2011 has been a crazy year for us lots of ups and downs, but lately mostly ups thank goodness. As you all know my sister had a lot of complications from a liver transplant in October of 2010. So the first part of this year was spent up at the hospital.
JANUARY....
This month started out good we took a trip to Disneyland and had a blast. So much that we are going again next month. But the week we got home we noticed a lump on Sophie's face we were scared to death. So they ran every test possible and were stumped. We finally ended up at Primary's for an MRI and other blood work when they decided that she had an infection in her saliva glands. So we were in the hospital for 3 days on IV antibiotics. So we had a neighbor up at the hospital cause my sister Abby was still up at the U with more complications so that is how January ended for us.
FEBRUARY....
This month was ok for us still up at the hospital a lot and still trying to figure out Sophie's infection cause the lump was getting bigger. We celebrated my Birthday as well as Sophie's, Abby was actually out of the hospital long enough to be home for Sophie's birthday but ended up back in again... We still managed to have fun and do a lot as a family.
MARCH...
So this was an exciting month for us Sophie's ENT doc decided that the infection was spreading so her saliva glands needed to come out. The last thing you want as a parent is to have a young child have to go through surgery. We want to protect our kids from all the pain in the world but sometimes it is out of our hands. So March 6th she had the surgery, we were very nervous for it because of where the infection was in her face was right by her facial nerve. We were informed by the doctor that he would do everything possible to avoid damaging the nerve but that there was a chance half of her face could be paralyzed. She was in surgery for a little over 5 hours (longest 5 hours of my life.) She did well and they were able to get all the infection out but had to take all of her saliva glands out on one side of her face and part of her skin. She is really sensitive to narcotics so they had a hard time waking her up. But once she finally woke up she demanded her ice cream that we had promised her. She was in the hospital for 4 days. But I think she loved the attention. They found out that the infection was atypical tuberculosis. So weird we don't know where on earth she got it. But it isn't contagious person to person when it is the type she had. But she has been healthy ever since. The scar healed well they had to cut around her whole ear and then down her jawline to her chin so it was pretty nasty at first. But you can hardly tell now, she does have a little bit of a crooked smile now but she is still beautiful as ever!
APRIL....
This was a pretty good month for the most part Abby came home then ended back at the hospital for a blood clot and CMV. But came home right before her Birthday and has been home ever since!!
MAY...
We had some more excitement this month! We woke up one morning to water everywhere in our front room and in our Kitchen. Our water line going to our fridge broke and went under the wall and soaked the carpet in our front room. Soaked our hardwood floors in the kitchen and dripped into our basement. We had Utah flood and fire come and start the drying process. It was a loud and obnoxious couple of days. But we had a silver lining in all of this. because our carpet can be seen from the downstairs living room the upstairs front room and the stairs and hallways we got new carpet throughout our house (except the bedrooms.) We got Beautiful new hardwood floors in the kitchen. That was all covered by home owners insurance. Then why we were at it we had our cabinets painted black so we had a brand new home it felt like anyway.
JUNE...
Ethan finished Kindergarten and had a great year of school he learned to read and write and he loved every moment of it! He had a great teacher and made some great friends. We spent June swimming and enjoying life.
JULY...
We spent a week in Park City with my family which was a lot of fun. We swam a lot and went to Lagoon. And we also celebrated Ethan's birthday up there as well. It was nice to just have a fun filled week and we stayed pretty busy. Lots of laughter and fun was had by all. The end of July I had surgery to fix my Carpal Tunnel. It was more painful than I imagined but I healed quickly.
AUGUST...
I was able to go to Josh Groban concert with my mom and sisters which was a blast we even stayed down town at a hotel, it was a nice getaway. We shed some tears at the concert mostly because that music is so powerful and we listened to a lot of it while Abby was in the hospital so it brought back a flood of emotions. While I was at the concert Ethan fell off his bike, the next day when I got home I noticed he was limping. After a few days of him still limping we took him to the doctor and found out he broke his foot. So he got to start school with a big old boot/cast. He has such a good attitude about life that he just went with it and wore that boot with pride.
SEPTEMBER...
This was an exciting month for us because Abby got engaged to such a great guy. We are excited that he will be in our family!
OCTOBER...
We had a fun October, we were able to spend a weekend in Moab with some of Shaun's family and it was so much fun. We made a lot of memories and had a really good time!
NOVEMBER...
We had a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving! Shaun's real estate business is going very well. He is now listing homes for HUD and stays very busy. Our family is pretty healthy now and we have a roof over our heads and lots of love to share. Shaun started taking Ethan skiing and they have had a blast! He is a natural that kid and is loving every moment of it.
DECEMBER...
Ethan and Shaun have been Skiing every weekend and it has been great for them. Real estate is usually slow in December but hasn't been for Shaun which is a great blessing. Ethan fell at school and had to get stitches but he is a strong boy so it didn't seem to bug him all that much. We have great kids and a great family. We have so many blessings right now, we may not be rich and we may not live in paradise or have fancy cars. But we have each other and we do what we love and we are surrounded by wonderful people who love us. So that is all we need. We hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I know we are hoping that 2012 will be filled with more ups and less downs. But if weren't for the downs we wouldn't appreciate the ups as much!
