Good fun that is funny

You were on a roll... what happened?

... a blogging roll, that is. Well, I'll tell you what happened. Crap. Crap happened. (At this point my mother might stop reading. Sorry, but crap is the best word I've got.)
One sick little boy. Misdiagnosed for 2 days and ended up in the hospital.

The family doctor kept saying Elisha had "the common cold." He said this two days in a row, ignoring my saying that E was running a fever and definitely not well. On the SECOND visit on the second day, he finally heard him cry, believed me when I said he was having trouble breathing, and sent us to a pediatrician and pediatric hospital.
So I carted E over there (did I mention that Ryan and Victoria were in Seoul at a wedding?), only to have THAT doctor take ONE listen to his chest and tell me "Ajou. Suwon." (Ajou is a big university hospital up in Suwon. A place I could not reach on my own, for a number of reasons.) At this point I called a friend who is fluent in Korean and pleaded for help.
She came over with another friend (for moral support) and took us to a hospital in Pyongtaek. The doctor THERE confirmed what I had been saying for two days, which was that E had bronchitis, laryngitis, and a serious case of the croup. He needed antibiotics, a steroid shot, and breathing treatments. The only problem was that that hospital was full, and there were 10 people ahead of us waiting for a room. Longer story shorter, we went to another hospital. Got a room. More meds.

Random "skin test." Don't know why or what for. Not Tb, as they checked 20 minutes later.

Have IV? Will travel. Seriously, you could go outside for walks, up and down hallways... or elevators...Wow I look fat in that picture.

Wait. This is about Elisha. Right.

After the meds kicked in, he wanted to Par-Tay. Thankfully, he did go to sleep, and slept off and on through the next day. 24 hrs. later he felt much better, but that only lasted a few hours. He spent the next 3 days whining, crying, and not wanting to do anything. They released us Monday, thankfully. A check-up on Thursday realized all that mess to be gone, but one ear is slightly infected. Sigh.

Anyway.... this post is seriously not complete without a few pictures of hospital food. Korean hospital food.
Quail eggs, anyone? Seaweed soup? Rice? (Rice and that soup stuff in the upper left with every meal.)

Ah, fish. 7 meals in the hospital and 4 had fish. 3 of those meals were breakfast.

Waaaiitttt.... what? What are those?

Are those what I think they are?

Why yes. They're little dead fishes. Lots of them. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Helping Mommy clean up!

Didn't realize ahead of time what a great photo-op this was for Grandpa Fred!! LOL

Summer days

Well, today is officially day one of Ryan's summer vacation! Yay!!!! Sunday evening was so much more relaxing knowing that he didn't have to get up and go to school in the morning. Which is good, too, because apparently both Max and Elisha have decided that they are going to be nocturnal now. Yeesh.

Anyway, I had big plans of writing a blog post the other evening about our summer plans, but then I read two other blogs of families who are in Eastern Europe adopting right now, and they were posting pictures of the orphanage and talking about all the orphans there, and how some will never be adopted for various reason. That evening our summer plans seemed frivolous and unimportant. Which is why it took me two or three more days to write this post.

So anyway, our summer has already started with a bang! Saturday we visited a super fun water park down on an army base 1/2 hr. away, with some army friends with kids the same age as ours. (Plus 2 older ones.) We had an absolute blast, and stayed for dinner and games too.

Today (Monday) we are babysitting our friends Ross and Renee's toddler girl, Sadie. They're moving, so I figured it would be most helpful to take care of Sadie so she wasn't in the way. It's like having twin toddlers, though. She and Elisha are only 3 months apart, and very close developmentally.

Let's see... as of right now, the rest of our summer plans include:
-seeing Sesame Street Live
- attending a wedding
- attending a birthday party for a 4 year old
- the Big Bad BBQ for Father's Day at church
- museums
- parks
- playgrounds
- touristy stuff
- trips into Seoul for various reasons

And who knows what else! We'll be sure and keep you updated, though. =)

It's the end of the world....

...wait, no. Just the school year. Yes, that's right, folks, it's the end of Ryan's first year of teaching here in Korea! He is now officially a 6th year teacher! That kinda makes him sound old... but he's not, LOL!

He had a great year, finished well, and is already thinking ahead to when school starts back up. We could not have done it without the help, support, and prayers that so many of you have blessed us with!

(Yes, I know I'm switching "persons" a bunch here, I'm sorry.)

Ryan enjoyed his students, his fellow staff members, and the great leadership of the administration here. He felt supported by his teammates as well as his "boss." He teamed up with other teachers across grade levels to have his students either work with or present projects to. He learned a lot, esp. teaching Economics!, and made sure to note what worked well and what needed some tweaking for next year.

All in all, a good year! Now let the summer vacation fun begin!!!

What does having a sick baby equal?

Lots of internet and reading time! (Okay, okay, and less than a full night's sleep, Tylenol, crankiness- on the baby's part, too... LOL... anyway, you get the idea.) Yep, when one of the babies is sick, E especially, it means lots of sitting with him, cuddling, unable to do much else but read and browse the interwebz.

The result of the latter being that I stumble across amazing blogs, fantastic ideas, and fabulous resources.

Like this one: Living with Punks. For the month of June she's hosting "Scrap Your Stash" where she and other bloggers post an idea a day of things you can make using fabric scraps from your stash. (Which won't be of any interest to most of my readers, but it is to me, so it gets blogged about.)

Max is too young yet for us to have decide how we are going to educate her- whether home-school or "regular" school. But, I came across this blog the other day, and she has lots of good info for families, not just homeschoolers. Raising Arrows is a site I'll be bookmarking for future use.

Another craft site? Yes, please! Sugar Bee Crafts even does a "Take a Look Tuesday" with great links to yet MORE blogs with great ideas. =)

Not a new site to me, but Celebrate Life (formerly Believe it and Be satisfied) is the blog of a gal who attends our church, along with her husband, and they are currently in the Ukraine adopting a little girl. Karen is an AMAZING photographer, and her pictures of Korea are fabulous! (The ones of the Ukraine are great, too, but living in Korea it's a bit cooler for me, LOL.)

Ferial's blog, Ferial-Shmerial, is also a fun read, with more great pictures. She and her hubby, John, attend our church, and teach at a different school in Pyeongtaek. Fun people, and we're looking forward to hanging out with them more now that summer is upon us.

Well, I won't overwhelm you with any more fun links... for now. =)

Having a sick baby also grants me more time to blog, LOL. Just less time to sew and clean and such. Oh well. Such is life.

Mommy Made Party Dress!

The very first party dress I've ever made! Love how it turned out, all fun and twirly just like Max and I had wanted!!!

If it weren't almost bedtime for me...

I'd go try this very cool and easy looking way to clean my oven glass...

Or maybe start a new outfit for Victoria or another little girl (we know a ton!)...
(Side note: I very clearly remember having at least one outfit in this cross-over-back style when I was a little girl, and I've been dying to make Max some.)

I'd whip up some sandwich cozies with some scraps from the depths of my sewing room...

Or maybe mop the floor.... sorry, no links or pictures. Just a thought. =)

Birthday pictures, belatedly.

Max turned 3 recently! Yay! We had a fun party for her (in our opinion, at least. You'd have to ask someone else who was there what they thought, LOL.)

Hey, it had lots of balloons. And hot dogs. And cupcakes. And if those don't make for a fun party for a 3 year old, I don't know what does.


In fact, it was SO fun, it wore out one little guy. (That or he was just plain bored. His parents wouldn't let him have a hot dog or cupcake. Poor kid.)

Max got a fun scooter (is the right name? I'm drawing a huge blank here...) It took several guys (Elisha included) a bit of time to assemble it. She also got lots of other fun presents from all the fun, great people who came to celebrate with us.

Things I'm thankful for right now

- Plenty of summer clothes for Elisha!
- Dr. Pepper
- food to prepare for meals this week
- my helpful, amazing, thoughtful husband. (Should have said "Gushy alert!" before that, huh?)
- Plenty of summer clothes for Max!
- The cool and refreshing rain.
- Great internet.
- The fact that summer vacation is almost here for Ryan!!!!