2017

Well, it's here.  The new year...already nearly a month in!  I write this for you because some of you enjoy it, but I also write it so I can remember life as it is now--everything going so fast!  A couple of MUST REMEMBERS already:

I had another heart surgery on January 10th, to fix some blood flow issues out of my heart and a resulting aneurysm in my left lung.  Everything went fantastically...I wasn't even kept over night!  Heart surgery-outpatient style!!  I can't even believe how far medicine has advanced, even in just my 35 years of experience!

God orchestrated so many things for me and my family those couple weeks before and after.  I am continually left in amazement at the personal-ness of God's graciousness to me.  Things big and small...like for instance, God sent a big snowstorm to the hit the Southeast 3 days before my surgery. This "happened" to be the weekend Josh needed to be in Atlanta for Drill and Drill was called off not even 24 hours before his flight, so he was home with me. God's kindness to me!!  This was one of many examples.

Which leads me to the next item I need to document to remember (also further proof of God's gracious gift of moving Josh's drill away from surgery weekend) is life as it is now:

So this last weekend Josh had his rescheduled Drill.  Pretty much without fail, if Josh is going to be gone, the wheels are going to fall off the bus.  Now I have the kids alone probably 70% of the week as it is, no big deal, but somehow, if Josh leaves the state... WHOA NELLIE.

It starts early this time...Thursday night when Josh gets home from work he tells me that the car was sputtering (the one we've had in the shop twice in December...and spent alot on to get it up to emissions test standards) and he barely made it to the driveway. So to the mechanic it goes bright and early Friday morning. Also, Renae wakes up with red dots all over her legs...I'm internally freaking out.  Bed bugs? No way. Bug in her bed that bit her all night?  Maybe.  She says its from running around the backyard in the grass last night (for 95 seconds) (in January).

We watch the Inauguration and then take Josh to the airport. Friday evening goes relatively uneventfully...other than Renae gets benedryl..."This is soo yummy!  It's my favorite thing to drink!  I wish you all could have to drink this yummy pink medicine!!"

Friday night I get to bed early...good thing, too, because I get a visitor around 2am.  An itchy visitor who gets more benedryl and then sleeps in my bed for the rest of the night.  Then at 6:15 the 4 year old comes to let me know he needs new sheets.  Thankfully, he doesn't...he somehow only drenched himself!  But the night it over.  Very quickly we are all up.

Renae's spots are worse.  She takes a shower, while I interrogate her on did she use any new lotion or eat anything I don't know about....pretty sure it's just hives.  She feels fine, just itchy.

The day goes fairly smoothly. Regular chaos, spills, and minor injuries occur.  A kid stops up the toilet using an entire roll at once.  So that bathroom becomes off limits since we have 2 others.  The rain stopped enough for us to go outside playing in the front yard until about 5 minutes later a stray dog showed up and started unfriendly behavior.  I shooed him off once which bought us about 3 more minutes.  Then he chased Jack and Noah...tears happened...I tried to get his collar to find a phone number he got angry growling at me.  Done.  See ya outside, it's been real.  (Good thing it took at least 20 minutes to get socks, shoes, and coats, and drinks, and bathroom trips done to get outside in the first place HAHA)  I end up calling our insurance Nurse line about Renae, just to see if there is more I should be doing as I'm sure it's hives at this point...there's not.  So more benedryl!

Saturday night...I fully intended an early bedtime, but I got caught up in a book that I started after the dishes and floors were clean which happened after the kids got put to bed.  I was sleeping around 11:30...woken up at 1am by a crying boy with growing pains...tell him to get in bed with me since I'm in a complete fog...after I get kicked about 47 times I'm awake enough to kick him out and get him back down to his own bed.  Only to be awakened 25 minutes later by his roommate who informs me that he is "sleep crying". Go down put her back to bed, put him back in bed with me.  Get kicked for a couple more hours...then a 3 year old makes the rounds "I awake Mommy!".  Put her back in bed.  She goes right back to sleep. I fall sleep.  I wake up to "Noah remember that potty is broken!  Go downstairs! Quick!"  "I need to go really bad!!!"  "Mom, Noah went potty down the stairs and on the floor." What.

!??!

Noah is so sweet though, I'm not even in sight and he is already hollering an apology "Mommy I'm sorry I didn't go fast enough, I'm cleaning up my mess, will you forgive me!?"  I get around the corner and he is using his blankie to mop up the flood. I head down to help him carefully avoiding the last stair which is quite damp...I skipped the step and somehow stepped down funny and end up falling. Yep.  Flat on my back in pee.

AND the hives are WORSE still!  I get her in the shower, again and scrub with Jordan's all-free body wash...again. No church for us, since she looks like she has the plague.

So after breakfast I help the kids makes some forts in the living room.  Quite entertaining-- Jack and Noah were "sneaky nature cats"  ?! and Jordan was a puppy.  This is all well and good until I notice Jordan come out of the fort (from the part where I couldn't see her) with a jump rope tied around her neck as her leash.  She was just fine, but that thing was tight!  So I take it off (she was NOT happy with me for taking her toy) and the jump rope goes in the trash. Soon after my adrenaline goes back to normal Noah uses the off limits bathroom and floods it.  Then in an effort to get bathroom privacy from Jordan he shuts the door (which can't be shut due to Josh's pull-up bar) and somehow, the pull-up bar comes off the door frame and lands right on Jordan's head. That sucker is heavy, too.  Lots of crying.  Mopping bathrooms. Time to watch a movie.

We have to miss AWANA due to the hives, and it was going to be backwards night so the kids changed all their clothes to backwards and we had backwards night at our house. ;)  hilarious.  And then Jordan comes up to me..."Momma, Noah got out playdoh..." And there on her finger is a good-sized lump of brown...NOT PLAYDOH.  Nice try, little girl.  Off to hunt for the rest of it... Jack and I sit outside the bathroom door and practice a little of his school work for 25 minutes while Jordan sits on the potty for more "practice".

And then finally it's time to drive to the airport and pick up Josh...who's plane was over a hour late. But still...  Hallelujah!

Sometimes keeping people alive is harder than it should be!