catching you up

well, yesterday marked the two month mark since my radiation treatment for graves disease. i went back for a follow up consultation and he wanted to do labs to test my T3 and THC levels. i got the results back this morning. it was not what i had hoped to hear, but definitely not the worst it could have been. the treatment is working, but it is taking longer than expected to destroy all the stored up hormones and the thyroid gland itself. this just means that instead of beginning to take the synthroid now, i am going to have to wait a while longer. i am waiting two more weeks and going back for another test. he says i willprobably have puffy eyes and/or muscle cramps when it is complete. hopefully, by then, it will be gone and i can begin the road to normalcy.

last night bret and i got very limited sleep. anna and rebekah were crying with earaches. bekah was up from 10-2 and anna was up from 2-5. poor bret had to get up and leave by 7:30. i tried to do most of the getting up with the girls, but at 5 i was purely exhausted. he got up with anna, then, for a while. finally, she got in bed with me when he got up and went to sleep. we (anna, bekah, and me) slept till 9. i got them in to see dr. curtis today. bekah has a severe double ear infection, but anna's ears were basically clear. she went ahead and gave me a prescription for both of them. i hope we all sleep better tonight.

micah had his 4 year check up yesterday. i know it is about 6 months late, but i was not up to it when it first came due. he is required to get one for school entrance. he was so brave. he was due for 5 immunizations. bret took him, since i had another doctors appointment at the same time. i was really relieved that bret was going to be with him instead of me. he was so brave. he only teared up for a miniute, bret said, and then walked out to meet me in the van with a smile on his face. we took he and anna to get chocolate milkshakes for being so good. anna did a superb job for me since she and bekah went with me to my drs. appointment.

we may be dog owners again tomorrow night. i have gone back and forth with this decision and still have not made it completely. micah and anna are begging for a dog. i really want my kids to grow up with a dog. i think there is a lot of value in having a family pet--responsibility and companionship to name a few. we have a back yard, but it is not big enough to be a home for a dog. we would have to have a house dog. i have determined if we get one i want it to be already potty trained so i don't have to sacrifice my new carpet. i want it to be very small, so it is easy to travel with us when we go on long trips to see family. but we can also leave it in the garage or back yard for several days when we are traveling if we need to. we have found one, or shall i say one has found us. a friend of one of our praise team members is moving to the ukraine this summer to teach for 2 years. she cannot take her dogs with her. she has two full blooded shih tzus. one is black and named isabelle, (izzy for short) and the other is white and black and named chloe. they are 3 years old, fully immunized, pottytrained and crate trained. they are gentle and she is giving them away (free) to a home she is comfortable with giving them to. this dog meets almost all of my criteria. isabelle is also the name the kids and i had talked about before ever learning of these two dogs. even using izzy for short. it almost feels providential. but, shih tzus were one of the ones further down on my list of breeds i wanted to consider. we meet them tomorrow. i will let you know if there are any new members of our family soon. if we like her and feel like she is a fit for us, she can come home with us tomorrow night. the kids really liked her by her picture. i will try to post her picture for you all.

i plan on posting about my weekend with bret this past weekend, soon. but until then, you can read about it on his blog, bret.blogspot.com. love ya'll,
summer