On the fritz

I have tried on several occasions to post the rest of our Nauvoo photos with no luck. In the meantime life has been going on and I am now way behind on my blogging. One of these days I will figure out the problem. In the meantime I will be moving on with our blogging life.

Probably the biggest event(s) in our lives has been the rampant sickness in our home. Ryan was the first one to come down with the flu. He was staying with his cousins in Utah when he got sick. I went and picked him up on a Wednesday. He had a fever for the next 10-11 days. He had a sore throat, stomache ache, and cough. He didn't eat much and felt crummy all around. He laid around for about 2 weeks solid. It was horrible to watch him go through it. I did take him to the doctor to rule out strep and they sent us home to wait out the virus. In the meantime I had a family reunion and had my brother in town. We also had plans to go to Jackson for a few days. Ryan assured me that he was up for the trip. I figured he could lay around home or lay around at the cabin. Plus I figured at that point that his fever was going to break at any moment. Well it didn't and Ryan kept getting sicker. In Jackson I ended up taking him to the ER. (as a side note the er in Jackson was nice. There was no one else there and we had an awesome nurse and dr. ) They said that he was fine that it was just a virus and sent us home with cough syrup. The Dr. was puzzled that no one else in the family was sick. Remember virus's are very contagious. One other detail we found out was that Ryan was low on iron. So even when he started feeling better he was still really tired and it took him a long time to recover. Not only was he tired, but our skinny boy lost some weight too.

Breakfast alone at the cabin. Everyboday else went to Yellowstone. Notice Ryan ducking behind the bar, he was embarrassed that his shirt was off.

Our only excitement for the day was lighting a fire. Ryan was so excited and it kept him entertained for a couple of hours.

Poor sick boy! You can see it in his eyes.

Our next stress was Jeff having surgery. He is doing great, but it has been a lot of work for our family. I really took for granted the things that he helped me out with that he can no longer help with. ie taking out the trash, cleaning up after dinner, packing for a trip, carrying suitcases, coolers ect, unloading groceries, picking up toys. He is also not able to put on his own socks or tie his shoes. One other thing that is hard for him is bending down to put up the toilet seat.

Next, Taylor got the sickness. She had a fever for about a week followed by a cough that won't go away. She is now on her 13th day of sickness. The saddest part of her being sick is that she missed out on our family reunion with the McMinns. She was really disappointed that she couldn't go. She stayed home with dad and they watched plenty of Dora.

Ryan also had some stomache issues while we were at the cabin. Luckily after 4-5 days and some laxatives he is okay now.

Lastly Jeff had a stomache bug for about 4 hours on Tuesday. It was the weirdest thing. He threw up several times and had to come home from work. He slept for a couple of hours, ate lunch felt fine and went back to work in the afternoon. We are wondering if he had food poisoning or a reaction to his medication. We are just grateful it didn't last any longer.

So now we have had sickness and recovering for the last 4 weeks. I have been going crazy! I have had to miss out on so many fun things, and it has been miserable to watch my family suffer. It is a good thing that we have some fun things to look forward to. I don't want to sound like I am complaining too much. I am very aware that there are people out there facing more serious illness, heartache, and stress. Mostly I am just reporting the facts for our own records. I am grateful for the blessings in my life, including the challenges. It really makes us appreciate the good times.