Friday, November 28, 2008

Flashback Friday

Today we go back to 1999. We lived in West Des Moines, Iowa in a large apartment building on the third floor. It was government subsidized housing which means there were lots of students living there. The graduate school in Des Moines had a lot of different programs. (DO, DPM, PA, PT and HCA degrees.) For some reason there were many LDS students at the school. Many of us in that apartment building were graduate students, LDS and in the same ward! We always had one or two neighbors right next door to us or downstairs from us that were fellow LDS students. It was fun. The apartment was such that our front doors opened to hallways as opposed to the outside. The laundry was on the first floor. Just to paint a picture. During this time period, Mikaela was 2 1/2 and I was pregnant with Hudson. It was our last year in Des Moines but we didn't know where we were going for the next few years. Here are a few stories from that year:

I decided to go to the mall for some shopping. I didn't do this very often as we had no money and I didn't need much from the mall. I can't remember what I was going for but I decided to go. I got Mikaela ready and myself. I was wearing these chunky heeled shoes and we headed out of our apartment door. We got to the second floor where we ran into the wife of a fellow LDS student. She had three little kids very close in age. She was carrying a newborn in a carrier and holding a sleeping one year old over her shoulder and a little 3 year old trailing behind. I was pregnant and only had Mikaela walking with me. So, being the super kind self that I am, I offered to carry her newborn in the baby carrier. (You can probably see where this is going!) I'm helping. We walk down the stairs to the doors outside. I open them and let her and the trailing two kids out and I step out and take two steps. One of those steps happens to land half on the sidewalk and half on the grass. My chunky heels can't take it and I begin to fall. FALL with a newborn in a carrier in my arms who is NOT mine! I fell and luckily was able to save the baby from injury and place her down gently. (Baby was totally unharmed during this fiasco - even stayed asleep!) You can imagine my horror at almost hurting another person's baby. The mother was so nice, but I am sure she wanted to yell at me or hit me or something. But, let's face it, she was carrying two kids down stairs which was WAY more dangerous then what I did. Needless to say, I sprained my ankle really badly and had to go back upstairs and ice it and wrap it and elevate it. As you can guess, we did not go to the mall! My ankle hurt for a long time and was really painful. I remember going to Young Women's that week and back in Des Moines, we had to drive all over the place to drop the girls off at their homes. We had our activity which was bowling or something and then we had ice cream. I remember my ankle was throbbing at the ice cream place and by the time I dropped the last girl off at her house, I was crying. I didn't know how I was going to drive back to my apartment because I was in so much pain. It was awful and stupid.

I remember we used to get coupons in the mail for Arby's. You could get a kids meal for 99 cents. Kirstie (was one of my best friends in Iowa and her husband was in Podiatry school too) and I would head out every so often and run errands together (usually Target) and we would drive through the Arby's and buy 5 or 6 kids meals and go to her apartment and eat them. When I was pregnant with Hudson I craved Arby's sandwiches. I know weird and gross but even more weird because I don't eat meat! We could all fit in her mini van together and would go all over Des Moines together. Those were good times! I miss them!

I remember the one time we had to take cover from a tornado. You could actually see the twister off to the west. The weather was crazy. Kirstie and I were on the phone not quite sure what to do. The news was telling us to take cover. We lived on the third floor and I guess we were supposed to go to the first floor. None of it felt very safe. Kirstie lived in the pool house on the first floor so she said to come and take cover over there. I gathered up all the photos I could carry and Mikaela and I ran over to her house. It was dark and there was heavy rain. It just pelted us. The wind was blowing like crazy. I opened up the glass doors to her hallway and Mikaela ran in and it just blew right out of my hands and slammed shut on us! We stayed with her and her kids in their master bedroom where we were close to a tv and the bathroom. We were ready at any minute to jump in the bathtub with the couch cushions to cover us. Mikaela and Dallin (Kirstie's second child who was Mikaela's age) were jumping on the bed having a party. They had no idea what was going on. Luckily, we didn't have to take cover and it all passed and no one was hurt!

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