A Reminder of Finiteness

The morning of February 14, after KK finished his work out exercises, he felt a sharp pain in his mid right side. He thought it was just a pulled muscle. As the day progressed, his pain level increased to the point where he was walking all stooped over. We were very worried about him! As I mentioned in previous posts, he's been sick a lot, so when this happened, our concern deepened.

We tried to convince him that he needed to go to the doctor, but he was adamant that he was ok, it was just a pulled muscle. Stubborn just like my grandpa was.😁

That night, he slept on the couch because it hurt too much to lay down. Mom slept downstairs with him so that she could keep an eye on him. About 5 am, she was awaked by the sounds of moaning and labored breathing. She knew immediately that something was seriously wrong. After talking to KK, he agreed that he needed to go in. He was having trouble breathing and the pain had increased significantly. Mom woke Dad up and they hurried KK to the ER.

After performing multiple tests on him, the doctors discovered that he had two blood clots- one in each lung- hence the difficulty in breathing. They immediately administered a blood thinner to start breaking the clots down.

He stayed all day and overnight in the hospital, so that they could monitor him to make sure everything was ok. Thankfully, he was able to come home the next morning, February 16. We were so glad to have our KK back!

Early morning, waiting for results.

Poor guy had multiple IVs! But, it isn't fair, he didn't bruise at all! I bruise terribly when I get shots or IVs.

Mom texted and told us he was getting into his hospital clothes... I'm sure all of you know about the infamous hospital gowns... We were texting things like "Don't turn around!" and similar comments. 😂 So, Mom sent us a picture of his back. Yes, thankfully they gave him decent clothes!

Poor Sam was so worried, he worked himself up into one of his sick spells. 😕He was sick for several days, but as you can see, he still had fun.

Abi and I went to see Mom and KK and to take them some clothes, etc. It was nice to see him and kinda reassure ourselves that he really was ok. 😊

Abi has been feeding the chickens a mash of sorts. The night KK was in the hospital, she accidentally dropped the bucket of mash...

I'm happy to say, Caleb is well on the road to recovery. He just had a follow up appointment this week where they learned that he'd had not only two, but four blood clots- two in each lung! The doctor told him that he is very fortunate to be alive.

The doctors surmised that the clots developed in his legs, then broke loose and travelled to his lungs. They probably formed during the long drive to and from Texas.

We still don't know exactly what caused the clots. The doctors are testing him for a blood disorder that runs in our family. It's called Factor V. They are almost certain that he does have it. I don't really understand how it works, so you can read about it here. Eventually, all of us need to be tested for it as there is a large chance that we might have it.

Thank you to all of our friends and family for praying for Caleb and all of us! We could feel your prayers. Most of us had an overwhelming sense of peace through it all. Praise the Lord! 

It was still a shock to us as young people, even though we had peace. We tend to get stuck in a rut of permanence. This event really shook our world of permanence, which I am thankful for! Life doesn't go on forever. We all will die someday. Are you ready to die?

A Month of Goodbyes...

Lois Ann Chupp left this month for maid work in Mozambique. She is helping a missionary family there with household chores and babysitting. They are trying to learn the language better, but are getting wore down trying to study language and take care of things at home. 

We had several goodbye parties for her this month. Some were fun, others were a little sad. 😥

Joseph is becoming quite the little personality! He's hilarious!

Mabel planned a going away party for Lois. She had a daffy meal and a mystery meal planned. That sure was interesting! These are all of our daffy meal dishes.

We weren't allowed in the kitchen. Period.

You use just whatever crazy kind of dishes you can think of for a daffy meal. These were mine.

Abi's

Unfortunately, Mabel made us switch eatery sets, so we couldn't even use what we'd brought. 😟 I was really looking forward to using my own stuff, but whatever, that's ok. Jason got Meredith's dishes. His fork was a broken fly swatter handle.

Sam got Grace's dishes, which included chopsticks.

Taylor got my dishes.

I got Taylor's dishes which were, a microwave plate, ice cream scoop, screw driver, a very sharp bread knife and a cream pitcher. The knife was the easiest thing to eat off of, but I had to eat very gingerly. 😜

Mabel did the mystery meal in Portuguese, the native language of Mozambique.

Grace got Sam's dishes, which included a sippy cup for her drinking glass. 😂

Jen got Josh's dishes- a disk golf, skid steer light cover, trim coil spoon, and his huge skinning knife.

 After supper, we had to find our own dishes and wash them.

They numbered us off into four groups to do skits. Each group received a bag with items in it that they had to use in a skit. It was so fun!

Our group were the Robinson cousins who were on a vacation to Canada but got lost in Alaska. Our family tree didn't have many branches. 😂

This group did traveling salesmen.

Sadly, I don't have a picture of this group in action. They did a doctor skit.

The last group did a surprise birthday party.

T.J. had his birthday this month. We sang "Happy Birthday" to him, but then realized we'd forgot to light the candles on his cake! So, we had to sing it again, this time all off key and horrible. After he blew his candles out, we told him to make a wish. He said, "I wish they wouldn't sing to me again." As you know, if you tell your wish it never comes true. So, we had to sing to him again.

The tail end of our last "Happy Birthday."

A week before Lois left, we girls had a sleep over in the church's apartment. We brought these tea lights up from the church so that we could have a pretty, ambient atmosphere. As you can see, they ended up not being so ambient. Grace just couldn't keep her lights in her eyes.

I couldn't put anymore pictures on after these because we all got in our pajamas. 😉

A breakfast of scrambled eggs and Pillsbury cinnamon rolls... Yum!

I heartily agree!

These two are such cuties!

Doughy was telling me about a mouse and an elephant. Like I said above, he's developing quite the little personality.

I made a candy board for Lois Ann as a going away gift.

The granary office that we clean is always extremely filthy.

We had a very special last Sister's Meeting with Lois. Abi and I were gone pretty much all day cleaning and stuff and while we were gone, Mom got up this lovely feast!

Our mail went kooky awhile back... It said we had over 10,000 unread emails. It kept counting up and up, then it would go down. I messed around with it for quite awhile. Somehow I ended up fixing it. I don't know what I did.

The Smith's came for Alaina's birthday party last Saturday. Some of them came Friday night, so we thought, what better idea than to take them to Sweet Joy's Saturday morning!

Alaina's cake

I can't believe she's one already!

Somebody put this cute party hat on her.

Kels made a supper fit for a king!

Little Laina girl had no idea what to do with all the presents!

This is a still from the video I took of us singing for her. Sorry it's so dark.

She made short work of her cupcake!

They were trying to get the balloons up in the fan.

Alaina's coat is still too big for her. 😊

Katelyn's imagination is something else!

We went to the airport to see Lois off Monday afternoon. It was sad to say goodbye. We'll miss you, Loui!

After the airport, we went to visit an elderly friend who is at an assisted living place. By the time we left there it was about 2;30. Gram had two Panera Bread gift cards so... we consoled ourselves with hot drinks and food. 😉 I got their kid's mac 'n' cheese, a cinnamon crunch scone and a chai latte. Wow! It was yummy!

Abi's cow Talitha went to cow heaven this Tuesday. 😔 It was a sad day for Abi.