able to enjoy a little extra time outside this Fall before the long Winter hits. Saturday we went to Grey's Lake with some friends and played (in short sleeves) until the sun set.

Blessing #5

I finally figured out how to post this video of Abbi's first year. A HUGE blessing because I was beginning to think it was impossible. We love you sis!

Blessing #4

Abigail Claire

I can't believe a year has already past since this little girl joined our family. I am so grateful for her sweet smile, pudgy little hands, contagious laugh and crazy blond, curly hair. Happy Birthday baby girl!

**Thanks to my friend Lisa for taking these darling pictures of Abbi!

Blessing #3

A Man with a Plan

I have been known to tease Colby about not having a job (and it's true that he hasn't worked for 3/4 of our married life), but Colby is one of the hardest workers that I know. I am so grateful that he has the perseverance to go through so much schooling, study so hard and work such long hours. I don't know how I got lucky enough to find such a wonderful guy who I also absolutely adore.

Blessing #2

Good Friends

I have always been blessed with good friends. The past couple of days I have felt extra grateful for my friends here in Iowa, as well as my friends who live far away. It means so much to me when a friends takes the time to listen to me on the phone, extends an invitation to dinner, or gives me a hug in the hallway at church. I am also grateful for the good friends that I had growing up who kept me out of trouble. I hope that my children will be able to experience the kind of friendships that I have.

Count Your Blessings

The past couple of days I have been feeling sorry for myself, which those of you who have been reading my blog can attest to (really, what kind of negative person wants to skip November and December?) Today I decided that I need to change my perspective. I started thinking about all of the wonderful things in my life. I have been blessed with so much. I decided that I need to start focussing on the positive things in my life, and I figured that November is the perfect month to count my blessings. From now until Thanksgiving I am going to post one blessing each day, I challenge you guys to do the same.

Blessing #1

I am grateful for kids who are good sleepers. They didn't start out that way, but somehow they have morphed into little angel children who sleep all night long, almost every night. Last night I put Abbi to bed at 6:30 and the boys to bed at 7:30, they all slept until 7:30 this morning. What a blessing!

Hapy Halloween??

I love Halloween, it is one of my favorite holidays. Most years, I totally look forward to October 31st. This year, however, I was dreading it. After October 31st comes, inevitably, November.... then December... and then January. All months that I would rather just skip this year. Altough I was not looking forward to the end of October, we had a fabulous month and celebrated the holiday to it's fullest. We attended Halloween party after Halloween party, carved pumpkins, ate homemade chili and hand dipped carmeled apples and trick or treated until the boys claimed their bags were "too heavy" to carry (granted this only took about 20 minutes). Here are all the details of our festivities.

We kicked off the season with the annual Fall harvest party at the elementary school.

We were also seen partying at the YMCA's annual Halloween party.

The kids were so excited to receive Halloween packages from both of their Grandmas, filled with lots of SPOOKY things.

Of course we couldn't miss the ward Trunk or Treat.

Abbi made sure she didn't miss out on any of the fun,

after all, this was her FIRST Halloween!

Carter was thrilled to be able to wear the skeleton costume that Ammon wore last year. Isn't having a big brother great?

Ammon dressed up as a Vampire, but not just any Vampire. If you can't tell, he is the Yowie Yahoo from Scooby Doo and the Vampires. (If you don't know who this is, don't feel too bad. I had to google it).

Kind of nerdy, I know, but Abbi and I went to the Trunk or Treat as momma and baby witch.

I thought our pumpkins were super impressive this year,

it must have been our rock star pumpkin carving team.

Colby was originally opossed to wearing this Vampire cape and teeth that I bought him, but the boys were pretty excited about it so he was a good sport and wore it trick or treating. And I think he looks hot as a vampire, hubba hubba (he's right up there with Edward Cullen, don't you think?)

While the boys were doing an inventory of their candy bags, Abbi grabbed a couple of pieces. She did not want to let go of this candy! It's a good thing she has two sweet brothers who were willing to share with her. (no she didn't eat it, she just wanted to hold it.)

I feel very blessed that Colb's schedule allowed him to spend October with us and that celebrate Halloween together. We are already counting down the days to Thanksgiving!