Jena and Blue and Gold Banquet 2010

Just a Jena up-date first:  She was off to school on Friday (with the doctor's permission).  She has done so great recovering that we decided she might as well be at school.  She is still one happy camper to have the stuff gone from her mouth.  Now she is looking forward to getting her new "pink" Personal Progress book tomorrow night at New Beginnings and not looking forward to getting braces.

Everyone else is hanging in there.  We are happy to have a sunshiney Monday with blue skies and fluffy clouds for a morning or so.  I looked to see if there were signs of crotus or tulips yet, but no signs in the front yard which is north facing...maybe in the back.

We had an outstanding Blue and Gold Banquet.  Because of the size of our Scout Pack, we only invite the scouts and their parents to the Blue and Gold.  Our theme was "In the Spotlight" presented by the Pack 838 Players.  The gym was set up as a park with a pretend stage.  The scouts brought blankets to sit with their parents on the floor while the 11 yr. old Scouts served a picnic like dinner (BBQ sanwiches, chips, veg. with dip, and a bottle of water (Note to those who are involved in such things--no tables, centerpieces, placemats, chairs...I think you get the picture.  Of course, we had over 8 Christmas trees to set up to make our park, but no cost in that.)  We had a red carpet and each of our Scouts were introduced with some fun facts and they got to walk down the red carpet.  After dinner, we divided into the dens and the moms and dads were also their own group.  I had the 12 pre-scouts who will turn 8 this year.  We all were given props and we had to make a skit and then perform it.  It turned out great with the Moms' skit "AB C Scout Soup" and the dad's "Visit to the Land of Oz" being the big hits.

The boys each received an Oscar neckerchief slid (our Pack Committee Chairmen, Cindy Anderson, makes a slide for each month).  In addition they all got a slide holder.  See pictures.  Sorry I don't have great pictures of our Walnut Grove Park.  My camera set at the Church while I was busy doing things in the background.  These are some pictures of my slide and holder.

It is so amazing what people can do and the time that they will spend to provide a wonderful time for the Cub Scouts.  It is such a good program for boys to be involved in.  I told Scott the other day that I am excited for the time when I can go to Pack Meetings and be involved with my grandsons.  Scouts is definately something that Scott and his sons will be involved in.  Scott liked scouts a lot himself.

Happy Valentine's Day and Happy Chinese New Year, too!

Each of our kids got matching gifts this year which include a 72 hr. kits, an emergency number card, candy (different for each one, of course).  Jena did the cards that went on top, although I wrote inside of her card and she did all of the others.

My gift to my sweet husband!

Picture is one that Jena was trying to take of the two of us that Gary kept messing up by being silly. 

This was at the Amarillo KOA Kampgroup during our Giberson Family Reunion last summer.

Gung Hei Fat Choi

Year of the Tiger

(over our dining room table)

No Chinese dinner today.  Jena isn't quite ready for that. 

We will head out in a couple of weeks and have Chinese food with the kids (who can come anyway!)

Whatever you are celebrating today, know that I wish the best for all of you.

From our house to yours---

Actual Photographs....

We had some requests to see the hardware since we had brought it home with us.  So here is the picture of what was in her mouth.  It is actually quite unbelievable that it all fit in there (and makes me wish I had even been more impressed with how she managed it all).

Notice the official ruler to show the actual size of everything.  We saw everything somewhat on an xray last week, but it is more impressive in "real life".  You can't see it but on the lower ends of those metal pieces are small screws that we turned twice a day for the first two weeks.

We are just glad to be done with that part of everything.

Here is Jena's heart and letter (and her swollen cheeks--she didn't know she was in the picture) that we started last week and are finishing up today.  They are drying and then we will spray them with glitter and they are done.

We are home

Jena did so well over night that she was discharged this morning and we are back at home a day or two earlier than planned (I actually had some books I was planning on reading, but at home there are things to do!).  She is very swollen and can only eat soft foods for two weeks but for her its all better than before with everything in her mouth.

She didn't sleep at all during the day after the surgery, went to bed at her usual time, woke up several times during the night to be checked or to go to the bathroom, due to the IVs., and then woke up at her usual time and has not slept at all today.  I on the otherhand took a nap yesterday afternoon in her room and then another nap when we got home today.  This hospital stuff wears me out.  Apparently, not Jena!

It is good to be almost done with this part of things...next will be braces.  Hopefully we can wait until the beginning of summer to do that.  We will see the orthodontist in the next month or so.

Hi from Primary's

I am here at Primary's with a very happy young woman without wires and screws.  She is doing great.  The surgery was at 11:00 and by 12:30 she was done.  The doctor was very pleased with how everything went and how her jaw looks now.  He did have to stitch a few stitches in her cheek where the post was on one side had torn a hole over the past few months.  She went to intensive care for about 4 hours but she was doing great so they sent her to a regular surgical ward around 5:00.  There is even a chance that she might go home tomorrow which would be great.

Jena is happy to have everything out of her mouth into a container that she can take to school to show.  She said she is happy to talk and to be able to feel her teeth with her tongue.  She is starting to swell some and that will be a problem for a week or so, but that is much better than having stuff in her mouth.

She saw me writing this post and said to say that she misses everyone.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers in her behalf.

Have a good night.

A switch in plans

Just wanted to let everyone know that Jena's surgery which was scheduled for Friday will now be done on Thursday morning.  The doctor's office called yesterday and asked if we would be willing to switch as they needed to reshuffle some surgeries to make room for another patient.  Of course, I had Thursday stuffed with things to do right before her surgery, but, of course, those things can wait (or I can get them done tonight and tomorrow).  Our other "choice" would have been in April, which none of us wanted nor would it have been good for her jaw to have the metal in that much longer.  So we switched things around and we will be there on Thursday.  Hopefully we will be home on Saturday or Sunday.

We will up-date through this blog so watch for things here.  That worked well last time.

Jena's Day of Joy

Sorry these are a bit out of order.  I did the smile box of our train trip first, but the Winter Quarter activity was yesterday.  And now I am finishing with today.  Jena and I headed down to Salt Lake to pick up my dad and Karla and headed to the Red Robin for lunch--yum.  Then we headed down to an indoor train show.  (You can see the pictures in the smilebox below).  It was fun to see the trains, especially the garden trains.  I would like to build one in our backyard someday.

After visiting with them for awhile, we headed over to a nearby wood shop and got some wood letters for our next fun time.  We headed to our friends, Debbie and Kaitlyn.  They enjoyed playing and painting the wood letters, we enjoyed visiting and eating some great chili.

We finally headed home around 8:30 p.m.  Jena told me "I had day of joy."  So I guess it was a good day.  Sometimes it is fun to do things with your mom and other great people.

Hope you had a 'day of joy".

"Winter Quarters"--Syracuse style

We had our "Winter Quarters" Primary Activity yesterday.  It is the first of our three Quarterly Acitvities based on the poineer trek.  We were hoping to have a lot cold snow to try to get our kids a small taste of what it would have been like for the children back then.  We have had unseasonably warm weather and no snowfall so our snow all melted.  Luckily, we had a breeze and a bit of rain so it gave them some cold to deal with.  It only lasted one hour and it worked well.  We had a fire with songs, snow games (had to improvise for those), cooked cheese bread in a dutch oven, and I had a tarp lean-to and we cuddled under it and share a bit about the history and then played a couple of children games.  We are also doing a Primary sampler and started getting the kids to make a stitch on it before we framed it.

It was fun even for us even with cleanup.  The kids thought it was great.  They are curious about what we are going to do next time "On the Trail", then we will have our own short trek for the Primary kids in the heat of June.

I was hoping to include a picture or two but we all forgot our camera, so we will have to wait to get come copies from some of our teachers who took pictures.

Visit to the Train Show

Make a Smilebox slideshow