On to Middle School

The very last day of Elementary School

The ClapOut ...a fifth grade tradition!

wait let me take a selfie #Ilovethesekids!

last day of first grade and last day of fifth grade...tears

oh wait I better pull myself together I have a long way to go.

Catie receives the Presidential Gold Award!

WooHoo!  Go Catie!

Last play day!  Enjoy it girlie~

. 

Go Mustangs...trying so hard to be all
grown up...this is the high school and
middle school sweat shirt.

 A FEW THROW BACK PHOTOS

Catie and Alex near his first birthday.

Catie's Second visit with Santa was with Aunt Beth at Bass Pro Shop...Catie didn't like that Santa.   She loved Aunt Beth though.  This was in 2004.

This was Christmas that same year 04 Ryan is pictured here...lol...he just graduated from high school.

Catie's first Best Friend Cadence sitting on Sesame St on the stoop.  

This is Catie with her Great Great Grandma Ruth.

And great grandpa Larry

Grandpa Tim and Uncle Adam

My girl scout is highly awarded...she spent a lot of time working on her badges this year and short of saving a life can't has received the highest honorer for being a Junior scout.  She earned her Bronze Award this year and I could be prouder...she almost right away started talking about how she was going to earn her Silver and Gold Awards.  

She loves basketball and has played for 4 years!

We started learning to cook this year and have been very successful!

She loves her Red Roo...and he loves her too!

They almost never play together.

First American Girl Doll at age 10.
I hope it's the last...damn those things are
expensive!

Catie and Dad go and sleep under the stars
at the Kansas Cosmosphere 

I <3 this girl!

and her art!  someday it's going to be
sold for lots of money!

Every Princess needs a Knight!

She also learned to play bells this year...
not a huge stretch since she played chimes for 4 years in Illinois.

She also went bald to raise money for cancer research...I freaking love this kid!

She sure does love art like I do..This is the centipede at Wichita

And she loves her Kansas Jayhawks...that's almost a crime in Salina...but she does it anyway!

Oh and she's a dare devil...she will ride any ride...nothing is too high...nothing is too fast.  

She loves frozen custard...you don't see that wild cat on her shirt...I made her wear it...
she had a girl scout event and I couldn't find a shirt that was white except that one..so I bought it and put her insignia
pin over it she nearly had a cow...the big black and white spotted kind...she never wore the shirt again.

This is the event that Catie earned her Bronze Award for...she collected food for three weeks for a local lunch program at Christ Cathedral called Feed the Hungry and then her whole troop went and assembled lunches and passed out lunches one Saturday.  They have gone back since and volunteered again.  I love this organization.  I really love my daughter and how great she really is!

Happy `0th Birthday Catie!

This is Catie and her 5th grade teacher...Mr Weikle...she gave him so much crap all year long...he gave her just as much crap.   They were pretty evenly matched...but the rest of the class never even had a chance with Catherine she is so far beyond where they are.   

Catie's birthday at home!

cousins time

Funny faces

First Day of School 2013/2014
Catie fifth grade Alex first grade...the last time they will ever
be in the same school.

She loves to cook and show off

Rusty needs a selfie...wait no he doesn't
want one...wait not Alex doesn't want one.

Me and my girlie!

Summer fun at the pool 2013

This was the last time Catie ate her favorite food  Salmon...she's allergic to salmon and
her doctor told us she could try it but it was likely going to cause a reaction ...it did...she was pissed...that was the last time she smiled with salmon on our table.

Disgusted!

So have you seen these new Coke Cola soda machines that are popping up in all of the fast food establishments.   Our newest one is the Wendy's here in Salina.  It's been a few months maybe a year...I don't keep track because we don't go there often.  We should they support a wonderful organization.  The Dave Thomas Foundation...it's an organization to support families with foster children and adoptions.  That is way off topic however...one of the big reasons we don't go there is the soda fountains.  They are the only drink service available and all of the drinks are dispensed though the same tap.  Including this lovely green beverage.   It's Dasani lime flavored water.  I was a freaked out enough when I got the drink that I ended up not drinking any and going back for some iced tea.   They do have fresh brewed iced tea so there was an option that didn't go through the soda machine.  The regular water was even dispensed through the soda machine however.   This poses significant problems for my family.
   My daughter has a red dye allergy.  Any contact with red dye sends her to the bathroom usually to spend the next 20-45 minutes with severe stomach upset, cramps, bloating, gas, and you guessed it diarrhea.  If we are lucky I can get it to stop there with a couple of Benadryl and she sleeps it off...if not she then starts throwing up and that's when I have to get out the big guns...Epi-pens are not our friends, but they do save lives.   This reaction isn't the one that people hear about so often...they hear about the mouth swelling and the tongue itching.   Well the reality is this is the same thing it just take my daughter's body a little while longer to register an allergic reaction than most...and this is pretty typical of someone who has an allergy that is progressing to anaphlaxis.  The same thing is happening to her...it's just further down in her body.
  This brings me back to the soda machine...if all of the drinks go through the same tap than all of the colors and dyes pass through that same tap.  All of them leave trace amounts behind...gross.  May not be a big deal for you and your family but it's huge for mine. Even that little trace amount can make Catie sick.  I was so grossed out by this water this evening that I didn't even drink it and it made me wonder did Dasani color the water to appeal to more people or was it a machine feature.  I wonder of they were just concerned that we "dumb" consumers wouldn't be able to tell which one was lime if they weren't neon colors.  For the record I have never seen a bottle of Dasani water this color...I know I wouldn't buy it if I did.  I'm not sure why we continue to allow these big companies to pollute our products here in the US when all over the world they are putting limitations on what chemicals, preservative and dyes these companies can use.

We moved....yes AGAIN. (:

So I mailed out our "we moved" cards this week.

 I love mailing things.   I know weird...but don't you love getting something in the mail that isn't a bill.  You get an envelope that is card shaped and it could be anything.   A thank you card, a late birthday card, a get well card, a letter, a I'm just thinking of you, a love note, a how ya doing, a "we just moved" , a wedding invitation, graduation invitation,  birth announcement, and so many more exciting thing.   The list could go on for years...but for me just the exciting thing is getting the envelope from the mail box.   We have so lost that with e-cards and emails and for most people nothing at all.

I told someone I was getting my cards ready to send and they asked how many I was sending and when I responded 105 she gasped.   Literally (yes I know how that word works) then she asked why I wasn't sending an email or just telling people.   Of course I am doing those things to people that need to know right away, but for everyone else they can wait and be surprised and most people will forget by the time Christmas card season rolls around.  I wanted to give them something tangible.  We had a fun card and we wanted to share the news with our whole friends and family list at the same time.   Besides I don't want to rob anyone of the moment at the mailbox and not knowing what's inside the envelope.  

If you didn't get a envelope and you are on our regular mailing list...please be patient...it should arrive soon.  If  you aren't on our mailing list I must apologize.  We have to draw the line somewhere and 105 is a huge number we started at 30 or so 16 years ago...we have gone up every year...so if you want to be on the list you better step up your game...just kidding.   We tend to keep people on our list who we hear from often...if we hear from you...we will want to communicate with you...remember I love the mailbox.  I love to send mail too!

When side effects are worse than the diagnosis...

My poor baby has been dealing with the worst side effects.  He has been going though detox at this point.  We only gave him one dose of the ADHD medication on Wednesday morning.  Almost right away he started having hiccups...I didn't think anything of it until I wrote his teacher and asked how he was doing on the new medication.  She said he was doing fine but was complaining of a tummy ache and had the hiccups.  Weird.  He came home from school...wound up...well that isn't any better than the other medication.  And the hiccups are pretty much continuous.  As we got closer to bed time the more wound up he got...that isn't cool!  So we got out the Melatonin and he got a dose and went to lay down.  He didn't seem to be able to fall asleep so we turned on his music.  At 10pm I looked in on him and he was wide awake and sitting  in bed and listening to his music.  We sent him to the bathroom and took the music away.   He laid down and we all tried to get some sleep.  He tried desperately to get to sleep but after hours of tossing and turning Nathan went in to lay down with him.  He spent several hours with him in and out of sleep...beating the hell out of Nathan.  Alex had muscle spasms and seemed to sleep so restlessly that it seemed like nightmares.  Then Alex started complaining about his stomach again.  He told Nathan to leave his bedroom.  Nathan to came back to our room.  This was close to 3:30 in the morning.  Neither Nathan or I had gotten much sleep.  We were hoping that Alex sending Nathan back to our room meant that he was really ready to sleep.  He was not.  He slept but it was so restless that we went and got him and brought him into our room so we could keep an eye on him.  At 6:30 I gave up sleeping and we got up and started the day.  He was very agitated and hard to keep still.   I called the doctor's office and talked over the issues that we had been having after just one dose.  One crazy night!  The doctor had us hold the next dose.  The craziness continued into the dose free day.  He wasn't sick but very tired. He left for school at his regular time and I sent his teacher a note and told her everything that was going on.   Her response was that this was the first time all year that Alex had exhibited ADHD symptoms.  We had done such a great job of treating them and keeping his medication at a good level we had never had an issues at school this year...lost last year.  We made every effort to get his medication worked out over the summer so that this school year he wouldn't be struggling.  The hiccups continued until about midnight last night.  He's also seems to have come down with some kind of stomach bug too...poor kid.  I called the doctor back today and told the nurse I was not interested in giving him that medication that made him have side effects that were way worse that the disease he has.  We had the doctor go back to previous medication but the extended release variety.   Praying this is the answer for my boy.

We just went past that line...

Alex has been having a few set backs with his ADHD.   He had a huge growth spurt in the last month and it really pushed him past the range of his last medication.   He has been acting out, testing boundaries, and generally pushing his luck.  He sometimes tries really hard...but over the last week I could tell that he wasn't even remotely trying at all.   Just a free for all.  I knew something was different.  Something had changes.   We had crossed a red line.  I didn't know exactly what it was, but I knew something had changed.  I called the doctor's office....they said "you have a med check in two weeks."   I said " No I need a med check this week"  His doctor is out of the country!  OMGOSH!!!   That will not do!  Then and there I made one of the most rash decisions I have ever made about my children's health care I have ever made....I switched him to another pediatrician he had only seen one other time because I need this med check to happen before the two weeks.  Thank God Nathan was behind me on this one and Alex really liked the new doctor.   We will miss the other doctor...but the new one was really thorough and took plenty of time to listen to all of our concerns.

The next big realization was he has just moved into a whole new class of medications...

One that required not my social security number but his...

And it is considered a controlled substance...so if he runs out before the end of the month...we are just outta luck...oh my gosh...we better measure right every time! It also carries some really strange possible side effects...aside from the usual ADHD medications causing slowed growth.  It can cause anxiety, suicidal thoughts, dry mouth, and irregular joint pain.  Don't all of those sound like fun.   I am really scared to give this to my seven year old son...but I am also really scared to send my seven year old out into the world unprepared to control his self.  He's a great kid and so sweet and loving.  I don't want to be the mom that denies that anything is wrong until he's too old to be able to develop any kind of self control.  I am hoping this medication is just allowing him to grow into that young man.  Right now...he really doesn't have that capability at all. I pray he will someday.  Until then I will be his advocate.

feeling guilty....time lost and words never said

Yesterday I found out that my mom's youngest sister died.  She was only ten years older than me.  I haven't ever been close to her.  My mom was very close to her when she was alive and I am sad she is gone.  I am sad she and I didn't get to know each other better as we both grew up. I knew that I was too close to her age as a child and felt like she was more like a sister.  We had the same sibling rivalry that my kids have today.   I never got to know her because we never got past that.  
When we were both adults and she was around she treated me like I was still a child and it was insulting and it made me very mad.  I made it a point to stay away from her after that because I felt like I had spent a great deal of time growing up to be treating like a child again was very upsetting.  In the end it hurt me...and probably her too.  At one time she and my grandmother lived with my parents...I don't think it was for very long but just long enough to cement that sibling rivalry and I really wish that had never happened.  I have a pretty decent relationship with my other aunts and I never had that sibling relationship with any of them...it maybe that they were always in a caretaker role.
I pray that my dear Aunt is happy now and I pray that she knows how much I do wish we could have been friends in our adulthood.  I loved her and miss her dearly.

youthville

I guess God is placing a plan in front of us...
I'm not sure how to proceed...honestly my heart hurts for a new baby.   My plan was to wait till something spoke to me,  I guess God is speaking to Nathan.  Am I on the silent treatment?   I have been desperately waiting for an answer, but maybe Nathan was the one that need prompting.  We (I) came to the conclusion this last week when it became painfully obvious that I was not pregnant and that we were done with that part of being parents.  My heart is breaking but I know God knows the plan and it's not the same plan I had.
Anyway we kind of were on pause this last month and waiting for a sign.   We got one and I moved forward with getting birth control and medication for my migraines.  That is one of the most important things right now.  

So I called and got the rx for my headache medication...that pretty much sealed the deal.   I have to be on the most reliable form of birth control for this medication.   The side effects are a little wacky but some of them are nice.   All this weight I have put on from trying to get pregnant will be easier to get off with the Topamax.  It curbs appetite. I should be able to loose some of this weight that way.  The second thing it does is it makes all carbonated beverages taste horrible...I mean awful...sad face...I love soda.   However I never could just keep it to a reasonable serving...so it probably a good thing.  Some of the weird and not so pleasant side effects....word soup (say one thing but mean something else or all the words come out of your mouth but in the wrong order)   I hate this one.  It makes me feel like a complete dumbass!   The last weird side effect I had was numbness in m fingers and toes...drove me crazy...always felt like my toes had the sock bunched under them.   That drives me crazy and makes me take off my shoes in public...one more reason not to wear socks I am sure of!
Well I guess I should explain the title of this blog...youthville.
Youthville is a local (Wichita) foster home organization.   And Sunday while Catie was selling girl scout cookies I was supervising and Nathan was off doing his own thing...cause that's what dad's do during cookie time.   When we were getting ready to leave I assumed Nathan had wondered out to the car and sent Alex out to fetch him with the car so we didn't have to schlep all of the cookies back across the icy parking lot.   All of the sudden Nathan pops out from behind a wall with the youthville brochure. (if you want more information) I was a first surprised to see him still inside and sent him after our son.  Then it occurred to me that he picked this piece of paper up all on his own and not from me prompting him to in any way.  I have been very careful to keep my thoughts to myself about the future of our having children.   He did this all on his own...and when asked he said he was led to.   I again left it at that...we both have a lot to think about and I don't want to force my agenda.  If he feels called to follow this I will gladly follow with him.   I will not however force the issue...not with all we have going on right now.
  Nathan has been under a great deal of pressure at the club with a big shake up and change in management.  All of the changes will be taking place in the next month and I don't want or need to put any more pressure on him.   He is so awesome and supportive of all I do this is the least I can do.
Please feel free to throw a prayer up there for us...we are doing a lot of that on our own and I know we will be answering a lot of questions once I share this.   Please don't hesitate to ask...I am doing ok and not feeling quite as lost and alone as I was in the last two posts.