Tucson Rodeo 2012

Every year hundreds of cowboys and cowgirls (over 600 this year) descend upon Tucson to show us what they got. With them comes thousands of fans from all over the country to cheer them on. The Tucson Rodeo is such a big deal here that the last Thursday and Friday in February is officially Rodeo Break and all school districts in Tucson shut down. In fact, last year at a school district meeting wherein we were discussing whether to lengthen the school year one woman suggested that we give up Rodeo Break. You could have heard a pin drop. It was like those movie scenes where the record scratches to a halt. People couldn't believe she just suggested that the beloved and sacred Rodeo Break be sacrificed. When I first started teaching in Phoenix (which doesn't recognize the Rodeo as an official holiday) I was shocked we didn't get Rodeo Break off. All my life, growing up in Tucson, I just assumed everyone got the Rodeo off. My co-workers found the concept of Rodeo Break to be hilarious and got years of mileage out of that one.

Anyway, I hadn't been since I was a kid so we thought we'd take the kids today for Opening Day (it runs all week). We had such an amazing and fantastic time. The kids loved seeing all the animals and competitions. Their favorite event was the steer wrestling. Our oldest daughter, the ultimate lover of animals, was very concerned about the well-being of the animals. She would stand up and shout, "Get the bull, cowboy, but please don't hurt him!" Our son declared it the best day ever and said he wants to be a rodeo cowboy when he grows up. Even our youngest, who is generally a holy terror everywhere we go, was mesmerized by the animals and was in her element being free to roam the rodeo grounds unrestrained. The people there are amazing. Friendly, welcoming, just really down to earth. There truly is not a more family friendly event anywhere.

Here are the kids right before we headed to the Rodeo grounds.

Our eldest daughter and myself, cowgirled-up.

Our youngest. I love this picture for a couple of reasons. First, the vest she is wearing is a vest my great-grandmother made for me when I was my daughter's age. It was part of an outfit. She would be thrilled to know that her great-great granddaughter wore this today. Secondly, when I was a kid my grandparents used to take me to see the cows that were down the road from their house. I would always go ask to see the "moo cows" and there are pictures of me around this age and a bit older standing at the fence like this or in my grandfather's arms looking at the cows. Watching my daughter today reminded me of this.

The vest.
Our kids are hard-core. They left the Rodeo all tatted up.

Catch Up in Pictures

I haven't posted anything in a while primarily because I don't even know where to start. To say that our life has been insane, upside down, turned around, etc. would be an understatement. However, things are settling down again and I figured I'd do a partial catch up in pictures that I love (and yes, I am well aware that I am totally biased).

Before I had children, in fact before I was even married, I ran by own basketball program at a large high school in Phoenix. I loved coaching. It is a huge passion of mine. When I had our first child over six years ago I gave that up along with my teaching job. Over the past year or two I have really missed coaching. This year I went back to coaching girls Varsity basketball at one of our local high schools here. The administration was great in allowing me to bring my children to the practices (thankfully my husband was home in time to watch them for the games...that would have been difficult). My decision to do this made life exponentially more busy but it was a terrific experience and my kids had a great time. The girls were wonderful with my kids and I will never regret raising gym rats. My daughter especially looked up to the girls on the team and they were so awesome in including her in pre-game activities (I took my daughter with me to a couple of games). She was in hog-heaven.

Our youngest daughter, A, is a spirited child. Days have been hard with her. Recently, she literally almost died and it has made me re-evaluate how I respond to her. While the days are still long and hard sometimes, I am just so thankful that she is here with us knowing that a mere matter of seconds could have meant a difference in whether I would be burying a child this month. I love this girl to pieces!!!

Our son, E, has battled asthma and other lung issues since he was 8 months old. We've had a rough couple of months. Here he is in a compression vest, something we've become all too acquainted with recently. Poor guy has bacterial bronchitis and pneumonia as well as a nasty case of thrush due to all the inhaled steroids he is on to control his asthma. Kid is a mess, but one of the most good natured, cooperative kids you'll ever meet despite spending most of his young life in and out of doctor's offices and hospitals.

E fancies himself a cowboy. He wears his boots everywhere and thinks they are perfect for kicking up dust. Unfortunately for him, his mother doesn't like the fact that the dust causes him to cough. Even when he is pouting this kid just melts my heart.
Our older daughter, D, has joined two cheerleading teams. One is her school team and the second is a team through Parks and Rec. She LOVES it. The Parks and Rec team had to vote on a team name and the name my daughter suggested, The Sparkles, won. She is beyond excited. I was a college basketball player so anyone who knows me finds it hilarious that my daughter is a cheerleader. However, she loves it and that is all that matters. (On a side note, since she spent the basketball season with me in the gym she is actually pretty impressive with a basketball so there still may be hope).
This picture seriously just melts my heart. I've found myself looking at it repeatedly. I just want to freeze them in this moment in time. I hope they are always this close and that he is always this protective of his sisters.
My serious little baby!

The Conclusion of Fall Break

My dear daughter has had the week off school for Fall Break. It has been glorious. I love having her home. Even thought she is in the midst of her second year in school (and loves it) I miss her terribly each and every day that I have to send her to school. It is not a feeling that has subsided as the days have passed. The thought of sending my little man off to Kinder next year is enough to render me inconsolable for at least ten years. But that's another story for another day.

This week has just been a fun week of spending time together. Last weekend to start her break she had a birthday party for a classmate, which was a lot of fun for her. The next day my husband and I took our kids and my almost 6 year old niece down to the University of Arizona and then out to dinner. It was a wonderful day and evening and the kids had a great time being together. My husband was off Monday so I loaded the day with doctors appointments: dentist visits for the kids and flu shots for me and the hubby. The kids got to spend some time at their great-grandma's house, which they (and she) love. My daughter also got to spend the night with the aforementioned cousin, and then today we had my nephew's 4th birthday party. My dad is also in from DC so they were able to spend some time with him as well. Tomorrow I am going to take the older two kids to see Dolphin Tale.

I am really sad to see this week come to an end. I love having our daughter home during the day and I really, truly miss her when she is gone. So, I am glad we had such a great week to spend together.

Your Christians Are Not Like Your Christ

My faith is important to me. It has shaped who I am and who my husband and I are raising our children to be. We are Christians and my husband and I were both raised in Christian homes, by Christian parents. Lately, though, I find myself thinking a lot about the quote by Ghandi where he stated, "I like your Christ. I don't like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ."

While my faith is important to me and while there are convictions I have based on this faith, I also like to think of myself as a fairly decent, accepting person. I don't begrudge anyone their religion (or non-religion) or personal preferences. I tend to take the approach that while I believe this way and my life is a reflection of that, you also have the right to believe and live how you want. That being said, as a Christian, there is a certain "code" I live by and expect others who claim to be Christians to live by as well. Some of that includes helping those in need, working hard, and generally treating others how we would want to be treated. There is a verse in the Bible, in the book of Matthew, that states, "Truly, I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me." I take that seriously and think that we as people, but especially as Christians, need to treat people better. All people. Not just those we like or those we agree with, but people we may not like, or people we may completely disagree with or even struggle to tolerate.

This past year has been very bumpy for us personally and professionally and the people who I would have expected to offer support didn't. (And by this "support" I am not referring to anything tangible. I'm referring to emotional support, checking in, etc. As a disclaimer, let me also publicly state that I am not referring to my family. They have been wonderful and amazing and things would be unbelievably worse were it not for their help). While this hasn't rocked my faith it has caused me to take a hard (and painful) look at the church to which we belong and those we considered our church family. While there was initial concern, after a few months we heard nothing from anybody there. Nobody checked in to see why we hadn't been to church in a while (serious health issues with our son and my husband's work schedule being the two primary reasons) except for a really snarky email from our pastor after missing a few weeks of services. I had made mention to the pastor early on that as a result of what we were going through we were feeling rather depressed. He never once followed up with either of us to see how we were doing. Outside of one man who was wonderful to my husband in the early months not a single other attempt at outreach was made.

While I have pretty thick skin this hurt a bit. The other part is that it made me wonder if this was really a church I wanted to be a part of. If other people are hurt or struggling or ill do I want to be associated with a church that is viewed as cold and callous? The irony in all of this is that this church (and many religions in general) criticize the government and always advocate for private charity, church help, etc. This argument presumes that the church is willing or able to help. It was very disappointing to me, after hearing all my life, how Christians are supposed to help others, care about others, treat others as we would treat Christ, etc, that the church put none of this into practice. It will be hard for me to sit through another sermon hearing about how we as Christians are supposed to behave and treat others when I have witnessed and experienced the hypocrisy first hand.

This is not an indictment of all Christians, of all churches, of all religions, or even of all people in the church I am referring to. My husband and i had attended a few services at another church a few weeks leading up to the start of our "year from hell" and when I opened my email I had offers from people to bring meals, offers from people to help watch my other kids while I was running all over town to doctor's appointments, offers for people to do my grocery shopping, etc. These offers came from women I had met briefly and in some instances never met. These are the types of people that epitomize my perception of Christians. These are women with a servant's heart looking to treat others as they would treat Christ.

I have been a member of my "brand" of Christianity all my life. Considering leaving is not something I take lightly. There have been incidents throughout the years that keep bringing me back to a place where I really feel I need to make the move and start over. This may have been the final straw that serves as the catalyst for that move.

I am interested to hear your thoughts. Have you left a church or religion altogether? If you are not religious how does my experience match up with your impression of Christians? If you are a Christian how would you handle this situation?

Hall of Fame Induction Speech

My high school basketball coach is being inducted into the Hall of Fame here in town. A few months ago he asked if I would give his induction speech. I was and am very honored and of course agreed to do it. The ceremony is tomorrow night and I am a bundle of nerves. Despite being a decent public speaker it gives me intense anxiety. I'm sick for days about it.

He was a wonderful coach and is a terrific man and was truly the ideal high school coach. We had unprecedented success and to this day some of my former teammates remain my closest friends. I look back fondly on those years and my basketball experience is the primary reason for that.

So, while I am incredibly nervous about sweating profusely, stumbling over my words, or blushing with embarrassment (pale, white people have a tendency to do that) I am also thankful for the opportunity to publicly acknowledge the impact he had in all of our lives.

Foot Loose and Tonsil Free

Our 4 year old son has his tonsils out yesterday and it has been a rough 38 hours since. The procedure itself went fine, but he came out of anesthesia fighting mad. They rushed out to the waiting room to get me (I would have preferred they came and got me first and then woke him up, which likely would have prevented the events that followed from occurring).

Anyway, when I walked back there he was swinging at the nurse, SCREAMING at her, completely incoherent. He was wild-eyed, scared, and in pain. It broke my heart. I ran to him, scooped him up, and laid down in the bed with him. He went right to sleep.

Then they woke him up to try to get him to drink or eat a popsicle, both of which he refused. He then also tried to rip his IV's out. The nurses finally gave up and removed them for him.

He vomited on the ride home, all over himself, the car, and the Albertson's parking lot.

Poor kid.

Thankfully he slept on and off for most of the day. He woke up rather frequently to vomit. After the 8th time in as many hours I called the office, where I got a medical-assistant who informed me that it is "normal" to vomit every hour for up to 48 hours. Whaaaat???? I'm not a doctor, but if the number one concern after surgery is dehydration then it seems to me that throwing up 48 time sin 48 hours would be a bit of a problem.

Last night was pretty miserable. I got a total 1 hour of sleep because his fever rose up to 103, he continued to vomit throughout the night, and he was pretty much just miserable. At 3 am we came downstairs and watched cartoons until 9 when he finally fell asleep for an hour.

The on-call surgeon I called at 7 this morning told me he wouldn't call in an anti-nausea medication, but I should instead take him to the emergency room, where they could both hydrate and medicate him. I wanted to be able to control the vomiting at home in the hopes that he would then start to be able to keep down what he attempted to drink. Long story short, the nurse from the surgery center ended up relaying my frustration to our actual doctor who finally at 2:30 called in a prescription for anti-nausea meds which I promptly gave him He then slept for the next 4 hours. Since he's been given two doses he has not vomited once and has even been able to take three bites of an icee.

He is not consuming anywhere near the amount of liquids he needs too and if his fever doesn't stay under control we will likely end up in the hospital anyway, but I am working my ass off trying to avoid that.

I just really hope having these tonsils out makes a difference for him. I asked the surgeon to save the tonsils so I could see them. They were pretty bad. Huge, cryptic, pockets of bacteria. It made me feel better about subjecting him to such misery.

All in all, having your tonsils and adenoids removed is quite the ordeal.

My son is loud, rowdy, and rambunctious. I am constantly telling him to quiet down or calm down. Right now I would kill for that loud, rowdy, rambunctious boy to be running through our house. This listless, miserable, upset child breaks my heart.

Addison Rerecich, The Pink Ninja, Gets a Second Chance at Life

A young girl, 11 years old, who is a member of the church I grew up in became very ill last May. She ended up in the ICU where she still remains. This was written by her mother on a Facebook page that people around the world have been following, "Addison Rerecich was a normal, healthy 11 year old girl, until late last May, when she was suddenly stricken with a dangerous bacterial infection in her bloodstream. Although she has survived the initial infection, her lungs were horribly damaged, and she has been in the Intensive Care unit at UMC's Diamond Children's Center for more than 3 months, fighting for her life. She now is waiting for a lung transplant, her only hope for recovery."

She has been dubbed The Pink Ninja because by all medical accounts she should have died months ago. The fact that she is still hanging on is nothing short of a miracle. I have spent a lot of time checking the Facebook page for updates, hoping and praying, that this little girl is given the life saving transplant she needs, while acknowledging for that to happen someone else has to say goodbye to a loved one and make the difficult decision of whether or not to donate.

Yesterday, Addison underwent a double lung transplant that will ultimately give her a second chance at life. It won't be the same life this once healthy, athletic girl had, but it will be a new life nonetheless. It was indescribable the relief I felt when I read that she was in the operating room. I was also incredibly sad that for this to happen some other family had to grieve the loss of a loved one. It also made me incredibly grateful to that family that in a moment of such sorrow they were able to make such a selfless, life-giving decision. Her family has been very cognizant of this fact through the entire process.

Today, I am just incredibly thankful that this child who has fought for months, is breathing air through lungs that aren't riddled with bacteria and punctured with holes and that were rendered useless. She has been kept alive by machines. Without those the doctors said she would have died within seconds to minutes, not hours, not days. While she is still on a ventilator her lungs are able to finally take in and expel equal amounts.

Today is a good day. Today is the first day of a new life for an 11 year old girl and her family.