ER Visit

Well, we had to make a trip to the ER last night. After the evening service at church, Mark was talking with people about the camp program or the upcoming men's retreat & I was in a meeting planning a luau for the last night of AWANA. We were both interrupted with reports that Joshua was hurt outside. Turns out that he had been running a race (obstacle course) with 2 other boys along a stretch of sidewalk and took a spill. He says he was in a rocky area where they removed some trees (but not stumps) from last year when he fell. Mark had brought him into the nursery and had guaze taped to the wound by the time I got in there. We had several nurse or paramedics that had looked at in before he covered it and said it was going to need stitches. So after leaving Stephen & Rachel in the care of our friends, Mark & Lisa Ellison, we raced to the ER with only a momentary stop home for his pillow buddy, Diego.
The ER doc ordered xrays to check for any additional damage or foreign objects but all was fine there. He then had to clean and stitch up a "corner" gash. It is about 1 1/4 inches horizontal under his knee and then 3/4 to 1 in. vertical. They gave Joshua some nitrus oxide to help him relax and not move while they worked on it. He still did quite a bit of crying while they were injecting the site with numbing med but after that did quite well. It took either 9 or 10 stitches. There are only 8 visible from the outside but I am sure that the dr. did 1 or 2 under the skin first that are not visible now because I know I saw him with 2 different color sutures.
They said that Joshua could go to school today but it was after 10 when we left the ER and none of us had eaten dinner yet. We swung by Meijers for fresh bandages, Wendy's for dinner, and then picked up the other kids before we go home around 10:45. We was about 11:30 before we headed to bed. Joshua's leg hurt pretty bad and so we put him in bed with us for the night. That worked till his meds wore off about 3 a.m. I gave him more pain meds but he just won't settle down so he and I came downstairs. I laid him in a chair in the living room so I could clean off the couch for him to sleep on but he got rather comfortable there and didn't want to go to the couch. So he and I spent the rest of the night sleeping downstairs. I felt it was too much for him to go to school with that little bit of sleep and not knowing how it might feel when the meds wore off again. It is rather a good thing I didn't send him. He is having quite a bit of pain still this morning. The wound looks fine but I think it might be some soreness to the knee or muscle around it that is hurting. So he is just resting with his leg up and watching his Go, Diego, Go! DVD.
I forgot to mention something a little strange that happened at the ER. They have this nurse who comes through and explains everything to the kids and helps them understand what the doctor is going to do so that they aren't scared. When she walked in to the room last night, by the time she got done with the introduction she said that we looked familiar. She was the same one that saw Stephen the last time he was in for stitches. That was several years ago though and for her to recognize us I thought rather amazing. She is now buddies with both boys because after Joshua's procedure last night she brought him a slushie and also a "Huggable Diego" toy as a prize for being brave and following the directions we had for him. She gave Stephen a little block set but he makes friends with all the ER workers.

Taxes

Our taxes are done! I finished them up about 6:00 p.m. last night! With 2 businesses they get rather tricky and I am not much of a paperwork person. Next year should be better because I am no longer a licensed daycare so that takes part of the complications out of it. Also, our house is a wreck right now because serious organizing is underway. That should help make taxes easier next year too.
Now, I have to get busy catching up on Avon that has been put off so taxes could get done.

Sorry...

I know it has been way tooooo long since I blogged. I've had numerous phone calls telling me so. I've been as busy as can be but not much I felt notable enough to blog about.

The Awana games have come and gone. Both Rachel & Stephen were on the teams this year. The T&T girls took second place and the T&T boys took third. This was the first year that we have had 2 separate teams other years they have had a coed team.

Weather...we have seen about everything recently. We had a beautiful spring in March but now we are back to winter. My hyacinths look pretty pitiful covered in snow. Right now we are under a winter weather advisory expecting 4-8 inches of SNOW by tomorrow morning. When I left for work at Meijer this morning we were forecast 1-4 inches but had changed by noon. A lot of things are cancelled for tonight and I am anxiously awaiting to hear about our church services. I am usually one of the first to hear because of being in charge of the email prayer chain. They will either call or email me so I can put the announcement over the email. Personally, I am tired and have a lot to do so an evening at home wouldn't break my heart too much.

Spring break...the kids all had spring break last week. That was the reason I knew lousy weather wasn't done. Around here, it doesn't matter how early it turns spring, the weather for spring break is always lousy. We had plenty to keep busy with and didn't even get to do all the things we wanted.

We had a nice quiet Easter, however the rest of the week was rather crazy. Joshua turned 6 on the 6th which happened to be Good Friday this year. We decided to let him have 2 friends over for a little party on Thursday because he wanted to go to a Griffin hockey game on Friday (which we could do because our church didn't do an area Good Friday service this year). It was a fun time and I even got to visit with a mom I hadn't met before. The problem was that they sold out of hockey tickets before we got ours for Friday. He was disappointed but now he & I are going to the final home game of the year this coming Saturday instead. Both he and Stephen had earned free tickets to games by a reading program through school.

Saturday, I had an Avon booth at a local craft show. It was from 8:30 till 3 and there was set up and tear down time too. Rachel went with me and I had 1 other rep working it too. It was a worthwhile day I felt. Then after we unloaded the car, I changed clothes and worked at Meijer for 4 hours. I got done about 9:30 and still needed some groceries for Easter dinner. It was a long day!

We had a nice visit with Mom a couple of weeks ago too. It was good to see her. This was her first trip down since the heartattack. She took Rachel out for a belated birthday breakfast on Saturday and then took Joshua out for an early birthday breakfast on Sunday. They both really enjoy that.

Report cards came home just before Spring Break. All is looking pretty good. Rachel is back up to an A in band so I bought her a new sax book with Disney songs in it to practice on. We have been assured that Joshua is plenty ready for 1st grade and Stephen's teacher commented on how he is doing much better since Spring Break.

Update: Wednesday evening services at church are now cancelled. I don't think that has happened very often in the month of April but I remember one year that we missed 3 of them in Jan. & Feb. Now I can focus on getting things done here at home. The only thing is that now I have to make dinner. Our church offers dinners on Wednesday before the other programs and boy do I get spoiled. With the weather the way it is, I'll take fixing dinner over having to go out in it again.

Rachel will be home shortly and she has to deliver the Advance Newspaper in this. At least she can have some help since Stephen can do his homework later with no church tonight. Actually, the other exciting news is that Rachel has been named carrier of the month for the Advance. Usually they put the kids picture in the paper but they haven't called to set that up but she got a gift card to the movies which is all she cared about any way. Her supervisor says she hasn't had any complaints with Rachel's service which is pretty good.

So that's some of what we have been up to. I'll try to do better at getting on here more but no promises.