Traction Day 2

Katie spent the afternoon with Anna today. When she first arrived Anna wanted nothing to do with her (which is how she was with Eric and me yesterday), but by the end of the time Katie had Anna smiling and laughing - at least a little.

Things on the home front were a little rough today. Amy was scheduled to have her wisdom teeth removed. We had a nice early appointment. In my mind I thought we could go, be home by the time the kids were finishing breakfast, and I could make it to the hospital in the afternoon. But we were rear-ended on the highway in route to her appointment (I was driving Amy's car). We sat by the side of the highway for close to an hour waiting (the police officer was directed to an accident that occurred later than ours by mistake) and then we had all the paperwork to deal with. We are both fine physically for which we are thankful and her car is not damaged (the other one was). The oral surgeon worked us in later and so we went ahead with the surgery as Amy returns to school next week and this needed to be done before that. So our nice early appointment turned into an almost all day affair. Then later in the afternoon, I took Molly to ballet - in the van this time - and once home the van began spewing radiator fluid all over the driveway. So off that went to the shop. If I wasn't reading The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment I could have quite the pity party today, but the book is way too convicting for that. So on to tomorrow and what the Lord has in store for that day.

PS. Amy is doing well after the surgery - we had somewhat of a rough time this afternoon, but she is doing well now. Praying for a speedy recovery.....

Traction Day 1

One mad, sad, hurt, scared little girl.....

Happy Birthday Anna

Anna's official birth date is listed as today. Of course we don't really know when her real birth date is - this one was assigned to her as it was the day she was abandoned. It was a somewhat bad timing as we just got back from vacation and she starts her traction tomorrow, but we wanted to get in a celebration before she goes into the hospital. I don't know that we adequately conveyed to her what a birthday is, but she seems to understand that she was 7 and now she is 8. It didn't take her long to get into the gift unwrapping, she loves ice cream, and our friend came over today and re-braided her hair so all in all it was a good day. Please pray for her as she goes into the hospital tomorrow - it looks to be a difficult time.

More Beach Life

We are home now after a wonderful vacation. I think it was a good time of bonding for Anna and it was a relaxing time for us as a family. For the last part of our time we had Scott's girlfriend and a good family friend join us and we enjoyed spending time with those two girls. But now its back to the grind....

Kissing cousins!

Beach Finds

We have been coming to this same beach for years and this is the first year we have found so many sand dollars, starfish and shark teeth. The kids have had a great time hunting. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of everything we have seen including a huge ray the fisherman next to us on the beach caught. It rather dampened the kids interest in going in the ocean that day. There was also a copperhead at the pool that has rather dampened my interest for going anywhere. Some of the kids came across some huge tarpins when they were kayaking in the ocean and then there are always the porpoises that are fun to watch.

Can you see the starfish?

Peter found 99 shark teeth!

Kayaking in the Marsh

We had a girl's outing in the kayaks - paddling through the marsh then out into the river and finishing up in the ocean.

Beach Life

Anna has adapted well to the beach. She wants to do everything including kayaking in the ocean. I was a little worried about sending her out as it can be fairly easy to tip in the waves going in or out. I didn't think she would handle capsizing well. However Amy the expert kayaker managed to get her in and out without incidence. We won't talk about how Amy the expert kayaker and her sister managed to sink one of the kayaks going out (we did recover the boat). Unfortunately Matthew was in that kayak and was rather traumatized, but he seems to have recovered.