Little Girls & Shoes

I love in when little girls are excited about shoes.  Too too darling.

Where's Jolie?

Excuse the mess . . . it didn't look this way when I put Jolie in our bed for a nap. Must be the result of the 30 minute screamfest before she fell asleep. Which only reinforced the knowledge that she NEEDED a nap. Desperately. Naturally I was a little {ahem} concerned when I came in and couldn't find her.  ANYWHERE in the house.

Oh, there she is :)

Happy Birthday to Kurt

We love you Kurt! Happy Birthday (a few days ago)!!

Silliness

Up House

My kids have been begging me for months to go to the Up house and I finally took them.  It was just a quick stop, but they had so much fun and wanted to stay longer to play.

I don't know why my pictures won't upload in the right direction.  Any ideas?

Adventures of Phineas & Ferb - The End

Day 6 - No pictures. I think everyone must have been worn out. 

Day 7 - Home at last :)

The End.

Adventures of just Ferb? - Day 5

Occupational Incident = Peg Leg Ferb

Playing with Legos

Working on art projects

Playing in the leaves

Waiting for Mom's volleyball game to start

Phineas is with Kurt on a work trip and had a very busy {unpictured} day :)

Ferb is hanging out at home with us.

Adventures of Phineas & Ferb - Day 4

Phineas at the beach.

Phineas at the hotel.

Ferb at Cornbelly's

Recovering from Cornbelly's

Dessert

Primary program practice

Phineas is with Kurt on a work trip.

Ferb is hanging out with the rest of us at home.

Adventures of Phineas & Ferb - Day 3

Pancakes

Flying

Dinner

Eye Appointment

Bedtime

Phineas {red hair, pointy nose} is with Kurt on a work trip.

Ferb {green hair, long head} is hanging out at home with us.

Adventures of Phineas & Ferb - Day 2

School

Snack Time

Waiting for a train

Phineas is with Kurt on a work trip in Europe.

Ferb, Candace, & Perry are with us at home.

Adventures of Phineas & Ferb - Day 1

Waiting in airport

Having dinner

Having dinner

Swim Lessons

Bedtime

Phineas is with Kurt on a work trip.
Ferb, Candance, & Perry are hanging out with us.

'Tis the Halloween season

I dug around the basement and pulled out our boxes of costumes.  I'd like to say we are a dressing up kind of family, but really its only the kids that love to dress up ALL. THE. TIME.

 And costumes also come in handy for other imaginative play. 

 Or why bother with clothes at all? Even though its been rainy and snowy and chilly all week, Olivia & Jolie have been running around in their swimsuits. 

Olivia Updates

This week Olivia had an MRI to check on the glioma in her brain and a follow up visit with Dr. Viskochil. The MRI shows that the gliomas on her optic nerves and in her brain are all stable, and there are no new findings.  HURRAH! It also looks like her MRIs will be every 6 months, instead of every 3 months - a little bit of a graduation.  HURRAH! HURRAH!

The only other concern I've had with Olivia is she seems to get tired quickly or want to be done when we are doing activities (swimming, biking, playing outside, hiking, etc.) and we discussed a couple reasons why - Kids with NF1 tend to have shorter attention spans and grow bored quickly. Kids with NF1 tend to have less coordination and weaker muscle tone, requiring more energy to do activities, so they are tired quicker. But there isn't really an easy, measurable answer so its another thing we get to watch and wonder about. 

Other updates about Olivia -

Over the summer Olivia had her speech assessed and we found she could use some help (those darn L's, R's, and blends), so she's been attending 3 or 4 times a month, and her speech is improving.

The speech therapist was also concerned about Olivia's voice quality - she has a gravelly, monotone voice - and we had to get her throat checked out for anything possibly growing on or hurting the vocal chords.  She saw an ENT through Primary Children's, had a *lovely* exam with a spray anesthetic and an endoscope down her nose while she had to say a variety of sounds and words. Can I tell you how awesome and amazing she was? No tears or crying or howling like some other kids did while we were waiting for her turn. She just did it. There were no findings on her vocal chord, but she does have a weak palate muscle which is common with NF1 kids (weak muscle tone again) and is a contributing cause to her speech problems. Which is good news because we are currently appealing our insurance's denial of coverage for her speech therapy- they are saying it needs to be for an injury or illness, and we are saying Duh! (in a much nicer and medical-letter supported way of course). 

Thank you to everyone who loves and cares for Olivia. We would be lost without the wonderful support of our family and friends, and especially without the love, blessings, and guidance from our Father in Heaven!

Salt Lake NF Walk 2011

The BIG day finally arrived!!! I was so excited I could hardly sleep the night before!

With some other NF Moms - Kelly, Andrea, & Me :)

Lots of activities for everyone - breakfast, face painting, princesses, fire trucks! Oh my!

Family!!! Unfortunately, I didn't get pictures of everyone who came, but here is most everyone :)

Time to Walk!

All of my girls were thrilled to meet the Disney princess' who came to support the walk.

We were so fortunate to have Maurice Simpson as one of the NF Heroes who spoke.  His message of "Everyone is Special" is still circulating around our house.  The woman in the background is Kelly Mills, the Children's Tumor Foundation respresentative. 

The fire trucks were also a big hit!!

Afterward everyone came back to our house for food and fun!

It was a beautiful day! I knew we were in the right place and doing good things.  Can't wait for next year!!

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!  Olivia's Team was the top fundraising team thanks to everyone's kindness and generosity. Altogether we raised $3,650 - septupling (is that right?) our original goal of $500. We also surpassed our goal of 20 team members, and had 24 walking for Olivia's Team.  Everyone's love and support has been amazing and we are so grateful for this wonderful experience. 

THANK YOU!

Asa & Paula Laws

Beth Hicks

Brad & Katie Laws, Ruth & Will

Brent & Amelia Duke

Brian Laws, Ben

Erik Richards

Hart Laws

Joshua Fouse

Justin & Jesse Betts, Jude

Karilyn Morrison-Bearup

Ken Thurston – Feel Good Foundation

Keshia Laws

Kyle Morrison

Nate & Kristin Nevins, Joey & Daniel

Nathan & Elaine

Raymond Scott

Rhea Laws

Scott Rogers

Val & Brenda Laws

Yote, LLC

Zlotnick, Laws & Sandoval, P.C.

And everyone else who has supported Olivia’s Team!