Happy 4th of July!

Much, much better!

Anna had fun making stuff yesterday. The bean bag works great to sit on around the house.

Anna is doing great most of the time. She walks like an old lady, but does walk a few minutes and then sits down for a while. She wanted to help me make our 4th of July cake. Our parade is tomorrow, but she will be a spectator and wave as the boys go by. I really don't think she would have any interest in attempting to go around the block anyway. She took another giant nap today, so she must have needed it. After making the cake, she had to rest for about an hour, but now she is ready to run around again. She sneezed, though, and thought that wasn't such a great thing. Tonight the bandages come off and tomorrow she can start her 2 weeks of showers.

Last night we had big storms here. Lots of thunder and lightening. She is always afraid in the night during storms and ends up in our bed during them. She asked me "Why is God doing so many fireworks?" CUTE.

By the way....Justin and Iveny brought by a DORA balloon, chocolate, fortune cookies and FRIED RICE. Unfortunately Anna had only been asleep for about 20 min so I didn't wake her. She was disappointed that she missed Justin, but she was soooo excited to see the goodies he had brought. THANK YOU JUSTIN, RICKY AND IVENY. Anna loves you!

Update...doing well

We had a rough night, but Anna is much better this afternoon. She actually woke up at 5:30 am today and needed more tylenol. She then asked for watermelon and Princess Soup (Thanks to Cambell's..they make DORA, too.) She has eaten and eaten today, so that is great. She has taken a few steps here and there, but staying down seems much more comfortable at this point. Her Grandma's and brothers spoiled her with presents and balloons and she liked that.

This picture shows her with her Surgery Buddy/Doll and her bear from the hospital. A Child Life Specialist came and "played" with Anna before surgery. Susan was awesome. She used the doll to show Anna things about surgery and Anna named the doll Jessica and got to dress her and everything. The bear was given to her just before surgery. She has had it next to her all day. When she was under the loopy drugs, she named it Brad, but today she says it is Baby Bear today. It has a Kohls tag on it with the Hospital name. Cute. Since the surgery was delayed, Susan was really great. Anna was able to paint suncatchers, color and watch TV. I had a goody bag of activities and didn't even need to get things out! I was so impressed with the hospital making Anna so comfortable. She had a blast and was so happy and had fun before surgery for 3 hours.

She is sore, but is doing great!

Anna update

Hey...we are home. Surgery was at 4:15....love it that they make us wait longer. Anna was amazing before surgery. Such a trooper and so happy and flexible. The usual Anna. She had to "play" for over 2.5 hours. I will go into that more tomorrow.

Everything went well and was done at 5:00, left the hospital at 7:00 and drove 45 min home. Lots and lots of pain and discomfort. Recovery room was slow and she was just so sad and crying and scared. Of course,didn't like the IV, etc. A side we have never seen before. She is not a drama queen and doesn't fuss much, so she is just in a lot of pain. Not screaming since that hurts too much, but often a constant whimper and tears. Poor thing. She will be with me tonight in my bed.The dr. removed a good sized hernia on the right side, which we were hoping he would find. It was pooching out more lately. A left one was starting to form and it was removed, too. Just a small incision on both sides. They are with clear bandage tape for 2 days. Nothing more was found and no problems. She is just so sad. No showers for 2 days. No baths for 2 weeks (she loves her baths...like her Mommy!) No swimming for 2 weeks ( we go almost everyday...bummer), no bikes for 2 weeks, etc and NO FUN basically for at least 2 weeks. We have already been doing low key things for 3 weeks and it has been hard on our active house!

I really don't think she will want to for a while anyway.Well, I am getting off for the night...just on a quick break to email. Please post to LL that we are home and all went well. Heart wrenching day to see her in this pain. Just aweful. Daddy is comforting her now and she is liking that.

PS...We woke her at 10:00 to go potty. She hadn't gone since around 12:30, so we thought it was a good idea. She didn't, but she did go and we got a little water in her, too. She hasn't eaten since 6:30 am today and had a popsicle at 10:45 am and a little slushy at the hospital. I am hoping she will want watermelon tomorrow. After they gave her the "loopy" medicine she did ask to go to Justin's for Fried Rice. That's my girl! She loves her Justin and Ricky and Iveny! Since that wasn't close, she did ask for McDonald's after we left the hospital, but she took one look at a french fry and there was no way she was going to eat it.

They gave her a caudal block and explained it kind of like an epidural to help with pain. She can't walk until it wears off, but I can't see that happening anyway for a while.

Thanks to all of you helping with the boys today and tomorrow!

Anna's surgery is tomorrow afternoon. I am still trying to figure out how to get her up for breakfast and done before 7am....it is now almost 8:00 and she has yet to pop downstairs with her big morning smile. She can still have clear liquids until 11 am , though. We drive to the hospital by 1:00 and surgery is at 3:00. Say prayers for a speedy recovery and that the Dr. will remove the inguinal hernia with no problems.

4th of July Parade

We finally made our signs for our Annual 4th of July Parade. We have been procrastinating since we are SAD that our neighbors moved. It has been sooooo strange around here without them. We are all just in a funk about it. They had 2 sets of twins and Brandon and Anna did a lot with them. And it was such a blessing to share Motherhood with Christine! The twins were always in the cul de sac playing on their bikes, scooters, etc. It is just strange without them. Christine is such an amazing woman, mom and friend and I miss her! Brandon is finally not in tears as much when Paige and Claire's name is mentioned. He just doesn't even want to go outside as much. I guess you could say we are grieving.

Anyway...we have an annual parade and it is on the 4th at 10:00. We will still be meeting on the Hamby's playground, even though they are gone. We are secretly hoping that they will show up.

Fun with Nolan

Hot at the Zoo Today

Went to the Museum first since it was raining.
Fun with Cousins


Barry's nephew is here for a few days. Yesterday we swam/got burnt at their Grandparents' pool, so today we headed to the Children's Museum since it was rainy. After our picnic lunch there, we went to the Zoo...hot there! Nolan is 9, like Brandon, and is just about 5 months older....and about 5 inches taller! He is a great kid and they get along super! The boys want to go Mini golfing later and also the WALL-E movie that just came out. I am thinking it is too warm for mini golf, though! Maybe Barry will take them! He is working on the golf course today anyway and not in his office.

Nolan is Barry's sister's youngest son. His sister, Faith, is also from China.

Anna was out of sorts when she got up today. She was missing Logan for the first couple of hours terribly. She will be glad when he returns tomorrow. It is just not the same around here while he is at Camp.

Since this whole surgery thing came about, Anna and I are pretty much hooked together until last night when I went to Scout Camp. She has times where she feels absolutely fine and then times where she complains that her stomach hurts. She just isn't her self, though. She doesn't get far from me at all and almost panics at times when she is in the other room and I am not. We have been staying home a lot and look forward to doing more things after surgery next week. Brandon has been going to the Park Program a lot and if he is gone, I can more easily keep her inside and calmer. We were going to give the water table to baby Mason, but it sure is coming in handy right now for Anna to go out and play with it and have fun.

Fun with Justin

We had Anna's favorite buddy over for some water fun on Monday after Story Time at the Library. Anna is supposed to be more "calm" these days until after her surgery, but since she feels fine, that is literally impossible! She must have had a little too much fun since her hernia was popped out more that night after playing with Justin and going to the Ice Cream Social. So, the next day, she laid flat for most of the day and it went back in more.

The kids had fun in the little baby pool and playing with the water table and water guns. Brandon had fun squirting them with water from the hose and then brought them hot water from inside to warm up their pool.

The highlight of the night for Logan was getting to shoot this black powder gun. He had to push and push the trigger to get it to go off and then it gave him quite a kick and boy was it loud.

Scout Camp

Tyler, Logan and Noah

It was family night at Scout Camp, so a couple other mom's rode over with me for the visit. We took the boys SUBWAY and they enjoyed that. It was soooo hot and muggy and buggy on the trails and at the camp. It seems like the boys are having a great time and had plenty of Scout Stories to tell.

Logan is off to Scout Camp, etc.

Logan last year at Scout Camp..my how he has changed.

It is Scout Camp time again. I will go visit on Wednesday for Family Nite and Logan will return on Saturday. He was getting very excited!

Speaking of excited.....Barry and Brandon left today for a bus trip to Wisc. for a baseball game. Since Anna and I couldn't leave town, my dad and Barry's dad took our tickets and went, too. Should be a fun day. Brandon was WIRED, to say the least! So, it is GIRL DAY today, as Anna calls it. We will be having lunch out at Panera's with my mom and shopping a little, too.

Brandon is hoping to stay busy this week with his cousin, Nolan. He should be arriving mid-week for a few days. The boys are the same age, although Nolan is MANY inches taller.

Anna's Surgery.....and the boys' procedure

Quite the week here at the Schmidt House! Logan had some icky dental work yesterday, but came out fine. Then today, the boys had a gazillion warts removed. Brandon was quite the screamer...poor thing. They are both doing fine and are only a little uncomfortable. They are still managing to fight, so they must not be doing toooooo bad! Some of Brandon's are still numb, so it should be REAL fun before too long. I am sure that the pain will be worse tomorrow. They are excited that they can't shower for 48 hours, but that also means NO swimming, which they love. Today we are just hanging out the rest of the day and making cookies, slushies, etc.

Anna and I went out of town today to a Pediatric Urologist/Surgeon. She has an inguinal hernia and it has to be removed. She is scheduled for surgery on July 1, but the doctor doesn't want to wait that long, so they are trying to move things around to get her in soon. She is a real trooper and I am sure she will come out better than I will do while she is in there! LOL. It is outpatient surgery, so that is good. She will be able to go home that night and not sleep at the Hospital. The hospital is 45 min away, so we are praying that nothing goes wrong between now and the surgery. The dr. only sees about 10 cases of girls a year with this problem. It is very common in boys, though.

Poor Sheldon...and Brandon

Brandon spent $20 on this turtle and the container for it in Gulf Shores. I took this picture of Sheldon in our condo while he was spunky and moving. Sheldon made it the 6-7 hours through Alabama, but then it became clear that Sheldon wasn't just sleeping anymore. Poor Brandon. He is so disappointed to have to have a funeral for his little pet. Logan is growing tadpoles and one died while we were gone. Luckily our fish were spared and they are fine.