The Boys get their Hair Cut

A few weekends ago, my mom came down to help clean and sort through stuff for our garage sale. And last minute I asked her to bring down her clippers because ours were way to loud to cut Josiah's hair. He wouldn't stand for it. These clippers were perfect. We placed Josiah in front of the TV with his favorite movie in "Happy Feet" and away we cut. He did really well and I think it turned out really well!

Josiah's Hair Before

Josiah's Hair After

Dan's Hair Before

The progression....top of his head was so shiny, you can't even see it.
Dan predicts that this is the pattern in which he will lose his hair (yikes).
Finished Product!!!

Both my boys after their hair cut. Aren't they handsome???

Things are Better :)

I have now had time to process getting turned down for the job on Friday and to realize that God does have a plan, I just don't know what it is yet. I am sooooooooooooo looking forward to this weekend that is coming up. We are heading to the UP for a wedding. Dan and his best bud, Jeremiah are in a wedding. So we all decided to go camping for the weekend. We each have our own camper, so that will be nice. But it will be so great to just get away and have some much needed relaxation away from everything. We are heading up on Thursday night and you know me I have started my lists :) I think there are 6 of them right now: stuff from our camper, food stuff, Josiah's stuff, extra stuff, food menu ideas and shopping list. Still have to get with Jeremiah and Kelly to get the shopping list more put together, but still having fun with the lists :) I am very concerned about our money situation right now as many of you know. So taking this trip is going to cost a big chunk of money between gas, food and camping. However, God is truly good. Yesterday I got my credit card rewards statement saying that I have enough points for $100. So our camping is going to be paid for. So cool!!

Another God/$ moment happened yesterday. We are planting a garden this year, both to save money and just to have a garden again. But the plants for planting a garden cost money. So I was cleaning out my purse and wallet yesterday and I found a $25 gift card from Menards that I had completely forgotten about. Yah!!!!!!! We only had to pitch in $10, and that was only because we needed to buy a new sprinkler, both for the garden and for JOsiah to play in this summer.

I have also been scrapbooking a ton. I figured out how to get paid to scrapbook :) When I substitute teach, I take all the stuff I need in a plastic carry along thing that is 12x12. Big enough to hold all my paper, pictures, tools, etc. So over the past month I have completed 32 pages. I am so proud of myself. Plus it has made subbing bearable!!!

I have been cleaning like crazy...a sure sign that I am feeling better. When I am depressed, I simply do not clean anything. The house gets completely let go. But both Dan and I used the rain day yesterday to sort through stuff for our garage sale that we are having later this summer. I have gone through about half of our attic. A big chunk still to go, but huge progress has been made already. I also started going through all of my clothes, getting winter clothes put away, summer out and stuff sorted out for the garage sale. So far I have 3 big bags of clothes. and tons of other stuff. It's going to be a big sale!!!

So once again thank you for the prayers. I have felt them a ton lately!!

And the week continues...

The Good News: Josiah is doing great!! The swelling is almost completely gone and after hopefully the last dr. visit for a little while, he said his hand looked good. He was doing so great that he would have the energy to throw an all evening tantrum. Good fun!!!

More Good News: My mom and stepdad, Bob, came down for a visit while I went on two interviews today. They took Josiah to his Dr. apt and then came back and helped with some much needed cleaning. Bob lit a fire under Dan's butt and our front yard is almost completely free of great big logs that have been preventing us from mowing our yard. Yah!!! We were gratefull for all they did for us today!

Not so good news: Dan and I had applied to the same place a couple of weeks ago for a Programmer Trainee position. The training was on the job for 3 months and then upon completion, you would be hired and given a raise with benefits. A person at our day care happened to work there and I had asked her if she anything about it. She checked into and let me know on Thursday that they had already chosen their candidates. On the upside, the person asked if I might be interested in another position they had available. Who knows.

More not so good news: I had the two interviews today, one at a bank and the other at a temp job doing filing and data entry. I was so excited after my first interview for the bank job. It was 4 weeks of training and several on the job rotations. The benefits were fenominal and would start on the first day. I thought I had done really great and that I had made a connection with my interviewer. They would let us know today if they would call us back for a second interview. I guess in my mind I had already gotten the job...not sure why, I just felt really confident. So when I got the call at 3:00pm saying they had selected other candidates, I was shocked and then really down. Thank goodness my mom and bob were here...a great distraction and I didn't really have time to shed many tears. I am trying to look at it that it just wasn't meant to be and I didn't have to make that decision, it had been made for me. I think the second interview went well. I was so confident after the first interview that I had a hard time getting focused. But I finally convinced myself that I should really take this seriously because you just never know. I think the interview went well, but that's what I thought about the first one too.

Just plain down and out: It is just soooo frustrating when things just don't seem to be going our way. I have no idea what God has planned in this for me, I sure wish I knew. I know for sure that he is testing our ability to live with less and spend less, because we simply don't have it anymore. We haven't been in this position in a long time, or maybe ever in our marriage. So its really tough knowing that we have all these bills coming, when I have no idea how, or where I will be able earn a living when school is out in less than 3 weeks.

We are now talking about trying to sell or trade in both our Aztek and Prism to get out from under at least one monthly payment and use the profit (if there is one) to get a car that is already paid off. We can always get something newer when I am able to find a stable job (if there is such a thing in my future).

On the sort of upside: I got our travel rewards statement from our credit card and we have spent enough money (yah, they sure do get you here...spend more to get a few bucks but still something) to pay for our upcoming trip to the UP. OK, not the whole trip, but it will pay for our camping and a few miles of gas :) I was pretty excited when that came in the mail today.

Yah, pretty down and out...and really trying not to be. So, I am sorry if my bloggin is really depressing right now. I will let ya know when things are starting to turn around. Hopefully that will be really soon! Thank you again for all the prayers. We have never needed them more and are so grateful, for those of you that have kept Josiah and our family in your prayers!!!! Who knows what tomorrow will bring!!!!

What a week!

SUNDAY NIGHT: We ended our weekend with Josiah getting bit or scratched by a cat (we weren't sure at that point). Our cat at home is very mellow and he has started carrying her around and can pretty much do anything he wants with no response. This cat, on the other hand, does not like kids. We were trying to see if he would simply learn not to pester this cat. He had already been scratched several times, but he was simply determined to make friends with this cat. Well he got in the cats face one to many times, and no one could intervene in time before the cat had had it. He had also taken a fall onto his face that night, giving him quite a swollen lip. Thank goodness kids heads are as solid as rocks at his age and that swollen lips heal quickly because the rest of the week would be tough. At any rate, I called my doctor immediately on our way home and he thought that we would be ok to wait until morning and he would call an antibiotic in. My initial reaction was panic. I have heard so many horror stories about cat bites and in the hand is the worst place to get bit. Plus there was cat scratch fever if they weren't bites, but scratches. Whatever they were, they were deep and we had a feeling that there was a good chance for infection. But we waited until morning.

MONDAY MORNING: An infection had definately set in and his hand had already started to swell and turn red. But we got the antibiotics going at around 11:00am. I was still really concerned about his hand, it was just getting more swollen and more red. So I made an appointment to see the Dr. When we got to the dr's office, they got us right in, but instead of seeing the Dr. who we had been talking to, the PA came in. He barely looked at it and said he was on the right antibiotic and sent us home, telling us to watch it. I was pretty mad that he didn't even take the time at that point to check with the Dr. on the situation. But we went home and kept him on the antibiotics.

TUESDAY MORNING: Now the hand was very swollen. But the redness hadn't spread, so I took him to day care and I went to work.

TRIP #1 TO THE HOSPITAL

TUESDAY AFTER WORK: By the end of the day, the day care provider said that it looked much redder and it did look more red. We went home and ate dinner and finally I decided to call the dr. By now it was 7:00pm. He told us to go immediately to the Emergency Room in town. The ER close to our house couldn't handle this. So we packed up and prepared for a long night.

Dan met us up at the hospital where we waited for an hour and a half to get a bed in the hall way. Ok, now. Picture an 18 month old simply hanging out on a bed in the middle of a hospital hallway. Yah, that's not going to work. But because we had been in a hospital with him before, we had discovered the best thing for a child his age that has to be restrained to a small area. The portable DVD player. He wasn't interested in any of the toys or books we brought for him, but the movies, he watched endlessly. I truly can't believe how much he sat and watched and was good for us, the DVD player was definatley a blessing. Because we would go on to spend many hours in the hospital over the next 24 hours.

They finally came to see us and said immediately that he would need IV antibiotics and may have to be admitted over night. We were prepared for this, because our doctor had given us the possibilities. From the time we had arrived at the hospital and the time we got seen by the doctor, the infection had spread from the base of his fingers to his knuckles and up. The infection spread so fast, but the dr. informed us that that was the danger and problem with cat bites, was that once the bacteria set in, the infection can move very quickly. He also let us know that it was a cat bite because of the progression of the infection. Cat scratches result in enlarged lymphnodes and his were fine. I was just glad it wasn't both at the same time. He was running a fever, but the dr. said it was just due to the body fighting the infection.

So it was a very good thing that we had made our way to the hospital when we did. We finally did get a room and then things moved quick for a few minutes anyway. They were getting him prepped for the IV and to draw blood. The nurse that did his IV this time was a pro. When we took him in for his seizure, they kept poking and poking and finally had to put the IV in his foot. That was so traumatic for him and so much for me that I had to leave the room. This time he cried and cried (which still breaks any mother's heart), but they were pretty quick about it. He continued to cry out of pain and now exhaustion for another 20 minutes and finally crashed.

We then waited another hour or so for the antibiotics to arrive because the dr wanted a higher dose than the pharmacy would allow. But they finally arrived and got his IV going. They also said that his blood work looked really good and that if we felt comfortable doing so, that we could go home and sleep for a few hours and then come back for the next dose of antibiotics. So we sat watching Happy Feet and Cars. He was so tired, but he wouldn't fall asleep. I think the IV was really uncomfortable on him, the tape was to tight or something.

A half hour later the IV was done and they unhooked the IV but left the stint in so that when we came back in the morning they wouldn't have to poke him again (what a great idea). We got home at about 12:30am and he was still wide awake. A bottle later, and he was out. It took a little while for me to settle down from the nights events, but I was finally able to get a few hours of sleep.

TRIP #2 TO THE HOSPITAL

WEDNESDAY MORNING: Josiah and I were up at 6:30am so we could get back to the hospital for his 2nd dose of antibiotics. Dan ended up going to work, because Josiah's hand was looking alot better and we were pretty sure they wouldn't have to hospitalize him at this point. I stopped and treated both Josiah and I to donut holes :) Nothing like a little sugar to get going in the morning!!!

We got to the hospital at 7:30am and we waited for another hour and a half to be seen. Finally they came in and then we had to wait for another hour for the IV antibiotics. So much down time for a 1 1/2 year old. I was starting to get warn out. He did watch his movies and was pretty good natured through it all, but he is still a toddler that wants to toddle!!!

Here is a picture of his hand on Wed. morning after all the redness had gone away. Still pretty swollen and you still couldn't see his knuckles, but better. The blue marks are wear the infection was the previous night. The dr. wanted to make sure it didn't spread any more.

Finally at 10:30am we were on our way home. Josiah fell asleep on the way home and would continue to sleep until 2:30pm. He was tired. He got up from his nap, ate lunch and we were on our way back to the hospital for trip #3. The bummer about all this is that we are going to get charged for all 3 ER visits. At least they let us go home over night, but it still sucks that they are going to get us for all 3 visits. Such is life, we had to get his little hand better.

TRIP #3 TO THE HOSPITAL

WEDNESDAY EVENING: Josiah and I got back up to the hospital at 4:00pm. Even with a nap, I was still wearing thin with the whole waiting thing. It is soooo hard to keep a child entertained. And I was by myself. Dan was working in the morning and he was so exhausted by the end of the day, he had to get a nap in so he could go to work the next day rested. Josiah new right where the toys were in the waiting room were and went right to them. Not a good thing really. However I wish the toys were portable and could be taken into the rooms with you because the center of this toy kept him kind of contained, but as you can see he did figure out how to climb out.

This time they sent us over the urgent care. The dr. that saw him this time asked if anyone had drained the puncture points. I told her that Dan had tried and had gotten some puss out on Tuesday. She felt around and decided it would be a good idea to try and drain them. So I sat on the bed, with Josiah on my lap. They used a needle to numb up the area and then a razer to cut it open and get any puss. This was not a fun time at all. He did as well as anyone getting a shot in their hand could have done.

After that, we waited again. Finally at about 6:00pm they finally started the IV which was only supposed to take a half an hour and we could have gone home. An hour later and it was finally finishing up. She had put the wrong drip speed in the IV, which I had asked about but she said it was fine. AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHh! I just wanted to go home and by this point Josiah was restless, tired and now hungry because it was now past dinner.

After all that we were able to go home and be done with the hospitals for the time being. In all this I have found something to be thankful for. The things that have brought Josiah to the hospital have been minor in comparison to other child hood problems. We were able to go home after a day or two and be done with the whole thing. I cannot imagine what it must be like for parents and children with childhood cancer. But for us, at this point in our lives, it was still a tough week and we are just thankful that Josiah is healing up very quickly and well. Now we just have to battle the yeast infections that come with antibiotics...nothing compared to the hospital visits, but still not fun!!! Thank you for those of you who knew about this situation and were praying for Josiah. Every prayer helps!!!

It's a Boy!

Meet the newest member of the Mindy and Mike's family!!

Luke Edward

Born: March 17, 2007

Weighed: 6lbs11oz

Length: 19"

Time: I think they said 11:46am.

Isn't he just perfect!!

Proud papa Mike!! I didn't even get a picture of Mindy with Luke. Maybe later, or check momteacherfriend's blog or insert title here.

It's Been a Long Time

...and I still don't feel much like writing. I think Mindy and both caught the same "blog" bug. EDS completely drained me of everything and the only thing I had energy for was playing with Josiah and watching TV.

For those of you who I haven't talked to yet, I no longer work at EDS. I couldn't handle the stress anymore. I don't deal with stress very well and I tend to duck out when the going gets tough. The reasoning is two fold: they had changed my schedule 5 times and were about to change it again in less than 4 months on the job. They told us we would have our schedules changed every 3 months or so. They told us alot of things that they didn't hold up their end of the bargain. At any rate I am substitute teaching until the end of the school year. I have no idea what I will do beyond that. I am trying to trust that God has something in mind, but sometimes that is hard to do when you see the paychecks ending. Please keep us in your prayers, as we will be needing them lots over the next months!

I will try and post a happier blog with pictures of our happy little (now getting very big) guy!!

New Babies!

All of my college friends got together during hte week last week because Tierney was in from out of town. Beth and Kari had new little ones in tow and I wanted to post a couple of pictures. Samantha is Beth's little one. She is the one that I had written about quite awhile back about being 9 weeks premature...but she is doing great now and putting on lots of weight. She is tooo cute! Kyra is Kari's litte one. Kari just recently adopted Kyra and she too is a beautiful baby!!! So much fun to have two more little ones to add to our crew!!!

A Visit to the Gardens

Josiah and I made the trek to visit my mom and Bob last weekend and we had a wonderful time. Samantha and Nathan came over for the day on Saturday and we all walked over to "The Gardens" to see the butterfly house. It was a beautiful day...a little cold out, but very sunny and bright blue skies. It was so nice to get away for the weekend!!! Josiah and I both needed some time out of the house and being able to go for walks and do fun things was just what we needed.

Caterpillar...Cacoon...

Beautiful Butterfly!!!

All the kids got tatoos on their faces at the Barn and had to show them off for the camera!

March Pictures

All is Well!

Just thought I would do an update while I had some time today:

Update on ME: Work is chugging along. Some days better than others. It seems like every day they add new constraints on us that make it more difficult to do our jobs well. Most likely do to my job, my moods have good days and bad. Mostly bad because I wish I was at a job that would better provide for my family and a job that wasn't so stressful. Customer service is a very tough industry. I had no idea coming into this job that actually fixing computers wouldn't be the hard part...it is dealing with the customers attitudes that's the hardest part. You'd think that they would be glad they had somewhere to call that could give them the answers they need. But it is more likely that they are wanting a place they can call to get the answers they want to hear. Such is life! I continue to learn more every day about computers and dealing with impatient people!

Update on DAN: Dan is enjoying his first day off in 5 weeks. He has worked 5 weeks straight (meaning every day). Between working a full 40 hour week and a side job that took much longer than expected, he has been gone alot in the past 5 weeks. Josiah and I are loving having him home today. We have just been hanging out, not doing a whole lot. The best way to spend a Saturday. The side job is almost finished and he is going to take a short break from sidework. However the money has been much appreciated at home :) Not sure what we would have done with out it, so I am very grateful that he was able to plunge through the long weeks to get it done.

Update on Josiah: He is doing great overall. A cold and some teeth cutting right now, but on the whole, he is having fun and learning alot. Josiah's most recent discoveries include:

1. Climbing out of a walker
2. Opening the door at Day care
3. And exiting the house for Kim to find him on the porch instead of inside in his walker. Little stinker!!
4. He can back up and sit down. Funny when he backs up to you and sits on whatever part of your body his butt is touching. For example: your chest :)
5. He can eat with a spoon all by himself now! Big accomplishment in our house. Still very messy, but he is loving the independence and so am I!!
6. Tantrumville has hit home! A couple of weeks ago he had a tantrum that lasted 10 minutes, all because I wouldn't carry him down the steps. Screaming at the top of his lungs and lots of banging of the fist.
7. He can do the motions for the Eensy Weensy spider. Very cute!!
8. Loves streaking before or after bath time. He gets so excited that he just runs and giggles around the house.

I will post some pictures when I can get my photo software to cooperate!!

A Scary Time for our Family

Most of you know by now that Thursday was not a typical day in our lives. The day started off very normal. I did notice that Josiah was burning up, but I was in a hurry like always to get to work, so I could get there in plenty of time to be ready to answer the phones. When I got to Kim's I asked if we could get Josiah's temperature because I was sure he was running a fever, but didn't have a good thermometer at home (now I will buy a good one:). We took it and it was 100.5 under the arm. Something I didn't know before this whole experience was that you add 1 degree when using an arm or ear thermometer. Good to know. He is currently cutting all 4 canine teeth. So thought that might be the culprit (again I now know that a fever more than 99 is caused by something other than teeth). Again good to know.

So I left for work. Around 11:00am I called Kim to see how Josiah was doing and he had been sleeping most of the morning. She was giong to call me when he woke up. When he woke up his fever was 102.5, which I now know is actually 103.5. But I decided to wrap up what I was doing and come home and get him. He had no other symptoms other than the fever and he was ver lathargic and sleeping alot. OK, so he wasn't at all himself and wouldn't be put down. But he wasn't coughing or runny nose or whining. He was eating good and drinking fine. So again we thought that it was probably teething.

I got to Kim's around 1:30pm and Josiah ended up sleeping on me for an hour and a half. Heavy breathing and just really run down. He did take a bottle like only Josiah could and then we headed home. On the way home about 3 minutes into the drive I remember looking back at him and he appeared to be sleeping. I just thought he was whipped. (OK, lots of clues that things were really wrong, but never having dealt with a sick kid, I didn't pick up on any of them). By the time I pulled in our driveway 5 minutes later, I turned around and realized he was either not breathing or really struggling breathing, his lips were turning blue and his eyes were rolled up in the back of his head (probably one of THE most traumatic moments in my entire life and moment I will never forget and a moment I will have trouble dealing with for some time to come). I freaked out, like anyone who has ever experienced their child not breathing and seizing. But he was still in his car seat so I pulled back out of my driveway (almost hitting a white truck, because I had only one goal and that was to get JOsiah to the hospital). Luckily we only live a half a mile from the hospital. I did have the forethought to put my seatbelt on because I knew I was driving a little crazy.

Josiah still was not responding to anything I did. He finally starting to breath again when I took him out of his carseat at the hospital, but he was limp and not really coherant. I ran into the hospital in pure panic trying to get out what had happened. My head was so fuzzy and jumbled, I could barely get out what had happened. I tried to call Dan and he didn't answer...even more panic. Finally I called his work and they were able to get ahold of him. Once he knew that Josiah was in the hospital and was being taken care of, he said his panic went away. Mine however still remained. I was now by myself at the hospital while they were trying to put an IV in and hooking him up to all the monitors. I had to keep leaving because they couldn't find a vein and he was screaming. They were asking me all kinds of questions and preparing me for tests they might have to run like a spinal tap....OH MY GOODNESS! Not sure I could have handled that. But not knowing why he had such a high fever and he was extremely lathargic all day, they wanted to make sure he didn't have meningitis. Josiah was a real trooper through all this though. He didn't hardly move through any of the poking except for the IV. He just laid there playing with the oxygen hose which is normally in their nose, but he liked sucking on it, and pulling at all the cords.

I was so thankful when Dan arrived. Shortly after, Kim (our day care provider) arrived, in as much of a panic as we were. She had never experienced any kind of emergency with any of her day care kids like this before. I was just so glad not to be there alone any more.

Not to long after we had arrived, they discovered that he had strep throat and had informed us that Josiah most likely had a febrile seizure. These happen when a childs fever spikes in a short amount of time. I joked that the purpose of the febrile seizure was to say "Hey there mom, I'm really sick and your not doing anything about it...please take me to the hospital so they can fix me up" I just feel so ignorant about so many things. I had been giving him the wrong dosage of medicince, taking temperatures wrong, didn't have any idea about febrile seizures. So much this little guy is teaching us.

Since he had had such a high fever and the seizure, they wanted to admit us overnight for observation. So Dan and I headed home while Kim came back up to the hospital to stay with Josiah while we took a car home and I packed an overnight bag. Then Josiah and I headed up to the big hospital in an Ambulance. My first ambulance ride that I can remember anyway. Hard to believe that he had his first ride at 15 months.

His fever spiked one more time to 103 while at the hospital, but by the middle of hte night the fever was almost completely gone. He just hung out with us all evening in the hospital room relaxing and watching TV. Finallly around 11:00pm we both crashed. Dan had to go home because they would only allow one parent to stay. The nurse didn't come in until 4:00, and we both slept straight through. Then by morning Josiah was rearing to go. He ate a good breakfast and was trying to stand up, but couldn't becuase the IV was in his foot.

Dianne (Grammy) came to visit us around 9:30 and by noon she was taking us home. The doctor was sure the seizure was a febrile seizure and told us that 50% of children that have had one never have them again. He also said that if he has another one, to wait 5 minutes before calling the dr or going to hospital unless he is turning blue. I can't imagine just waiting there 5 minutes while he isn't responding. I just pray he never has another one. I am not sure I can handle it. He obviously has no lasting affects from the whole ordeal....me on the other hand will be a few weeks or months in recovery.

Until this morning I really had no idea how this whole thing truly affected me. I am very weapy whenever I think about what happened and about the "what if's" that went through my head on the way to the hospital. I am very afraid something bad is going to happen again even though I have tried to pray about it. Just have to pray harder I guess. But I have sanitized everything (which I haven't done in his whole 15 months here on this earth). And I keep jumping up at every little, from a cough to falling to a whine. I am panicked that he is going to stop breathing again. I know I need to let it all go. To know that God is watching out for him when we aren't there. But I am not quite there yet. I know that time will heal the fear, but mostly I just need to turn it over to God and let Him deal with it for me. In time I will!

We are just very thankful our little man is ok and has no lasting effects from the high temp or seizure. Today you would never know that only 2 days ago he was in the hospital. It is truly amazing how quickly children recover. If only the parents could recover from the same ordeal in the same amount of time. Thank you for all who were praying for Josiah foremost and for Dan and I.