Prayer Request

Amanda has surgery on Tuesday. She does not know what time yet. In addition to praying that the surgery goes well, please pray that they will be able to get the IV into her easily. Anyone who knows Amanda, knows that this is never an easy thing for them. They pull out all the stops when getting an IV in. It takes numerous people, special procedures, etc. Let's all pray that it goes in the first time with no complications. From past history, this would truly be a miracle!

Also pray for Amanda to have peace about the whole situation. Her mind tends to jump to the worst possible scenario.

Thanks!
-Lura

Fair Entry

I'm posting this for Amanda. This is her fair entry and her red second place ribbon! -Lura

Quick news...

I had my first doctor's appt and I don't know much new news. I didn't expect to at this one. Thursday is the one where I should know something.

Tuesday...August 14, 2007

I thought I would share a few pictures with you all.

The far left are a few more from the triplets party. The top one is Sean lighting the canles, middle is Caitlin loving on Old Grandma, Tanis, Old Grandpa, my mom and Jonathan. The bottom picture is Jonathan, Luke and Caitlin with the cakes Grandma made.

On the right is Gabe and some of the Bible School Boys from my class, the bottom is Gabe coming down the big slide at the wrap up picnic.

Have a good day!

Monday you can fall apart...

I couldn't think of any other song lyrics for Monday except those. Today was a good day for the most part. I took Gabe, the triplets and my nieces Carmen and Scarlett to Kellie's house. We played, swam in the pool, had lunch and tortured the dogs. Apparently one of the trio used Hot Pink chalk and colored one of the pug's bottoms. I think that we will still be allowed to go over and play, but I am not sure.
When we got home the kids played outside while I got dinner ready and Sean mowed. They had fun in the sandbox and I think most of it stayed in the box too! After dinner we ran a few errands and the kids went to sleep between 8:30 and 9:30. I was hoping they would drop off around 7:30. I was dreaming! Sean and I are running on only about 3 1/2 hrs. of sleep, so we are pretty tired.
Gabe is feeling much better today. He sounds congested, but is breathing just fine. Praise the Lord! Tomorrow I have the first of my dr.'s appts. this week. Yippee. I am nervous, I think moreso that they will tell me that there is nothing they can do. I want this taken care of once and for all!!! I don't want another year of surgeries!!!!!! I think they just like me, so they drag things out.
I got great stickers in the mail Saturday...Thanks Char!!!! The trio loved the Clifford stickers. My therapist didn't return my call to reschedule. I am sure she knows I start to get paranoid wondering if she wants to drop me as a patient. I think she enjoys torturing me. Maybe I should check her credentials next time I am there....if I get to go back! She owes me a sticker.
My mom's watercolor won a blue ribbon and Best of Show in the fair today! My cross stitch has been judged...we'll see what happens. This was another try of stepping out of my comfort zone. I don't care if I win, I'd like to, but I put myself out there to be judged and face rejection. This is a big step for me. Kind of like my statements.
Well, I am going to post this and go to bed...Have a great night everybody! Sleep well!!!

Late Night Fun at the ER

Last night we put the kids to bed and Gabe started coughing and saying his tummy hurt. He uses this all the time to get out of going to bed, cleaning his room, etc. so I told him to stop whining/faking it and go to sleep. He kept coughing, some obviously forced and complaining, so I finally said to come and sit with me on the couch. When he did we could see that his chest was moving really funny. I don't know how to describe it, He wsa really having to work to breathe and when he take a breath his chest wouldn't move much, and when he'd exhale it would kid of pop out, but he wasn't releasing all the air he took in, just really weird! So Sean called the pediatrician who said he needed to go to the ER asap. My mom got here to watch the trio and we took him out. It turns out he was having something like a bronchialspasm (?). His "breathing tubes" were spasming and he wasn't getting enough air. They gave him some breathing treatments and steroids and an inhaler to use if it starts to happen again. The dr. said that it might be a once every 5 years type thing or it could happen more often. Sean has asthma and it is hereditary, so we just have to watch and we will talk to the pediatrician of course. The medicine made him so incredibly hyper!!! He was feeling 100% better by the time we came home, stopping by McDonald's for a diet coke of course. When we got home I remembered Lura's post about the meteor shower, so we went and stood in the backyard. It was about as disappointing as the space station night, although we saw one really bright one. Then nothing...
Gabe is doing just fine this morning and we are going to go and play at Kellie's. I wonder what other fun is in store for us today??? Hopefully no more hospital trips!

Kellie and Brian's Party

Here are Pictures from our day at Kellie and Brian's end of summer party. You should all recognize my 4, Lura's 2 and Kellie's 1. I think my 30 lb. weight gain from the darn steroids is incredibly noticable and gross, but I am publishing the pics anyway. Go Me again!! We had a ball and I think the kids would have stayed all night if Kellie would have let them. I am taking my 4 and my two neices back tomorrow to play. Brian grilled amazing bbq chicken, as always. I didn't even look at the other meat as that is my favorite. They had a sno cone machine and cottom candy maker there that the kids loved! Okay, the adults might have loved it a bit more. I wish you could have all been there, it was so much fun!

My Statement Yet/Question....

I was at a store know for its blue light specials yesterday. There were long lines and I had been waiting for a few minutes when a cashier came up and tapped me on the shoulder and said she was opening a new lane and I could come on over. Even though I was last in line, I still went. Hey, I had an invitation that everyone around me had heard. I felt sooo bad and uncomfortable once I started checking out. Was I wrong to go? The cashier personally told me to go on. Should I have let the people in front of me go? It is not consuming me, but boy do I have guilt over this. I feel like I was wrong.
What would you guys have done?

THANK YOU CHERYL & KEVIN!!!!!!!!!!

I got the greatest thing in the mail today. Some of you may argue as to how great it actually is....but trust me... this made my day! Thank you so much Cheryl and Kevin! You guys are super-duper!!!!!!

My Dumb Body..

Well I see the ob/gyn on Tuesday now. I have an enlarged left ovary and a cyst on it that is the same size as the ovary. Whooppee. Then I am scheduled for a surgical consult Thursday for my belly. It is getting pretty bad so I hope they will schedule something soon. I think I am going to buy myself a girdle. I hear they keep hernias away. The damn apples sure aren't working! :)
ha ha I made a funny!

This is your only warning....

I sent a fun email to some of you...I don't have all of your addresses. Just Humor me. You don't have to answer, but I thought it was fun. I also thought you all deserved a warning!!!!
I love you all dearly. Really, I do! :)

Things to do today....

1. Run and empty the dishwasher. Done

2. Call the dr. for me, Luke and call Dr. K to cancel appt. 2 out of 3 done

3. Reschedule the triplets physicals.

4. Fill out preschool forms.

5. Finish up the 8 loads of laundry. 3

6. Vacuum area rug and sweep floors. swept, not vacuumed!

7. Get trash and recyclables ready. ( this always reminds me of Carrie!) SuperSean did this.

8. Make grocery list.

9. Go to the grocery store. I ran in to get a few items. Does that count?

10. Take trio to Toys R Us and get bikes. Done.

11. Go to post office and mail letters, bills and package.

12. Remind myself I am a good mom! Just did it!

13. Clean fridge.

14. Finish cleaning kitchen and mop floor. cleaned 1/2, no mop.

15. Wash out kitchen trash can. Yes!!!!

16. Bag pop can tabs for Phyllis.

17. Get dirty laundry from upstairs.

I guess this is a good start. Hopefully I will be able to put Done by a few.

My statement for the day..."I don't think it is safe to leave your kids in the car to go into Rite Aid and buy M&M's." I almost did this today, but couldn't justify risking their safety for M&M's!
Just to clarify, I didn't actually do this. I had a fleeting moment where I considered it, but I do know better! Now if it had been for a Diet Coke.... ha ha.

Life....

So Sunday night we put the kids to bed and about 40 minutes later Luke woke up burning hot! He wasn't when he went to bed. He threw up a few times and had an incredibly restless night. We gave him tylenol every 4 hours and he never cooled off. The next morning he woke up and threw up bile. He wasn't keeping anything down and his tempwas still over 104 so I called the dr.. We got in at 8:00 last night. Luke always runs high fevers when he gets them so although I was worried I wasn't panicky (too much). His fever broke about 7:15 and by the time we got to the dr.'s it was 100.2. His right eye was blood red and the left was tinged red. So he got drops for those. When we got home his temp was climbing again, so we continued with tylenol and motrin every 3 hours through the night and he still didn't sleep well. He threw up several times during the night and by morning wasn't even keeping water down. So I called the dr. again and he wanted to see him right away. He had lost 13 oz. since the night before and his eyes were bloodier from the force of vomiting. So we got a suppository to settle his tummy, his fever was gone, and we go back tomorrow. Thankfully he has kept things down. The dr. said that if he didn't keep water down we were going to have to admit him to the hospital. Praise the Lord he is doing much better. It was a scary 2 nights and I am hoping he sleeps well tonight. He even went out to play in the new sandbox this afternoon!
I am having major troubles with my belly and Sean wants me to call the dr. tomorrow and tell them the swelling and pain are much worse. I am just tired of it all!!!!! Think they could do a tummy transplant?
Other than that, I have no new news. Oh...Will almost got married twice on Fresh Prince yesterday morning at 2:30 and again at 4. Last night Dan and his father had difficulties and Murphy Brown was discovered to have a bit of a slutty past. That is what happened in Nick at Nite world.

Statement for the day...I don't think it is okay to eat grapes at the supermarket before you pay when they are sold by weight.

Birthday Party Pics

The triplets party was Sunday and it rained cats and dogs so we had it indoors. It was busy, but I think they all had fun. We tried our anual birthday picture, I am going to steal Victoria's idea and I will post a pic from all 4 parties later. It is so neat to see how they have grown and changed. On the left you see Isaiah 2, Tyler and Ethan 3, Jakob 3, Tanis 3, Steven 3, Johnny 4, Andrew 18 mos., Caitlin and Luke 4.

I love the picture above of Jonathan and Old Grandpa. There is also a picture of Gabe looking hip hop in his sideways hat, Caitlin hanging around upside down, Luke checking out the candles, Tyler, Ethan and Johnny in the new Nemo sandbox, Tanis, Johnny and Luke singing Happy Birthday, Tyler enjoying cake and Caitlin sneaking some frosting. The cakes were a Princess, a Pirate, and a train.

We had about 34 people there for cake and ice cream and 5 more stopped by later. Sean quickly took a trip to our great neices birthday party where there was much family drama, of course. He wasn't sorry to leave it! I'll have more pictures when mine get develped, or I draw them - whichever happens first!

My Babies are 4!

Exerpts from my journaling...

On January 23, 2003 I took a pregnancy test and then another...we were pregnant! Sean and I had only decided to start trying in early December so it happened really fast. The following Saturday we told our parents and my sister. Everyone was happy for us. That night I had really bad cramping so we went to the hospital. They did bloodwork and an exam. The hormone levels in my blood were lower than what they should have been, so they decided to do an ultrasound. We were preparing for bad news and doing a lot of praying. The tech. kept asking me if we had done any fertility treatments and I said no. Then she called in someone else who asked me the same thing. I just wanted to know if the baby was okay and all they would tell me is "If they let you go home you know you are okay, if not then you should worry." I was already worried! After what seemed like forever the ER doc said I could go but that I needed to make an appt. with my ob that Monday. Monday came and Dr. Jones told me very matter of factly "You are having a normal twin pregnancy." My due date was figured to be Sept. 28th which was the day after my sister's birthday. With this news came celebration and sadness. I was so afraid of sharing the news of my pregnancy, let alone a twin pregnancy, with my 3 closest friends who were all trying to get pregnant. I did, and they were all happy and supportive.

9 weeks later we went back for the second ultrasound to make sure both babies were okay. I laid on the table quite nervous, my first pregnancy had been twins but we lost one very early on. Judy put the gel on my belly and started the ultrasound. She was very quiet which was not normal for her, so Sean and I got a bit scared. Finally I couldn't stand it and asked her if everything was okay. She said "Look at the screen and tell me what you see" We said "3 black circles" and she said "uh-huh". I said "what?" still not quite getting it and she said "Amanda, there are 3 babies" We started giggling, in complete shock, and she had Dr. Kasten come in to take a second look. He said to keep it quiet for 2 weeks and then we would be past the first tri-mester.

We got home and my mom, who was watching Gabe, asked how things went. She was the only one in the family who we had told about the twins (she didn't even tell dad!). We showed her the picture and because she had seen Amy's with the twins, she caught on rather quickly. When she got home and told dad he called certain it was an early April fool's joke!

The 2 weeks went by so slow. I got so nauseated, lost 8 lbs. and couldn't stand the sight of diet coke! On March 12th we went back for our ultrasound and it showed 3 viable babies!!! We were free to share the news and was it ever exciting! Gabe couldn't quite grasp the idea of 3 babies. He was 4 and had been praying since before we got pregnant for twin sister's like his cousins. He got a lot of attention as the new "future big brother x 3". My dad made copies of the ultrasound and carried it everywhere. He interrupted a church meeting to tell the asst. pastor who had just had twins the year before, would whip the picture out in the middle of stores and restaurants. He was tickled!

May 6th we found out Baby A was a boy, Baby B was a girl and Baby C was most likely a boy. 2 weeks later we got confirmation that C was definately all boy!

I had dr.'s appt.'s weekly and that meant ultrasounds weekly. They couldn't distinguish 3 seperate heartbeats with the monitor, so they had to do it visually. We were always happy to see them. Gabe went several times and thought it was weird. One week I had been feeling this knocking between my legs. It was the strangest and most annoying feeling. It didn't exactly hurt but it was by no means comfortable. During one of my visits it happened and so Judy looked with the ultrasound and we saw Baby A actually knocking on my bladder! Caitlin would sommersault constantly and each week we would find her head in a different position. Jonathan would stick his feet up under my rib cage and hiccup pretty much non stop!

I found out during my 2nd trimester that Lura, Kellie and Victoria were all pregnant. It was so neat to all be doing it together! Me with 3, Kellie w/ 1, Lura w/ 2 and Vic with 2! One girl and 7 boys!

I was hospitalized once with a kidney infection and after that had to go on MATRIA for home contraction monitoring. I never had many contractions except for on the 4th of July when Scott's mom was killed in a car accident on the way to my house. I think stress induced those. I felt horrible and couldn't even go to the funeral because I wasn't aloud to travel out of town at that point.

The 3rd week of July they did an ultrasound and found that Baby C had slowed in growth. We were sent to Akron on July 31st for level 3 ultrasounds. They couldn't determine if there was danger or not, but decided to admit me anyways. We were completely unprepared! 4 days later on Aug. 3rd Luke Edward, Caitlin Grace and Jonathan Gerald entered the world at 8:43,8:43 and 8:44 a.m. Gabe was also born at 8:44 a.m. Sean and I like to think that Jonathan, who is the spitting image of Gabe, is the twin we lost that God knew we were not ready for in 1998. We spent just about 3 1/2 weeks in the NICU and came home only to go to Fisher Titus for a week. It was a tiring first year, but wonderful.

I am so thankful to my Lord for giving me 4 beautiful healthy children and on this day especially for my sweet triplets. They have made my world busier, noisier and a lot more complicated but have also made it full of much more love, laughter and happiness. I couldn't imagine life without them and I love them so much.

Happy 4th Birthday Luke, Caitlin and Johnny!

My statement for the day...

I really like watching the new show on VH1 "Bret Michaels Rock of Love". It is trashy, goofy, serves no purpose and I enjoy it.

I am tired of cleaning. It has been at least 20 minutes so far! I have found several "lost" items though. I guess that is good.
The kids are finally out of time out. Jonathan and Caitlin apparantly felt they had severly dry skin so they covered themselves head to toe with Vitamin E lotion. What a mess.
Luke has been fairly decent and Gabe is at Valley Beach.

Has anybody heard the song "Rockstar" by Nickleback? I absolutely love it, well I love Nickleback to begin with. Ooh, Lura....this might be controversial. And I love the Harry Potter books too. Take that!

I am doing okay physically. The "lump" I think it needs a name, has grown some more and it really hurts to have my waistband touch it, however I think the neighbors would frown on my nudity. Okay, they would run screaming to their phones to call the cops! I didn't get much for sleep last night, in case you can't tell!

We are getting ready for the triplets party on Sunday. Tomorrow they will be four!!!!! They got accepted into the preschool we wanted, so they will start school in a month. My mom is making three cakes, as she does every year, for their birthday. Caitlin is having a cinderella 3-D cake, Johnny is having Thomas the Tank, and Luke requested a pirate cake. They will love them I am sure. None of Sean's family is coming to the party....long story. We are expecting his cousin Rhonda and her hubby and possibly her parents. We are also inviting Angie's (his sister who passed away) sons and her ex husband and new wife. We get along with them well. And Lura, Kellie and Vic and their 890 kids. Plus my family will be there. It should be fun. I will have lots of pictures! I think Sean and I are going to try and do some birthday shopping tonight. As Lura would tell you my kids NEED presents!!! (sorry Lura, you know I couldn't resist.)
Hopefully my tummy will hold out for all of this.

Well I am enjoying reading all the new and exciting things you guys are posting! HINT HINT!!!

Congratulations to Kellie for finishing Grad School!!! She graduates on Saturday!!! Hooray! I am so proud of you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This one's a shocker....

This used to be the for Lura segment on my blog, but apparantly that wrecked the whole purpose. Cheryl figured out what I am doing, so ya'll bear with me....

Sometimes I miss out on great opportunities because I am worried about my appearance too much.

Charity was right. Brian Bonsall. Did you cheat????

Some News...

Hi friends.

Today was a busy day. I had a dr.'s appointment this morning, Caitlin this afternoon and in between the triplets painted the floors in the kitchen, dining room, living room and front room with RED jello.

Caitlin's appointment was with the eye dr. for her second post surgery check up. Her right eye is still turning out more than it should, so every Monday night we have to give her an eye drop in the left eye. When she wakes up her eye should be dilated and blurry. This will hopefully cause her to use her right eye more and make it straighter. We go back on Nov. 1st - if there is no change we will have to schedule another surgery.

I saw the dr. this morning. Crystal, you had better be HAPPY!!!!!! I have been having bouts of abdominal pain again and last night it got pretty bad and I discovered a lump where my deformed scar is from abdominal surgery 2 years ago. It hurts! Also I have been having other things and have some swelling on my lower left side, again. They have scheduled an ultra sound for Monday the 6th and then on the 16th I have a consult with a surgeon. The dr. thinks that I have developed another incarcerated hernia in me belly. Whooppee.

So that was today. I hope tomorrow is a bit more relaxed and the kids behave.
Have a good night everyone!

For Lura

I don't like that white stuff that is on oranges after you peel them.