Sweet Strawberries

Today was strawberry picking day.  You simply cannot beat fresh strawberries straight from a family farm.  The strawberries in the store can sometimes be frighteningly large and alien like.

Father's Day in the Hospital

This year Father's Day was was pretty much ignored. I'm not even sure I told Brian happy fathers day.  Oh wait, I did, through a text message once I was finally headed to bed that evening.  He did however, get to have a fun guys weekend up at a friends Lake cabin, which may or may not have caused me some major stress.  Saturday night was pretty rough for Josiah. We were up most of the night, he couldn't sleep because the pain, I had no Tylenol just Motrin which didn't seem to be helping as much as I thought it should.  Sunday morning 8am me and the three kids headed to Urgent Care. I assumed they were going to tell me he had strep and needed an antibiotic which I'd go pick up and then I could finally get that Tylenol and be on our way home to get some much needed sleep.  Instead they found his fever to be 104.5 and a stiff, quite swollen neck and said you need to go to the ER and maybe I should try to get a "family member" (their words) to help with childcare for the other children.  That's when I immediately felt sorry for myself because I had no family member to call and come to my rescue.  I got in the car called mom asked her to come, darn she was in Kansas...I started calling people.  Oh great it's Sunday morning 10am everyones in church now.  I prayed.  God provided. Thanks again Lizzy!!  

Brian showed up at the ER. I was elated!  A CT scan showed a nasty Abcess infection in Josiah's neck. They kept him two nights to make sure the infection responded properly to the antibiotics.  We got home this morning and have alot to be thankful for! We feel for those parents that who have children in the hospital especially long term.  We were there two nights and I thought that was hard.  My sweet friend Sarah and her son Caleb came to visit us (huge blessing for me and Josiah both!) she told me they were riding the elevator to come see us and Caleb was telling someone that his friend Josiah was "very sick".  This person asked Caleb, "is his hair gone too?"  Broke my heart for the people that have to watch their children suffer with long term or terminal illnesses.  We are so very thankful for three healthy children. 

He received a very cool bear and balloon from his cousins - that was the first time I saw him light up a little (although you can't tell from the picture) when the lady brought it in to him. 

Neck is still a little stiff, but improving fast!

He wasn't quite as excited to share his cool bed with his sisters as much as he was his good friend Caleb.

Friends are often the best medicine. We are quite thankful for this sweet little red headed boy that brought Josiah a treat and a bag full of fun things to keep him busy and who also told the nurse, "Josiah's my best buddy!" :-) Love him!

They were great about getting us out as soon as they could this morning.  We are pretty excited to all be home again and have our Joey back!!  Next trip to hospital will be in a few weeks to get those big ol' tonsils out for good! Yay for no more snoring!

Lately

We are eagerly awaiting the sale of this pretty little gray house. :) It'd be so cool if we were in a new house by Christmas.  With the house on the market, I try my best to keep it in decent shape, but I have three kids, let's be honest, it's usually always messy.  But we have found ways to spend our time outdoors during this lovely month of June.

The boys built themselves a game of Washers one day when Brian had the day off and no house project to work on.

This one brings so much Joy to our lives and alot of drama as well :-)

Meeting up with friends is high on our list of ways we spend our time around here. 

Love Love Love These Four

I'm currently reading a book called, "All Things For Good" by Thomas Watson.  Thomas is currently reminding me that the things of this world will not last.

 "If you love the world, you love that which may keep you out of heaven...But if you love God, there is no fear of losing heaven. He will be a Rock to hide you, but not to hurt you. By loving Him we come to enjoy HIm.  You may love worldly things, but they cannot love you in return.  You may love worldy things, and they die and leave you. Riches take wings, relations drop away. There is nothing here abiding; the creature has a little honey in its mouth, but it has wings it will soon fly away.  But if you love God, He is "my portion for ever" Psalm 73;26 He abides for ever.