Hug those babies close...

My friend Mimi, who I only know through what she has shared online, lost her son today.

Julian, who I mentioned before, but not by name, has earned his wings today. He lost his battle to Medulloblastoma.

This sweet boy who has such a beautiful smile and has touched so many is finally at peace.

Please keep Mimi and her family (she has 3 other little boys) in your prayers as they go through these days without King Julian.

If you'd like to read about Julian you can visit his care pages to see pictures of his beautiful smile and read about Mimi and her journey through this with Julian. You have to register to log in, but it's free.

Go to www.carepages.com
Click "Visit a CarePage"
Register (first-time users only)
After you've registered, enter the exact CarePage Name below:
JuliansWorld

How cool is this idea?

My friends son has a birthday right before Christmas. This little guy doesn't want for anything, he has bikes, motorbikes, a quad, every gaming system known to man, toys up the wazoo. He's a great kid. He decided this year he wanted to have an "Army" birthday party.

My friend decided in lieu of gifts for her son, she would have people bring an unwrapped gift to be donated to a local charity that helps out soldier's families while they are deployed (going with the Army theme).

She felt free to invite as many kids as she wanted then and they ended up have all he kids from his class, the neighborhood, and his soccer team.... it was over 30 kids in all. They had a huge stack of toys to take to the charity.

Her son had a blast (he had plenty of gifts from his parents and relatives) and was SO proud when he dropped off all those toys!

Bad mommy...

Since our return we've been really pushing a new regime with the kids. While two weeks with Meemaw is like heaven for the girls, the two weeks after lead to cranky, cranky kids.

Wha??? No sugary marshmallow breakfast cereal?

Huh? No Fresca with dinner?

No fair! We can't go swimming?

This is terrible! I don't have anyone to cater to my whims 24/7.

So we've been working on attitude adjustments. Lots of counting negative behavior and time outs (gotta love 1 2 3 Magic!).

As for our sanity, we spent the last two weekends doing our 2nd sweep of out with the old in with the new. Boxes of shoes/clothes and toys to the donation bin, and boxes for organizing toys coming in. We went through the girls things and found places for everything. Everything has a place. They are expected to put things in those places.

I know. Crazy parents.

Today was a snow day. We had a foot of snow. And it still falling at a fast clip. Julia's school was cancelled and then her dance class was cancelled. For the most part we had a great day. They played nicely and we had a good time.

Then it was time to clean up the mess. Hardy har har.

After numerous polite requests, I pulled out the big gun. I gave them a 10 minute warning that they need to START picking their toys up.

Nothing.

SO. Without a word, I picked up the toys in the dining room and put them in a trash bag. NO threats. No yelling.

Julia lost it when she found out what had happened. She was yelling at me, so she was sent for a time out. I calmly explained I gave her and her sisters plenty of time to clean it up.

So, she went upstairs for an attitude adjustment. Then the letters began.

Anna was her courier.

The first read: Sorry Mommy, I want my toys back now. Love Julia I will take care of my toys.

Then the second: To Mammy, I love you a lot. Love Julia

Then the third: To Het, We want are(sp?) toys back. Love Anna

Then the 4th: Melmo, Melmo, Melmo From Emma

Then the 5th: ga ga go From Baby Alive

Then the 6th: Nana nana From Tena (the horse)

She did make me laugh, but the toys are staying in the bag. They will go up in the closet in time out.

Thanks ya'll

Thank you so much for your concern. The emails and comments were so great and I appreciate it.

I'm doing okay. So much better really. There is a lot going on in our lives and my "brave face forward" just had a momentary weak spot. I have been working really hard on being optimistic, but I do falter.

I met with my treatment team tonight (wow, so official) and they all agree that they think my symptoms are from the Zoloft wean and not from the Wellbutrin. So, they are doubling my Wellbutrin and I'm supposed to be watching carefully over the next few days. If the dizziness increases or the "agitation" gets worse then I am supposed to call soon. I was worried I was really crazy, that I was honestly losing my mind. My PCP really explained to me what was physiologically happening right now and that I haven't just developed a major mental illness.

My doctor said that the reason she did not wean from the zoloft is because she was putting me on the wellbutrin and the combination of the two lowers the threshold for seizures in some people. So, with my BP being under maintenance she just felt it was safer to go with the switch.

So, not to continue the pity fest, I'm really ok for the most part. I have happy moments surrounded by some scary stuff. The worst part is that I just have no idea when it hits.

Two families I am semi acquainted with are going through some ugliness. My next door neighbor (they moved while we were on vacation though) was diagnosed with cervical cancer at 28. She has 3 kids and it's not going well for her. Her MIL is in the final stages of liver cancer (genesis endometrial cancer) and over the holidays their house had significant water damage and ruined many of their belongings. If you could just send some happy thoughts their way I would greatly appreciate it.

The other family is someone I "met" online through a blogger I frequent. I've been following little Julian's trials for as long as they've been posted. He is a 4 year old boy who had a medullablastoma and he is very close to getting his wings. His mother writes a very inspirational journal on his care page and I feel so touched by the entire family, I would love if you could send some strength thoughts their way.

Ok, now that I have brought the mood down, I'll send you all on your way.

2007 Portion of our Trip...

Because that's all I have!

I left my camera battery in the charger at my parents, so there were no photos taken after Dec 30.

The other criteria for these photos are that they are they only ones in the horizontal format. Office isn't working on this computer (this is my long dead computer that was sent off for repairs while we were gone over the holidays, can I give a shout out to Notebook Mechanix? They ROCK!!) I need to enter my product key, and it's in a box on it's way here.

See there was fun to be had!! The girls LOVED swimming in December. My parents pool was over 90 degrees while we were there. It was all Julia and Anna talked about for the 2 weeks leading up to the trip!