a little bit better...

well, the water was turned back on (yeah!) after over 3 full days without. it took them all day to fix it and they destroyed half our yard, but it's on. katya was so excited to be able to flush the toilet. so was i! when i went to sams, i bought a lot more bottles of juice, so we can stock up on our water supply even more!

on another note, we think we've got my sleepiness kinda-sorta figured out. i went and did a sleep study b/c i'm always so tired during the day and don't sleep well at night (and no, it's not just related to the kids). for a continuation of the test, they had me take a series of short naps during the day and i fell asleep rather quickly all 4 times. hummmm--i guess i must be tired. so, it seems like a chemical in my brain doesn't do it's job at telling me it's time to get up and there's one that doesn't want me to go to sleep.

so, now i take melatonin to fall asleep at night (i'm often out before nate is now) and a drug called provigil to keep me going during the day. i still feel sleepy, but not enough to have to take a nap or anything. i've only been taking it for a couple of weeks, so we'll see how it goes--i'll probably be taking it the rest of my life. [although probably not on sundays so i can get my good nap in!] it's funny how in general we all function the same, but one little hiccup or problem can cause such difficulties. thanks goodness for modern medicine!

on a different note, we were able to go to the balloon race here in st.louis yesterday. it was pretty cool and an absolutely gorgeous day. (we are right in the middle of some great fall weather, even though it's a little early and it should warm back up here temporarally). we saw lots of balloons take off (though not quite all since we had to park in the outer reaches of mongolia). the kids all really loved it and even liam got into it. the energizer bunny is the first to go, and then all the other balloons try to catch up and drop their "marker" closest to where he lands. it's a pretty big event here--although i do have to say that i believe albuquerque has a bigger and better one! but, it was still quite fun!


i had to throw in this pic of seth--getting one that turns out well with these kids is a rare occurrence, so i'm quite excited that it worked out--especially since i was not a happy camper at this point of leaving the balloon race.