another stretch and picts!

Today Claire had her procedure to stretch her bile duct. Nothing like jumping right back into the swing of things! She did great today. She is feeling pretty good about her 'mask' performance too. I am so impressed with her. The past two times she's gone under, she goes crazy right when I carry her into the room. Kicks and screams!! And then right when I sit her down on my lap with her baby and blanket in arms, she folds her arms across her chest, (says a little prayer...or at least that's what I imagine she's doing!) holds completely still and breathes in the sleepy gas from the mask. It really is quite amazing. It takes a lot of courage and self control from a child to pull something like that off. She's quite proud of her mastery, as she well should be! Very first thing she said to me after waking up was, "I did a good job with the mask, didn't I momma?!" YES you did. And YES you can get a purple ballon for your amazing accomplishment.

So back to the procedure....things went well. The doctor says he thinks are kind of at a plateau. The bile duct has looked pretty much the same the last few times he's done it and he doesn't think it's going to get any better (or worse) than it is now. So now it's just a matter of making the decision to pull the tube and see how she rolls. If she gets sick in any shape or form after it's pulled, we'll know it didn't work and another tube will go in....most likely followed by a not-so-favorable surgical revision. If she stays well after it's pulled, we will smile and go swimming!!

August will most likely be the month they will pull the tube and see how it holds up on it's own. She'll have another stretching procedure the end of June. Until then, we'll just keep on keepin' on! One of the last things my Grandma said to me was "you hang in there. you just hang in there." And that's pretty much what we do around here....I must have got that quality from her.

I don't always get everything done in one day that needs to be done. But on most days, I do fulfill the things that matter most. Playing with my kids are among those things that matter most....and today we made a Curling course. We made a large triangle with three different point sections in it on the ground out of masking tape. Then we made 2 different colored disks (out of bottle tops/lids), 3 per person plus one bonus disk that doubled your points, to glide towards the triangle. With a poster score board taped to the wall to keep track of our points, we slid our disks towards the triangle, knocked each other's disk with a bump from our own, and even did a little math as we added up our points. It was one of those times we simply enjoyed being together, doing something random, homemade, and enjoyable for all! I love moments like that.

Here's a glimpse of some of the fun moments we had in St. George, Utah. Many moments were filled with reflection, love, and fond memories of my dear Grandma...but being together as a family lifted all our spirits and reminded us all that there is much LIFE surrounding us and many days of enjoyment yet to be had!

The day before she was called back to her heavenly home. How blessed we were to be there to experience her life and her death. She's smiling, even though she was too tired to keep her eyes open.

Skipping rocks while trying to keep Mabel from walking right into the water! Good luck skipping that honker, Benson!!

Playing with cousins.

Enjoying a little water on one of the many hot HOT days in St. George!! Mabel loved every second of wetness, Benson loved getting Grandpa wet, and Claire was allowed to walk and only get her feet and calves wet. Another test of 4-year old self control that she passed with flying colors.

{pay back time!}

Mini golfing. (Jared and I got to go golfing with family THREE times while we were out there! A dream come true!!)

Climbing in the beautiful red rock of Snow Canyon. The kids could have spend hours running up and down the rolling mountains.

So great. Eleven days I'm blessed to have memories of.