Christmas pictures

Poor Dog!

Loves to sled!

Goofy kids!

Tired of the pictures!

Go Giants! Woke up one Sunday morning and informed Dad that he was no longer a Cowboys fan and was going to cheer for the NY Giants. Heartboken dad takes it day by day! Good friend Mike (aka Jersey) thinks it is GREAT!!!

Belated Merry Christmas!

As I sit to wish everyone a Merry Christmas I am in ah of my mom and that fact that she is playing with our dog, Riley! Growing up the last thing I ever thought I would see my mom do is play with a dog, let alone allowing the dog to come into the house! Maybe next year we will get my mom a dog for Christmas to keep her company! :) What do you think mom! Anyway, we have had a great time with our parents and my brother this Christmas, Nate's parents came out on Christmas Eve to hang out with us for a few days, and as soon as they walk in the door the kids wanted to open their presents. We were able to hold them off for a couple of hours, then the opening marathon started. This year was unique for our kids in the sense that they had grandparents, aunts and uncles, and mom and dad's presents to open up, but before that we did our tradition of reading a Christmas book. Thanks to my Aunt Juanita sending the kids books every year for Christmas, we started a tradition of reading a book before we can open presents! Jake was very impatient to say the least! But what 5 year old boy wouldn't be! We were quick to remind the kids that this Christmas is different because we are combining 2 Christmas' so it will feel like they are getting a lot of presents. We heard lots of "this is great" and "thanks it's just what I wanted!" Friday night the girls and I headed to the mall to spend the gift cards that were burning a hole in their pockets! We had great luck with the sales, while at the Children's Place, Kristen was helping Bekah get some clothes, and without missing a beat looked at Bekah and said, "Now you need to add some color to this outfit, how about these leggings." Another mom and I started laughing, sounded just like Clinton and Stacy from "What not to wear". Guess we have been watching to may TLC marathon's lately.

Then on Saturday we went to Huron for Christmas with my parents, brother and his fiance. The kids had a blast and got to hang out outside and slid down grandpa's hill. MiKayla even took the poor dog down the hill. And once again we heard great responses to the gifts, we are so blessed! The kids have done great with all the festivities, and not being in their normal school routine. Haven't even beat each other up to bad! :)

Update on Jake: He hit the wall on Friday, but we were warned that the meds would ware off a couple days after which would have put in on Friday. He went outside after his nap and seemed to do much better, must be because he got to spend the evening with dad, watching "boy" movies! This boy is tired of Hannah Montana! Seems to be doing much better today!

Hope you all have a great holiday weekend!

Why can't I go out and play!

At 4:50 this morning that is a statement I didn't think I would hear today! Instead I heard, "I don't want to get up and go to the hospital!" "I want to stay in my bed!" "No I don't want to go see Dr. Larsen!!!" Not a great way to start any day, especially today! All I could think was this is going to be an extremely long day, with lots of struggles! Things got better as soon as we realized Jake is normally sleep walking at this time of day, I'm sure as soon as we get outside and breath some nice SD winter air, things may change! Thank God it did! Jake and dad were outside waiting for mom, this is usually what happens only because someone needs to shut off all the lights and make sure the house isn't going to burn down! :) and he woke up. I was blessed with Jake riding with me, why does this always happen, whenever we need to take both vehicles somewhere dad gets quiet time and mom gets the herd, oh well, today I was grateful he wanted to ride with me so I could get a better sense of what I would be dealing with later on in the day.
Jake was full of questions and when over each detail of what we saw at the hospital when we went for the tour. After we got done replaying the tour, questions started coming about the surgery itself, Jake is so into details that he wanted to know how many people were going to be in the surgery room with him. Stumped me with that one, I quickly pushed that one off on Dr. Larsen, and low and behold the questions stopped! Guess since I didn't know the answer to that one it wasn't worth asking any more, and the questions stopped.
We got to his room, put on the gown, and asked for the Nintendo controller, yeah are kids spoiled today! We all had a good laugh trying to play Mario cart, driving that isn't as easy as it looks!
About 7:00 one of the nurses came to get us to take us to pre op. Jake started getting a little tense, because it is in one big room, with lots of people. Other kids crying because they can't do what they want to do, hearing conversations of others surgeries, ect... while waiting for the operating room to get cleaned up and ready for Jake we met about 4 people who were going into the surgery with Jake that ALL asked what are you here for? It was a great reminder that our children take in all we say and do! He said verbatim I am here to get my adenoids out, and they are going to put a wire up through my nose to make a passage so I can breath better, because my bones are growing bone on bone, and it is full of stuff. WOW!!! by the last nurse he took a big breath as if he was getting ready for a big speech! Need less to say they all were amazed at how detailed he was! Dr. Larsen came in to check on Jake and go over everything again with him, then asked the flood gate question, "Do you have any questions for me?" Aaahhh, let me ask a few. Dr. Larsen had him laughing before she left the room, the tension was released! Another "thank God!"
With in an hour of leaving him in the surgury room (Nate was able to go in with him to hold his hand until he was asleep) we were in the post op room, getting details of the surgery. Dr. Larsen was very impressed with how things went! Praise God, she didn't need to remove any of the bone, the wire worked along with stretching out his nasal passage (does this by putting air tube in by the wire and "ballooning" air into the area, for all the drs out there hope I am explaining this in the right way!) Things are now clear and clean! And he was told he was the best patient in days!
Recovery was quick, grandma brought the girls up to see him, and were able to make edible Christmas trees with Jake then it was time to go home. The nurse walked us to the entrance of the children's wing and Jake quickly turned around and asked "Where is the wheel chair, I would like a ride." I convinced him we were ok and that we would carry him if needed, ok Kristen would carry him if needed. He took total advantage of that one. Once we got home he slept for a couple hours, then asked if he could go outside and play in the snow with his sisters, because ya know mom I feel better! It is amazing at just how quickly he felt better, not to mention still drugged! :)
We are so blessed that we have started moving in what we feel is the right direction for him! We can only begin to pray that 2009 will be nothing like 2008 for our family where his health is concerned! Thanks for praying this year and especially today! I didn't even cry when they we wheeled him away! We could feel the Lord's presence with us all day.
Thanks for taking the time to read today's book! :)

Well, it's official, we have joined the blogging frenzy! Not sure how much I will blog, depends on the time I have with all the kids' activities, work, and church! With the below 0 temperatures and churches cancelling services, we decided to hang out as a family today, Nate and the 3 younger ones played NFL monopoly, while Kristen got over the fact that she isn't old enough to have a face book page yet! The woes of being a pre-teen! :0)
For those who haven't heard yet, Jake is having surgery on Tuesday, he is going to have his adenoids out and a balloon plasty on the bones around his nose and eyes. The surgery is expected to take 2 hours, Grandma Linda is coming down to hang out with the girls, hoping this will keep their mind off of the events of the day. It feels great to prayerfully coming to the end of a long year! He is excited because he wants to be the king of the house, as if he isn't already!
Will let you know how things go when we get home on Tuesday!
Stay warm!