12.25--McCracken Christmas

Ahh...what a lovely Christmas!! By far, Christmas is my most favorite time o' the year...EASILY!! There's nothing better than snow falling, a cracklin' fire place, family giggling between each other, the delicious food that everyone worked so hard to prepare, and you can't forget all the wonderful presents! Every year Adam and I trade where to go for Thanksgiving and Christmas. This year we spent Thanksgiving in Ohio with the Finnegan Family...and Christmas was spent in Pennsylvania with the McCracken Family (Wow, that felt weird typing McCracken...ahh there it is again! It's been a while since I've typed that one!). Anyway, we got to spend a wonderful time at Uncle Chucky's house Christmas day! Boy, what a great time we had!! We ALWAYS have a good time...check out the pictures below!

Our McCracken Family.
Missing: Doug, Heidi, Caden, Andrew, Kayla.

I requested a silly picture...we are a silly bunch!

Cousin's...Proves the saying--boys are weird.

Sitting around watching football.
(Li'l Willy hanging out with the boys too!)

Chit-Chatting...
(Note the Penn State Christmas tree in the right)

Me and Baby Caitlyn.

Haha...chaos getting ready for pictures...

Great Great Grama Sara and Caitlyn Mae!

*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.
PRESENT TIME!!!

For Christmas presents this year, everyone was to bring a present. The rules were that the present had to be for a boy or a girl. For example a bag o' chocolates (could be for boy or girl). Or if you decided on something for a boy or girl, you had to write on it who it was for...boy/girl. All the presents were placed on the table and counted up...24 o' them! So next I cut up pieces o' paper with the numbers 1-24 written on them. Everyone had to pick out a number out o' the basket...next we called for #1!! #1 got to pick out whatever present he/she wanted. Then #2 was called, they had the option o' picking out a new present (whichever they want) or steal, steal the present from #1. We went all the way to 24! Let me just tell you that everyone was soo scared to "steal", so they just picked out a normal one!! Guess who the first person was who chose to STEAL?!? YUP..ME!! And the second person to steal?? Adam. Actually funny story...Adam stole Dad's present. What was even more funny, it was the present that Adam brought. He really liked the present he got!
Gathered around for the Present Exchange!

The Present table...lots o' good ones there!

Chucky's pick!!
Chucky didn't see that his said GIRL on it...so it was all girl things! That just made us laugh extremely hard. He loved his presents and started talking with a lisp. HILARIOUS!! He got a necklace with matching earrings, he also got a sunflower decoration to be hung on a door or what not.

...he also got an angle with accessories for each season.

Chucky's necklace and matching earrings.

For some reason no-one wanted to steal from him!

Decker's sweet Irish Shirt present!

Me and Sweet Aunt Gert!

Julie and Mama got the SAME present!! (:
Water...Crystal Light...and a chocolate coin...

Me and Great Grama Sara!!
I had to practically beg to get my picture with her. She HATES her picture taken!! Absolutely HATES her picture taken!! So I better frame this one!!

Playing Games...we LOVE games!
We played Banana-Grams and Golf.

Boys still watching TV!

Me and my brothers...we're silly!

...but I still love them!

Absolutely LOVE being silly...

Me showing everyone my new piccolo!

Haha...Jason and Aunt Juli.
These two were like no-other team that you've ever seen in your life. They worked together at both games and were very cut-throat!! They became such great friends! Ah...they should probably frame this picture!

Me and Kate!!
This picture I actual like o' us!

Uncle Jeff and his favorite sister!! (:

Me and Uncle Jeff!! (:

Uncle Chuck & Aunt Tammy...Our HOSTS!

My Baby!!

BUDDY!!! (cousin)

Haha...Uncle Decker!!

Sweet Aunt Patty!

We just had to do a silly picture!

Me and Uncle Tom!

We are so silly!

Missed the memo about smiling?

LOVE this picture o' us!!

Yeah, McCracken's are a li'l different!

THE END!!!

Monday (Day 18)

UPMC Montefiore.
My New Room---N1262
My Phone Number--412.802.3226

See My Room? My last name is Finnegan now...

On my way to the OR...

Because we didn't know what room we were going to be in we had to carry our luggage all over the hospital. We did have a lot o' bags; however, we put the majority o' the bags underneath my gurney so Ace didn't have to hold all o' them.

Down in the "pre-op" area with the two anesthesiologist. They did an excellent job...mainly because they knocked me out and I don't remember a THING!! YAY!

I got back from surgery and hooked up to IV pain meds, which I can click the clicker every 6 minutes.

Alonna, RN, monitored my post-op status
for my first night. Ugh, it was very painful,
I'm not gonna lie.

Uh...Eww....

Just got back from surgery..."resting"...

My nose looks all deformed and stuff.

I was NPO (nothing by mouth) so they gave me a plastic stick with a green spongey thing on the end. I could dip the green sponge in water and then use that to moisten my mouth.

Me & Baby...Baby helps me when I need to cough.

Me and MY BABY...he makes me feel all better.

Because I have a PICC Line, the "lab tech people" don't have to jab me every a.m. to take my blood, which is a huge blessing! This is how they drawl the blood. They use an empty syringe and pull back so that all the blood into the syringe. The blood taken here is called discard blood, and it is thrown away.

Drawling the Waste Blood from PICC Line.

All the equipment that she used. You can see all the flushes, and all the tubes that are needed for my lab drawln. I needed a Chemisty, CBC, PT/PTT, INR, and then an ESR.

All the equipment.

The view from my window...

Lots o' buildings and houses...

/\/\/\ MONDAY VISITORS /\/\/\

I certainly was not expecting any visitors to come down to visit me because o' it being such a long drive. Pastor Coleman was on a missions trip to St. Vincent where he took a bunch o' the older kids (Johnny, Jared, Ginny, Joy). Yet, he made the 2-3 hour trip down to Pittsburgh to visit me and I believe Bob Clark. Poor Pastor, I doubt he will ever want to leave the county or leave the church again, cause he left and everyone got sick (Bob Clark, Alisha Hawn, Me), got in car accident (Vera Alleman), and Jana got her last treatment.

Pastor & Me.

I met her at camp and we always had a hot glass o' tea together. She is from Upper Michigan, but she has family in Butler. So she spent the week in Butler with her family. Then she stopped by to visit me, which was oh so very good o' her. She really made my day. I hadn't seen her in forever. So it was so awesome to see her. I love this girl.

Me & Mama A.

/\/\/\ Food to Eat /\/\/\

Ace got a li'l hungry, so here is what he ordered"

• Cheese Burger.
• Fries.
• Brownie.
• Ketchup.
• Mustard.
• Mountain Dew.
  

/\/\/\ THE END /\/\/\