First Day of School

Long lost post from July!!

I can't believe I forgot to post about Sophia's broken arm!!!  It was such a big event for us!!  So one Sunday morning in July, Sophia apparently fell off of a little baby armchair onto her left arm.  I went to pick her up from Sunday school and she was crying, though not that much, so they mentioned that she had just started crying but the lady who handed her to me wasn't sure why she was crying.  It was a weird cry, one of those cries that you just know something is not quite right.  So we got her home and I went to change her out of her dress and noticed that she wasn't using her left arm!  I called Jeff into the room, showed him that she was unable to move her arm, and off we headed for the ER.  We stopped by the church to try to find out what had happened, as we knew it was something that happened there and that was why she had been crying.  Everyone had gone home, except for the Childhood Resource people, so they called up some of the workers and that's when someone mentioned that they thought she had fallen out of that little chair.

In the ER they did xrays and thought that maybe it was just dislocated (nursemaids elbow) and so the ER NP attempted to put it back in...Sophia was crying and the NP did it 3 times and it obviously wasn't working. After about 15 minutes of being out, she came back in and tried to get Sophia to use her arm, she coaxed her with a popsicle, but instead of trying to reach for it with her arm, she reached for it with her foot!! At that point the NP said she suspected it was something more than a dislocation and splinted up her arm and told us to see an Orthopedic specialist on Monday. 

Monday I called Gillette Children's Hospital and they got us in right away with a specialist.  He looked again at the xrays and couldn't find a break, but he also said he was sure it wasn't dislocated because of the pain and the fact that she STILL wasn't using her arm at all.  He said he suspected a hairline fracture in the cartilage of her elbow and ordered her to have it casted. 

Sophia picked out a lovely PINK casting material and ended up having to wear her sweet little cast for 3 weeks...it ruined her time of swimming, going to the lake during Family Camp, and not to mention what an ordeal it was to give her baths!!  She survived though, and about 5 days after getting it casted started using her fingers and then her arm.  It healed well and we are so thankful, once again, that we are near good medical care!

Wheaton, IL

We arrived in Wheaton on August 16th, and began moving things in to our lovely, fully furnished 3 story duplex!!  It's part of the Furlough Homes Foundation, a ministry of College Church here in Wheaton that provides homes for missionaries on furlough.  It's just perfect.  It has everything we could need inside, it's 2 blocks from the boys' school, so we can walk everyday, and there are tons of MKs (Missionary Kids) for the boys to play with who also live in homes similar to ours. You can see in the picture that we were completely loaded down...the Tahoe has 2 bikes on front and 4 on back, plus the car top carrier and full of suitcases in back!!  It was soo fun to travel together, we also had our small Toyota Corolla packed to the gills as well...I drove that with 2 kids while Jeff drove the Tahoe with 2 kids.

MOVING DAY!

I need to catch up on some other posts, but I'll post quickly to let everyone know that we are moving to Wheaton, IL tomorrow!!!  It's a new season for our family, one where all the males in the household will be going to school and the girls will stay home!  We are super excited and basically have the cars loaded up and ready to go!!  I can't wait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Medora

Mini golfing with the family

My ball definitely wasn't supposed to land on the cart path! Oops!

Bully Pulpit's signature 15th hole

Golfing with my mom at Bully Pulpit

After spending some days in Colorado and Douglas, we headed to Medora to spend some time with my parents. 

This girl is in love with her shoes!

 

 

Summer

I love summer.  I love the warm weather.  I love wearing flip flops everyday.  I just love summer, and I've loved watching Sophia experience things with her senses--feeling grass on her feet, smelling the flowers, tasting lots of fresh fruit, and watching the birds and other wildlife we've seen.

Snow in June???

We headed to Colorado in June to catch up with some supporters and visit a couple of our churches. While we were there, we went to a wedding in Winter Park...imagine our surprise that there was STILL snow on Berthoud Pass!!!  The boys thought it would be fun to throw snowballs at me...however as they ran around gathering snow, they all started feeling sick because of the altitude!!  Fun times!

Canada 3

Canada 2

Canada

So we got invited to spend a few days in Canada with some friends...it was to be a quick trip up there and back, but with a few days for relaxing and fishing in between.  It was such a great time!  We went with our friends, the Heinschs, and their 3 boys.  I'm telling you, those 6 boys spent 90% of their time in the freezing water--either catching crawfish, swimming, kayaking, or fishing.  They had SO much fun!  I especially loved the deck over the water, and was excited to catch a sunrise there one morning.  We had some rain, but for the most part it was super good weather and an excellent time! 

Heading to the border...it was an old factory building!

Waiting in line to get into Canada

Sophia

More Como Town

Como Zoo with friends

The boys and I had such a fun time meeting up with the Heinsch family to go to Como Zoo!  It was Mindy and I with 6 boys and Sophia...we enjoyed seeing the animals and then getting a special treat and getting to ride on rides at Como Town.  You can see the fun Jonathon & Connor are having in the roller coaster...so great to see their faces!