School has been out a week, and once again we have a summer membership to the pool at the country club. Scott and the kids went a couple days this week and I have finally be able to go with them the last couple days. When we returned home after swimming, we sent the kids to their rooms to change their clothes and then spent some time relaxing in the living room.

At dinner time, only Emily and Timothy came to the table when we called them all the dinner. Timothy explained that Zachary was asleep. He often just falls asleep in odd places and odd times, so this didn’t surprise us. He could eat when he woke up. Not long after we started eating, Zachary came downstairs. The first thing we all noticed was that he was only wearing his swim shirt (no trunks). We asked him where his shorts were, and his response was that he needed to go to the bathroom. He then went into the office. We called him. He returned to the living room, and we asked him why he had gone to the office. Once again, we got the response that he needed to go to the bathroom and he turned and headed to the office. This time I got up and took him to the bathroom. When he returned to the living room, we directed him to go to his room and get dressed.

A moment he later he was back in the living room dressed the same way he was the last time we’d seen him and he informed us he needed to go the bathroom. We reminded him not to go to the office, and he actually made it to the bathroom this time. Not long after he returned to the living room with his blanket. This time we began to suspect he was asleep. He’s a silly kid, but he knows where the bathroom is! We asked him if he was awake and he giggled. We asked him where his clothes were and he giggled. He was heading toward his room, so we again asked him to get some clothes on. Up the stairs he went.

After he had been gone a few minutes, I headed upstairs to check on him. I found him laying in his bed with his eyes wide open. He looked at me and told me he couldn’t get his clothes from his top drawer. He usually using his little stool to reach the top drawer, but clearly he wasn’t thinking straight. I got him dressed and asked him if he was hungry. He was hungry, so we headed down to eat. He was truly awake this time, so we all had a good laugh telling him about his naptime adventure.

All three kids have done this at one time or another. It seems to always involve needing to go to the bathroom. Why is that?

Timothy’s first hit off the machine in baseball.

Emily’s presentation at the PTA Reflections Awards.

Her newsletter without illustrations (we didn’t get it scanned after she drew the pictures)

Zachary’s first t-ball season will be starting soon! I’m sure many videos and funny tales will come from that…

We’ve admired this house from the outside for 8 years and had often thought that one day we’d like to build one that looked just like it. Instead, we decided to skip building one and buy the house.

Thanks for making us laugh!

The week long celebration came to an end tonight with a trip to the North Pole on the Polar Express.    A full account with LOTS of pictures to come soon.

If that doesn’t put you in the Christmas spirit, nothing will.

Open up the pictures folder on your computer, choose the fourth folder and then the fourth photo. Viola. 4×4. Try it.
Here is my picture:

Aw.  My favorite 4 people in the world at Sea World San Antonio last Spring Break.

Eeny, miney mo
Catch a tiger toe
Mama said I get the last one
So I get this one

Emily will be home in an hour!

What we didn’t expect was only 2 of the 21 students to be in the drawing.  Emily called us from school on the last day of school to let us know that we would be taking a hamster home from school.  She was so excited that we couldn’t help being excited too.

Meet Sneakers.  He lives in his cage in Emily’s bedroom.  He seems to enjoy his new home a lot. 

Unfortunately, something came along about eight months ago that forced me focus on myself. At Emily’s 7th birthday party at the end of August, I noticed a lump about the size of a ping pong ball in my right groin. It didn’t hurt, but it was a little disconcerting. In the following weeks, I kept track of the lump. It changed size and would go away with no apparent reason. I mentioned it to my doctor at my annual checkup, but all she could do was guess what it could be since that was during a time when the lump was not there.

Fast forward to mid-February. The lump is still coming in going, and I decide it’s time to get it checked out. I actually made it in to the see the doctor at a time when the lump is there. My doctor didn’t know what it was. Whatever it was, she knew it would have to be removed so she referred me to a surgeon.

When I made it in to see the surgeon two weeks later, of course the lump was gone. The surgeon guessed it was a lymph node or a hernia, but couldn’t be sure with it not actually being there. Those guesses were based on the location. He gave me instructions to call him the next time it came back. That chance came just a couple weeks later. This time the doctor felt pretty sure it was a lymph node, so he scheduled an ultrasound and possible biopsy for the next day.

The ultrasound had surprising results. Instead of the expected lymph node, it was confirmed that I had a femoral hernia. Surgery was our only option. At that time, the question was when. The answer came the next week. The surgeon’s office called me while we gone to San Antonio to discuss the results of the ultrasound. I asked if we could wait until summer to get it repaired, and they really didn’t encourage that. The longer we waited, the greater the risk of strangulation. At that point, it would be emergency surgery. Scott and I talked about it and decided we would schedule it as soon as we could.

After we returned from our trip, I called the surgeon and scheduled the surgery for April 25th. They told me that it was an outpatient procedure with about three days recovery, which made April 25th ideal because it was during a four day weekend from work. I wouldn’t have to miss any work. That is why I really started to panic when I came down with a sinus infection on the 18th. I really didn’t want to have to reschedule.

Luckily, I was feeling mostly better by the 25th so off we went to the surgery center at 10:00 that morning. After a visit with my surgeon and the others who would be involved with the surgery, it was time for my nap. I had told the anesthesiologist about the sinus infection, so she added some steroid in with the anesthesia to help with that. The next thing I remember is being in recovery with Scott close by. Apparently, I woke up at the end of a conversation with the surgeon. As it turned out, I had two hernias in my right groin. They have both been repaired, and I am well on my way to being back to my old self.

This is not my first visit to a hospital / surgery center in recent years. But, this is the first time it is about something that centers on me. The three other times that I’ve had surgery in the last 7 years, the end result has been a baby. We were always surrounded by our very supportive family and had a wonderful Sunday School class in Plainview that was very good to provide a meal or two and to stock us up on diapers.

I have to say that the show of love around me over the last weekend has been very humbling. Our new Sunday School class, which we’ve only been in for about 4 months, provided meals for 3 days. The wonderful ladies that I work with sent food for another day. Another group I have joined since we moved here has called and promised to bring meals soon as well. Mom and Dad came for a week to help corral the children and to care for me while Scott had to work. There have been more emails and phone calls than I can count. I returned to work today and was really pampered. I almost feel like I shouldn’t be feeling as good as I do, but the truth is that I feel okay. I am tired and a little sore, but I am doing really well.

When we get bogged down with all the awful stories that we hear on the news, it’s hard to feel like there is any good left in the world. But there is. I have seen it this week.

People may think they look alike, but I think if they spent even a little bit of time with them that they would know that their personalities are quite different. Maybe that’s what I see when I look at them, so I don’t notice them looking alike.