Houston . . . We have a Problem!: 2009

Yes, I am starting this post with 2 little words. The End! All I can say is thank God it is The End.

There are many reasons that I blog . . . I blog for my own sanity, without it I would be bottling up some pretty serious emotions and would probably explode (oooooh gross!). I also blog for my children. It's new for me - I just started this year but I want them to have this someday to know what we have gone through and triumphed as a family. I think sometimes that Nate may need it someday to look back and see how it all began and hopefully how it ended with a cure. Or that my girls may need to read it at some point if they are struggling through the same challenges (God forbid) and I am no longer around to guide them through the difficult times. In a nutshell I do it for me and I do it for my family but if it reaches someone else and touches them in a positive way that would be awesome .

Before I blogged I photographed. I photograph EVERYTHING! I even have a picture of Emma's 1st poop in the potty. If you don't believe me - watch out I may just email it to you!! I love taking pictures of my family just as much as I love looking back at the photos and remembering all of the good and bad memories that we have created together.

So, in this final blog of 2009 it will be a combination of words and photos to review our lives over the past 12 months. The good the bad and the ugly . . .

The year started just like any other year -

January 2009 - - - big news of the month: Laura turns 36 - no picture of this big event. Why? Well, that would be because I am the one always taking the pictures!! With my 36th birthday came a sick little boy - we battled RSV and croup and I thought one of us might not make it. We were all grumpy from lack of sleep (ha, if I had only known then what I know now).

Mommy and Nate doing breathing treatments for RSV

Not a happy camper!

On January 23rd - Nate's 7-month birthday he decided it would be fun to pull a lamp down on top of his head to celebrate the big day. He survived and didn't even require stitches but so began my crash course in the new, wild world of BOY!

February was a fun month.

We celebrated the girls' birthdays with a joint
princess party and since I didn't get my own
princess party in January they let me celebrate
with them!

For Valentine's Day I decided it would be fun to take the kids down to the lake and take some photos of them. The girls loved it . . .

Nate not so much!

But I did manage to get one cute shot of all 3 . . .

Not a lot of activity in March . . .

Emma officially turned 5 and we spent plenty of time enjoying Spring Break in TX.

April brought several Easter celebrations for our family . . .

I love this picture of our family. It says so much -
Sophie is looking at her big sister, Emma whom she adores. Emma is laughing because she is such a sweet, happy girl and then there is Nate going for the bow because he is always into something!!

This was a great day of fun at Prestonwood. We had lunch with the Easter Bunny, an Easter egg hunt and lots of fun crafts and activities. It was a great day with our friends, the Becka Family . . .

On Easter eve we left some food and water out for the Easter Bunny. The girls decided to leave it by the fireplace since they know for sure that is how Santa gets in . . .

I guess they were right to do so because when they woke up their baskets had been filled with goodies . . .

This month Nate got his 1st official haircut. As with most 1st haircuts there were plenty of tears!! At least he had his pretty, pretty princess telephone to make him feel a bit better!

Moving on to May

We love May around the Houston house. May means the beginning of the Texas summer and lake house living!

May was actually a very busy month . . .

We had end of school year parties, a dance recital, Mother's Day weekend, Memorial Day weekend and swimming, swimming, swimming!!

Mothers Day 2009

The girls were both in a dance recital - we could not have been more proud. Emma performed both ballet and tap and Sophie stood on stage during her ballet performance.

Sophie didn't move a muscle but we were so proud of her for going out on to that big stage!!

The girls loved receiving flowers after the performance

Well, ok Emma doesn't look that thrilled but Sophie was super happy!!

After the recital we headed down south to host a memorable Memorial Day weekend celebration at the lake house. We love summertime!!

Good times!!

June! If it were not for Nate's 1st birthday I would say we could skip June! June was a tough month. After suffering for a couple of weeks with some lower abdominal pain it finally got so bad that I checked myself into the hospital. My mom and dad actually came over a drove me to the ER so that Jim could be at home with the kids. It was a long night of much pain and many misdiagnosis that lead to a ruptured fallopian tube due to an undetected ectopic pregnancy. All in all it turned out ok but there was a point sometime in there that I was pretty sure I was going to die and all that I could think about was who would take care of my 3 precious babies and what would they remember about me? After a few weeks of recovery and downtime I was back as strong as ever and happy to be able to fulfill my duties as full-time mommy!

Ok - enough about me in June! My beautiful cousin, Paige Allen got married in June!! She was an amazingly beautiful bride and we were so honored that she chose Emma to be her flower girl.

2 Beautiful Girls!!

Another very important day in June would be Nate's 1st birthday!! Hip-Hip Hooray for Nate's 1st B-day!

I'M ONE!!

I love birthday cake but I will share . . .

Somewhere in there we celebrated Father's Day but poor Jim always takes a backseat to everything else going on during our busy summers.

July - Woot-Woot!

July was another full month! We hosted a 4th of July party at the lake house, Emma completed her tennis lessons and played in her 1st tennis tournament, we welcomed a another new member to our family, and we spent countless hours swimming!!

My cousin, Brian married the love of his life, Debbie and we are all so happy to have her in the family!!

And I can't forget this adorable picture of Ms. Emma with her tennis team -

And lastly we had to say goodbye to a dear friend. We lost our huge oak tree in July. It fell down in the middle of the day just as quietly as a little mouse. It was a good tree and has been deeply missed. We miss the shade that it provided from the morning sun and the girls miss their favorite climbing tree that was always there when they wanted to play! We were so fortunate that it did no damage as 1/2 of it landed on the house and the other 1/2 blocked the street until we could get a crew out to haul it away. RIP Big Oak Tree!!

August

August is easy. 3 major events.

1)Sea World

The Houston 4 (we left Nate with GaGa) headed south to San Antonio for a fun-filled vacations at Sea World. We all had a great time despite the 200 degree heat! Ok - 100 but it felt like 200!!

2) Kindergarten

Yep, it's true! My 1st born started kinder this year. I can't believe my baby girl is old enough to be in school!

3) Thieves

So, we woke up one fine August morning and this is how we found my truck. Nice! All 4 tires/wheels gone.

The girls still talk about someone "stealing our wheels" and Emma always says "They sure must have needed them more than we did." What a sweet girls she is!! Well, the price tag on that was over $8K so I dang sure hope those thieves REALLY needed all 4 of our wheels. Thankfully, we have insurance and we were rolling within a few days!!

Ok, so I said there were only 3 events but I had to include this picture of Nate. Technically he is not an event but his tumble out of the Radio Flyer was . . . .

September

If you have read and kept up with my blog then you know that September is Nate's diagnosis month. I won't go into details here. To read his full dx story click here.

Before Nate's dx made September so memorable Nate and Sophie had big news. They both started preschool at St. Andrew UMC Children's Weekday Program. This is Sophie's 3rd year in the program and Nate's 1st year.

Then as everyone knows Nate was dx with Type 1 on 9/17/09 and our entire world was rocked!!

We spent several days and night at Children's Medical Center of Dallas where we learned to care for Nate.

This picture of Nate pretty much sums up how we were all feeling on dx day.

To see more photos and read about Nate's dx feel free to click here. After Nate's dx and hospital stay we didn't waste anytime getting involved in the JDRF and as it turns out they were having their walk for a cure just a week later. It obviously was our 1st walk but I was proud that in just over a week we raised over $2000.00!! It was an emotional day but the beginning of a yearly tradition that we will support until they find a cure for Type 1.

And the man of the hour . . .

how could we not walk for this sweet little boy??

And the best picture of the day . . .

and to thank all of our sponsors . . .

October was a busy month full of transition and many, many activities. We started off strong but were quickly thrown off course when Nate came down with a nasty stomach bug. Wow - they told us that sick days would be hard but we had no idea!! Nate would have ended up in the hospital even without diabetes but diabetes threw a huge wrench in the entire ordeal. He was sick for several days, unable to keep any food down and low, low, low bg levels. We were finally admitted back at Children's for some professional assistance. Not my idea of fun!! We were all exhausted . . .

Why can't they put more comfortable accommodations in pediatric hospitals?

Hello?? I need to work on that!!

Once out of the hospital it was on to more important adventures . . . Halloween and all the fun that goes with it.

Nate - Mommy's Little Devil!!

My 2 Princesses and Little Devil

And the best part of October is that I met all of my D Mom Blog Friends!! It all started with Joanne's post and the rest is history. Thank you all for embracing me and understanding every single emotion that I have gone through, am going through now and will go through in the future. Thank you, Joanne for being my friend and for introducing me to some amazing women.

November was a slow month. We started falling into a D groove and so our new life started to become a little less scary. Different and still a little scary but not quite as bad as September and October.

We have a D things . . .

and we have our happy, active, beautiful little boy that will never know life without T1 so he is just living life the only way he knows how . . .

BEAUTIFULLY!

And then that brings us to December . . . the most wonderful time of the year!

December was so busy that my head is still spinning. We decorated the house, had a nice visit with Santa, Sophie's Christmas concert, multiple school Christmas parties, Rockettes, a dance recital and that is all before we even get to the main event.

Christmas was great fun this year! All 3 kiddos are old enough to enjoy spending time with family and the excitement that surrounds the Christmas season. Nate is too young to understand what it is all about but that didn't stop him from enjoying every moment! Well, except for that Santa encounter - - - maybe next year?

Nate loves his Choo-Choo!!!!

All in all it was a great Christmas. I enjoyed every moment and didn't stress at all over Nate's diabetes. We just took each day as it came and it turned out ok. I guess you could say we survived our 1st Christmas with D and we did it together as a family!

Now that 2009 is coming to an end and I have looked back over then entire year in pictures. I have to say that the good outweighs the bad although there were times that I had my doubts. Nate's diagnosis seemed devastating and overwhelming at first but I am slowly realizing that it is part of what makes Nate - Nate. He is a sweet, beautiful little boy that has a disease that I wanted to hate and hate I did until a very smart little girl taught me a big lesson. Nate has diabetes. It is part of him but it is not the biggest part of him. It's just a small piece of a fantastic little boy that will grow up and live a long and healthy life.

So, as we close on 2009 and look ahead to 2010 it is my resolution to become more positive about Nate's T1, leave the past in the past and focus on being the best mom and wife that I can be, and try and find the old me again. I have let a lot of things go so that I could focus all of my energy on Nate. This year I will still love and care for my son but I will also find some time for me so that I can be a happier and healthier mom for all 3 of my wonderful children.

The End!

Happy New Year!!!

PS - I'm way too tired to proof tonight so please forgive the typos!