Our Thanksgiving

We had a quiet Thanksgiving meal. It was just our little family for the big Turkey dinner and then some of Jared’s family came over for supper and pie. It was actually kind of nice to have it with just us for a change. I thought it was going to be a little depressing but it was ok. Jared took the older girls shooting for awhile in the afternoon. It was there first time and well Destiny don’t care if she goes again. Brielle is all ready to go and do some actual hunting!!!  She really had fun!  What’s a guy to do when he don’t have any boys take some of his girls I guess…lol!!
Destiny played some Christmas music while I was getting lunch ready!!

Destiny playing the piano

Our turkey got a little brown..but we like it that way {IT actually cooked WAY faster then what I was expecting…}

Homemade dinner rolls…YUM!!!!

All the fixins…




Jianna- “Aaaaallll done!!”

Pies are NOT my specialty!!!! Actually it’s the pie crust that I HATE!!!  I need to find a good recipe…My problem is that I don’t have the patience to deal with the crust..so next year I am either going to buy my crust {Michelle I know you are going to cringe to that!!!}} or I need to practice more through out the year and make pies more then once a year!!  So Jared helped me did the pie crusts this year. He came home to see me all frustrated and took over!!! So he wanted me to make sure to take a pics of his pie this year…his patchwork pie crust and apple pie too..

Destiny wanted to make a pie too so she found a chocolate chip pie recipe and made it!!  All
the kids loved it..it was pretty good!! She is becoming quite the baker and for that I am thankful!!


Then in the middle of night some kind of bug decided to get me..and leave me on the toliet with the garabage can directly in front of me..if u know what i mean;)

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!!!

"Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever." (psalm 118:1 niv)

Happy Thanksgiving y'all!!! Hope u all have a great day with your families!! Avery has something she would like to tell you all too:))

Brielle’s follow up

We went back to Shriner’s today to get the results from her MRI. We got good news and bad news I guess..The good news is that they finally figured out what is going on. She does indeed have a discoid meniscus. So what the one dr was thinking is indeed what she has. Im relived that they finally figured it out!  But the bad news is that she will have to have surgery on it to correct it. The surgery shouldn’t be terrible so that is a relief.  They are going to do what they call an arthroscopic surgery. During arthroscopy, the surgeon inserts a small camera, called an arthroscope, into the knee joint. The camera displays pictures on a television screen, and the surgeon uses these images to guide miniature surgical instruments. Most arthroscopic surgeries are done on an outpatient basis. They usually go home a few hours after the procedure. Once in there they will make it into a disc shape again since it is a circle right now. Take a look at the picture to see what I am talking about….

They wont know how much they have to take out until they get in there. Depending on how much they take out will determine her recovery. If they take a lot out they will put her in a brace and it will keep it straight for 6 weeks and physical therapy will follow to restore strength and mobility.. If they don’t have to do a lot I guess she will recover fine after a couple of days. So we are praying that they don’t have to take a lot out so she has a quick recovery.

Avery’s appointment with the Neurosurgeon

Great news to report….We finally went to see the neurosurgeon for Avery’s neck for AAI. He told me that her gap is around 4mm and that is in the normal range so it turns out she is pretty much in the clear and she don’t have AAI. He said he would clear her to jump on trampoline, tumbling, pretty much anything. He did say we could do the x-rays for a couple of years if we wanted to, to watch to see if the gap grew bigger or changed or anything..but we will see I guess..It just shows that u need to see the right specialist bc her regular dr had told me that it was abnormal and so on…and he apparently had no idea what to look for.
Now for her back…remember I was telling u there was a bump on her lower part of her back next to her spine..well the neurosurgeon is referring us to an pediatric orthopedic dr now. When we first started talking about her back he said that her top part of her back has a slight curve but it was nothing to be worried about or concerned..just kind of watch it and if it got bad then we would need to go to the orthopedic..well then I asked him to look at her lower back and he pretty much just told me that we would need to get hooked up with orthopedic. But he thought it was bc her spine curved..I said are u sure that is all it is and he thought it was but I'm not sure I believe him or not..so we will see..
We are also going to go to see the orthopedic for her hips.I asked the neurosurgeon about it and he said that we needed to see an orthopedic for it. Avery has a loud clunk in her hips. She is CONSTANTLY putting her hip out and in and it is actually called Hip Subluxation. We could be just sitting in the rocking chair reading a book and she will pop her hip in and out over and over. The therapists wont even do joint compression on her hips anymore bc of it. Actually they are the ones that told me that I should get it looked at. I kind of just got used to it..but every time she does it it still makes me cringe and I tell her to stop. I guess every time she does that she is wearing the bone done and making everything looser. So it just gets easier and easier as time goes on I guess..The only time her hip is probably in is when she is walking. So I'm really curious to see what he has to say about it.


Avery with pumpkin. He was in the waiting room while we were waiting. He entertained Avery during our long wait. He is a therapy dog. There was a girl there that is in the middle of cancer and that dog aka pumpkin goes everywhere with her. He has his own hospital badge with his picture on it. Last week he spent the week in the hospital on the cancer floor with her. Everyone just loves him. Even when the dr came in to see Avery he asked her did u get a chance to see pumpkin?? lol!!  HE is highly trained, bc he liked to show off on what he could do. The girls dad let Avery feed him a treat and then a little bit later Avery signed more and held her hand out…She wanted to keep feeding him some treats..and pumpkin sure didn’t mind!! HA!  But I couldn’t help notice the binder sitting on her moms lap. It had said on the cover Julia’s medical history and that binder was FULL of paperwork. It.broke.my.heart. That girl has gone through more then I can imagine in her short time here on earth and she probably has a long road ahead of her. We see a lot of drs. and it seems like we have a lot of medical problems but let me tell you we don’t have hardly anything compared to what that girl is going through. So I will take all my doctors appointments and be quiet about it. I pray for God’s healing on that sweet girl and praying that the parents can get some rest bc u could just see there tiredness on them.

Quick Update

Brielle had her MRI today and she did great laying still and didn’t have to be put out for it…woohoo!!  We go next week back to Shriners for a follow up appointment and then we will get the results from her MRI.
Avery was suppose to go to the neurosurgeon last Thursday but once again they cancelled and so we will go this Thursday..she also had her back x-rays done but of course we haven't heard anything on them either..
So we wait!!!

Brielle’s Mystery knee

I know that I had said that I would be done posting for awhile but things don’t ever go as planned in this household!!!!!  Brielle’s  mystery knee problem showed back up on Monday..A little background for those of you that are new and not aware of what has been going on…This has been going on ever since Brielle was two..She just woke up one morning and couldn’t walk or straighten her left knee. It is always the left knee and always hurts from behind the knee..At first it stayed like that all week long and I was carrying her everywhere..then it would go away and show back up for a couple of days..and it went off and on like that until she was 4 and that was in 2007.  Well we did several tests including blood work like testing for lime disease, rheumatoid arthritis,  and so on…the list kept going on..tests would come back negative and they would think of more things to test for so we would go and do more blood work..nothing was showing up on the million of xrays she had done either.. and finally we did an MRI and nothing showed up on that too..one dr would pass me on to another dr bc they didn’t know..so I went to many different drs. I went to a rheumatoid arthritis dr to  and he thought it wasn’t JRA {juvenile rheumatoid arthritis} bc the blood work was coming back negative and she wasn’t have any other flare ups anywhere else it was always the same knee and also they are never red, hot to the touch which I guess is possible with arthritis flare ups. So finally I wrote to our Shriners Hospital here and asked if they would see her bc I was tired of spending all this money on all these different testes and then just getting passed onto the next dr and basically starting all over and always getting the same end result of I don’t know what is wrong with your daugther. The Shriners Hospital down here is for joints, muscles, and bones { apparently different Shriners hospitals focus on different things} so since I thought that one was right here maybe I would get some answers. So I was delighted when I heard back from them saying that they would take her on as a patient. So we went to them and they basically told us that there was nothing they could do bc she wasn’t having a flare up at the moment and they didn’t have any answers either but to come back the minute she  starts to have a flare up again so they can actually see it in action. So that is what we did…we waited…and we waited..and waited some more..that was in 2007.WE went four years with NO flare ups of anything!! I thought it just fixed itself and went away and we were done with it.
Well flash forward to the present….On Monday she wakes up and is complaining of her knee hurting her..and I really don’t think anything of it and don’t even look at it and tell her it will probably go away as the day goes on { I feel super bad that I did that!!!} So on Tuesday she wakes up and tells me it hurts really bad  and I tell her once again that she probably just slept wrong on it and it will go away {again I feel super bad!!!} so then when she came home from school she wrapped it and said that it helped to support it a little..then as I was making super a huge ole LIGHT BULB went off in my head!!!!!  Oh dur this is the same thing that happened so long ago!!!!!  So I sat her down and really looked at it and found out where the pain was once again in the back of the leg and realized that she really couldn’t straighten it at all. So then that night when she was sleeping I snuck into her room and tried to straighten it just to make sure she wasn’t making anything up {after the whole glasses incident I just wanted to make sure;)}and sure enough in her sleep I couldn’t even straighten it.
So I called Shriners up first thing in the morning and talked to the receptionist and explained the situation and just wanted to see if I could bring her in still even though it had been so long bc they were the last ones seeing her for the situation. They talked with the nurses/dr.s and called me back to let me know that she could be seen in the clinic the next day..Praise God!!  Whew bc I didn’t know who I was going to call if they said no bc her family dr just left his practice last month so we would have had to start all over again!!
Today we went to Shriners then and yes her leg was knee was still having problems so they really got to see it during a flare up. They did comment and say it is inflamed in her knee..and we went over a lot of stuff.and basically the dr said she was a huge puzzle to him!!! bc everything that you would think it is well then something throws him off and it kind of rules itself out.

This is our plan though we are going to do a 3 Tesla MRI scan on her knee. It is a higher quality vascular imaging then a regular MRI so they are hopeful that it will show something the other one didn’t.  IM not holding my breath though bc it isn't until the 15th of this month and by then it will probably go away and then it wont be hurting her when she is having the MRI. The one dr through out there possible discoid meniscus but once again she doesn’t have the popping that goes along with it so they really don’t know.  A discoid meniscus is an abnormally shaped meniscus within the knee joint. The meniscus is a C-shaped wedge of cartilage that helps support and cushion the knee joint. In each knee there are two menisci, one on the inside (medial) and one on the outside (lateral) of the knee joint. In some people the lateral meniscus is shaped more like a solid disc rather than the normal C-shape.
Most people with a discoid meniscus never know they have it! Many people live normal, active lives with a discoid meniscus--even high performance athletes. Therefore, if your doctor finds that you have a discoid meniscus, but it is not the cause of your symptoms, it would be left alone.
In some people, the discoid meniscus can cause problems, usually a popping sensation with pain over the outside part of the knee joint. This is why some people use the phrase 'popping knee syndrome' when talking about a discoid meniscus. In these patients, conservative treatment consisting of exercises and stretching can be performed. If these treatments do not relieve the symptoms, patients may choose arthroscopic surgery on the discoid meniscus. If the discoid meniscus is torn, the torn portion can be removed. In addition, the discoid meniscus can be shaved into a more normal appearing meniscus.
So here is the picture they drew me…

and here is a better one that I found online:)

But they think maybe it could be a torn meniscus or meniscus pathology. They said that they will wait to see what the MRI comes back and set us up to come back and see the sports injury dr. to go over the results. They do both really feel it is more of a physical problem in her knee then anything else bc it always happens in her same knee and all the blood work has been negative. They also said that we can do a knee scope next if the MRI is negative to get in there to see what is going on too.  Really they don’t know they just want to tell u something to make you feel better Bc when the dr was getting ready to leave the room he said I wish I could tell you what is wrong with her I am really puzzled with her and I know this is probably frustrating to not know what is wrong with your daughter. Well of course!!!! They sent her home with some crutches to use and to help her support herself walking bc before she was just kind of wobbling around on her tippy toes of her one leg.  She only needs them if it is hurting her badly and having problems walking. SO that pretty much sums it up!!! 
This is what happens when you are in a room waiting for the dr. for THREE hours!!!! You be a kid again and color your heart out and enjoy the quietness!!!!:)

If anyone has any ideas at all I welcome them. I would love to solve this mystery.

Trick or Treat

First up…Mary Poppins..Destiny wanted to be Mary Poppins..so off we went to Goodwill we found the black coat, white shirt and black skirt there on the dollar rack..Score!!!  but the problem was they were a women's size 18…so we had scale it down a couple of sizes..;) We also found the carpet bag and the shoes at Goodwill too…and found the umbrella and the hat at a garage sale..of course we had to make the hat too bc it wasn’t any were close to Mary Poppins..we spray painted it black and found some wood balls and painted them red for the cherries and I had some daisy flowers that we stuck to the hat.I also made the red bowtie to go along with it. I think we did a pretty good job. I think she makes a great Mary Poppins!!!
 
A couple of pictures of Mary Poppins!!

Up next Brielle..she wanted to a bride and look like me when I got married. {even the hair} I wanted to make her a dress but found a really cheap on EBay so I didn’t..the veil is mine from my wedding

Here is a picture of us on our wedding day…to show u what she was going for!!

Avery the kitty..I made her the tutu and glued a black feather boa around it so she could have a tail:) and then made her ears out of the rest of the boa.

and finally the twins..the show stoppers..boy did they get a lot of attention last night..They were Thing 1 and Thing 2 from Dr. Seuss. I made there hats out of a white beanie hat and blue feather boas and just kept gluing it around the hat and then glued a red bow in it. I found some red shirts and my friend cut out the vinyl for there shirts and then I ironed them on.

Jianna was thing 1 and Jayla was thing 2


I thought I would include a picture of what Thing 1 and Thing 2 look like for those of you {like my mom} who don’t know what Thing 1 and Thing 2 look like!!


We went trick or treating with some of the cousins…which makes it more fun!

Going through and eating a bunch of candy to get a sugar high right before bed!!  Good times!!!

Alright well there ya go..I'm going to take a little break and you probably wont see any posts for awhile…I am going to be super busy getting ready for our church's bazaar. I am making a bunch of stuff…so I’m going to be sewing like a crazy woman for awhile!! Ill post after what I made.