Everything Else.

Here are some other happenings that went on during the month of September,

We went to a swim party at Kwintons Aunts house.

Nobody almost drowned this year!

Kwinton J gets cuter everyday

We went to The Gardens at Thanksgiving Point.

This was a maze through bushes.

Kwinton knows a baby hater when he sees one.

He is not happy to be with Angie.

The kids climbed rocks. Oh, and Angie.

My dad and mom!!! I love them!!!

Aren't they the cutest?

Gabriel caught a dragonfly and tied it onto this vine.

He said he wanted to go fishing with it. Gross.

Our attempt at a family picture. Kwinton J is sleeping in

his stroller and of course crazy child is fighting with me.

We also went to Liberty Park. I am pretty sure it was

transvestite day there. Which is fine. None of my business.

However I am not quite ready to explain that to my kids.

Kwinton loved playing in the water though.

So we went into the Tracy Aviary.

This is Kwintons Mowgli crawl he did it for about 2 months

before he learned to walk.

The girls

Some of the boys. The young lad in the middle is Jarom.

He is Chris and Megs crazy child.

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Gabe and Kwinton. SOOOO HANDSOME!!

My nephew Bain had a birthday party. He is the one

in the cooler.

This is his older brother Tae bringing out homemade

light sabers.

Then chaos broke loose.

This is Cali hiding from the chaos.

Cole and his grandpa Franc. I don't know what it is about

his Grandpa, but Cole LOVES him. All of my other kids are

afraid of him.

Kwinton J got this crazy rash.

It didn't seem to bug his and it went away in a few days.

But it totally freaked me out.

Cali and Gabe won all of these prizes from school.

Selling ALL these books.

My niece Emma turned 9. She had a Hollywood Party!

The kids all walked the red carpet and posed for the paparazzi.

It was a ton of fun. Cute Cali.

Haha. His face is priceless.

Then they had a dance party.

And last but not least Gabe pulled out the moves!!!

The scoop.

So I figure that anyone who actually reads my blog, which is probably 5 people, already know what is going on in my life. However, I am going to post a little bit about it for those of you that I don't speak to on a daily basis so you don't get all of the fun updates(Which is maybe 1 or 2 of you.) haha.

How it started.

I have been getting migraines for YEARS! Literally years. I would say something like 13 years. The past few years have just gotten really bad. To the point where even if I don't have a migraine my head still hurts. Dr.s have tried putting me on meds which I refuse. I do not want to have to take a pill everyday for the rest of my life. So I insisted that my Dr. look deeper and find out WHY??? Why does my head hurt? Am I crazy?

Turns out I am NOT crazy!!!

My Dr. gave me a referral to a Neurologist which I couldn't get into for 2 months. So why we were waiting on that appointment he sent me in to have an Eco on my heart. I wasn't really sure why, but hey I am not the Dr. It was at that Eco that they found what they were looking for. A hole between two chambers of my heart. I left there with little information just the knowledge that it was there. After a week of wondering what in the world it meant the Dr. finally called me. Turns out it is pretty common. About 25% of people have this hole. However it usually goes unnoticed. A small percentage of those people however are affected by it.

How is this giving me headaches????

Now I cant explain things nearly as good as the Dr but here is what I understand. Blood is leaking through the hole in my heart. Your blood is supposed to travel through 2 chambers of your heart then go to the lungs to get filtered then back through the other 2 chambers of the heart and to your brain. Well, since I have a hole all of my blood is mixing together and sending "un-filtered" blood to my brain. Which likely includes tiny blood clots. Potentially causing headaches!!

Whats next....

I have just been through a week of tests ordered by my surgeon. It was a longer week than I thought it would be, but I made it through. The results from all the test have shown that I have a moderate size hole in my heart however it is letting a lot of blood through. This is a concern because it puts me at a bit of a risk to have strokes in my lifetime. Everyone is technically at risk of having strokes I am just at a higher risk. I also met with a Neurologist this week, (Yes, the appointment I made 2 months ago finally rolled around) and it was a total nightmare. She was an awful lady who made ME feel like a crazy person for not just wanting to be put on a medication for my headaches. "Forgive me for wanting to find out why my head hurts all the time, and not wanting to just drug it out of me." Anyway, I am hoping to meet with my surgeon again this week now that all the tests are complete and talk about my options.

To fix or not to fix.....

There is a lot of controversy about enclosing these holes in hearts. From a cardiovascular standpoint my hole is big enough that from what I understand it should be fixed. It will reduce my risk of strokes, and hopefully give me a bit more energy.

From a neurological standpoint there have bin studies done on migraines being linked to heart murmurs. They have all however been inconclusive. However in my own "research" which consists of me using google to the best of my limited ability (haha) there are thousands of people that have have the enclosure sugery and say that it reduced and even got rid of migraines. I am just praying that I am one of these people and it works for me too.

On a lighter note Kwinton J has learned to walk. This is us bribing him to walk to us with fruit snacks!

Birthdays

Cole and Kwinton J. had a big birthday party. Cole had two requests for his birthday.

#1 water balloons and #2 to smash his cake in his face. They seemed like pretty reasonable request to me.

Getting ready for the water fight

GO!!!

It was just a cupcake but he was so happy!

Kwinton smashed his cupcake into his face too

Then he went into what I like to call a food coma.

Side note- Kwinton loves when Cali hides behind the pillar and scares him.

Well, now that she has started school he just crawls around looking for her. SAD

I know I am about a month late here, but as they say "better late than never!" This year we had our usual 24th of July festivities going on up at our cabin. With as crazy as life is getting this is actually the only time we have been able to make it up to the cabin this year. It's not looking good for the rest of the summer either. The kids always have a blast up there and so do I. Its a nice way to get the kids away from their usual entertainment which for the most part includes some sort of electronics.

The Crew!!

Me and Cali

Amber and Amy (Amy had her baby last week)

Kwinton and Chris R.

Kids in dirty pool (seriously look at that water)

Cole

The kids got to dig in sawdust for candy, and prizes.

Kwinton J. got to go first! He loved it!

The little kids. Cole, Jarom, Kyla, and Landrie

The middle kids. Cali, Enoch, Hannah, and Payton

The big kids. Gabriel, Emma, and Sierra

While the other kids were digging in the sawdust Kwinton

found some lunch scraps someone left behind!!!


Cali getting ready for the parade.

Enoch and Gabriel

Cole

Cali and Hannah (There besties!!)