A lil more than just overwhelmed

It's been over a month since I last posted. So much has gone on and my family needs your prayers.

The week of Thanksgiving my husband was hospitalized for his Crohn's disease. he was over an hour away. He had a partial blockage - which they were able to get under control with steroids. So no surgery yet!!! He was there for almost a week. It was a rough week- never knowing what was going on (he didn't even know), if he would have surgery, and me at home taking care of Malachi- who didn't understand why daddy was not coming home. It was a fluke but Jadae was able to see Malachi one time in the hospital in his room! Malachi and I would pray every night for his daddy!

Now, not even 2 wks later my mom is in the hospital. (A lil' background) She was diagnosed with Breast cancer (stage 3) almost 2 yrs ago to the date. She was treated with chemo and radiation and was cancer free for several months. It came back this summer and had spread to her lungs. She had a mastectomy done and has been undergoing radiation for several months. She had her last radiation treatment Wednesday.

All this week she felt like her balance was off and she mentioned it to her doctor which ordered a MRI done right then. Yesterday morning they admitted her because they found 2 tumor's in the back of her head. One is small the other is walnut sized. They are located near her vision cortex on the brain. They are removing the bigger one today. The cancer has spread to her brain.

My mom is having brain surgery today around 11 or noon. The surgery is expected to take from 4-6 hrs but up to 8 hrs. I am scared. This is scary. Please pray- have other people people. She needs a break in life. She has had a hard one, a rough childhood.

I've been told that as far as brain surgeries go this one is minor. And that the doctor is optimistic.

So much has changed in a single day. Yesterday I woke up and things were fine. And then I ended up spending the entire day in the hospital and plan to do the same today. Pray for us!

My first offical attempt of doing Tot School

I have never offical sat Malachi down for Tot School. I teach him new things all the time and do many things on the spur of the moment. I also teach Scarlett tons of things. Right now I am teaching her how to read off and on. I am not very consistant with it but as the mood hits I work with her. It is a little easier to do "Tot School" with her, as she is almost 4 and Malachi is only 22 months old.

Anyhow, yesturday I sat them down at the table and squirted shaving cream (I have quite a few bottles that I got at CVS for free) all over the table. I had planned on helping Scarlett learn how to write and read different words (she knows a handful of them right now) and teaching Malachi his shapes and how to draw them.

Scarlett was more focused than Malachi. Malachi was just content to play and run his hands through the shaving cream. I reviewed the shapes with him for a little while. Then I just let them play until the smell just got too much for me.

stART- A Plump and Perky Turkey

This past wkd Malachi and I drove up to my sister-in-law, Sara's, house to spend the wkd with her and her family. Her oldest son is a year older then Malachi and they love to play together. We had planned for a great, fun-filled wkd. We got there Friday evening and hung out, played the Wii, watched a movie, etc.

During the middle of the night I got sick. And I ended up being sick all wkd. I almost never get sick. It was awful. Sara took really good care of me! So there went all the plans we had for the wkd. The boys still had a lot of fun playing together!


We are not exactly sure why I got sick. I never ran a fever at all. But I could keep nothing down and then some more. There are three theories that we have
a) I caught some sort of stomach bug
b) I started a new medication 2 wks ago and ever since then I have been really nausea
c) I bruised (possibly even cracked) my ribcage a few days before the trip and have been in tremendous pain since then. So maybe I was sick due to the stress on my body


Sunday morning I was feeling a a little better. So we did a craft I had planned. I read them, A Plump and Perky Turkey by Teresa Bateman. It is a really cute book about townsfolk trying to find a turkey for Thanksgiving dinner. So they decide to advertise that they need a turkey to model for their Art fair, hoping to trick the Pete the Turkey after he judges the townsfolk creations. I am not doing the book any justice.


We then made turkeys with the boys using the outlines of their feet and hands. After the turkeys were completed I knew they looked different then what they were suppose to look like. Once I got home I realized that we did a few things wrong. I am blaming my sickness~ tired + weak + not feeling well = a poor memory!

This was the first activity that I did with stART. Which stands for Story with Art. A very fun idea to make story time very interactive and to help use your child(ren)'s imagination!




Today I re-read the story and re-did the craft with Malachi and my niece, Scarlett. This time I made the turkeys according to how they were suppose to be made.

(Sorry about the quality of the pic's. Our camera is semi-broken. It takes pictures. But the display screen is all white and we have no view finder. Therefore, when I take pictures I have to pray and hope that my aim is correct and that I am in focus!)


For more ideas, go to StArt at A Mommy’s Adventures.

It's what's for Dinner...Last night

I like trying out new recipes. Espically when I know that Jadae can est whatever I prepare. I tried out a new recipe last night. It is very simple but good! And since I have not posted a recipe in awhile I will post it here.

Farmer's Chicken

Yield:
4 servings
Ingredients:
4 tablespoons butter

4 tablespoons flour

2 cup milk

1-2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cubed

4 celery ribs, chopped

1 small onion, chopped

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

12 ounce package of stuffing mix

Instructions:
1. Saute onion, and prepare stuffing mix according to package directions and set aside.
2. In a medium sauce pan, melt butter and then add flour. Stir until bubbly, then cook one minute. Slowly add in milk, stirring continually to avoid lumps.
3. Add chicken, celery, onion, salt and pepper. Cook and stir for 5-10 minutes, until chicken is done and celery is starting to get tender.
4. Pour mixture into an 8x8-inch casserole dish. Top with stuffing. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes.

I did not use the celery. (I forgot we had some and Jadae is not sure if he is able to eat it yet due to his Crohn's) I also subsituted Rice Milk for the milk. And I accidentally dropped the cutting board that I was chopping the onion on and lost half my onion :( But overall is tasted really good. Next time I will add more chicken (I used a little over a pound) and a little less milk. (it was a little too moist for my husband).

( I got this recipe from Tammy's Recipe's at http://tammysrecipes.com/)

I Won a Give-Away!

As part of 1+1+1=1's 1000 Subscriber Celebration, Carisa gave away several BrainyBaby dvd's. And we won one of the Animals dvds! I was very happy about winning this because Malachi loves animals!

Last week while Malachi was on a mend I decided to put the DVD in the player for the first time. Both Malachi and my niece that I sit for loved it! It was all about animals. It went on to talk about different animal facts (a cow has 4 stomachs), what different animal baby's are called, what animal families are called, etc. So educational and kept both thier attentions! (Malachi is 22 months and Scarlett will be 4 next month)

God heard our prayers!

After Malachi had been hospitalized we were told to keep an eye on him. If he were to vomit, act lethargic, lose consciousness, etc. we needed to call the neurosurgeon in Cleveland right away.

Malachi has been sleeping with us since he fractured his skull because I wanted to keep a close eye on him and make sure that he is okay throughout the night. Malachi had thrown up. Thursday morning I woke up and smelled something awful. Malachi had thrown up. I yelled for Jade right away. Fortunately he had not left for work yet. I called the neurosurgeon, who wanted us to bring him back to Cleveland right away.

Not knowing what to expect we grabbed an overnight bag and got there as quickly as we could. (I had packed a bag of a few days worth of clothes for each of us when we got back earlier in the week- so we would be more comfortable while we stayed in the hospital). On the way there Malachi got sick again. He looked so scared. I was scared. I figured that since he was vomiting again he would need surgery. I did not want to even think of how bad the outcome could be.

While we were waiting for a room in the ER Malachi had told each of us that he loved us. That made me nervous too. Did he know something we didn't? Was he saying good-bye?

He was rather clingy and tired, and just looked miserable. He was having diarrhoea every hour or so. We were in the ER all day long. Malachi had another CAT scan to see if the area where the fracture was was swelling or bleeding at all. A radiologist, doctor, and neurosurgeon all look at the scan and could not find anything!

In fact, not one single person could even find the original fracture!!!! Skull fractures typically take a long time to heal.

We know that God healed Malachi's skull! Praise God!

(read previous post to learn more about his accident)

Malachi's hospitalization

Sunday during nursery Malachi ended up hitting his head badly in a doorway. It took a little while for me to comfort him but after I offered him a banana and some banana bread he calmed down. At my mom's house Malachi got sick and on the way home he got sick again.

We called the doctor's office and talked to the ped on-call; she said that if he threw up again we were to take him to the ER. But since he never lost consciousness and because he was acting okay that we did not need to take him right away. I was really concerned and my mommy gut was saying "take him". I was quite persistent about it. So Jadae took him while I went with the youth group to a Underground Railroad Reenactment Walk (that we both were suppose to go on with them). Malachi ended up getting sick a third time at the ER)

About 2/3's of the way into the walk Jadae text's me to see how much longer I would be. Then he calls me. I knew something was up if he called. He explained that Malachi has a slight skull fracture and that they were going to transfer him to Cleveland's Rainbow Baby and Children's Hospital. (they were originally going to go to Arkon but we have family in Cleveland). They wanted to observe him overnight. I left right away and went straight to the hospital, hoping and praying that I would beat the ambulance there. I did!

I am so thankful that I listened to my mommy's gut even though everyone told me that he would be fine and pry just has a bug. Even though he never lost consciousness it did look like he had a concussion. I was so afraid for him. He was being hospitalized. Would he be okay? How long would he have to stay? I was very scarced and did not know what to expect.

They allowed both Jadae and me to ride in the ambulance. We went to their ER first and then got our room for the hospitalization at around 3 am. Malachi went crazy running around since he was coped up on a hospital bed and in our arms for the last 8 hrs.

We saw a neurosurgeon who said surgery was not necessary. He had a non-displaced fracture of the left temple. A nurse took his vitals every few hrs and saw some more doctors. We were discharged at 6 or 7 pm and were allowed to go him with the instructions that we were to keep an eye on him and if he exhibited a list of symptoms that we were to call them immediately.

The hospital was really nice. Malachi played in the playroom for awhile. He also made friends were the staff. They all thought he was so adorable. We only had the cloth's that were on our back. But if we had to stay longer I would definitely had someone bring come clothes up and some comfort items for Malachi. Malachi loved walking the hallways.

While we were in the hospital we got word that Jadae's grandpa had died. He is the grandpa whose house we have been living in for almost 2 yrs now. Malachi's middle name came from him. While his health had been declining we did not expect him to die soon.

My mom got her port in today. She starts radiation on Wednesday or Thursday depending on how well her staples are healing from the mastectomy.

So I am a little overwhelmed right now