Christmas Eve we went over to the Cox's home for food, games, and Christmas traditions of reading the Christmas Story from Luke and The Christmas Orange story. One of the games played involved a spinner and a bowl full of jelly beans. When it was your turn, you spun the spinner and then had to eat what ever jelly bean matched. That catch was for every color of jelly bean there were two flavors - one good and one nasty. I did not participate but had a blast watching my dad and Garrett. Dad got wet socks and raw fish. He almost didn't keep it down.
We spent Christmas morning together in our new home. We had breakfast, opened presents, then went to church. Afterwards we loaded up Mitch, Winter, a bag full of presents, and what seemed like a million cinnamon rolls (Randy made at least 6+ batches this year) and headed to my parent's house. We spent the rest of the day with my family. We ate way too much food, worked on a puzzle, and had fun opening presents. Randy was on call Christmas day and was called out to take care of a fawn that was stuck in a fence. The tires on his work truck were well worn. He ended up sliding down a hill and burying the truck in a snow drift barely missing a parked car. Dad and Jason had to go pull him out. Thankfully, his work truck now has new tires.
The day after Christmas, the 9 of us went snowmobiling near Park City. That was first time I have been on a snowmobile in at least 10 years. It was freezing, but we had a good time. The most dramatic thing that happened was Garrett lost his glove and our guide was kind enough to go get it for him. We also learned that it is best if Randy and I have separate snowmobiles. :-) That evening was the Rawson Christmas party. 
 |
| Oh Jason |
New Year's
On New Year's the Coxs came to my parent's home. Of course plenty of food was involved. We were tired and I think we celebrated New Year's at 10:15. Somehow Randy and I didn't get home until almost midnight.
Randy's Birthday
We celebrated Randy's birthday over three days. On Saturday we went out to lunch at Red Robin with the Vocklers and then headed over to James and Kelsie's place for games and dessert. We had dinner with all of my family on Sunday. Monday my parents came over to install a new over the oven microwave they had purchased for Randy. It is amazing to have extra counter space now that our old microwave is off the counter (and it currently sitting on the floor in the living room). That night we went to Warrens for dinner.
Randy's Work
These last two weeks have been incredibly rough for Randy. We have been blessed with a ton of snow which in turn means more deer and elk problems for land owners (animals getting into their hay stacks, destroying fences etc). As you can imagine, many of these land owners are not happy campers. As helping land owners is Randy's primary job, he has been working like crazy trying to help all of the land owners with their problems which includes driving to their property to better understand the issues, cut fencing, deliver fencing, haze animals off property, etc. Randy has worked late every day last week and on Friday didn't get home until 10:30 pm.
He did have some interesting experiences this past week. One included darting a troublesome moose who amazingly laid down at the back of the open trailer door. That will never happen again, but it was such a blessing at there was 4.5 feet of snow on the ground and it would have been incredibly difficult to drag the bull moose through the snow. Last night, Randy brought home an owl that had been hit by a car. It spent the night in the baby's room and during the night it escaped from the box and was sitting up in the closet. Randy took it to a rehab center this morning, and it looks like the owl will be okay and will be able to be released. Randy is currently out responding to another moose call. 
My Work
My job is going well. Getting up and down off the floor and bending over at the waist are getting progressively more difficult. Clients and my co workers have been very helpful in lifting animals up and down for me. I performed my first gastrotomy last month. That was an awesome confidence building experience. The dog did well until he ate all of his pain medication (1800 mg of Rimadyl) at once and had to be readmitted to the hospital for treatment. He did go home and is doing well last I heard.Two weeks ago, another doctor performed a gastrotomy on another dog and he removed $15.33 in change from the dog's stomach! That was super cool.
This week I removed a cyst from Alli, my parent's dog. Surgery went really well, but the little stinker pulled out her stitches! However, her surgery site should heal just fine. Baby Girl
 |
| 24 weeks |
 |
| 28 Weeks |
My LoveThis morning Randy got up and brought home doughnuts for breakfast and a bouquet of flowers for me. He really is the best match for me. I can't imagine my life without him. He works so hard, always gives his best, and is willing to work a longer day in order to help someone else out. He has been getting up early or staying out late to shovel snow.
