An update on James and what we've been doing

James sitting in a Little Tikes car Tuesday night! He thought it was so fun to drive, but he couldn't understand why, when he turn the steering wheel that the wheels didn't turn that way too!

James' Beads of Courage. Each bead represents part of James' journey with leukemia. Hospital stays, surgeries, pokes, lines, chemo, etc... He also has a Purple Heart which signifies the end of treatment.

Wednesday afternoon, the clowns stopped by. James was starting to get fussy since he wanted to eat. The clowns kept him amused for 45+ minutes and by then, it was time to head to the OR.

This is James yesterday evening... he had been having breakthrough pain earlier and was tired. It didn't prevent him from watching Superman though! I do believe that when James is finally discharged I will have memorized the Superman episodes!

I'm hoping that James will be discharged this Tuesday. But nothing is definite yet and it all depends on James. He get out of bed and went for a ride in a wheelchair down to the library here. But we headed back shortly, since he was getting tired and hurting. James and I snuggled up and slept the rest of the afternoon away. Now he's back to watching Superman all snuggled in his soft green blanket the Child Life Specialist brought by this morning!

♥ Hannah ♥

Family Life

B caught reading a book!

K's birthday dinner... just waiting for the salmon. It was an absolutely delicious meal!

And now, I have a 18 year old sister! my goodness, how time flies!

Momma has more pictures of what country children do when they don't have a swing set over on One Big Adventure, plus an update on J's recent trip to Atlanta!

Meet Gusty.... aka Gustavus Adolphus snoozing on the side porch.

The treats after chicken processing... We had two families over who wanted to learn the 'how-to'.

We just did 75 chickens, since all of the 150 weren't big enough for slaughter yet. It made for a quick day. Although, we were all exhausted by the end of the day. J decided to finish up the day with some excitement by cutting his hand on a lounge chair on the porch... Poor baby! It's looking much better now, but we are still keeping it cover and putting antibiotic ointment on it.

So that's what we've been doing around here lately.... Hope you all enjoy the quick visit around the farm!

~Hannah

The Little Man

J really loves to dress up in a suit and tie (the tie is probably the most important, since he thinks it makes him look like Daddy, even though Daddy rarely wears one.) Yesterday, we were looking for an outfit J could wear today to Atlanta for an appointment and J found a tie. We pulled out a suit J was given back in 2007 (he was almost 3 then) and it still fits him, probably because he's gotten taller and slimmed down from all the steroids.

B, C, and I took J outside and got some pictures of him all dressed up with the new camera from Grandpa John and Grandma Nan (Thank you so much!)

I do have some more pictures to post, but they are on the other computer, so they will have to wait for right now! But they are some great pictures of things we've been doing around here! 

Hannah

Busy, Busy, Busy and a giveaway, too!

 We've been busy here the last couple weeks. On the 10th, we had several families over for Epiphany and I don't have any pictures from that... sorry! McKenzie or Mr. Daniel - would you email some of the pictures to me, pleeeaaassseeee. On the 17th, we had our first overnight visitors since August of 2005! 'J' made a new friend and 'C' and 'B' loved playing baseball with Mr. Norm and Mrs. Sally! I think we might have talked their ears off :)...

I've also been working on another project. Last October, I was reading a food blog and noticed a link to a giveaway for baby shoes. I visited the site and entered several of the giveaways there. I actually won something, too. It was a cute, but extremely expensive baby blanket!!! I've been entering other giveaways since then and started another blog to blog about giveaways (and earn extra entries :*)). I really wanted to host giveaways myself. But after thinking about it for a long time, I decided that I wasn't going to try and get people to sponsor giveaways on my blog. A day or two later, I got an email from a company asking if I wanted to review their product and host a giveaway. So... tomorrow morning, I am posting my first giveaway. A natural shielding lotion and I am really impressed with it. I'd like to invite you to come and enter the giveaway too.

A week ago, 'J''s surgeon called Momma and told her we could start putting his ostomy output into in mucous fistula, which is the other end of his colon. I'm excited that we have made it this far and I'm not looking forward to doing this next phase. The surgeon told Momma to contact a nurse practitioner to see about supplies. Momma talked to Mrs. Brenda, the NP, this week and Mrs. Brenda told her that she can set us up with a special pump and catheter to run the output in overnight... This is going to be interesting! 'J' appears to be doing better with the saline and kefir flushes now and I'm glad for that. Flushing him can be a problem and it takes a long time. I'm always glad when he falls asleep during flushing, because that makes it go easier for both of us.

Momma asked me to take over dinner meals this week and I've been finding it easier to come up with meals that all of us can eat. If any of you have suggestions for meals, I'd love to hear them. Tonight we had Daddy's Egg Bake! I used mozzarella I made today and ricotta from the last batch of mozzarella I froze. It was pretty good, but needed something else to help the texture. I think the ricotta made it 'grainy'! I've got an idea for tomorrow's dinner, but need to finalize it :)...

Got a few things to check on and finish, so I'll say g'nite!

~Hannah

What is important?

It must be one of the 'I'm up late' moments. But I was thinking about what is important about going to bed early verses staying up late and, should I say, enjoying the peace and quiet.  I stay up way too late most nights and get up late in the morning.  I have all sorts of things I do when I stay up, entering giveaways, blogging on my family's site, working on HTML codes, emailing (not that I email a lot of people, it's just reading all the mail from email subscriptions.).
Which brings me to my question, what is important: going to bed early or staying up late and getting things you want done? That's something I haven't figured out yet. What about you?

A year ago

Today marks a year since I paid my first, and I hope my last, visit to the ER for a severe sore throat. We were spending Thanksgiving with Momma's family and we all had varying degrees of sore  throats, runny noses, etc...  On Friday, I was feeling awful, though it's hard to remember about it. I do remember that breathing fast helped my throat feel a little better and that my fingers and around my eyes were tingling and I remember being very cold and crying because I hurt all over. I know that they drew blood (another first, that I hope not to repeat in an ER), because it hurt when she took the needle out and I had a bruise there. When Daddy took me back to Nona's house, I went right to bed and slept most of the afternoon. The next morning, Momma and I left early in the morning to go to Macon from North GA, Momma took me to see the oncall doctor at J's pediatrician, because the antibiotic wasn't helping and the pain meds didn't do anything to clear whatever it was up. Dr. G gave me a prescription for steriods. I was to take them for six days. By the second day, I felt so much better and I was able to work with J on his tubing and check 'n' changes. Momma and Daddy and K did them while I was sick. That is one experience that I wouldn't like to repeat.

This year, Nona, Poppa and Uncle E came down on Wednesday and we had a great visit. Thursday, we all ate Thanksgiving dinner together. It was delicious!

Doing Math

Today I was working on my math. Problem 17, if you want to know:)... It was a trapezoid and isoceles in one, and I had three different numbers, two right angles and I needed to find the area. I couldn't figure out what it was and finally looked in the answer book to see if they gave any information to help me. The only thing I learned was that the answer was 640mm2 and that just told me that I was waaayyyy off. So I asked Momma to help me and she couldn't figure out what was going on either. I knew one of the numbers was a dud and knew which one. I was all set to wait till Daddy came home and ask him(because my Daddy knows everything!) Just then, K told me that J's diaper was leaking and could I go and change it? I headed out the door and immediately, I knew how to work the problem and get the answer I needed. It just took me a leaky diaper!

Modesty

Wedding dresses are something that has bothered me over the last few years, because of the lack of  modesty.

These are wedding dresses from 1861. Not only are they gorgeous, but they are modest. However, I would like to point out that these dresses are huge and I don't see myself wearing them. But the basic style - highneckline and longer sleeves is what I'm mainly looking for.

The mark of the man of the world is absence of pretension. He does not make a speech; he takes a low business-tone, avoids all brag, is nobody, dresses plainly, promises not at all, performs much, speaks in monosyllables, hugs his fact. He calls his employment by its lowest name, and so takes from evil tongues their sharpest weapon.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Conduct of Life 1860

Now compare those wedding dresses with one that is common today.

Quite the difference there, wouldn't you agree? They are all beautiful dresses, but there is definitely a difference in between the two pictures. Yes, for some people, this is a modest dress and compared to others, it isn't. The main question that keeps appearing is, what is modest? I think that I Peter 3:4 answers that question very well, "Rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God." I believe that there are standards for modesty and that our parents should have a large say in what we wear. I would be among the first to say that I don't always agree with my parents on modest clothing. But I have found that they are always right if they have a check about my clothes and usually my momma doesn't object if I have a check about something either and we'll either pass it down to the next sibling in line or give it away.

According the dictionary, modesty is:

1. the quality of being modest; freedom from vanity, boastfulness, etc.
2. regard for decency of behaviour, speech, dress, etc.
3. simplicity, moderation.

Modesty isn't just what we wear, but what we do and say. Proverbs 31:30 says ^"Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing, but a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be praised."