We had another great fourth of July weekend in Laguna with family and friends. Unfortunately Brittney & the gang as well as my brother and Kim were unable to make it this year. Although it was a quieter year and a quicker turn-around for us due to Blaine’s work, we still had a blast while there and made more great memories with the kids. We took them to baby beach on Friday and then Salt Creek on Saturday for the 4th. Two awesome beach days with some adorable little beach babes!
Jed really enjoyed the beach this year. Last year he was just a baby and only crawling. This year he was running and digging in the sand, splashing in the water and trying to keep up with Sissy and GG! You’ll notice his hat is on backwards in most of the pictures. That’s just how he rolls now. In addition to being obsessed with shoes, he has a new love of hats worn gangsta style!
The Friday before last, we took this little guy to Phoenix for a routine check up with his cardiologist. While we are doing our best to stay positive, Blaine and I left this time around feeling a little down. I will start with the good news. About a month ago, we received a letter stating that Dr. Stock, Jed’s cardiologist was leaving Phoenix Children’s. We were totally crushed with this news, as we absolutely love Jed’s doctor and have so much faith and confidence in him. After meeting with him at this past appointment, we learned that he is not retiring or leaving Arizona, but will be opening his own practice in the Phoenix area. This was a huge relief for us! The other good stuff is that Jed’s oxygen stats remain in the high 90’s and is overall growth and appearance look great! The not so good news is that the reading from his echo tell a different story. In non-medical terms, his heart is working much harder than it should to compensate for his continuous growth. It’s at a point where another ballooning of the pulmonary valve should happen. Dr. Stock wants to see him back in November and reassess after another echo. We will be hoping and praying things turn for the better on their own. If not, it looks like Jed may be having another ballooning before the end of the year.
Every time we go to these appointments, it’s such a slap-in-the face reminder to Blaine and I to let go of all the little things and to enjoy every moment that God gives us. It’s amazing how quickly we forget to do just that and get hung up on negative thoughts and insignificant daily stresses. Deep down, we know this journey isn’t over for Jed, but I think that we’ve both been a little too hopeful, believing that he was done and wouldn’t need anymore intervention for a long long time. Having to hear Dr. Stock revisit another ballooning so soon and discuss possible open-heart surgery down the road were not words we wanted to hear. Nevertheless, this is the path God has chosen for our little man and we know He is watching over him always. Our blue eyed dimpled smile bundle of joy is a constant reminder of how precious life is and how lucky we are.
On the evening of the fourth, the Andersons had us over for such a fun an delicious clam bake! Although I do enjoy some fish, I get a little squealy when it comes seafood that’s still in the shell! Well, I was pleasantly surprised and not only found myself enjoying it (dipped in gobs of butter!), but I was super impressed with how many clams and mussels the kids devoured!
Poor baby had a major booboo at the party, doing a face plant into some broken glass. We felt like horrible parents, being that our little grown up, Grayson had warned us all not once, but a few times that Jed was carrying around a glass. Of course he ended up dropping that glass before any of us got to him and sliced the lid of his eye pretty good and is still black and blue today. We are just SO grateful, as it definitely could have been a much scarier scenario. Here’s our little boxer wolfing down some homemade peach cobbler after his accident!
On Sunday, Blaine took Grayson out for a boys fishing day on the pier. Blaine either has amazing luck or expert fishing skills or maybe a little of both, because they managed to catch a handful of fish in just a few hours!
Colbie and I stayed back an had a fun and eventful girls day. We headed to the mall, got some hot chocolate, hit up the candy shack and the Disney Store and then I surprised her at Claire’s with REAL earrings! She’s been wanting her ears pierced for sometime now, so I thought, why not today?! Well, I should have thought that through a little more and waited for the assistant so that she could have had both ears pierced at the same time. I thought, “Colbie’s tough,” she was super excited when I told her & I had no idea she would cry and get herself so worked up the way she did after the first piercing. We were seriously moments away from leaving with one ear pierced. Thanks to a ton of patience from “Miss Erica” and over an hour of walking around and convincing Colbie to go through with it, we finally got the other ear done! Of course she didn’t cry at all after the second piercing and her mood immediately changed from fear to ecstatic! She loves them and wants to show everyone her new permanent fashion accessory! I will post pictures soon. Unfortunately, since returning to Yuma Sunday, my phone broke and I lost tons of pictures and videos. So glad I took my other camera this trip, so at least I had some pictures from the fourth.
We’ve also adopted another family member! Meet Brutus! He’s just a small little six year, 75 pound African Sulcata tortoise! Yep, he will most likely outlive all of us and over double in size! What the hell were we thinking?! Well, in addition to learning that his previous owners were moments away from turning him into “turtle soup,” we learned that 75% of his diet is grass (which we have a lot of) so we figured he should be a relatively low maintenance pet. Ha ha! That’s what they told us before we realized we had to build him a six foot deep, five by five foot wide brick sealed “bunker!” I’m so bummed I lost all the pictures of the building process & the finished underground castle we built for Mr. Brutus. The kids are loving their new pet and so far, he seems to enjoy his new home and gets along great with the rest of the funny farm!
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