A Whirlwind week last week

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For a while now we have been keeping abreast of my Mother In Laws health issues.  She lives down in Florida. She has had continuous health issues ever since I have been married to my husband.  This year, the issues seem to be extremely bad and getting worse.

She has been in constant abdominal pain for several months now. She goes to sleep at night in pain and wakes up in pain and it is there all day.  The doctors do not know what is wrong.  She has this other condition of too much calcium in her blood.  They cannot find where that is coming from and are just giving her medication to try and reverse the symptoms.  She is on a lot of medication at this point.

When we talked on Face Time back in May for her birthday, she was laying on the couch and saying she couldn’t get up for anything and her husband was saying she was really drugged up so to speak, and she wouldn’t even take Tim’s phone calls at times…

Well up to last week, they have been making the situation sound very dire, to the point it seemed of life-threatening.  So unbeknownst to us they made a trip down to southern Florida to where there other son lives with his wife and did some repairs on their house that they have had since last November. My husband happened to talk to them a week ago Sunday and his dad said that they were bringing his brother and his wife up to their house for a week.

This was really a surprise, for one, my BIL is an alcoholic, has been for most of his life and the tension between Father and that son is not ideal…because of the decisions his son has made over the course of his life related to the alcohol.  So for him to go ahead and bring him up to his house for a visit was a huge thing on his part…and secondly, we were surprised because my MIL has been so ill.

My first instinct is compassion, and knowing how ill my MIL has been I mentioned that perhaps we should drive down to FL to see his brother while we were there.  I knew this would be a blessing to his parents.  We have never been together for more than two days in the 10 years that we have been married (us and my BIL and the In Laws) and that was only one time.  My BIL has no drivers license due to the poor choices in his life and the chances of us seeing him at the same time at their parents house is basically a one time event…as much as his mom hopes it wouldn’t be, I see the reality of this happening again as very slim…

Anyhow, I mentioned that on Sunday evening and told my husband that if we were to go, to ask his Dad if I would be able to cook all the meals…his mom is not capable due to being ill and the Sister-in-law does not have very good cooking skills…at least that is what I surmise when my husband said he starved down there last November between his mom’s cooking and her cooking there wasn’t much to eat, taste wise or otherwise… Which is fine, I enjoy cooking and the Lord has blessed me with the ability to cook!

My husband didn’t say anything else after we talked it out and I left the issue in his court.  Monday, I hopped out to the travel trailer and started getting it ready to go in case my husband said we were going.  I was hoping it would not be too long of a visit.  The relations with my in-laws and myself are quite strained, mainly with my MIL…so the tension is there, week long visits are too long, 3.5 days are just right.  So this was huge just to even suggest going.

I had two appointments that week one on Tuesday and one on Wednesday.  My husband called Tuesday afternoon to say we would be going!  I asked when and he was thinking the next day, I mentioned the appointment and I was blessed to not have to go until Thursday.  So now I had to get everything really packed and get as much food prepped as I could so I wouldn’t have to do too much once there.

Wednesday was the marathon cooking day.  I did two different batches of cookies 3 dozen each, baked a cinnamon roll coffee cake for breakfast, made the homemade pancake mix for potatoes,bacon and pancakes one morning.  I browned the meat for Pizza rolls for lunch, meat for beef stroganoff, and meat for the cheesy hamburger and broccoli recipe I have on here, and meatballs made for spaghetti. I then baked two cake pans of a carrot cake to assemble the cake for Father’s Day on Sunday.  I was slightly exhausted.

I sent an email out the night to our Pastor asking for safe travels, for prayers for my MIL’s health and shared how bad it was and that the outlook was not looking good for her, and asked for prayers for issues relating to their dog that has bitten our children 3 times, praying it would not go after Thomas.

Thursday morning we took off about 8:30 and we finally arrived down there about 5pm.  Thankfully we were blessed with smooth travels. We drove up and unloaded from the truck and said hello’s.  Tim and I had decided to set up the playpen so that Thomas would be safe and his dad mentioned that the dog was not there.  Kind of with a look to me like “I had to get rid of the dog, because of your wife” but said to Tim, that he took the dog to the neighbors which ended up being next door so that there would be no issues.  I gave his dad a big hug and said thank you so much for the consideration regarding their dog.  I basically lost my peace and calm when I saw them last November and their dog bit my son right above his left eye and they said it was nothing and that basically I needed to get over it…when it leaves a scab, that is a bite…but then…their dog is his “3rd child”, treats it like a child and cannot stand the fact that his favorite “child” would ever do anything wrong and no one should ever mention anything bad about his “child”….that issue is a whole other post that I will spare you from!!

Ok, back on topic…we get our trailer set up, I start getting dinner ready.  We were to have the spaghetti and meatballs…now here is one of those things that is so annoying….I have asked for about 8 years now the recipe for her spaghetti sauce….never once has she given it to me…it is always oh sure when I get home, or next time I make it I will write it down…or its up in my head there isn’t one, etc…. So I asked Tim  to help me out..works like a charm every time…she’ll do anything for Tim.  I whipped out my two jars of homemade sauce and said I could use mine but I would really like to make hers and Tim asked her where the recipe was at.  Well of course it wasn’t written down, or she couldn’t get to the cook book.  I said I was sending Tim to the store to get whatever we needed to make it…and low and behold she whips open her pantry and pulls out everything she needs….

So it’s a large can of tomato puree one of those giant ones like 32 oz. and then it was one small can of tomato paste and then a tsp. of oregano and another tsp. of basil.  She said she usually adds a Tablespoon of brown sugar but didn’t have the normal kind and we used that organic type of brown sugar in the plastic container… and then she used about a quarter of a cup of Mogen and David Concord wine it  is a red wine….  The sauce comes out with a slight sweet taste and is very delicious.  See my tomato sauce always comes out with too much water and I wanted it the consistency of hers…well after doing some internet research on the way home, I figured out that I just need to let mine cook down more. 

Well I could see that his mom was still in a bit of discomfort with her abdomen and she would sit down and rest….but the whole,  “I am so ill I cannot move” that we have heard for the last two weeks…was just pure manipulation…this lady was up and about and moving around etc.  I think Tim felt just as duped as I had…it is one thing to be ill and not have a quality of life but it is quite another to make family members think that you are dying and there is no hope left and that is what she did, basically both of them…

Well the rest of the trip was the same, with my Sister-In-Law there and being computer challenged I helped her get her email set up correctly and to get rid of all the emails she had that were junk…26 pages worth!!!  I helped her get her browser fixed…she had about 7 toolbars installed etc.!!! Then once I had her set up, I organized all of my MIL’s pictures on her computer so that all their volunteer trips were together, all their missions trips were together, vacations were in another folder, etc.

It made it easier to stay busy and keep an eye on my children with my SIL there, the focus was not on me, I just needed to cook the food and make sure everything was tidied up afterwards. Praise the Lord this was easy and I was just so blessed to not be judged and criticized for every little thing I did while I was there.

Sunday came and of course it was time to go to church…I had asked the night before what time we needed to leave. I was told we needed to leave the house no later than 9:35 so that we were at church BY 10AM!  Ok, understood, we wanted pictures before we left for church with everyone looking nice and I made sure my crew was ready by 9am.

We went outside and took pictures and everyone loaded up to head over to church.  We get there and the service is still going on, I remarked to Tim that I thought it was strange that they wouldn’t have time in between services for people to leave before the next one started…and then she pipes up and says that service starts at 10:30!! WHAT!!!  I can’t believe she did that not taking into consideration that we have 6 children 3 of which are in the toddler stage and you now want them to sit quietly and behave the whole time…a small compromise would have been nice to just show up say 10 minutes before service, it would have been plenty of time to see who she wanted us to etc…. but that is how she operates, it is about her and only her…

I tell you, when you have sat in a church under a good Preacher who truly preaches the word and whose sermon’s are not using “worldly” attributes and examples….you really miss it when you sit under someone who does do that and you are so disappointed…. You would think that a Pastor of a church would not be using as an example the occasion of kissing on the first date….Shouldn’t they be preaching about staying pure and not doing that…not this preacher…his whole sermon was full of things of the world that were so out of place and shouldn’t have been used.  I am so blessed to have a wonderful Preacher that wants to keep us in the Word, preaches the Word, teaches us the Word….I am going to be so sad when the day comes that we have to leave this church.

My daughter said to me afterwards that she was so sad during her time in the youth class.  It was for ages six and up.  We took the three older ones to the room that was designated and when she was talking about it later, she said, “I was so sad and I just wanted to come out and find you in church.”  I told her next time, she felt that anywhere we were visiting to get up and come find me.  It turns out there were just babysitters in there, there was no Sunday school program, they just had them playing video games and watching movies!  What in the world…..well I guess that is the point it was of the world and not of Christ….sigh….

Sunday after church we came home, I fixed up lunch and was going to get the dinner in the crockpot.  Tim mentioned us going to the beach so I said talk to your dad about it…Well his dad had offered to take everyone out to eat which was a nice treat.  I hadn’t started the dinner so that worked and we were going to take off for the beach.  Well we ended up going a little later to dinner and it ended up that his mom would not go, it seems as if every time whether it be here or there, when it is time to go out to dinner, she comes up with some reason as to why she cannot go.  So she didn’t go, then Tim didn’t eat, his stomach was not feeling well, his dad did not eat his stomach was not feeling well, so the children and I and my Brother and Sister in Law ate, which made us ask why did we even bother to go out to dinner!!

Our family left the restaurant as soon as we were done eating and headed out to Jacksonville Beach.  It was about 8pm, the sun was just starting to go down, really breezy but it was a warm breeze.  The water felt like lukewarm bath water, just delightful….. Here are a few pictures of the evening….

 

Thomas’ foot prints, 10 months old

I love this picture of my daughter and I.

This picture is a great one of my husband smiling, I have a slightly crazed look in my eyes because the water came in just as we were going to take the picture and surprised me!!

I am so thankful we are back home, I am thankful that my husband had a chance to see his brother and that it was a blessing to their parents. I am thankful the Lord blessed us with the time at the beach for a wonderful family time that was just us and so memorable.

Mother’s Day and an Anniversary….

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This last weekend was Mother’s Day.  For the weekend we went camping.  This year the holiday coincided with our Anniversary as it did 11 years ago when we were married. 

I wanted it to be a tradition every year that our family would go away together for our Anniversary and my husband was willing to compromise as long as we were able to have an evening out to dinner with just the two of us that same week or somewhere around that day.  Which, this idea should work out great if our Anniversary is not on the weekend  

Last year we were camping in Pigeon Forge TN.

I was 6 months pregnant at the time….here we were with our barbequed shrimp and Filet Mignon with sparkling cider….

Here we are this year….

And hey look the same meal!!!  It is one of the few times that we get to splurge and have steak and since it is the best price buying it ourselves and cooking it we almost get two for the price of one compared to going out!!!  Haley took our picture and it was pretty dark as you can see by the time we were able to eat that night…I think it was around 9pm!!! So here it is almost 9months post partum.  And of course our Sparkling Cider!!

It was pouring down rain the whole day.  We were able to stream a few shows over the iPad for the children to watch to keep the insanity from ensuing and then the power went out about 4pm!!  So we still managed to keep them occupied and we finally decided to leave the trailer around 6pm just to get a change of scenery, fresh air….still pouring rain….

  

We corralled the lil guy as best we could on our bed, it is getting hard to watch over him when he is so mobile…not a great amount but just enough to get into trouble and get slightly hurt if you are not watching.

Then we came back around 8pm, fixed up food for everyone and sat the children down for another movie. We had the children off to bed around 11pm and I looked outside at the rain and saw that some little critter had been out in the rain to get into the garbage.

The park owner usually comes by each evening to pick up the trash from the garbage bins at each site, however, that night it was pouring rain and they had been gone most of the day.  I saw them arrive back and they stopped in front of our campsite on the road but we didn’t see them come to our site….I mentioned to my husband that something had gotten into the trash and he got up to go look.  We couldn’t even see the garbage can but saw some garbage clear over by the playground…I was thinking a couple of raccoons had gotten into it as I think that is what had happened when we were camping in NC a few weeks back.  Then my husband pipes up and says…maybe it was a bear!!!  What…and he is leaning way out the door looking around and I squealed at him…”Then close the door!”

It turns out the next morning when the park owner was back around to pick up garbage….it was indeed a BEAR!!!  and we missed it only 4 feet away from the window with the shades open and we missed it…of course due to the infernal pounding of the rain, we were not able to hear anything…I don’t think it could have rained harder from the gates of Heaven had the Lord tried!!!

We were at a lovely campground called Solitude Point…a wonderful Christian owned place that was tiny…only 14 camp sites with 4 cabins to rent.  If you are in the area, it is well worth coming by for a visit.  They do not have a pool, however, if the weather is warm, you can rent canoes, or inner tubes to float down the Saluda river.

All the spots were beautiful like this, your own little cozy area where it was private from your neighbors, so nice and green.

    This is the playground area that was right next to us, just so beautiful, a little tucked away oasis and you can see our trailer through the last picture…

A nice little garden area up by the Lodge that has a cross and the 10 Commandments on display.

 

Hope you have a blessed week!!

Catching up on ……everything….

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Summer Storm….

Late June we had a storm come through our neighborhood…I happened to be caught in the middle of it with the children in town and was not home… but the wind was quite strong and took out a huge tree between our neighbors house and ours…actually 3 trees were completely destroyed…. This one came all the way across to our house and thankfully only the tip of it hit the AC units.

Thankfully we had some friends from church coming over the next afternoon and one of them brought us a chain saw and Tim was able to get to work that evening after everyone was gone and start cutting up the tree.

The children helped haul away the branches to the back yard and loaded up the logs that were not too heavy.

We now have five huge piles of branches to burn off on our small fire pit….that little area with the papers….that’s the fire pit….so it is going to take a while to get this whole tree burned up!!

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We had another birthday here in the house..

Master P turned 3.

What better way to spend the afternoon than catching up on some sleep!!

Master P had a good time playing with a couple of new trucks and was quite pleased that he now had his own trucks and didn’t have to borrow his older brothers.

The evening was capped off with a requested strawberry cake….

 

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Baby update

Well there really is not too much to report….I had my 32 week visit….pretty much the same as the 30 week which I had not posted about…I’m on the every two week visits with the midwife at this point and I know they will become weekly here pretty soon.

I had gained 2.5 pounds since the 30 week which was good.  There was some concern that I had not gained enough and needed to step it up some…but a pound a week is good and the normal amount to be expected. So we are looking at about 15 pounds so far I think…we were hoping to have closer to 25 but that is just not meant to be this time.  My blood pressure was normal about 95 over 60.  I am having the breathless that seems to come with the latter days of pregnancy.  It is quite debilitating for me at times and gets me depressed when it happens…I know it is normal and not something more serious, but it brings me down at times. It’s not just a little out of breath…it’s like I cannot get enough oxygen to take a few steps.  My midwife said to be aware whenever I get up to make sure I am taking in deep breaths of air and I do try that, but sometimes, it is not even when I get up…I can be up working and all of a sudden I need to sit down before I feel like I am going to fall down.

The other issue is the restless leg syndrome….my legs are just “crawling” at night and so painful…it makes it hard to get some rest at night.  I just remembered the other night that I should taking my calcium/magnesium pills so I have been taking those for the last couple days to see if there is a correlation and the pain is not as bad or non-existent…the first night I thought there was improvement, I took them today, so we’ll see how this evening goes.

I am trying to make sure I get my protein in each day but at this stage of the game, I am seeing it has to be at the beginning or middle of the day and not the evening.  If I eat at night it has to be a very small portion of whatever.  If I eat too much, like a normal size, it just pushes my stomach too much and the pressure with the baby makes it about impossible to get sleep at night.  I am sleeping on my two regular pillows but have two couch pillows many times to elevate my upper torso so the heartburn is not too bad and try to keep it at bay….At this point Tums is my best friend I like the Aldi’s brand of Tum’s and sometimes the bottles of berry flavored Tums are not even and there are more pink ones, the ones I like in the bottle…so I always try to get the best ratio for my needs ….well the other day I took one from the case below the case on top…as I thought it looked better…lol….and to my dismay…..they have changed their recipe…iccckkkk… I went back a few days later to pick up some items and looked again at the supply…its not like they go through cases of these things a week…and I saw where I had taken my box and looked at the expiration date…and then compared to those on top and sure enough they are different batches so I bought the one box and will be going back tomorrow to get two more boxes as I am sure I will go through two more bottles in the next 6 weeks and just save the others for emergency use!!!

So that’s it in a nutshell…I go back next Friday the 22nd…and I will be meeting with the Dr…This would be my area of prayer right now….that he would give the ok that I would be able to use the Midwife facility.  If he says no, because of the state laws and I cannot, then we will end up giving birth at the hotel across the street!  And just work around the system….I do not want to have give birth in the hospital if I do not have to….There is just something so special with just my husband and I and the midwife…it is truly our special moment with our new baby….

Our midwife has mentioned that most likely I will have an IV started as soon as I get there just to help prevent the hemorrhaging that I went through last time.  My midwife also mentioned that she might have a nurse on hand for the birth as well.  A lady that she has worked with many times and has over 25 years of experience….so just  covering all basis as much as possible….My midwife seems to think that the Dr. will give the A-OK after this visit and that would be such a wonderful answer to prayer….then all I have to do is get through the labor and birth part!!!

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Camping last weekend….

This past weekend we were able to go up to Northern Georgia for the weekend…  One last trip before the baby arrives.  After the previous week and a half of temperatures in the upper 90’s we were hoping it would be a little cooler at the campground.  We stayed at Riverbend Campground.  What a wonderful little campground!!!  The weather was cooler and on Thursday evening it was probably in the mid to upper 80’s which was just perfect.  The next two days were very cool!!!!  A cool mist settled over the campground but we made the best of it.  The children had fun riding bikes and swimming in the pool they provided.  As with just about every camping trip there are always children to be found and new temporary friends made for the few days we are there and that was the case this weekend as well!!

We had the Hiawassee river right behind our campsite and that was a point of interest throughout the stay…the river was extremely slow moving but was still fun to be near.  We didn’t promote any swimming in the river but it was fun to watch the occasional kayaker go by and on the other side of the river was the lone single female cow, which would occasionally come down for a drink and let her presence be known by her mooing!!

Sunday came and although I am never really fond of packing back up and heading home…I just wish we could camp every weekend! , we packed up on Sunday with a special treat for the children in store….we headed down the mountain and made a stop in the town of Helen and took the children TUBING!!!

Ok, so this will be permanently put on the list of “Things not to do when 8.5 months pregnant and or with children under the age of 3”  Haley had been tubing with our church the weekend before and loved it, Tim and gone along for the day to help supervise with the large number of children and came home saying he was ready to take us all the next day he had so much fun….

Well lets just remember he went with children that are, for the most part, able to swim, and to stand up in the water by themselves…it is fairly shallow and they could handle going over slight rapids……

It’ll be great, we’ll get to cool off in the water….yadda yadda yadda….lol I think the next time we do this, the children will all be at least a minimum of 10 years old!!!  So we get our tickets and our tubes….Tim decides, he will carry the baby and I will be hooked up to the next youngest Master P who just turned 3…there is no way that I can carry anyone on my lap being in an inner tube….I am somewhat glad there are no pictures of me trying to float comfortably being this pregnant!!!

So that means there are 6 of us in tubes…..we put the first tube in with Master P and he immediately starts to whimper….mind you all the children have life vests on praise the Lord!!!  I get in my tube next to him and we latch together and then he calms down….everyone else loads up and Tim tries to get the baby situated on his lap….

We are going along fine… the river is packed with people tubing and we are going along somewhat slow not too fast….My daughter was ahead of us but not tethered and so was our oldest son…they ended up pulling off to the side for us to catch up and then those two were upset because the sister was doing all the work and the brother wasn’t helping….not that he had ever been tubing before and knew what to do…. so we kept those two tethered together, Tim was tethered to our 2nd oldest son Master J and there was myself and our other son….

So we go meandering down the river, come to one of those slight rapids, mind you I am prone to getting stuck on the rocks with my bottom…lol…. I get stuck on the rocks and my son’s inner tube swings around behind me with the current onto my other side and the tether strap actually ends of straddling the rock that I am partially stuck on….I am not sure whether it was just the current or if we got bumped by another tuber, but my son’s tube ends up flipping over completely and down in the water he goes….my little 3 year old….ACCCKKKK I was thinking he was going to pop back up a lot quicker than he did but regardless, my arm was down in that water in a half a second and yanked him back up….So for the little guy who had been enjoying the tubing thus far, he was now scarred and the whole rest of the trip he was saying…mommy don’t let go of my tube and every time he saw a rock sticking up in the water, his lips would start quivering and he would be crying……

My next oldest son at one point would not stop crying either, daddy had put the baby with him in case he needed to get out and rescue someone quickly…well that was not to be had…so daddy told him in no uncertain terms that he was to shape up immediately and that put a stop to his crying…we changed up the tethers so that we each had three tubes together….that worked for Daddy but he had two straps I only had one strap and the next rapid, I had to let my daughter go otherwise we were going to have problems, but we caught back up and she just held onto the tether or to the handle on my tube….  Then there was the other rapids that we went through ok but I was worried about my husband and all the boys…. and of course one of them got stuck on the rock so he lets go of the baby in the tube by himself and hopes that he will float to where I am at…aCCCKKK  so there I am trying to hold my spot in the water, catch the baby in the tube before he floats by and make sure that my tube and our other son don’t float away…..

Every child experienced a time of crying and not having fun, I was just slightly uncomfortable to say the least, between trying to recline or sit upright….and lastly not to mention the sunburn on my calves and just above my knees….OUUUUCCCHHHH, they haven’t seen the light of day in years…I had put sunblock on my feet but thought my legs would be ok….NOT…..

So here are a few pictures of our camping.

Daddy trying to teach our daughter to swim without getting in the water!!

 

The Father-Son Campout

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This was the first year that Tim was able to attend the Father Son Campout with our church…He took the three oldest boys.  They loaded up sleeping bags and two backpacks of overnight clothes for the four of them.  One of the Church members has quite a large piece of property out in Honea Path, SC that has a large lake as well.

They met up at church and loaded up the church van and drove down to the property at about 4pm on Friday…Now you must realize that with a 6 year old, a 5 year old and one just a month shy of 3….that there was nothing they could think about all week except going camping!!!

Practically every day was “When is Friday?”, “When are we going camping?”, “Is it time for camping yet?” The boys were so excited to be able to sleep in sleeping bags outside in tents and to go fishing…

While my husband was away with the three oldest boys, my daughter had a friend come stay the night from church.  This probably was the ideal situation because the boys were all gone and not here to harass the girls and my youngest little boy could have cared less that there was a guest in the house .

Here are a few pictures of the boys…my husband sent them from his phone.

This is my oldest, Master A, and my husband said he has a natural talent for throwing the line out in the water, he did the best, better than my husband he said!!

My next oldest, Master J,..quite proud of his catch, this was their first time fishing and catching fish.

My youngest, Master P., with one of the other little boys from Church.

They came home, excited, dirty and talking a mile a minute about how much fun they had!!!

I am hoping that maybe for next year we can organize a Church camping weekend in addition to The Mother Daughter Luncheon and the Father Son Campout.  I have done that with a church we used to attend and I think we would have a really enjoyable time with this church.  We don’t have as many church members that would be camping but the few that would be able to go would make it a really nice time.