creative juices

I don't ever spend much money on arts and crafts stuff, especially since Mychael and Nathan are taking a weekly art class, and Zach and Jordan are content with coloring and Play-doh. But it never ceases to amaze me at how creative they can be with what they find around the house. In these pictures you can see Zach's "base" made using the math manipulatives (the small cubes are storm troopers), Nathan's raft he made out of popcicle sticks which actually floats, and Mychael's puppet out of a sock and miscellaneous items.

pass the albuterol, please

Our Thanksgiving got off to a pretty good start with breakfast at Nana's, but sort of went downhill from there...family pictures fell through, then right as I was pulling the last casserole out of the oven to go to the family dinner gathering Mychael came up to me and said he couldn't catch his breath. Unable to find my stethoscope, I put my ear to his back and heard wheezing on both inhalation and expiration, so...Jon headed with a very teary and scared Mychael to the ER. Jon's mom met me at the entrance and traded cars with me, she took my car full of kids and food and went to the dinner (we said there was no need for everyone to hang out in a germy ER) and I stayed with Jon and Mychael. Praise God, we were seen quickly...Mychael's O2 sats were 89%, so they wanted to get him going on a nebulizer treatment fairly soon. Then they took a chest x-ray, and monitored him awhile. He was markedly better after the treatment, but when we were getting ready to be discharged his heartrate was around 150, so they kept us awhile longer and did an EKG. We finally got to eat some turkey around 8:00...and some Pepto-Bismol around midnight! He has not even needed the inhaler they sent him home with, but he is on an antibiotic and prednisone. Thursday night before we went to bed I got out a book of mine and read all of the Scriptures to him which were about sickness and healing, and I also anointed him with oil. God is good.

trip to zoo

I braved the zoo with the four kids on a beautiful day yesterday. Fortunately, I had an excellent photographer along to capture some of our day (aka Mychael Judah-bean). Jordan was a bit of a pill, but everyone else did great (and I didn't lose Nathan for even a moment!), thank God. The sea lions were the most entertaining, but some of the animals in Africa were up very close.

Mmmm...

The kids and I went to one of our favorite parks last week which also happens to have goats on the premises. Jordan got brave enough to feed them out of her hand, and every time they ate what she gave them she'd say, "Mmmm." It was so cute!

Halloween

We took the kids to a fall festival before trick or treating around our little neighborhood. I am placing the kids on a candy fast the next two days for the sake of my sanity!!!! Oh my gosh, they were WILD yesterday, Nathan got into the candy a couple of times on the sly. It wasn't pretty.

visit from grandparents

We were honored with a visit from my parents, AKA Grandma Chapstick and The Beepinator (OK, for those of you out of the loop, that's my parents, Grandma and B-Pa). It was short and sweet, and it gives us that fix we needed until our visit down to see them at Christmas...

Cub Scouts

Both older boys are participating in Cub Scouts this year, and here's a picture of Nathan with his first badge earning (it wasn't the bobcat badge, that will be next). He was proud as peaches, I can really see how Scouts helps with self-esteem, I highly recommend it! Mychael did earn his bobcat badge, but the picture was too dark. When he gets his uniform on tonight I'll get a better picture and post it.