Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Week 8: {Wild Card}

Well, this week I am cheating a bit and using pictures I took earlier this week at Dylan's appointment :) I had grand plans to try something fun, but God had other plans for me.  Those plans included taking care of sick kids and then getting strep throat myself. Fun, fun, fun! So this week, my title is {Thankful}.  No matter how crazy life gets, God always reminds me to have faith in Him and His timing and not my own.  Dylan is a product of His timing.  Even when our world was turned upsidedown, God had a plan.  We are so very thankful for each and every day with our perfectly imperfect Dylan.  He is perfectly and wonderfully made....just the way God wants him!


Wednesday, February 20, 2013

A Visit with Dr. Graham

Well it has been one year since Dylan has been in to see his oncologist, Dr. Graham.  He is now on a rotation of visits of 6months to a year, depending on how he is doing.  Praise God that he is overall a super healthy boy! He gets the normal kid stuff from the germy kids at school, but cancer wise, he is PERFECT!! Doctor Graham was impressed with his overall health and was very happy to see Dylan.  In the cancer world, there are so many "bad" cases, so the miracle cases like Dylan seem to cheer everyone up.  How can you not love his smile?! Well, that is, if he smiles during the appointment.  He always hates going to the doctor.  But this time he did surprisingly well while getting his vitals.  I do not think there has been a time where he did not bawl the entire time they did them.  This time he just observed and allowed the nurse to do her job.   I was a little shocked and very proud! He is growing up!
 


Speaking of growing up, Dylan has grown 2 inches and 2.5lbs in a year.  Although we are happy there is progress, he is still on the small side and not growing as fast as he should.  We have gone to an endocrinologist before and all of his labs were perfect.  So for now, we wait and rejoice with every little milestone and inch our little munchkin can get! We have been concerned for quite some time with Dylan's development, mainly speech.  He is only using about 15-20 words on a regular basis and seems to not be able to put some sounds together.  The doc is not sure why this is happening.  He has treated many, many kiddos and this is not too common, at least not this delayed.  He wants to do a full developmental screening along with a possible MRI to rule out any kind of brain damage from his treatments.  Since we currently do not have insurance for Dylan, this may be a difficult task.  It would cost thousands of dollars for both of these things.  We are going to try and apply for another government program in April once Dylan turns 4.  He was denied last year, but we can try again.  Please pray for us to be able to find some sort of affordable program to provide for his needs.  God is the ultimate healer and has healed Dylan of his cancer. We know He can also take care of the little details such as insurance too!  Dylan will be seeing his eye doctor on March 4th.  We are going to attempt to use the new snazzy tool to take his pressure in the office.  PLEASE pray that this works!
If it does not work, then we know that God will provide the funds to do the procedure under anesthesia. 
We are so very thankful for every single day with our spunky little Dylan.  He is a daily reminder of God's faithfulness and grace.  Thank you for being faithful friends and prayer warriors! We love you guys!!
The following picture is the last part of the visit and Dylan was DONE! He cracks me up :)

Week 7: {Negative Space...it's a positive!}

This week's challenge was to involve negative space in my photos.  While I tend to do this a lot anyway, it was fun to be purposeful about it.  Negative space just means space in the picture that is not focused on the subject, and therefore makes the subject stand out more.  Sometimes it is fun to fill the whole frame with your subject, and sometimes it adds a different twist to leave some negative space in there. 
My friend and I took our kiddos out for a little photo adventure in a nearby parking garage.  We went on a saturday so there was hardly anyone there.  The kiddos loved it! They loved running around in a new environment. (Disclaimer: We were very careful to make sure no cars were entering without our knowledge, and there was litterally nobody there) Andrew has just started to walk really well and was enjoying the freedom and chasing around his little friends.  We meant to do this last week to get some Valentine's pictures.  I had a little banner and everything! But sickness kept us away.  I am so thankful all of that is over! I managed to get a few good ones of the boys.  They never cooperate and do what I want them to do, but I guess that is all part of the fun?! Happy Valentines Week!!
  

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Week 6: {Good Morning}

Dylan is our little rooster.  He is always the first one up, letting the rest of us know that the day is ready to begin.  He has to stay in his room and be quiet until 7, but I cannot seem to keep him quiet much longer than that.  He will usually play in our room until Andrew wakes up.  As soon as he hears Andrew in the monitor, he runs out the door yelling "Bubba! Bubba!" eager to greet his best friend! It is still a little dark by 730 in the morning so Dylan usually startles Andrew with the blaring lights and excessive excitement.  Nevertheless, Andrew loves his morning greeter. They are so cute together! I hope they always are this excited to see each other in the morning :)

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Week 5: Finding the Light

This week's challenge was "Finding the Light."  Although I had many ideas of what I wanted to do, life got in the way.  This has been an exhausting week.  Dylan has had a cold/flu all week and just has not been himself.  Then he shared it with his brother.  He does not like to share toys, but germs are no problem.  The first few days I did really well keeping them from kissing each other and drinking from each other's cups, but then I gave up.  They are crazy with their water bottles and are always stealing them from each other in attempt to empty it before the other gets it back.  Seriously, these kids are crazy! So anyways, Dylan is on the mend and now Andrew has the ickies.  Nevertheless, the show must go on and I must finish my weekly challenge.  Since I could'nt get outside, I decided to go to my next favorite lit spot, our bedroom.  Normally my room gets amazing natural light, but today was cloudy.  I still managed to get some cute ones even though Mr. Andrew was a little less than cooperative.  Dylan definitely hammed it up this time, which is rare.  He will usually run from me when I bring out the camera.  There is just something magical about playing on mom and dad's bed.  My niece recently fell off of her mom's bed and broke her elbow, OUCH!! So now I am even more careful when they are horsing around on our bed.  Today's shots show a little of the craziness that is my LIFE! I love them and love that there is never a dull moment around here.  Enjoy!