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Chris was recently selected to receive the Exemplar Magnet Award (EMA) at work.  I have no idea what that means, but this is the caption they are putting under his picture in some room where all EMA nurses are recognized.

“Chris is committed to putting patients first in all that he does. Chris has been mentioned by several patients/families during follow up phone calls. He takes time to listen and answer questions and performs frequent checks to ensure safety and comfort.  Patients appreciate this as it helps relieve fears and anxieties. 

Patients have described Chris as absolutely fabulous, excellent, pleasant, nice, helpful, exceptional, understanding and considerate.  They say, ‘He went out of his way for me and my wife’, and ‘He had that special factor in him’ which contribute to a positive experience.”

I may not know what EMA means, but I do know that he’s really good at his job and that his patients love him.  I’m proud!  He’s so kind and patient–two qualities that also make him a great dad and husband.

Love you, honey!

 

 

Here are copies of the newsletters that we send out to churches and supporters.  If you would like to receive these directly to your email in the future, please send your email address to meehanfive@gmail.com .  You can also find these updates at http://meehans.wordpress.com

Ethiopia Newsletter 1 (Oct 2011)

Ethiopia Newsletter 2 (Dec 2011)

Ethiopia Newsletter 3 (Feb 2012)

 

 

Yarn Braids

Kayla’s hair is kind of a weird length.  It’s about 4 inches when it’s completely stretched out.  I’m not very good at styling 4 inch long hair.  I can’t really braid it yet.  She has so much new growth that the braids only look good for about 1/2 a day, so it really isn’t worth the work.  Her hair is too long for puffs.  I finally have figured out products to put in her hair to make it look fantastic unstyled, but that only lasts from bath to first nap and/or bedtime.  She doesn’t look good with fro anymore, either, it’s just too long.  Too long for some styles, too short for others and I have no clue how to do anything in between.  So….I decided to try yarn braids.  About 4 weeks ago, I put in Kayla’s first batch.  For my first try, I think they turned out pretty cute.  She LOVED them.  Every morning when I took off her sleep cap her first words were, “Pretty hair, mama, pretty hair.”  (Yes, she says more than 1 word at a time now!!!).  It was super easy to maintain and looked cute even after 3 weeks.  I took them out and put new ones in just because I was bored.  She got tons of compliments (so did I on a job well done) and after my initial hand pain went away, it was the three easiest weeks of hair styling we’ve ever had.  Her first batch had 2/3 brown yarn and 1/3 deep purple.  The second batch had teal instead of purple.  I don’t think she can have this style all the time because I’ll get bored with it, but we’ll definitely come back to it while we wait for her hair to hit about 6 inches in length.

She also got a new tutu and had some fun wearing it around the house for a day along with her pretty hair.

For those wondering HOW to do yarn braids, I just googled some videos.  Here is one of the sites I checked out.  http://www.afroniquelyyou.com/2011/09/protective-styling-yarn-braids/

I took Kayla to the store to find the right yarn color(s) for her hair.  Her hair is more brown than black, so we went with the darkest brown I could find.

I cut all the yarn, put the three strands together for all the braids, washed and heavily conditioned her hair and then got to work.  I put all of her hair in with one strand of brown yarn, but I think I would do it different next time and divide her hair into two clumps and put one with each of the brown pieces.  Too many of the braids in her second batch slipped far from the scalp too quickly and I think dividing up her hair would help.

I started with the top–where people can see the parts more–and finished with the bottom and back.  I used lots of clips to hold back the hair I wasn’t using and did one side at a time and then tried to mirror the parts on the other side.  I did smaller parts on the top and sides than I did in the back to save myself some time.  Half before nap, half after.  My hands really did hurt, BAD, the first time I did these.  Stop to stretch out your fingers.

I tied off the ends, cut closely to the knot and then burned the end just a bit with a lighter and rolled it in my finger.  In three weeks, only one had to be retied and burned.

I kept the first batch pretty short.  The second batch was more shoulder length and could be braided into a larger braid during mealtime to keep the braids out of the food.  I like both lengths!

I couldn’t find any good information on upkeep, just warnings that I should know what upkeep would involve before I put them in.  Well, I decided I’d just figure it out on my own and it was super easy for us.  I would wet them twice a week during regular bath/shower time and then once a week I would wash them (takes LOTS of shampoo) and condition them–especially the roots.

Once the hair starts to grow out a bit, the beauty of these is that you can just pull them back in a headband and no one will notice.  I also pinned back one side with a flower clip and put a hat on her a couple of times.  Most people thought it was her real hair until I pointed out that it was yarn and that her hair was only about 1/2 that long.

To get them out, I cut off the part that had no real hair in it and then unbraided the rest.  It didn’t take that long.  Maybe 5 hours to put them all in and 30 minutes to get them all out.  5 hours seems like a long time, but when you consider that you don’t have to worry about hair for another 3-4 weeks after that, it’s worth it!

If you want to try them and have any questions, just ask.  I’m no expert, but I’m happy to share my experience with any mama wanting to try these.

I’m on a list kick lately…must be all the things that need to get done in the next few months.  Lists keep me sane.  Anyway, here is my completely non-productive list for today.

Top 5 reasons I loathe having long hair:

5.  It takes too long to style and requires three different styling tools.  I’d prefer to wash and go, but my long hair does not work that way.

4.  When I shower, the loose stuff runs down my back and gets stuck in my butt crack (yes, I did just write that on my blog).

3.  I have to brush it a few times throughout the day for it not to look stringy and I would prefer to never have to think about my hair throughout the day.

2.  It gets all static-y when I brush it and just looks ridiculous.

1.  It accentuates my fat face.  I would say that it makes my face look fat, but if we’re all honest, we know that nothing can make anything look fat unless it actually is fat in the first place.  So, it accentuates the fact that my face is fat and I don’t like that.

So, why have I grown out my hair?  Well, we’re moving to Africa (in case you missed that!).  Hot showers will be rare and short hair has to be washed every day–long hair can be pulled back.  There won’t be any great salons and very few people who know how to cut ferengi (white person) hair and short hair has to be cut often.  So, even though short hair is easier to do every day, I’m pretty sure that doing my hair each day at all will not be a luxury I’ll have and no one likes how hair looks in that growing out stage (you know what I’m talking about), so I’d rather just have it long already.  Suffering for the cause. :)   And, in case you’re wondering how I deal with makeup if I can’t handle hair…I don’t.  I’ve never worn it and don’t have any plans to start.

I shall remain an accentuated fat faced, stringy, static-y, styling my hair kind of girl–at least until it’s long enough to just pull back and forget about.  Such a serious thing to be concerned about, I know.

Things that I will miss:

1.  My parents (and other family and friends)

2.  Having a car

3.  Hot showers

4.  Little Caesar’s Hot n’ Ready pizzas (and other fast food)

5.  English

6.  Lots of summer swimming

 

Things that I will not miss:

1.  Snow

2.  Presidential election commercials

 

Hmmm…the pros don’t really outweigh the cons here, but I’m still so ready to go.  We’re getting there.  August is creeping up on us and I can’t wait!

 

We’ve had some interest in the house!  People have emailed and called.  We have shown it once and have another showing scheduled.  Nearly 100 people have viewed our online listing.  This is all good news.  Of course, it doesn’t mean we’ll sell it, but at least we are generating interest.  Keep on praying!  We are asking God to send just the right buyer at just the right time.

Sign

The sign is now in the yard and our home has been listed four different ways online.  I guess we’re getting a bit more proactive.  Please pray that God would send the right seller at the right time for our home.  I’m not nervous…yet!

http://broadwayhome.wordpress.com

January

Here’s a little January update.  Sorry for the lack of posting.

Reily lost a tooth–the dentist pulled it, but it still counts.  He fell when he was younger (no surprise to anyone who has met him in real life) and knocked it loose.  It finally needed to come out.  Gavin handled Reily losing the first tooth pretty well!

We finally got some snow (boo for me, yea for the kids) and Chris took the boys sledding.  They’re still trying to figure out a way to get some snow to Ethiopia.

Kayla is a princess.  Good thing she’s a sweet one!

I put yarn braids in her hair.  This took about 5 hours all total and she sat great for all of it.  Of course, she got to watch cartoons and take 1/2 an hour to eat a cookie (no joke), but she did great.  And, she loves her, “Pretty hair.”.  She likes to say that every morning when I take off her sleep cap.  Her hair is only about 1/2 this length.  The yarn makes up the other half and I added in some purple.  She really does love it and it is SO easy to maintain.

House for Sale

Well…we took a small first step.  We listed our home for sale.  I posted it to Craigslist and there’s not even a sign in the yard, but we had to start somewhere.  I’ve also posted it on Facebook, so we’ll see how far social networking and free internet listings take us.  I’m sure we’ll get a bit more aggressive in the next couple of weeks.

We are really hoping for a closing date of June 1.  I don’t know exactly what we’ll do after that until we leave, but we do know we’d like to be out of this home by June 1 or July 1.  We’ll see…

A random woman at the Y today told me she wished her kids were young again, like Kayla, because they were so much easier then.  My initial thought was, “Yeah right!  Easy? You’re nuts!”.  But, the more I thought about it, the more I realized how right she was.

While it is true that toddlers require more physical involvement from their parents, that’s about it.  It is very easy to meet my daughter’s emotional needs right now.  It is very easy to guide her, direct her and shape her at this age.  She is mold-able.  Her behavior is totally manageable and she learns new  things on a daily basis with ease.  It is easy to protect her and keep her from harm.  We are her only influence right now.  The older she gets, the more I have to release her into the world and the less safe she gets.  The older she gets, the more emotional needs she has and it will be increasingly difficult to meet those needs (Lord, help me when we hit 12!).  Toddlers are so very time consuming, but I can keep up with her.  She is happy almost all of the time.  I know that will change as she learns more about the world around her and has more experiences out in the world and starts to try to make sense of all her experiences–especially as she branches out from our family unit more and more.

I may be physically tired from trying to keep up with her (and her two brothers), but I would rather be physically tired than emotionally drained or dealing with negative behaviors that have terrible consequences.  This lady’s comment was a good reminder to try to enjoy this age because it is gone soon and there’s no turning back!

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