Dodger Week

So last week was Dodger week for Chely and I and, well; ofcourse Dodgers games rock. April 24th Chely and I went to our first game of the year with the tickets given to us by our comadre Norma ( thanks Norma). We had great seats, great view of the action, beautiful weather, Dodger dogs and the exiting feeling you get when your star player gets a hit. Oh, and then there was this moment; An Arizona player hit the ball to Jeff Kent, Jeff quikly steps on second base then throws the ball to first for a double out play and to Jeff Kents suprise; the umpire called the runner at second base SAFE so Jeff Kent unhappy with the umpires call; starts to argue with the umpire and you can really see Jeff Kent heated up as you can see one of his team mates holding him back. Jeff was ready to swing at the guy. You can also see Joe Torre on the left jogging towards them to clear things up. The result of all this Both Jeff Kent & Joe Torre were ejected from the game Unfortunately the Dodgers Lost 4-6 to the Arizona. We left Stadium Disappointed. :( But still said " We have to come again. And again we came the following Saturday 26th with my brotherand his girl friend. BROTHERLY LOVE This the Dodgers were playing against the Colorado Rockies and the seats were a bit further than the last game But as mentioned before; Dodgers games ROCK.... So there we are enjoying the 1st inning the Dodger Ace is Pitching (Brad Penny) and the Colorado Rockies hit a homerun in the first inning making the game 2-0, Chely turns to me and says " Man, the dodgers suck this year see, they even gave up a homerun already off the best pitcher they have. So alittle annoyed by the comments and hoping the Dodgers can prove my wife wrong this game. So it's 3 outs and it's the bottom of the first inning, the Dodgers score a run, then 2, then 3 then 4 and next thing you know this is the score. 10-2.Yey.. Its was soooo exiting to see them score 10 runs and was waiting to see what Chely was going to say now. To tell you the truth, I dont remember what she said :) In the 4th inning; Brad Penny threw a 96mph fast ball that hit the umpire in the neck close to his jaw. The umpire was briefly unconsience and they had to call an ambulance to take hurt umpire to a near by hospital. I had never seen something like that before at a baseball game. Througout I kept telling my brother that we should'nt leave even if the dodgers were up by 8 so early because when my brother and I we're kids; we went to a Dodger game where the Dodgers scored 11 runs in the first inning as well and they ended up loosing that game 13 to 11. But this time around they did keep a 7 run lead by the end of the game. I have to say this game was one to remember.

Sunday Gardening

So most of you know that my dad is my landlord and we live right next to each other. You also know that we share the house with my mother in law so we can save money to buy a house some day. Well I never felt like making the yard look pretty until I came to the conclusion that it will take us a while before we buy our house. So I decided to make the yard look beautiful by adding some plants and flowers with the help of my father who happens to be a Gardner.

I have been bugging my dad for weeks about getting the yard fixed up. He had his concerns about it since I am not the type that waters the plants. I tend to forget and remember when its too late and the plants have died. But this time I am was serious, I wanted a nice decent yard. And to my surprised my dad began buying plants.

So this Sunday was the day, I woke up and went out to say good morning to my dad. He had just got home from the nursery with more plants. At that moment I knew that this was going to be a day out in the yard under the hot sun. So we went ahead and started, my dad began planting the plants as I got rid of the weeds and flowers I disgusted.

This is what my yard looked like. Those plants on the side of the gate get on my nerves so bad.

This is my dad working on the yard. The plants will ultimately fully cover the gate giving the property a little privacy.

In the process of cleaning up the yard we found a few friends.

Mr. Lizard who kept scaring the crap out of me.

And Mr. Grasshopper, my dad's friend but not mine.

After planting the plants and adding a new line of sprinklers we had hosted our first BBQ in our house. Every Sunday we have BBQ at my parents but this Sunday it took place at my house and it was fun. I have no pictures but we will definitely have more BBQ's and pictures in the future.

Monday morning I woke up early to keep working on the yard. I just had to plant some flowers that my dad no longer needed and water them.

Back in the old times when I was young, my cousin used to live at this house. Her dad and my dad decided to build an improvised BBQ grill. Because there is so many memories with this we could not take it apart so I decided to keep it and make it a pot. My goal is to have it covered with flowers hanging off the side.

This is our end result

I am looking forward to seeing the trees grow and cover up the fence but that will take a while. It does not look like much difference from the pictures, but from what it used to look like before and what it looks like now it is a big change.

Shitty Day turned okay (excuse my language)

So my day started as usual, not wanting to get out of bed but finally making it to work. I get to work and everything is the same as any other Saturday. We get a few calls before Alicia and I head over to Miller West to provide distractions to a few patients on the core. Then we headed over to our playroom and patients. We return to lunch at 12:40pm, I take a 30 minute lunch to prepare for a birthday on the core. I check messages in the middle of my art project and that's when it all began. Can not really go into details due to confidentiality, I am doing this mostly to vent and get some stuff out of my head.


A patient passed away and they needed child life to help the 5 siblings cope with the news and answer any questions concerning the cause of death and organ donation in SPANISH. Great now who can I turn to for support? Alicia agreed to go and help me, fortunately as we go to the room One Legacy has already started the process and are very well familiar with child life and happy that we are there ..phew.... So Alicia went back to attend to our kids in miller west as I stayed to support this family. To try and make this short, the immediate family was interested in organ donation but had various other family members attempting to change the parents minds about donating, even though this was something the patient had mention to mom while alive and well that she wanted to help others if the time came. So many things happened during the 5 hours I spent with this family that I went home so frustrated and upset. I could not think of anything else but what this family has been through and instead of deciding for themselves and going through with what they wanted they kept having someone else in their own family question their decision. I kept going back and forth thinking as to how I would react being in their shoes and as a professional wanting the best for the family. I guess I would also be listening to all my family who would be telling me to think twice about approving to organ donation just because I would like to hold on to any type of hope for a miracle to happen. But then I think about everything that One Legacy had explained to the family and it made perfect sense to me that there was no miracle waiting to happen. The only thing left was to try and help someone else in need by donating organs. All of this might not make any sense to the reader and even in my head it still seems confusing with all sorts of emotions involved that what I am writing so far is making sense to me.


I got home and I just wanted to sleep, not talk to anyone, not even my husband. Him on the other hand knew I had a hard day and wanted me to talk or to get up and do something fun to get me out of my funk. We went to get dinner came back and even during dinner I could not stop thinking of what just happened at work. So to try and forget I went to my room and began playing solitaire. Then my husband comes in with two shots, salt and lemon. At first I was a bit upset that he wanted me to take a shot because I hardly drink let alone to feel better for a while. But then I remembered what Michelle from One Legacy told me after we were done with the family "go out relax, and take care of your self." So I thought why not, let me relax, enjoy the night. We put on some music and all of a sudden we started our own little karaoke fun where I was the only one singing. It was fun and hey I began feeling a little lighter emotionally. No, I am not drunk it was only two shots and I am starting to feel okay. Everything will be good and I learned from this experience. I decided to become an organ donor, so to my family; if the day comes, do not argue or go back and forth with the medical team. If they say there is no hope for me to live or am brain dead and i can help someone else live, please listen to the medical team and let me help others. After all if a miracle would happen then it will occur at any time whether you decide to argue or not.

LAKER GAME

So it's a Sunday afternoon and Chely and I are at the freaking Laker game ! Wooh Hoo !

First time for both of us, Chely is not too thrilled about sitting at a basketball game trying to figure out whats is going on and why people are cheering and booing at certain times in the game.







The Lakers really showed off their team work and accomplished a great win. With Plays like these:



Which showed they have a good chance of winning the championship this year. The only thing that we were bumbed about is that they did not have a good half time show.

Happy Birthday Ismael

Saturday, March 29 was Ismael's 27th Birthday and I had been planning a small celebration for weeks. On Saturday, we went out for dinner to Wokcano in Brubank along with Ismaels brother and his girlfriend. The dinner was delicious, and we had a good time at the restaurant. Ismael even got to make a wish and blow out his candle.

(This is Hallie and Jose, the couple we hang out with the most and always have a good time together.)On the way to the restaurant Ismael told me that he kept wondering why no one had given him his birthday gift including me. What he had no idea of was that I planned a surprise birthday gathering for him on Sunday, so that is why he did not get any gifts on his actual birthday from his mother or my family. Going to dinner for his birthday was sort of like a trick to make him think that the dinner was his only celebration. It was until we finished dinner and he blew out the candle that I finally gave him his present, 2 Laker game tickets agains the San Antonio Spurs. After dinner we went to play pool, my first time ever and it was fun.
On Sunday, Ismael dropped me off at my sisters house because I told him that we were going to go shopping. We had planned that after we got back from the mall Ismael was going to meet us at my sister's for a movie. But instead of going to the "mall" I helped my sister get ready for the surprise party. My sister and her husband were kind enough to let me borrow their house for Ismael's party and they were extremely helpful in every way possible.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH NORMA AND ANTONIO.

When our guests started to arrive I decided to call Ismael and let him know that we were home and that he should come over so we can watch the movie. Ismael still not knowing anything got a little upset because he was thinking of going over at about 4 or 5 in the afternoon and I was asking him to get there at about 2pm. He had even planned out his day to visit some friends, watch the baseball game, and even record some music at home with his equipment (which he had just set up right before I called him). But he dropped all his plans and agreed to meet me at my sisters early. So when he got there I walked him to the back yard, which he questioned and I don't remeber what I replied because I was afraid of giving it away before anyone would say Surprise,and it all came together just fine.

This was the look as he seen everyone there.These are just a few of our guest that were there. It was a small gathering with just family, his mother, aunt and grandmother arrived later.

Eventhough it was small, Ismael still had a good time and he was surprised, didn't even have the slightest idea of what was going on for the past 2 weeks.

And he got presents. Hope you had a wonderful birthday weekend!

Easter Sunday

I just wanted to write this quick blog about Easter Sunday. I can't remember the last time Easter Sunday was so fun. The vibe throughout the entire day at the compadres home was great. The day included, BBQing, Playing games, egg hunt, water balloon competitions and yes; even Adult musical chairs was in the agenda.

But, the best moment was when my Godson Peter was opening his Easter basket. Araceli put a $5.00 bill inside a plastic egg so Peter can open it and say "Wow, Money!" you know? A kid receiving money in my experience is something a kid loves....Peter quickly says " Give it to my dad" Araceli says " Ok, I'll give it to your dad to hold it for you" So she calls John over to give him the $5.00 and Peter tells his dad he can keep it. "Why" we ask Peter. Peter responds, “Because my dad needs it for work. At that moment I can see how proud John felt that his son gave him the $5.00. Even though John might not have needed the $5.00; just the fact that Peter gave it to him out his heart; it just made my day...

Long vs Short

Through out my young years as a little girl, then teenager and even young adult, my father would only trim my hair once a year. We had it scheduled, it took place every February 2ND. When I say trim it meant barely cutting the ends just to straighten it. My father just like most Mexican Males have the idea in their head that any female looks beautiful when she has very long hair. So my father never thought of or even pictured me with short hair. If I ever brought up the conversation of me wanting to cut my hair shorter, he would state that if I did I would not look as pretty as I did with my long hair. So I did not cut my hair throughout my childhood. What I did do was permed my hair when I was in middle school and then dyed it when I was in high school. I have to say that my father did get upset when I permed it to the point that he stopped talking to me for a few days. He did not say much when I dyed it since to him his opinion no longer counted since the day I permed my hair. Towards the end of my high school years I started to get the idea of cutting my hair thinking that my father would not say anything about it. Oh no, to my dad cutting my hair was still an off limits conversation. No, not while you are living under my roof he would say. But I really wanted to cut it, so around the age of 20 I began warning my dad that I was going to cut my hair as soon as I turned 21. So the whole year he kept getting the warning so he would not get upset and expect it once it happened. So November 3rd came around I was now 21 and..... I could not do it. I could not get rid of my beautiful silky hair so, I got layers around my face but still had my beautiful long hair.

And that was the beginning of cutting my hair. So I finally went ahead and chopped it off.

After that, I let it grow more, cut in layers, let the layers grow out, cut it straight, let it grow, cut it to shoulder length, let it grow, gave it more layers, let it grow, cut it straight no layers, let it grow and Finally up to today; I decided to cut it the shortest I had the guts to go.


Now I am thinking about letting it grow to the point where I once had my long straight hair up to my butt. So what do you guys think, is it better long or short?