Call Me Frank

Many of you know that I have lipoma (not cancerous even though it sounds like it.) A lipoma is a benign tumor composed of fatty tissue. We refer to them as my fat blobs. I probably have about 20 of them, but three of them were especially visible on my left arm. Most lipomas can be removed in the doctor's office or outpatient surgery center. The doctor injects a local anesthetic around the lipoma, makes an incision in the skin, removes the growth, and closes the incision with stitches. I had one removed on my forearm just above my wrist. I had another removed just below my elbow. On Wednesday of last week I had the third (and largest) one removed from my tricep. It was big enough that it took 18 stitches to close. You can count them for yourself in the picture. It isn't painful, but I look like Dr. Frankenstein's monster. After the doctor (Dr. Berry for those who know him.) removed it, he apologized for the size of the incision. He also told me that it was big enough that he removed my gall bladder while he was at it. (The reason for the bruising is because the blob was so big that it left a cavity that allowed the blood to pool.)


Sorry if this is TMI, but there you have it.

New Furniture

Our couches that we bought when we moved into our house were getting pretty thrashed. We have been casually looking around for a while, but nothing too serious. We finally decided to look on ksl.com (local classifieds) and found some really good deals. We found a leather couch and loveseat right here in Lehi that we decided to buy. They are maroon. We moved our other couches to the basement. The only furniture we have had down there up to this point was the Foof Chair (a giant bean-bag type chiar.) Here are some pictures of the new furniture. You are all welcome to come visit us so you can see them in person.

Couch

Loveseat

Funny Pictures

We have taken a couple of funny pictures of the kids recently and thought we would share them with you. Not much more to this post than that.

I made cookies one night. Joseph wanted to lick the mixer blade. This is a picture of him licking it with his mouth wide open.

After he got done with the blade he still wanted more cookie dough (takes after his dad.) I gave him a scoop. He stuffed the whole thing in his mouth (except for the stuff left on his hands.) This picture is the result.

Mark found a little pair of kid sunglasses that he put on. They were pretty funny, but the smile makes the picture.

Ryan fell asleep in our bed one night with the big dinosaur that he got for his birthday.

Ryan's First Time Skiing

While the kids were out of school and I was off of work for Christmas, Mark wanted to go skiing. Ryan had fun sledding just after Christmas and was pretty excited at the prospect of going skiing. Mark invited a friend to ski with him and the four of us headed up to Alta Ski Resort. (Alta lets you ski for free after three o'clock on some of the easier runs. After renting skis, Mark and Michael (his friend) headed for the lifts and Ryan and I headed for the rope tows. (Editorial note: I'm not sure why they have rope tows for the beginners since they are harder to use than chair lifts.) Ryan and I worked on putting our skis on and then started skiing. At first I was trying to give him some confidence by holding him up, but quickly realized that he was relying on me too much (leaning on me rather than trusting his equipment.) I decided to turn him loose and see how he did. To my surprise he was able to ski very well on his own. He wasn't very good at stopping, but as far as the skiing went he was great! This picture was of him after one of the few times he fell. Most of the times he fell it was because I was stepping on his skiis. Notice the large ski goggles he has on. They are Mark's, but Ryan wanted to wear them. Mark wore mine and I wore sunglasses.


Ryan's First Time Skiing from Derek Lindsey on Vimeo.

The video clip is his second run on his own. He was navigating pretty well, but when he came up on a second group of people, he wasn't sure what to do. My audio commentary is pretty funny in the clip as was my filming the nearer he got to the group of people. As always, if you don't see the video on the blog, follow the link to vimeo and watch it there.

We are Thankful for Ryan

We had a nice Thanksgiving weekend. The highlight was that it was Ryan’s birthday on Thanksgiving Day. Wow, he is five years old. It was five years ago that he was born on Thanksgiving Day. What a great kid! He had a fun birthday. He got some art supplies, hot wheels, puzzles and books. His favorite presents have been Construx set that he can build a crane, dump truck and front loader out of. I have spent several hours building with him over the last few days.

He also got a huge stuffed dinosaur. It is probably about three feet tall. It’s a lot of fun. He carries it around and makes it talk and pretend to eat stuff.

Ryan likes to get into really small spaces. Here he is in the bag his dinosaur came in.

Ryan loves pumpkin pie. It’s a good thing since his birthday falls on Thanksgiving Day every five years. He had pumpkin pie for his birthday cake this year.

Lauren's Room

One of Lauren's favorite things to do is to decorate her room. If she isn't actively decorating her room, she is planning new decorations for her room. She has been dying to paint her room since the last time she painted it last year. One of her least favorite things to do was to practice the piano. To combine the two, Marsha institute a new program called "Positive Patient Piano Practicing for Paint." If Lauren would have a positive attitued about practing the piano and put the time into doing it, she would get a star for that day. If she stuck with it for two months, Marsha would help her paint her room.

She stuck with it, so last Saturday was painting day. She decided that she wanted to move into the room upstairs (she had been in the basement), so we moved Joseph into Ryan's room (The picture is of the first night in the same room for Joe and Ryan.) and set to work on painting Joseph's former room.

Lauren originally wanted to do stripes, but we talked her into doing multiple bright colors per wall.

Her friend Annie Estes came over to help her paint. They had a great time.

She was almost giddy while she was painting she was so happy.

She bought a new comforter, sheets and curtains to go with her room.

The room turned out great.

After finishing the painting and going to a BYU football game, we decided to get dinner at a little burger place called Chadder's. It is a knock off of In-N-Out berger.

Ryan and Joseph had a great time taking big bites of their burgers. You may notice that Ryan discovered that scissors will cut more than paper. He's a little mangey, but it will grow back.

And for those that are curious, Lauren is doing great on her piano. She now plays just for the fun of playing. She has been improving quickly and actually admits to liking to play. The following is a video of Lauren playing in a recital in October. If you can't see the video, click the Part of Your World link and watch the video on Vimeo.

Part of Your World from Derek Lindsey on Vimeo.

Halloween 2008

We had a great time for Halloween this year. We are still trying to come down off of our sugar high. We carved pumpkins the Monday before Halloween.

Ryan designed and carved this pumpkin himself. He was pretty excited to put a candle in it.

Lauren's pumpkin is also of her own design. Isn't she cute?

We grew Mark's pumpkin in our garden.

Mark stayed home and gave out the candy while Marsha and I took Ryan and Joseph trick-or-treating. We wanted to try and dress Joe as Syndrome again this year, but he wouldn't go for it. He was willing to wear a Bob the Builder costume that we bought for Ryan a few years ago. He really filled it out. He got lots of comments on being so bright.




Ryan went as a snake hunter. He originally said he wanted to be a snake, but we couldn't figure out how to have a kid go trick-or-treating as a snake. We had some jungle/adventure clothes, so snake hunter was a good alternative to being a snake. Ryan and Joseph were pretty impressed that they could knock on doors and people would give them candy. They were still going strong at the end.

Lauren and her friend Esty went trick-or-treating around our block by themselves. They then wanted to go to the rest of the ward, so I took them around. We went to every house in the ward. They were pretty excited about that. They kept complaining about sore feet, but didn't want to quit.

We had great weather for halloween this year. I think it was the warmest trick-or-treating we have had in years. It rained a little bit, but it was warm. We had a very impressive sunrise on halloween this year. The picture doesn't do it justice, but it is still pretty good.