Snippets from our day

"Mom, Charlotte just spilled the syrup!"

"Charlotte, don't stick your hand into your poopy diaper."

"No wands at dinner please."

"Charlotte, don't play in the toilet!"

"Emily, no hitting Nan with the wand!"

"Nathalie, stop moving! One of the baby bunnies just fell out!"

"Charlotte NNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!" (as she dumped out an entire box of cereal)

"Nathalie, I'm not carrying that blanket into the library."

"Emily, you have to eat the egg white too, not just the yolk."

"Mommy, I don't like French toast. Just eggs." (From Nan as she devoured her 4th egg)

"Mom, the kids ate all my popcorn in my lunch."

"Mommy, can we please pick up Emily from school now? I miss her." (Nan at 1:30)

They make us laugh

Here are some funny stories of these little girls.

Every day after school I pick up Emily and a few other girls. The girls' mom takes Emily to school, so I take them home. Well yesterday Emily really had to use the bathroom so I dropped her off at home first. Matt was waiting for her and after attending to that need, she went outside with him and Charlotte and started playing. At one point, Charlotte was chasing Emily and Emily would turn around to laugh and say, "Come and get me!" Emily only turned her head around though.

Finally Emily turned her head a little too forcefully. And then she started yelling, "Ow, ow, ow my neck! Daddy, my neck! I can't move my neck!" She had gotten so into playing with Charlotte that she pulled a muscle in her neck! Matt kept a straight face until she wasn't looking.



Nathalie and I were talking the other day about cheetahs. We watched a few youtube videos on them. At the end of our "lesson", Nathalie said, "Mom, I really want to get a cheetah." I replied, "Nan, cheetahs are wild animals silly! They don't live in houses. Where would it run?" To which Nathalie responded, "Mom, the cheetah could run on the sidewalk."




We were in the backyard yesterday doing some gardening. Matt was watering and he asked the girls to help by taking buckets and watering our fruit trees (which are in buckets). When Charlotte heard him ask, she picked up a little toy bucket, filled it with water and carried it over to one of our trees. She did this three times (all on the same tree). What a good little worker!

A little lost in the shuffle, but not forgotten

Emily's birthday! Let's celebrate it!

Emily and Matt had a campout at Grandma's house with Emily's new sleeping bag. It was her first ever campout with just Dad. She was thrilled to be with him. We're going to go camping soon because she loved it so much. She also loves "special Daddy time" right now and often asks if they can just do something, the two of them. So this was huge for her.

 Emily's "Aurora dress". Only the 2nd thing I've ever made with a store pattern, and as usual, I used the pattern to get started then put it away and took off on my own. Despite being OCD, patterns just bother me. But it turned out GREAT. Emily loves it. Although she did get mad when I hemmed it. She wanted it to drag on the ground and I didn't. It's still long though!

 Best friends.

And let's not forget about sweet Nan. Nan, who saw the whole accident from the bike trailer. When I talked to Emily after school on Monday, she didn't ask about Charlotte. But the first thing Nan asked when I talked to her was, "Where's Charlotte? Is she okay?" And my beautiful girl who loved the few days alone with her grandma because she never gets alone with Grandma. Oh, you lucky girl!

And last but not least, Emily's first day of kindergarten! I forgot to take a picture before school so I was planning on taking one after...and obviously I couldn't. Luckily a wonderful friend took this of Emily and a friend in Emily's class. So cute!! She loves kindergarten so far.

My goodness, how time flies.

Unexpected

By now most of you know that last Monday, Charlotte and I were hit by a car that was backing out of the driveway. The driver didn't see us for the glare on the rear window. I was pushing my bike (with Charlotte in the front child seat between my seat and the handlebars) and my bike trailer (with Nan in it) up a hill. Charlotte had her helmet on. As the car got closer I smacked the back of it with my hand but it didn't stop in time. It hit me and my bike, knocking us both over before it stopped. Because Charlotte was buckled into the child seat she hit the ground too, really hard. The force of it knocked her unconscious.

I unbuckled her and her helmet and picked her up. The driver held her for a moment while I moved the bike and trailer out of the way, and then they drove us to the hospital. The driver sat with and occupied Nathalie while Charlotte was immediately strapped to a board. By the time we got to the hospital (about 10 minutes from the accident) Charlotte was starting to regain full consciousness. In those 10 minutes she had been in and out of consciousness in my arms.

At our hospital they did several CT Scans on her and discovered she had a fractured skull. We were transferred to Nationwide Children's in Columbus. Charlotte and I rode in the ambulance where she fell asleep. At Children's we met with 5 specialist teams. The diagnosis was: Charlotte has a fairly severe concussion. Because she was completely unconscious for 15-30 seconds and in and out of consciousness for 10 minutes, they (the specialists) knew her concussion was more than just a bump. She also has a left temporal lobe skull fracture. We were admitted to Children's and watched for 24 hours.

Charlotte was very sleepy until Tuesday (the 28th) morning. She threw up 3 times total. She had some blood draining into her middle ear which is normal and good. They want the blood to drain instead of staying with the brain and increasing pressure in the skull. She will have blood in her middle ear for the next few months and it will slowly break down into fluid and be reabsorbed by her body over this time. As for her skull fracture it occured very close to her left ear. We have to return to Children's for an appointment with the neurosurgery team where they make sure she is recovering well and an appointment with the Ear/Nose/Throat (ENT) team. The ENT team will run some tests on her. The biggest concern at this point (besides hitting her head again until she's healed) is that the fracture also damage some of the bones in the ear. Because the middle ear is filled with blood she can't hear very well out of that. But they won't know if she will have permanent hearing loss until our follow-up visit.

So how are we doing? We're doing better. Last week was hard and stressful. We missed Emily's first two days of kindergarten. Matt went 30 hours without sleep because he worked the night before the accident and had slept 20 minutes when some friends of ours woke him up to bring him to the hospital. I went about the same without sleep because I stayed with Charlotte overnight at Children's (I forced Matt to go to his brother's house to sleep) and held her all night. I am paranoid about Charlotte hitting her head again. The end of last week was hard emotionally as I struggled with various things, like reliving the accident over and over, anxiety and realizing that our sweet, sweet Charlotte could have had a very different outcome.

We are incredibly blessed. The fact that Charlotte only has a skull fracture as opposed to a crushed skull, that she didn't have any dangerous swelling or bleeding, that her neck wasn't injured, that the right people were in the right places at the right time (over and over and over), that our other daughters were scooped up and loved and didn't even realize they weren't with us, that every specialist and doctor we met with was excellent, was evidence of many things.

1 Nephi 21:13: Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; for the feet of those who are in the east shall be established; and break forth into singing, O mountains; for they shall be smitten no more; for the Lord hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.

 2 Nephi 9:52-53:  Behold, my beloved brethren, remember the words of your God; pray unto him continually by day, and give thanks unto his holy name by night. Let your hearts rejoice. (53) And behold how great the covenants of the Lord, and how great his condescensions unto the children of men; and because of his greatness, and his grace and mercy, he has promised unto us that our seed shall not utterly be destroyed, according to the flesh, but that he would preserve them;

Mosiah 2: 25 And now I ask, can ye say aught of yourselves? I answer you, Nay. Ye cannot say that ye are even as much as the dust of the earth; yet ye were created of the dust of the earth; but behold, it belongeth to him who created you.

It was very evident to us that our Heavenly Father was in complete control. I believe that the Father doesn't "make" bad things happen, but instead "let's" things happen. He let us get hit by that car. He also let us find Charlotte's helmet that morning at the very last minute (and without the helmet.....), let us have a doctor who thought and acted quickly, a nurse who called my in-laws, nurses who were on top of their game, the phone number of a good friend come to my mind, incredible specialists to be right there when we got to Children's, another friend to be right by her phone to take care of Emily, family members in Columbus who brought food and comfort, peace and clarity to my mind so that I didn't panic or go into shock, protection for me so that I only got a few bruises, protection for Charlotte. And He gave us protection for Charlotte.

We literally had hundreds of prayers. Mormon, Jewish, Episcopalian, Protestant, non-denominational, atheist, Baptist and I'm sure I'm missing some. We had prayers, phone calls, prayers, hugs, priesthood blessings, prayers and other blessings.

Charlotte is healing. She wouldn't be without His protection and without the prayers said on her behalf. Matt and I are only grateful. We're not angry or bitter at the driver. How can we be, when we have such a beautiful daughter to be grateful for?