Hot Head Hank

We had a great Easter with the family. Well, minus the 15 mins that we took pictures. Hank was not having it today. Can you tell?

It actually hurt when he pulled my hair. Precious thing. See below for more examples of how much Hank enjoyed the pictures. His 17 year old cousin was at a loss of what to do with our angel baby Hank.

If you look really close, you can see cousin #14 made his debut in the cousin picture! Tribb Thomas is in the purple onesie. He did great for the pictures. He is really an angel baby!

It was so humid outside today. That is good for Hank's curls but the rest of us were sweating like pigs.

Look at the 5 girl cousins! They love each other a lot!

Elle was our model for trying to get the right lighting for the picture. Great smile Elle!

Here are all the big cousins. Man, it sure is easy getting a picture of them. They stand right where I ask them (the first time). They hug each other easily. They don't wail and throw themselves on the ground and demand a piece of cake. They just smile and look fabulous. We will be there someday. Right?

Cute Clara and Blair.

Happy Easter.

He is Risen!

Family update

Just a quick update on things around here.

Rhody is doing better and better everyday. He is slowly getting back to school--a little everyday.

Actually, one of the sweetest moments happened yesterday at school. I took Rhody to class about an hour after school started. He had missed 7 days of school! His adorable classmates started clapping and cheering for him as we walked in! It was just precious. Rhody was a little embarrassed but loved it too.

Hank is doing great. He is thick and healthy. He talks constantly--but you can't understand anything he says. He leaves a huge mess in his wake. And he can be incredibly demanding of my attention. He drives me crazy at times. All of that. . . and I am still crazy about him.

Lainey is swimming along. Her favorite thing right now is to plan her birthday party. She spends about 6 months out of the year planning her party. The theme, the location, the colors, the girls to invite, the food that will be served, etc. To be honest, I am a little over planning her party. She likes to discuss it often. I am betting we end up with a roller skating party. I vote that over a swimming, cooking, movie watching, slumber party. I like a start and end time that fits within a 2 hour time period. But I let her keep dreaming and planning.

Bo is. . . Bo. Crazy and fun and loud and sweet and crazy. He is big into threatening me. "If you don't let me go outside, then I am not going to come out of my room for 100 days!" "If you don't let me eat that candy, then you are not my sweet mommy anymore." I tried to explain to him the concept of empty threats, but evidently he didn't understand.

Well, I have realized some unfortunate things about me today. It has been exactly a year since I signed up for my second triathlon with Team in Training. I was starting from scratch with my training. And with a 6 month old. A year later. . . I am back to that "scratch" point. All that training, down the proverbial drain.

And to continue that patheticness, I also realized that at this point, I color my hair more than I work out.

Sad but true.

That says a couple of things about me. I haven't been in the gym at all. And my hair is shockingly gray. And grows entirely too fast.

A couple of weeks ago I met a dad at the playground. We ended up knowing a few of the same people. Most of the people we had in common were from the triathlon. When I mentioned that I had also done the triathlon in the fall, he seemed absolutely shocked.

Shocked.

Somehow his first impression of me was that I wouldn't be the type of person that would do a triathlon.

I am slipping into a deep funk right now after writing all of this down. I think I might need some chocolate to help me out of it.

Where the heart is! (cheesy but true)

After a long week, we are home!

Rhody was cleared to come home today. He had an Xray this morning that showed his pneumonia had not worsened in the last 24 hours. That is good news. He still has pneumonia. He is still on 3 different drugs to fight it. But we get to do that at home now.

No more IV (he hated that). The worst part of the whole thing for Rhody was the removal of the tape and the IV.
Children's Hospital was a great place to get the treatment Rhody needed. We had some great doctors and nurses everyday that we were there.

We are happy to be all together under one roof. We are so grateful for all of our friends and family that jumped at the opportunity to serve and encourage us. We feel loved! (and full--from some yummy treats)

We are still praying for Rhody. For a complete recovery.

And grateful that he got to take a shower. It had been like 5 days or something. Pewee!

Update #3--Thursday

Hello from Children's Hospital.

We are still here. Rhody had a much better night. His fever got pretty high again yesterday. Since then he hasn't had a fever. He has been eating more and drinking more.

This is a regular occurrence down here. Rhody playing on the iPad. Angry Birds and Face Melter are his faves.

The IV is driving him crazy. They only have to administer meds in the evening but he still has to have it on/in all day. So he can't use his right arm. Good thing he is left handed.

We are about to head to the playroom here at Children's. He needs to get up and walk around some. It's good for his lungs.

We are watching the original Robin Hood movie--the cartoon one of course. Man, those old cartoons are so slow moving. Rhody doesn't seem to care!

What have I learned today? That I really like the pale pink shade of Reese's wedding dress.

I haven't done much today. But I did get to brush my teeth and change clothes. That is a step up from yesterday.

We will keep you posted.

Update #2

It's now 10 o'clock on Wednesday. Rhody has just perked up a little bit. I think the Motrin kicked in and he feels a little better. He ate some jello and is watching some more tv! Kyle just came back to the hospital.

We will be here until tomorrow--at the very least. He is taking IV antibiotics once every 24 hours plus an oral antibiotic. Today we will just be hanging out at the hospital and resting. He does have some fluid along the outer edges of his left lung. We are hoping the medicine alone will get rid of that!

We are so grateful for all the offers to help with our other children or with anything else we might need. Thank you so much. We are doing ok right now.

On a lighter note, I did learn this morning that if a crocodile gets too cold--it can't move. To warm it up, you should throw warm water on the crocodile. But who would want to do that? Gracias, Diego and sister Alissa.

What have you learned today? :)

Thank you for your prayers. We want Rhody to feel better. For the pneumonia to go away---sooner than later. But no matter what, we trust in the Lord and His great love for us. For Rhody.

Jeremiah 29:11-13 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

My favorite part of that verse is when God says if I pray--he will listen. I know that for sure.

It's Not Just Strep

Long story short.

Rhody has pneumonia. We went children's hospital on Saturday and discovered his pain in his chest was actually pneumonia. We changed medicine but he really never got a lot better. He got a fever today (Tuesday) so the doctor wanted us to go back to the hospital.

It's now 3:00 am and rhody and I just got to his room. He has slept off and on. They have him on IV antibiotics to try to fight this infection. The good news is that the latest Xray shows that the pneumonia is in a more layered pattern rather than in small pockets. It is much more difficult to heal when it is in pockets. Usually there needs to be a surgical procedure done to drain those pockets. So we are hopeful that it wont develop into a pocket formation.

We are grateful for your prayers! Rhody is not thrilled to be here. Although he seems fine right now He is watching Little Einteins--at 3:00 o'clock in the morning.

Hopefully we can both get a little sleep. What are the chances that they have an extra ambien lying around?

Update tomorrow. Or a little later today.

Medicine 4 Ways

This has never happened in our house but all 4 kids are sick. They have strep. That was a fun doctor's appointment with all 6 of us in a room. And Bo was in rare form. His crazy came out.

Rhody is the most sick. He feels awful and has slept a ton. We have meds now so hopefully all will be well in 24 hours. Or at least moving in the right direction.

Like my subject matter for practicing on aperture and ISO? It's our world right now.

And that makes 14!

Rob and Haley had their sweet baby Tribb yesterday morning!

He is precious. We are all so glad to finally meet him and hold him. His name is Robert Tribble Thomas. He is already greatly loved!

This is Charly looking up at Mommy and baby Tribb. She will be a great big sister.

That makes 14 grandchildren for my parents. Ages 19-1 day. 5 girls. 9 boys. 12 blue eyes. 1 brown eyed child. 1 undetermined. So fun. So glad you are here Tribb!

Game Day

If you are wondering what we did today or what we will be doing for the next month of Saturdays, here it is.


You will see that Bo is always willing to pose for a picture. Even in the middle of the game.

Big brothers!

The beginning of T-ball for Bo. He was wanting a little more action! (like soccer)

Rhody's favorite "move" is the pull-back. Here it is!