Birthday Boy

So, maybe most people wouldn't classify Bronson as a boy, but as he's turning 18 next year and will officially be an adult I thought I'd better use "boy" as long as I can :)

Bronson's birthday celebration was very low-key; I cooked his favorite breakfast (waffles), then he opened presents from the family. He hung out around the house during the day, then ended up going to work yesterday evening. That's a sure sign that Bronson is approaching adulthood, where he had to work on his birthday!

Since Bronson turned 17, I thought I would list 17 interesting facts about him:

1. He was born one month early, weighing in at a tiny 5 lbs 9 oz
2. Bronson could identify letters of the alphabet by age 21 mos and taught himself to read at age 3.
3. His favorite books to read are fantasy and sci-fi.
4. His favorite color is green.
5. Bronson is terrified of spiders.
6. He has a photographic memory.
7. He's had the same best friend since kindergarten.
8. Bronson is a gifted writer and has won various writing contests.
9. He would like to visit England and Japan someday.
10. His favorite foods are pasta and meat (he claims he's a carnivore).
11. If he puts on round glasses, he looks just like Harry Potter.
12. Bronson has an extensive vocabulary.
13. He likes to sleep in his swimsuit.
14. For his career, he wants to be an English professor.
15. Bronson has a metal bar in his chest.
16. He's very good at voices and accents.
17. He is currently developing/writing a book series.

Happy Birthday Bronson - we are so glad to have you as part of our family and love you very much!!

Summer Games Success

Krissia completed her swimming competition at the Utah Summer Games on Friday. As I reported in my last post, she won two gold medals on Thursday, setting a record in one event. Friday was a repeat - again, two gold medals and a broken record! Thursday's events were the 100 freestyle and 50 backstroke (record), while Friday's events were the 50 freestyle and 100 backstroke (record). We are so proud of her success, especially since she has only been able to train heavily for a couple of weeks as she's been recovering from her broken elbow.

Here is Krissia wearing her "bling"

Globetrotter

So, maybe Krissia hasn't exactly been traveling the globe, but she certainly has been traveling a lot the past two weeks.

Last week, Krissia attended a swim camp at BYU. We paid extra to have her stay in the dorms all week, and with the current gas prices, it was probably cheaper than driving her to and from Provo for five days. Those of you who know Krissia well know that she is very social, so needless to say she had a blast!! She met several other swimmers - most of them LDS and from other states. In fact all she did was talk, talk, talk about how much fun she had that I was worried she hadn't paid much attention to the swimming instruction :) Here is a picture of Krissia with two of the girls she met at BYU; their names are Jessie and Amy, and they are from Californa and Texas.


Of course, being the beautiful and sweet girl that she is, Krissia also attracted some attention from the boys. This young man's name is Taylor, and he lives in Boise. He is already talking about coming to Price next summer when Krissia is old enough to date. Good grief!!

Krissia was home for one night, then spent the following day in Richfield helping DEl with some pageant stuff. It was back home for Sunday and Monday before leaving Tuesday morning for girls' camp. Krissia spent two days there, coming home early yesterday so that she and DEl could drive down to Hurricane in preparation for the Utah Summer Games. Whew!

It will be nice to have Krissia home again. Not just for her help around the house, but because I enjoy spending time with her. I know that her brothers miss her, as well.

P.S. I just received an update about how Krissia did in the Summer Games today. She won two gold medals, setting a new record in one event. She'll be competing again tomorrow; I'll try and let everyone know how she does.

Something New for Father's Day

Okay, in order to celebrate Father's Day, I went way out on a limb and tried something new.

For Del's Father's Day card, I created a digital scrapbook page....my very FIRST one!

Soooo.....here it is:



I've been collecting digital scrap booking supplies for a few months now but have been too scared to try it (other than creating digital word art, which I absolutely LOVE to do).

In retrospect, I feel I could have made the photo cluster bigger and the word art smaller - oh well, maybe next time.

We had a nice Father's Day celebration with presents and cake. I feel so fortunate to have a great husband who's also a wonderful father. DEl deeply cares about the welfare of our children, spends "quality" time with each one, and always encourages them to give their very best effort in whatever they do. He truly is "someone special"!

Sunday Stroll

Isn't it nice when your plans turn out better than you expect?

When driving through Helper ( a small town near Price) recently, I'd noticed a walking trail near the road. I mentioned it to Del, and we decided to try it out with our family Sunday evening. The first half mile of trail was right next to the freeway and quite noisy. However, we literally turned a corner and found ourselves on a secluded, wooded path.

It was almost like we'd stepped into an enchanted wood. There were picnic areas, a river that ran next to the path, and even a couple of swinging bridges!

The trail passed through the sites of a couple of ghost towns, with plaques that described their histories; we actually saw the old foundation of a small building. There were also a couple of trees between the path and river that had recently been gnawed by a beaver, but we didn't see the animal.

We took a small detour and checked out this train engine located a short distance from downtown Helper:

The trail continued on from that point, but it was getting late and cold and we still had to walk back to our starting point. The kids were disappointed, but I told them that it would give us something to do on another Sunday :) All in all, we really had a wonderful time.

While we were checking out the train, Del had a private photo shoot with each of the two older boys:


I think he did a great job, especially since the flash is broken on our camera!

Arizona Vacation Part 3: The long drive home

Although we had a wonderful time in Arizona, we weren't looking forward to the LONG ride home. We estimated it would take around 8 1/2 hours for the drive itself, not counting the stops - which is a must if you are traveling with kids.

We decided to break it up as best we could while still trying to get home in a somewhat timely manner. About 3 hours after leaving Phoenix, we stopped in Tuba City for lunch at McDonald's. Tuba City is on the western edge of the Navajo reservation; I mentioned this to the kids as we were leaving the town and Jefferson said,"I was wondering why there were so many Indians at McDonald's, but I didn't want to be rude so I didn't say anything." From Tuba City, we drove to Kayenta, which is near Monument Valley. We had a few different road options for the ride home, and we chose to drive through Monument Valley, since none of us had been there. The scenery was beautiful, and we recognized many of the formations from different movies we've seen. We stopped to stretch our legs and get some pictures:

Monument Valley is situated on a small strip between Arizona and Utah. It was interesting to note that on the Arizona side, Native Americans had built houses right up to the bases of some of the rock formations but once we were in Utah, there wasn't a single house to be seen anywhere near the formations. The road took us through Mexican Hat, which is a microscopic speck on the map but is located in the middle of some vibrantly colored sandstone cliffs. We opted not to stop in Blanding or Monticello, and drove straight for Moab. About 20 miles outside of Moab, we stopped at an arch literally located next to the freeway. We decided this was another great opportunity to stretch our legs:

You probably can't read it in the picture, but this arch is named "Wilson Arch". This was exciting for us, as we both have Wilson blood in us and this is Del's middle name!

Del,Bronson,Jefferson, and I hiked to the top while Krissia and Mathison hung out in the van:

After our hike, we stopped for dinner in Moab, then it was straight on to Price. 10 hours after we left Phoenix, we pulled into our driveway. Luckily, Mathison is a great traveler, so we'd had a nice drive:

We had a great time....but it sure is nice to be home :)

Powerless

This post was going to be the final installment in our vacation series. Instead, I'm going to vent some frustration.

Mathison and I returned about an hour ago from a 10-hour jaunt into Salt Lake City for a doctor's appointment at Primary Children's Hospital. It appears that Mathison is beginning to show some early symptoms of the same immunodeficiency that affected Jefferson. The immunologist decided that certain tests were needed in order to get a clearer picture of what's going on with Mathison and suggested we get them done all at once this afternoon to spare us another 2 hour drive into SLC.

So began our 3 hour nightmare. The first test the doctor ordered was a sweat chloride test to rule out cystic fibrosis. Mathison was hooked up to 4 "jumper cables" - 2 tightly secured to each arm - and given electrical pulses for 5 minutes. The cables were so tight that his hands were turning purple, his arms had to be kept straight out in front of him, and the current stung horribly as it went in. Needless to say, Mathison was screaming the entire time - and nothing I did could calm him. When the time had finally come to turn off the electricity, both arms had to be wrapped from wrist to mid-bicep with gauze, then plastic wrap, and finally an elastic bandage. These layers prevented him from bending his arms, and he ended up crying for several minutes in frustration.

At this point, we had 45 minutes before they needed to take off the wraps, so we headed over to radiology to get a CAT scan of Mathison's sinuses. The patient has to hold completely still during a CAT scan in order for it to effective; I had wondered how they were planning to do this with a one-year-old without sedation. Well, it didn't take us long to find out. They swaddled Mathison like a newborn, then strapped him across his chest and upper legs to the table. They also had a way to secure his head to prevent him from turning it. The poor kid looked like a mummy....and didn't like it one bit. More screaming; by this time Mathison's face was bright red.

Luckily, we got the views they needed on the first try, sparing us further torture for a few minutes. We headed back to the lab to remove the arm wraps and get a sweat sample taken. Just when Mathison thought the worst was over, it was time to take his blood. It took 3 people to do it, he was fighting so hard. In fact, he wiggled the vein away from the needle before they had collected a full sample. They spent 10 minutes looking for another vein before finally deciding they could take the remainder that they needed through a finger poke. At this point, Mathison's face was a deep purple and his eyes were nearly swollen shut from crying.

Don't get me wrong - my intent is not to rant about the staff at PCMC; they were very good and tried their hardest to do everything in a professional, compassionate, and timely manner. Rather, my frustration came from having to watch my terrified baby get poked, prodded, and shocked .....and not be able to do one thing about it. I know that the tests were necessary and performed in Mathison's best interest, but it still broke my heart as I watched my child suffer. It was especially hard because as a young toddler, Mathison is used to me protecting him - and he couldn't understand why I was just standing by and letting others hurt him.

I hate feeling powerless - especially when it comes to my children.