Trader Joe's Tuesday: Peanut Butter Filled Pretzels & Sweet, Savory & Tart Trek Mix

I've been totally into snack food lately--probably due to being pregnant and hungry all the time. These are two of my all-time favorites!

The Peanut Butter Filled Pretzels come in salted and unsalted varieties, I prefer the salted. I'll never forge the first time I tried these: it was summer 1995 and I was working at the Doubletree Hotel in Pasadena (now the Westin) and one of my co-workers brought these as a snack for our department. I was in heaven (no, not the job--it was lame, but the snack for sure!) I was glad she brought in a few bags of them because I probably ate an entire bag by myself (ahhhh, to have the metabolism of a 19 year old again...) I was hooked from that day on.

I love trail mix type things, but let's face it--they're really high in fat (although lots of protein!), so I don't buy them THAT often--except when I'm pregnant (hey, I need the protein!!) . And Trader Joe's seems to have a plethora of them, so I could never decide where to begin trying them. The first time I had the Sweet, Savory & Tart Trek Mix was during our Bradley classes when I was pregnant with Sammy (if you are looking to do a Bradley birth, I highly recommend Kathy Killebrew). Kathy would always have healthy snacks out for us while we took a break during our 2 hour classes, and this mix was one of them. It was the prefect blend of almonds, peanuts, golden raisins, dried cranberries, chocolate chips, peanut butter chips and cashews. So good and satisfying!

Oh wait! I have to make one more plug for my other favorite trail mix (sorry, no picture) the Truly Tempting Trail Mix (I THINK that's the name...I may have to double check and update this if needed). It is a similar blend, except it has dried cherries instead of the cranberries and golden raisins AND it has oversized Belgian chocolate chips. Oh so yummy as well...I trade off buying that one and the sweet, savory & tart. My husband loves both of them as well.

Enjoy and just ignore the fat content--think PROTEIN!!!

Nothing too exciting...but that's probably a good thing

So, I've been a slacker on the blog lately. Nothing new to report except that Samuel's doctor has recommended surgery so he doesn't have another issue with the scar tissue. We are scheduled to meet with the surgeon on September 3rd, so I'll know more then.

Here are a bunch of random pictures from the last week or so. I've been wanting a new camera, so I got a new Cannon Powershot that Dana recommended and I really like it! I still haven't figured out all the features, but I've decided that it must be a good camera--I saw 5 different people at Underwood Farms with the same camera. Totally funny!

Speaking of which, Underwood Farms was fun, as always. We got there an hour later than I planned and didn't stay as long as I wanted, but we're going to go back again in a few weeks anyway. Here are a few pics with the new camera!

Hannah feeding the alpacas

One of the goats demanding food

Sammy feeding the horse

The kids thought it was so funny to see the goats climbing up so high

They (surprisingly) had a great time in the sandbox.
They usually hate sand, but seemed to be enjoying it for once.Sammy loves the big tire tunnels, although he looks rather contemplative here...
Here are a few pictures from our quick getaway to my parents house. The kids love to go to this place called John's Pizza--it's like Chuck E. Cheese, but much better food and no obnoxious mouse. Hannah was LOVING the pizza, as you can tell.

Sammy was totally into Grandma's iPhone.
How is that my parents have an iPhone and I don't? They can't even figure out how to use it most of the time...and I say that with LOTS of love Mom and Dad! :)

Samuel got the kids into air hockey and they were quickly addicted!

Hannah wasn't quite tall enough

Last, these pictures are from two weeks ago when Shelley and her family were here visiting from Japan. We just had to make our customary visit to Souplantation and had a great time eating and chatting away, so there are no pictures of her visit except for when the kids were playing outside the restaurant after we ate.

And there's my update for the past week or so. Mommy and Me classes for Hannah and I start next week and Sammy starts school on the 8th. I guess summer is officially almost over. I've been spending the past few nights catching up on all the episodes of Heroes, Pushing Daisies, and How I Met Your Mother that I missed so I'll be all caught up when the new seasons start. I can't wait!

I PROMISE I'm back for Trader Joe's Tuesday tomorrow.

Oops!

We decided to head out to my parents house for some R & R since Samuel is still off work (and may not be going back for a while, but I'll post more about that when I have more information).

We had a great time swimming and eating and watching the kids play. They always have such a great time at Grandma and Grandpa's. And Sam and I actually made it out to a movie last night--YAY! Plus, they have a king sized bed which seems so luxurious after squeezing 4 people into our little queen sized bed (yes, we co-sleep, although I think most of you know that...).

Someday when we have a bigger bedroom, we will have a king sized bed. Actually, we just might be able to fit one in our bedroom, but there is NO WAY we can get the mattress up the stairs. We had to remove the railing just to get the queen mattress upstairs. Anyway, I digress.

So, oops, no TJs Tuesday AGAIN. Yes, I am a loser, but we left in the morning on Tuesday and I totally forgot until the afternoon. Oh well.

We are off to Underwood Farms tomorrow and the kids can't wait!

On a lighter note...

Thanks to Lyndsey for this gem of a website.

This one is my favorite. No wait...this one. Or maybe this one.

Thanks for a much needed laugh!!

Good news...

Sam came home from the hospital yesterday at 6pm. His intestine freed itself on its own and everything started working again. I'm just glad that we didn't have to do surgery.

He's on a clear liquid diet for 2-3 days (so pretty much water, apple/grape/cranberry juice and broth only). He's not happy about that. He was envisioning a pretty huge meal for his first taste of food in 3 days. I guess the gluttony will have to wait.

Update on Samuel

I was going to give an update last night, but was so tired I went to bed instead.

Thanks to Dana for watching the kids for me yesterday afternoon, so I could go visit Sam. I was lucky enough to have timed my visit for when the doctor was coming by to give Samuel and update on his most recent CT scan. This CT scan was the one where they make you drink a yucky liquid dye and as it goes through your intestines it allows you to see what is going on in there.

The doctor was right in his assumption--somehow part of his intestine got tangled up with some scar tissue in the abdominal cavity and it has caused a "kink", if you will, in the system and won't allow anything to pass. The normal procedure is to wait it out 3-5 days to see if untangles itself without any interventions. After that, they will have to do surgery to cut off the scar tissue and free the intestine.

Since today is day 3 and Saturday is day 5, we are going to meet with a surgeon today to talk about options (laparoscopically vs. opening him up) and time frames and most likely do the surgery on Friday if it hasn't worked itself out by then.

Samuel is doing better--he has stopped vomiting so THAT'S a good thing, and they've been managing his pain pretty well. He is starving of course, since he hasn't eaten since early Tuesday morning (and it's just going to worse since we are just waiting it out), but he is hanging in there. Poor guy! We don't really know when he will be coming home, but no sooner than Saturday for sure. I'm guessing Sunday or Monday.

Thanks to April for watching the kids for me today and to Megan for watching them tomorrow. I appreciate all your help!

No Trader Joe's Tuesday today...

No TJs post today. I've spent the day at the ER with Samuel due to complications from his colonectomy in 2001. After blood work, an x-ray and three CT scans, they finally admitted him to the hospital late this afternoon.

Without being too graphic, his entire colon was removed back in 2001 due to severe ulcerative colitis. That used to mean that you had an external colostomy bag for the rest of your life, but thanks to medical advances, they now can form an internal "pouch" from the small intestine and hook that up to your rectum so everything works pretty much normally. Sorry if TMI--it could have been worse as I could have gone into much more detail.

Anyway, he was in a lot of pain and his stomach, especially the pouch area, was distended and he couldn't even walk. He was already at work (he works at a hospital for those who don't know), so he just walked down to the ER and checked himself in and then called to let me know.

Fortunately, my parents had to come into town today as my dad needed some emergency dental work done, so my mom came over as soon they arrived to stay with the kids and ended up staying for the rest of the day.

His doctor has concluded that there is some scar tissue causing blockage of any food or liquid passing though his system. They have put him on IV only--no food or liquid for 24 hours and then will observe hims as they introduce liquids the next day and possibly solid food the day after. So we are looking at most likely a 3 day stay. If they can't get any liquids to pass through, then they will go in laparoscopically to remove the scar tissue.

I didn't want to upset the kids (who wouldn't understand anyway), so I just told them that Daddy was at work, which is true--he IS at work...he just isn't technically working.

I got home around 6:30 tonight, just in time to feed the kids and put them to bed. I'm just glad that this happened on a day when my parents were around to help out and I didn't the added stress of wondering how the kids were doing at someone else's house for the entire day.

And Shannon, I appreciated the timing of your comment today--I have definitely had my fair share of hospital visits lately!

Trader Joe's Tuesday: Dark Chocolate Chunk and Almond Cookies

This is going to be a short post because I am tired and it's been a long day...BUT these are one of my favorite cookies (second only to chocolate Joe Joe's). Someone brought these to our PCC class for snack once and I've been hooked ever since.

I love the semi-sweet chocolate chips and the chopped almonds in a crunchy cookie--so good with a tall glass of milk.

Hannah's neck

So, I haven't mentioned this before because I haven't, until now, had ton of conclusive information about it and I didn't want to sit and speculate. A few months ago, I noticed that Hannah had a rather large lump on the right side of her neck. Since she is so chubby and her neck is no exception to the chubbiness, I never noticed it until one day when she threw her head pretty far back to look up at something and the skin on her neck was tightened and you could clearly see a lump. I, of course, freaked out (silently) and immediately called her pediatrician who after checking her out, referred her to an Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) specialist.

The ENT had a terrible time trying to get Hannah to just hold still so she could look in her ear and inspect the lump. Hannah would have nothing to do with her and fought and fought (it probably didn't help that her appt time was the same time as her nap time). The ENT concluded that it was most likely a bronchial cleft cyst, but wanted to do an ultrasound to confirm. We did the ultrasound a week later and it did not show any signs of fluid (translation: not a cyst) and looked more like a solid mass. After meeting with the ENT again, we decided that a biopsy was the next option to determining what it was.

Well, since Hannah wouldn't even sit still for an exam--there was no way she would sit through a needle being put into her neck, so we had to put her under general anesthesia. That would also give our ENT a chance to do a thorough ear exam since she hadn't been able to do one yet.

This morning we went to Good Samaritan Hospital (outpatient surgery center) to have her biopsy. We had to be there at 6:30am(!), so it's been a long day. Everyone there was so nice and all the nurses doted on her and catered her every whim. It was really sweet. The anesthesiologist came in and talked to me at length about what they were going to do and how long recovery would take. We seriously has way better treatment for this minor surgery than we did at CHLA for Sammy's surgery. The anesthesiologist at CHLA spent about 45 seconds with me regarding Sammy and the recovery nurses at CHLA were TERRIBLE. I didn't mention this about his surgery, but they didn't get Samuel and I in to see to Sammy until AFTER he had woken up from the anesthesia and he was literally SCREAMING in pain and fright. They didn't get us for 20 minutes after he awoke. I was furious! So, after that experience I made sure that I was there before Hannah woke up from this. She did really well considering her day. There was some crying, but it was quite controlled and not from pain--nothing like the awful cries from Sammy. I will never forget that sound--it was one of the worst days of my life, seeing your child suffer like that and not be able to do anything and knowing that he was all alone for at least 20 minutes.

The doctor told me that the substance they removed from the biopsy looks fairly consistent with that from a cyst (surprisingly enough) and they would know more after the lab analyzed it. She is quite confident that it's not a tumor or other growth (yay!). She also mentioned that Hannah's right ear canal isn't formed properly and that there is an unusual boney (is that a word?) structure blocking half her ear drum. She said that she has never seen this and actually called her colleague down to the OR to take a look as well. She said it is not causing Hannah any pain or other problem, but suggested we take Hannah to CHLA at some point to do a hearing test in that ear to see if she has any hearing problems because of it. I'm not too concerned about that since she speaks so well (and has since 11 months--seriously, full sentences at 17 months!). She also suggested getting a CAT scan sometime as well to really see the entire ear structure in more detail, but obviously when Hannah is older and can hold still.

Anyway, we went home at 9:00 am and Hannah has been doing great. We went to Kidspace for the morning and everyone's favorite El Pollo Loco for burritos and quesadillas for lunch, then home for a much needed Mommy nap. (I've become quite the insomniac lately and was awake from 1:30am-5:30am when I finally got up to get ready for the day). We had a nice nap and I finished Breaking Dawn (#4 in the Twilight series) while the kids played. All in all, a much better day than I thought it would be.