The Rays are in the World Series

None of you knew that we all played baseball did you? We will be playing the Phillies in the 2008 Baseball World Series. Of course I am joking, but what a fun coincidence.

I have been finding out that there are so many people that read our blog. It amazes me how many people comment on something that I wrote on here. If you read our blog and have one of you own that isn't listed on the right side, please, please leave me a comment and you blog address so that I can add it to ours. I love reading them and seeing pictures.

Thanks!!

By a girl!!!

Last night at church a lady brought Cole over to me crying. He had a large lump on the outside corner of his eye. I asked him what happened and he said that he ran into someone. I had to keep asking questions to try and find out who it was so I could make sure the other person was ok too. He looked around and finally pointed to someone across the gym from us. I looked and looked.

He said, "mom, it's the girl in the red dress!" I was looking for a big girl in a red dress.

He said, "No! It's the girl right there!"

I looked to where he was pointing and it was a little tiny girl clinging to her moms leg.

We have laughed all morning that he took on a 4 year old girl and she taught him a lesson by giving him a black eye. Can you believe this was caused by bumping heads with a 4 year old? She is perfectly fine. Cole got the short end of the stick and we both think it is funny

My eye and the doctor

I have been asked a lot lately how my eye is doing and if I went to the doctor. My eye is doing good and yes I went to the doctor. This past Monday I had an appointment with a Neurologist. He thinks I had a TIA (is that right), but ordered some tests and sent me to the lab for blood work. I went right down to the lab where they removed 10 gallons of blood. It took a little convincing for the lab tech to listen to me as to where she should stick me, but I finally won. After she poked me in the arm and dug around a little she finally used the back of my hand. Why won’t they listen from the start?

My next test was Tuesday morning in Radiology. I had my first ultrasound on the carotid arteries. I also have a CT scheduled for the 22nd. Lots of fun, right!?

I have gotten back the results for the blood test and the ultrasound. My Lupus Anticoagulant test came back suspicious, therefore, I had to go back today to the lab to have another 10 gallons of blood taken and sent to Mayo for additional tests. My ultrasound showed elevated velocity in the left ECA consistent with stenosis with a peak systolic velocity 241 cm per second. Also, my ESR-Sed Rate was 31H with a reference range of 0-29. Therefore I am guessing that mine is high…but that is just a guess since I don’t know what ESR-Sed Rate even means.

To be honest I have no idea what any of these test results mean. The one thing that I could understand on my ultrasound results was that the blood was flowing in the normal direction. Do people have blood flowing in the wrong direction? The other thing I know is that the doctor is looking at Lupus.
So there you go my friends. Thank you for all of the thoughts and prayers. I will let you know what they find after the CT and my most recent blood work.

Kramer

The other day I received an email that said Kramer in the subject line. I opened it up and there was a picture of little Micah. His parents thought he looked like Kramer off of Seinfeld. He is absolutely beyond adorable. Not only is he adorable, but also he lets me sing to him without screaming at the top of his lungs. That makes him even more special to me. Not many people will put up with my singing.

Thanks Heidi and Brandon for sending me this photo. I love your family!

A wedding and a date

A WEDDING:

On Saturday Hunter was invited to a wedding over in Houston, MN, which is about an hour and 15 minutes away. His friends father was getting married and she invited some friends so she would have someone to hang out with for the day.

Doesn't Hunter look so handsome!?!?

This is the driveway up to the farm where the wedding was. It was such a beautiful drive.
A DATE: After dropping Hunter off I thought that Cole and I could have a little date. We decided to take the scenic route back home and drive through the bluff country. Every time I think it will be a good opportunity to take pictures it gets cloudy and grey. The morning started out beautiful...lots of sunshine and perfect picture weather. Right after we dropped Hunter off the clouds rolled in and it was cloudy and grey. Grrrrrr! Even though there were clouds it didn't stop us from having fun or stop Cole from taking 100 pictures of everything on the side of the road. No you are not getting ready to see 100 pictures of everything on the side of the road.

Our first stop was at the Root River Trail Head and Nature Center. We were a little disappointed in the nature center, but the area around the center was beautiful. The picture below is Cole being excited about having a date with me.... As we were driving we went through the town of Rushford. We went up on one of the bluffs and look a little walk.
As we were driving home we decided to play "My Cows", which I totally won. Here are some of the cows that were "mine". This is one of Cole's 100 pictures.

We saw many fields of corn. I love the lines that the rows make. After Rushford our next stop was at this little river.
As we made our way down to the bank of the river we saw fish jumping and trying to make their way up this retaining wall that was in the river and made a water fall. It was really fun to watch Cole watch the fish.

This is just a little picture of Cole's eye. Don't know why we took it....we just did. It was our date after all.

Camp Victory

This weekend Veronica is at camp Victory with the high school youth group. I am sure that she is having fun. I took some pictures of the camp, but they are a little "grey". It was dusk and cloudy. The camp is so beautiful. They have completely renovated the whole camp. I could move out there it is so nice.

These are some of the cabins. They even have heated floors!!

This is the drive up to the cabins or back down to the lodge. Doesn't seem very big until you have to hike back up it.The view from behind the cabins.

This is the side of the lodge.

The fence running behind the cabins.

Random Pics of the kids

Veronica

VeronicaVeronica and Emily at the big John Marshall vs. Century game. V goes to Century.

Hunt Cole, Hunt and Phil. Phil is a youth leader at CCC
Phil and Cole. Cole actually looks scared.
V-Ray
V dressed up like the boy with the tuba during homecoming week.

Little Drummer Boy

I can't really call him that anymore. He is now drummer, acoustic and electric guitar, and goofing around with the bass guitar boy. Hunter is really growing up to be a musician like his dad, which makes me very proud of him. I can barely play the radio.

Since we have returned to Rochester, Hunter has made the Youth Group Worship Team, Last in Line. He wasn't sure that he was going to make it since he is in 8th grade, but was very excited when he got the news. He gets to play two or three weekends a month. The weekend of November 2nd Last In Line is playing in the main sanctuary. We aren't sure if Hunter is going to get to play in there, but I sure do hope do. That would be fun. If he does I will be sure to take a video.

Welcome to the Jungle!!

I feel so bad that Ronnie's birthday was spent the way it was. He was so great to get tickets to a Twins game (they were free which made it even better) for my birthday. All he got was yard work.

This was our back yard before Ronnie got a hold of it.Cole up on the hill in our back yard. This is where all the deer walk through. It was really pretty in the spring when all the wild flowers were in bloom.
Cole coming down the stairs. You couldn't walk up and down these before. There were vines growing all over them.
Ronnie...the manly man. He pulled and cut all the weeds, vines and little tress off of the wall.
Ronnie did all of this on his birthday. We still have a lot to go, but boy does it look a lot better.
Ronnie enjoying the fire. Cole is up on the hill.
Making sure he doesn't burn the house down. :)
I am sorry, Hunky, that you worked on the yard for you birthday. Thank you very much for sacrificing your day to do it. I really do appreciate it.

I Filled Up Today!

My gas light came on this morning letting me know that it was time to fill up for the next two weeks. I hate spending $55.00 each time I need to fill up. Even though it will last me two weeks (as long as I stay in town) it is still way to much to spend.

To my surprise the gas prices had gone down. I was very happy to see that the price had dipped below $3.00. I even took a picture as proof.

When we were moving from Kentucky to Minnesota 5 years ago someone told me that our gas prices would always be so much higher than the prices in Kentucky. I have to say that we have always been below the national average, and now we seem to be WAY below. Something else we were told was that our cars would freeze and not start. That is something else that hasn't happened. We asked around and found out that you need to keep at least 1/2 a tank of gas in your car at all times so that the gas doesn't freeze.

Well that is all for now. I have lots of pictures to share about 1) Hunter playing with the worship team 2) the retreat Hunter went on 3) Ronnie's birthday day and a couple of other things. I will try to get that done this week.