New addition

While it seems that sometimes we can win for losing; we do have some very generous people in our lives. My aunt has chosen to up-grade her above-ground pool. In doing so, she generously decided to give us her old one. It needs some patching, but is otherwise fairly maintenance-free. Its an 18' x 4' -- so it should be quite large enough for physical therapy/exercise-type things, but small enough to be within a long-arms reach of the kids in their floaties.

The kids LOVE to be in the water - especially Rachel. Simon is a lot more cautious, but even he is learning to relax a bit. Their first real experience was this 4th of July weekend. In the photo to the left, Rachel is in the papasan float with the yellow vest. Simon is behind me in the 2 person ring float wearing his green vest. I think I'm going to try to get a float similar to the 2-person ring float in the photo because Simon liked it so well. It has leg holes on the one side for a child, while the other side is not quite closed for an adult to hold onto as well. Its a very good design!

One of my MILs has an above-ground pool similar to the one we just got. We swam in hers last night. Simon relaxed enough to wear his safety vest and sit in the papasan float by himself. Rachel quickly gets tired of being in the infant floaties (with her vest) and tries to dive in on her own. She requires quite a bit of handling! I look at it as some physical therapy for my arms and exercise to keep my bones healthy!

Updates...

I am working on separating my family-based blog from my cancer-based blog. I've titled my cancer-based blog as Erika's Miracle Journey. I hope to write here about family things -- things the kids do & say, milestones, updates on Andrew, and general family/faith things. Of course, some cancer crap is going to seep into this blog and some family drama will creep into the cancer blog, but I think it'll be easier if I separate the two. So please join my other blog and drop in here occasionally too!

July is *the* month!!!

July started with my birthday as usual on the 1st. Then my mom's birthday (the 2nd). Then a 4th of July party on the 3rd, followed by another one on the 4th. Then on the 5th I had my first pain injections. Now today, the 7th, is my cancerversary. Two years ago today I was diagnosed. Two years ago today my life changed for the worse in some ways, but for the better in other ways. On the 8th I'm going back to the plastic surgeon in Louisville for a 2nd opinion on my implant problems. On the 10th it'll be 2 years since I found out Rachel was indeed a Rachel & not a Joshua! On the 14th it'll be 5 years since Andrew proposed to me. On the 15th I get paid! :-D That's just the first 1/2 of the month! Whew - no wonder I'm so tired!