Four Eyes are Better then Two

Last week the girls picked up their new prescription glasses. While Rebecca was in great need of glasses, Marietta was on the borderline of needing them. We decided since we were out glasses shopping we would get Marietta some too so that she could use them at school and church, it will be up to her if she wants to wear them all the time. They have had them for almost a week now and you can tell how wonderful Rebecca finds it to be able to see things clearly now. She wears her glasses all the time, even though by the end of the day her eyes are a bit strained or her ears a bit sore, she is really enjoying being able to read signs and see things clearly. I look forward to hearing about her experience when she goes back to school (March Break right now) and can see the board clearly. Marietta on the other hand enjoys to wear her glasses when she goes out so other can see them, but since she is not in such a great need of them it's not uncommon for her to have them off at home.

Rebecca is Seven

On March 6th we celebrated Rebecca's 7th birthday. As with most kids she has been looking forward to this birthday for a long time ... especially because on her 7th birthday she was finally allowed to have a pet. Since Marietta's last birthday Rebecca has been asking for a pet. She decided near the beginning she wanted a fish ... a goldfish ... and has since constantly talked about the fish she was going to get. Santa gave her a small 5 gallon aquarium and so two weeks before her birthday we got it all set up and ready for her fish ... and then finally came the day she was allowed to go pick out her fish.

Left: The tank all set up and ready

Right: Swimmer and Goldie

Thankfully Rebecca was healthy this year for her birthday. This time it was Marietta who was sick. Marietta spent the day at home, resting, so she'd have energy to party later on. After school Rebecca had her friend Meaghan over and we all went to Chatters Indoor Playground for a couple hours of fun. We hit the place on a good day as there were no birthday parties going on at the time and we left before any arrived.

I think Matthew enjoyed the place the most, and was far from ready to leave when the girls decided to call it quits. The playset is designed in such a way that he could get up and around it all on his own. Parents are also able and allowed to play/crawl around. The only help he really needed was a little boost to get up to the big slide ... I imagine done on purpose to prevent little kids from going down ... but Matthew showed no fear and quite enjoyed it.

Left: The kids are all lying down on the "stairs". It was Matthew who started this idea. The girls found him lying on one of the stairs ... guess he was getting a little tired out ... so they all joined in.

Right: No Fear ... Matthew heads down the slide.

They had great fun making trains and racing each other down the slides.

Punching bag time ... ahhhh ... watch out for Matthew

Birthday cake time. I had planned on making a goldfish cake, but Rebecca found a Garfield cake mold downstairs and insisted on Garfield ... even though she hasn't the faintest idea who he is. Either way it still tasted the same :)

Left: Marietta made bookmarks for Rebecca who requested these for her new Bible and Psalm book, which she knew she would be receiving for her birthday. Marietta even made enough that she has some for her regular reading books too.

Right: new sunglasses

Classis

Our thoughts are prayers are with the student who will be examine by Classis this week in order to receive permission to speak an edifying word. Five students are being examine in Kerwood today and one in Burlington on Friday. May the Lord grant strength to each of these students so that they make speak clearly and faithfully about their love and understand of God and His Word. May He also grant that whatever the outcome may be each may accept and see this also as coming from the Lord.

Rob is off to witness several of the exams. We were suppose to leave early this morning to watch all five examines, but the kids had other plans. Rebecca and Matthew have been sick for several days and continue to struggle with fevers and a bad cold ... the latest virus that is going around and has hit the school quite badly. I will not complain as we have done quite well when it comes to sickness this winter ... but why do they always get sick when we have plans for the day????

Sarah, Plain and Tall

So as I mentioned a few posts back, Marietta's class was going to performed the play Sarah, Plain and Tall. Before the performance they each gathered whatever items they had at home that would be useful. Marietta needed an apron to go with her dress and so she got this great idea that mom was going to make her an apron. I decided that if she needed one so badly she could make it herself, which in turn meant even more work for me ... but we had fun.

Since it was a bit of a last minute idea, and since she insisted it had to be white, we dug around until we game up with a while blanket that they used for her dolls and off we went to cut and iron and pin and sew. Marietta was quite thrilled as she has been asking for some time to be allowed to use the sewing machine. Unfortunately she doesn't have the greatest teachers, as I have very little knowledge and most definitely no talent when it comes to sewing ... but needless to say we had fun together. We kept it simple and even managed to make three aprons, which she proudly brought to school so the other kids would have aprons as well. When all was said and done she asked if I had any other sewing work that she could do for me ... hmmm ... I'll have to think on that one.











I only managed to get one picture of Marietta facing me during the play. This could partly be due to the fact that I also recorded it on video since she so nicely begged me to record the whole thing. By the sounds of it the kids had a great time making the set and preparing for the play. They did a nice job, except for the fact that they were very hard to hear. Thankfully I read the book beforehand so I could follow what was going on, but otherwise I would have been lost. After the play I took a picture of Marietta in her outfit ... with her apron on. I think I'll have to add one of the aprons to her memory box ... I can still remember the first time I was allowed to use the sewing machine.

Christmas Program

Yes, the title is right. Yes, this is a picture from the Christmas Program. Yes, I'm a bit behind on my blogging ... but ... no, this is not from December.

On February 20th the kids of Timothy were finally able to present there Christmas Program after it was cancelled in December due to the last day of school before the Christmas Holidays being a snow day. The bad weather carried on into the evening and so the Christmas Program was postponed until February

I must say it was quite nice to have the program in February. It would be worthwhile for the staff to consider moving away from always having a Christmas or Easter Program (they rotate, so next year we'll be having an Easter Program) and instead have a program at someany point throughout each year. This would mean that the theme would not always have to be Christmas or Easter related and the audience would not be over tired and busy from the steady Christmas rush. Easter time isn't so bad, but in December it seems we have a constant stream of parties, dinners and gathering, on top of the regular busy schedule of life. I think we would enjoy it much better if we just didn't have the program at Christmas time. I realize we are there to listen to the beautiful music telling us of the riches of the true meaning of Christmas ... but I must say it was quite enjoyable in February also.

Last year we got front row seats and learned that front row isn't always so great. We got to see just that ... the front row of the student. Since the student are all standing on one level only the tall ones stuck out after that. So this year we got smart and found ourself a seat on the balcony. It was a much nicer view ... just not so great for those with cameras that don't have high zooming capabilities.

Rebecca is busy looking for us. She never did find us ... this would likely be due to the fact that she needs glasses.
















Last minute Rob decided he was going to come along. I had not gotten a babysitter since he had originally said there was no way he'd have time to get away from his studies. So we attempted to take Matthew along. I suppose we were hoping for magic ... most certainly we were dreaming if we thought he'd behave (which we didn't really think, but thought it worth a try). Needless to say I don't think I got to see more then 15 minutes of the program before we gave up and realize there was no way we could contain him any longer.

I brought him back in at the end and and amused himself in the chair for a bit and then enjoyed the clapping part at the end and got right in there adding his vigorous clapping to the rest of the noise.

New Fructose Malabsorption Support Group

For those of you who stumble across this blog while searching for information about Fructose Malabsorption, I just wanted to let you know that a new Fructose Malabsorption Support Group has been set up.

This group has just started, so as with most things, it is starting small, but hopes to grow over time. While the previous Australian Support Group I mentioned provides a lot of information, it can also be very restricting to those who don't fall into their FM outline as this group specializes in those who cannot eat wheat products. While this is common in FM and many cannot eat wheat, there are also many who can eat some form of wheat, whether only very little bits, or a certain kind (sourdough). And so the new group is more open to all varieties and sensitivity levels of FM so as not to make people feel like they have to fall in a certain "mold" or that they are not properly helping themselves if they continue to eat wheat.

Hopefully over time this group will grow and be helpful for those who are looking for information and help with FM. If you are suffering from FM please help it grow by joining and introducing yourself and asking any questions you have.

You can find the new support group at:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/fructose_malabsorption/

Getting Big

My boys getting big ... just some little tidbits about our growing little big guy.


Matthew likes to hang out on our bed and watch Barney, Spot, Little People and recently has added Thomas to his list. I am not to keen on the amount of TV he watches, but know that it goes in spurts depending on how he is feeling. Recently he finally decided to reattempt to get off the bed on his own (he was able to before but something must have happened as he refused to do it again) and now that he gets off the bed on his own he often doesn't watch for long but comes wandering back out of the bedroom after about 10-15 minutes. It seems he just needs that "down-time" to get refocused and reenergized and then he's okay to go for a while again. Whatever it is, it's the only thing besides holding him that stops him from being so miserable on his bad days.


Poor Zoey (my parent's dog) ... Matthew really tries to be nice, but he's just a bit rough. Matthew has no fear and has never shown any fear of dogs. It's a good thing that Zoey is too old and dumb to act very quickly as poor Matthew has deserved a few bites. I will never forget the time just after Matthew started crawling that I found him clinging onto Zoey's saggy cheeks, looking the dog straight in the eye with no fear at all. Zoey on the other hand looked quite afraid and unsure what to do ... funny ... this is the same dog who took a good hunk out of Rob's (and others) leg before. Matthew loves animals and tries to be nice, but his pets and pats are rather rough and since Zoey is old and deaf Matthew scares the crap out of her quite often. I'm afraid one of these days Matthew is going to pick on the wrong dog and we could have some serious consequences.


Another of Matthew's loves is the toothbrush. For quite some time now he has had his own toothbrush and has enjoyed walking around with it in his mouth, chewing away at it. He always enjoys being part of the routine and loves to climb up with the girls to brish with them. He's also very good at spitting ... nobody had to teach him that he figured that one out quite easily on his own. For a time he got into the habit of cleaning the sink, toilet or the registers with his toothbrush. (He can climb up on the toilet himself to get the brush, so if the bathroom door was left open he'd be in there with his brush). Needless to say we were going through quite a few toothbrushes in a short period of time, so we had to pack away the toothbrush for a bit. This did not go over very well and he would often be begging to brush his teeth. Recently I allowed him to have a brush again and we try keep it out of his reach as well as have him under close supervision when it is brushing time ... we'll see how long he behaves.


The stools are usually hidden in our house since Matthew is way to quick and mischievious if they are out. If the girls are doing cooking or baking then they take the stool out for a bit. Matthew is right in there like a dirty shirt and the second they are off that stool he's up there and getting whatever his hands can get ahold of. If there's one thing that Matthew likes it's the foods that he's not allowed to have, this is why the stools must remain hidden and all food far back on the counter as even without a stool he seems to have arm extensions that reach quite far. He enjoys to be part of what everyone else is doing also and here he is cracking egg shells ... since he's allowed eggs that's okay.



And when he's not cooking, he's cleaning!! I assume all kids like the vacuum cleaner as I know all of mine have ... it's just a kid thing ... too bad it wears off so quickly. You can see laying on the floor a little red vacuum that is suppose to be Matthew's, but of course that is not good enough and he much rather use the real one. And the real one is not good enough unless it is actually running and making lots of noise. He has lots of fun doing this.







And here is one of Matthew's favourite past times lately ... books. He just loves to read. Often if he's quiet I don't know whether to go look and find out what kind of trouble he's into and what kind of mess I'm going to have to clean up or just leave him for fear I might disturb he's good playing or his reading time. Thankfully his box of books is in his bedroom so it's somewhat easy to sneak up and check on him without him noticing. He is often found sitting on the floor reading through the books and like a true boy he loves the ones with trucks and construction equipment. He has also taken a liking to Thomas books. These were not in his box but he found them on the shelf in the girls room during one of his distructive moments when he was ripping off books and throwing them on the floor. After that he kept going back to get them off the shelf, so we added them to his box ... amazing how they naturally gravitate to these things.




It's such a fun age to watch them grow and learn so much each day. It also makes me sad at times as each day he learns more he becomes less and less a baby ... if only we could freeze him this way (when he's having a happy day :).

100th Day

Yesterday the Grade 1 class celebrated the 100th day of school. On this day they do various activities about the number 100. This day is also an open house day and they try to get 100 visitors to come to the class. Well they managed to 130 visitors this year.

Matthew and I went to visit during the morning. We took along Aunt Aileen, Taryn and Aiden, who had also brought with them Hannah and Lydia. This was a pleasant surprise for Rebecca for she had not expected these visitors. We enjoyed a piece of cake, a couple stories and spent some time helping the kids make their 100 day necklace out of fruitloops and licorice. The classroom was full of parents, siblings, aunts, grandparents ... it was a busy place. Later on Joycee and Ryan came to visit Rebecca and at the end of the day Rob stopped in for surprise visit.

Matthew sat with Rebecca after recess for a few minutes. This didn't last long and he got the wiggles, plus Rebecca had to do some cleanup. While Rebecca was cleaning up Matthew tried on her (incomplete) 100 Day Crown. It's suppose to have 100 stickers and a 100 Day "sign" on it ... Rebecca was a little behind and didn't get it done.
















Hannah sat beside Rebecca for a bit and they both made 100 Day necklaces. They had to put 100 fruit loops on the necklace in groups of 10, with pieces of licorice dividing the groups.

Just to forwarn you Aileen ... Marietta is already asking if you can come to see her Sarah, Plain and Tall play. It's on March 3 @ 11am ... come one, come all ;)

Winter Fun

We've had a good amount of snow this winter. I'm not particularly fond of cold weather and winter, but I do figure that if it's going to be cold I rather have snow with the cold ... it just looks so much nicer. We did pretty good for snow the last few months, getting a good dumping and slowly adding more dumpings without much melting in between. Makes for skinny roads and big piles in the front yards ... and of course lots of shoveling or snowblowing. I'm thankful my husband takes care of that department. I can guarantee I wouldn't like snow at all if it was my department.

I find the kids always play very well in the winter also. There is so much that they can do out in the snow. It takes a bit to get them outside and sometimes I just have to kick them out, but once they're out they find plenty to do and usually don't come back all to quickly. Unfortunately it has been quite a cold winter and so I didn't send Matthew out, although he sure would have loved to. A few times I let him go out, but he has a hard time maneuvering in all the clothes. One time he fell face in the snow and nobody saw it happen right away. He couldn't figure out how to get up again, so there he lay until he was noticed ... poor guy.

Since it has been so cold (often -15C) sledding really wasn't all that appealing, for once you add the wind factor it's just bone chilly. There was one time we tried it out. We weren't quite sure what to do with Matthew and then decided that since he has no fear he would surely enjoy the ride ... so off we went. Well it appears that our dear little boy does have some fear in him ... for he one ride down that hill had him crying up a storm and now he refuses to go near a sled, even for a nice calm ride on level ground. We didn't last very long at the hill that day as it gets rather cold just sitting there holding a scared boy and watching others sled.

A couple weeks ago the weather warmed up and all the snow melted. Knowing that it was all going to melt away we decided to head out sledding while the weather was a nicer temperature. This time we figured it was warm enough for Matthew to play at the bottom of the hill. We usually hit the Water Treatment Plant ... a common sledding area ... but decided to try something different this time. So instead we went to Olympic Park on the West Mountain. This is a smaller hill, but still a good size for the girls. The best part was we had the whole hill to ourselves (not sure if this is normal). There was a nice little ramp that someone had made and the kids thought this was great fun since they've never attempted these at the other hill with it being bigger.

Rebecca and Marietta










Rebecca and Rob

And Matthew hung out at the bottom of the hill. He enjoyed watching and would point and laugh. At first he hardly dared move on the unlevel snowground, but by the end he was playing around with the snow.

At the end of January Hamilton celebrated Hamilton Winterfest. There were various free activities throughout the city which we (or the girls) partook in. Several of the recreation centers had free craft, cooking, games or something of that assort sessions that you could sign up for. The girls went to two of these sessions where they did crafts and some "cooking" (in quotation because all they really did was stir the chili together but didn't come near the stove). As a family we went to one of the parks for a morning. They had various games there (not very well attended) and a horse and wagon ride, as well as indoors you could enjoy a free snack, hot chocolate and lunch ... so being the dutch people that we are we went out for that.

The horse and wagon ride and the girls with Chimo the Winterfest Mascot

The girls played at the park for a bit ... Rob and Matthew joined in.

The other winter fun that the kids got to do was go to Bronte Creek with the whole school for a day. The school started a new event (they hope to make it annual) and the kids had an amazing time. They spent the entire day at Bronte Creek each taking turns going sledding, skating, playing in the playbarn, having lunch, and playing different snow games (and snowballing their teachers). The girls begged me to come along as one of the helpers ... but I only like winter from inside my house and don't much like being cold ... so the idea of spending a whole day out in the freezing cold was not appealing. In the end they had a nice day of around -5C, so it was rather ideal weather ... but still I was happier inside my house. Needless to say, the kids slept good that night!!

Some Progress!?!? (We Hope!!)

A few weeks ago the kids had Career Day at school. They had to dress up as what they would like to be when they got bigger. Neither of the girls really know what they want to be or have any desire to be anything at this point, so they just picked something that would be easy to dress up for or that they had "tools" for. I don’t have a picture of Marietta, but she didn’t look any different anyways so it doesn’t really matter. She chose to be a hairdresser, so she dressed normal and then had a caddy of all different hairdressing tools. Rebecca decided to be a doctor. We found a extra small nurses outfit at Value Village and I just had to shorten the legs a bit to make it fit. We couldn’t find the surgeon’s hat that James’ got (see here) but we gathered other medical stuff that’s accumulated over the past years and they had a fun day.

We have news about Rebecca’s stomach. This past week we seen GI. We were very thankful to manage to get our June referral changed to January. This was originally Matthew’s appointment slot, but he got bumped up to December when he was diagnosed with Fructose Malabsorption so our very nice GI Doctor agreed to see Rebecca in his time slot (usually you can’t do this because it was only a follow-up time slot and you need a consultation time slot for first appointments).

At first it didn’t seem that much came out of the appointment. The doctor would like to just get to know Rebecca and monitor what’s happening before trying to come to any further ideas on how to help her. She did order a x-ray of her stomach since we have never had one done (we have had an ultrasound, but no x-ray). We did that and then went back to wait for the results but for some reason they were not coming up on the computer in a timely fashion so we went home and they called back the next day.

Rebecca’s x-ray, to put it bluntly, shows that she’s full of poop. Even though our less restrictive diet has put her back on a daily bowel movement schedule she is still backed up and not clearing out her system properly. So we started her on a laxative called Dulcolax. She had to take 5 doses of this and just completed her last dose tonight. This laxative works by stimulating the colon muscles to contract and push it’s contents along. It also helps by accumulating water to soften the stools and allow easier elimination. Let’s just say it works well. The nurse warned that she would probably have more pain while taking it and this was indeed true, but she’s been tough knowing that it’s short term and hopefully is going to help the ongoing pains. She was also a bit nervous about going to church (a bit of an anxiety attach) for fear she would be in too much pain or have to keep going to the bathroom. She stayed home this morning since I was home with Matthew anyways and it’s a good thing she did. By afternoon the worse of the last dose had worn off and she was good to go in again.

Tomorrow she starts on another type of laxative called Polyethylene Glycol 3350. This type of laxative increases the amount of water in the colon, but does not stimulate the muscles like the Dulcolax. At this point they are saying she will probably need to be on this for the next six months or so. She has a follow-up appointment in three months so we’ll see how things are going at that time.

So it’s a bit of a comfort to have found something that seems to explain her increase in pain in the last months. It is also nice to know that it is something that has treatment options. We have no idea how long this has been a problem since we have never done an x-ray before. She did have an ultrasound in July, so I assume if it was an issue then it would have shown up ... but I am not really sure and will have to discuss with the doctores. Based on that our guess is that her very restrictive diet at that time did more damage then good. It is really hard to tell at this point whether we were always dealing with bowel/constipation issues or how Fructose Malabsorption factors into the whole equation. For now we hope that this treatment will ease her pain and allow us to better establish and understand how much Fructose Malabsorption is an issue for her. We will also have to better establish a diet with more fiber ... something rather hard to do when you have FM.

So that is the biggest news on the Rebecca front. We hope that this will bring some relief and maybe also ease some of her anxiety as well. We were thankful to see that the GI doctor did not quickly dismiss her case because of the possibility of emotional/anxiety/depression issues. She felt that there was likely both going on and that we needed to look at both, this was comforting.

On the emotional end of things. Since I last wrote we have gone through two assessment/interview processes in order to get Rebecca into a counseling program. The first assessment determined if they felt help was needed. The second assessment was to better understand which treatment would be best for her . We sat down with two therapist and from there they take it back to the team and decide what program would work best for our family. We were told it would take about six weeks to get into a program, so we are just waiting on that right now. They were encouraging in that they did say that it seemed we were on the right track with how we are treating/helping her.

So all in all, things are looking a bit more positive right now. Not that she is feeling any better at this point, but we have gotten our foot in the door at the needed places to hopefully be able to get her on the mend.