"Grandchildren's Artwork"

A couple of months ago my grandchildren in western Kansas sent me a link to Artsonia. Maybe you have already heard of Artsonia, a student art gallery K-12 showcasing art projects from around the world. When Katelyn and Jake have a new art project posted I get an email and then I can go to the website and see their art work! "IT IS SO...FUN!!! : ) You can also leave a message for them about their artwork. I started wondering if Allie and Hannah might have artwork too from another school district and did some checking...sure enough there they were!

For Valentines Day I copied a piece of their art and enlarged it, then used it as part of their Valentines card. I'm already thinking of other ways I can use their artwork.

"Artsonia" check it out maybe your grandchildren are there!

Learning to Walk

Claire our youngest grandchild is 11 months old already and walking! We were at their house a few weeks ago and she was just taking a step or two, now she is walking the length of the living room. This week-end we decided to Skype them, something we haven't done very much since they moved back from Colorado. They still live four hours away, to far for just an evening. Four hours is a lot better then the twelve hours we use to drive when they lived in Montrose. Sunday evening we used Skype to visit and see everyone! Before we were done with our visit grandpa and I wanted to see Claire walk so they took the computer to one end of the living room and put Claire at the other end. I held out my hands to her and said "come to grandma" and here she came!! Technology is "AWESOME".

A few years ago when our son and his family lived in Montrose they couldn't come home to our house for Thanksgiving so we put Skype to use then too. When the rest of the family got to our house and we were ready to eat Thanksgiving dinner we set the computer on the hutch looking towards the table and they did the same. Who says you can't have a family dinner even when one of the families is 600 miles away and west of Monarch Pass on Thanksgiving! That was something to be very thankful for and we were. ; )

Nick our grandson with Cystic Fibrosis thinks he might be going into the hospital for what they call a tune up and I'll have to see if we can Skype him there too!

My co-worker Pam, had a good time with Skype on Sunday also! You might want to check it out.
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A New Year, Old Challenges

A new day, a new year but the same old song and dance from Social Security about Nick's disability. He has had to prove he was born with a disability for 19 years and since he turned 18, a year ago, has to do it all over again. I guess they don't know that you will have Cystic Fibrosis until there is a cure. We would love nothing more then to have a cure and not worry about getting any SSI from the government. They have been turning his check of $226 back into Social Security because they (SS) told them if they didn't he may own money back to them. Lets see on one hand you have a healthy life and the hand holds a check for $226, which would you choose? Which would anybody in there right mind choose. Oh that is right we are dealing with someone in an office somewhere deciding if Nick has a disability when all they have to do is go to the internet and look up Cystic Fibrosis and there is your answer.

I wish so for a different life for Nick. Something that would give him some hope for the future. It is not only his disease but his education, the job market, the family of a mother, father and siblings he should have been able to grow up with. He has had a lot more thrown at him then most people know about. I sort of get upset when people are so set on the sex of a baby just pray for a healthy baby and don't worry about what sex it will be. Give them the best life you can give them with lots of love, a happy childhood and guidance for growing into an adult. He has never had the fun of growing up a care free child, he has always had more weight on his shoulders then a lot of adults have had to carry around. In the last few months there have been some caring people come into his life that should have been there a long time ago. Good people that if they had come into his life a few years ago Nick's life would have been so different. I pray it is not to late and they have the patience to see Nick through until he finally figures out what he needs to do.

I know there are a lot of grandmas out there who feel this way about their grandchildren and I would love to hear from them. My heart breaks for Nick and wish I could do more for him.

"Seventy Years"

This last week end was my parents 70th wedding anniversary! Yes that is right 70th!! The actual anniversary is not until the 15th of December but that is to close to Christmas to get us all together two times that close together. We had been anticipating this week end for 6 months and now it is already history. I think everyone had a great time. There were 44 of the 59 of us able to attend or maybe I should say 58 and counting, # 59 will be here in about 5 weeks. Jeff, my nephew and his girlfriend came from as far away as Maryland and our son and his family live in Oakley, Kansas which is where the celebration and or reunion took place.

A small group played golf Saturday morning with a much larger group of 21 playing in the afternoon. The youngest was my grandson at 7 and the oldest was my dad at 89. Several of the women and girls went to a Girls Day Out at the fairgrounds!! Jewelry, purses, candles, food and lots of other things that light up our lives were there for us to look and "buy"! In the afternoon we had swimmers, golfers and a trip to the park, the weather was beautiful. In the evening we had a pizza party and played Family Feud the 1960 version! Most of the great grandchildren didn't know the answers and sort of looked at us funny. Needless to say there was lots of laughing. At 11:00 pm there sat my mom of 87 playing cards with 3 of her granddaughters. Sunday morning after breakfast we checked out of the motel and went to the St Joseph gym to continue the laughs playing Minute to Win It (this was summer tv show) if you go on line you can see the different games they played for money. My youngest brother had about 20 different activities you could try and do within a minute. We didn't actually compete but we got to try as many and as often as we wanted to. Everyone from 3 to 89 was involved in the fun. Everything from stacking 3 golf balls (which my dad did) to bouncing 3 ping pong balls into glasses of water to make tic tac toe or balancing 12 pencils on the back of your hand then catching with the same hand to keeping 3 balloons in the air for 60 seconds which is harder then you would think.

After enjoying a wonderful meal there together we took the family picture and all headed in different directions home. There were lots of pictures taken all weekend with lots of different cameras so it will be fun to see them at Christmas when most of us will get together again!

Witches and Dragons and a Princess Oh My

Well the grandchildren are back in school, the State Fair is just around the corner, Halloween decor is out in all the stores and that means it is almost time for my grandchildren to hit the closet to find out what they will be for Halloween. Last year in November a couple weeks after Halloween I happened to be in K-Mart when the rack of costumes went to 90% off. If you know me that is my kind of sale! That is the way I buy birthday and Christmas presents too most of the time. Well maybe more like 50 to 75% off but when I go in a store the first thing I look for is the sale sign. It is getting harder and harder to buy a season a head thou for the older grandchildren. Their likes and dislikes change more often. Back to the closet that holds a dragon, jack-o-lantern, Spiderman, knight, witch and several princess costumes, that were originally $40 to $15 (I can't even imagine spending $40 for a Halloween costume) and I got them for $4 to $1.50. For me that was a fun shopping trip you would have thought I won the lottery. Of course some of the costumes people make are very good but not everyone has the time it takes for that anymore. When Nick our oldest grandchild was about 3 or 4 I made him chaps and a vest and he was the cutest little cowboy another year he was a pirate and his little sister an angel. Then more grandchildren and a different job and the costumes I made kind of went away.

Actually I'm really not a big fan of Halloween! Years ago when I was young probably 4 or 5 my parents left my older brother and I with a babysitter and her older brothers thought it would be fun to put masks on and look in our windows to scare her. Well they accomplished that but also scared me and I can still see their faces looking in the windows.

It is fun for children to get dressed up and see if people recognize them or they can pretend to be someone out of a book or movie that they enjoyed. I guess the treats they get that one night that last for several months is a plus too! Nick is passed the dress-up stage but can still enjoy the candy that comes home with his sisters. He actually can eat all the high calorie things he wants because with Cystic Fibrosis you have a really hard time keeping weight on. Several of us wish we could give him some of our extra weight but we haven't come up with a plan for that yet. When that happens we really will have won the lottery!

Fourteen Pounds and Counting

Three of our six grandchildren came to stay for a few days before school got into swing for the new year. Jake a first grader, Katelyn a third grader and Hannah a kindergartner. Katelyn and Jake can't wait for school to start another year they have been counting the days! Hannah is excited about starting her first year of school. When Hannah's mom took her to enroll she told everyone this was the best day of her life! It is a great feeling when your children or grandchildren are so anxious to go to school.

One of the things grandpa and I wanted to do while they were here was to take the pull tabs that we have collected over the last few months to one of the Ronald McDonald houses in Wichita. When I say we I mean our family, extended family and my work family. I work at ESSDACK , an educational service center, in Hutchinson, KS and some of the people there help collect tabs for us. I have mentioned before about the jar we have in the kitchen at work and sometimes some of my co-workers bring me a "bag of tabs." I know this is an extra step for some of them but they are awesome for taking the time and we appreciate it. Our first trip was back in December and we said at the time we wanted to bring the grandkids the next time if possible. We usually take them to Sleepy Hollow close to Wesley hospital in Wichita but next time I think we will take them to the one close to Via Christi which is where Nick stays in the hospital when in Wichita. Nick is sometimes in the hospital because of Cystic Fibrosis but Via Christi is also where Nick goes for the Cystic Fibrosis clinic. We took their picture outside on the porch with Ronald and then took the tabs inside. We took 7 pounds in December and we took another 7 pounds this time so we are 14 pounds and counting! They could see some of the families that the tabs will help and we talked about it in the car afterward. I want my grandchildren to realize one of the best things you can do in life is to help people. There are always people that need help whether it be just spending some time with someone who is lonely or taking pull tabs to Ronald's house, or donating in some other way, there are lots of ways to give back.

Another way my co-workers give back is by taping segments of My Kids Turn. If you are like me you need a little help when it comes to homework or just extra fun things that help your children or grandchildren with their school work. They are taping new segments all the time. I haven't had time to look at all of them but the ones I have seen make learning fun!!

Thank You!

"Thank you to those of you who gave to Cystic Fibrosis and or Nick's medical fund!" I also want to thank anyone who sent the blog on to someone else, it helps raise awareness of Cystic Fibrosis. If you haven't been on this side of a disease you don't know how much your caring means to us. You really do touch our hearts!

We had the Great Strides Walk here in Hutchinson for Cystic Fibrosis for several years, when that dissolved we started going to the walk in Wichita. We haven't gone there in a few years but still collect what we can and send on to the CF Heart of America Chapter in Kansas City. Last week I ran into one of the mothers we met through the Cystic Fibrosis walk we had here in Hutchinson. She asked about Nick and I asked about her son with CF. Her son is 13 and going through a lot of the same things Nick went through at that age and still continues with some of them. He has a feeding tube which Nick doesn't have but was threatened with several times because of weight. If you don't know about CF you probably don't know that they have a very hard time keeping weight on because food runs right through them. Many people don't realize that it isn't just a disease of the lungs but also the digestive system. The pancreas is very much involved in the digestion so they usually get diabetes on top of everything else. We are thankful that Nick hasn't developed that yet. They take enzymes to help with digestion. Nick takes 7-8 capsules (enzymes) every time he eats meals or snacks to help with his digestion. He probably takes 15 or more medications in a day besides his breathing treatments and percussion.

There isn't a support group here in Hutchinson Kansas for people affected with Cystic Fibrosis but it would be beneficial if there were. I think the families could lean on each other and the knowledge that could be shared would be awesome. Sometimes it feels like you're going through this alone, the children, the mothers, the fathers, the siblings and yes the grandparents.