We were in the thick of fundraising and the excitement was nearly unbearable! We were heading into the unknown but were very excited about it. If we had known everything then that would happen up until today, would we have done it anyway? Hmm.....let me think.... YES! YES!! YES!!!

This was the weekend that we not only had our first fundraising effort, but this marks a year since Eli had his 2nd fundoplacation and g-tube put in. Probably, it also marked when the TEC started (though we can't be sure about that).

It marks a year since Blake started high school. A year since Hannah started junior high.

What a year!

Yesterday was a hard day at school for Micah, but he did GREAT at church in his new class!

TODAY... Eli had a dentists appointment today. His two front teeth have always looked "dead". But he is now in a medical condition that we felt if something needed to be done, it could be. Thankfully, they are fine and nothing needs to be done. The doc did tell us that he has ground his teeth in the back nearly to the nerves (that sounds like it would hurt if he breaks through). He said when that happens, we will have to act, but now is not the time. Unfortunately there is simply nothing that can be done to stop him. If someone has an idea BESIDES a mouthpiece of some kind, we'd love to hear it. He doesn't just do it when he sleeps. He likes the sensory stimulation he gets from it.

At the dentist, they had to wait a good bit of time and Micah was out of control. Trying to hit Mary and screaming. He didn't want to be in the stroller. He NEVER does that with me. It's frustrating to both of us. She disciplines him much more than I do and doesn't let him have an inch, but he doesn't have the same respect for her. I think that's normal for all kids, but maybe you get more used to it when you have them from birth. I don't know. We are getting weary of the behavior problems. He's our first child with discipline issues and we frankly don't know what else to do. We are definitely needing to PRAY MORE and PRAY MORE TOGETHER and PRAY WITH HIM about it. Unfortunately, that's sometimes our last resort. If we could just keep him at home all the time, it'd be great! He's generally very good at home.

Enough of that! Blake has his first football game tomorrow night (he's in marching band). Mary's gonna try to go over and watch. I have an engagement that I had before I found out when the first game was. Blake's great at springing stuff on you the day before or just a few days before and there's sometimes no way to change plans that quickly...especially with church stuff or when others are involved. I sure wish I could be there for his first game though. Ugh.

Here's a picture of Hannah, Bethany & Seth that I found that is too cute! It's from the fall festival last year. 2 magicians and a mime. (Hey! Maybe I could get Micah to be a MIME!!! Mimes are quiet right??? :-) ).

Okay...there's more than one. Eli in the middle and then there's this one. YES...our Christmas tree was UP October 31 (not decorated yet, but we were in the process). At that point, if we were going to miss Christmas with the Kids, we were going to have it early. Of course we ended up not going to Ukraine until February 13. :-)

I have more pics of the kids that I will post in another post. This post is LONG ENOUGH!

In case I haven't reported it, I'm returning to Ukraine September 15.

And finally...if you missed the article about our family in the Baptist Messenger here in Oklahoma, it reappeared in the Baptist Press. Here's a link... http://baptistpress.com/BPnews.asp?ID=31174

Blessed be the name of the LORD!

Yes...I know I have not posted in several days.  :-)

We got Eli's blood results yesterday and they are GREAT!  That's good news.  It still doesn't explain his lethargy, etc so we are going to take him to an endocrinologist because we don't know what else to do.  We don't want something to slip by us that could prove to be more of a problem later!

If you've been a reader for long, you know that when we got home from Ukraine with Micah and Matthew, we had an amazing baby shower and received diapers to last 5 or 6 months. Well, we're into the last package of diapers. It's been 5 months. THAT was a HUGE blessing. We were SO GRATEFUL to not have to buy diapers during this time at all.

Micah had a HORRIBLE day yesterday.  In fact, he was biting and hitting other kids and the school called us and told us we needed to come up and do something (they aren't allowed to discipline kids at all unless it's in the IEP as a specific response to a specific behavior...ugh)--(needless to say we are going to be revamping the IEP next week).  So Mary and I both went up and was he surprised!!  I did the disciplining and we also explained a little more to the teacher about his background.  He was an angel after that.  Surprise surprise.