Youth Room Redo

I mentioned back in September how our church recently started a brand new Jr. High Youth Group called LOL4JC.  It stands for "Live Our Lives 4 Jesus Christ".  I was able to go the opening kick-off back in September and had a fabulous time with everyone!  Tonight I got to help again when they decided to paint the room and make it their very own space. :-)

The room they are/have been using was in a lot of ways just a storage room.  There were a couple small couches and chairs in there, but there were also cabinets and junk and a piano.  Just lots of stupid things that were stuck in there when there wasn't another place for them.  It wasn't as bad as it HAD been, because Pete and I had cleaned the room out .... twice.... on two separate occasions, when things became overrun again.  Well, on Tuesday night, we moved all the furniture and junk out and made it open and ready to paint.  I took this picture of the youth leaders before the paint went up.  You'll see the "fantastic" aka hideous mural on the one wall.  That was put up in the early '80s by the kids' sunday school class.  Hilarious!  I had to take a picture for us to always remember the awesomeness of this mural.

Friday night, Melissa (youth leader) and her husband came in and took down the mural and painted in all the corners and stuff to get it ready to paint tonight.  They were there until nearly 4am getting it all ready!!!!  You can see Noah was pretty excited to see the changes!

Tonight, Melissa put the kids in charge of everything.  They put down the drop cloths and she helped them get the paint out.

They went to town!  Youth group lasts an hour and 15 min and they got the entire thing done in that amount of time.  Couldn't believe it!!  We had 8 kids there tonight and 5 adults.  Oh how I wish all rooms got painted that quickly! :-)

The girls were the roller queens of the night!  They kicked butt at the rolling!

And they had tons of fun doing it too!  Noah worked on painting for a while, then he decided he wanted to help with clean-up.  He spent lots of time getting brushes and rollers washed.  I was really proud of both of my kids!

While the kids worked with Melissa and Steve on painting the room and radiator, James and I worked on painting the door white.  It was some weird creamy yellow.  Not.  Cute.

This was our crew!!  They did a GREAT job and I told Melissa that she should put them to work in other areas of the church that need revamping.  They were work horses!

We moved some of the furniture back into the room, but Melissa will work on getting it set up, either on her own or with the kids at the next meeting.  I think it's going to be really awesome!!  So proud of this group of kids!

A Site Change

I've had a few people ask me how Noah's connected to his pump and how it works.  Well, I decided to share with you how we do a site change.  We have to do a site change every other day.  And, what I mean by a "site change" is we have to refill the insulin in his pump and reconnect it to another part of his body, so that each site doesn't go bad.  I'll try and explain that as I move through these pictures.  

First things first - I need our site change supplies.  We start by disconnecting his pump and removing the insulin vial already inside the pump.  I need a new insulin vial, our infusion set, a syringe, an alcohol wipe, and his plunger.  I have two insulin vials in the picture above, because we just had to switch to his new insulin called Humalog.  After almost 3 years of using Novolog, our insurance company decided it wouldn't cover the Novolog anymore, so we had to switch.  It's not a huge deal, but it makes me angry that I don't have a choice in the matter anymore.  But, I'll save that rant for another day. :-)

The insulin that goes inside his pump is this little vial thing with the tubing attached.  I have to extract the insulin from its container using a syringe that attaches directly to this vial.  You can see that it will hold a lot of insulin, but for 2 days, we only fill it up to about 60 units of insulin.  We're trying to keep it very close to what he uses, because whatever is left after those two days is thrown away and we can't waste the insulin.  The tubing is actually part of his "infusion set".  We screw that piece with the tubing onto the insulin vial before we put it into the pump.  We have to "rewind" the pump settings to make room for the new insulin vial to be inserted into the pump.

Once it's been rewound and we put the new vial of insulin in, we have to fill the tubing.  I have to hold down the ACT button, so that the plunger inside the pump can get back to the position to pump the insulin through the tubing, so we can see drops coming out of the needle that is inside that blue thing on the left.  The blue thing is the needle and the needle cover.  That is the piece that is pulled out once it's all been inserted.  It fits perfectly into the blue plunger you'll see in the next picture.

Once the insulin drops are seen coming out from the needle, we place that circular thing inside the blue plunger and get it ready to insert into Noah.  That circular thing is the sticker that holds the cannula (tiny plastic tube) on his body, so that tube that pumps in the insulin stays in place and doesn't get ripped off.  The blue cover covers the needle until we're ready to insert it.

Here is a picture of the needle.  The drop at the top is his insulin.  That's how we know the needle is good to go.  There is a plastic sheath covering most of that needle.  When it is inserted into Noah's skin, the needle comes out and leaves that plastic piece inside of his body.  That is how the insulin gets into him.  The pump uses our programmed ratios to determine how much insulin he gets throughout the day.  It is constantly being pumped into him, just a small amount each minute or so.  That's to mimic how his pancreas is supposed to work.  Different times of days take different ratios. Right now he will get .475 units at a time between noon and 5pm with differing amounts, ranging from .50 to .450, at other times of the day.  Confusing, right?!  The pump does it all for us.  It's just our job to enter the right amounts and the doctor tells us what to do and what to change.  That, thankfully, is not something we have to figure out on our own.

Anyway, once everything is ready to go and the sticker covers are taken off the circle piece with the needle, we place the plunger on whatever part of his body we need to place it that day.  Right now we are rotating between 6 different places - left and right tummy, left and right butt, left and right love handle.  On the count of three I push those white tabs at the bottom of the plunger and it pops the thing into place.  I pull it off and the needle comes out with it, leaving the sticker attached to his body and the cannula inserted inside of him.

So, now he is attached to his pump.  If he needs to disconnect for any reason - to take a shower, go swimming, go through basketball practice - he can unscrew, with a simple turn, the plastic piece on the top of that sticker and it comes off.  He can then reattach by placing it back on the same spot and turning it into place.  We then "fill the cannula" by pushing the appropriate buttons on the pump and he's back in business!  The insulin, like I said, continues to pump into him every minute or so, unless we bolus, which means giving him a specific influx of insulin, when he eats food.

I wanted to take a picture of him, after I documented all of this, with his giving me a thumbs up.  This goofball wouldn't cooperate...

....as you can tell!

I finally got a thumbs up after chasing him through the house and convincing him that these pictures would make his grandparents happy. ;-)  Lately, the site change process has hurt him, so his confidence in getting it done has been shaken and he was a little emotional and nervous about getting it done tonight.  But, it's not something, unfortunately, that he has a choice in, so he (once again) faced those fears and, thankfully, had a pain-free site change.  So, there you have it.  That is how we give Noah his site change.  Just another day in the life of a Type 1!

A Shared Journey

I have no picture to share, nothing really about any specific event.  Just wanted to share a little ray of hope we received tonight.  After nearly 3 years, we met a fellow Type 1.  Not a Type 1 that we met at the doctor's office, or on the internet, or at an event.  We met her in our Bible Study and got to spend a really nice time talking to her our about shared journeys - her as a Type 1 and us as parents of one.

This new couple that joined us tonight - Blythe and Jared - are a nice-looking young couple that I've actually never met before.  I didn't realize that they had started coming to our church.  But, to be quite honest, we've missed the past 2 weeks and the 3 weeks before that short break were spent in the crazy chaos that is Christmastime.  Anyway, we got to meet them tonight.  It wasn't until our meal was over, at the very end of the night that she came over and sat by me and said, "Do you have a diabetic son?".  (Debbie, when she was praying at the end of our study, mentioned his disease)  I told her yes and she said, "I'm one too!".   This started a wonderful 30 min conversation between her and her husband and Pete and I - though, if I'm being honest, it was mostly between the two of us talkers. ;-)  I introduced Noah to her and he got to see that they have the same pump.  He was glad to see that, but much happier to run back and join his friends in a game of basketball to be bothered with our conversation.

She shared her story of diagnosis and told us about how long she had been living with it.  She told us that one of her brothers is also a Type 1.  She talked to us about our experience and how Noah handles it all.  I think she was impressed at how laid back we are about it and how open and honest he is about his disease.  I can't really share everything we talked about, because we jumped so quickly from topic to topic.  For me, it was like I finally got to meet someone in "real life", someone that could end up becoming a friend, that knows our journey.  Knows our fears, our struggles, our triumphs, because she has experienced them too, through Noah's eyes.

As a mom who is recovering from a major breakdown back in Aug-Oct, this was like water for a thirsty man.  A flesh and blood person who has lived through puberty, lived through college, that is a normal, healthy adult that can say to me, "It's going to be ok.".  It brings tears to my eyes to write that "out loud".  To say, "IT'S GOING TO BE OK!". I don't know if I realized how much I needed to hear that from someone who's lived it.

I feel like I'm in a much better place than I was last fall.  My anxiety is almost gone.  I'm sleeping again.  The pump has made such a huge difference in our lives, but that doesn't mean I forget all those feelings and all those fears.  I don't think we ever realize, when we're on this journey, who will touch us most.  Who will say something small, but have it touch us deeply.  But, tonight, it happened and I SO look forward to getting to know her and her husband more.  Not just because of our commonality, but because they seem like special people and, without them even knowing it, they made this mom breathe in a way she hasn't for quite a long time.

Two Lost Posts

I was going through my pictures and realized I had 2 old posts that I never published.  I didn't want to forget them, more for me than anyone, since I consider this blog a diary of our lives.  The first was from a fun night we spent with friends on New Years Day.  A friend of Pete's from work, Bob and his wife, invited us to their house for pizza and board games.  Well, heck, I love board games, so we thought that sounded like a great idea!  Made even more so when we found out they also invited our dear friends, the Thirys!

Now, Bob and his wife Karen only have one daughter.  She's an 8th grader and super-sweet.  I was a little nervous knowing that the rest of our 3 and the Thiry 4 would be invading their house, but they handled the craziness well. :-)  Noah stuck to playing Minecraft on their Xbox most of the night, but that didn't seem to make him bored in any way.  He did stop to play a little Apples to Apples and even a little Hide-and-Seek when all the others decided to play, but Minecraft is and will always be his favorite thing.

The older girls all played a game that I can't remember the name of, but they really had fun playing that and it was great to see Madie getting to play with girls her age for a change.

The grown-ups, sans Karen (because she was playing with the kids), played a game of Dungeons and Dragons.  Apparently this isn't like the normal DnD is played, but I officially became a full-fledged nerd after playing it.  Getting told how to play is a little intimidating, because it seems really complicated, but it ended up being really, really fun!

You have to do a lot of strategizing and I swear it literally makes you wiggle your fingers in front of your face as demonstrated by my friend there.  We all did it, except Bob who's a pro. :-)  It was some weird side effect of the game.

We stayed until 10pm when we finally finished our grown-up game and the kids were still going strong.  Karen, on the other hand, was sleepy and probably very ready to have her house back to it's calm regular self. :-)  We really appreciated their hospitality and for handling all of our children in the great way that they did, especially when all 8 of them decided to play hide-and-seek all over their house!!  Oh boy.

The second lost post was from WAY back in early December when Noah and Livie had their Christmas concert.  I didn't want to lose this post, because this was Noah's last year to perform.  Next year he'll move up to the 6th grade choir and band, should he choose to continue doing it (and I hope he will!).

Noah started taking band this year and has had a lot of fun with it.  He chose to play the trumpet - after his grandpa and mom before him.  Look how cute he is with his fellow band geeks!

The rest of the classes finally started filing in as well, so I ran up and snapped this quick shot of Livie as her class arrived.  We were very excited to be in the big gym, because it was re-opened just a week or so earlier after the devastating flood hit it back in April.  It looks amazing now and it was great to see so many people turn out to see their kids and the new gym all at the same time.

Livie's group (aka the entire 2nd grade) sang some really, really cute songs and did a great job with the motions and everything. :-)

Noah's group (aka the whole 5th grade) also did a great job!  They got to sing a few songs and then finished by singing a dance song while some of the kids performed a dance together.  Who, do you ask, performed in the dance?  Why, Noah himself!

He even danced with a girl!!  It was so stinkin' cute too!  Madie did it when she was in 5th grade, so I was soooo excited that Noah got to do it too.  And, you know what, his dance moves aren't too shabby!

I've uploaded a video of it, so hopefully it'll work for you. :-)  So, those are my two lost posts.  I do believe I can finally start posting about our January going-ons now.  Though, with school just now back in session after our recent snowfall and frigid temps (-40 to -50 wind chills) AND my recent kidney infection that threw me for a loop, there hasn't really been anything special to talk about.  But, at least now when there is, I'll be ready to tell you about it. :-)

A Special Gift

One of the presents that Livie got on her 8th birthday was a fish tank.  She's been wanting "a pet of her own" for ages now, so she was crazy, CRAZY happy that she got this tank!  We gave this to her on her actual birthday (the 28th)), while we were in Goshen.  I bought it there on Black Friday, so it seemed only fitting to take her back to that store to shop for the things she wanted to have inside of it.

The aquarium is a special GLOW tank.  It has black lights, I believe, that makes everything glow.  So she picked out special multi-colored rocks and all things Spongebob.  Oh, and plants too, of course.

We got it all set up once we drove back down to Nana and Papa Ts.  She wasn't able to get the fish, though, until today.  She was counting down the days until she got her fish too, let me tell ya!

Today, we went out to Walmart (since our PetSmart is a good 30 min away).  They had a nice selection of glow fish, so she picked out a yellow one - she says it's green - and a pink one.  Then she bought a small catfish to keep the tank clean.  The catfish is at the bottom on the left, while the other two fish are swimming.  No names yet.  She needs to think about it for a while.

The tank is right on her nightstand, so it's almost like a night light for her.  She LOVES it!  Tater has been very curious about it too.  He keeps sniffing it.  We think he smells the fish food, you know, being a lab and all.  It's kind of funny to watch. :-)  But Olive hasn't shown the least bit of interest in it.  With all of these pets running around here, we may soon have a zoo on our hands!

One exciting thing is that, once we got them home and looked a little closer, we realized that the pink one may be preggers.  She's got a swollen belly and it's discolored, like there's a sack inside.  Guess by the end of the month we'll find out if we are right about that or not.  So, this special gift has been a HUGE deal for this sweet 8 yr old of mine.  And, I think, it's giving her daddy ideas of getting another tank set up just for him...

Olivia's 8th Birthday!

We celebrated Livie's birthday over 2 days, starting on the 27th, because Pete's sister and her family were heading home the next morning and we were headed up to Goshen that night.  Livie wanted a Bigfoot birthday, so, just as we always do, I decorated the night before at my in-laws' house (with help from my niece).  

How fun is it that I found that yeti gift bag?!!  We brought her bigfoot stuffed animals with us, so we could decorate with them as well. :-)

She had ordered this poster to hang up on the wall during her party and then later at home.  She said it looked like Harry from "Harry and the Hendersons" and I had to agree.

Everyone was excited to celebrate her turning eight!

This is my niece Allyssa that helped me decorate the night before.  She had some great ideas on how to make it special.

We ordered Pizza King pizza, our favorite, for lunch and got everyone fed before we had her open presents.  We didn't do a cake this year, which felt a little weird.  I mean, who doesn't do a cake?!  But, she wanted popsicles, so we did those instead.

Everyone seemed to enjoy all the food, so the kids gathered in the dining room, while we all hung out in the family room.

Even Noah was excited when it was time to open presents! ;-)

She LOVED her bigfoot shirt and slippers!

Her Aunt Jill got a fabulous deal from a friend who was getting rid of tons of American Girl stuff.  She gifted Allyssa on Christmas with some of it and Livie on her birthday with the rest.  She has been playing with the stuff ever since!

I thought my nephew Ty really pulled off this look. ;-)

Livie later tried to eat him, but that's normal for her.

Once the presents were opened, the beast (also known as Livie) settled down to play.  She and Allyssa played American Girl stuff for a while.

She later had tea with her Uncle Adam. :-)  We left around 5 and went up to Goshen to spend some time with them and celebrate Christmas together.

We draw names on this side of the family too, so we had presents for Em and Jeff and then Kendalyn's birthday present.  Before we exchanged gifts, we went out to eat at Dairy Queen and dad took them Christmas shopping.  Instead of shopping and wrapping presents, he gives them each $40 and let's them choose.  Kinda fun!  Noah was showing off the sock monkey he got.  Kendalyn was wearing the sock monkey slippers that came with the monkey.  Avery was showing off her Ariel doll.

You may remember that back in Sept I had a Thirty-One Catalog party.  I bought this pink bag for Kendalyn for her birthday.  It has her name on it with a crown.  She loved it and stuffed with tons of things while we were there.  The cooler bag is what I got Em, but I hear Avery has adopted it as her bag. :-)  Guess I know what to get Avery when her birthday rolls around!

One of the funny things was watching Tater (yes, we brought him), Shermiand Wrigley all play together.  I say "play", but I really mean follow each other around and sniff butts.  I swear it went on for an hour!  At least they enjoyed each other!

Dad and Avery were watching music videos on his Kindle together, so Kendalyn joined them and Noah popped in for this picture. :-)  We had a lot of fun during our short time up there - staying up until after 3 am playing a crazy-hilarious game called "Cards Against Humanity", and then getting up and going out for breakfast on Livie's ACTUAL birthday, before heading back to Warsaw.  It was a fun way to celebrate Livie's birthday.  Can't believe my sweet baby is 8!  Time just continues to fly by when I'm not looking.  Happy Birthday to my girl!