Rude Awakening!

Life has been pretty chaotic the past few weeks!
Levi took me to California for my Birthday it was so fun! We went to see a fight and caught a baseball game as well.
Angels vs. Red Sox
I was thrilled when the Angels won 11-3! Actually I am thrilled when any team beats the Red Sox!
Unfortunately we got some bad news while we were there. Of course it would happen while I was out of town!
To understand a little background is necessary.
In March of this year I was sick and had a few complications from a surgery I had in Feb. Of course my Grandma who is very supportive, watched Olivia and Krew while I went to many doctor appointments. She is one of the very few people I allow to watch my kiddo's. I know I am pretty over-protective, so it helped my recovery immensely knowing my babies were safe and didn't need to worry.
That day Olivia had asked my Grandma to build a fire. While doing that my Grandma kneeled down in such a way that her leg was injured. My Grandma thought she had pulled something and wasn't too concerned about it, she thought it would go away sooner or later. A few months go by and her leg just got worse and worse, finally after us begging she went to see a Doctor.
They discovered she had a blood clot in her leg. The Doctor said that Physical Therapy would take care of it. (I am thinking that sounds pretty crazy, but I am no Doctor) She had one session and things began going downhill quickly!
She couldn't walk and was having a hard time breathing. My aunt went over and took her to the ER.
This was the news I received on my trip.
They discovered blood clots not only in her leg but in her lungs as well. They put her on blood thinners and assumed that would take care of the clots. Not only did it not work but it actually made things worse. Her leg was so swollen and it was pretty painful for her. I knew it had to be bad when she complained, because she is pretty tough.
The Doctors had no clue as to what was going on and decided to operate to see if they could figure it out.
It wasn't good. The Doctor told us that the removed a hematoma "the size of a Volleyball!"
Last weekend we were informed that not only was it cancer but that she had another tumor in her leg that would need to be removed. That happened Saturday night.
She will now need Radiation treatments and it will be a long recovery for her. I will be there to help her in any way I can.


This has been very difficult! I guess I assumed she would be with me forever, not wanting to even think otherwise.
She has been a stable person in my life, when I have had no one else. She always gives me advice and honest advice even if it may be something I don't want to hear. When I thought things were hopeless, she reminded me that things don't stay the same forever.
My Grandma has been like a second mother, I lived with her off and on throughout my life....when my parents divorced, while going to High School. (Imagine all of the advice and help while in High School!)
I can't begin to list the many things she has done for me or sacrificed for me. All of the things she has taught me.
Now when I need her the most, she can't be there for me. She is my rock when these things happen in my life. I am very lucky to have her.
I love her so much and I think that it is my turn to take care of her now.

Friends...Fireworks and FUN!!!!

Olivia turns 4!

My amazing skills as a Blogger!!!!!

Well, what a blogger I turned out to be! In my own defense, these past few months have been busy!!!!!
So I decided to post my blog with pictures from the last couple of months.
(Easy way out!!)
So I will begin with May..... Olivia turned 4 on the 17th and Krew turned one on the 22nd.
We celebrated by having Olivia's party at Kangaroo Zoo, which was actually pretty cool! I had never heard of it until Levi told me they were building it right next to his office/warehouse.
It was especially great for me because I didn't need to worry about entertaining 16 kids and their parents!!!!!
It was great! We had a lot of fun!!!!!

Spring?????

Well, it's here!!!! Softball season has begun once again! You know what that means.......we will be making one or more trips to the hospital!
You think that I would be talking about my children, (and in a sense that is true!) but I am talking about my husband!
Yes, anyone who knows Levi has had a laugh or two at his expense. I can honestly say that there is another person in this world that is more accident prone than I.
I guess it was meant to be.
At one point I was able to handle his accidents like a champ, being a pre-school teacher it was the norm for me to take care of such accidents. I could even handle the occasional puking child.
My last year of teaching, I should have known I was pregnant because it was at this point when I had to have an assistant handle these instances, and I was puking right along with the kids!
The only positive thing I can say about this time in my life was that it brought me my beautiful baby girl...and I lost 30 pounds!!!!
Needless to say, I have never been able to get over these issues.
I have become the person who panics and has to leave before passing out!
I will give credit to Levi who is the paranoid over protective parent. For some reason the roles are reversed in the occasional accident. I freak out while Levi calmly deals with the situation.
I am sure it is because he has a lot of experience with injuries, stitches and poisonous spider bites!
The last softball injury occurred when running into home, and although he won't admit this, purposely sliding into the catcher. That was 10 stitches in his chin!
So now that spring is here (not totally convinced though) and softball has begun, we will find out what accidents await us this season.
Hopefully, Levi and I both being accident prone, will cancel out and this will not be passed on to our children. (unfortunately we have already had a few instances.)

We shall see....Krew is very mobile, and almost walking. I cannot believe that he will be 1 in may. I can't believe Olivia will be 4 in may either!!!!
We are currently checking out pre-schools for the fall.
I am sure I will have a harder time with it than she will, while teaching pre-school, I didn't have my children yet. I didn't fully understand how difficult this transition would be. Olivia? totally fine. Me??? a wreck!
I am hoping that finding the right pre-school will make the transition a little easier. For me!

WoW!!!!!! Is it really April???? I do not remember where the time went......actually I don't remember much of anything lately!The past 2 months have been CRAZY!!!!!After having surgery the end of February, things kind of settled down.....for about 1 hour! I guess my family has been the lucky recipient of a bad cold! The kiddo's were swiftly taken to the Doctor, thanks in part to their paranoid mother!!!!! (praying it wasn't RSV!)You would think that after having one child, I would be more relaxed the second time around.To understand you need a little history........Olivia was born in May of 2004, we were very excited to have her, and the anticipation of seeing her beautiful face was overwhelming.While pregnant I was always fearful of something going wrong, I just wanted her to be born so that I could check her out and see that she was just perfect!I didn't realize that I would regret thinking that, and wishing I was still pregnant, before I knew what Levi and I would have to endure for the first 3 months of her life.I never saw it coming!Olivia was born with a rare birth defect called a Diaphragmatic Hernia.Interpreted it means she had a hole in her diaphragm where some of her lower organs moved into her chest, causing her left lung to be under developed and putting pressure on her Heart. If that wasn't bad enough, she also had 2 holes in her heart.I never dreamed that I would be leaving the hospital without my precious baby. 8 days after she was born, she was life flighted to Primary Children's hospital. There she would undergo surgery to repair her diaphragm and put her organs where they should have been.Unfortunately, Levi and I did not realize how bad this was until we researched it on the Internet. BIG MISTAKE.We discovered that this birth defect had a 10 % survival rate. We were heartbroken. The day after she arrived at Primary Children's she had surgery....this was the longest few hours of my life!They repaired the diaphragm and over the next few weeks she gradually improved. Then she was finally able to come home!!!!It wasn't until a few weeks later that I realized just how bad this could have been. Another baby in the NICU at Primary Children's had the same birth defect as Olivia. It had been 4 weeks since we brought her home and while reading the newspaper I discovered that the other baby didn't make it. It sunk in that it could have been us. I felt so very lucky and vowed never to take anything for granted.This being our first child, and with her being so ill, we went crazy!The Doctors warned us that if she got sick, it would be harder for her to get over it, than a typical child would. That's all we needed!I am sure we went a little overboard but I can say now that she did not get sick!!!!! It also could have been the 6 100$ RSV shots the doctor wanted her to have. The shots couldn't prevent the RSV, but if she got it, it wouldn't be as severe.We were soooo over protective that she never got sick.So 2 nights ago, when Krew had a fever of 103 we panicked! Yes this was my second child, but this was something I never had to deal with before.In fact for the first 3 months of Krews life, it was like having that first baby. Everything was different.The pediatrician got a call about 2 or 3 in the morning! But she understood what we went through in the hospital with Olivia, and was kind enough to tell us it was a good reason to call her and not to worry about it.I love our pediatrician!!!!!So, Because we have all been ill, my small worry turns into huge paranoia! The babies are doing OK, and will hopefully have a speedy recovery.On a lighter note, my daughter witnessed a miracle!While looking out of our back doors, I heard a gasp, followed by "It's a miracle!" I asked her "Olivia, what is the miracle?"She looks up at me and exclaims "The sky is leaking!" (Rain of course!)She probably says at least 5-6 things a day that make me laugh!We are so lucky to be her parents, and Krew's as well!

Sick!

OK, well just thought I would post something about why I have not posted anything recently. I had a kidney stone for 3 weeks, finally I had to have surgery to remove it. It was horrible, and even though I have had the surgery before...it was especially worse this time!!!
I can honestly say I would rather have a baby and be in labor than have kidney stone surgery. For anyone who knows about this and has gone through it....you have my deepest simpathy!!!!!!
I am better now however, and am trying to turn my house back into its previous state. When Mom is sick, the house goes to shambles!!!!
I hope everyone else is doing well!!!!