Needing Prayer!

Wow, this is not the time of year you want to be visiting someone in the hospital! (Not that you want to any time of the year for that matter!)
We got a call Tue. night from Doug's Aunt Ty (Doug's mom's sister) They were having an ambulance come to take her husband, Steve, to the hospital. He was having a lot of pain in his chest and it felt like an elephant was sitting on him. They were pretty sure he was having a heart attack. They did tests and found he wasn't having a heart attack, but he had several blood clots in his lungs. (They admited him that night.) The next morning they went to turn Steve on his side and he started having a major heart attack. (This was his 4th) They did some more tests and found that the valve on his heart is not working correctly so the other half of his heart is enlarged because it's working over time. His blood pressure and pulse is back to normal so they think they have the clots disolved. The have him sedated enough to have a tub down his throat (Sorry, no technical terms) That way his heart can be resting and not having to work so hard. If he can fight through this they'll perform surgery. The Dr's have said he'll have to fight! So far he is. Right now the family can use all the prayer they/we can get!
God will never give us more then we can handle! It just seems hard sometimes! Thanks in advance for the prayers!

Holiday Season

It's amazing how time flies! I can't believe Thanksgiving has already past and Christmas is only 2 1/2 weeks away! We love being with our families during the holidays. It's kind of a curse and a blessing. The mojority of our family lives around here, so we have to squeeze in all the family gatherings! It's so fun watching all the great-grandkids play. The majority of them, on the West side, were born in a 4 year span. Below is a picture of the 5 that were at Thanksgiving. (One of the better pics.) It's impossible to get 5 kids to sit still and smile at the same time :-)
Zoey, Madilyn, Ainsley, Rhange, and Caden (All West's)

I'm so thankful that I've been able to get all of our Christmas shopping done so quickly this year! I try to start earlier in the year, because of Doug's work, money is usually tight in the winter time. This year was the first year I actually went shopping on Black Friday. My sisters and I found a lot of good deals! I'm not a huge shopper, but I don't mind doing a major trip once a year. Going with my sisters helped and it keeps us entertained! It is definitely a nice relief to know I'm done!

This past weekend we did our Christmas pictures. I made a deal with Doug that we only have to do family pictures for Christmas, one time a year. (He's not a big picture fan.) This year it went really quick and smooth. I know it helps since the kids are getting older! We even had time to get a picture of the 3 cousins on the White side. Now I need to work on Christmas cards... I'm out of excuses :-)

West Family December 2008

Doug & Tiffany

Madilyn & Caden

Our Handsome Cade

Our Beautiful Madi Rai

Ty 16 months, Madilyn 2 1/2 yrs, Caden 4 yrs

It's been awhile...

Where to start... I'm not doing so well on keeping up with things!

The kids enjoyed Halloween this year. They're both at the age where they enjoy dressing up and seeing everyone... the candy is an added bonus! (They don't realize yet that Daddy get's the majority of it.) Cade was a Good Pirate and Madi was a Fairy Princess.

About a month ago (Nov. 9th) we found out that my cousin passed away. It still seems surreal! He was 6 months older then me and had moved up her with my Aunt. They were living with my Grandma for now. From what I gather he was really excited to restart things up in Springfield. I was looking forward to getting to know him better, but God had other plans. It helps knowing I'll see him again someday! My Aunt was still in the hospital, from having back surgery when my Dad and Grandma found him. She was released that day to come home. I know it's been hard on my Aunt and Grandma! God holds us and guides us through!

I use to babysit a little girl , Emilee, that's 10 months younger then Madi. I watched her for 6 months, I then realized I was not one of those moms that could babysit in my home full time. It's not bad every once in awhile, but consistantly.... just not my cup of tea. I've actually started watching her again on occasional Saturdays to help her parents out. I know all three of the kids get a kick out of it! It's someone different to play with. One of the Saturdays I was watching her, my mom, sisters, nephew, my kids, and I went and took pictures at a pumpkin patch/maze place in Marionville. We were able to get a couple good pics of each kid.

Emilee 20 months

Madilyn 2 1/2 years with Earl the dog.

Caden 4 years old.... so grown up!

My nephew Ty, 14 months

Cade & Madi

I Know Prayer Works!

Sat. Sept. 20th was an interesting day! Doug was bow hunting Friday night and through the day Sat. My mom and I took the kids to the Safetypalooza in Nixa. It was fun... Cade got his bike helmet fitted to him, and Madi got a new helmet and it was fitted to her. The kids got to shoot an air riffle, crawl in a Sheriff's car, and a fire truck. Cade even got to ride his bike through little coarses, even learning hand signals. When we registered they got entered to win a bike. They did drawings every 30 min. We had fun doing everything and when we were loading everything in to the truck, I got a call saying Madi won a bike. She was excited to pick out her own big bike!

After that the kids and I drove to Ash Grove for a family reunion on Doug's side of the family.

Early evening my mom, Judy, mopped the floor. After she got done, her stomach was cramping and felt bloated, she was feeling light headed and her chest was cramping. She decided it was best to call an ambulance. Just in case! The ER told her they use to send women home with symptoms like that and the majority would come back in 3 to 4 days and had had a major heart attack. They did a lot of blood work and a chest x-ray Sat. evening. They kept her over night and Sunday morning they had her do a stress test. The Dr. came in that morning and said it could be stress, muscle strain or 3/4 of the time it ends up being acid reflux disease. Sunday afternoon they let her go home, all of the test came back fine! They said her liver count was a little high, but that's nothing major. We're just glad it wasn't a heart attack or anything major!

My younger sister, Tracy, told us she was expecting again on Ty, her son's first birthday, Aug. 21st. (they would be 20 months apart) She had some spotting and cramping on Sat. and we told her to take it easy and drink LOTS of water. We wouldn't let her go garage sale shopping with my mom and I. Sunday morning she called us saying that she went ahead and went to the ER Sat. night. After running some test and doing an ultra sound, they told Tracy and Craig that they couldn't find a heart beat. (The Dr. told them that around 50% of pregnancy's end in misscarriage.- that's crazy! We don't realize how often it happens!) Initially they talked about doing a DNC (cleaning everything out) Sunday morning. Luckily her body did everything on it's own! Although it's hard think they lost a baby, God has completely had his hand on them. Tracy has had a peace! They know there was a reason for it. It makes it a little easier since she was only 12 1/2 weeks along. They didn't know if it was a girl or boy and they had seen the heart beat, but never heard it. Plus she has Ty to help keep her occupied. We know God works in mysterious ways and He is amazing!
Thanks for everyone's prayers!

A Crappy Day!

Being a mom... is interesting! Yesterday I took the kids to McDonald's and met a friend of mine (Courtney) there. The kids ate their lunch and then played for awhile. Cade came down saying he needed to go potty. So I had both of them get their shoes on and we were going to make a potty trip. Cade decided he wanted to play a little longer, because he knew once we were done with the bathroom trip we were going to leave. I thought, he must not have to go very bad, he'll come back down when he really needs to. About 5 minutes later Courtney and I were thinking.. Man, Cade's been quiet. I hollered at him and I saw him stand up in one of the big bubbles. I was shocked to see that he was wearing his shirt and underwear only. (And his underwear was on backwards.) I told him to put his shorts on and quickly get himself down to me. I looked at Courtney and slightly laughed. At this point I could laugh, cry, I was embarrassed, mortified, and shocked.... I couldn't believe what had just happened. Unfortunately my first thought was, we could leave now and no one would know. That thought didn't last long, I wouldn't want other kids to find it. (Luckily my 2 kids were to only ones in there.) So... I sucked up my pride and went up to the girl at the register, I told her what happened and asked her if they had something to clean it up with and I would go up there. She giggled over it and spoke with the manager. An Asst. Manager said she'd clean it up, she had five kids and it wasn't a big deal. I was so embarrassed and kept insisting that I would clean it up. The Asst. Manager went in and couldn't find her way to the right bubble. She was feeling claustrophobic so she came out. I asked again if she'd give the stuff to me and I would go up. She said she'd let me, only because of her feeling claustrophobic. Courtney ended up taking the paper towels and cleaner and going up there. (She's a nurse and deals with poop and stuff all the time. I was very thankful for her doing it!) I felt so bad, it took her a good 10 min. up in that thing.
We immediately went to the bathroom to get everything cleaned up. I had to change his clothes and wipe him down. Then, while helping Madi go to the bathroom, she almost fell in the toilet. I was ready to go home! I pray no other moms ever have to deal with anything like that, how embarressing!

The Begining!

I finally decided to start one of these blog thingies! Hopefully, I don't bore to many people and I can keep things updated.

It's amazing how time flies by! When you're little you can't wait till you graduate high school and find prince charming and live happily ever after. I just had my 10 year class reunion this summer, talk about time flying by! Doug and I have been married for 7 1/2 years now. Since we've had Cade (4) and Madi (2 1/2), time's flown by even faster! Doug's now back in school to get a Bachlor's degree in Wildlife Conservation and Management. Hopefully he'll be done next spring/summer (2009). It's been an interesting ride with him being in school full time, working full time, and volunteering the Conservation Dept. We know it's a ride that God's guiding us on!