I am happy to report that the link to subscribe by email worked.  My notification came a day after I updated but hey....it worked!  If you want to subscribe to my ramblings, scroll clear down to the bottom of the page and input your email address.  Maybe I will get the hang of this after all...

We are coming off of one crazy week.  Needless to say, I am happy a new week has started and hopefully it will be less stressful and adventuresome.  Last week's chaos was caused by our "healthy" kids.  I guess I take their good health for granted and God just needed to remind me that they are fragile sometimes too.  Delaney has been having some shortness of breath and hard time breathing in.   Last week she had a chest CT scan looking for a pulmonary embolism which a blood test came back positive for.  Praise God the CT scan showed no clot.  Doctor said sometimes that test comes back with "false positives"...  Talk about scary!  She had an echocardiogram and a pulmonary function test  on Friday which we will hopefully get the results from today.  Then, Wednesday night at football practice, Mason took quite a shot to the side of his head and ended up with a mild concussion.  He sat out of football and PE the rest of last week and was hoping to head back today but, failed his jumping jack test the doctor made him do.  So now he gets to sit out a couple more days at least.  Hopefully he will bounce back quickly and be good as new.  That is some scary stuff seeing your kid forgetful and dizzy.  Needless to say, we don't want to see another one of those happen.  Mama Bear would have a hard time letting him play again.  And to top off our crappy week, the Cyclones lost to the Hawkeyes....

The girlies had a couple of exciting adventures last week.  Now that they are at the Jr. High, they get to participate in the Special Olympics!  They will be in the bowling competition in October so this past week they were able to get out of school two days to go bowling for practice.  Talk about lucky ducks!  They had a great time and did really well.  Lauren did get a little overstimulated both days and had a seizure shortly after arriving but, being the true Rock Star she is...she recovered quickly and bowled the rest of her games.  Lindsey bowled for her while she was recovering and thought that was pretty awesome to be able to bowl double time.  Then yesterday, their dance classes started for the fall.  The girls are in a program called "Dance Without Limits" through the Des Moines Ballet.  It is specifically for children with special needs and we are so thankful we learned about it last spring.  Talk about a tear jerking experience....to see those kids out there dancing and having such a good time is priceless!  I don't think there was a dry eye in the place at their recital last spring. 

Now getting to have the bowling and dance experiences last week really opened my eyes to see the awesome people out there who work with kids with special needs.  The aides that accompanied the kids to the bowling alley were caring for their school kids like their own and cheering for them when they bowled....even if they got a gutter ball.  Some of the kids are severely profound and can do nothing to care for themselves.  To see the excitement the kids had to be there bowling and to see how excited the aides were for them just really warmed my heart.  It makes me realize that when I think our lives are impacted greatly with the girls' disability, there are others who are facing even greater challenges and really, we don't have it that bad.  I need that reminder sometimes.  Bless the aides who spend their days caring for these kids while they are away at school.  Now at dance class, it is a group of teenagers/young adults who volunteer their time to help teach the kids how to dance.  These girls are students who have dance classes numerous times a week for themselves, go to school full time and still take time out of their busy schedules to work with our girls and others like them.  They do it because they want to, not because they have to.  Now I think that is just awesome and it is so cool to watch them interact with the kids.  They always have a smile on their faces and they genuinely want to be there helping them learn to dance.  Their parents should be so proud. 

So even though it was a stinker of a week, I am thankful for God's protection over my children.  My learning experience was again to be reminded to never take anything for granted; especially the health of my children.    And, that He put some really special people in this world to help care for some really awesome kids.  Lastly, even though the Cyclones didn't beat the Hawkeyes....there's always next year to look forward to.