Summer 2015

It is officially summer and we are taking full advantage of it!  Here is what is going on in our family this past week:

First, before I move into the fun stuff going on with our family I have to share some news for those of you who have been praying for my parents.  They traveled, along with my brother, Jeremy, and sister, Holly, to the University of California (San Francisco) to see some physicians who are researching Cruetzfeldt Jakob Disease (CJD).  This is the disease my mom has been diagnosed with (although the only way to be certain is via a brain biopsy or autopsy).  The researching physicians offered to run numerous tests to confirm the diagnosis to the best of their ability, as well as provide very helpful information to our family regarding the specifics of the disease and how to properly care for my mother.  They confirmed that they were nearly 100% certain that this was the disease that is afflicting my mother.  This saddens us, because it really is one of the most cruel diseases one can be afflicted with.  And, it is extremely difficult to care for someone who has this disease.  But, we are now armed with more information and my dad is in the process of contacting Hospice for an evaluation of whether my mom could qualify at this point.  Usually, you contact Hospice when the individual is within 6 months of passing; however, it is so hard to tell when that will be with this terrible disease.  The physicians at the UCSF believe her disease is slower progressing than most with the disease.  They would guess she may be with us for another year, maximum.  However, most patients with this live only 6 months and we believe she has had this disease for at least 8 months.  Regardless, we know that we need to get certain things in order and spend as much time with my mom as possible!   Thankfully, we have a trip planned to visit very soon.  I just love my sweet mom so much and this breaks my heart.  I am definitely planning on doing an entire post on my mom soon, as tribute and for documentation so my kiddos can remember and know how awesome she is as well.

We have been so busy recently.  This past weekend (Father's Day Weekend) was the first one in forever where we didn't either have out of town guests or were out of town ourselves.  So, we used the time to try to get some stuff done around the house that we really needed to get done.  Also, we made sure to spend some quality time with Drew on Father's Day to show him how much we appreciate him.

The kids each made a little card for daddy using their footprints (and Abbey's handprint as well).  Luke wrote everything on his card to daddy, but of course Abbey needed a little help.

We decided to take a bike ride all the way to our little downtown on the afternoon of Father's Day.  First though, all of the tires had to be aired up.

Drew taught Abbey how to use the little air compressor.

It was her job to stop and start the air compressor at the correct time.  Here, she is waiting patiently.

The kids love to have specific jobs and feel helpful.  Luke's job was to put the caps on after Abbey aired up the tires.  Look at his concentrating face!  :-)

All ready to go--time to get on the bikes and head to the trailhead!

Father's Day was so much fun. Then, as this week began, so did Luke and Abbey's second week of swimming lessons. They are really progressing well.  They wanted to practice swimming at home last night.  However, when we tested the pool chemicals, we realized they needed some adjustment.  So, we weren't able to swim.  Luke asked if they could play with the water hose instead because he really wanted to get wet.  I said, of course you can! 

Abbey got to control the hose first, since Luke was the one initially insistent on getting wet.

Look at that adorable bow on her hiney!

Her turn to get sprayed!

She got it back pretty quickly.  Look at her sneaking up on Luke!

A spider web on the playset got wet.

This morning, the kids and I took a fun walk.  We intended to go down to the creek and see what we could catch with our net; however, the water was still flowing pretty rapidly.  So instead, we just explored. 

There are a lot of trees uprooted due to the recent flood.  Although it saddens us, it is also pretty fun to check out and makes a great science lesson.

 

This mushroom we found was so pretty that it looked like a flower.

We came across many snails who were crossing the trail.

We are still schooling through the summer, as we do year-round school, so we have had that on our schedule each day as well.  The kids love it, and I figure, why stop something they love.  Because we school year-round, I don't feel bad when we take off a week here or there.  It creates a ton of flexibility into our scheduling which I love.  So there you have it--some of the stuff we have been up to this past week.