NOT AGAIN :(

We didn't even make it to October this year before Jonathon started into his breathing issues. Last night (Wednesday) just before bed we noticed his breathing was starting to get labored. He's had a tiny bit of a cold but sometimes that is all it takes to set off his asthma. Yikes! So, luckily we had some of his meds on hand and were able to get things calmed but first thing this morning it was off to his specialist. Sure enough he was heading into some dangerous territory again and luckily I think we have headed it off. I am so hopeful he will be able to one day grow out of all this. Please say some extra prayers for this little guy and his lungs. Thanks

OUR DAY TODAY

Rob had the day off again today and went golfing with his brother. I had a friend over with her kids so our kids could play together this morning. It was a loud, rough and tumble morning. I fixed lunch for all the kids and then everyone parted ways and either went to school or took naps. Mine took naps. The rest of the day was fairly normal considering we have toddlers running around. In other words, the decibel level was above the legal limit. Rob had come home and taken a nap after his golf game and the kids were up soon after that. By the time he woke up, I handed over the kids and told him "Mommy was in a time out." He could tell from the look on my face I was serious so he took the kids in their bedroom and they all picked up toys and books. Unfortunately, my time out only got me as far as the kitchen and the laundry room to finish what I hadn't been able to while I was chasing the screaming MiMi's! Darn! Luckily, Grandma rescued us by making dinner (well, I did make a vegetable to go with it.) :} She made a corned beef casserole and Carly liked it so much she had three helpings! After dinner we let the kids unwind a bit by watching The Incredibles, one of their new favorite movies. Later, as we were getting them ready for bed and doing Jono's breathing treatment we noticed he had started breathing rough. He's had a little bit of a cough and runny nose for a bit but his breathing has been o.k. until tonight. So, we had to do a little different treatment. His breathing sounded better when we put him to bed but I will need to check in the middle of the night and see if he needs another treatment. Poor little guy. I sure hope he grows out of this. Well, better get some sleep so I can check on him. Night.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Today was my birthday. Had a great day with the family. Mom and Dad took Rob and me and the rest of the family out for dinner tonight to Olive Garden. It was terrific. We had some great food then came home and had cake and ice cream and opened some nice gifts. The kids were pretty rambuncious. Other than that they behaved pretty well. I went to a chiropractor today and he helped my back but hurt my shoulder a bit in the process. He wants me to come back on Thursday but I'm not sure whether or not I will keep that appt. We'll see. Light's out everyone. It's late! :)

CUTE GIRL, CUTE HAIR

Julie and I spent hours taking Carly's hair out of cornrows and extensions and then combing it out to put it in these cute, simple braids. Doesn't she look adorable? She loves them, too and it's all her own hair! Yay!

BIKING WITH GRANDPA AND JONO

Dad has been up and around the last couple of days trying to keep himself limber. Last night he was riding his exercise bike and today he did some laps (walking) but with something to help steady him and Mom tagged along too just in case. Last night while he was riding his bike Jono decided he needed to sit on Grandpa's lap. He started climbing up and I was telling him "NO!" but Grandpa said; "Let him come." I guess riding the bike together is something they do pretty frequently. So, I let him climb up and ride with Grandpa. This little boy sure loves his Grandpa! I took some pictures. I actually took several because I was trying to get a picture of Jono just smiling normally or even laughing with Grandpa but everytime he sees the camera he CHEESES it. By "cheeses" I mean he flashes a smile so big for the camera his eyes disappear and his whole face scrunches up. I have learned not to say "Smile Jono" but he just naturally does it whenever a camera is aimed at him. You will see I had a hard time catching a normal smile. I pretended I didn't have the camera and would get it all ready and then when he wasn't looking I would aim and then make a loud noise or say something so he'd look and just catch him completely unaware. You will see some results were better than others. At least Grandpa and Grandma both were getting a kick out of it, though. At one point, Jono stole Grandpa's phone (something he delights in doing.) Mean Mommy made him give it back. He started to squirm at another point and Grandpa told me to put him up on his shoulders. I was horrified at the suggestion and told Grandpa "No way!, that will hurt you!" To my surprise, Grandpa told me his shoulders were the strongest part of his body. Hmmm. I still haven't gotten to the bottom of that one. I'm thinking as long as he doesn't have to move them they are strong and don't cause him pain but I never would have guessed he could have a toddler squirming on them and not be in pain. Anyway, I finally did as he asked and put Jono up there. Grandpa and I found a new way to control him. If he's not good we threaten to put him on Grandpa's shoulders. He didn't like that at all. He didn't have control! Lol! Well, that's a lot for one post. I'm just so grateful my kids get to experience their grandparents. Times spent with my grandparents are some of the best memories I have of my childhood and I want it to be the same for them. Well, here's Grandpa and my little Cheeser. Enjoy! (Warning: These were taken with my phone camera--so they are not the best quality--but they get the point across.)

HOW'S THIS MOM?

IS THIS BETTER?

ARE YOU STILL TAKING PICTURES?

MAMA STOP ALREADY!

GRANDPA, IS SHE STILL THERE?

O.K. MOM, TAKE THIS OR LEAVE IT!

HEY GRANDPA, WHO SHOULD WE CALL?

I DON'T WANT TO GIVE IT BACK MOM! NO FAIR!!

HEY, HOW DID I GET UP HERE?

WILL SOMEONE PLEASE GET ME DOWN!

FALL UPDATE

Dad is feeling much better today. He went to his Heart Dr. appt. who, by the way, thinks he is doing wonderfully well! We like that kind of news. Dad was able to walk today without much problem but for safety sake he used his walker most of the time. He is still a bit sore but that is to be expected. I don't remember if I have blogged about this yet or not but Mom has a pretty significant hairline fracture in her foot--almost to the point of a clean break. She is supposed to stay off of it (yah right) but neither of us know how she would do that. This one is enough of a break that it gives her quite a bit of pain when she smarts off to it. There are days when she does pretty well staying off of it and the swelling goes down and she hurts less but other days she really pays for it. She is going to see a podiatrist on Monday to see if there is anything else she can do for it. Hopefully, there is. I took the kids to a playgroup again today and they had a blast. The blast for me was not only did they have fun but they wore themselves out! Yay! Got them home and they took excellent naps. One of my neighbor's watched them for a bit tonight so Rob and I could escape and go out to dinner. That was nice. Then Susan, Russ and Alyssa came up and visited Mom and Dad and brought Jonathon a birthday present. She got him a cowboy hat and sewed him a cute costume vest from one of the Toy Story characters. He loved it. I will get a picture of him in it and put it on here. Well, that's about it for the day. Take care.

IT'S A LONG WAY DOWN . . .

I didn't write last night because we were all kind of shaken up. Dad fell and Mom, the little kids and I were the only ones home with him at the time. Luckily the babies were asleep so they weren't in the way. He fell downstairs. He does laps (just slow ones to keep his circulation up) and was just walking around the family room when he fell. I won't go into the details but it took Mom and me about 30 minutes to get him up. I tried calling a couple of neighbors whose numbers I had memorized but neither were home. He was hurting pretty good so I didn't want to leave even long enough to run upstairs to grab phone numbers to call anyone else. In hindsight (which we all know is perfect) I probably should have. Dad's polio leg gave out on him after he used it to kick an exercise ball out of his way. Luckily that same exercise ball broke his fall and kept him from hurting himself worse than he did. He is pretty scraped up. He hit his head on the exercise bike and had a pretty good goose-egg. He also took a little skin off his nose and off both knees--but he didn't tear up his pants! He is pretty sore today but I think the thing that hurts the worst is his pride. This stupid post-polio (I won't give it the dignity of capitalization) is such a mean disease. It is not logical at all. It's not like polio--that if you work the muscles they get stronger. It is the opposite--kind of. You can't just exercise and work your muscles and make them stronger. In fact, most of the time if you do that--you weaken them. It doesn't make any sense. You don't want those muscles to atrophy but then you don't want to kill them off either. Anyway, we so are grateful Dad didn't break anything or hurt himself worse than he did. I think we have now talked him into using his walker or cane most of the time. Dad has a checkup with his heart Dr. tomorrow afternoon that was already on the schedule before he fell, but I'm sure he would love to talk to you if you have a minute. Take care all--and keep Dad and Mom in your prayers. Love you all, N.

SO, IT WAS A BAD WEEKEND . . .

Well, not horrible or anything. I just didn't feel good. All the way up until today and I still don't feel very good. So, I didn't write. Nothing major has happened--nothing really minor either for that matter. We are just hanging around watching the weather change. And it is. Coming down. The temperature that is. A little at a time. We are in the seventies these days--either low or high--but alas the seventies. We can handle those for awhile. Today, is my niece Caitlin's 18th birthday. That makes my baby sister Sarah really old. Do tell her, won't you?! She likes to hear it, especially from other people. Okay, just kidding--the last part. But it is her daughter's 18th birthday. My babies are younger. That makes me younger right? That's what I thought. You did say yes, didn't you? Okay, I'm going to bed now. Night all. :)

WELL WE CAN DREAM CAN'T WE?

This morning at my house was really loud. The kids were so rambuncious! They could not settle themselves down no matter what. I could not settle them down no matter what! Luckily, I had planned to take them to a playgroup at one of our local parks. That was the best thing because they ran. played, climbed, swung and wore themselves completely out. By the time I brought them home they were ready to nap and I was able to get a few things done around the house. Grandma and Grandpa ventured out to get Grandpa a haircut today. Other than that Grandma has been pretty good about staying off her foot--and she noticed the swelling has gone down some because of it. Although, staying off of it is for sure going to be a challenge for her. Rob got home around 6 tonight after a very long work week. We are hoping for a quiet weekend and a lot of extra sleepin'. Here's hoping our dreams come true! :)

MY TODDLERS = PERPETUAL MOTION

It's been a busy week. I can't believe it's Friday already. My poor husband had put in 42 hours already by Wednesday evening and was like the energizer bunny as of early this morning--although maybe not quite so ENERGIZED. LOL! He just has everyone on vacation at his work but him and one other person this week so they have really had a heavy load to carry. He will be really glad to have them all back. I had my physical therapy today and I have to say myself that I am doing really well. They are having me lift all kinds of weights and do stretches and I have been moving up each time on the weights and reps. I have been really impressing my physical therapist. Not to mention myself. Lol! The munchkins were a handful today--that is if the hand belonged to André the Giant! It's really not that they are bad, it's just that they are in perpetual motion--and they are so fast! It is hard to keep up with them some days. We are all looking forward to the weekend. Hopefully we can get a little rest and relaxation. YAH, that's gonna happen--O.K. probably not but we can hope! Have a nice night everyone!

WHAT'S UP DOC?

Grandma and Grandpa both had doctor appointments today. Grandma has been having pain in her foot again for the last few weeks--same foot as before. I finally talked her in to going to her Doc to have it checked. They X-rayed it and found it was a stress fracture but this time it's not a hairline one--it's a very visable, clear fracture. She is supposed to stay off it as much as possible. Although, I"m not sure how she is really going to do that. I suggested crutches but she said she doesn't do them well at all--so, I guess we are just going to have to keep her down somehow. Her doc is having her see a podiatrist in about ten days to take a better look at it to see if anything else needs to be done. Grandpa's appointment was with his Parkinson's specialist. This doctor came very highly recommended and we really like him a lot.This appointment was just a follow-up to Dad's last one and he got great news. His doc thought he was doing really well. We always like to get those kind of reports. I watched one of my neighbor's kids who wasn't feeling well today and couldn't go to school. Her mom is a teacher and just needed somewhere she could stay for the day. I made a bed for her on the couch and she and the kids watched movies all day. I think they all enjoyed it--even the sickee. (Although, I've seen enough movies for an entire month!) Well, better get myself to bed. Gonna be a busy day tomorrow.

THE MORE THINGS CHANGE THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME

Today was Primary Election day here and where would you expect to find us? Yep, at the polls doing our civic duty. Even though Dad's having a bit harder time walking any distance these days he still wanted to vote. So we put the wheelchair in the van and took him to the polls. We only had the city council up for election this time but wanted our votes to count so we figured we should cast them and turn them in. Someone has been teaching me the importance of voting and this civic responsibility stuff since I was knee-high to a grasshopper (or something like that.) Have I told you lately how much I love my conscience, er, um . . . I mean my DAD! Lol!

PLAYGROUND PICTURES

I'm being a little lazy tonight. It's nearly 12:30 a.m. and I'm exhausted so I thought I would just post a few pictures from our play group last week. The kids had a lot of fun and made some new friends. This is actually a pretty fun play area with some different things than the other playgrounds we usually go to. We had quite a few kids at the playgroup but I didn't start taking pictures until it had started to thin out. I will try to write more tomorrow. Night all.

My cute climber boy!

New friends--Jono with his new buddy Matty on the teeter-totter!

Carly having a gleeful time on the teeter-totter! I LOVE that little face!

Jono and Carly on the teeter-totter.

Jono with his new friend Matty.

COME SATURDAY MORNING

Some of my dearest friends came up today and did a little carnival for Carly and Jonathon. They had games and prizes and made it so fun for them. They had so much fun! After that, Rob kept the kids and I got to go to lunch with my girl friends and just hang out, talk and catch up. It was such a nice afternoon. I really miss my friends and it is so nice when I can spend some time catching up with them. Tonight we went to the ACTUAL wedding reception and it was so lovely. We had a great time there also and were able to catch up with some other friends we hadn't seen for awhile. Our little ones had fun dancing when the DJ started the music and they met some new friends. All in all it was a really nice day. Grandma and Grandpa ventured out for a few hours today. They just ran some errands, did a little shopping and had a late lunch. The weather was pretty decent--only in the 80's with a cool breeze. Much nicer than it had been. They came back when they had worn themselves out. Not much else to tell for today. I think everybody had a good day and tired themselves out in the end. So, now I shall sleep. :)

"THE SUN IS TOO LOUD, MOM"

Lol! That was what Carly told me today on our way to a playdate. She used to say "the sun is too shiny" which I thought was cute, but I think "loud" is even cuter. She doesn't like it to get in her eyes, but then who does? Rob came home a little bit early tonight and I came home a little bit later than normal with the kids so they ended up taking a later nap. It worked out well for us because we were tired and we could lay down for a bit, too. We woke up about 6:30 and were taking our time getting up. We were trying to figure out what to do for dinner and talking about a few things when it hit me that we had a wedding reception to go to. Rob ran into the kitchen and got the invitation off the fridge. We didn't even know if we had time to make it now. He read it and it was from 7-9 p. m so we still had time to make it. We hurried and got dressed and got the kids dressed and rushed out the door. It was in another city about 20 minutes away. We pulled up to the place and it looked kind of dark. I said that out loud; "It looks kind of dark." Rob grabs the invitation and reads it again and starts to laugh (thank goodness.) He said; I should have read it closer the first time. It's not until tomorrow night." "Oh no!", I said. "I'm so sorry honey!" And all he said was, "Well, we have another crazy story to add to our books." Lol! I LOVE MY HUSBAND! He is such a good guy. So, we took the little ones and went and got some dinner and then came home. Apparently, we have a wedding reception tomorrow night. :)

TEMPER, TEMPER

I don't know what is going on--maybe it's a full moon; maybe the werewolfs are out--whatever it is, I need it to stop! My little ones have turned into the crankiest of the cranky! I finally had to give myself a TIME-OUT tonight! And then, in order to really get it, I practically had to hide. They are getting enough sleep, enough food, tons of hugs and bundles of love. So is this just a stage they go through during the terrible two's and three's? Please say "YES!" It has to have an end! Where are my sweet little babies? I want them back! This past week has been so full of tantrums and tempers--times TWO. Mommy needs a break! Can someone please bring my gigglers back?! Puh--lease?! Gah!!

FIRE TRUCK FUN!

I promised some pictures from the kids tour of the fire department. Here they are. They had a lot of fun with their Uncle Steve and Dad. I was just the photographer. They were really cute. All Jono wanted was to drive! He's so funny. They are both getting so big!

LESSON ONE, DONE

I think my lesson went pretty well today. I was nervous at first but I settled into it pretty quickly. The good thing was I had lots of participation from the class, lots of people with comments. Yay for that! I am so glad it is not a silent class who stares at you and expects you to just feed them. It makes the whole teaching experience so much more enjoyable and joyful. The kids have been pretty moody today--even after naps, especially Carly. I am not sure why and am hoping it will pass quickly. She may just be over-tired or maybe it is a growth spurt. She has been doing a lot of that lately. Over the summer she has gone up two whole shoe sizes! She is quite a bit taller too. I haven't measured her but I had to buy her new pants because all of hers had gotten too short for her. She is going to be a tall young woman. Out of nowhere the other day she told us she is going to be a basketball player. I love it! Speaking of things that are large--you should see the size of Jonathon's hands. It's one of those things you don't notice at first--or at all really, unless he happens to hold them palm up facing you. He did that a couple of days ago for some reason and Mom and I realized again just how big they are! And it's not like he's growing into them as he grows--they are getting bigger as he gets bigger! You can tell that if he does one day grow into these gi-normous hands we are going to have a GIANT on our hands--pun intended. Lol! (Which would be kind of ironic since he started out so teeny.) I am really liking the fact that Julie has a foods class this semester. I came home from Church pretty tired but needing to get dinner started. I really wanted a nap but knew it was going to have to wait if it happened at all. Then, I got reminded Julie had an assignment to cook a meal. It had to have so many ingredients and include meat and vegetables. Also, she had to do it on her own. Grandma gave her some great ideas, and voila, my nap was suddenly restored to me! A couple hours later, Rob and I woke up to a lovely dinner of Chicken Divan. Julie did a terrific job! I'm excited for an extra day with Julie and Rob this week where they don't have to be at work or school. Not sure exactly what we will do with it yet, but hopefully we will get to relax a bit and have some fun as a family. Hope you get to do the same. :)

SATURDAY STUFF

Julie worked today and then came home and did about 14 hours of homework. OK, I'm exaggerating but only by half. She seriously spent 7 hours doing homework and is not finished yet. Of course, she has 3 AP classes (college level) and one concurrent (college/high school) class--so basically four college classes. We tried to talk her out of it but she really wanted all of them and now--well, homework from Haiti is the price! While she worked we took the little ones down to see Uncle Steve at his fire station. He showed them the fire trucks and let them climb up in them and check them out. I've got a few pictures but haven't got them ready to post yet. I will have to try to put them on tomorrow. Mom and Dad hung out at the house today. Not sure what they were working on since we were gone for quite a bit of it. Everyone is doing pretty well. Carly and Grandma still have colds but other than that things are going alright. Megan came by this evening and she had gone hiking today and got pretty badly sunburned. Either that or she was really embarrassed for some reason. Hmmm, pretty sure it was the sunburn though. Lol! Got my New Testament Lesson all ready for Sunday School tomorrow. It's my first time teaching in years. Wish me luck. We are in Corinthians. :)

PLAYDATE

Carly and Jonathon had a playdate with some friends earlier this week that was so fun. Carly and the older sister had met in a music class before but Jono and the younger sister had never met before. They are all within a few months of each other and are so cute! We went to the park and played and then went and fed the ducks--one of our favorite things to do! The kids all played so well together. Below are a few pictures. They were all a bit camera shy but I thought the shots from behind were kind of fun, too. Have a great Saturday!