Arthrogryposis and Falling

Erika had another fall. She is falling way too often for comfort. :( Every time she falls, because her joints don't bend, she is like a tree falling and it is scary.

Well, she fell; typically there is no injury. It is hard to tell sometimes because her joints don't look normal, and she doesn't hold her hands normally. This time, she fell and tried to catch herself with her arm, but it jammed her fingers.
We put ice on it, and put her to bed with some tylenol, and then this a.m. it was a little more swollen. She can move her fingers, but they hurt. I am suspecting she may have a fracture in her hand because of swelling.
So we put more ice on it, and I called Care Now, to see about an X ray. I did the web check in , and so far haven't heard back!
So I called our personal doctor's office, and he has left practice. His replacement isn't there yet, and the nurse was unsure of where we should go to get an x ray. She said, "you can come in and see the PA, but she'll need to send for an x ray, but I don't know who we are going to use now, everything is different. " That makes me feel nervous, as this is our doctors office we all use!

So I called our Orthopedist's Nurse and PA, at Scottish Rite Hospital because Erika has an appointment with the Orthopedist at 8:30 tomorrow a.m. She asked some questions, and then said, "if you go and get x rays, chances are, they won't do anything but splint it until tomorrow anyway; do you have a splint? I said YES! She said, elevate, use ice I'll set up an x ray for you first thing here, and then we'll see the doctor.

OH MY GOODNESSS! Thank you so much GWEN! She set my heart at ease and told me not to worry. But I do worry. I feel like crying. I hate it when the kids get hurt. I hate it worse when I don' know what to do.
An emergency room visit would have been silly; as by the time we got out of the one we would have gone to, it would be time to see the doctor in a few more hours.

If she hadn't had an appointment already, I probably would be at the emergency room with her. And then, they'd say , "What does she have?" "What is that?" I've never seen anything like that before.... etc. etc. and then they'd say, "She needs to see an Orthopedist. LOL do ya think???

Can you tell we've been through this before. :)

Here she is "Elevating". :)

This last incident is making me think over having a doctor more locally, that we can interview AND educate ahead of time. I do know of a great pediatrician who knows us well because of Out on a Limb Camp, but he is almost 2 hours away. I have seriously thought about using him though, because he understands what Arthrogryposis is.
But, we also need a new doctor for the whole family. I have heard there is a D.O. doc not far from us that is into both nutrition, alternative and traditional medicine. That might be the person we need to investigate to see if he is a good fit.

Happy Anniversary Part 2

Here we are 20 years after our wedding day. :)


We had a really nice day today. Right before we left for dinner, Erika fell down and bent her finger. She has it on ice right now. Glad we are going to the Doctor on Friday morning. If it is still sore, I'll ask him to look at it too. :)

We went to a Mexican Restaurant called Cristina's. It was quite tasty. The girlies had a good time. We asked them what they would be doing when they were 20, considering it is our 20th anniversary.

Anna says she is going to be training alligators. Sarah said she is going to be a ballerina, and Erika says she will be a teacher.

What will we be doing in 20 years? I don't know, but I sure do hope we honor the Lord with our lives in all we say and do.

Thank you Lord for a precious 20 years together.



Our girlies:


Dad and Mom Kissing again!

Erika doesn't seem to mind, but after all, she is the Oldest!

Happy Anniversary

Today is our 20th Anniversary.....

It has been a fast 20 years! Where did the time go? It is like we have lived 3 lifetimes since our Wedding Day. I don't know why it seems that way, but it does. :)

Tonight, we are taking the girlies out to celebrate, and they can take pictures of mommy and daddy at dinner time. They might even be able to get a kissing picture.:)

We are so thankful for each other. We are thankful to the Lord that God brought us together and molded us into one.

May we continue to bring Glory to Him.

Happy Anniversary Dear.

After School Fun

Katie and Lillian spent time swinging on the porch swing.

Erika spent her precious time washing her hair. :)

Anna enjoyed spending time with Miss Kittie Winkle:

We had a little friend come and visit this afternoon. Sarah loves to play with Joy.

The goats love visiting with Joy too. :)

Cat Fishing

Here is the fishing pole with a stuffed mouse tied to the end.


Miss Kitty Winkle went for the first bite!

The Grand Girls Made It To School

After all those shots; Lillian claims she was really "stabbed"; the grand girls are off to school. :)

Why is it, that it seems quiet here? It is always noisy with 3 girls, but somehow, today it is quiet....

Or at least, quieter....

Katie came home with her new Oboe! She is 1st Chair for Orchestra and is happily playing in the other room.

All Dressed Up and NOWHERE to Go!

Our grand girls are supposed to start Public School tomorrow. My daughter in law received an email TONIGHT, the night before school starts, that they need shots updated and will not be allowed to attend school tomorrow.
They were registered over a week ago! I'm not sure why the school waited until the night before school to let them know! There are apparently new requirements for shots for kids to enter Kindergarten, and new shots required for Jr. High.

So tomorrow EARLY, they plan to be in line at the health department, so they can get the children into school before 10:00.

I looked online trying to see what was required, and I couldn't make heads nor tails of it. The wording was difficult to understand.

I was just at the health department 2 weeks ago with our girls to get shots updated. I wish we would have known and we could have taken care of the grand girls at the same time. :(

What is it with the shot-nazis?

Sunday

We went back to our church for the first time in 3 weeks today. It was nice to see all our church family we have fellowshipped for the last 13 or so years.
After our teaching elder finished his sermon, Mike said, "I am really going to miss that teaching." The good news is, we don't have to miss it, as it is online and we can listen to it at home. :)

We do plan to keep going to our Ministry Group that is in our area. We love our Generations Family.

Moving on is a very difficult decision. But we know it is the right decision.

When we attended Cornerstone for 2 weeks, we felt totally at home there, and already know many of the people there. It is a great little fellowship, and being less than 5 minutes from the house, it is amazing how "at home" we felt.

There were a few people I needed to let know that we are transitioning to a new phase in our lives, and they were so kind and understanding. There are many more we need to let know, and over the next month we will do that. I think we will plan to attend both churches over the next month to make the transition easier....

It is exciting being a part of the Body of Christ. We are looking forward to what the Lord has for us, here in our community.

Our Week

Was BUSY!

Erika and Anna are so grown up!



Lillian wanted me to take a picture of her reading. Here she is reading a blank book.
Then next picture: She was SUPPOSED to color her star blue, because the stars were "yellow, blue, yellow, blue, yellow.... and she was supposed to pick blue. She said,"no gramma... I want it to be yellow." So I got her to say the pattern. When she finished she said, "no, I want it to be yellow, she then crossed out all the blue stars so they could all be yellow! LOL She is just like her dad. :)



Katie has been a good sport doing school with us this week. She starts 8th grade in Public School on Monday.



Erika and Sarah are great students and have remembered all they learned from last year. They are just blossoming. :)



Anna said that Lillian was making too much noise for her to study her math, so she asked if she could go in my room to study. I gave her permission and went in about 20 minutes later to see if she needed any help. I found her like this. LOL

Poetry Books

This year we are going to be working on creative writing and poetry. So, I decided with would be great fun to buy blank books and decorate them with all sorts of fun things to make our books special.

Lillian LOVED doing this and she was quite creative! She designed her cover all by herself.

The other girls did too; but it seems that Anna's design fell on the floor before the glue gun was available for use. :)

Mud Cakes

Today Lillian and Anna made a wonderful mud cake. They decorated it with leaves and flowers. Lilly was thrilled with it until she got mud all over her elbow AGAIN after washing her hands. LOL She doesn't like her hands dirty, and especially not her arm!
But she sure enjoyed the distraction of making a beautiful cake. But it came with a "poison warning". "Don't eat this cake gramma! It tastes like Poison!" Ok Lillian, I won't. :)

The Not So Thrilled Kindergartner :)

Lilly was thrilled to start school on Thursday, but today, NO WAY! She played today. :)
She kept asking if Sarah or Anna could please play kitchen with her, but they were busy doing school work. She finally decided to take a nap. Poor Baby, lost all her playmates.
She did however enjoy the library today.

How Deep The Father's Love For Us

How Deep The Father's Love For Us

The First Day of School 2009

We got off to a good start yesterday, and had a couple of extra students! Our grand daughters do not start Public School until August 24th, so we just added them to our classroom. :)







The Ponytail Brigade :)

True Grace, Religiosity and BCLC

Somebody asked the question is BCLC was compatible with Christianity, as in, if it taught a "false doctrine", how could you use it with your children?

I have been studying this for a while, and I would really like to address that issue, as something has been made very clear to me in my study and I am quite excited about it.

BCLC speaks often about unconditional love and forgiveness; not parenting from a fear base but a place of love. It is not consequence based, Logic based, or control based, therefore the title is, "Beyond Consequences, Logic and Control.

I was reading a book today having nothing to do with this, yet I found it had EVERYTHING to do with it. The Title of the Book was "The Reason for God" by Timothy Keller. In the book I was reading the chapter "Religion and the Gospel". It began to cover the difference between "Phariseeism" vs. "Grace" and how one leads somebody to be accepted based upon performance, and by fear of punishment, where the other, is based upon acceptance because of love.

Let me explain:

Pharisees lives are driven by the despair of sin. They build their sense of worth on their moral and spiritual performance as a kind of "resume" to present before God and the World. The moral and spiritual standards of all religions are very high and Pharisees know how deep down they are not fully living up to those standards. The result is internal anxiety, insecurity , irritability caused great distress and from lack of measuring up. It shows itself in pride, fierce judgmentalism and even self righteousness and defensive criticism. It is based upon fear, of eternal judgment as the pharisee can never live up to a Holy God.

Phariseeism says, "I obey, therefore I am accepted by God".


Grace however, just sounds too easy. Nice deal! I trust, and then I can do what I want. That however is NOT TRUE. Having experienced true grace causes a person to say,
"I am accepted, therefore I obey!" That obedience is based upon the unconditional love poured into us and onto us. The motivation is not from fear of punishment but it is motivated by love and joy. It is motivated by security.

In Christianity I would say, "I am a child of God".
In our Family, I tell the girls, "You are a Minich!"

Grace and Mercy frees us from the bondage of expected performance, to make a life worth living and loving.
In Christianity, we are not accepted because of our performance, but because of a forgiving Savior.

In BCLC, our children are loved unconditionally not based upon what they do or how they perform, but sacrificially loved, laying our lives down as living examples to show a light out of a very dark place. When our children respond to that, it is very much a parallel to what I have written above.

So let's take our children who come to us for acceptance. When they have a warped view of our love for them, which is unconditional, or should be.... or if we give them conditions for accptance, which many times we do.... it can cause them to view themselves as not measuring up, never being good enough, and can lead to anxiety, depression, anger and acting out.

However, if we take our children's behaivors in stride, and see them through they eyes of simple grace, extented to them with loving hearts, patiently showing them we love them unconditionally, not based upon what they do, but we love them JUST BECAUSE, and then accept them, JUST BECAUSE, the results are astounding!

It may take time for them to respond, as they do not initially trust. But when they DO TRUST, and I promise, they do.... the result is so delightful, the relationship, so delightful, and all of the barriers are broken down. You have relationship that you never dreamed. Your children come to you and seek you out, they love you, they care about what you think, they WANT to please you and it is an amazing experience.

I see it in my own life before my Lord... I do want to please the Lord, I do care to please him, not from fear but out of gratitude and love.

I see the girlies, and our boys too, in the very same way.

The relationship is free to blossom in love.

Churches, Locations, Involvement

This has been on my mind for a very long time. We moved about 40 minutes away from our church about 7 years ago.
When we were closer, we seemed to be much more involved, especially with mid week activities such as Awana.

As gas prices have increased, our church body has changed, our family has grown, our needs have changed and some of our ideas about interaction within the church body has changed, we are exploring the very tedios idea of finding a local body of believers in which we can share fellowship and be more involved.

We have been at our Present church since the mid 1990's. Maybe close to 14 years? I honestly can't remember. All I remember is that Marcus was in 6th grade, and he is now in grad school, married, and has 2 children. :)

Change is always hard. There would be those we miss terribly, and those we have had wonderful relationships with. But... we know that this move will also bring about blessing in our lives as we meet new believers, are able to fellowship in a local area and become more involved in our community.

We are weighing all these thoughts out in our hearts and would really appreciate any prayers offered on our behalf.

We are praying for wisdom, insight and that we make the right decision for our family.

51

Yesterday was my Birthday. :) It was made very special by 5 little girls. Katie and Erika made a gluten free Sponge Cake with Lemon drizzle. It was really great! Lillian gave me a very nice foot rub... though, I heard her say something about removing my toe and throwing the bone away. YIKES!

Anna enjoyed spending time and decorating, and making sure I was kept out of the way so they could make a nice dinner for Mike and I. :)

Mike gave me "The Enchanted Treasure Chest of Wonders".....

"I wonder where the bathroom is?" "I wonder if these sore spots are permenant?"
"I wonder where my bifocals are?" Hmmmm. He gets to have a 50th soon..... my brain is working..... "I wonder if it will work right by then?" LOL

Here are some photos from yesterday.