I miss you, too

Let's just start by saying it's been a CRAZY couple of weeks. 

I have had quite a few people ask how we are and tell me they miss my daily blog posts. I miss blogging, too!  But I feel like I've been sick & out of it for so long, I don't know where to start! So this will just be a mishmash of kid cuteness and pictures I have on my camera.

It is mid December, and there is still hardly any snow on the ground.  We got a little more last night, but there's not enough to play in or snow machine on.  In these pictures (from the 6th) it warmed up enough to rain, and we had to get the boys mud boots back out of their closet upstairs!

The boys are all officially "and a half".

The twins are five "and a half",

and Wyatt is two "and a half." 

I'm not sure why this bothers me to the extent that it does... but Wyatt being two and a half is like watching him wave goodbye to his toddler days.  {wiping tears}  Luckily, he is pretty fun right now, so I'm enjoying him even though he has the audacity to keep growing up before my eyes!

 With my anxiety, it sometimes helps to watch TV. It distracts me from my thoughts.  The other morning I was watching Cutthroat Kitchen and afterwards when the boys were going to make pudding, they said they wanted it to be a competition.

 So they poured in their milk together on the count of three, Jack stirring chocolate,

 and Logan making vanilla.

Then we did a taste test, and it ended in a tie.  

 They apparently get a lot of inspiration from the TV... Their most recent hijinks was this spiders web with swinging baby soap dispenser when you opened the door, courtesy of Home Alone, of course. 

 They love to try making "traps" as they call them. 

Aside from having really fun ideas, they are also becoming really great helpers.  They clear the table, vacuum the rug and organize their toys when I ask.  It's so lovely to have their help.  Especially during weeks like this when Josh is gone so much after work.

 They really love helping with Wyatt.  

Here Jack was helping Wyatt take off his gear for Saturday Social.

All three boys LOVE Saturday Social.  They love to play basketball in the gym with Josh, run with their friends and eat the popcorn & slushies provided.

The weather lately has been really grey and cold (plus we've been sick) so that makes us even more grateful for the opportunities we had at Saturday Social to play!  I wish the blue skies would come back.  I really miss seeing the sunshine, and today especially I wish the clouds would depart so our dear friends who are traveling home for the holidays could leave as planned.

Over the course of my being diagnosed with pneumonia and falling back into anxiety & panic (plus the kids all being sick) I decided along with my doctor to increase my medication dose.  I am anxious to see if this rectifies the situation and am hopeful that I will soon be back to my old self after so many months suffering.

I have also found a counselor who will counsel me over the phone, which is a great blessing to me, and I think that, too, will help with my emotional state.

 Meanwhile, I am doing the best I can to distract myself (with TV and music and addressing what felt like hundreds of Christmas cards) and trying to focus on the holidays that are rapidly approaching.

Elf on the shelf is one of those ways.  The boys are loving it!  One night I forgot to place him somewhere, so we told the boys they had been so good that he didn't have to report to Santa that night.  Hehehe!

 And this guy... He puts a smile on my face, too.

I mean, how could he not???

Happy Friday night all! 

Hopefully I am back for good!

Healing

 One day down... four to go, and then we have Daddy home, to ourselves, for three whole weeks!  I'm slowly recovering from the pneumonia and our boys are all slowly recovering from the flu/hacking coughs.  I am also attempting to heal emotionally.

Some days are still full of anxiety & tears. Other days are more hopeful.  I am holding my breath that a change in medication will help me balance out.  In the meantime, I am seeking comfort in my boys, and in Josh's arms, and in my mother's voice.

*

Please, when we cross your mind, lift us up in prayer.  

Ask the Lord to carry our family through.

Thank you.

When it rains, it pours...

This will just be a quick post before I retire to bed surrounded by sick children.

Just as I was getting ready to go to sleep last night, exhausted beyond belief, Jack woke up. And proceeded to vomit, shaking and crying, poor little soul.

I alternated sleeping beside him, and sleeping in my own bed, praying that God would lower is 102.5 degree fever and spare his brothers.

Then this morning Wyatt's fever began, and by mid-afternoon Logan, too had thrown up.

Currently Josh is bathing them with Johnson & Johnson Soothing Vapor Baby Bath, and then we will crawl upstairs together, read some books and lay them down for bed.

If you have a moment, please do me a favor. Please lift our family up in prayer. Josh has missed nearly an entire week of work. I am still coughing horribly and suffering awful anxiety.  All three boys are coughing and weak, fevering with runny noses.  We desperately need your prayers for health and healing.  And I need your prayers for peace.

Thank you, sweet friends.

***

Pneumonia...

I had been feeling a tightness in my chest for a few days, when suddenly on Sunday I felt like I couldn't breathe.  It was so bad we called the emergency on-call number for the health aide at the clinic.  Leah came over to watch the kids and the health aid met us there once the boys were down.  He took my vitals, noting that my oxygen was only 94, and listened to my lungs, which were crackling, and confirmed that I had pneumonia. 

I couldn't believe it. I had thought maybe bronchitis, or even just my anxiety making me think I couldn't breathe. I never in a million years thought I had pneumonia.

I did a nebulizer treatment there and the doctor who called back said to send me home with an inhaler. She wasn't wanting to do antibiotics yet because I didn't have a fever and I wasn't coughing up mucus.  So we came home and I took two puffs every four hours.  That sounds pretty easy, right?

Well... when the albuterol from the inhaler makes you feel like you are having a panic attack, it's not so easy. It makes my heart race, my arms shake, my thoughts race. It's terrible. For an hour and a half after taking it, I have to keep reminding myself that I am fine, it's just the medicine making me think I'm freaking out.  

Josh stayed home Monday, and I was alright. I went in to be checked again, and my oxygen was up to 97 and my lungs sounded better.  Josh also stayed home Tuesday, but he had to go in to make lesson plans. I was so freaking out Tuesday morning (feeling that I couldn't breathe, that I was getting worse, that I was going to pass out or die) that I called my dear sweet friend Leah to come be with me while Josh was gone. She came and Josh went, and I managed to not pass out.

When Josh got home we started making plans for me to visit Anchorage. Flying out, leaving the boys... it terrifies me. But feeling like this, constantly being afraid for my life, having the anxiety run my days, and not having access to good mental health care out here, made me feel that flying out was my best option.

My mom agreed to meet me there, in Anchorage, and take me to my appointments (a Godsend), but when we went to book airline tickets, there were no flights today or tomorrow.  I had been given (on my third trip to the clinic) a Rx for an antibiotic, so our thinking is that we will keep up with that and see how I do. If I am still a wreck in a few days, I can fly out. But if not, I will try to wait to fly out until during winter break to see a counselor in Anchorage who can then do phone/skype sessions with me as needed when I am back in Marshall.

So that's where I'm at. Crackly lungs (which sounded worse today) but a better oxygen reading (at 99), burning chest, sore throat, severe cough, stuffy nose/sinuses, sore face, and plugged ears.  I would like to just fast forward through the next few days and be well again so Josh can go to work, and I can take care of our kids.  Thank God for Josh.  He has been awesome, and I'm so grateful.

When I come to mind the next few days,
please lift up a quick prayer on my behalf.
Prayers for peace, for healing, for faith.
I would so appreciate it.

Dashy

 Meet Dashy.

Our Elf on the Shelf.

 We started December with one gift for each day of Advent. I spent zero money on this (aside from our Elf on the Shelf), the rest are all things I already had on hand.

 Each day the boys get to open one surprise.
Little things like brownies we get to bake together or beads to make necklaces with.

Elf on the Shelf was their first present, and they are enamored.

 Logan loves him.

 Jack loves him.

 Wyatt loves him.

 But most importantly, I love him.

For those of you who don't know what Elf on the Shelf is all about, here's the rundown.  

Once the elf is sent to live with children, his magic begins.  All day he watches the boys' behavior, and then each night, once we are asleep, he flies back to the North Pole to report to Santa.  For this mama, that means little boys working hard on kindness & listening. And that's a beautiful thing!

 We wrote letters to Santa and asked Dashy to deliver them.

The next morning Dashy appeared with two letters back from Santa, telling the twins how proud Santa was of their kindness and how if they kept working so hard, they would get the presents they requested.

They were tickled pink to have real life letters from Santa.

***

But their favorite part about Dashy is waking up in the morning 

and finding what he's been up to all night.

 Each night we leave him on my desk, and each morning, we wake up and find that he has arrived back from the North Pole and had a little fun.  The first night, he was playing with Wyatt's cash register.

The second night he had snuck into our bag of Whoppers and enjoyed a few.

The third night he spent playing the Wii.

And the fourth night he arrived on Bucky the pirate ship with Jake & The Neverland Pirates

to deliver Santa's letters.

The boys are always reminding each other that Dashy is watching, and Tuesday Logan admitted that he had lied to me and he didn't want Dashy to tell Santa, so he thought he should tell me the truth and apologize. I was flabbergasted.

They love to hold him and carry him around and even bring him upstairs each night for story time.  I am so happy I decided to get one this year. It has truly put magic in our Christmas!

Tabitha's Questions

My friend Tabitha over at Team Studer had these questions on her blog, 
and I felt inspired to answer them!

1. What is the first thing you drink in the morning?
Coffee.  With loads of creamer. 

2. What is your favorite day of the week and why?
Friday.  Because I have survived the week, the weekend is coming, and we have date night!  
Hello, pizza & a movie!

3. What is your least favorite chore?
Cleaning the shower.

4. What are the biggest changes from your life today compared to five years ago?
Five years ago, I had been back at work for one week, leaving behind my five month old twins.  My very heart was breaking. So I would say the biggest (and best) change in my life since then is that I am a stay-at-home mom now.  Also, I had another baby & moved to a tiny village in rural Alaska.  But in my mind (and my heart) the biggest change is not having to leave my boys anymore.

5. What category of pins do you like best? (food, nail art, crafts, etc)
I am not on pinterest.
(Insert shock here)

6. If you had 60 minutes all to yourself in the middle of the day today, what would you do?
Today, I would take a nap.
But usually I would read or blog.

7. What was the last movie/video/commercial (damn you, Carters) that made you cry?
Parenthood. 
The episode where Kristina is in the hospital and they think she might die. 
I was a mess!

8. If you had the time and money to study something in depth for 6 months, what would you want to learn?  
Geology.  
I would become a rock geek!

9. What are three things you took for granted today?
Waking up.
Food on the table.
A husband who goes to work so I don't have to.

10. What is your favorite personality trait about yourself?
I love that I am motivated.
Motivated to get things done, motivated to change, motivated to make life better.

Poison Control

I was going to blog about my new book today, 

but something more pressing came up. 

I was emailing Julie (my sister-in-law and BFF) on the couch with my laptop when Logan came over with both hands pressed against his mouth and told me he had drank soda.  I argued with him, telling him there was no soda on the table.  He was insistent, telling me he had licked it off the table.

I got up and followed him into the kitchen and that's when I saw it.  There on the table was one of their toy dinosaurs, which he had opened with my kitchen screwdriver, and leaking out of its battery was a bluish liquid that had dribbled onto the table.  He told me he had drug his finger through the liquid and then licked it off his finger.  And that his mouth was burning.

I grabbed my cell phone off the kitchen table, scrolling my contacts for Poison Control, while guiding him into the bathroom to rinse his mouth out with water.  While he was spitting, Poison Control answered my call and assured me that while his mouth likely tasted pretty bad, no harm would come of it.  

I was so grateful I had their number already saved in my phone, and every time I've called (and I've called more times than I'd like to count) I am so grateful for the peace of mind they give me.

So Logan's lips hurt, and his fingertip, but he's really no worse for wear otherwise.  But I thought I'd share Poison Control's number with the masses so that if you find yourself in a similar situation, you, too, can be given peace of mind.

POISON CONTROL:
1-800-222-1222

Logan confided in me, after I explained that what he had consumed was battery juice, that while trying to get the AA's out of his dinosaur that he had whacked at them pretty aggressively with the screwdriver.  So it was him who "popped" the battery, causing the fluid to leak out. I talked with both he and Jack, making them promise not to touch batteries (or screwdrivers!) without first talking to mommy to make sure it was okay.

Whew.
What a way to get my blood pumping this morning!

Weekend Update + What Makes Me Happy

Weekend Update

 Friday

After a lovely Thanksgiving, Josh let me sleep in Friday morning.  When I woke up he was making bread & tortillas. During nap time I got to watch some episodes of Parenthood (my favorite!) and in the afternoon Josh took the twins sledding.  They were so happy to get outside.  When they came in, all rosy cheeked, I made them hot cocoa (with whip cream, of course) and once they were warmed up we decorated for Christmas. All three boys were so excited to help decorate our little Charlie Brown Christmas tree, and we had a great time.

Once the boys were down for the night we had Leah over for pizza and a movie. We watched Pitch Perfect, which was cute & funny.  It was great to hang out with Leah and laugh.

Saturday

I woke up with the boys Saturday and started laundry.  I cleaned the house and changed our sheets.  I also started a list of 1,000 gratitudes or gifts.  But more on that later.

Saturday evening we had family movie night with Turbo + cheese pizza + fudge for the boys.  Then I had Girls Night with Leah.  We hung out until after midnight talking.  It made me so happy.  Love that girl.

{The Advent Josh's sister made for Logan, Jack & Wyatt}

Sunday

Yesterday I slept in again.  I got to read in bed, which was luxurious, and watch the sun rise over the mountain.  It was breath taking.

I spent the day wrapping Advent Calendar gifts for the boys and preparing for the week ahead.  We will be making countdown chains for Christmas and writing letters to santa this week.  I can't wait!

What Makes Me Happy

God working in my life

I got a care package last week, and literally every single thing in it was something I needed or wanted.  There were popsicle sticks, which I had been wishing I had for crafts with the boys; two kinds of holiday m&m's; bath time alphabet sponges that Wyatt loves; beef jerky for Josh (his favorite); shelf creamer for me for my coffee that can sit in the pantry until I open it (!!!); and the cereal that comes in little boxes which my kids adore.

But the best part of the care package was the book she included.  One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp.  I literally looked at buying it on Amazon last week, but didn't. I know that with the holidays coming, I am going to have a tight budget this month, so I decided not to get it.  I started reading it the day I got it, and I can't put it down.  I will probably do an entire post on it this week, but suffice to say, it is speaking to me, and I know God had a hand in getting it from Kasey in New York to me in Alaska.

Talking to my nephew Ferris on the phone

Twinkle Lights

Our sense of community

Both at Thanksgiving and upon hearing of the crash in St. Mary's, I found myself grateful we are all in this together.

Samantha's leftover potato salad

It is oh-so-good.

Being anxiety free

Christmas Card preparation

I love the holiday season, especially sending out my yearly cards!

~

"Thanks makes now a sanctuary.  
And I take my vows: 
I will not desecrate this moment with 
ignorant hurry or sordid ingratitude."
-Ann Voskamp

This week I want to slow down & be grateful.

***

Sunshine Award

I've been nominated by a blogger friend (hi Kasey!) for a blogging award.  

It's a chance to answer some questions and nominate other bloggers to do the same.

Here's how it works:

1. Include this icon in your post-

2. Link to the blogger who nominated you-
Kasey at Powers Full Life

3. Answer 10 questions about yourself.

4. Nominate 10 other bloggers to answer 10 new questions.

5.  Tell the people that they've won.

Q & A:

1. If you could try out any  job for a day, what would you like to try?
I would like to be a geologist. In another life, that's what I would have been. And I would have loved to teach geology in a college. So if I could try anything, I would probably do that.

2. Do you wear socks to sleep?
I wear socks to sleep pretty often. I like to put on really thick lotion before bed, and slip socks over it, so my feet soak in lotion all night long.

3. What's your favorite book as a child and/or adult?
My favorite book as a child was The Best Little Monkeys in the World by Natalie Standiford
My favorite book as an adult is Sea Glass by Anita Shreve.

4. What is your greatest accomplishment to date?
My three children & the family life I've created with them.
It's all I ever wanted, and I love it.

5. What state/area of the world do you live in?  Have you always lived there? Are you happy there?
I currently live in rural Alaska in a tiny village of about 350 people along the Yukon River.  There is snow on the ground about eight months of the year, and temperatures in winter can reach sixty below.  We are off the road system and our only mode of travel is bush plane.  This is the third school year we have been in Marshall.  We moved here so my husband could become an elementary school teacher and I could finally be a stay-at-home mommy.  We plan to be here at least five years total, but also know that God might have different plans.

This fall has been really challenging (as you know, if you've been reading the blog lately) and I have struggled with severe anxiety, panic attacks and a touch of depression. But to tell you the truth, I think I would have faced these struggles anywhere.  It's in my family to suffer with these mental health issues, and honestly, I am grateful that I'm not the only one who has been through what I've been through.  I guess what I'm trying to say is that even though it's been a really difficult few months since we got here, I would have to say that, yes, I'm happy here. I love my husband, I love my kids and I love my life as a stay-at-home mom and homeschooler.  Getting my emotions back on track (thanks to modern medicine, journaling and some self-help books) I find that my joy is even richer now than it was before I had suffered this way.

6. If you could live anywhere in the world for one year where would you choose?
I think it would be fun to try a year in Hawaii.
Just to see how it compares to Alaska.

7. Best Christmas movie?
The Holiday

8. When do you decorate for Christmas/ or count the Christmas season as started?
I decorate for Christmas the day after Thanksgiving every year.
But Christmas music goes on as soon as Halloween is over!

9. What is your #1 goal for the next 5 years of your life?
My number one goal right now, and for the immediate future, is to pay off our debt.
In the next five years we'd like to buy a house (!!!), and I'd like to figure out if we're meant to have another baby or not.

10. What is your favorite blog, or what blog should I add to my blogroll? 
Enjoying The Small Things
Nie Nie Dialogues
Barefoot in the Kitchen
The Small Things

People I've nominated:

Holly @ Adventures in Alaska
Roxanne @ The Tuck Show
Annie @ Annery at Home
Joleen @ Beauty and the Beef
Samantha @ Life As We Know It
Liz @ Smelly Moose Family
Tabitha @ Team Studer
Rebekah @ Treasuring the Little Things
Megan @ Hurray! It's Megan
Allie @ The Kirby Way

My Questions:

1.  What is your favorite TV show?
2. What makes you happy when you're grumpy?
3. What is your favorite childhood memory?
4. Who is your best friend? Why?
5. What's your "feel good" movie?
6. When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?
7. What inspires you?
8. What is your favorite book?
9. Who is your favorite author?
10. What is your favorite song?

***