Sun overload...

I'm guessing no one felt the need to divulge their marital prayer habits... I understand, pray is personal! I'm definetly still working through some of that myself.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure we are all of sun overload at our house. Kali, Megan and I are all a little red in the face... probably time to take a pool break!

Have a great weekend! We don't have any big plans... just playing our new found past time Carcassonne.... which might I say is an AWESOME puzzle/strategy that has managed to take over every evening for my husband and I! It is a game that won board game of the year a couple of years back, and it originated in Germany. If you are ever looking for something to do, give us a call and you can come play this addicting game with us! :)

Seriously Satan...

One of many of the things that Robert and I struggle with in our marriage is praying together... or even talking about praying together. I mean, I pray daily (and often during the day), but I have no clue how often my husband prays or even what he prays about. The few times in our marriage that we tried to start and end our day with a prayer together, we slowly began to feel Satan attack... or at least I think that's what it was... it just seemed that each time we were doing what we needed to do all 'hell' broke loose in our life.

Anyway, over the last few months, I have personally grown in my walk and really tried to do the things that God is calling me to do... and one of those things is to bring prayer into my marriage. So, here is my question for you... how often do you pray with your husband? Do you do Bible Studies together? Do you wake up in the morning and pray, what about bed time? Or, do you just pray together for the 'big stuff'? Please be honest with me... if you don't pray together (and don't mind sharing), why not? If you do, how often?

Oh and I would just like to say how annoyed I am that my dear hubs has come home from work and is in quite the mood. Ah, the joys of the inpatient man... Looks like it's going to be a loooonnnnggggg evening!

It's a girl...

OK, wait, I'm not saying that I'm having a girl... that would be impossible! What I mean is that my girls have decided that they are girls. In the last couple of weeks they have each gone through some kind of transformation of types... Kali asks me to brush her hair and asks if her clothing matches... Megan has wanted to wear earrings and asks me if her clothing is fashionable... HOLY COW! Now, it's not that I don't want my kids to match or wear cute clothing, but do you know how expensive it can get when they actually care about their clothing??? To top things off, today they convinced me to take them to the mall for ear repiercings... Kali needed her first holes pierced and Megs wanted second holes. (Who knew those were still in fashion...)

Anyway, I'm sure Robert will be all kinds of excited when he gets home and realizes how much we spent on cute little earrings etc, but they are awfully excited! He should be way more concerned about the future school clothes shopping we need to do if they are both concerned about clothing...

Summer...

It just dawned on me the other day that we are on the downhill slide of summer... and it makes me a little sad. I've had a little bit of the green monster as I've read about all the great trips that my friends have taken with their kids and it's made me realize that this summer has been filled with a lot of unpacking, rearranging, bickering between children, the pool and that's about it! We haven't gone anywhere except Ft. Worth for a few hours to visit a friend at Cook's. In kid world, I've been told, this is the boringest (or to be grammatically correct most boring) summer ever! I had great ideas about things we could do this summer, but they never really materialized. Oh, well... 5 more weeks to get something accomplished! Perhaps the place to start is by getting out of bed before 10am...

Thanks for the prayers... and advice

Thanks for the feedback and prayers. I should probably start by saying that we have done many of the modifications that ya'll suggested and Kali simply needs more. In fact, she asked me last week if she is retarded, because she can't remember when we tell her to do something. She also has a reading issue that we can't seem to diagnose and by gaining control of the ADHD symptoms, I am hoping to figure out how to fix the reading issue. So drugs was kindof the last resort...

As for the other child... Megs... it's difficult to put into words all that she struggles with, but to name a few OCD, perfectionist, severe anxiety, emotional roller coaster... etc. etc. My guess is the emotional roller coaster comes from the pre-teen hormones flowing through her veins... as for the rest of it... God only knows. The dr gave her some suggestions as to how to handle some of the emotions she deals with and the people that she encounters... that's about it for now. He wants to watch her for a while longer to see what happens... another words... no meds, just continue to cope. I'm not sure how I feel about this as he doesn't have to watch her struggle daily through life. But, I think I will try to start some counseling with her and who knows, maybe with Kali under control I will have more energy to help MEgs. The most difficult part of this all is that she struggles with things that I don't even understand... and I'm seriously not sure how to deal with it!

Anyway, thanks for the prayers... I think I'm going to head to the pool... my way of coping with my crazy life!

On a lighter note... I hope this link works as the video cracked me up this morning... it is called THE DONT SONG... as in what husbands shouldn't do! Enjoy your friday laugh... if it works!

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=17891468452

Prayer Requests

Ok ladies... I need some serious prayers for my children. We have an appt with the family dr on Thursday for each of them... Kali for ADHD and Megs for severe anxiety. I don't want to go to this appt... It took me 2 weeks to even make the appt... but I can't take it anymore... my house is a zoo and every time I turn around there is someone having an emotional breakdown.

I'm feeling quite guilty for not medicating Kali during the school year right now, as I frankly don't know how her teacher dealt with her. The kid has no impulse control, excessive amounts of energy, and can't even sit through a hannah episode, oh and I can't forget that she looks at me like I'm speaking Chinese every time I tell her to do something. Previously, my dr suggested behavior modifications and lowering my standards, and just seeing how she did in 2nd grade. Well... she isn't going to make it to second grade at this rate and I really don't think it is fair to set a child up for failure like this! There are a lot of behaviors that people have pointed out to me that she does, that I hadn't even noticed... like she can't actually sit on her bottom through a meal, she stands most of the time while she eats or sits on her knees, bottom, feet, stands, knees, bottom, feet... you get the picture... apparently, she is always moving in some manner too... not that I didn't notice it myself, I just thought she did it more in my presence! Anyway, there are many more symptoms of ADHD that she has, but I'd be here all freakin' day! :)

Megs is an entirely different ballgame. She was treated for anxiety in kindergarten, but over time we were able to wean off of the medication. I guess the pre-teen hormones that are flowing through her veins are causing her ability to cope to decrease, cuz let me tell you about the summer we are having! Several friends have told me of panic/anxiety attacks that she has had when I wasn't around... and they know because their children have told them. How crappy is it when other 10 yr olds don't want to play with your kid because they know there is anxiety? Things that should be easy for Megs aren't, so how is she supposed to cope with the hard things? She won't ask for ketchup at MCD's, she won't talk to a friend at the pool if they are there with someone else, she calls me after 30 min at home with her sister to ask when I'm coming home! UGH! All of these things individually wouldn't be that big of a deal, but together and happening daily is not so fun or healthy for a 10 yr old child. What's she going to do when she starts 5th grade and realizes she has 4 teachers... or 6th and has 8 teachers???? Holy cow... she will seriously freak! She can't even handle being asked to move to another chair at choir practice... totally freaked her out for 2 hrs even though the director specifically told her she wasn't in trouble! Sunday at lunch she apparently freaked out because her food was touching... and I didn't even see it... if I had, I probably would have told her to get over it... Oh my... as you can probably 'hear' in my post, I'm not exactly the most patient when it come to this stuff...

Anyway, as you can see we are dealing with a lot here. I don't so much mind the 'stigma' of Kali and her ADHD... or at least it is something I can handle. What I don't want is the 'stigma' of an anxiety disorder or OCD for Megs... that is not ok for a 10 yr old and I honestly think my dr is going to tell me I'm a loon. At least I do have past medical history to go off of, and if you've met my husband you know there is quite a bit of genetic issue there too... oh and did I mention my own prescriptions for some of this? FUN, Fun... isn't parenting grand?????

Updates (I use that title alot, huh?)

Karena came home safe and sound last night... PRAISE GOD! She was speaking and moving like normal, but the final MRI showed a few abnormalities. The hope is she won't require any physical or speech therapy, but she seems to get overwhelmed and overstimulated quite easily! Keep praying she continues to improve!

My children are DRIVING ME CRAZY! They cannot seem to keep their hands off each other. Yesterday, Kali punched Megs, today Megs scratched and pinched Kali! They both ended up with a red hiney, but seriously now... QUIT IT~! I thought summer was supposed to be fun! Holy cow! If you know some magical solution for this let me know... as of right now all I can come up with is heading to the pool where at least their bickering is drowned out by the splashing! (hee hee... I made a funny... drowned... get it... sorry, bad joke!) Anyway, pray for this situation too! I don't know that I have it in me to handle another 8 wks!

JW

Prayers... prayers... prayers...

Sorry I haven't been around this week... life has been a tad crazy! Kali's buddy Karena was admitted to Hendrick Hospital on Wednesday and care flighted to Cook's on Thursday. Keep her family in your prayers... she had strep last Sunday and Tuesday night was very disoriented. Her parents (Kayla and Shane) took her to see Dr. Wylie on Wednesday morning and he admitted her immediately. By the middle of the afternoon she was completely unresponsive and we were all quite scared. They did many tests and labeled it encephalitis and sent her off to Cook's. At Cook's they have agreed that it is encephalitis, but cannot find the cause. As of right now, they suspect the strep virus went array and caused the inflammation in her brain. Because the swelling in her brain was in her frontal lobe, she has been silent since Wednesday. (This is not normal for Karena!) Friday was the first day that she opened her eyes and seemed alert... Today she said a few words. A friend and I are going up tomorrow as it is killing us to sit here and wait, but please keep everyone in your prayers. The dr's told Shane that they felt like they could be looking at a 2 wk stay at Cook's!

On a side note, we have learned much about encephalitis and I would just like to encourage all of you to be quite careful when playing with kittens/cats that you don't know or swimming in a lake as both of these are carriers of viruses that cause encephalitis. In fact, kittens carry the herpes virus and a single scratch can cause all of what Karena has experienced this week! The lake/pond/river can carry ameba's that cause encephalitis! EWW! I'm trying not to be completely grossed out, but it is difficult when you see your child's best buddy almost comatose in the hospital bed.

Another side note... Karena is the first child that I have met that can keep up with Kali and has never complained that Kali was too rough... Kali and Karena both attack life in full force and can often be found rolling around in the floor wrestling with each other... this is part of what has been so difficult for everyone on the sidelines... the child that is never still or quiet cannot move or talk. I'm hoping that when Kali walks into the room tomorrow there is a different Karena laying there... the one who tries to jump right out of the bed and attack her! :)

Anyway, thanks for the prayers...