The Arm

The first night Stephen had his cast, it was quite a novelty. Everyone had to touch it, examine it, even sniff it (not sure why). He chose his favorite color, RED!

My nephew, David, is also sporting a cast this summer, but he is getting his off tomorrow! The two cousins stopped to pose for a picture when David's family was over on Tuesday night. These two guys had quite a bit to talk about as they exchanged injury stories, hospital stories and cast stories. They've got a special bond now, those two.

We're Still Here!

Don't worry everyone! We're still here ... I just haven't gotten to blog for ages as you can see. I don't really have time to do major posts right now either, but I WILL bring you a bit up to date on things.

I realize that I left a lot of you hanging about Stephen and his arm. My apologies. Things just went way too fast there that week and then we had to leave for Ohio and then Virginia the next day. Stephen's arm is most likely fractured. The x-rays still didn't show anything, but when the doctor at the Fracture Clinic looked at it on Friday, a week after it happened, he said that Stephen showed every indication that it was a greenstick fracture. He decided to treat it as a fracture and put a cast on it to make sure that it does heal properly. Stephen chose a nice, solid red color for his cast because his favorite color is red. He didn't really want it on before going to Camp because he was afraid that everyone would be asking him what happened. And that's exactly what happened. In retrospect, I should have had a shirt made for him that said, "I JUMPED OFF THE EDGE OF THE SLIDE" and let him wear it every day. Poor kid didn't even want to look at anyone who asked what happened after about the 100th time. There were about 841 people there this year and a LOT of people had to stop, ask what happened, and then share their own story. Stephen didn't really care. I did, though, so I listened to all the stories people wanted to share! Hahaha

Camp, in a nutshell, was wonderful! This was our first year without a stroller and I really enjoyed the age of the kids this year. Christopher was supposed to be in the 3 year old class this year, but he decided to hang on Mommy instead. That was fine, except for the day that I had to do a forum and he decided to stick with me. My sister-in-law was a sweetheart and sat with him in the front row while I was doing my presentation and then took him outside when he got bored. I'm so thankful she was there, otherwise, he would have been sitting on my lap!! Still, it was a great year. When you go to Camp with children, you must go with NO expectations of anything and then you end up having such a blessed week! This is what I did again this year and can you believe, it was the first year in seven that I didn't have the mid-week meltdown because I was the one who was stressed?! I loved it!

We stopped by Syracuse, NY on our way home last week to break up our trip a bit. We stayed with our friends Scott and Miriam and their two girls (the boys were in Ohio doing the after-camp thing, complete with a day at Cedar Point on Monday...remember that?! It's still going on with the next generation!) We headed home on Sunday afternoon and then stopped at Niagara Falls for a quick visit as well. Niagara Falls pales in comparison to Karen's pictures of Iguazu Falls in Paraguay, but hey. This is what we have here, so we enjoy them and appreciate God's beauty here!

I'll update more later. Lots of little things happened in the past few weeks, but this is where we've been in a nutshell. And all of you lurkers that identified yourselves to me at Camp last week, I'm glad to know you're out there! Feel free to comment so that I know you're still around.

Stephen Update

Not much to update on as we still don't really know what's going on with his arm. We ended up in the Emergency Room on Sunday morning (and were in and out within 90 minutes total!!! Unheard of, but thankful for!) because his arm was swelling quite a bit. The doctor made a splint for him and told him to keep it on his arm and keep it as immobile as possible. Uh, did he not see that he was working on a six year old boy?!?! The one that I caught climbing on top of a Little Tikes Crazy Coupe car to reach the top of the play set so that he could go down the slide head first this morning! I guess using the ladder that was next to the car was too convenient and conventional and he needed to try something with a little more of a challenge.

Anyway, he was sent home with instructions to keep his arm immobilized and to keep the appointment with the Fracture Clinic at the hospital that we thought was going to be today. Only ... no. It's not today! It's scheduled for 11:15 Friday morning - exactly one week (about to the minute) of when he fell.

From what I've been hearing, kids bones heal fast and there's really not much you can do for them anyway, except to keep them immobile. "They" told me that the swelling will go down and the specialists will still be able to tell on Friday whether or not there is a hairline fracture, or if it's just been badly sprained or bruised. Today his biggest complaint was that it was "itching worse that a thousand mosquito bites!" Those of you that know what Stephen's mosquito bites look like know that it HAS to be quite torturous inside that splint!

Please do pray for him this week, though. We were hoping to leave for our vacation to Camp (Ha! That's an oxymoron! Vacation=Camp?!) a little bit early, but it looks like that won't happen now. We're praying that everything will go smoothly on Friday at his appointment so that we can leave with a free conscience. We ARE travelling out of the country, you know. Who knows what we could run into in that foreign land if something should go wrong! Ha ha.

In the meantime, Stephen's been enjoying banging his hard splint on things, using it as an excuse for not being able to help me vacuum, or get this one: he couldn't flush the toilet because it hurt too bad! Snort! I'm not that dumb of a mom! I taught him very patiently how to reach his other arm over there to push that little lever down! That excuse is no longer valid.

And there you have it: the NON-update on Stephen's arm.

Lazy Days of Summer?

Whoever it was that coined the phrase "Lazy Days of Summer" must not have had a LIFE!! School has been out here for exactly 13 days and today is the first time that I had any "lazy" time. My lazy time was about three hours in length, all while sitting in the Urgent Care Clinic, wondering if Stephen had indeed broken his arm.

This morning, just before lunch, the boys were playing out in the yard with the sprinkler. Stephen didn't want to get sprayed at one point, so he ran up the slide. Timothy turned the sprinkler on the slide just as Stephen was jumping off the side. He slipped and landed on his elbow.

Unfortunately, three hours at the clinic didn't solve anything. The x-rays show that there are no fractures of any sort, no torn ligaments and nothing else visible. There is now a possibility that it could be broken cartilage in his elbow. We have an appointment on Monday at the bone clinic at the hospital.

I can tell that something is indeed wrong because he just wants to lie around and not do anything. He even threw up a few times and refused to eat his favorite alphabet soup and Canada Day ice cream (Chapman's Maple Leaf white ice cream with a red maple leaf in the middle). He's resting comfortably on the couch watching Story Keepers right now. Poor guy. What a time for something like this to happen to him.

Please pray for Stephen while we wait to go to the bone clinic on Monday. He was very brave today as everyone poked and prodded him and moved his arm all over the place, but I know he's still in pain. I think he's now going to be forced to have a few lazy days of summer until his arm starts to heal!

Our Mini Vacation

Last week Esther and Wolfgang invited us up to their condo in Collingwood for a few days of summer fun! We had a fabulous time on our little mini-getaway. The weather was beautiful, but WINDY like you wouldn't believe! Stephen loved shaking out his towel at the beach, much to our dismay. The sand was so dry and the wind would blow it everywhere! We even had to wash our clothes several times to get all the sand out of them!

The wind made the temperatures pretty cool, but the sun sure was strong ... ask Fred. He forgot to put on sunblock when he was flying the kite! OUCH!

We're still not sure who enjoyed the sand more ... Timothy or Uncle Wolfgang! Timothy loved to roll in the sand (and couldn't figure out why his bum was hurting so badly later when we were driving back to the condo). Wolfgang was busy making a fortress and constructing roads with Christopher.
Christopher loved the beach, especially when he got up the nerve to go into the water and jump the waves with me, but I think his favorite time this past week was when he stood by the edge of the water and threw one stone into the waves after another. We had a hard time pulling him away from this spot! As Auntie Esther said, I'd better enjoy these days when the boys can be entertained and thrilled by the simple acts of throwing stones into the water. Those days will go by fast and then they'll be wanting to do parasailing with Uncle Wolfgang!

Up In Flames

This is our neighbor's house. It was hit by lightning this afternoon. It had been raining off and on all afternoon with periods of lightning and thunder. We didn't think much about it, except for the fact that Megan and Anna were here for a playdate and they were quite disappointed that they couldn't go outside.

About 3:00, Megan, Timothy, Christopher and I were doing a craft in the kitchen when we heard a loud CRACK! My first thought was that it sounded like something must have gotten hit by lightning, but I peeked my head out the deck door, didn't see anything and let the thought go. About ten minutes later, we started hearing sirens and saw a few fire trucks zoom past. They sounded close, but still, after another peek out the door, I still didn't see anything so I went back to the craft table.

Curiosity got the best of me, and since Fred was upstairs, I ran out the front door to see what was going on because cars were now starting to stop in front of the house. This is what I saw.

The sad thing is, or maybe it's a good thing, the family was not home at the time. A dog was rescued, but a cat got spooked, ran to the basement and died in the fire. The house is destroyed, as you can see.

This has been a sobering afternoon for me because it is only because of God's protection and His decision that our house was spared. This random lightning strike was too close for comfort. Tonight there is a family whose lives have been turned upside down because of an act of God. They have no home to go back to. They have lost pretty much everything, if not from fire and water damage, then from smoke damage. The road is still blockaded tonight and they are not permitted back into their house.

I still remember the shock of finding out that my aunt and uncle's home had burned to the ground when I was a teenager. It took weeks and months for reality to hit me, and I wasn't even directly affected by it. I can only imagine what this family is going to deal with in the next little while. Please pray for them with us, would you please? Those of you who have been through this before know how to pray more specifically, but I know that any prayers for them will help them to deal with this tragedy in their lives. Thank you.

Guest of Honor

We love having people over. I think it's a genetic thing because I can remember our family always having someone over when we were growing up, too. We love the visiting, the sharing, the playing, the fun! When the boys were smaller, they would always set an extra plate at the table for supper, "just in case someone comes." On Sunday mornings they almost always ask who is coming for lunch that day. I can see that it's becoming a normal thing for them to have guests at our table, and that makes me happy!

This is a picture of the most recent family that we had over for a fun time! Jorge and Nancy are both originally from Argentina, so during the meal we laughed and talked about all the things we had just experienced in Paraguay and compared the differences between the two South American countries. We had so much fun together.

One of the traditions that we also have in our family is something that was sort of inspired by my sister, Liz's family tradition of having a special birthday plate for the birthday person in their family. I always liked that idea, but since we didn't have a specific plate that said "Happy Birthday", I decided to improvise. Actually, I decided to not really do it for birthdays at all, but to have a Guest of Honor whenever we invite another family over for a meal. I tape a piece of paper with a star or a smile face on the bottom of the plate and then randomly set the table. We never know who is going to get to be the Guest of Honor because we don't know where the marked plate is set. (Ok. I confess. I always make sure that it is NOT where Fred or I sit, but the rest is totally random!)

Well, sweet Marsha was our Guest of Honor this time! Dylan tried to peek under the plates when he came to the table to sit down because he remembered this from the last time they were here and HE was the GOH, but it didn't work! Marsha won that honor! Marsha got to drink out of the wine glass that has gold stars all over it. She got to be served first. She got to have dessert first. And she got a little prize bag that she could take home. (I think that Nancy secretly wished that SHE would have been the Guest of Honor because there was a package of Pop Rocks in there and she ate almost the whole thing herself!)

I love this family tradition that we've established because it blesses someone else. The boys absolutely LOVE the excitement of wondering who is going to get the honor and then they just bubble over explaining what it means to the recipient. Every time we have someone coming, they ask if we're going to have a Guest of Honor again. We don't always do it, but usually when it's a family with kids we do because the excitement level is great. It's fun, it's a blessing, and it's definitely creating memories!

Speaking of family traditions, what are some traditions that your family had or has that are special to you? I encourage you to continue the ones that work because they will be wonderful memories for your family for years to come!