Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Here's to preteens, Easter, eczema, and the end...

 Easter 2011 was great and celebrated quietly (as I would prefer!) with everyone home and G'ma and G'pa Nelson joining us for dinner. The kids hunted for their Easter bags full of goodies in the morning and after a little church action, I got to work cooking up a storm. Lee spent the morning manicuring the yard for (my) Easter present. Honestly, just him being home with for the weekend and us getting to do our boring family things all together was more than present enough. ;0)
J. Lamb 2011
 My POTD (picture of the day) blog is still going strong (here). I have had a blast thinking of subjects and capturing them. Of course, my subjects are my kids 80% of the time though! It really shouldn't be any other way! Let me know if you want me to add anyone to the e-mail listing for it.
 As for the preteens...sigh, why is it that the older they get, the busier I get? Drake will be 12 on Thursday (can you believe it!?) and Adree became a teenager last year (I'm kidding of course...but, seriously she has!) and little Seth (Mr. Monkey) likes to stir the pot! He and Adree bicker constantly! A couple of weeks ago we had the opportunity to go hiking to the waterfalls (Red Cliffs Rec. Area) with a good friend of ours and the kids had a blast! They love to hike anyway and that coupled with water, they were in heaven! Both the boys came back soaking wet and Drake skinned his leg up good. Eh, good thing kids dry out eventually and they make Neosporin!
J. Lamb 2011

And speaking of Neosporin...poor Drake. It's not unusual for him to have eczema in the winter and when he developed it in the crook of his elbow, I treated it with heavy duty lotion and a little hydrocortisone creme. It got better, it got worse, it raged out of control finally and off to the doc we went. She looked it over and prescribed a steroid creme and prescription strength Neosporin. We used it for about 5 days and the eczema dried up nicely, until I noticed he was starting to get a rash up his arm now. I stopped using the steroid creme and kept an eye on it and by Sunday he was covered in a rash from his earlobes down his torso. Monday morning, back to the doc we went. She was concerned, concerned enough to send him to the Dermatologist the next day. Great. Thankfully (well, kind of) it turned out not to be anything other than an eczema rash gone viral (he had a cold at the time and that made the eczema go crazy when we treated it). So, yes he has been covered with head to torso eczema. Like I said, poor Drake. ;0( A couple of weeks later he just has break out on the backs of his arms still, but the rest of it has dried up for the most part.
The end? Ah, soccer season is coming to an end...tonight being the last game! They've won one game so far, but they learned how to function as a team and learned a little skill along the way. Adree has improved so much and we are so very proud of her! Last night was their last practice (they had a water party instead) and I think Adree is happy she was able to participate and make new friends (ah, who am I kidding this girl knows everyone!), good job Adee-girl! ;0)

Thursday, April 14, 2011

What's the haps?

J. Lamb 2011
"Time just doesn't seem to stop...only speeds up as it passes"

                                                               (and boy is it true!)


As I look at my babies here I can't believe how much they've grown! I can't believe it's been five years now since they came back to me and all of the sadness and hurt from not having them here every day has simply melted away. Everything happens for a reason and rather than resent it, it's up to you to figure out what you need to learn from it. Learn and grow and be strong.

J. Lamb 2011
Adree is just as involved as ever and last week she had the opportunity to perform at Tuacahn with her choir group! (She is on the bottom row, 5th kid in from the right) Western themed show this year and 20 schools from the area were able to participate this year. That's up from 7 schools last year, they had use two nights! She loved it, but was seriously pooped at the end of the day from practicing in the sun all day at school and then a soccer game that night. Yep, we rushed all the way across town from Bloomington Hills to Ivins to make it too! (If you know Dixie, you know that is quite a ways...ick, especially with traffic!) She loved the opportunity and is looking forward to playing in band next year at Intermediate school, yikes!

J. Lamb 2011
Drake is loving school (as always) and is continually improving his violin skills. He has such a mathematical mind set that reading music is really fun for him! I was laughing as he set his music book in front of me at my keyboard and proceeded to coach me in the songs! I let him do it for a while until I confessed that I can indeed read music...;0) All this and he informed me recently that he intends to write a 4 part sci-fi novel! I love it!
Sethee is reading Harry Potter books and Garfield comics and made up and illustrated a Capt' Underpants comic this week. I get to bind it for him this evening, he's thrilled! He's still attending scouts regularly and he wants to play soccer himself this fall! I know he'll be great at it...such energy this boy has! I'm going to try and get him signed up for swimming lessons this summer as well.

J. Lamb 2011
This little social butterfly always has somewhere to be and something to do. She alternates between being super helpful and a pill...some days only the latter is the case. *sigh* I try to keep her busy which helps, but if she's busy then Mom is busy and Mom doesn't need any more help being busy! I can't believe both she and Drake will be Intermediate students next year! Wow, if they're that old then I must be ancient! ;0P

Can you believe that I haven't been with with the "M" word for a year now? Yeah, me either! I have spent the time developing a deep love for sewing. I mean I always enjoyed it, but I spend so much time thinking of fun projects to make now it's crazy! I actually am meaning to open an ETSY shop (a site for handmade goods) and I will just as soon as I get enough projects completed. I'll let everyone know when I get it open! ;0) Up above is a dress I made for Miss Adree for Easter. It was originally a thrift store dress that she and I picked out and I blogged all about here if you want to see!
Time flies when you're busy, but we wouldn't have it any other way!