Our Trip to UT...

Here is our trip to UT. We did a lot, and I don't feel like adding a ton of captions, so enjoy the pics.

Carol informed me I needed to add captions.

Swimming at my parents house.

We miss our Peyton Walter!

Swimming wipes you out!

Cora giving some wild flowers to Aunt B.

Mom and Dad at the canyon picnic.

The kiddos up the canyon. We miss the mountains a lot.

Roasting some mallows for some S'mores.

MMMMMMMMMM s'mores!

Mmmmmmm s'mores (again).

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, s'mores (and again)

How cool was it that there was still snow on the mountains.

Emmett riding Susie's dog.

We dropped in to see Grandpa Andrus, and he wheeled out the Doctors carriage for the girls and E.

We spent an afternoon with the Cardon's. I particularly like Bones' boots.

We also got to go see Carol's Grandpa.

Then we went Temple Square and toured the Supernacle, and the grounds.

And these are the end as we were getting ready to leave. We miss you all!

quick update

So, I know it's been a while.....sorry.

I just wanted to post pics of some recent happenings. In mid june, we went to the Denton Air Show! I fondly remember going to air shows with my family as a kid. So I thought that I would share that with my family. It was quite hot and Josh was a little bored, so we didn't stay long enough to see the actual planes in the air, but we got more of a ground show. Emmett loved it though. When we were leaving he kept telling Josh that we needed to stay at the airport!

I don't have my knowledgable dad here to tell me what kind of planes these were, when they were made and used, etc. But here are a few pics to prove that we are still alive and well.

All I remember my dad telling me about is this plane below. I don't remember what it is, but I do remember that these were the planes used in the Doolittle Raid on Japan in the second war.
The kiddos in the belly of the plane
The weekend after that we went to San Marcos and San Antonio to see some newly transplanted Fish family. Here are the Fish Texans getting to "ride" the San Marcos river. We stayed two nights in San Antonio with Abe and Meredith! It was so nice to see them and we are very happy to have them so much closer!
We got home from Utah on Monday, and I have a ton of pictures that I need to sort through and post. I will hopefully post them with in the week

-Carol

Pics

Here are some pics from the surgery. Shannon suggested we let Maren take some pictures and have her create her own scrapbook. She was super excited about it. So here are some of the photos. Most of her pictures are of the fish on the walls so I just posted some of her. There will be video forthcoming. It is mostly of her after they gave her her first round of sedatives and she is a little punch drunk.

Before the surgery. Just waiting.

Dr. Peifer (he is single as far as we know. We trying to devise a means of introducing Michelle, so far we haven't come up with anything.)

Examining her bracelet while under the influence. It was pretty funny.

She wanted to touch the crab after she was drugged. I think she thought they were real. This is me helping her back into bed.

Touching the crab.

Waiting for her to wake up.

It looks worse than it is. Today she has been acting quite her normal self and hasn't had much in the way of pain meds. She actually put her scrap book together this morning. Once again thank you all for your prayers and thoughts.

~Josh

Video to come.

Maren's Surgery

Just a quick update... Maren's surgery went fine. The doctor said once he got inside the ear there was no cholestiatoma. He believes what was showing on the CT scan was actually the retracted ear drum (I could be misinterpreting his explanation). He reconstructed her left ear drum, put tubes in both ears and removed her adnoids. Once the surgery was started the whole thing was over in about 2 hours. Maren is home and is fine. She was a little groggy and ornery on the drive but quickly fell back to sleep once we were home. Thank you all for your prayers and thoughts in our behalf. We feel truly blessed to have so many wonderful friends and family who were so anxious to help and we have been truly strengthened in our testimony of the power of prayer. Thank you all.

~Josh

P.S. We have some pictures and video to come, but it is late and I haven't even downloaded them yet.

Our Bear

Since I am no good at calling people (sorry) I am attempting to keep you all informed. Most of the time parents are quite sure that their children having hearing problems. It is the most logical explanation for not obeying the first time, and our kids have not been any different. Maren, however has been different. With her it wasn't just an exacerbation but a consistent need to repeat instruction, even when it wasn't related to less than desirable activities. She has had more than a few ear infections in her life, and due to the cattle call clinics that we were using during the time we were on medicaid, we weren't always super excited to take her to get looked at. So, now that we have actual insurance and she seemed to be having some issues, we finally decided to take her in. The pediatrician said that there was an infection and she was on some antibiotics for a while. He also put her on a antihistamine to help with the allergies worsening the symptoms. Once her ear cleared up he asked to see her back and consequently, he recommended we head take her to see and ear nose and throat specialist. The ENT said she had mild to moderate hearing loss in one ear (the left), and her ear drum doesn't vibrate. Further hear ear drum is completely retracted. After 2 cat scans, he is pretty sure she has something called a cholesteatoma (spelling?). So for everybody besides Abe, that means there is supposed to be an area just below the inner ear that has just air in it. In Maren's case that space that is supposed to be empty is filling up with skin. That skin is causing the retraction and starting to erode some of the bone tissue in the inner ear. So we have Maren scheduled for a surgery on the 4th to remove the extra skin. They will make a small incision behind the ear, pull the skin back, remove a section of her bone and remove the skin and rebuild her ear drum. They will also put a tube in her other ear. If we don't do the surgery then hearing loss is certainly going to happen since the bone that is eroding is necessary for hearing. There are a few possible complications. The biggest worry is a result of nerves in the area associated with facial movements. But, we have a good doctor and we are confident everything will go well. That being said we would definitely appreciate your prayers in her behalf since it is still a little scary to have our baby girl going in for surgery. I think I have covered everything. I hope you are all doing well.

~Josh

Quick update

Just a quick update. I proposed my dissertation on the 14th and passed. I am super ready to be done with school and this means I only have a few hurdles left (gather data, analyze, write up, and defend). I still have a few side projects that need to be addressed as well, but I can finish those once I am no longer teaching. Just thought some of you might want to know. And since most of you would rather see pictures than hear about my interminable scholastic endeavors, here are some pictures.

A visit from the Floridians

A couple weeks ago my sister Annette and her family came to visit us.......and Rollie happened to have a business meeting. How convenient. Anyway, I didn't take as many pics as I wish I had. But nonetheless, this is what I have and I hope you enjoy it.

Uncle Rollie and Jess
Emmett "walking" the merry-go-round
Alaina and a lady bug.

Annette and Emmett
I love the look on both Emmett and Ammon's face. Emmett was sneezing but I don't know what Ammon was doing.
The Cousins.......some of them at least
Poor Uncle Rollie. He was a trooper doing push-up with 6 kids
Sorry for the short post. I have very little time. Emmett has become fascinated with scissors, tape, matches and all things inherently dangerous which doesn't allow time for me to do any extras.

-Carol

the problem with food

I am sure that every parent wishes at one time or another that their child(ren) would just eat what is made. I can remember as a child being the only one still sitting at the table long after everyone was done, because I had not eaten my canned beets. (I hated those things) The dinner rule in my house growing up was this: You could not get down from the table until you have eaten everything on your plate. Yes, it was in my childhood that I became a lifetime member of the Clean Plate Club. I also remember thinking up ways that I could dispose of my food without having to actually eat what I didn't want. I am sure you all have done something similar to what I did. Getting a mouth full of food and then saying that you need to use the restroom only to spit out the food in the toilet and of course flush to dispose of any evidence. Or I would "use" paper napkins to hold my chewed food in.

Now that I am a parent I can watch for these and other tactics.( I have seen Jessica spread out the content on her plate to make it look like she has eaten most of what she originally had. I laugh inside at the attempt and then think "c'mon Jess, you can come up with something better than that. Try again")

But more often than not, mealtime can be quite demanding on my patience. I feel like a broken record repeating the same phrases over and over. This redundancy makes me want to run full speed at a brick wall.... (did you get the visual?)

So after struggling with the meal/kid scenario for several years, I think that I have come up with a couple of solutions that I thought I would share with ya'll.

#1: If they don't eat what I have made for dinner, that is fine, they don't have to eat it......they just get to go to bed hungry.......oh and they get to eat their dinner for breakfast!!! After Cora went without dinner, breakfast, and lunch, she got hungry enough to eat the night before's dinner for a snack. I know it sounds cruel and pretty extreme but it works. All I have to do is mention having their dinner for breakfast and they comply.

#2This approach I thought of recently and it works well too. We have a 3-4 "corse" meal.

I will serve only the vegetables(their least favorite for the menu) as the "1st corse" and they have to eat a reasonable amount before they get the "2nd corse" which is their next least favorite. I do this until they obtain the coveted roll or meat or whatever it is as the last corse. The theory behind this one is that they will get the most nutritious food first and therefor by the time they get to the least nutritious they are full or nearly there. I am sure that there are many flaws and long term effects that my children will one day blame all their problems on, but for now this is what works for me and thats what I am going to do for as long as I need to.

If you have any input or constructive criticism, please feel free to share them with me.

Happy eating!!

-Carol