God is so faithful!

"...pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much." James 5:16

I have thanked God for each of you that have been praying for Josiah. We are blessed to have so many wonderful friends that have gone to the Lord on our behalf. Praise God that Josiah's tests today came back normal. The nurse's words were "keep doing what you are doing and we will see you next week". We will keep going back weekly, but I am confident that he has already been completely healed by the ultimate Healer!

pray with us

finally it's the weekend. we made it through another week. 3 dr. visits last week, down to 2 this week and it looks like 2 more next week... and so it continues. all i can think is that God does not want me to have any opportunity to forget how much i need Him daily in my life of chaos. He has actually been teaching me about being silent and listening for Him, so for that i am extremely thankful and blessed. i have much more to learn, but it is always great to feel His presence. 

at our last 2 visits, josiah has had some protein in his urine. 2 possibilities are that his kidneys are not completely doing their job (which can be an effect from the HSP) or that he is just really active and doesn't drink enough to stay hydrated. we found out that about 20 out of 100,000 kids get HSP and 50% have some form of kidney problems. also, that it reoccurs within the first 4 months for 25% of them. our dr. is allowing us a few more days to try to getting him to drink lots of water to see if that fixes the problem. if not he has to have more blood work done. i am praying that we will not have to take any more blood, because i don't want to put josiah through that if i don't have to. the anticipation of the needle is probably worse than the actual procedure, but neither one is fun for a 5 year old boy. i am also praying that when we go back on tuesday that the test will come back completely normal. i would be most thankful for your prayers for him. be expecting a praise report on tuesday!

Eisley is 6 months old!

Eisley is such a happy girl and a wonderful addition to our family! Where have the last 6 months gone? These days she enjoys playing with her toys, putting EVERYTHING in her mouth, and eating oatmeal and squash! She is getting good at sitting up by herself and she also gets up on her hands and knees and rocks back and forth. I'm sure it won't be too much longer before she is crawling. It looks like she is going to beat Isaiah, he didn't crawl until he was 9 months old! Ay her Dr. appt. she weighed 14 lbs. 5 oz. (10-25 %); and was 25 1/4 inches (25-50 %).

Time for an Update

I know it has been a long time, over a month, since my last post. Things in our house stay extremely busy, as I'm sure they do in yours too. This past month has been full of Dr. Appointments! We have taken Eisley, Josiah and Isaiah in for their well checks. We took Isaiah to a kids ENT, due to his large tonsils and sleep issues. By the way, they are recommending that we do a sleep study on him. The 3 big kids went to see Dr. Mac, our pediatric dentist. Boy have dentists changed. The kids can't wait to go back again, they had so much fun! Of course, thanks to the bill, I'm definitely in no hurry! Then yesterday we spent half the day at the Dr. office and the ER at Cook's Children's Hospital with Josiah.

Sunday night his left foot was hurting him and Brent noticed him limping and that his foot was swollen. The next day it was a looked a little better, but later that afternoon, he told Grana that his foot was hurting, but it was the other foot and it was swollen, too. No injuries, no bites, just swelling for no known reason. He got to the point that it hurt him to walk or even just to stand up on his feet. The poor baby was actually crawling around to get the things he wanted.

Turns out, after ruling out every other possibility, that he has HSP or Henoch-Schonlein Purpura. It is a disease caused by inflammation of the blood vessels. We are thankful that this is something that clears up on its own, although they said it could take 3-6 weeks. The Dr. said that it it is probably just how his body reacted to a viral infection. We will be going back to the Dr. weekly for the next month to keep a check on him. They need to watch his kidneys to make sure there are no complications.

Then next week Isaiah has an appt. with the pediatric dermatologist and Eisley has her 6 month well visit! And at the end of the week the big 3 are getting their flu mist. And Ashtyn has her opthamologist appt., hopefully that will be it for a while! I'm praying for good health!

On top of all this we have started cloth diapering Eisley. There are lots of great reasons to make the switch, but if it wasn't for her delicate skin and how it was reacting to the disposable diapers (I tried several different brands) I would not have even thought about it. I'll keep you posted how it goes, but so far I really like them and we haven't had any skin problems!

Isn't God good, it just so happened that Josiah's cousin Micah was at Cook's Children's Hospital that morning getting his cast off! They had fun playing games while we waited!
See what cute cloth diapers they make now! These are called Fuzzi-Bunz!
                                             Eisley's first food...rice cereal!

Isaiah and Eisley's 1st day at "Grana's school"

I am so thankful for my mom! She has been such a big help to me over the past 5 months. She has joyfully kept all the kids for me one day a week all summer, so that I could continue to work part time. And this week she started keeping Isaiah and Eisley 2 days a week while I work and while Ashtyn and Josiah are in school. She offers to help me all the time which is such a blessing, because I hate to ask. Isaiah has been looking forward to this week, for him and Eisley to go to Grana's, since before Eisley was born. He was so exciting Monday morning when I brought him to her house. She had out homemade playdough, with letter cookie cutters, all waiting for him. She also had out cars and trucks to play with, puzzles and even had a story picked out for the day. Being the 3rd of 4 kids, and rarely getting all the attention, I know that this time with Grana is very special to him. He and Eisley, both had a great day!

Ashtyn and Josiah's 1st day of school

Ashtyn and Josiah both loved school! Ashtyn is in 1st grade. It will be different for her this year because we have heard that they have lots of homework and no rest time! Josiah is in Pre-K 3 days a week. When I picked them up I asked Josiah if he had fun and he said" Yes, I'm ready to go back NOW!" This is big for Josiah to want to go back! I'll keep you posted on how he does on his second day (Wednesday). Here are a few pictures that I got of them.

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We're all ready to go, with our reflective backpacks






Isaiah's ready to go to Grana's house!










Ashtyn at her BIG desk, full of books!





Josiah with "Dude", their pet turtle that he got to help feed.






This is a picture I got as I was peaking in through the window, before I left.

Sunday

The girls in mommy and daddy's bed








Ashtyn almost ready for church, all dressed up. We are trying to fit in wearing those white shoes before summer is over and she outgrows them:)














Eisley in front of the TV, waiting for the rest of us to get ready








Josiah in his new classroom with Freddy the Frog










Ashtyn in her 1st grade classroom with Mrs. Hedgpeth








What a busy and exciting day we had...
1. Ashtyn's first night to ever sleep in sponge rollers (can you believe I waited 6yrs!?!)
2. Went to church and heard a great message from our awesome new pastor
3. Came home and had lunch
4. Went back to church aka the kids school for Open House and Meet the Teacher
5. Came home fixed dinner
6. Got ready for bed early...tomorrow is the 1st day of school!!!