A little . . . okay, a LOT . . . of my tale

I've been feeling compelled to write out my story lately . . . not because I think anyone wants to read it, but more because I will benefit from remembering and writing it. This will be a 2-part story describing two distinct ways the Lord has been working in my heart this year. I'm having trouble deciding whether to tell the "contentment no matter where He takes me" tale or the "thankful He saved my life" tale first. Hmm . . . I guess being alive is always a good place to start. (By the way, this is a loooooong story, so if you already know my medical saga, skip the first 13 or 14 paragraphs (yes, it's THAT long).)

For those who may not know my story, I have had a chronic kidney condition all my life. It's most likely benign, but I have seen a nephrologist for the past 15 years to monitor it, and in the interest of being on the safe side, my first nephrologist 15 years ago decided it would be prudent to biopsy one of my kidneys. This took place in 1994 when I was 19 years old. Unfortunately the biopsy was inconclusive - it revealed abnormalities but was not conclusive as to what the underlying defect was.

So, fast-forward about 10 years. I was 29 and barely pregnant with our third child (so barely that I wasn't even aware of her yet) when I developed high blood pressure for the first time. The drs pretty much treated it as pregnancy-induced hypertension even though they thought it highly unlikely that it would have developed so early in the pregnancy if that's really what it was. I began taking medicine to control my bp, and in the end Lauren was induced 3 weeks early because the medication was beginning to lose its efficacy.

Now comes the first time in this tale when I began to truly fear for my life. When Lauren was 3 days old, I developed the worst headache known to mankind. I had never experienced anything like it. It began on a Monday afternoon, and by the next morning I was in tears. We had to take Lauren to the pediatrician to get her billiruben checked that morning (yes, ALL of my kids decided to be jaundiced), and several nurses asked if I was okay. I struggled through that visit, which ended around 9:30 am. I had made an appt to see my midwife at noon but dropped the kids off at my mom's and headed on over there hoping she could see me sooner. I waited for about an hour in tears when finally I went to ask the nurse how much longer it would be. Taking one look at my face, she said, "Just one more minute." Within a minute I was having my bp taken, and at this point it had risen only to about 170/90. (It would continue to rise until it finally peaked at 210/115.) At that point, my midwife and the consulting OB sent me straight to the hospital with my "Do not pass go. Do not collect $200" card. I spent 4 days in the hospital with post-partum pre-eclampsia (which I did not know could occur), 2 of those days in critical care as they worked to get my bp under control. I finally got relief from the headache on about the middle of the second day.

I was sent home on day 4 (finally being able to see my 9 day old baby I hadn't seen since she was 5 days old) but my bp continued to be a roller coaster. Finally after a few weeks, the OB said this was clearly not pregnancy-related anymore and I needed to see my pcp because he would know of a wider range of bp medications to try. Of course, about this time our insurance changed, and our pcp was no longer covered, so I had to go see a new dr. He was listening to my heart and said, "Do you know you have a heart murmur?" Um, no. He said, "It's actually quite loud. Are you sure no one's ever mentioned it." Of course, I'm very sure, so he does a chest x-ray. Here comes my next "Do not pass go" card. My heart was enlarged, so he sent me straight to the cardiologist at 5:30 that afternoon.

The cardiologist was concerned that I may have had cardiomyopathy; I did not. He said that my heart was definitely enlarged and a couple of my valves (mitral and aortic) didn't close all the way, but it was probably the result of how high my bp had gotten during my pre-eclampsia episode. He wanted to keep an eye on things and thought it would probably resolve itself in time. It did not.

All this time, I'd been seeing my nephrologist to keep an eye on my kidneys. Sometime in mid-2006 he decided to do a kidney ultrasound since I had not had one in many years. That ultrasound revealed some enlarged blood vessels in my left kidney. He thought it was probably just some scarring from the biopsy I had had years before, but he ordered an MRI to get a closer look. So, I had an MRI in the fall of 2006, which confirmed enlarged blood vessels in that kidney. My dr decided not to do anything at that point (a decision he would later question) but to keep an eye on things. So, in December of 2007 he ordered another MRI. (Meanwhile, my bp had continued to require more and more medication in order to keep it down.) This time the MRI report was that the vessels of my left kidney were even larger than they had been the year before. This concerned him, but he still said it could be anything from a minor aneurysm to scar tissue to . . .

So, in Jan. 2008 I had an arteriogram of my kidney. (That's not a fun procedure, but it is pretty cool. The radiologist pretty much steers a catheter through your arteries much like a kid playing a video game, with the controls entirely on the outside of your body as he watches the inside on a monitor. I'm amazed at how they can make it twist and turn through exactly the vessels they want to get it to your heart, brain, kidney, etc.) As soon as the radiologist injected the dye, he said, "Oh wow, you have a massive AVM." (a term I would later learn means arterior-venous malformation) He had told me prior to the procedure that he would inform me right away of what he saw but that he would NOT make any guesses about what my dr may want to do about it. He stressed this point quite emphatically before he began the procedure, so I was a bit taken aback when his next words (after, "Call and see if Dr. W is in the hospital at the moment - he's going to want to see this right away.") were, "You're definitely going to need surgery to fix this. Yeah, they're gonna have to fix this." So much for not taking any guesses!

So, at this point (while I'm lying flat and still in the hospital bed for four hours, as is required after an artiogram), the radiologist told me to call my nephrologist and ask if he really wants to see me or if I should just go ahead and let them make an appt with the cardio-vascular surgeon. I didn't have to call. The next morning my phone rang, and it was Dr. W's office saying, "We're making an appt with the cardio-vascular surgeon." Still, I didn't have any idea what to expect. As anyone on the planet would do, I began to research AVM's on the internet. It seemed that the most common treatment was an arteriographic procedure where they insert some type of stent through your leg to repair the problem. Of course, I also read that sometimes they have to take out your kidney, but I had absolutely no idea which of the things I was reading applied to me. So, I did what any normal person would do . . . didn't worry about it and went on our church's women's retreat.

We were gone from Fri evening until Sunday around noon. It was a great retreat and a time of sharing and connecting with friends that I will treasure forever. I pulled into my parents' driveway around 1:00 Sunday afternoon (David had, of course, gone to my parents' house with the kids) and found David standing in the driveway waiting for me with a piece of paper in his hand. He barely said hello before saying that Dr. W had called and left his home number for me to call him when I got back to town. Ding-ding-ding!! Alarm bells going off in my head . . . he called on a Sunday??? And he left his home number??? Those are never good signs.

So, I called him right away, and he said that he had been in his office looking over my pictures (from the arteriogram) and realized that a whole lot of doctors were talking about Rebecca R, but he wasn't sure if anyone had actually talked to Rebecca R. Umm, no, actually. He said he just wanted to prepare me for the fact that I as going to be having a "huge operation" and that there was a very good chance I would lose my left kidney. Huh?? At this point, I still wasn't even 100% sure what an AVM was, much less how it was threatening my life. He said that he had moved my appt with Dr. B (the surgeon) up to the next afternoon and wanted this taken care of asap.

So, the next afternoon I went to Dr. B's (aka, my life-saver and miracle-performer) office and finally began to understand exactly what was going on with me. I finally saw the previous two years of my life beginning to make sense. Have you ever watched one of those artists on tv who starts a painting with seemingly random strokes on a huge canvass? I saw one once where the artist spun this huge square canvass around as he made stroke after seemeingly meaningless stroke, until all at once - as it was practically finished - I saw the face of Albert Einstein. It wasn't until almost the final stroke of the brush and spin of the canvass that I saw any face at all, and once I did, it was unmistakeable, and I didn't know how it had taken me so long to see it. That's what it was like when Dr. B explained my AVM. So, here it is:

When I had that kidney biopsy back in '94, the biopsy needle had nicked a hole in an artery and a vein. Blood had begun to leak, so instead of going from the artery to the vein via a capillary bed as it's supposed to, the blood was shunting straight from the artery into the vein. Well, as you proably know, the blood in an artery is high pressure, in a vein low pressure. So, over time, as this blood was forced into the vein at high pressure, it began to pool there and create what's called a fistula - a bulging area of blood vessel where blood accumulates. Well, after almost 14 years, that fistula had grown so much that there was more than twice as much blood in it as there was in the entire rest of my body. The result: my heart was having to work waaaaay overtime to supply enough blood to my body, resulting in an enlarged heart, high blood pressure, and chronic exhaustion (which I had chalked up to having 3 kids aged 3 and under!).

So, Dr. B's plan of action, he said, was to go in through my abdomen (because the kidney's vascular system lies in the front), find the exact spot of the leak, and fix it. Sounds pretty simple, right? Well, he said that the fistula contained so much blood that when reading the arteriogram pictures, it was impossible to tell exactly where the hole was. It would fill with blood with every beat of my heart, and by the time in emptied during the off-beat, it was already full again . . . so, he basically said he would have to go in fairly blind, use an ultrasound once he got inside of me, and try to find the leak that way and hopefully be able to save my kidney . . . and my life.

Now's probably a good time to mention my grandmother. My dad's mom (who died in her 60's while I was in college) had high blood pressure and kidney problems most of her adult life. She had the first of several heart attacks in her 30's and eventually died of a massive heart attack on the operating table for an unrelated, relatively minor, sugery. (Thyroid, I think.) So, all this time, I've pretty much figured that my health issues are just genetic, and whatever happened to her would probably happen to me, too.

Now, if you know me at all, you know I'm not an easily freaked-out person. As my pastor, Bill, would say, my boat doesn't tip real easily. Even right up until this point, I've been my usual even-keeled self - not panicked, not worried, not anxious . . . but, then . . .

I went for my pre-op on what was supposed to be the day before my surgery (it ended up being postponed a week because I had the freakin' flu), and at LEAST 4 different medical professionals (drs and nurses) came into the pre-op area and said, "Oh, you're the woman with that AVM?" or "I saw the pictures of that AVM . . . amazing . . . mind if I listen?" (You could hear it with a stethoscope on my side, and they were all in awe of that . . . imagine how much more amazed they were when I showed them that you could actually feel it just by touching my side . . . I'd been feeling it for a long time and just thought it was a very-strong pulse.) Or, my favorite, from my anasthesiologist (who is also a good friend), "Wow! Do you exercise at all? You do? That is unbelievable. I can't believe you're alive."

So, now that I was turning into a medical freak-show - which is great if you want fast and friendly service from a medical office staff, but not so great if you want someone to allay your fears about your condition - I was starting to get a little concerned. In fact, by the time I was on my way home I was coming unglued. Fear and panic were apparently trying to make up for lost time, and I became almost fully convinced that I was going to die on the operating table exactly like my grandmother had. Yep, that was it. Everything else was so uncannily similar to her that this made pefect sense, and I morphed into panic personified, crying and hyperventilating like there was, pun intended, no tomorrow.

Here's where my favorite phrase comes in, "But, God . . ." How many times is that found in the Bible? I don't know, but it's in there a lot. Things are looking mighty hopeless . . . but, God . . . those must be two of the most beautiful words in the English language. As I was driving home from the hospital I was listening to a song that I had not heard in, literally, years. Thanks to my recent aquisition of an ipod, I had been traveling down memory lane and dowloading songs I hadn't heard in ages. One of these was by an old Christian folk singer named Don Francisco. Most anyone under 35 or 40 has probably never heard of him, but the majority of his songs were simply Bible stories told in a beautifully poetic way and set to folk music.

The song I was listening to (unintentionally; it was on shuffle) during my drive home that day was called "Voyage to Gennesaret" and was the story of Jesus walking on the water as the disciples' boat was caught in a storm. Here are a few of the lyrics (the rest are in the link):

A man was walking on the water, and we trembled, cried and prayed
Till He stopped and turned and spoke to us, "It is I, don't be afraid.

At that moment, I had the clearest sense of God's presence and voice as I have ever had in my life. I saw Jesus - the unseen presence through every twist and turn of my life's journey - looking at me with love and saying, "It is I. Don't be afraid. Everything you're going through, have gone through, and will go through. Every road your life takes you on. Every storm you weather. Every joy, every sorrow, every pain, every unknown. It is always I. Never be afraid." I'm sure many of us have experienced what the Bible refers to as "peace that passes understanding," and this was truly one of those times. Only God could take me from abject fear to peaceful calm in a heartbeat.

And more aware of my heartbeats, I had never been. After two years of trying not to worry, every palpitation (and they were many) felt like it could be the end of me. The feeling of peace God gave me that day would not last; it would come and go. But, the vision and the message remained. I would lie in bed at night with my hand on my side feeling the blood pouring through the AVM and imagine that it was suddenly harder, faster, stronger, fainter . . . I conjured up images of my heart stopping or my insides hemmoraging that would make a CSI writer proud. But, always, I remembered God's voice: It is I. Don't be afraid.

So, thank you, Don Francisco. Thank you, Dr. B. Oh, how did things turn out? The surgery was not fun, but it was successful. After making a 10 1/2 inch incision and retracting my ribs out of the way, Dr. B located the leak with an ultrasound and was able to bypass and patch it without having to remove my kidney. I'm told that when they opened me up, my heart was pumping almost fourteen liters of blood per minute, and by the time they closed me, it was pumping six. (Five is normal.) Recovery was not easy . . . 5 days in ICU, 2 days in a regular room, 4 weeks without my kids, 6 weeks sleeping (or, more accurately, not sleeping) on the couch, and going on 6 months now with ribs that protrude in places they previously didn't and lingering pain when I do certain things like close the door on the back of the van or lift a heavy casserole dish out of the oven. But, you know what? I'm alive. God is still there, the unseen presence comforting and holding me steady through every storm He allows to come my way. And, like Peter, I sometimes keep my eyes on Him and experience a peace that is as miraculous as walking on water, but I often take them off and panic anew. For those times, here are a few more of the lyrics from the song, which is really from the Word of God:

I climbed across the gunwhale looking straight into His eyes
But long before I reached His side, the wind began to rise
I forgot Him in an instant and I sank just like a stone.
I cried out, "Jesus save me!" and His hand was on my own.

We did it . . . the big day

After having him at home with me for 5 years and 10 months, I dropped my firstborn off at school today. I expected tears . . . from both him and me . . . but to my surprise and delight, neither of us cried. He was nervous. I took pictures, but he did not want to look at the camera. We got there about 15 minutes before the start of school so that he could meet and play with other kids in the class. There were a couple of girls playing with a globe, a couple of boys playing with some type of connecting buildng toy, and another boy playing with blocks. After clinging to me for a few minute, he said he wanted to go play blocks. We (David and me - he's such a great dad he went to work a little late so he could come with us for the first day) said great and took that as our cue to go.

The pics are not great. This is Josh's nervous side, refusing to look at the camera and unable quite to form a smile. But, he wasn't crying!

Daddy and Joshua before we left:


Mommy and Josh arriving at school:


Walking into school:


Josh at the sign outside of his classroom:


Josh at his seat at his table (he sort of looks like he's crying, but he's not):

Have you read them?

I saw this on my friend Kristen's blog (who got it from another blogger who got it from another who got it from the blog linked below. . . I'll spare you the entire chain of possession; suffice it to say it is not my list.) Anyway, I thought it was interesting. I couldn't find the actual source for the list or whose "Top 100" these books are, but I agree that most should be on any top 100 list. (Though I'm a little perplexed by the appearance of Bridget Jones' Diary and the absence of Diary of a Young Girl by Ann Frank.) And, I'm stunned by the statistic below . . . seriously, only 6 of these? Granted, I have an English degree, so I had no choice but to read a lot of them, but MANY of them were required reading in high school, and several of them I even read as a kid. I'm going to hang on to this list and make sure that my kids are able to "bold" most of them . . . whether they like it or not.

(Of course, this will be far more interesting if the rest of you copy and paste it into your blogs and follow the instructions.)

And, if there were a way to super-italicize The Count of Monte Cristo, I would. It's my favorite book . . . just so you know.

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According to The Big Read, the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books on this list. How many have you read?

Look at the list. Bold those you have read. Italicize the books you LOVE.

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. 1984 - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchel
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. Emma - Jane Austen
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. Dune - Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones’ Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Where do people come from?

A conversation between Ethan and me while watching the Opening Ceremonies last night:

Ethan: Mommy, why won't I ever be older than Josh?
Me: Because Josh was born before you, and you can't change when you were born.
Ethan: Why was he born before me?
Me: Because that's the way God planned it to be. He made Josh exactly when He planned to and you exactly when He planned to.
Ethan: How does God make us?
Me (not wanting to go there yet): Well, I'm not sure, but (interrupted by Ethan)
Ethan: I bet I know how he does it.
Me: Really, how?
Ethan: I bet He says, "May I please have a person?" and He gets one.

Works for me.

Awww

I'm sitting on the couch watching Jeopardy, Joshua and Lauren are jumping around and wrestling, and Ethan comes up and lays his head on my chest and puts his arms around me.
Me: You tired, buddy?
Ethan: No, I just really love you.

Life with a drama . . . king

So, tonight was family movie night, which we try to do about once a month. And, no, poor Lauren, as much as we love her, does not get to participate, so perhaps "Family Movie Night" is a slight misnomer. Anyhow, tonight's movie was Iron Will, a classic true story about a boy in a dog sled race. I chose it primarily because Joshua is obsessed with huskies right now, having bought a husky webkin several weeks ago. There are not words to tell you how much he liked this movie. He LOVED it. He wants to know when he can run in a dogsled race and whether he will get to wear "tennis racket shoes" when we move to Pennsylvania. And, of course it could probably go without saying that after it ended, he spent 10 minutes racing around the living room on his stick horse pretending it was a dogsled and telling me to cheer for "Iron Josh" and "Iron Wolfy" (his webkin). When I went in the boys' room to tuck them in, he was climbing over the end of the bunk beds to get on his top bunk (in order to make it more difficult than simply using the ladder) and saying to himself, "Don't give up now . . . you're almost there . . . you can make it . . ."

Darn blogspot

For some reason, Blogger would not let me load more than those 5 pics, and now it won't let me add pics at all using the blogger tool. (Anyone able to solve this mystery for me?) So, I had to start a new post and use photobucket. Sorry these are in two posts, but here are some more birthday party pictures:

All the kids on the front steps as the first clue is read:


Lauren and Bella working studiously on their craft:


Can you tell these two became fast friends?


Here's the great thing about moving to David's hometown: five boys (all first or second cousins) aged 4 and 5 - here are four of them:


David and his mom:


The kids all hung their loot bags on the fence while they dug for the treasure - thought it made a cute picture:

Pictures from Jack's birthday party in PA

I decided I'll do pics from one PA trip event each time I post. Today's pictures are from the kids' cousin Jack's birthday party. Last year we happened to be there for Isabella's party (Jack's little sister), and this year our trip just happened to fall during Jack's! The kids had such a great time with the pirate theme. Jack's parents, Jason and Mary Esther, hid clues all over their backyard with little rhymes pointing the kids to the next clue. The kids had so much fun racing from clue to clue carrying their loot bags that they had decorated right before the hunt. The hunt culminated with the kids' taking turns digging for the treasure that Jason had buried in the garden and marked with rocks in the shape of a J for Jack. (They each had lots of turns digging as it was really quite buried!) When they finally reached the treasure (which was a treasure bax wrapped in a black trash bag to protect it, making it look a lot like a dead body buried in the back yard, lol), it contained tons of goodies: beaded necklaces galore, candy, games, gold coins, etc. Here are a few pics from the party in no particular order:

Isabella enjoying her ice cream cone:


Searching for the next clue:


Still searching:


Digging up the treasure:


Lauren wearing some of her loot:


(Those beads by the way were a lifesaver during the 8+ hours we ended up spending in the Dulles airport on Tues and Wed. We had over 20 of them, and Ethan and Lauren played with them for HOURS. David agreed it was okay for Ethan to wear them since he was being a pirate.) :)

We're back!!

Okay, so technically we've been back for almost a week, but I am still trying to catch up with the world.

We spent almost a week in Pennsylvania exploring job options for David. Basically, he had an interview in Harrisburg that could not have gone better. Then we went to his hometown in northern PA (I'll leave out the name, but I affectionately think of it as "Not the end of the world, but you can see it from there, PA - no offense, family and friends who live there.) While we were there, David met with two different people about possibly going into practice with them, and both of those meetings went great. So, now that God has made it clear to us that it's time for us to head North, we're hoping he'll start closing a door or two to make it easier for us to decide which job to take. (If any of his prospective employers happens to read this, I am of course hoping that you will not actually close the door!)

It's amazing how much my perspective on the whole situation has changed in the past 21 months. That's how long it's been since we went for that fateful visit to David's hometown, and God blew us all away by giving me peace about moving there. (For those of you who haven't heard this long tale, I couldn't even say the word "Pennsylvania" without hyperventilating for the 6 years we were married prior to that fateful trip.) I still am not chomping at the bit to go because I hate to think of all I will miss . . . my family, our church, my kids going to the same Christian school I went to, stores, restaurants, civilization . . . but I really and truly have peace about it and feel like this is what we are supposed to do now. So, we are working furiously to get our house ready to put on the market, and at the rate we're going we should have a "For Sale" sign up by at least 2013. Actually, we're aiming for next weekend, but if you looked at our walls, you'd say we're clearly delusional. Unless, of course, royal blue permanent marker on a subtle beige background is the look you're going for . . . then, have I got just the house for you.

I'm going to post just a couple of pics tonight and perhaps more in small doses over the next few days. There are so many that I'm afraid you'll never come back if I post them all at once. That, and I'm tired.


Here's Lauren and her Granddad, to whom she was attached at the hip most of the trip:



The kids LOVED Grandmom and Granddad's garden:


Lauren at the Susquahanna River looking cute (I guess if I'm going to move there, I should probably learn to spell the name of that river, but I'm faaaaar too tired to look it up tonight!)


Ethan happy to be at Grandma's house:


Joshua and his Granddad:

And, now for something completely different

A canadian woman has had her kids taken away because she twice drew a swastika on her daughter's arm. Check out this article.

I truly am as offended by the swastika as anyone and am appalled that any parent would teach such so-called "values" to her children, but to take her kids away?!?! To those who like to bemoan America's loss of personal freedoms, this makes me glad not to live in Canada. (No offense, Shannon and Christina, if you happen to be reading - I was just floored by this article!)

In the interest of fairness, I was also floored by this article about a decision by an American judge not to allow drilling for oil and gas in an area of lower Michigan:

Property ownership /interest issues aside, where do these people suggest that we drill? We are stopped at every turn from offshore drilling, and now China is drilling off the coast of Cuba. Who would you rather have drilling (because with the state of today's oil market, *someone* is going to drill), us with our state-of-the-art technology or China with their outdated technology that is bound to do much more environmental harm than our own processes would?

And, seriously, the drilling in Michigan is going to harm this warbler bird? Here's my question (posed to me by one of my brothers, and I agree with him completely): how does one reconcile an unquestionable belief in evolution and rabid environmentalism at the same time? Does it make any sense to believe that thousands, perhaps millions, of species have literally come and gone from the face of the earth, leaving only those who could adapt and survive, yet somehow those species who happen to exist today are indispensable and to be protected and preserved (by another species, mind you) at any and all costs? I can't quite wrap my mind around that. Anyone? (This question is also implied by what I think is one of the best bumper stickers I've seen: "I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain to be a vegetarian!") And, no, I am not an evolutionist, but I do have a sense of humor.

We now return to our originally scheduled mindless posts about my kids. ;)

Uh-oh, you're in for it now

I have succesfully figured out this video linking thing, so I apologize in advance. It's been awhile since the PA grandparents have seen any videos of their only grandchildren. Too bad their son didn't marry someone who could manage to mail them a dvd every once in a while, sheesh! So, here are a few videos:

This one is from our beach trip in May - Josh and Lesey the first time they realized they could "swim" in the ocean. Before this, they were just jumping and splashing. Granted, they a had to revert to dog-paddling, but hey, the waves were pretty decent.



This one starts out fuzzy and odd for some reason (can't imagine why considering the mad skills of the camera-operator), but then it's Ethan lying (laying?) in the surf. He was a bit timid about getting out into the water - this trip was in May, and he mastered swimming in a pool toward the end of June. He's super cute, though. :)



And, lastly, here's Lauren jumping in the holes the boys dug. Since she could not have been less interested in the water, this is the best I could get.

Lauren's tribute to American Idol

This is my first attempt to post a video. It's from about a month ago. Lauren was playing around with my guitar, so I decided to get the video camera out. About a minute or so into it, she randomly began singing about David Cook! Yes, we watch American Idol and are not ashamed to admit it. (Btw, please ignore the disasterous bedroom in which she is being filmed. If I could somehow edit out the mess that was in the boys' room that day, I would. *Head hung in shame*)

Thankful Friday

Why, you may ask, would I have a picture of a cell phone on my Thankful Friday list? Because it has been missing for three days! Now, I'm a reasonable and rational person, and I am fully aware of the fact that I got along just fine for multiple decades without a cell phone. Indeed, those who came before me got along just fine without phones of any sort for centuries. Nevertheless, I need my cell phone. And, I am BEYOND thankful that I found it. Where? Under my bed. Before today, I thought the last time I remembered seeing it was when I was talking to my dear friend Alison in my car on Tuesday. Today, however, I had a sudden and euphoric revelation, a vision you might say, of my delightful daughter sitting on my bed playing with the camera feature on my phone the other day. (And, no, she did not have permission to do this, but when has that ever stopped her?) Remembering this, I began pulling off sheets and blankets and finally, on my hands and knees, I found it . . . the holy grail. Okay, not quite, but it sure does feel like it.



Lauren got her first haircut this week. Yes, she has hair. Not rich, full, flowing locks like some girls her age have, but hair. The boys were getting haircuts and she kept asking if it was her turn yet. I asked the girl who cuts theirs whether she thought trimming it from time to time might help it thicken up. Sensing the opportunity to lighten me of 5 more dollars, she of course, said, "absolutely!" So, Lauren got her haircut. I have no picture of it, nor did I save a lock of the hair that was cut. Being the remarkably un-sentimental person that I am, it did not even occur to do this with either of the boys, so I figure I won't rub salt in the wound of having a thoughtless mom by suddenly becoming thoughtful and sentimental over Lauren's milestones. I'm smart and thoughtful that way . . . and maybe they'll spend ever so slightly less on therapy in years to come.

Other things I'm thankful for today:

• Finding inexpensive tickets for our trip to PA next week so all of us will get to go.
• That David has several job options possibly opening doors for us to move to PA soon. Am I thankful for that? Not exactly, but I am thankful that, against all odds, God has given me peace about it, and it is nice not to be a walking ball of anxiety and fear.
• A hymn we sung in church last week, "O, God Beyond All Praising," which has a stanza that says this: "And, whether our tomorrows be filled with good or ill, we'll triumph through our sorrows and rise to bless you still." That really spoke to me this week.
• The chocolate trinity milkshakes the kids and I made this afternoon . . . mmm, mmm.
• Lauren's face after eating a chocolate milkshake

Our first lost tooth!

Check out this guy:



I put the boys to bed around 8:30 tonight, and around 9:15 Josh came into my room and said, "Mommy, it feels like something's wrong with my tooth." I looked, and it was twisted around backward and hanging almost upside down. I showed him in the mirror, and he was giddy with excitement. I tried pulling it but could barely even get to his bottom teeth because he couldn't stop grinning from ear to ear at the prospect of his tooth coming out. Finally, daddy came along and got it out in one swift yank. No blood, no tears . . . a perfect first baby tooth extraction. After calling Aunt Nae, Gaga, and Granddad (sorry, you weren't home, Grandma) and running around the house like he'd won a million dollar lottery, he finally went back to bed. He said he may not be able to sleep because he's too excited about the tooth fairy. I said, "Well, if she comes and you're awake, she may have to leave because she only buys lost teeth from children who are asleep." He said, "Mommy, you're the tooth fairy, and you can just pretend I'm asleep." Smart kid.

The race is on

I love the Olympics. I decided to let the boys stay up and watch a little bit of the track & field and swimming trials tonight. I told Josh that the 1500 meter was about to start and that the men would run around the track 4 times. He said, "Like this?" and ran a lap around our living room. I said that no, he would have to run around our living room about 100 times to be a mile. So, of course, being Joshua, he HAD to become what he was watching, so from the moment the starting gun went off, he started running laps around the living room and continued to run the entire 3 minutes and 49 seconds that the race lasted. (Can you believe people can run that quickly?) He said, "Did I win? Do I get to go to the Olympics?!" and when I told him yes, he ran his victory lap:






On our way home from mom's house tonight, we found this little guy on the railroad track. We pointed him out, but the kids couldn't see him from their seats. To their great surprise and delight, I got out and picked him up and brought him to the van for them to see. To their even greater shock and delight, I put him in an empty laundry basket I had in the van so we could bring him home. (Well, I put him in it so we could bring him home; the laundry basket wasn't in the van so we could bring him home - sometimes I have trouble correctly placing my modifiers. And, sometimes I'm anal about noting it - mea culpa.)









And, having nothing to do with anything else, but just because she's too cute for words, here's Lauren before church this morning: