Brynn's prognosis

We got a call back from Brynn's doctor yesterday and he has pretty much ruled out ITP and Leukemia. Thank heavens!!! What she does have is Henoch-Schoenlein Purpura (HSP). In most cases it is very mild and resolves itself spontaneously within a month. But in rare cases it affects the kidneys and bowels. So all I have to do for treatment is give her anti-inflammatories. BUT. . . I have to give her urine samples to the lab. . .once a week for six months. . . . then once a month for three years! We are extremely grateful and relieved that we don't have to worry about chemotherapy or steroids and blood transfusions. The urinalysis is just a precaution to make sure she doesn't have any blood or protein build-up in her kidneys. So I will try very hard to keep a positive attitude on my weekly trips to the doctor to deliver pee. Today was our first day and she refused to pee in a cup. "My bum is way too big to fit over that cup!" She cried about it all morning (literally!!! -- she's been quite emotional the last few days) and finally she did it. So that's what I get to do till she's 7 1/2. That seems like a really long time. But for now she's healthy and we can sleep at night. Thanks for all the prayers!

Every Parents' Worst Fear

Sunday afternoon Brynn started complaining about her ankles hurting. She was crawling around and wouldn't walk on them. By bedtime she was hysterical and we could barely console her. I took her socks off to rub some lavender oil on her and noticed that her ankles were swollen and bruised and she had what looked like a rash all over them. I was concerned and thought that as long as she could fall asleep I didn't need to take her to Urgent Care. Monday she was able to walk, as well as this morning. But around 3 pm she began complaining about her arm. She was just laying on the couch watching a movie so I went to scoop her up and she started screaming that I was hurting her, squeezing her, her whole body hurt, etc.  She would not stop and said that her elbows and knees hurt. They too were swollen and badly bruised. So after notifying the doctor we rushed her in to see him. Within 45 min. our world got turned upside down as the two possibilities are ITP or Leukemia.  As a parent, once you hear that word you lose sense of self control and logic. I instantly began to cry even though the doctor is fairly confident it isn't leukemia.  My sweet little girl!  Then he started saying he wanted to call the hematologist at Oakland Children's Hospital, and bla bla bla. I'm not sure what he said after that.  We ran straight to the lab for some blood work to check her platelet count, which would determine whether or not she had to be admitted to the hospital overnight. We got the labs done and went home to wait. About an hour ago the pediatric unit at the hospital called and her count seems fine for now. They didn't tell us what the count is or what our next step is. Tomorrow morning our doctor will review everything and if her platelet count isn't too low she'll just be monitored on a weekly basis. Our little Brynnie was such a trooper! She was very brave while getting her blood drawn, never crying or even flinching.  She was even kinda giddy and embarrassed when the EQ Presidency came over to give her a blessing. During the blessing Tanner was crying and I looked up to see my tender little Bryson wiping tears away. We never said anything to the kids about what was going on. Our friends little boy had this ITP thing last year and he is fine. We are hoping that's what it is. With tonight's news it'll be a lot easier to sleep. We are so grateful to have the power of the priesthood and the power of prayers. I don't know if I've ever prayed so hard for 5 hours straight before. We feel blessed to have a very competent doctor and lots of medical assistance should we need it. Let's hope we don't. Brynn's Great Grandparents were on their way to the temple and put her name on the temple role already and I know that lots of prayers have gone up in her behalf. We are exhausted and we need some rest. We'll keep everyone posted when we know what her condition is. 

Goodbye Mean Mommy!!! So long!

It's true!  The "Mean Mommy" was visiting our house for a little while. The last month or two have been pretty busy for me and with no husband around I've been wee bit short tempered.  The laurels have been wanting me to start teaching them a hula for the Christmas program and I keep saying "just like...2 more weeks... maybe 3".  On Sunday one of them finally said "So what have you been doing that you're so busy all the time?"  Hmmm...well... I don't know really!  I guess the usual stuff - laundry, cooking, cleaning, yard work, etc. - then throw on a couple Super Saturdays, a huge Scavenger Hunt, a ward party, a camping trip, a new puppy, a few sick kids and a sick husband, and there you have it.  And...come on...lets face it, one whining sick husband is sssooooo much worse than a houseful of sick kids.  So if my normal day-to-day weren't busy enough with all the kids, now I have a terrible-two's who can: climb out of his crib in record time, open all doors (even locked ones), scale the freakin' wall, make a mess - no...DISASTER - in lightning speed, and, oh yeah! he doesn't sleep.  Occasionally I think I have enough patience to lay down with him which always results in a full-on wrestling match to hold him still and 15-20 minutes later when he falls asleep we are both drenched in sweat and my ears are ringing from the blood-curdling screaming. i. love. motherhood!  In light of the last few weeks behavior problems my goal is to take a big chill pill and ease up a bit. I think the only thing I have to do this week is clean up my house which has been severely neglected. We promised the kids we wouldn't yell anymore and the other day Bryson was quick to call us on and say "See! You broke your promise again! You aren't supposed to yell anymore!" Right. Tanner is working all week again so we won't see him till Thursday but I think I can handle it since I have nothing pressing in the future to stress me out. Its a damn good thing I don't stress easily cuz we might not have made it another week.

So goodbye "mean mommy", I'd like my kids to like me again. 

Pumpkin Party

Not sure how we got stuck scooping and picking out seeds!

OOH  t-r-o-u-b-l-e !!! Hud's latest trick that he undoubtedly taught Makaid.

Pretty cool lookin'. That's a lot of freakin' pumpkins to carve in one night and that's not all of them!

Ward Party

Being on the activities committee has been awesome. We're trying to have an activity once a month to make up for the no-activity's we've had for two years. It's fun but its some work too. Stephanie and I flew solo on this one but it turned out OK. I think our ward is enjoying the fact that we have things going now. Our carnival was complete with face painting, hair spray, pyramid cans, fishing, ping pong toss, tic tac toe, basketball toss, cake walk, pin the nose on the pumpkin, AND pony rides. Lucky for the Peavine Ward they have a resident cowboy.

The super heroes were in full effect

Not real sure if he likes Oscar the Grouch--though with Hud's attitude lately we might call him Oscar

Brynnie waiting for her hair coloring

Pony rides were the highlight, even for our kids. Every time I turned around Hud was running after Tonka and Tanner

8 Years Later

Last Monday was our 8th anniversary!  I have spent one third of my life with this man and it has been wonderful. We are so blessed to have the perfect marriage and friendship. I couldn't ask for a better man to spend the rest of my life and all eternity with. He is such a thoughtful husband, always making me feel like a princess and I have never doubted I am the queen of his heart.  Tanner is such a devoted father and his children all adore him more than anyone else, even me (unless they don't feel good!) He is the light of their lives and vice versa. I feel so blessed to have been given such an awesome family and I look forward to anyone else who might join as well as years and years together with my best friend.

I was going to put a picture of our wedding on here but I'm computer retarded and I don't know how to scan old pictures in.

Halloween Hunt 08

We finally pulled off our Halloween Hunt this year (we've been wanting to do it for years).  The object was for the planning couple to remain anonymous and send out all contacts and info via a secret email account from Jack Ripper.  Everyone automatically thought it was me - I'll take that as a compliment but obviously my friends don't know me very well because I am not that creative. I'm REALLY good at copying and tweaking a bit.  Plus I had help from some other very creative planners.  30 people showed up--4 teams of 6 or 8 people.  From our meeting place the pit stops were:  Go to Scheels and find one of the 14 statues of past presidents for your clue;  go to a pizza parlor and eat 1 slice of a ridiculously hot spicy pizza (some threw up, some thought their throats were on fire, all are still feeling it today); go to a bowling alley and bowl a 60 before you can get your clue (we won't mention how retardedly bad I did); go out into a pitch black pumpkin patch and find your team's pumpkin and then smash it to get your clue out; meet at the GSR and ride the Ultimate Rush (a freefall swing -- like bunging jumping).

Cracking open our pumpkin and getting our clue....can you tell Ryan's a doctor?

We had to find Calvin Coolidge out of 14 pres. in a 300,000 sq. ft. store

The whole group...note Napolean and Pedro 

The Black Widows -- some of the teams fell apart at the last minute so we had to combine a few groups.  We got the Mendiolas and the Dobbs

Lucky me, no one in Sherri's group would go with her so they nominated me and sent me through the gate. Pretty scary but SOOOO fun. It's hard to scream when you are flying, or falling, at a 90 degree angle from like 100 stories high. 

Everyone had SSOOO much fun and we had such a blast seeing all our planning really pay off. Everyone there was so awesome, all the people who helped us with our pit stops were so accomodating, and we just had one heck of a night. We can't wait to do it again. And next time....WAY HARDER!!!  BTW my team won first place!!

I don't even know what to call this

Um, HI. . . . how's that exhaust pipe?

Poor puppy

Another Baby

Certain members of my family (my husband and my daughter) have been bugging me for a very long time to have another baby. Brynn has even gone so far as to tell people we are having a baby girl. Their little cousin was saying a prayer the other day and blessed "Aunt Kim and her new baby." So to appease them we decided to have another baby. Fortunately for me, I don't have to be pregnant or give birth to it. It was kind of a spontaneous move, we've thought about it off and on for a few years now but never in depth. Meet our new baby (yet unnamed).

She has made it her prerogative to carry/hold him ALL DAY

11 week old mini Dachsund

Since he has no fur he's always cold and needs to be wrapped up like a baby

My God! How Great Thou Art

We haven't been camping at all this year so we decided to swing on down to Yosemite -probably one of my favorite places-for a real quick trip. We got there Friday afternoon and after setting up the trailer we went for a bike ride (not ONE of us had a bike so we all got new ones). Hudson fell asleep immediately but we kept going till we got to the meadow and it was a total BLIZZARD. Yes, we knew it was freezing but it was sunny when we got there.  After our short bike ride we cranked up the heat in the trailer and spent the rest of the night playing games. On Saturday we rode around the valley for about 4 hours and the kids all had a blast. We hiked to Yosemite falls (too bad there wasn't even a trickle), went to the Indian village, the Store, saw some deer and bucks up close and personal, and went to Awahnee Hotel. It is soooo beautiful there. I am truly amazed that there are people in the world who look around themselves and cannot see anything that denotes a God. I look at all the beautiful places I have been blessed to visit and I see that my Heavenly Father loves us so much to give us such extraordinary scenery and such majestic landscapes. Aside from the major blessings of my beautiful children and wonderful husband, I am so blessed to live so close to all these beautiful places and have the freedoms to explore them, and a healthy body which allows me to appreciate all that I can do.

Hudson-just about at his breaking point when we pulled up

If you can't tell he's totally asleep. I got to ride with one hand everywhere while I held him up with the other.

Saturday morning -- beautiful but still FREEZING!!!

Half Dome

"I'm COMING!" --he's kind of a straggler, HAD to stop and climb over EVERY SINGLE rock on or off the path. Why go around when you can go over? That's totally lame!

I told the kids about a cave that I had gone through the last time I was here (with the Biology class as a Senior in HS) and after pointing him in the general area Bryson happened upon it. What a memory! 

Just chillin' on a huge rock

In a teepee in the Indian Village

They don't even care how close you get--so tame!

Too cute with all their little red noses

Brynn was bummed because Tanner and Bryson left her to go on a fast bike ride and she had to stay with boring me (if you don't know Brynn very well she is the laziest little stinker in the WORLD)

Bryson and Brynn playing in the creek bed

That's a doe just a few feet away from us

Yosemite Falls

"Hey look what I can do with pretzels!"

Eating probably the BEST tri-tip ever in the trailer

Betcha Didn't Know

Our corn crop crapped out on us and we only got a few meals with it (and it didn't even taste good). At least the kids found a good use for it and have spent many hours playing in it. With a little imagination and a few dried up corn stalks you can come up with all sorts of things. Note to self: Next year cut down the corn before the kids can destroy it and spread it all over the ENTIRE YARD.
#1. A whipping tool
#2. A parasol
#3. A kite or flag
#4. A prop for posing
#5. A machetti
      #6. Two extra-long arms
#7. A sword
#8. An Axe

#9. A broom

Who woulda thought a corn stalk was so useful?