I'm probably getting robbed right now

Is anyone else buying their child a Stretchkin this year like this crazy mother is? I didn't think so. This is literally the first year Ava has ever really wanted one specific thing for Christmas so being what I thought was the sensible mother that I was, I thought, what the heck? Let me get her one.

Oh Lord - what have I done.

The website alone is full of so many colors and an energetic video that I was already thinking "what am I doing?" Then to order one, you just blindly fill in all of your personal info and hit NEXT. I might as well of scanned my thumbprint and given them my pin number. So the next page you enter your payment info and it sort of seemed secure but who knows? My bank account may already be drained. Of course there is a cost for shipping - fine. BUT rather than take you to another screen to review your order, it simply says "THANK YOU FOR YOUR PURCHASE - YOU SHOULD GET YOUR ITEM IN 2-4 WEEKS." What the heck?! 2-4 weeks?! Why wasn't that helpful info offered on the first tab?! So after a few more tabs, it then asks me if I would like to adjust my shipping to rush the delivery so I feel a little redeemed thinking it will be here in time for Christmas. I figure well why not? - I've already come this far on this unsecure website - let me see what the cost for a rush delivery will be. Well well well - once you hit NEXT it says "THANKS! YOUR ORDER HAS BEEN CHANGED AND PROCESSED!" Well, where the heck was the warning price on what the rush delivery will be?! So now I am an official idiot who paid way too much for a crazy toy that will probably cause strife and frustration in the home on Christmas Day. Just great.

So I have already taken a vow! Never again will I hunt down some ridiculous toy! And my other vow is that we will all use this toy even if we hate it! We will all pretend we love it. It will be packed on trips we take. I'm sure it will make it's way to Disneyland at some point and we will pose it in a picture with a turkey leg. We will all love it to pieces.

Ugh, so don't go buying one - just wait until next year and if your child would like a unicorn stretchkin you can buy it from me!

And yes, I am now returning back from this fog of a purchase to remind myself why we have Christmas in the first place. And it's not to hunt down toys on the internet. I have officially learned my lesson!

-Emily

I Feel Like a Stuffed Turkey

So besides being up at 5am this morning because I no longer am able to sleep, I also feel like a big overstuffed turkey just waddling around. This pregnancy has made me feel bigger than my first and what's scary is that I still have about 15 weeks to go - so I'm only going to keep getting bigger. That's sort of scary!!

But it is Thanksgiving! So I am thankful that I am housing a growing baby for a few more months even though I will be a sight to see with a huge gut leading the way. And I am thankful that my house is warm right now (although some might say it's still cold as we don't set our thermostat for 70 - it is set for a  few degrees below this). And I have a family who loves each other. And that Tony is such a good dad to Ava and his son already.

Fun story - on Sunday we had a sort of mini thanksgiving lunch after church at home. And Tony was showing Ava the wishbone and explained to her the whole wish thing and whoever gets the bigger piece when it breaks, yada yada yada. So it breaks. And Ava gets the small piece. And just when it looks like she might cry, Tony says "Do you want to know what I wished for?" So she says yes and he says, "I wished that your wish would come true." And boy, did she just light up and smile. What a wonderful daddy who just saved the day and made her day! So Ava was BEAMING and smiles at us and says "Oh good because I wished to be a fairy!" Oh jeez - didn't see that coming. So even though Ava won't turn into a fairy ever, Tony gave her a great moment.

But the 1 thing I am most thankful for (if I had to pick just one) is that "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved." - John 3:16-17. Isn't that remarkable? That God SO LOVED the world - SO LOVED. Not just cared for or like the world, but SO LOVED. And when I think of all the rotten things I have done in my life, I am THANKFUL. And grateful. And humbled. And ashamed even. Because I have done and continue to do rotten things. But He did it anyway, even knowing all this. So I am thankful.

Now that I have a child, I could never in my whole life imagine sending my one child as a ransom for the sins of the world. My sinful self sees other sinful people and I think, "No way would I give my one child away to die for so and so." Especially then if no one cares about the sacrifice later and forgets all about. Or says it really didn't happen - NO WAY would I give my child up to do this when so many people would reject it or ignore it. But God is not me. And God SO LOVED the world that He gave His only begotten Son . . . wow. That is the best thing ever. And that has to be the number one thing I am thankful for - how could it not?

Everyone please have a wonderful thanksgiving! And give thanks for the Lord is good. And I am so excited that my family is here and we are already enjoying the next few days together. And I will get to see a friend tomorrow who I haven't seen in years! Literally - years! Wow - what a wonderful Thanksgiving :)

"Oh come, let us sing to the Lord! Let us shout joyfully to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before His presence with thanksgiving; Let us shout joyfully to Him with psalms." Psalm 95:1-2

-Emily

Drugs or no drugs?

The cold weather is upon us and I am bracing for Ava to, once again, have her asthma start flaring up. Every year around this time she starts coughing - she will sometimes throw up from coughing so hard, sounds like it is difficult for her to breathe and of course all of this happens at night so I don't tend to get much sleep because I'm just waitng to hear her cough and need help.

Every year around this time I start her on her Singulair, QVAR, and albueterol to try and prevent it from getting worse. Every year, even though she uses these meds, it gets worse - she has coughing attacks, we end up going to the doctor, and she usually starts to run a temp because she gets an infection, or she gets strep throat. And every year I tell her doctor, "I don't really see that the medications help her that much when she's coughing." To which he smiles at me and says, "well she would be much worse if you didn't give them to her."

Last year, she was having such a bad time coughing and breathing, I put her in the car to drive to the emergency room. When we went back to the doctor, I again told him the meds weren't working well and he told me to keep using them. I also notice the meds make her more moody and irriated - she's typically a very happy girl.

So now we are in THIS YEAR. And it is my first time using my oils on her for her asthma. Two nights ago, she started coughing - the kind of coughing where I would normally grab her inhalers, give her some honey, and if it still didn't work, I've put her in a steamy shower to help open her up and pray like you wouldn't believe. Well, I just bought a bottle of oil called RC which is a blend of a few oils including eucalyptus, pine, marjoram, lavendar, and peppermint. I dilute two drops in my hand with about 4 drops of grapeseed oil and rub it on her chest and back. Two nights ago, when she started coughing, I put some in my diffuser in her room and I kid you not - within 7 minutes she was done coughing. All night I kept waiting for it to start up again (because it ALWAYS starts up again). And it didn't. She slept like a log until 7am. I put some more on her chest in the morrning along with some thieves oil on her feet and sent her off to school. So I was quite impressed and I'm hoping it continues to work as well for the rest of this fun asthma season.

The bottle of RC was $22. A jar of grapeseed oil is maybe $5. Ava's Singulair costs me $147 for 30 5mg tablets. Her QVAR is around $45 and her albuterol I think is $15. So $22 plus a jar of grapeseed oil? I will keep using it. Because so far, it has worked far better than those meds. And I'm actually crying as I'm writing this because so many times in the past few years, we have struggled to buy these meds. And when a doctor tells you to get them because they will help, I bought them. And sometimes I could only buy one or two of them because I couldn't afford all of them and I would cry because I felt like a terrible mom who couldn't provide something her child needed. I always asked for samples at the doctor and sometimes they would have some to give me. I spoke with the doctor about the cost of the pills and they gave me numbers to places that maybe could help me. But they couldn't because it was based on income. So Tony and I would feel stuck because we didn't qualify for anything low-income but it's not that we made so much money that I could just go buy any prescription Ava needed. I was finally successful with one of the meds when I sent a form to Merck and they sent me a years worth of Singulair for free last year so that helped quite a bit with the cost.

So again, I praise the Lord for helping us and I'm hopeful these oils will continue to work well. Because the meds sure didn't impress me with their effectiveness for Ava in the 3 years we've used them. And the preventative meds she had, I made sure we followed how they were supposed to be used but she would still have horrible coughing attacks, strained breathing, etc. Maybe some people have had great results with the meds - I'm glad for you. And I will continue to monitor Ava to see how these oils work this season. But so far, so good. And at the end of this cold season, I will report my findings!

-Emily

The Boy

So as many of you know, we are having a boy (Tony actually did a sort of reflex fist pump during the ultrasound - I say it was a reflex because he has said, "It just happend - I didn't even mean to do it"). He was also very excited when we found out we were having a girl with our first pregnancy so don't go thinking we prefer one gender over the other - does not matter to us in the slightest. The Lord will give us what we need to be given.

I felt we really tried to prepare Ava that the baby "will either be a boy or a girl - we don't get to pick." Anytime she would say "maybe it will be a girl," I always replied with "we don't know, we can't pick, it may be a boy, God will give us what we are supposed to have," etc. So when the day came where Ava heard It's a Boy! from the lovely ultrasound technician, she responded with "he can sleep in the office." So, I'm thinking she was really hoping for a sister. Her face just said it all - she was not planning for a brother.

I think I sort of get her hesitancy. I didn't grow up with brothers and I don't know much about males other than what I've observed from people around me and from what I know from Tony. I know about girls - I am a girl so that's my specialty. But, never fear! We have an expert in our home to help! Tony is a male! So this is actually perfect and takes so much pressure off me to know how to teach someone "guy" things. Now, in all seriousness, I love that God made man and woman. What a perfect design. When I think of Tony, I love that he is strong, protective, masculine, chivalrous, etc. It just warms my heart and brings me comfort knowing he protects our family and just loves us. He brings so much to our home that I can't bring simply because I'm a girl and we're different. I am really looking forward to having a son and to raise him with Tony to be a good man who loves the Lord. Wow - what a big responsibility having children is?! All of the things you have to think of - so much responsibility! But the Lord is guiding us and as long as we stay focused on Him, we will be on the right path.

Now, Ava is getting more excited every day and warming up to the idea of a brother. She took all of the ultrasound pictures and taped them on the wall in our dining room. She has now felt her brother kicking which she laughed and smiled and thought was just great. She has even seen some toys that she thinks he would like and has said, "maybe we can get that for the boy." THE BOY - so that is apparently what she is calling him now. She does give my belly a hug everyday and say, "I'm giving the baby a hug" so she is coming around. We have talked about what we will need to teach him and she lit right up and had a ton of ideas.

I can't wait for Ava to meet her brother. Other than Tony and the staff who will be there deliving the baby, Ava will be the first one to see him in our family. It only seems right for us to do it this way. Our little family. I love having a family.

Ava will love him - and he will love her. And Tony and I love them so much it just fills my heart and sometimes I get tears in my eyes. What wonderful gifts we have been given to cherish and love and teach (among many other things). I pray for them everyday.

"Only love can be divided endlessly, and still not diminish." - Anne Morrow Lindbergh

-Emily

Witch Doctor

Okay, so I'm feeling like sort of a witch doctor but I use that term very loosely because I really don't know what a witch doctor is and it doesn't sound like it would coincide well with my Christian beliefs. So maybe that's the wrong word. And I'm too lazy to look it up. But let's not get crazy about it - just know that I'm now into using essential oils.

I learned about them from a long-time friend (thanks Ash!) and after my daughter got sick with bacterial pneumonia this year, I figured, let me try it. I had heard about an oil called thieves that helps with sickness or you could use it to clean with, as well as a bunch of other oils so I thought, why not? Well, let me just say - I am loving all of the oils I have so far and I am putting them on people around me and diffusing it in our home. I feel sort of like a crazy lady and people may think I have jumped off the deep end but have no fear - I think I am still mostly sane.

So I gave my mom a bottle of an oil called Valor, which is a blend of some oils (I don't remember which) and told her to rub a drop under each big toe and behind each ear so that she wouldn't snore at night. She laughed at me, I laughed too, and that's when that witch doctor song popped into my head. But I said "just try it - the whole neighborhood hears you snoring at night (we do - I live around the corner from her)so what's it gonna hurt?" Well, she didn't snore for a week which had everyone impressed and my stepdad gave me a hug and nearly cried. BUT THEN she gave the bottle back to me and told me it was because she wanted to see if it was really the oil that was helping (but she could have been thinking she had gone off the deep end too using the oils so she returned it). Needless to say, the snoring started back up the first night she didn't use it and my stepdad came back to my house in search of the bottle. He also asked me how it works to which I replied, "I have no idea." But it works (and I've heard there actually is a description of how it works out there, but again, I'm too lazy to go check it out).

That is just one example so far of how I've used the oils. I've also been cleaning with them, diffusing them, putting some into a spray bottle and spraying it everywhere, etc. Last night, I felt a sore throat coming on so I diffused some thieves in my room at night while I was asleep - I feel perfectly fine this morning. My daughter was coughing the other night so I diffused some stuff in her room - she slept like a baby and I didn't have to use her inhalers. I had a cut on my finger - I put a drop of lavender on it - within 2 hours it was practically gone. Tony had a toothache this morning so I told him to rub some thieves on it - pain is gone (and I am NOT paying for ANOTHER root canal by the way! He can go find a random person for all I care to pull the tooth out for a small fee - I am not doing it!). Remember the saying - "You don't need to floss all your teeth - just the ones you want to keep!" Tony needs to get on it (whew, that was my pregnant lady rant right there where all of your feelings just come pouring out at once with no filter).

Anyway, that is why I feel like a witch doctor. People tell me something and I say, "I have an oil for that!" So if you come to our home for a visit, you may find yourself being a hit with random oils - AND I even think you will love it :)

-Emily

Thank you for your prayers

Well, what a scary night Tuesday was. I didn't even know a temperature of 106 was possible - the thermometer just kept on going and going and all I could think of was "please stop going up, please stop going up."

It all started Monday morning. I went to Ava's room to wake her up for school and noticed she felt warm. She had a temp of 101.5 so she stayed home from school and I figured she just had a bug. The day went on and around 2pm her temp was at 102.3 so I gave her some tylenol. It went down a bit but not for too long. Gave her tylenol again before she went to bed. She also started with a bad cough on Monday night. Usually when she starts coughing, it doesn't start off bad but will gradually get worse. Well this time she coughed and it sounded bad right from the start.

At 3:30am Tuesday morning her temp was 103.7 so we took her to the doctor in the morning. My first thought was that she had strep throat again because she said her throat hurt so I figured she would need an antibiotic because she had an infection. Ava NEVER gets a temp over 103 so I thought for sure, we would get antibiotics. Well, the nurse practitioner tested her for strep and for the flu Tuesday morning - both came back negative. She assured us it was just a virus and would go away soon. We took her home, Tony stayed home with her, and I went into work for a bit.

Tony texted me later to say the temp was at 103.4 even though he gave her some motrin just a couple of hours before. Told him to put her in a lukewarm bath and make sure she wore light clothing. I called the doctor again to share my concerns that her temp was still high even after meds. So she called in a prescription for Ava for tamiflu, even thought the flu test came back negative - she thought it would help with her symptoms. Well, tamiflu was $212 so I said, "no thanks - we will just try and keep her comfortable."

6:15pm - Ava went to sleep and her temp was around 102. Tony and I sat down to eat dinner. Around 7:30pm Tony noticed she was moving around a bit in bed so he went to check on her. Said, "Hey Em, she feels really warm." I took her temp and the numbers just kept climbing and climbing. Finally it stopped at 105.2. We immediately put shoes on, grabbed some flip flops for Ava, locked up the house, and got in the car.

The hospital took her temp twice and I sat there watching the numbers climb. First time it was 106, second time it was 106.2. I almost started crying. The guy taking the temp looked at the nurse and told her, "I took it twice." They went and got ice packs to put under her arms. Ava's little heart rate was high. She started to cry but I wanted her to calm down thinking, what if she has a seizure? Got us in a room and as we walked into the room, the doctor walked right in with us and started askinng us questions. "When did it start, does she have a cough, did you go anywhere this weekend, did she get bit, is there cancer is your family . . . " Then you could hear them consulting with one another by their computers - "They said they went to oceanside to a pumpkin patch, she didn't go swimming, cough started yesterday, . . . " I was grateful they were moving quickly with trying to help her. So they did lab work, urine test, chest x-ray and took the labs in a big orange bag that said STAT. Gave her some fluids and they took her temp again and it had gone way down. I was so grateful for everyone's prayers that night.

When all of the tests came back, it was determined she had Pneumonia and they gave her some antibiotics through her IV. I was so relieved we had an answer.

Ava was such a trooper. Anytime one of the doctors or nurses asked how she was, she would say, "I'm good." She was very relieved they could just leave the needle in her arm so that they wouldn't have to poke her again each time they gave her something. The doctors and nurses were wonderful. Our nurse brought Tony and I some coffee and crackers - I jokingly asked how much it would cost (but I was only sort of half joking because I knew we would be getting a huge hospital bill in the mail). Luckily, the coffee and crackers were free.

I felt such peace knowing that the Lord arranged this night the way He did. All day I had been praying, "Lord let me know if I need to take her to the emergency room" because Ava has a very high deductible - and we don't just go to the emergency room for a sore thraot or a little slice on your finger. And He did - it was very clear we needed to take her. Also if Ava hadn't gone to sleep so early, we wouldn't have noticed her moving around it bed and checked on her. If we all went to bed at the same time, I wouldn't have checked on her for awhile and it just makes me overwhelmed to think "what if we all went to sleep and I didn't check on her for hours?" Who knows what would have happened with her temp so high for so long.

So once again, I praise God and I thank everyone for their prayers. And I am at peace with the huge bill we will get in the mail because we had to take her. And the Lord will provide for us the way He always does. I have complete peace.

"I love the Lord because He has heard my voice and my supplications. Because He inclined His ear to me, therefore I will call upon Him as long as I live." Psalm 116:1-2

-Emily

Spanking

The other day as I was walking back to my car after dropping off Ava at school, there was a mom with her children walking toward me. The mother looked mad and the little family kept walking while the mom kept talking when she finally just reached over and hit her son on the arm (maybe to be extra sure he got what she was trying to tell him?) Either way, I walked away very interested in the whole idea of spanking/hitting your children as "discipline."

Now, I'm sure she was upset about something - you could see it in her whole demeanor. And she didn't hit him hard or else I would like to think I would have said something. But it is fascinating to me that some people spank their children as a form of discipline. If you think about it, those that spank/hit their children cannot do it to anyone else. If someone I supervise at work does something wrong EVEN THOUGH I'VE TOLD THEM A MILLION TIMES THAT'S NOT HOW IT'S DONE AND NOW I AM FRUSTRATED I can't just reach over and whack them on their arm. If I do something at home and Tony hates my guts, he can't come over to me and hit me - he'll get arrested. But kids? Sure - go right on ahead and spank them.

Countless studies have shown that spanking your children is not effective and people tend to do it more out of frustration rather than "Okay Johnny, I'm going to spank you now with an open hand on your bottom because I didn't like how you just spoke to me and I'm doing this to correct your behavior." If you are trying to correct a child's behavior with hitting - what message does that send? "You did something wrong - now I can hit you." Totally illogical. Not to mention, when they get older, what are you going to do then?

Now, I have heard many tales of people spanking their children maybe once in their lives because of something just crazy that happened and the parent was freaked out - e.g. child walks out into the street and a car is coming so you hit them on their bottom as you yell. I can logically get that and maybe that will be me one day. I can also see myself pushing Tony or smacking him if he jumped out from behind a door and scared me half to death - I get it. But I don't get it when people spank as one of their primary ways of discipline.

Interesting fact: the United States passed an Animal Welfare Act in 1966 to help protect animals. Did you know that the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act wasn't passed until 1974? Now I'm not saying spanking is child abuse so don't go crazy. I just thought it was interesting that we had a law passed for animals before we did to legally protect children from abuse.

Now, I work somewhere where everyday I hear stories about families and their children who are taken away because of abuse. I have heard horrendous stories about sexual abuse that would make you want to vomit. I hear about the children who are malnourished and live outside under a tarp. Very sad world we live in. So if you do have your children, let's love them, show them patience, notice when they are getting tired so that we don't frustrate them, etc - because life goes by so fast, doesn't it? And I for one need to stop being so judgmental and start being more kind. And helpful. Rather than just talking all the time without doing. Because that's just as bad as spanking - maybe worse. Maybe that mom that I saw at Ava's school that hit her child on the arm has no one to talk to and her life feels out of control. Who knows. We can all be more kind. You never know what someone may be going through.

So just some thoughts I had to share . . . sort of a bummer topic I know. But children (especially babies) are on my mind (and bladder) all the time now so these things just pop up. Plus as you know we don't have cable at the Dual house so evenings can be very quiet. But in all seriousness, we can all love better. And then our children will see us loving others better, and then they will show love to others more, and then . . .

-Emily

"Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord . . . " Psalm 127:3