It's been awhile since I last updated and life has been busy!
Jillian is doing well, next month we have a Cardiology appointment with Echo to check her valve and heart function. I know we will get a good report but I can't help feeling nervous when ever these appointments get close! Jillian is loving kindergarten, which ends in just a few weeks! She loves to read and write stories of her own and she is a pretty good artist. She has started piano, which she is doing well, but as of right now doesn't "love" it. I know from experience that the love of piano doesn't always come right away and I know if she sticks with it, she will LEARN to love it...haha! Thanks mom for making me stick with it, I truly love to play now. Jillian is still really petite but has gained 5 lbs since her valve replacement, which is awesome! Claire now out weighs her by 4 lbs and Jacob is 12 lbs heavier. It is funny to go out with all three, nobody can figure out ages and how in the world we have three so close in age! When we say we have twins everyone automatically thinks Jillian and Claire must be the twins, so it is fun to mess with people.
Jacob is still his same responsible self with a newly acquired attitude, which I assume is coming from school! He is getting more rowdy boy, which is good since he spends most of his day with us girls! He is loving school and of course is into following ALL of the rules! He likes math and solving problems. He plays well with everyone and really has fun with his friends and sisters. Jacob is also taking gymnastics which he LOVES!
Claire, Claire has been the "problem" child this year! About 9 months ago she started loosing control of her bladder after being fully potty trained for 1 1/2 years. She got multiple UTI's and a kidney infection which started the kidney workup by our Dr. When all came back normal we were referred to urology whom were a bit baffled themselves with her symptoms. Then Claire started complaining of leg pain, long story short I insisted on an MRI of her spine and we found she had tethered cord which was causing nerve damage to her legs and Bladder. Surgery is the fix for this, so off we were! On April 29th she had surgery to detether the cord. Surgery was 90 minutes and went well. We spent 4 days at Primary Childrens, which was awesome as usual. Claire recovered quickly and is back to her same crazy self. We knew this surgery may not "fix" the damage already there but would for sure stop further nerve damage. I was hopeful we would be lucky and it would be a compete fix but it doesn't look like that will be the case, while the leg pain is mostly gone the bladder symptoms are still there. She can go longer between potty trips but is still having accidents and tells me she can't feel when she has to go, plus she has another kidney infection! We have an appointment with the neurosurgeon in a couple weeks and will discuss further testing to see just how much nerve damage there is and figure out how to deal with it and make life as easy for Claire as possible!
Claire loves everything music and dance! She is constantly singing and dancing and is loving her ballet class with Miss Meagan.
After Jillian's big surgery last year, we were sure we were good for a couple of years and were going to adjust our health insurance to a policy that was cheaper but had a larger deductible and out of pocket maximum but we spaced the deadline and had to keep our same policy. This turned out to be a blessing as we had another unexpected surgery! I am grateful for Jason's job and the insurance that comes with it that is for sure!
As for me, I started a new business! I have always loved planning vacations so I stared a travel company. Perfect Cents Travel (thanks Dad and Tamara for the name) is doing really well, keeps me super busy and I love it! It is so much fun helping people plan and book vacations and it is nice to get paid for it also. The travel business is making a comeback and I am glad I am a part of it. Jason has been a huge support and help. He is my tech support and takes care of the Facebook and website maintenance. Plus he has caught the bug and is having fun finding and putting together great package deals to feature on Facebook and the website.
We have big plans for the summer! We have been working really hard at racking up points on our Southwest Visa cards and now have enough points to fly all five of us to Florida in August to take a 7 day Western Caribbean cruise on the Carnival Dream. The kids are super excited, we will also be spending one crazy day before at Disney World so they are beyond happy :) Through out the whole points process I (we) earned enough points that I earned companion status on Southwest which means every time I fly someone can fly free with me until Dec 2014!!!! So hopefully we can take full advantage of that over the next year and a half.
We are also hosting a foreign exchange student from Finland this next school year, she will be here the first part of August, we are excited for another adventure!
We sold our boat so we will spend our summer playing in the pool, lake and seven peaks, camping with family and friends, keeping up on our school skills and working hard!
