Patty Johnson's Blog

Today Adam's sister is having surgery at Marshfield hospital. We left my parents at 5am this morning to get her to see her before she had to get prepped. I brought my lappy so I could type magazine notes and they actually have free wifi which is pretty cool. I'll update here when I here more about the surgery but that will probably be in a few hours.
Update 07/31/06 12:49 PM: Michelle is out of surgery and in a room in pediatric intensive care. She's not awake yet but they said we should be able to see her in about a 1/2 hr. She has to at least stay tonight in intensive care and then will be moved to a regular hospital room until at least Thursday
Update 07/31/06 6:49 PM: Michelle is in her own room in Pediatric ICU. She is still pretty groggy but is now sitting up in a chair and is detached from some of the equipment. She's pretty tired but they come in and wake her up alot to check her vidals.
Update 08/01/06 12:20 PM: Michelle is going to be moved into a regular room today at about 4pm. She had quite a rough night last night waking up every hour because of pain.
Update 08/01/06 6:21 PM: Michelle still in a lot of pain but is in a nice room in pediatrics.

We woke up today at about 10:30.  Adam had to go to the uhaul place with my dad to pick up his car.  Dad had to pick up the uhaul at 8am this morning and realized he didn't have anyone to drive his car.  Then, I had to go to our house to pick up some things like Lily's adorable lavender dress.  We all got ready and we're off the the church.  It was super hot today but luckily the church was air conditioned.  The wedding was pretty short (like 20 min) and Lily was really good.  She just sat and watched and the only time she really made noise was when they went to light the unity candle, she kept saying "Hot"  Yep, candles are hot.  

Lily fell asleep between the ceremony & reception so she and Mom stayed in the car while Dad changed his clothes (he was wearing a suit and it was WAY too hot for that) and Adam and I made some white-trash grilled cheese.  So, Lily got to nap for a whole 1/2 hour and we were at Elizabeth Inn.  Some drinks were free from 4:30-5:30 so Adam had like 7 whiskey sours in that time.  So, by dinner he was buzzin'.  Then, he had to switch to Point Beer because that was free all night.  

Dinner was really good.  I'm convinced they put an addictive chemical in the chicken because I ate like 7 pieces...well, that and I really didn't eat anything else besides 1/2 a sandwich.  After a little while the dance started and that was okay but they played quite a bit of mexican polka sounding music.  Every once in a while they'd slip in a popular song but most of the songs sounded like the Chicken Dance.  Lily was crazy.  All she wanted to do was run all around the hall, into the bar, down the hall and back again.  We each took turns chasing her.  I took a bunch of pictures but it was strange trying to get used to my Dad's camera.  I had to keep trying out different settings to see which was the best and then sometimes you'd try to take a picture and it would flash 5 times and sometimes I'd set it to just one time but then 1/2 of that time it would take it right away and the other 1/2 it would wait like 5 seconds.  Weird.  I need a new camera.  We left at about 10 and Lily feel asleep on the way home.

Tonight some of Shaun's co-workers threw a party at Fill's for Shaun & Sarah. Adam went there right after work and I joined the party when my parents got home from dinner. They babysat the Lily-monster for us so we could go out together. A bunch of Shaun's & Sarah's family members were there and then our gang (Aaron, Vanessa, Eric, George, Leick, Mark, Chad & Amanda, Tara, etc) Also, Shaun's friend Vanessa from Minnesota was there too. I made meatballs for the event and other people brought food too like taco dip, mexican dip, deviled eggs, cake, and my favorite was a igloo centerpiece made of sugarcubes and it had a little bride and groom in the inside. They will be leaving for Alaska on Thursday. The night went intesting with Dart, Pool, Fooseball, and card playing...and of course a lot a beer.

So, Lily was being adorable today and "shopping" in her Grandma & Grandpa's cupboard and putting what she wanted into a basket. I run to get my camera and turn it on and I hear a scary grinding sound. Now the Lens is stuck in the out position and whenever I turn it on I get the grinding sound followed by a E18 Error. From what I see online this is a death sentance for my camera. I've tried the tips online for fixing it but none of them have worked so far...I'm super sad and frustrated

So, Ken Jennings put some excerpts from his upcoming book, "Brainiac", online today. The whole excerpt about trivia is here but here is the part that mentions us...

"I'm standing with His Honor the Mayor in the open back of a Jeep Wrangler, winding through the streets around the campus of UWSP—University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point—at about ten miles per hour. He's waving and throwing miniature Almond Joy candy bars to the crowds lining the streets. Ahead of us crawls a black-and-white driven by one of Portage County's finest, red and blue lights flashing. Behind us a motley assortment of vehicles trails for well over a block. The bizarre procession includes a flatbed truck full of dancing eggrolls, a zombie-filled cemetery, a Viking ship, a hotwired 1979 Chevy Beauville that looks like it could rust apart any second, and a guy dressed like Batman, riding a moped and dragging a wheelchair holding another guy dressed as Spider-Man. This is the Trivia Parade, the event that always kicks off America's biggest trivia contest, held every April for the past thirty-six years in Stevens Point."

The zombie-filled cemetery is our "Dawn of the Dad" float ;)

Well, this afternoon Lily and I went to our real house and did some cleaning. Then, went to walmart to get paper towels and garbage bags because it's kinda hard to clean without those. We met Mom & Dad there too. Becky called them a little while after she left work and told us that we were under a thunderstorm warning and where she was it was terrible outside. So, we quickly made it to the front of the store and all checked out. Then we all went to my parents house to wait for the storm. Adam met us there too and it ended up not doing much but raining. We had chili dogs for dinner then I tried to get the Lily monster to sleep at 5:30 because she hadn't had a nap yet. I ended up falling asleep too. Adam was downstairs playing soccer on his PS2 and he thought I was just watching "Kyle XY" with my parents (Keep in mind that is only and hour long and not on until 7) So, when we both woke up at 8:30, Adam had no idea what time it was. Silly boy. Then, of course Lily wasn't ready to go to sleep at her normal 10 o'clock so we ended up playing and watching KyleXY (which my Dad Tivos luckily) and she finally went to bed at like midnight.

Well, we played in Festivus Contest called "Get Trivia" There was surprisingly only 6 teams playing in the contest. The contest was run basically the same as our real contest except for 1/2 the time (27 hrs instead of 54) and the point value formula was obviously different because there was only 6 teams instead of over 400. Their contest was broadcasted over the internet (but they had problems the original way they were webcasting so Adam had one of his online buddies set up a room on ventrilo so it wouldn't breakup & rebuffer all the time) We ended up winning by like 1225 points so that was pretty sweet. Our team consisted of me, Adam, Lily, Aaron, Shaun, Eric, Mark, Alex, and also Vanessa and Ian played on and off.

My birthday was pretty unevenful but fun anyways. Mom & Dad, Ron & Billie and Adam, Lily and I all went out for brunch at Country Springs. Ian was there so I got to wish him a happy birthday too! After that we came home Lily and I took a little nap. Then after a while the three of us we went to dinner at Applebees. Lily had fun flirting with the little boy at the next table. I skipped the free dessert because I really didn't want to be sung to by strangers. Then, we went to the park by my parents house and played on the playground. After that we met Mom & Dad, Ron & Billie, and Uncle Bob & Aunt Lynn at the nursing home to visit Grams. After a few hours there it was back to my parents house for super yummy ice cream cake and chit chat.

We are currently playing the Festivus Contest from 6pm Friday through 9pm Saturday. Blogs to come after that ;)

Today Adam, Lily and I went to the Family Resource Center ice cream social. There wasn't very many people there which surprised me but we went anyways. Adam and Lily played on the playground because Lily was just to busy playing to eat ice cream. I had a sundae though which was yummy. Then, they had bread to feed the ducks and geese so we took lily to see them. She fed lots of geese but when she was out of bread the geese started hissing at her. So, what does my little girl do? Hisses back! So hilarious! After that we went back to my parents house for dinner which was Mom's tacos (the best!)

Not much has been going on. My parents are back in town but we are still basically living here. Tomorrow is the start of the Festivus contest so we have our computers here anyways, not that we have internet at home right now. It's nice and cool here so I've been wearing sweatshirts which always makes me feel happy and snuggly.
Aaron, Eric, Ian and Vanessa came over yesterday and we hung out in the basement. They brought some books for the upcoming contest and we watched some of the video from last years contest that Steve taped with his Replay.
My laptop wasn't working wirelessly and it took me forever to figure out why. There is this little button on the front of my computer that Lily LOVES to play with and apparently that turns on/off the wireless adapter. So, now I know! The*More*You*Know!

Lily did two new things at her old age of 18 months. She ate her first Peanut Butter & Jelly sandwich on the 14th (which she isn't too sure about) She also learned to brush her teeth tonight. She loves her Elmo toothbrush and plays with it. She still learning 'how' to brush her teeth but she's doing good so far...

Lily is sure having fun at her Grandma & Grandpa's house. The puppies love all her attention and Chico is always following her around. Chico even stays with her while she's taking a bath. If he's not there Lily will keep saying "Puppy! Puppy! until he comes in" She also has fun destoying the house but I try to stop that by distracting her with toys like her bin of balls.

I spent alot of last night trying to watch the 3rd episode of Kyle XY. Keep in mind that I have already seen most of it when it aired on Monday. But I keep having to pause it because Lily is a crazy girl. Then, George comes over to play Playstation2 with Adam. After a while they get tired of FIFA Soccer so they decide they want to go to Family Video. They rent Arena Football and I get "Failure to Launch" When we get back I try unsuccessfully to get Lily to sleep then Adam comes in to tell me that the game they rented totally sucks and they are going back to exchange it for another. Lily and I go with because I'm hoping the car ride will lull her to sleep. Nope. Adam tells the guy at Family Video that the game didn't work so the guy puts it in one of those scratch doctor type things and gives it back to him but also lets him rent another one. They rent College Baseball this time. I finally get Lily to sleep and watch the rest of Kyle XY. Vanessa was supposed to come over after work so I waited to watch the movie for a while and I played on my computer uploading pictures to my photobucket. George left at midnight and no signs of Vanessa so we just went to sleep.

Adam, Lily and I went to IHOP for dinner tonight. I've been dying to try their funnel cakes since seeing the massive amount of commercials on tv for them. I should have just had pancakes. First of all, I realized that funnel cakes are not so much as a breakfast thing as a dessert thing. I had mine topped with strawberries but would have preferred chocolate syrup like in the dells. Also, IHOP doesn't do it right. Funnel cakes should be thick and cakelike on the inside and light colored and slighty crispy on the outside. Ihops are small, thin, way too crispy and almost brown. 2 thumbs down.
Also, Adam and I were discussing our origins and talking about if Lily is more italian, german, irish etc. He said a funny thing that I just had to add on here. He said that Bamberg is a much more popular name then Johnson. Here are some stats:

• JOHNSON is the #2 most common last name.
• 0.81% of last names in the US are JOHNSON.
• Around 2025000 US last names are JOHNSON
• Bamberg is the #36331 most common last name.
• 0.0005% of last names in the US are Bamberg.
• Around 1250 US last names are Bamberg

I know that he was trying to say something else at the time but I just had to further bother him by posting this ;)

Yesterday I received an invitation via email for our 10 year high school reunion. It was sent from one of the girls in my class who has a new last name and she didn't have a subject line so I almost didn't even look at it. She also asked for donations to put an ad in the paper for it...how much can that possibly cost? Anyways, it's at Club 10 bar on September 9th. I can't decide if I want to go. When I couldn't go to the 5 year I said I would go to the 10 year, but who do I even care to see? And out of those people how many would show up. For the 5 year like 60 people out of 600some went but I blame that on it being the week before xmas and really short notice.
Should I go or not...Opinions?

Last night we had some storms. I woke up a couple times from the big booms. Luckily Adam woke up at about 6am and noticed the alarm clock was off...along with all the rest of the power so found a battery operated clock so he could get up for work.
Nothing much going on today. I cleaned my parents house a bit, vacuuming up things like cheerios and puppy food.
Lily and I just watched a show on HBO Family where they read "Goodnight Moon" her favorite story. She thought that was pretty cool

So, it's like over 90 degrees outside and people are acting weird. Cliff, my parents neighbor, was blacktopping his driveway today. Kinda a strange day to do that.
On my way to Target this total jerk would not let me in the right lane. I had my blinker on and it was obvious what I wanted to do but every time I sped up to pass him he would speed up too and when I'd slow down so would he. I had to go all the way to the next gas station to turn around. People suck.
Lily had an Icee on the way home to cool down from our shopping and she ended up dumping it all over herself. I immediately shouted her clothes when we got home and she had a bunch of blue spots on her shirt and a very blue butt. Silly Lily!

Here is a cute slideshow of pictures of Adam, Lily and I!

We are housesitting/puppysitting at my parents house this week while they are in Ohio. My dad has a few shows that automatically record. Monday night "Kyle XY" was one of them. It was the third episode in the series and I was hooked right away. Luckily Dad kept the first two on his replay so I got to watch those too. Well, Kyle XY is sponsored by Sour Patch Kids. It must be a huge backer of the show because they show bags of it in all the episodes and talk about it "my sour patch kids are sacred" one boy says. Also, every commercial break has one of the new commercials (which are hilarious...my favorite is one where a girl in pigtails wakes up and one has been cut off then the camera pans to a sour patch kid holding the hair and scissors. Then it says "First they're sour" and he drops the scissors and hair and hugs the girls leg and it says "Then they're sweet") Anyways, the power of advertising made me run to Wal*Mart to satisfy the Sour Patch Kid craving that I was having. Boy they are delicious!

Today we said goodbye to Minocqua! It was a great vacation!

We went to Peck's Wildwood Park today bright and early at 9:30. It was nice because it wasn't too hot out yet and there wasn't that many people there. Lily ran around calling all the goats "puppies" and we even saw two huge turtles mating. Lily liked running around looking at all the animals.

Once we got home we spend some more time outside since it was our last day and night there. Lily had some fun in an inflatable tube with Kelsea until Kelsea climbed over and started poking Lily in the eyes ;) Toddlers are so cute!
Later on we got to bury Lily in the sand up to her chest. She thought it was pretty funny until she realized she couldn't move and started saying "UP! UP!"

At 11pm Adam was still in alot of pain and the Tylenol with Codine wasn't working at all. His mom easily convinced him to go to the hospital. Michelle and I went along with them while Adam's dad watched a sleeping Lily. It took forever since it was late at night but we finally got some x-rays done and they didn't find anything. They told him to go see a dentist becuase maybe that is the probrem and then prescribed Vicotin and Penicillin. We were able to get the drugs right away becuase they have a drug vending machine called InstaMeds. You type in your code and it processes your prescription and insurance and spits out your drugs. Very cool! We got out of there at almost 3am and went right to bed because we were getting up at 7am to leave. Adam's dad said Lily woke up at like 1am for a while but by the time we got there she was alseep on the couch.

Happy Birthday Mom!
Adam & I spent the early part of the morning at Urgent Care. He went in because of his sore jaw and I went in for my cold. They gave him Tylenol with Codine and Naproxen. I got Amoxicillin and they told me to get a decongestant/antihistimine.
Today Adam and his mom and dad and sister and Lily and I all went out on a boat ride to Otto's beer garden. They tried a couple beers and I had Cream Soda because I obviously don't like beer. Michelle took Lily shopping around while we were there. Then, we had a snack of Macaroni & Cheese wedgies. This was mac and cheese battered and fried. DELICIOUS!

Woke up today and we were out of milk so we all went on a family outing to Trig's to get some...well that and stuff to make our dinner tonight: Kabobs and Ice Cream Sundaes. I feel like crap today: sore throat, runny nose and just all around can't breathe. So, I also picked up a nice box of Kleenex and some nasal spray. woohoo. Adam, Lily and little Frankie dug up a big canal and connected it with one we made days ago. Lily of course got all muddy...I'm going to have lots of laundry to do when we get home! We stayed inside alot today again because it was cold and windy for most of the day, except when the sun peeked out. The next two days are supposed to be 81 and sunny so hopefully that is true. After dinner we played poker for $2 buy in. I did pretty well, but Adam ended up winning which is good because we made like 8 whole dollars! Lily went to sleep tonight at 7. I have had "Live and let die" in my head for days and today was the worst. I even got it in Adam's head because I kept humming it.

Woke up at about 10 today and hung around inside. We watched the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Competition on ESPN where the same guy won again eating 54 hot dogs with buns in 12 minutes. The America guy came in second place with 52. Lily wore her 4th of July dress & we had a mini photo shoot in the liitle garden by the cabin.

Then we went into town and went to the local internet cafe. I emailed out a cute pict of Lily and had my parents spread it around. Then, we had lunch at Culvers and once again were too full to get custard which is what we really went there for. Next, while Adam was watching the Italian vs Germany soccer game, Lily and I played outside running back and forth. Then, after soccer halftime Lily and I layed down for a nap until dinner. Tonight's dinner was Scala's italian beef and brownie sundaes. The rest of the night we hung around inside watching a "dirty jobs" marathon on Discovery channel because its cold outside.

Today was a hot day. Adam even went in the water which was pretty amazing for him. I followed Lily around as usual and it was in and out of the water. She only really likes to go knee deep besides sitting down every once n a while to get her butt wet. Tonight's dinner was sub sandwiches & root beer floats. Adam did an amazing catch during wiffleball, but he ended up hurting his jaw & neck so he's been popping tylenol since then. Today the slide was a little wet & Lily's swimsuit was too so she flew down it! After Lily's day in the mud, she took a nice long bath in her inflatable duckie. Then she went to be before 8pm!
Lily's cute moment of the day: Lily was taking a nap in the other room and I walked by the door and peeked in. I didn't see her so I did a double take a saw her sitting in bed and awake. I walked in to find her reading "Goodnight Moon"
Here's a cute pict from today:

Rolled out of bed at 9:30 this morning and had Bacon and Cereal. Then, we went outside and Lily of course was ready for the water. Days pretty much consist of changing Lily and I in and out of our swimsuits. Adam's mom and sister went shopping in town today and bought Lily a cute Minocqua shirt with a moose on it. Adam's mom LOVES moose things. For lunch we went to Black Bear Bar for Pizza which was pretty good. We played in the sand and water some more, of course. We also went for a boat ride to the Minocqua Brewing Company for beers and root beers. Lily loved the root beer. Then, back to the cabin for dinner. Tonight was chili dogs, baked potatos and key lime pie. After dinner the family played TAPS which is two big lines of people and everyone has a cup. The first person drinks their cup and then has to flip their cup on the table a certain way. That signals the next person on their team to go. It's basically a race to see which side can do this. They played for like 3 hours so the grownups were wasted (that's how the kids put it)

While all that was going on Lily and I and the rest of the younger kids played in the sand and sat by the fire. Kelsea likes to chase Lily around - she is just a little bit younger than Lily. So, she gets a hold of Lily from the back and tries to hug her but really just drags her down. They are so cute together though.

We arrived in Minocqua at about 1 o'clock in the afternoon. Then we went to our meeting ground of Trig's where we got grocery and beer necessities. I've never seen a grocery store so crazy. People where lined up all over the place with cartloads of food for the weekend. Then we arrived at our home for the week, Hidden Harbor cabins. We unpacked everything and started to move in.
The first thing Lily wanted to do was play in the sand and water. It's going to be an interesting weekend with her I'm sure.
Michelle put Lily's hair up in pigtails and it was so cute. She romped around in her swimsuit and very much enjoyed using a shovel to add sand to the lake. Lily also dug up a hole with some of the kids which they filled with mud and so Lily just loved to play in the muddy pool. I called her my little mudpuppy.

On the other side of the cabin they have a cool swingset with a little Lily-sized swing that is shaped like a bumble bee. She had fun on that.
This is a family reunion style vacation so every night someone makes dinner for everyone. Tonight was spaghetti and it was SO GOOD. Crystal made homemade sauce which was super. Then, for dessert they made pretzel jello.
They only have a shower here and not a tub but luckily I brought Lily an inflatable tub. She liked that alot and we got all the mud off. We had lots of fun playing but were all wore out pretty early.Adam, Lily and I all went to be at about 9pm!
p.s. Pictures coming soon, I'm just blogging at the internet cafe in town and I don't have any photo editing software on my computer to make picts smaller