No surgery for now.

I postponed Sam's ear tube surgery. I wasn't feeling comfortable with it for a few reasons:
1. The whole general anesthetic thing.
2. It's only temporary and isn't really guaranteed to take care of the problem when they fall out.
3. He hasn't had any infections since I took away the pacifier, gave him a new pillow and changed the carpet in his bedroom.
4. The surgery leaves a permanent scar on the eardrum, which does cause some amount of hearing loss.

So, I'm trying to utilize zoning for Sam. It's kind of like reflexology, but more specific. Thomas was kind of skeptical at first, so I would like to point out a few things about the body.
1. The body is a type of bioelectric/biochemical machine. The body works on electric impulses that come from the brain. The brain and other parts of the body produce natural chemicals that determine a lot of what goes on in our bodies.
2. Body systems need to communicate with each other for the body to work properly.
3. Parts of the body are connected to seemingly unrelated parts. Have you ever had an itch somewhere, then found that when you scratched it, it wasn't actually itchy in the spot you thought it was?
4. I was having really serious after birth cramping after Sam was born. It was definitely way worse than labor and delivery. My mom said she would rub my foot in the spot that corresponds with the uterus. I was going to say something like, "Whatever! No, don't touch me," feeling like there's no way it would work, and I was really hurting. She starting rubbing on that spot, and I got instant relief, no joke. Every time a cramp would come, Thomas would rub on that spot or I would do it myself if no one was there.

It makes sense to me that this form of making sure the body is all "opened up" to receive the biochemical and bioelectrical messages works.

I decided that I would give it a month to see if it is working out for him, but Sam is actually improving already. He started getting a cold (a runny nose), and I put thyme oil and peppermint oil on his feet in the areas that correspond with his ears, nose, eustachian tubes and thymus (the gland in the chest, just behind the sternum, that is the brain center for the immune system--produces T cells and other things that help protect the body). Next day, no runny nose. His language is already becoming more clear, and he is communicating more with me, using words. I believe that Heavenly Father has given us this way to help us take care of our bodies. I will let you know as more develops with this.

Addendum on Dec 22nd: When my mother-in-law was on a mission in Cambodia a few years ago, one of the women they knew was laid out on a table outside because she was dying. So, Leola went over to her and started rubbing on her feet. Everytime she hit a spot that hurt, she really worked that area, and then onto the next spot. She rubbed and worked on her feet (not like a foot massage, but really working those areas) for more than an hour, at least. When my in-laws were leaving Cambodia to go home, this woman practically jumped on my mother-in-law, hugging her and leaving kisses (they kiss with their noses, like eskimo kisses) all over her face and neck because she was so grateful. I know there is something to this.

Updating

So, I've been a bit busy. Here's a quick synopsis of the recent happenings:

The ENT said that Sam does need tubes in his ears. However, I'm REALLY hesitant to have my almost 3 year old put under general anesthetic for tubes and possible adenoid removal. Then again, I'm fighting with myself because now is the time that his language skills are really developing. I spoke with a lady that I visit teach and she said that she was told her little boy needed tubes, but then when she went to the ENT 3 or 4 months later (he was totally booked til then), he had grown out of the problem. Then again, her little boy was a lot younger than Sam. I guess that I will take him into the doc one more time in about a week to see if he still has the problem, especially since he seems to have a cold. If he does, then we probably ought to go ahead and have it done, since constantly having fluid in there can actually cause permanent damage over time. We'll see how it works out.




Claire is 5 months old today. What a cutie she is, and such a happy little girl. This video is from about a month ago.


My sister Miriam just gave me a copy of this photo she took. I scanned it in so I could put it on the site--though my scanner doesn't do the photo justice.

Andrea has been doing pre-ballet and is excited about it. She keeps talking about getting toe shoes and a dog someday.



Peter is such a good boy, and so smart. He is such a great helper. Yesterday, he told me that he wished he could live at school because they have playground toys and lots of rooms. He and Andrea just had their Primary Program. Here is one of the videos I took of them practicing a song called "Tell Me the Stories of Jesus".


Sam seems to be the comic relief of the family. His language skills seem to be improving a bit.

Thomas is done with harvest, but now he is cleaning things up, building things and thinking about projects.

I'm pretty boring, though I am considering going to school for music therapy instead of vocal performance. There are so few music therapists, and a great need for them in this area.

Caitlin is working at an assisted living center and a phone center right now. She's pretty tired, I think. What an awesome girl she is.

Halloween was fun. Peter was a vampire pirate (he was a pirate, but he got some vampire teeth from a party), Andrea was a ballerina fairy princess, Sam was an ape and Claire was a banana. I just wore a black and red irridescent hooded cape and darker lipstick. The kids asked what I was, and I wasn't sure. So, I said I was a witch. Next year, I think I will wear the same thing, but find some vampire teeth, too, and be a vampire instead. Thomas was a candy hander-outer. Very scary. Caitlin was also a pirate, but she wrote something on the back of her shirt: "Arrrrr, they're after me booty! (The gold, of course.)" She's funny.
We had our first really good snow, but it's all gone now. I'm sure we'll get more soon enough.






More later...and I'll do better at keeping it updated...I hope.

Change of appointment

Sam was supposed to see the ENT on the 22nd (or should I say, 'the twenty-tooth', as Pete called it last Christmas), but they called & said they had a cancellation for Monday so we'll be able to get in sooner. Yea! More updates to come!

Bye-Bye Baby!

No, not Claire. Following the advice of a couple of friends, we've gotten rid of Sam's paci (said like pa-see), otherwise known as 'the binki' by said friends. : ) That seems to have been helping by warding off further infection thus far. It's alright that he's given it up since he's 2 1/2 now--it's time to say bye-bye baby, even if he only used it at night. Just for the sake of being thorough, we've also gotten him a new pillow and will be getting new carpeting in that room as well. Most of these problems started (at least the constantly runny nose) since we moved him into the 'boy's room'. The carpet in there is the oldest in this house, so we got an end roll piece pretty cheap and it will be put in sometime in the next week or two. We also have an appointment with the ENT for October 22nd. We shall see what he says. Perhaps by then, his eardrums won't have the pulled back reversed pressure and/or fluid behind them. If not, then we will further explore allergies, etc.

A Quick Video

Here is a video of our newly painted front room. Try to ignore the red sharpie decor on the couch and some of the carpet...I tried to avoid videoing the exact areas of Sam's 2 1/2 year old expertise.



Speaking of Sam, the audiologist said that his eustachian tubes are not opening properly, so that is what is causing the fluid behind his eardrums. He is recommending to the family doc that we get sent to the ENT (Ear Nose and Throat) doc so he can see if it's a result of allergies, large adenoids, large tonsils, or something else making it difficult for the eustachian tubes to open when they need to. If you have no idea what I'm taking about, then here are two illustrations and a medical explanation:

About the eustachian tube
The eustachian tube begins in the nasopharynx, which is above and behind the soft palate, and extends to the middle ear.
The eustachian tube opens periodically to equalize the pressure in the middle ear. A malfunction of the eustachian tube may cause problems in the middle ear or the mastoid.
Some of these problems include:
Fluid
Infection
Retractions of the eardrum
Cholesteatoma
Children with some middle ear problems may "outgrow" the difficulty as the Eustachian tube matures.

Sam, cont.

I've abandoned soy. I've decided to try another route for Sam. He's going to the audiologist this Thurs. More about all that later; it's hard to type with one hand while holding the baby.

Dave's Killer 100% Whole Wheat Bread Recipe

Click this link to take you to the page where you can find the new 100% whole wheat bread recipe that I really like. The only differences are that I don't use a thermometer to check the temp at the end of baking the bread and I replace the sugar with an equal amount of honey.

On another note, Sam has an appointment with the doctor tomorrow morning. We will see if we have gotten anywhere with figuring out what is up with him.

More about Sam

Well, we tried him on the goat's milk, but it didn't seem to help with the snot production. I did more research on proteins in cow's milk and turned up some interesting information. Of course there is still lactose in goat's milk, just like cow's milk, but some of the proteins are different. There are two kinds of protein in milk: casein (KAY-see-in) and whey. The whey protein is different in goat's milk, but the casein is just the same. So, I'm guessing that since a person can have sensitivity to different fractions of the milk, that he is probably having a problem with the casein. I've put him on all soy for the next couple of weeks and we will see how it goes. He doesn't mind the taste, so at least we are good there. I've also learned that there are actually milk solids in margarine as well. I didn't realize it before, because I never read the ingredients in margarine...I just knew that there was hydrogenated oil in it. I also changed my bread recipe to eliminate the dry nonfat milk that I put into it. That's okay...I found a stellar 100% whole wheat bread recipe that was SOOOO good, Peter--the "I only like white bread best" boy--said, "Mmm...this tastes just like white bread!" I'm sure that's because I use hard white wheat instead of red and set my grain mill to "finer" instead of the "coarser" setting. Let me know if you want that recipe, and I will post it for you.

um, yeah,....fun....

Sam has had 3 ear infections in 2 just over 2 months. Finally, I started thinking along the lines of allergies. He had some blood drawn (oh, YEAH, that was fun....NOT.) for these alergy tests and we got the results yesterday. They tell me that he has possible sensitivities to three things: a common mold (they didn't say which one), a common weed (again, don't know which one), and cow's milk proteins. So, he has to lay off of all cow's milk products for a few weeks and see what happens. I did get him some goats milk, like what he was on as an infant, so that he can still get the calcium and other good things he needs for a growing body. I'm not so sure if I should be giving him that right now or not. I'm wondering about soy milk for 2 weeks, though I'm not really keen on only soy milk for little kids if it can be avoided. Oh well, I guess I'll do some more research and see where we go from there.

Just more pics

A good friend made some cupcakes for the kids. This is how Sam looked after digging into his. He even had chocolate boogies...sounds like one of those treats from the Monty Python chocolate frogs skit.

Next is Andrea in her first dance class. She did really well.

I had Claire giving good smiles and almost laughing while Daddy was supposed to be filming...well, it didn't work out like I had hoped, as you will hear at the start of the video.

Very Cute Pictures; Playing with my camera, Making Fairy Shacks

There, that title is my tribute to my brother-in-law, Bill. When my in-laws were on their mission, he decided that we should make the family emails more interesting by making each subject line into a haiku. I think I did it right.

Well, here are some pics for you. Apparently, some child was messing with my camera so there are some slightly strange-looking (Pete's is a bit creepy) pictures of my 3 older kids, and then some cute ones of the baby, and my sister Caitlin and her friend Katelyn making fairy shacks (they call them fairy houses, but I needed one less syllable for my haiku).

This one is a bit to reminicent of the movie The Grudge. Not a good thing.

Not much better....

This one's better, but still looks like it was taken from someone's dream or something.

"You must have been a beautiful baby...."

First day of First Grade!!!

The owners of FairyLand Construction Co. with their most recent project.

Baby Bath Time with Mom and Dad doting and cooing.

My taking-care-of-my-body blog

Okay, I've made another blog specifically to make a journal of my journey to health. If you want to check it out, click on this link to reachingstride.blogspot.com

so funny

Okay, check out this mock blog called seriouslysoblessed.blogspot.com It's just funny.

Recently

As a favor to my friend Tricia, I am posting some pictures of recent happenings in our family: my new highlights, Peter and Andrea at swimming lessons, Sam baby powdering the chair, Claire getting bigger and smiling. Enjoy!

Fair and Not Fair

Today is the start of the 3 day event of the Madison County Fair. I'm totally bummed because I decided to enter my awesome strawberry-raspberry jam, but they did all the entering last night. I don't know why I thought they would do all that this morning. I'm so sad. My jam is really pretty and tastes so awesome! Rats. Oh well, now I know they do all their entering on the Wednesday before the fair. So unfair.
The kids are really excited though; they've been waiting for the fair for a long time. For those of you who have been to my house, you know that I live across the street from the Madison County Fairgrounds. That makes it convenient when you want to attend an event there, but kind of, well, noise-ish, but not noisy. For example, I had all my windows open this morning, and decided to finally close them because all the ambient noise consisted of "baaaaaa,......................baaaaaaa". At other times, I can hear horse whinnys and things of the like, because the parking lot for all the pickups and horsetrailers is behind my house. I really don't mind it, because then my kids can see a bunch of different animals without taking them anywhere. The circus came to town and presented at the fairgrounds, and we could see the elephants from my front window. So, I guess that's a fair trade for all the animal noises. Besides, I'll take the animal noises over road traffic anyday!
A side note: I just love my kids. While I'm on the subject of fair and not, it probably isn't "fair" that I have been so blessed. My kids are all healthy, good kids, and they are so loving. Then again, since we are the ones that feed, love, care for, teach, look after them, etc., then I guess it is only "fair" that Tom and I should be the ones to get the most enjoyment from being with them. :)

Blessed Baby

How very fortunate I am to have such a loving family. Andrew, Caitlin, Miriam and Molly all came to Rexburg when we had our sweet baby blessed. DC and Anjelica were supposed to come also, but a wrench was thrown in the works so they weren't able to make it. Only one of Tom's siblings could come, Danny, and his famly also. Of course, my wonderful in-laws were there, as well as some very good friends. I know, we are so blessed to have so many great people in our lives who love us very much. Here are some pics from the weekend together.

Accident Prone

Poor Andrea. She is 2 years older than Sam, but she is a wisp. She's got great core strength for her size, but she's still very wispy. Sam weighs only a half pound less than she does. This may explain why Sam can walk up to her to hug her, then decide he wants to wrestle instead and down she goes--nothing she can do about it. It also becomes a problem when she happens to trip; again, nothing she can do but fall, it seems. Well there's a program for kids to have a free lunch for 2 months in the summer at the park. The kids had been wanting to go for a long time, so I finally took them a couple of weeks ago. Everything seemed to be going along fine, until we were getting ready to go. I unlocked the van so Peter and Andrea could get in, which they did, while I was saying goodbye to a friend who was about to move to Hawaii. Well, I heard a scream-cry and looked over to see my sweet "Andrina" holding her elbow and taking in a deep breath, ready for the next cry. It seemed that she had tried to get back out of the van and fell, or just plain slipped and fell after getting in and then ended up in the gutter and a little bit under the van. I figured we might have a fractured elbow or something, but when I moved her hand so I could look at it, I saw the blood. There was a big piece of concrete that had broken off of the curb and was in the gutter and it cut a slice just above the bend in her elbow. The only clean thing I had in the van to stop the blood was some dried up wipes, so that's what I used. It was just under half an inch wide, but it was deep enough to see the fat and muscle. So, she got four stitches and was very brave through the whole thing. The saddest part was when she finally looked down and saw the blood. She didn't do a total freak out, but she did look at the little puddle in her hand, and with wide eyes and tears said, "Mom, that's MY BLOOD!" I just said, "Yes, but you are alright, you're alright." She had bruises all down her shins and scraped up her knee pretty good, too.

That's not even the all of it...2 days after that, she and Peter were supposed to be cleaning up their room, right? Well, they were almost done when they decided to play with their bedroom door and Andrea got a little split on her forehead. It may have been a good idea to get one stich, but Thomas just pulled it together with medical tape. We're putting her in dance this Fall, so hopefully we will improve balance as well as strength...poor kid.

Happy Birthday, America

Here's my Fourth of July Family!

Pete got to be in the Fourth of July Parade down Main Street with his peewee ballroom team. The older kids were in it, too. Andrea was upset because she wanted to be in a parade also. We were having trouble getting to the parade in time, so we didn't sit at the first corner like we do every year. Instead we were a few blocks down, and when Pete got to us, they had just performed at the beginning of the block, then basically ran by us to the other corner of the block and started their routine again...that was very sad for me. However, my in-laws got there and sat in the usual place, so at least they got to see him do his thing. Here's the only picture we got of him as he is running by. He's the boy farthest to the right, in the front of the line.

We had Tom's parents over for dinner for steak (tube steak for the kids) and other yummies. I made a poke cake (for those of you who haven't ever had it, you make a yellow or white cake, let it cool for an hour, make gelatin--reducing the water by 1/2 cup--, poke your cake all over with a fork, then pour the gelatin all over the cake, chill for 2 hours and then you have poke cake! Top with whipped cream and/or fruit that goes with your flavor gelatin, or nothing at all!) and decorated it so that we had a "flag cake". Oh man, I love cold poke cake. I used cherry gelatin, though it was topped with strawberries Very tasty.

Aside from the fun stuff of the day, I really am grateful to a loving Heavenly Father that we have this country to live in, despite its many problems. I hope we can pull together as a nation by doing what we can to make this country great on an individual level and give thanks for what good we have.

Her Papparazzi & adoring fans

Baby & More

Pete had his last tball game today, so I finally got pictures of him playing. His last time at bat, his coach told him to try to hit right into the green. He told the coach he would hit all the way into the green and run home...and he did! Although, it may have been good to stop at third, but he did it. He's such a cute kid; then again, I think all 4 of my kids are cute, in general. :) It's been outside water weather, so the kids have been out a lot recently. Here's a couple of videos of the baby--the last one was seriously 5 minutes after the first one.

The Name

Well, we seem to have decided on Claire Elizabeth, but we might make it Claire Elise. Although, Tom said that if she talks too fast people will think her name is "Clerikson". :) Thank you all for putting in your votes. It's hard to choose one beautiful name for a beautiful baby when there really are so many nice ones to be had. It's been especially hard for us this time, for some reason. We figure that Claire will stick unless Tom gets some kind of strong inspiration to call her something totally different when she is blessed. We'll see!

She's Here!

Yes, making her premiere appearance here on earth is...well, we're not quite settled on the name. If you'd like to make your vote in the comments section after reading the blog, feel free...just don't be offended when we choose whatever we want anyway. :)

Our beautiful baby girl arrived at 6:15pm on June 12, 2008. She was 7 lbs, 3 oz and 19 inches long. She has bright, alert eyes when she opens them and a head full of brown hair. She's a good little baby. We're so blessed to have her here.

I went in for my weekly appointment Thursday morning and had the midwife (that's Certified Nurse Midwife, not lay-midwife) check to see if I was even close to dialating, just in case. Here's how it went:

Rachel: Oh, my gosh...

Char: What?

R: Oh, my gosh!...

C: What?!

R: I think you're at a 4 or 5 (she means centimeters dialated--10 cm is complete for those who don't know)!

C: You're crapping me...

R: No, I really think you are!

So, that's my cue...when I am that far, the baby comes that day. And...she did. Labor and delivery went well. She had a bit of trouble breathing for a little bit because she swallowed a bunch of fluid on the way out and must have inhaled a little bit, too. She got it out and pinked up well. Today the doc came to check her over and said, "Well, I think she's just perfect... I want to take her home with me!" That's pretty good since I think he has 5 young children of his own! Anway, she really is cute, and we have some cute little photos as well. Check out the pictures first, and then check out the name options.

Disclaimer: We're not taking a poll on pulling out new names, but we are interested as to which one of these name choices you like best for this cute little person. Thank you for being interested in our family. We love you all.

Name choices shown as first name with meaning and middle name with meaning:

A: Claire (clear, bright)Elizabeth (oath of God)

B: Nissa (friendly elf) Munay-said like moon-eye (to love)

C: Naomi (pleasant) Elise (French form of Elizabeth)

D: A different combination of Claire, Elizabeth, Nissa, Munay, Naomi or Elise

It IS June, right?

Caitlin called it...yesterday it was windy and cold a lot of the day. It rained the night before and got down to around 35 degrees during that night. Last night, while the sun was still up, Caitlin went outside for a minute and then came back in and exclaimed, "It's gonna snow; it feels like snow!" I thought she was being a bit dramatic because it got cold suddenly. No, she was right. Between 9 and 10am today, it started snowing. It didn't stay on the ground, it pretty much melted immediately. However, it doesn't change the fact: it was snowing on June 11. It's been overcast all day. I still have to say, I love it here...despite the strange weather from time to time. People in Houston say that they have weird weather. Well, if there was a weird weather contest, we totally won that round!

Catching Up

I've been negligent about blogging. So, we'll try and review the last month or so. In May, Peter had a "dance recital" of sorts. He was in a peewee ballroom dance group. It was really cute! His group did the 'cha-cha' to the Flintstones theme song done by the B-52's. The girls were dressed like Wilma and the boys like Fred. I will try to get a video of it up soon.









A duckling wandered into our garage from the Nature Park nearby. It got a bit attached to Thomas. When Caitlin took it back to the Nature Park, she purposefully wore a sweater that had large, defined markings on it so she could see if the little duck would remember her when she went back. It worked! The next time she went, the little duck started quacking from all the way across the lake and came right up to her.






I got to go help out with Kindergarten Field Day and snapped a few shots at the end of Peter and his friends doing the parachute games. I never did anything like that in school...unfair. :) He also had his Kindgergarten Graduation. I will also try to get a video up of him doing a particular song for us that I really thought was cute. My boy's growing up! I painted that cool spider on his face. :)










The crops are all in now, and I'm getting closer to delivery now and feeling like anytime now would be a good time. About 3 weeks to go. We'll see how she (meaning me) ends up!