Swelling

Okay, now we're seeing more of what the doctor was talking about...



- Posted from my iPhone

Surgery

Sarah wanted me to post some pictures from Michael's surgery yesterday, so be forewarned. He is doing much better. The swelling has gone down significantly and he's not near as bruised up as they thought he would be. The pain must be tolerable now because he's no longer asking for pain reliever. We are still having some trouble with bleeding, so he's having to stay down quite a bit, not that he really feels like being up to do anything.
This picture is of the Squamous cell carcinoma after it's regrowth from the biopsy and the marks for the cutting pattern:




After his surgery, with 18 external stitches (I didn't ask how many they put on the internal layer that will dissolve).



The piece removed:







Today, looking and feeling better:



Thank you all for your continued prayers for our family. They are much appreciated!
Joshalyn

- Posted from my iPhone

Warning: Important Post!

This is a very special post. However, you will have to read the whole thing to find out why…

On Saturday, Daddy and Mommy spent several hours in our living room, touch up painting and putting up our new wooden blinds. The blinds keep the sun out much better than our old blinds did!


Wallace was Daddy’s special helper. However, it takes Wallace much longer to place a screw, so they were working into the night!


Because they didn't get everything completed on Saturday, on Monday Mommy decided she would surprise Daddy and have the flooring done when he got home from work, with the help of Sydnee and Abby (and all of us older girls watching the 7 little ones that are 6 and under)!



They had a great time and were nearly done when, unfortunately, Mommy was trimming a piece of flooring and cut her hand with a box blade knife! It was a really bad cut...we could see the bone in her thumb! Abby called Daddy at work and he came home and took Mommy to Urgent Care. It was gaping open so wide, they had to DermaBond it together before they could do anything else. Then, they put in 4 staples because Mommy refused anesthetic and the doctor thought that might be less painful. After he got the staples in, though, they decided that the staples stuck up too far and would be likely to get caught on something and rip out. The doctor pulled them out and put in 6 stitches, all without anesthetic! He said he had never given a patient stitches without anesthetic! Why did she refuse it, you might ask? Because we just found out Mommy is expecting baby "12"! How very exciting!

None of us thought to get pictures in all the chaos, though we thought later it would have been really neat to show the huge hole in Mommy's hand where you could see all the insides and muscle and everything, right down to the bone! However, here are some pictures of her stitches and the wrap that they put on so her thumb would stay up close to her hand. Mommy thinks that's pretty funny since she can't move her thumb anyway because they think she may have severed a nerve!


Anyway, just for fun, we are going to try not to tell anyone about the new baby until after Daddy's birthday, except for those special friends who read my blog! So, if you talk to anyone...shhhhh! Don't tell - it's a secret! And, if you're one of the first 5 people to comment, email, or call us to let us know you know, I'll send you a special gift!

posted by the blessed sister to 11 and aunt to 2 - Sarah

Calvin is 1!

I can't believe Calvin is one already! He is such a sweet, little, cuddley guy. He is going though a "Sarah" phase right now, which, I must admit, I LOVE. The other day he took me over Mommy - Mommy isn't quite sure if she likes that or not, but since it was only once, she's okay.

Calvin has 3 words: baby, dog (which was his first word) and cat. We find it interesting that he hasn't said Momma or Daddy yet.

Gift Time!

Calvin got a new slide which he loves. He is getting brave enough that he likes to go down it standing up......?! But in the beginning, he preferred to sit on the box it came in!

Calvin really enjoied his first cupcake and his birthday prayer with Daddy!

Daddy does a dedication with each of us on our first birthday where he goes over what our name means, why we were given those particular names, his hopes and prayers for our lives, and then he publically dedicates us to God and gives us our first Bible.

Calvin really loves the Bible Mommy and Daddy got for him. He is already practicing preaching from it! Hopefully, he will live up to his namesake and become a fiery preacher of God's Word!

Happy birthday, sweet Calvin! We love you!

posted by the blessed sister of 10 and aunt to 2 - Sarah

Payton

We've had a great time with Payton! She's gone home now, but she'll be back later this month, along with Hayden! We're very excited to see them both!

Sydnee, especially, had a lot of fun with Payton! Payton loves to be carried around and Sydnee was happy to oblige!

Payton loved our indoor swing! She is such a fun little girl! It was a pleasure to have her here!

posted by the blessed sister of 10 and aunt to 2 - Sarah

Thanksgiving Celebration

We had such a great Thanksgiving this year! All of us girls had a great time helping Mommy prepare all the food. Even Elly and Selah were big helpers and it was a lot of fun to have us all helping in the kitchen!

Abby made "Turkey Cupcakes!" They looked fantastic! It took a lot of work, but the finished product was well worth it!

This year, we spent Thanksgiving with dear friends: Mr. and Mrs. C, Savannah, Sabrina, Sienna, Stasia, Seth, Sayer, Shenandoah, Mr. H, Hannah, and Liberty. We had such a relaxing time and really enjoyed getting to know Hannah and Liberty. We look forward to meeting the rest of the "H" family soon!

We got this picture of the "C" and "O" children. Savannah has some great "Then and Now" shots on her blog. You can see them at http://thefamilycochran.blogspot.com/2010/12/thanksgiving-weekend-2010-part-2.html

Good friends, good times:

What a lot of blessing! Hope everyone else had a wonderful Thanksgiving, too!

posted by the blessed sister of 10 and aunt to 2 - Sarah

Idelette

Well, unfortunately, our 2nd big dog, Ron, ran away. He's been gone for well over a month now and, though we've looked for him, I don't think he'll be coming back. That being said, Daddy decided that Oxy is now lonely and needed an outdoor companion. Around that same time, a very funny thing happened. Mommy decided one day that she wanted to reward all of us children with ice cream because we had all been working so hard, so she took us to the only restaurant in town that has ice cream. Well, when we got there and sat down for them to take our order we found out that THEY WERE OUT OF ICE CREAM! We couldn't believe it! Even though they are a restaurant that serves food, they have a wide selection of ice cream, almost like a Baskin Robbins or something, with an ice cream case that has about 12 selections. We were pretty disappointed, but Mommy said we could go to the grocery store in town and pick out a gallon to take home. Well, right outside the store there was a poster for Great Pyrenees puppies! We tried hard to convince Mommy that it was Providence! The next day, Daddy took us to look at the puppies and we got to bring one home! She's a beautiful Pyrenees and we named her Idelette (for all you Church history buffs, yes, Idelette Calvin)! We call her Ida, but Mommy calls her the little potato!

Isn't she adorable?

posted by the blessed sister of 10 and aunt to 2 - Sarah

Quilt and visit

We recently had a great visit with some dear friends! They just had baby #7, their first boy! What an exciting time! He is named after his father and he is a beautiful little boy! While looking back over my pictures for my post, I realized I made a huge mistake...no pictures of him! I couldn't believe it! Maybe this will explain why...

We were all excited to play with their new pony! She is very sweet, maybe a little headstrong, but still very young. She is beautiful and it was a lot of fun to be out in the pasture with her!

Here is our latest quilt project for the "D" baby:

We have a couple of other quilts that we are working on right now. What a blessing it is to have babies!

posted by the blessed sister of 10 and aunt to 2 - Sarah