INTRODUCING

Sione Ronald Tapa

Born 8/25/08 at Emmanuel Med. Center Turlock, CA at about 4pm. Weighed 8lbs 12 oz, 21 inches long. Mom and Baby doing Great! More pics and info to come.

Olympics, Spin Abouts, and Old Pioneer Day Pics and An Ode To SUMMER

So, we love the Olympics, but I've been to darn tired to stay awake at all hours of the morning to watch it. So THAT's why people love DVR and Tivo so much. Duh.... me and my dumb "try to get the old things working like new"-self can never figure out why new technology is so great when the old stuff works just fine. And HOW OLD is DVR and Tivo? Probably about a decade or so. Boy, I wouldn't blame IBM if they never wanted me back to work for them... which I'm trying to decide whether or not to do in the next couple years.

Anyhoo... after Tekina saw one of the qualifying rounds of gymnastics, she decided to make up her own moves.... kinda like the "upsides" we mentioned in a previous post. So, here's our newest video of Tekina competing in the new gymnastics, and a blurb of Finelea doing what she does best: making a mess.


***I couldn't upload the video. I'll try later ***


And after uploading the video, I realized we totally completely forgot about some snapshots we took at the stake pioneer day activity last month, so here they are.



Tekina and Noa both rode a horse for the first time. The guy with Tekina is a friend from our ward. There was no way I was going to get my pregnant self on that poor horse. He probably would have looked at me and dropped dead before I swung my leg over. I wonder if it would have even been possible for me to maneuver myself up there in the first place. Probably not. Of course, when it came to Finelea's turn, she sat down on the ground in protest, but I got a picture of her in the cultural hall at the chuckwagon feed. Mmmm... just thinking of those BBQ beef sandwiches makes me feel all lovely inside.





























Oh yeah, and the "pioneer kittens". Those poor things were probably mauled to death by the time Noa got a hold of them. I had to grab the kitten away from him and put him back in the cage. The poor ugly kitty. No wonder he scratched Noa.



















So, now that the kids are back in school, I'll post a picture of our most beloved park for the summer. Here's Tekina playing in Central Park in Mountain House. At 10am every day, the water feature turns on, and the kids are in seventh heaven sloshing in the chlorine filled wonder. I liked it because between the wind and the water, there was a cool breeze there most of the time..... and best of all, it kept the kids out of the house and away from making disasters (which are impossible for me to clean anymore).



Dear Summer,

BYE BYE! I'm still trying to finish all the Otter Pops in the freezer with help from my little Tekina. If the birds hanging out in our back yard hadn't eaten most of the asian pears you sent to my tree, I would be scrambling now trying to somehow preserve them in jars -- which doesn't sound really appealing since I'm having a baby next week. Thank you for not making me TOO HOT for a long period of time even though your heat did eventually take out my A/C. And when it was too hot, thanks for the time you allowed me to spend with my kids indoors. They had a lot of fun creating new play equipment out of what we have. Thanks for the great anniversary, and helping me learn about some fun family history stuff. Don't worry if you don't hear from me for another 9 months. I'll be busy with Fall, Winter, and Spring. November's election and all the propositions I have to vote on sound interesting. I look forward to swimming with you again next year.

Until next year,

Me.



On to the sleepless nights of a screaming newborn -- which I'm really wanting OUT about now so I can finally move around and get stuff done. I'm past excited and on to DESPERATE! ONE WEEK FROM YESTERDAY!

Like to Bake?

Someone, please make this for me, except with blueberry topping instead:



I'm going nuts! I'm having cravings for something in particular every few hours. This is crazy.

Holy Moly Cravings

Up until now, I haven't had any real significant cravings. All of a sudden, I'm having cravings for everything POLYNESIAN. So for the past couple days, I have been consuming everything from coconut juice to kalua pig to those purple hawaiian sweet potatoes. Luckily, I live in a place where it's relatively easy to get these things. Last night during the Olympics, we ate Lupulu (a Tongan corned beef and taro leaf dish).

I think I'll introduce you to something that has always been a fetish for me. My first roommate at BYUH was a girl named Susan. She grew up in Hawaii and became one of my best friends instantly. One thing I miss is when we would grab a big bag of oranges from the cafeteria and take them to our dorm room and chow down on oranges dipped in Li Hing Mui. Now, Li Hing Mui is an acquired taste, I think... but once you've tried it, you just want it every now and then. Every now and then, I have my sister-in-law who lives in Maui send me a package of Li Hing Mui powder so I can kick my cravings. I devoured an orange yesterday with Li Hing Mui powder all over it, and I'll probably do again today. I can't go too crazy, because it does contain aspartame which isn't the best thing to consume while you're pregnant.


So, the count down is on! 1 week from Monday! Mom and Dad come to lend their assistance on Thursday. And I'll probably try to kill time by reading the Twilight series that a friend let me borrow. Hopefully, I can get an insurance problem settled before the surgery. If not, I'll have to scramble to find out who's going to cover this c-section... but that's a WHOLE other story that I won't bother anyone with. I'm just praying it gets resolved quickly.

Adoption

I wanted to pass this along to you. I think unmarried young women who give their babies up for adoption are probably some of the most unselfish women in the world. I only wish more mothers of young women would be more encouraging and supportive of the adoption process and realize that there are families out there like this one looking for these souls to raise up to Christ. I've heard of many grandmas taking on the responsibilities of motherhood for their daughters. I've thought a lot about this, and I hope I never have to find myself in that situation, because I would really have to rely on the Holy Ghost to lead me in this situation.

I hope these people (Sean and Char) find a young woman smart enough, brave enough, and unselfish enough to become the birth-mom they are looking for:

http://seanandchar.wordpress.com/

Spirit of Elijah and lucky 08/08/08

Some of you may be wondering what I'm doing now. No, I haven't gone into pre-term labor (although that wouldn't be such a bad idea). No, I haven't died from heat or cold showers.... we finally have our AC working and water heater replaced.

Last Sunday, Siope's elders quorum talked about a new website called new.familysearch.org. Only a select number of areas around the U.S. have access to it, and we happen to be one of them. After a few attempts at the weird URL, I finally got in, and I have been in my own little family history dimension ever since. You family history/genealogy/temple worker buffs know EXACTLY what I'm talking about. It seems like I'm compelled to find people who haven't had their work done, or who's records are floating around out there without any attachments. I have been able to trace genealogies of mine back to the 1600's, and am working on going further. I know this is nothing compared to some of you, but a few years ago, there was nothing past my great-grandparents on my mom's side to speak of. Now, I'm finding all sorts of stuff! I wish I knew their legacies, but all I have for most of these people born in the 1700's are names and dates. But I do have a lot of stories from those in the early 1900's and 1800's (thanks to Aunt Karen for finding them). Those are really fun to look over. I'll have to post some stories about some of them as I continue to gather more information. Maybe I'll have to create a separate blog with the info so I can contain it all .... there's a lot. I must sound like I'm babbling a lot. I'm tired and ready to have this baby. The time goes by quickly when you're doing ancestral research, so I'm having a nice time killing time. I wish my brain could articulate my excitement, but I guess this will have to do for now.

Yesterday, we went to the $1 Summer Camp movie at the local theater. We saw "The Waterhorse". It was a fun little movie. Tekina didn't really care for it, but Finelea was screaming each time the waterhorse would jump out of the water. Finelea is my little waterhorse. I'm sure if we had an in-ground pool, she would be in high heaven! Of course, Noa loved the movie too.

Tomorrow is my 10th wedding anniversary. Yes, 08/08/08. We were married 08/08/1998 in the Laie, Hawaii temple. Yes, it sucks being 9 months pregnant on my 10th wedding anniversary. I was HUGE pregnant on my 1st, 2nd, and 6th anniversaries also, and recovering from a miscarriage on my 8th anniversary, and having problems (which eventually ended up in a miscarriage) on my 9th anniversary. Somehow, I can't time my pregnancies right
so I can actually have a fun time on my anniversary. I did have a fun time between the 3rd and 5th anniversaries though. We went to Monterrey Bay once and Half Moon Bay another time. I wanted to go to the beach this time, but I may just be too darn big to even think about leaving the east bay. We'll just have to fly by the seats of our pants this time and hope for lovely, non-pregnant, financially stable 15th and 20th wedding anniversaries. A couple years ago, we were planning on going to Hawaii for our 10th, but between miscarriages and economic distress, we just won't be able to make it. Oh well. Some other time. I miss Hawaii profusely, and can't wait to go back for a LONG visit. Siope's brother and sister both live in Maui, and we would love to visit them again as well as revisit our lovely Laie where we made our home and had our first 2 children. I'll never forget the wonderful years there. It seemed like those were the best years of our lives even though we were busting our tails trying to make it through school and having two babies. But I don't regret a moment of it, and would love to move back if it were at all possible. Some day, perhaps.

My Home Problems

Why is it when you just don't have the money to fix anything, stuff starts breaking? As you know from my previous post (if any of you read this anyways), my AC broke last week. We were having estimators come out and give us quotes for a full system replacement when a dude told us he may be able to fix it. He didn't have the part he needed, but yesterday the most weird thing happened. The guy was on another job that involved removing an AC system EXACTLY like ours. So, consequently, he had all the parts he needed to fix our machine right there. He told me he would only charge for labor to replace them. This will allow us some more time to gather the finances to replace our system. Of course he didn't give us a warranty or anything on the parts because they were from a used system, but I thought it was so cool that he only charged $75 to fix it! I had him replace our thermostat too for a little more. I wish every contractor had that integrity. I'll probably go with him to replace our whole system when it comes down to it. For now, I'm just glad my home temperature is teetering in the upper seventies instead of the upper eighties.

So -- I didn't mention another problem that arose a couple days ago. As we were getting AC quotes and going in and out of the garage, I noticed a strong gas smell. Actually, one of the estimators noticed it before I did. Darn. Something was leaking. I got on the phone with PG&E as I headed off to my OBGYN appointment and they told me they would send someone out to take a look. The only problem was that I was not going to be there, so they would only just turn off the gas, and I'd have to call in again for them to return. Since I didn't want my house to blow up, I decided to have them go ahead and turn off the gas. The following day, I called PG&E to come back out. I had to wait in the sweltering heat ALL DAY for them until they came at 6pm. I wish they would have just given me a 4 hr window. Anyways, they came and said that our water heater (which my husband changed 2 years ago) is made for liquid petroleum (i.e. propane) and not natural gas, so the gas has been squirting out of the vented side opening. So PG&E disconnected the water heater, capped off the gas line, and made me sign a waiver saying that if we reconnect it, they are not liable. Oh GREAT! So, yesterday I called around for plumbing estimates to replace the water heater. We're going to have to pay in upwards of $900 to get everything replaced and up to code (unless we want to pay an unlicensed plumber $650). Ugggh! Just what we need! Another expensive home problem! I wish we could have blamed it on someone and called to get them out, but it was my DH who was clueless in this case. He had someone help him change it w/out a permit, and viola! A problem. As handy as my DH would like to be, he just conceded to the fact that we needed a licensed plumber for this job.

So as I wait for warm water in my house (which isn't nearly as bad as waiting for AC in the middle of summer -- in my opinion), I'm trying to figure out how we're gonna pay for all this crud. For cryin' out loud -- does it ever end?