Ya...No Joke...

So after I got out of the hospital, I had to get my hair done. It was looking pretty bad. When I was feeling good enough I went to my hair dresser Patty. I was just planning on doing the usual, boring highlight and trim. But before I left, Tony said, "You should do something cool with your hair!" What he was meaning exactly I wasn't sure. He continued to tell me that he thought I should just do something funky...like get a different hair cut, or color it different or something. I didn't think much of it and headed to Patty's. I told Patty what Tony had said, and being the brilliant stylist that she is, she said "Let's put a fun color in one section of it!" So she pulled out what colors she had. She had red, blue, magenta, & purple. I didn't even hesitate...purple. (Although now I think magenta would have been cool...maybe next time.) I told her to just go for it. So this is what she did! I went home and Tony loved it. He was a big fan. I like it too...it is different and gives people another good reason to stare at me besides the fact I have fluid running out my nose!

Ya, I'm a Slacker!!!

So yes, it has been forever since I have written and updated my blog. But I do have a good excuse. I was in the hospital for about a month. The reason goes as follows: I had Meningitis twice, then for some odd reason I started having seizures. My mom was there with me and said I had about 7 of them. Crazy. I don't remember it at all but my mom said it was awful. So I was back in ICU for that for a while. Next I was back up on the floor. Then Dr. Hunter (one of my doctors) did surgery on me, yes to try and stop the leak, so I was in the hospital another week recovering from that! Whew! He went clear up my nose by my brain to patch a spot.
So I had packing up there for a while. It is pretty crazy when they pull packing out of your nose that is packed up so far is it by your eyes! It feels like they are pulling your brains out of your nose! AHHHH!!! So it was quite the journey. More so for Tony and my mom, because I don't remember very much of it, but I sure wasn't feeling my best and it took quite a while to recover. The seizures really messed with my brain and memory. In the hospital it was hard for me to do things mentally that a third grader could do. It was different exercises that were really simple, like simple math, comparing 2 pictures and finding the differences, or finding things that came next in a sequence. It was crazy, and frustrating. But a lot of it has come back to me. When I got home I had to be reintroduced to my home, I didn't remember any of it. I would ask Tony the day or the date about 20 times a day. I am sure he got sick of it. Anyway, I am doing a lot better now. Not 100%, but better. I have already started leaking again since the surgery, so no it didn't work. But really, who thought surgery number 59 was going to be the winner?!?!?! Just kidding, I don't have a bad attitude about it. One of these times it will work. I actually am sitting here with a tissue stuffed up my nose so that I can do something with out dripping everywhere. My mom got the great idea of getting those cotton rolls from the dentist (thanks Bruce) that they put in your cheek and they fit perfectly up my nose and can hold me over for a little while. So they are nice. They look pretty funny, so I usually just use them when I am home.
Anyway, while I was in the hospital, they put a PICC line in. (I have the picture, it is the long purple tube with two ports on the end) It is basically a glorified IV. It goes in your arm in a vein, but they actually thread the catheter all the way up your arm and around to your heart. It is a nifty invention. They are wonderful for me because I don't have any veins left. IV's only last a couple of days, but PICC lines can be in for over a year the guy told me. So since I had a PICC in, they let me go home and give myself the antibiotics I needed for another 4 weeks. It was a pain but I did it. I had to give myself 2 different medicines, so about every 4 hours I was shooting up with one of the two. It was a pain during the night having to wake up and do it. But I did it, and now the PICC line is out and we are moving on. I have been going to doctors already to see what surgery they are going to do next. Not sure what it will be, but I will let you all know. Here are some pictures of me giving myself medicine and also with a roll of cotton up my nose.

An Old Dream Comes True...

Well, I finally did it. After all these years of admiring Carrie Underwood, I was able to see her live. Thanks to my dear husband who bought me the tickets a long time ago, a friend (Joslyn) and I headed up to the E Center in Salt Lake and enjoyed the show. She put on a really entertaining show and of course she was absolutely gorgeous!!! I have been a fan of her's since the day she tried out for American Idle way back when. At first I really liked her because she had a gorgeous voice and the one major thing that I noticed about her throughout the show was that she dressed modestly!!! Amazing in this day and age. So I was rooting for her the whole season, and the night she won I remember being so excited that I wanted to cry!


Anyway, she moved on in life to become quite famous, and then the modesty flew out the door pretty quick. But I still like her music and I keep tabs on her here and there. So all in all, it was a fun time. Peace out.

Seattle...

Well...earlier this month I was able to fly up to Washington state and surprise my good friend (Kerri) who was going through the temple. My mom and I went, and we had to plan it very carefully so that Kerri wouldn't find out. It was awesome how it all worked out. We got in pretty late and had my aunt pick us up at the airport. When we got to her house, Kerri was already asleep (Kerri lives with my aunt.) So that worked out perfectly. So we just snuck around the house really quietly getting ready for bed and then went to sleep without anyone knowing.

In the morning my aunt told us not to come out of our room until 9:30, when she got home from aerobics. So about 9:30 we could hear everyone down in the kitchen eating breakfast. So my mom and I decided to go down. My aunt has 2 sets of stairs to get to the downstairs, so my mom and I split up and each went down a different set of stairs. We were in our pajamas still so it was great. We walked into the kitchen about the same time, and I acted like I had just woken up and I said "What's for breakfast? I'm starving..." And you should have seen Kerri's face! I wish I had a picture of it. It was classic. Her jaw dropped and she was so confused for a minute. But then she came-to and figured it out. It was awesome.

The day at the temple was great. She was going through for her first time, so it was really neat. Afterwords we had a little lunch at my aunt's house. We stayed for a couple of days and played and shopped and it was so much fun. Good times, good times.

A New Abode...

So since Tony found out that we are staying here at the Springville factory, we decided to start looking for a place to buy. We looked for quite a while and settled on a place called Somerset Village in Spanish Fork. It isn't far at all from where we live now. The cool thing about it is that they build the houses, frame them and then wait for someone to buy them before they actually finish them. So that has been so fun. We have got to pick everything out. Paint, flooring, countertops, cabinets, etc. So fun. And of course Mommy Mary helped out to make everything flow and look good. Another huge bonus is that we get a 2 car garage!!! We are really moving up in the world I tell ya.
Here are the first set of pictures that we took on the 1st of November when they were just getting started. We are pretty excited. We are shooting to move in around the first week of December, but we'll see.

One of the Cutest Girls Ever...

So, I guess I am a biased aunt who thinks that her nieces and nephews are the cutest. But I think most aunts say that. Anyway, one of my cute niece's name is Shayla (as you can tell from the picture, duh) and she just started preschool. She absolutely loves it! She is a complete social butterfly and loves being around other kids. These are her first school pictures ever and they turned out so dang cute - I just had to post it on my blog! She posed like a pro. She moved to Wyoming last Spring with her family and I miss them like crazy. I especially miss her mom Erin, we are really close and it is hard to be so far apart. Thank goodness for phones I guess. Shayla and her brother Jonny are growing up so fast – it is crazy. I need to get more pictures of them (hint hint Jon...). The last picture I posted of little Jonny was when he was standing there with his crack showing. So cute. They are such fun kids. Hopefully someday soon we will be able to go up to Gillette and see them. Anyway, enjoy the cute picture of Shayla. I love you Shayla!!! Love, Aunt Bergen

Bergen Gets an Idea...

So I guess I am going to back the train up a little bit and tell you about something we did last August. I know this will mess up the order of my posts, but just bear with me here.

So, it was a Friday night, and we were doing the usual weekend thing...sitting home on the couch by ourselves. Tony says, "What do you want to do?" And I respond, "I don't know, what do you want to do?" And it continues on until about 10:00 PM when we then decide to watch the news, Sports Center, and then hit the sack. Exciting eh? So one Friday night I had had enough of that. I got to thinking and had an epiphany whilst sitting in the water closet. (Don’t most of you do your best thinking there???) I decided...WE WERE GOING TO THE ZOO!!! So Saturday morning we got up, got all ready and headed up to Salt Lake to go to the infamous Hogle Zoo. I hadn't been there since fifth grade, and I soon found out why. When we got there, we got out of the car and were immediately surrounded by families with little kids and strollers and coolers. Not a single soul our age was in the vicinity. Oh well, what the heck, we were going to go and have fun. So we went. We never did see anyone our age the whole time, but we did run into Dana Petersen (Kent Petersen's sister) who was there with her kids, and she took a picture of us. So we do have this picture.

Other than that I just took pictures of animals. And at one point we came across this gorilla figure and decided we had better try and stand like gorillas. Ya, pretty cute I know.

So, after all, it really wasn't that exciting of a day - it was quite a juvenile activity actually, but at least we did something and got out of the house and inhaled some fresh air. I'll think of something better for next time, or better yet how about you come down and keep us company!!!

Tony's Birthday...

Well yes, we do all tend to get older as time goes by - sadly enough. And Tony has now reached the ripe old age of 26, which is approximately 9,490 days. Ya, he is an old man. But we had a fun birthday for him...at least I hope it was fun. I tried to make it different than a normal day. The only thing I failed miserably at was making his favorite cake - which I forgot all about. He LOVES the rainbow chip cake with rainbow chip frosting, ya I'm a bad wife. But, I made a big happy birthday sign and laid it on the floor for him when he got home from work (he gets home about 2 hours before me) and then when I came home I walked in the door with some balloons, including a "Go Diego Go" mylar one with several colored latex ones to go with it. He loves Diego, he watches it all the time. He was thrilled, I just know it.


Then that night we went to dinner at Red Robin with my Aunt, and my cousin and her family. We had a good time.

For his birthday Tony got quite a few things, including: 2 XBOX games, a new church shirt, a Kohl's gift certificate, a Wal-Mart gift card, some coin, a new basketball (well actually it was just one that his brother Nick found at the church one day and no one claimed it for a while so he gave it to Tony), and then he got some new basketball shoes. I think he had a pretty good birthday. Even Stick remembered and called, so I think that that really capped off the day!

The Best Month of All...

Well, October is my absolute favorite month for quite a few reasons. Let me fill you in...#1 There are a ton of birthdays...(I think the best spirits were sent during this month, sorry guys.) Tony's birthday is on the 1st. On the 13th is Adrian's (my sister), Stick's, and Chris's ( Tony's Brother) birthday, and on the 26th is my mom and dad's anniversary, my grandma's birthday, and my birthday. And of course the 31st is Halloween!!!! #2 it is great because you get to stay home in your pajamas the first Sunday and watch General Conference, #3 The weather is just perfect, not too hot and just starting to cool off. And the very best reason of all is #4...you get to watch Football, Baseball, AND Basketball all month long!!! Hallelujah! (Ya, I have to admit, I was way late to church the other day because I had to see the fabulous end of the Falcons game. It was exciting.) So those are my reasons to love this month.

Because there are so many birthdays in the family during the month of October, my mother-in-law has one big birthday party on a Sunday and everyone gets together for dinner, dessert, and to open presents. It is a big sha-bang. This year was fun, and Isabella had the most fun of all because she was the appointed one to open all the presents...

(Chris, Tony and I are all just barely mature enough to let a 1 year old unwrap our presents for us...) She had fun and we all got fun stuff - thanks to everybody..

I was actually released from the hospital about an hour before the party believe it or not. I had just enough time to shower and get to Tony's house. I was feeling pretty weak and sickly but I was glad that I made it. We always have fun when we get together for birthday parties.

Isabella was cute as usual. She had on her Halloween outfit, Melissa always dresses her so cute. She is fun. Here is a nice cheeser smile for ya...

Vegas Baby! Here We Come...

So yes...I am WAY behind with the blogging. Sorry to disappoint all you on-top-of-the-world-bloggers who stay up on this stuff. I have had a couple recent stays in the hospital (I'm ok, really) so I am really behind on all this. So I am basically going to skip a small section of our life and just start here. :o)

On September 2, we celebrated our 4th wedding anniversary. Crazy how time flies. We went down to Vegas for a couple of days and just did the Vegas thing. It was really fun. I can't believe we have been married for 4 years, time flies. Sad to say, this is the only picture we had taken of us together the whole time we were down there and I don't even know where it is at - ya, I'm awesome. So apparently from the picture we ate at some restaurant. I don't know if it was good or not - you will have to ask Tony. We had fun down there and spent way too much money. But hey, what can ya do. I bought way too many things at the malls and shopping places, and then I found my new calling in life...to be a professional B-I-N-G-O player! Yes, I know it is gambling, so yes I am heading to H-E Double Hockey sticks, but it is great. It is pretty intense too. For those of you who have done it before, you know what I mean. It is some serious stuff. It was great. I hung out in the Bingo room while Tony tried to master 21. And no we don't have a gambling problem, so you really don't need to be calling our bishop...

While we were there we met up with my cousin Cameron & his wife Christina who live down there. The picture of Cameron is actually one of his finest, I caught him when he was deep in thought apparently. But his family is really cute. They have 4 girls, and 2 of them are twins. Way cute.

Other than that we didn't do much. We were only there a couple days though. We were going to go to the traveling exhibit "Bodies", but for some reason we ended up running out of time. I'm sure there are many more details about our Vegas trip, but my memory lasts about 30 seconds, so if you want more detail you can give Tony a call! I am pretty sure we had a blast though!!

Blaze Game!!!!

Well....last night we had an adventure. It was fun though. Tony got us tickets online to a Utah Blaze playoff game. They played the Crush - whom I think are from Washington or something. Anyway, we drove up to Salt Lake and went to a Blaze game. For those of you who don't know who the Blaze are, they are Utah's Arena football team. Anyway, it was a lot of fun. Our seats weren't very good (up in the 3rd row of the nose bleeds), but they were the cheapest so we got them. We were looking around the arena and noticed that there were tons of empty seats in the lower bowl. So at half time we snuck down and found some seats that were closer.


At half time we were walking around and I saw a sign that said they were doing tattoos!! Oh yea!! There were a bunch of little kids in line, and ya, you know me, I made Tony and I stand in line and get one. It was kind of fun. Tony wasn't very amused at first, but I made him do it anyway. They were airbrushed on and they have already come off, so they weren't too permanent. I went for the great big one that said Utah Blaze and of course Tony had to do the smallest one they had so it would be inconspicuous and no one would see it. They turned out kinda cool. Good thing we got a picture of them because they are gone now!




So close to the end of the game when we had moved down to the lower bowl, I wanted to get a picture of Tony & I together with the game in the background. So we stood on the stairs and I asked a nice little old man (whom I assumed had used a camera before sometime in his life) who was the usher for that section if he would take our picture. We showed him which button to push and everything. Well, this is what we got folks. Maybe he was blind, not sure what a camera was, or just a little senile, but this is what we got! Nice. So we moved over to another section and had another lady who looked a little younger and more capable take a picture do it for us. It turned out better (obviously).



The Blaze ended up losing 44 to 49 - but it was still a lot of fun. After the game we went to eat at the Red Iguana. It is really good Mexican food if any of you want to try a new restaurant out next time you are in Salt Lake.