... and then we mourn

Wow, how do you say good-by to two super guys? Guys that you have flown with, joked with, camped with and saved lives with, you keep flying.

Sunday the worst happened two of our local medivac helicopters collided mid air, killing six and critically injuring one. The helicopter business is so small that you know practically everyone, especially those around you, and every time one is lost it is a personal loss. These pilots and flight crews are like a family they all made time to stop in the E.D. after Mikes accident, the word had gotten out and they rushed over to offer support, donate blood and just to keep an eye on "Binky" cause after all the E.D. is very understaffed.

They have given up their vacation time, holidays, and family time just to make sure that someone else lived, they have flown in weather that most sane people refuse to drive in to make sure a critical child received the medical help they needed, treated the drunk driver even after they had witnessed the carnage they left behind, and spent countless hours volunteering just because helicopters are just so cool.

So today every one went back to work fighting the fires, picking up and transporting the sick and broken, with shoulders a little lower, laughter a little bit quieter, and remember when stories a whole lot more frequent, and Tom Caldwell and Tom Clausing your buddies will miss you but you will never be forgotten. Fly safe.

Fire Season(its finally here)

Well for weeks Mike and all of his pyro buddies have been very sad that we have not had any fires yet, well we have plenty now (5 and counting). One helicopter has been in New Mexico on a huge fire, and we are watching a good friend fight those in Nor-Cal, and if you hear about a short-haul rescue in Zions that was Mike and his "bumble bee".

Mike was left at home to baby sit a prescribed burn on the North Rim and three days ago it got up and really went to town, still within its boundaries but moving faster then they wanted so we really haven't seen much of him. After talking with Mike and his fellow "flame bugs" they gave me some advice for you all.

1. don't drive into the smoke that's the way the fire is moving.

2. don't drive over just to look, the news crews will show you it at 10.

3. smile at the fire fighters when you see them(yes they know they are dirty and stink but they are trying to ensure your safety).

4. Smokey really knows what he is talking about.

5. and their favorite: if there is a fire camp set up close to you home baked goodies are always appreciated.(some of these guys are away from their families for months).

Going Green

Okay I have officially jumped on the "green bandwagon"(really it was more like a stumble and fall, kicking and screaming). I have now changed all light bulbs to energy friendly, recycle and compost, reuse the kids bath water, have limited showers to 3 minutes(because people if Africa only use 2 gallons on average daily, so we can't be water hogs), and know exactly how much water my family including pets use each week(1100 gallons), and we are trying to cut down a little more. My toothpaste is natural, we eat organic oreos, and ritz crackers, and thanks to Chet free range beef, and have even made my own weed killer with vinegar and dish soap(really works) but I just cannot and I mean cannot give up my shampoo and conditioner, I mean really how hard can it be to come up with a good organic that actually suds up like you want, or a conditioner that actually moves through your hair, don't get me wrong it smells really nice and has a great tingle, but I just need the suds.

15 months

Wow it is hard to believe it has been so long, but 15 months ago we finally got to bring Dawson home. I don't know if it as such a hard winter for us with Mikes accident or how sick Dawson was or if I am just nuts but I just can't shake the feeling that I am just waiting for the other shoe to fall. My wonderful Dr. calls it P.T.S.D. and recommended therapy so you all are it.

So here is Dawson's story I was admitted to FMC on February 27, 2007 for bed rest at 37 weeks due to high blood pressure and puppps. No luck in getting my numbers down so Wednesday morning they started the induction and Friday afternoon we had a baby, immediately we all knew something was wrong our beautiful little baby just laid there making the scariest noises, the N.I.C.U. team that was there immediately grabbed him put him in the warmer and started oxygen and he was rushed to the N.I.C.U. with severe respiratory distress.

After a few hours I was finally allowed to go down to see him, he looked so strange laying there prone under what looked just like a cake saver(oxygen hood) I don't know if I was scared or worried or just numb, after all it had been only two months before that, that they had let me into see Mike in the I.C.U. after surgery. It was so easy to believe them when they told us that they were just going to watch him for a little while( I now know that he was in transition) and that he would likely be fine and he would be moved up to my room sometime later that night.
That never happened, the very nice and sympathetic nurses put me in a room far away from the other new moms and crying babies(ours didn't cry for 5 days) and left me to settle in when I started to hemorrhage. My poor nurse was new to the floor and looked at me standing there with blood pooling at my feet gave me a towel and told me she needed to talk with the charge nurse, I never saw her again, so back comes the Dr. who asked if there was any other tricks me and mine would like to pull(her husband was one of Mikes surgeons) and calmly stood on my stomach and gave me a few tablets to stop the bleeding and no you don't take them orally. Everything was looking good so about 10'clock Mike left to go home to the kids who were with my mom, and I went to sleep.

You always hear about all the troubles with midnight, the witching hour and all of that, I now think it is true, I was awaken by that strange feeling you get when someone is watching you, to find my new nurse, the pediatrician, the N.I.C.U. Dr. and the hospital chaplain(yes they really do have them) standing next to my bed telling me that they had just intubated my baby and were placing central lines, and was I fine with that? and then they all just filed out and left me to go back to sleep, it was the weirdest feeling they all just acted like that was normal and that I shouldn't worry and I would be able to see him in the morning(I couldn't leave the bed due to my little bleeding problem). Well it wasn't a nightmare or even a bad dream because when I woke up I discovered the sad truth; my baby would never be coming up stairs, some mean nurse had came in while I slept and taken out the bassinet and even the pack of newborn diapers that had been sitting out for him.

Oh my baby was beautiful in a gloomy pale way. When I went down to see him they were still trying to get him stable, he was being treated for pulmonary hypertension, sepsis and possible pneumonia with unstable blood pressures of 48/33 and still didn't have a name. The N.I.C.U. staff was amazing the rushed me into a rocking chair and let me sit by his side all day long telling me everything the were doing to him laughing at his size and amazed at his will to fight(with babies this sick you don't get percentages you get live or die), and hounding us for a name. Our Bishop came that night and he and Mike gave him a blessing, and a name Dawson McKowen. Oh the nurses were so excited and quickly hung his name above him and informed us he looked just like a Dawson.

Sunday I awoke and finally cried and I mean sobbing on the end of the bed in a strange huddled heap with a very happy nurse holding on to me telling me that now that I had cried I could go home(my Dr. thinks she's a therapist), Home! I didn't want to go home my baby was here you idiot. But I had four little ones at home that needed their mommy too, and someone to pack their clothes for Disneyland(thanks G-ma Kelli and Brooke). So after a nice visit with our cutie I came home to see them off and to cuddle my new electric baby, aka; breast pump.

Monday Mike and I arrived to find that they now knew what was wrong with our baby and the appropriate drugs had been started. And that they now felt he would make it and get to come home in about 8-10 days. Dawson then proved to be a little shit as they weaned him from sedation he pulled his ventilator out set his apnea monitors off on a regular basis and wet through his diapers daily and was a very tough stick in the last few days he was there his I.V. was placed in his forehead. On day five he was taken off his ventilator and only on oxygen assistance with his cannula's hooked on by Velcro stuck on to his puppy dog cheeks.

Wow how time flew, Not. The N.I.C.U. for all their care is a very scary and somewhat boring place to spend your days. The one exciting very emotional event came on day 6 I finally got to hold my snugly new baby for an entire half hour. Unless you have been denied the feel of your new baby in your arms you will never understand it but it is better than anything else out there.

I spent most of my days sitting next to him in the good rocking chair(you know the nurses like you when they save you the good furniture)reading to him until it happened, the magic question "How would you like to take your baby home tomorrow?" Yee Haa I showed up the next morning ready to dress him for the first time, had passed the CPR class, arranged for oxygen to be brought into the house, had the car seat ready and then mommy gut feeling kicked in I just could not bring myself to take anything into the hospital, so I guess that I shouldn't have been so surprised and disappointed when the really, really, mean Dr. told me that he had failed his hearing test and they were going to keep him for at least 7 more days to treat him for meningitis and they would now be doing a lumbar puncture on him to culture. Then Mrs. well meaning nurse came to tell me that due to his deafness she would set up an appointment with the School for the Deaf in Phoenix, and me, I just sat there holding onto him reading his stories to him and quietly sobbing.

Another 7 days passed, Mikes mom came to help with the other kids, and I was now on a first name basis with at least half of the hospital, when again they told us we could take him home tomorrow, by this time Mike and I just looked at them like "yeah right we've been through this before", but no they said really you can have him home in the morning. So again we loaded up the "coming home outfit" new blankets, tiny little turquoise bear paw bracelet and his car seat and very cautiously walked into the N.I.C.U. only to be met by a nurse who claimed that she couldn't possibly part with him and could we please let her have him, well after a quick hell no we got to bath our precious baby for the first time dress him in his soft blue puppy dog sleeper safely buckle him into his car seat we practically ran out of there(I kept looking back for at least 3 miles) and took our baby home.

Now 15 months later he has passed two hearing tests(he has only a slight delay in his hearing possibly due to all the antibiotics), has us all convinced he is special, has learned to walk which he hates to do, and his favorite person to read to him is still his Mommy.

one of the few

Okay living away from Utah has brought us some great friends with some different beliefs(I have actually explained garments so well that many of my friends want them). So we were all so excited with this new game we found on www.beliefnet.com it even has a cheesy name "belief-o-matic"I and a few of my non member friends found out that they are really Mormon. So go try it.

oh so natural

So after yet another night of painting and scrubbing and looking for missing kittens we fell into bed(so it was only 9:30 you try raising five kids). Peace at last I stretched out in nice clean sheets, had perfect white noise from the window fan and was gone. Fast forward to 4:15 am clomp clomp, rattle rattle.... what the h#&% as I flew out of bed Mike so calmly replied just a cow!!!!!!!!! Sure enough my newly planted flowers went the way of free range and the worst part, I just shrugged and went back to sleep.

showing our age

Friday Mike and I started the dreaded pre painting, pre moving sorting, you know go through all your belongings get rid of half of it and repacking the rest(so you can get rid of that the next time) when I stumbled upon my childhood pride and joy my record collection. Yup you heard me a super sized stack of super sized vinyl. Wow what memories that brought back, me and Brooke, Saige, friends and cousins dancing and singing along with Annie, Ernie's Hits, and our all time favorite(tongue in cheek) I'm a Mormon! including the smash hit I want to be a Mother(yeah probably was my favorite). Mike being the great husband that he is even volunteered to go out to the shed and dig out my old record player for me. So there I am so excited to share the music from my childhood with my cute little group when Carsten spies my treasures "WOW mom look at the size of those disks did you have to carry your cd player on your back like a backpack, what kind of batteries did it take?" Well I told him to just be quiet and he was in for a great treat, So I played Ernie's hits for them turns out they have never seen Sesame Street so Ernie who, and some pretty good scratches, so it really did sound as if Ernie's rubber duckie had been exposed to a little to many bubbles, so we moved on to I Have a Song for You all about animals, volume 3. The only problem is that by then Kallison was dancing to Hannah Montana on her mp3, Braxton and Carsten had gone back to the wii and Ardynn just stood there looking at me like I had just told her she was going to have to start wearing Sam Jams(complete with hammer loop) and putting her hair in a side pony. At least Dawson thought it was cool he just stood there and shook his little osh kosh clad back side bopping out to Kitten in the Sun and Mister Stand-On-One-Leg, his mommy is so hip. By then even Mike had given into his unwarranted need to laugh at my lost childhood and safely retreated back to the shed and his own "lost boxes of childhood treasure." Well the records and there player are safely packed for the move, the kids are all back to the 21 century, Mike is still out in the shed laughing at me, and as for me when did I get old?