Saturday, February 19, 2011

Lantz

No more snoring at our house!!! It has been 2 weeks and Lantz is officially back to himself, minus the snoring. It is amazing how QUIET our house is and it has never been quiet before. John and I have to check in his room to make sure he is alive because it is so quiet. He only took about a week and half to recover so we were glad about that. We are glad that part of our lives is over.
Here he is right before we leave the hospital.Our friend, Kirk, was nice enough to babysit for a couple of hours so John could come see us at the hospital. He got to read Lantz some books. While John was away Makelle threw up and Kirk got to deal with the mess. That is a true friend, although I don't think he will be volunteering that again! I felt horrible. Oh well it was nice to see John and get a break while he was there. It was a Valentines to remember!



Getting his first ice cream after surgery!
He did great but we were glad to come home. John was able to miss two days of school to watch the kids. It was good he already planned for that because the Zak and Makelle were sick for an entire week. We both had fun week of ornery miserable kids. It makes me glad my life isn't usually like that and that my kids are usually up feeling good and making messes. Sure makes me appreciate the messes.


**Details for me to remember
The week before surgery when they had to to lab work he did awesome. He held very still for his blood to be drawn and when he got poked his eyes teared and his lip trembled but he didn't cry and he held very still while they got all of the vials of blood. I was SO proud.
They gave him some silly juice before surgery and it made him all smiley and he couldn't hold his head up. He would just lay in my arms and gaze at me with a smiley face.
Surgery was about 1 hour and he did great. The Dr. said his tonsils weren't big they were HUGE and so were his adenoids he was glad to get them out. After surgery Lantz was having a hard time breathing so they had to give him breathing treatments in recovery for the next hour before I got to see him. They sent me to his room to wait for him and we were in a shared room. We got to share with a noisy family on the other side. I was in the room for 2 minutes when I called John to tell him about surgery and I said this is going to be the longest day of my life because I have to share a room. I was looking forward to a nice quiet day just holding Lantz. The room had the bathroom and entrance on my side and the sink on their side. Every nurse or visitor for them had to come in my room and they had to come on my side to use the bathroom and I had to go on their side to wash my hands. Their son kept coming on our side and touching Lantz let's just say it was a LONG day! Lantz did good all day except when he would go to sleep he would have respiratory distress and his alarms would go off. A nurse would come re position him and he would be ok for a few minutes until he would not breath good again. We went to sleep for the night when at about 10:45 we get a knock on the door saying they were coming to clean the other side to get it ready for a patient in the morning. I was thinking what time is it. I thought this can't be for real. They have had 6 hours to clean and they are coming now. I sat up and read for the next half hour while they banged beds, mopped and cleaned the room. Luckily Lantz hadn't got to sleep all day so he slept thru it. The rest of the night he was once again in respiratory distress and the alarms were going off. I stopped calling the nurses because they would just wake him up reposition him and it would all start over. So I spent the night with alarms going off constantly. At one time a nurse heard the alarms down the hall and came in. She had a look of horror on her face as she saw the numbers on the machine. She looked over at me on the couch doing nothing and said this monitor must not be working because his oxygen should not be that low. I said it is working but we can't get him to breath good on his own. That nurse immediately put him on oxygen while I got a lecture about how bad it was to let his oxygen get so low. He stayed on oxygen the whole time while we were there when he was sleeping. He never could get his levels up on his own. After keeping us for an additional day the Dr decided as long as I wasn't worried they would let him go because he was probably used to not having high levels of oxygen. We were glad to finally be released. Lantz was excited to eat some food. The first day we were there they forgot to feed him lunch. When they finally brought him some they brought someone else's food with Fried chicken and mac n cheese. Lantz was crying and begging for the chicken which of course he couldn't have. It was delightful. Two hours later they brought dinner which he wasn't hungry for yet. When they were bringing dinner they asked if he would rather have chicken or a hamburger, REALLY he just got out of surgery? Let's just say they didn't quite have a clue what was going on. Then the next day when he could eat food they brought him Jello and only jello all day. Of course he didn't want to eat that because the day before he had real food. It was a bit of a joke!!!! When we got home he ate many helpings of spaghetti and pudding!


Friday, February 11, 2011

Sickness and SNORING


I spoke to soon about the winter blues, Spring please hurry so we can leave our house, play at the park, not be sick and see other people!!!! I know every other mother with young kids feels the same way too (and we miss our husbands)! Life is good but it seems like this is the LONGEST time of the year when it is sickness, sickness, and more sickness. We go from crazy busy one day to cancel everything because we can't leave the house. It sure make me grateful for sunny days, healthy children and everything else good in life, like these kiddos. The one good thing is they SLOW down a bit and they even let me CUDDLE them. Which almost never happens. Here are the sick boys cuddling each other.


Lantz gets to have his tonsils and adenoids out on Monday so I had to capture his snoring one last time. His breathing has been getting worse and worse and now he doesn't eat well because he chokes a lot. He sounds like he is snoring when he is just sitting next to you. The Doctor could hear his breathing before he even checked his tonsils. Now that is sad! I start to feel bad that we are having him have surgery just so he doesn't snore but then I go listen to him in bed and watch him and I feel so bad he hasn't ever had a good nights sleep. Only a few more nights and then hopefully good nights are ahead!


It's hard to hear in this video because of the background noise but at the end you can hear his breathing! I don't expect everyone to watch it, I just want to have it recorded so that I always have it. My little guy is going to be a completely different person. Not really but his loud breathing and snoring is a HUGE part of who he is. Poor guy, better days are ahead.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Tender Mercies

I think I am officially over the winter blues for a while anyways. Man, winter is sure a depressing time of the year! It seems like life is sickness, sickness, and more sickness!

On to better things. John and I have been talking a lot lately about how blessed our family is. We are blessed in many many ways. We have had the opportunity to see several missionaries from our branch leave on missions lately. Our branch now has five missionaries out, AMAZING! We also have super AMAZING youth here that influence our lives so much. My kids have great examples and there are certain young men that Zak tries to dress like every Sunday and he stays after church to help them with their cleaning duties. The same goes for Makelle. We were with one of the girl missionaries when she opened her call. It was a great experience. That night on the way home Makelle said. I know I said I didn't want to go on a mission because I was too scared, but now I want to go on a mission but I am still a little scared. She then started to tear up. She came home and in her prayers she prayed that she wouldn't be scared to go on a mission. I am so grateful for good examples in the lives of my children. I love that they have people that they look up to that are making good choices. They want to be just like them and I have no problem with that. We think of it as a huge blessing that we are here in Indiana at this time when some of our family is struggling with making good choices. Our kids look up to these people that they love so much and when they make wrong choices they are so confused. We are grateful that Heavenly Father has provided good examples for our children and put us here where our children can look to their example. He truly loves us. My children have grown by leaps and bounds spirtually lately. Makelle got a new temple calendar and she was so excited to find her birthday on it. She then said look mom I only have to go up these three steps (squares) to get to the temple and be married. She was so excited and it was so easy for her. John then talked to her about what those steps to get to the temple would be. Then a few days ago she was sick and she walked into our room after going to bed and quietly said, "Dad, I need a blessing". John was able to lift her onto the bed and give her a blessing. She went to bed, stopped coughing and woke up better the next day. How grateful I am to have a husband who honors his priesthood who can be called upon at any time. I am grateful that my children realize the power of the priesthood and that they can call upon their dad for anything. In scripture reading Zak has been reading his own scriptures all by himself (he is such a great reader, so exciting). John talked to him about praying each night to know if the things he is reading are true. He talked about how other books are pretend and some books have educational things that are true or that sometimes change. Then he bore his testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. Zak does that every night now. How amazing that I have a husband who taught Zak at young age to pray and know the truth of every single page of scripture he reads. Heavenly Father loves us and he blesses us. I am so grateful for my knowledge and testimony of the gospel and for a husband who constantly humbles me. I am grateful to be a mother to these great kids who are tomorrows future. Life is good. So even though I may have days of the winter blues I quickly get over it when I realize how blessed I am.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Lantz's Birthday

I can't believe this guy is 2!!! He is so big and it is weird to not have a baby around! He was so excited for his birthday. He would talk about his Elmo cake and blowing out candles. He practiced blowing them out for a week. He got some presents in the mail a few days before his birthday and while I was in the attic he took advantage and started to open them. He knew good stuff had to be inside. For his birthday while we waited for Zak at school we went birthday shopping and to Chuck-E-Cheese to pretend ride the toys. Good thing my kids are content with sitting on them without them moving. They think it is great.




Then we picked Zak up and we all went to lunch at McDonalds and got ice cream cones. All of the kids were in heaven. All of the customers looked at me like I was crazy with four little kids alone at McDonalds. Then we came home and the kids helped me make the cake for Lantz. Then we decorated the house and got it ready for when Lantz woke up from his nap.
It's Elmo in case you can't tell!

Then it was party time!





Zak got him GUM and I think he was most excited about it!









He had his candles blown out before we even stopped singing. He had been practicing so much. Zak and Makelle were so mad about him doing it so soon. He was just so excited to finally get to do it.
Licking the candles.
Showing everyone his ELMO!


Cute messy girl.
A close up of the messy.
Happy Birthday Lantz!

Snow Fun

A few weeks ago we got enough snow to play in. The first day I was a little plow horse and hooked a laundry basket and 2 tubes to a rope. Then I put it around my stomach and pulled 4 kids on it. I asked John if I would get mother of the year award for all of my hard work. He said he was sure I would get redneck mother of the year award!!! After that I let him try it out. He only had to pull Zak most of the time so he didn't get the same experience. Although he did feel like he was going to die after.

I love this picture of Zak and John!
This is when John is about to die.
He's up an at it again.
Lantz got on for a minute but he gets too cold.