Happy Thanksgiving

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO YOU ALL!

I just wanted to take a moment to wish you all a very happy holiday! I started a tradition with my family that I'd like to share with you all. Each year I ask the girls and my husband to make a list of 10 things they are thankful for and why. I make my list and then when it's time for dinner, we share them. It's been neat to watch the list evolve as the girls are growing up. It also made me cry because it's proof that they are becoming so appreciative of the things around them.

So here we go....

Jill's List~ 10 Things I'm Thankful For & Why~

• My Husband~ He gets up every single morning at 5am and goes to work all day as a truck driver and heavy equipment operator. He finally gets home around 6pm each night. There are not too many days he complains about having to work. He's a wonderful provider and works hard for us to have the things that we do.
• My Girls~ I'm blessed to be called "Mommy" and I thank God every day that he gave me them. They're my world and continue to make me proud each day. I'm so thankful they are "good kids" and have some pretty amazing morals and values that I know will carry them through life.
• My Mom~ There is not a day that goes by that I don't thank God she is around. She has been my rock and without her I'd be lost! I look forward to our Saturday mornings together.
• My new Church~ For years I have longed to find another church home. We'd been members of a church for a long time but when you don't feel like you're being fed spiritually anymore then I feel it's time to move on. It was one of the hardest decisions because we had become a big part of the church but it was time to move on. We visited a few churches but none of them fed me....until we were invited to attend CCC with my best friend. From the moment we walked in, I had goosebumps! I sat in the service that October sunday with tears streaming down my face. I felt so comfortable. I felt so at home. I felt like God was speaking right to my heart that day. And the sermon...well it just happened to be a sermon that spoke right to Frankie and I. I looked over to see Kayleigh smiling and clapping to the music. The two Sundays that followed, my brother was in town and we missed church....yessss we couldn't attend physically but we MISSED it! My girls kept asking when we were going to go back? That made my heart smile :) The following Sunday, they were actually up early and ready to go! We haven't missed a Sunday since. They are asking to get involved with the Youth Group activities and Kayleigh even asked to bring her best friend with us. I know this is where we were meant to be! :) Thank you Jillie for leading us in the right direction!
• Insulin & "Goober"~ I'm so thankful to Frederick Banting for helping to discover it. Without constant doses of this wonderful drug, Kacey would die. YES, DIE! I am also VERY thankful to "Goober", Kacey's insulin pump, for all the hard work he does every single day to keep Kacey alive. Before pumping, Kacey was taking 8+ shots a day and with the pump, she gets one needle every 3 days (most of the time). It's made life easier for her because she can eat with the press of a button. For a child, thats GREATNESS! :)
• My Friends~ I'm blessed to have some of the greatest friends I could ever ask for. They've been there for me through my roughest times and been there to witness some of the happiest! It's so nice to be able to pick up the phone and call them and know that if they can be there, they will! I'm also blessed with a BFF that tries so hard to understand diabetes and listens with an open heart. She's heard me complain & bitch, watched me cry, and seen diabetes...good and bad. And not one single time has she ever turned her ear or her heart. It's hard to find a friend that does that. Most of them get tired of "diabetes talk" or they get tired of the inconvience that diabetes gives us. But not her!
• My bathtub & hot water~ Sure it sounds silly! At the end of a rough day, I love to go sit in the bathtub and relax. All of the stresses flow out into those bubbles and I can usually get out a new person ;) It's called "Mommy Time"!
• My cell phone~ I'm not so sure what I ever did without one! It allows me to have constant contact with my husband, my girls, my mom, my brother and my friends. I can be reached anywhere at anytime and its a nice security blanket!
• My new minivan~ I LOVE IT!! It makes life so much easier. I'm thankful to my husband for working so hard to get it for me even as impatient as I was. He kept reminding me that the right deal would come along...and it did!
• My computer~ Because all my D-Moms live in it! :) It also allows me to keep in contact with other friends and family that aren't as close as they can be. It allows me to share all the amazing pics and scrapbook pages I create. It has also become a very useful tool for the girl's too!

Frankie's List~ 10 Things I'm Thankful For & Why~

• My wife~ My best friend and I love her
• My children~ I love coming home to see them
• My job~ Good benefits for my family
• Home~ Place to rest and stay with my family
• Health~ Keeping healthy so I can work
• Friends~ To do things with and talk to
• Jesus~ For keeping us together and taking care of us
• Brother~ Finally got to meet him after 34 years
• Mother~ For being my Mom
• Nae~ For helping my family when we need it, never having to ask

Kayleigh's List~ 10 Things I'm Thankful For & Why~

• Insulin because it keeps my sister alive.
• Family because they support me everyday and made me who I am today.
• My cell phone because it allows me to have a social life and to stay in contact with my family and friends.
• A house because it provides me with shelter and a safe place to go knowing that I can always come home. Lots of people are homeless.
• An education so that I can strive to be the best that I can be.
• A hard working father who loves me because he works everyday to make sure I have the things that I want and need.
• A loving mom who helps me with my cake business so I will be successful and is always there for me.
• My sister because she loves me and provides me with someone I can laugh and joke with daily.
• Nae because she always gets me what I need and then some. She put me through all of my cake classes as well!
• Janice & Josh becuse they are my best friends and I always have fun when I'm with them. They make me smile and laugh daily!

Kacey's List~ 10 Things I'm Thankful For & Why~

• The first thing I'm thankful for is my family because they take care of me and helps me when times are tough.
• The second thing I'm thankful for is the friends I have because they help me when times are tough and they are someone to talk to.
• The third thing is my toys because it tells me that my family cares about me and they want me to have fun.
• The fourth thing is my sissy because she loves me alot and cares about me. I love you my sissy!
• The fifth thing is the bed and room I have because it means my family loves me alot.
• The sixth thing is a house because it shows me my family wants me to have a good life and shelter.
• The seventh thing is my Mom because she takes care of my diabetes and gives me food and shelter. I love you Mommy!
• The eighth thing is my hard working and loving Daddy because he loves me very much and he shows me that he cares about me and that he gives me food and shelter. I love you Daddy!
• The ninth thing is my Nae-Nae because she loves me alot and makes me lots of beautiful pump packs. I love you Nae Nae!
• The tenth thing is my pump because it helps me with my diabetes and it shows me that my parents love me and trust me. I love you Goober and HERBIE!

So there ya go! Our Thankful Lists! They all seem so similar when I read them and we all did them in sperate rooms so we couldn't see what each other was writing. Funny how some of us are thankful for the same things! :)

Again, I wish you all a very happy holiday! We all have many things to be thankful for!

Icky Sicky

The last few days have been some nasty diabetes sick days. Kacey started with the sniffles last week and then she got the sore throat and stuffy nose. I was giving her the Triaminic and hoping it wouldn't develop into anything worse. By Sunday, she was blowing her nose and it looked like Spongebob had melted in the tissue! Yeah....ewwwww is right! By Monday afternoon, she was feeling really crappy and I was called to come and pick her up from school an hour early. She kept saying "Mommy, I really tried to make it all day!" Her blood sugars were still swinging and she was just a mess. So yesterday morning, I got her an appointment for 9am. Diagnosis....sinus infection and the start of bronchitis. Ummm....GREAT! No wonder she felt so freakin lousy! So I took her back home and thats where she stayed the rest of the afternoon.

By last night, she had a terrible sinus headache that made her sick at her stomach. This is when diabetes gets really scary for me! She ended up throwing up her dinner because she was coughing so hard and then the headache made her nauseous. (***insert worry here***) I grabbed her pump to check her blood sugar...113 with 8 units of IOB!!! So now...do we wait to see if shes gonna drop or spike up from puking? I was too scared to chance it so I gave her 8oz of Hawaiian Punch. Wait....Wait....Wait....check 30min later....252....YUK! And then 2 hours later....460!!! GEESH!!!

This cold is just kicking her butt! I'm so thankful that we're out of school for the holiday for the next 5 days. Hopefully she'll be as good as new by the time she goes back. Then when we go back, we only have 2 weeks til they are out for the Christmas holiday break. (Thank God!)

I'm just feeling a lot of frustration school wise and the thought of homeschooling Kacey is looking better and better. If she wasn't such a social child, I think I would have pulled her already. But she likes being with her friends and she's been in her school for 6 years now....so its a tough decision! It's just hard on me because at least once a week (sometimes twice) they are calling me to come and get her because either shes dropped low and is scared shes going to drop again OR shes so high that she feels like crap and wants to put her head down and go to sleep. So what do ya do? I've never been able to feel how it feels to have those nasty blood sugar swings but I've heard they make you feel pretty icky. So who am I to make her stay at school when she feels so crappy? I can't do that to her! I know shes not "faking" because her numbers tell all and when I bring her home, she gets on the couch and she goes right to sleep. Usually after about 2-3 hours, she starts to feel better and she gets up for dinner and eats and then goes right back to sleep. I guess we will ride the roller coaster of this year and then we'll see what happens when she gets to middle school.

Today's task....REST and Write 10 things you are Thankful for and why? Each year, I will have the girls write down 10 different things they are thankful for and Frankie and I do the same thing and then we share them at Thanksgiving dinner. I'm excited to see what they choose! I started this last year with them and I think it's a neat way to see into someone's heart. :) After the Thanksgiving list is made....then it's on to the Christmas list!!!

The 2010 D-OC Blog Awards

It's that time again! The 2010 Diabetes Online Community Blog Awards. This year is going to be a fun one! There are several neat catagories for you to nominate your favorite blogs. Please be sure to take a few moments and nominate your favorites!

Nominations will go on til December 8th!

Here are The 2010 Diabetes OC award categories!
Best Blog Design

Most Creative

Blogger Who We Wish Would Blog More

Funniest Blogger

Most Likely to Put You in a Good Mood

Best Commenter

Best Twitterer

Blogger with the Best Hair

Blogger You’d Share a Drink With

Best Photographer

Best Use of Bad Language

Best Vlogger

Blogger Most in Need of Comment Love

Blogger I Most Want to Meet Offline

Jump on over to the D-OC Blog Award site and check it out!!

Ok, so what do I do now?

1) Nominate a member of The Diabetes Online Community for each category whom you see fit.

2) Open up your email and in the subject put DOC NOMINATIONS, in the body of the email Copy and Paste the category list (below) and write in the name of the person you are nominating to the right of each category, as well as the URL of their blog page and/or website address, and then send the nominations to docawards@gmail.com.

One Rule. The website or blog you are nominating must be diabetes related. (If you think we should have any other rules please let me know!)

Share the love and show the D-OC your support by voting!! :) It's your right! LOL!

The Versatile Blogger Award

I proudly accept this blog award for The Versatile Blogger

There are 4 things that you must do in order to accept this award:

1. Thank the person who gave you the award:

Thank you Nicole from, We Cara Lot Blog for taking the time to nominate me and making me feel special enough to receive this award! Thank you to every single one of you out there that read my blog. I'm so blessed to be part of such a wonderful online community of D-Bloggers and I'm even more thankful to call you all...my friends!

2. Share seven things about yourself:

Hmmmm...ok my 7 things....

One: I love doing crafty things! It can be anything from beading jewelry to painting stained glass. Both of my girls love doing those sorts of things too and giving them away as gifts. When Kacey was first diagnosed, I had a nasty run of insomnia and so I spent those hours beading. I ended up with a huge basket of stuff I had made and I sold it to friends, family and at local events and donated 100% of the profit to JDRF.

Two: I enjoy taking pictures and scrapbooking them. I've always been a huge camera fan and when my brother gets back to the East Coast, he's gonna share his photography skills with me. I hardly ever go anywhere without my camera! I'm hooked on Creative Memories digital software. I can sit for hours with the computer in my lap and create fun pages with the click of a button. It's so fun to be able to share those with family and friends :)

Three: I love Christian worship music. I drive Kacey to school every morning and we listen to K-LOVE to start our morning and it's such an uplifting feeling. It also warms my heart to hear my girls singing along to the songs or hearing them get a worship song stuck in their head and humming it during the day. We've found a new church that we just absolutely LOVE! It's everything I've always wanted from a church and I'm so in love with looking over at my girls during service and seeing the smiles on their faces because they're getting so much out of the lesson being taught. Some of our favs...Chris Tomlin, Lincoln Brewster, Nicole Mullen, TobyMac, Steven Curtis Chapman, Matthew West and those are just to name a few!

Four: I collect Pandora charms. My girls and my hubby started my bracelet for me in Aug 2008. I've got 18 charms and the safety clasp now. It's one of my absolute favorite pieces of jewelry! Each charm has a special meaning and it's neat to sit and look at my wrist and think back to what each one means.

Five: I never go without my toenails painted! I hardly ever wear polish on my finger nails but I can't go without wearing it on my toenails...LOL!

Six: I love Willow Tree Angels and Precious Moments. I started collecting Precious Moments for Kayleigh when she was little and when Kacey came along, I decided to start the Willow Tree Angels.

Seven: I LOVE COFFEE! All kinds and all flavors! I'm a Starbuck's lover and when I'm at home all day, the coffee pot stays on and it's easy for me to drink 1-2 pots of coffee on my own! Anyone that knows me well enough knows that my all time fav is Peppermint Mocha's :) :) :) :) !!!!

3. Pass the award on to 12 bloggers you have recently discovered and who you think are fantastic.

Wendy at Candy Hearts Blog

Joanne at Death of a Pancreas

Laura at Houston We Have A Problem

Amalas at Plastic Pancreas

Jennifer at Sweet Sassy & Sugar Free

Lora at My Diabetic Child

Cody at Pancreatic Challenged

Renata at The Diabetic Duo

Amy at My Diary As The Mom of a Diabetic Princess

Kelly at Chasing Numbers

Tracie at Such Is Life

Cara at Every Day, Every Hour, Every Minute

I tried to pick ones that had not been chosen yet...if you have been nominated already...sorry! :)

4. Notify your nominees...consider yourselves notified :)

The Big Blue Test

Here are a few pictures from Kacey's Big Blue Test. She had so much fun doing this and watching what happened to her blood sugar in just 14 minutes.

Testing her blood sugar before she started....

Bike ride for 5 minutes

Jog in place for 5 minutes

Another bike ride for 4 minutes

Test again....

Test...2pm...174

Retest...2:14pm... 139!! Woohoooo! TAKE THAT DIABETES!

Kacey & Goober wishing everyone a Happy World Diabetes Day!

14 Years Ago Today...

On this day, 14 years ago, I was set up on a blind date with the man that would become my husband and father to my children. When we met, he had hair as long as mine, he drove a truck with 39in tires and our first date was to the Monster Trucks and Denny's for dinner. I remember being so nervous and scared because we'd never met before. Little did I know...I'd fall head over heels for him! The last 14 years have been an amazing roller coaster ride! I'm so thankful to be his wife. I decided to dig out some old pictures. Boy was it hard to find one from each year around the same time frame! Especially before digital camera time...LOL! So here goes.... 14 years of LOVE!

1996~ This was taken not long after we met. Good grief...I look so young! Well...I was...LOL..I was 21 and he was 28.

1997~ We'd been together for about 6 months here.

1997~ Just a little over a year later, he asked me to marry him!

1998~ Engaged and still soooooo very happy!

1999~ May 15th....we're married! It was my dream wedding! Everything about our wedding was perfect (except the cake! thats a post for another day!)

2000~ This was taken not long after Kacey was born (yeah see the chubby face...eek!)

2001~ The first year we bought Busch Gardens passes.

2002~ Still so much in love!

2003~ I cried when I found this picture. This was taken at his Granny's house and shes no longer alive and the apartment is no longer in their family. (Yep I know it says 2004 but the date on my camera was wrong...LOL...you remember those ones you had to set the date on? Ive got so many pics with the wrong date cuz I couldnt remember how to set it!)

2004~ This was at a friends wedding. How about that short blonde hair? HAHAHA! Yuk!

2005~ Hair longer and dark again (thank God!)

2006~ This was taken at Harborfest. We had so much fun that weekend! You can see his tattoos in this one. He has the key on his arm with a ribbon wound through it that says KAYLEIGH & KACEY since he said "They have the key to his heart." and then on his chest (against my wishes) he has the lock that matches the key with my name on it since he says "I hold the lock that no other woman can open." LOL...yeah yeah mushy huh? But its what he wanted!

2007~ This was at his family Christmas party.

2008~ This was taken at my Mom's house that Christmas

2009~ Having fun like always!

2010~ Still in love after 14 years :) This is my favorite picture that we've ever taken!

I LOVE YOU FRANKIE!

Robbed

Thats exactly how I feel about diabetes lately. I feel like diabetes has snuck in and robbed Kacey like a thief in the night. On Thursday night and Friday morning, the lows and spikes from the juice had taken it's toll on Kacey's poor body and she was completely wiped out. She ended up on the couch...just laying there like every single bit of energy had been sucked out of her. Over the weekend, the lows were still there but they were spread out. This morning, she woke up with a headache. She grumbled when I tried to wake her and that always is a true sign of a bad diabetes day ahead. She got up and had some breakfast and even though she was a 169, she was moving slowwwww. I drug her on to school and my phone rang about 11:45am. I looked to see who was calling..."SCHOOL NURSE". I held my breath as I choked out a hello. Kacey was in there...blood sugar a 118...lunch was in 15 minutes and she had NO appetite...she was cold...her tummy hurt...her head hurt...her throat hurt....and she was tired. Kacey wanted to come home. DAMMIT DIABETES! You've robbed her of ANOTHER school day!

I stopped asking God a long time ago..."Why me? Why Kacey? Why our family?" and I embraced the fact that this is how we had to deal with things and live our new life....but when we have days like this...it makes me so angry! There are so many times I think.... What if Kacey didn't have diabetes and could actually function to 100% in a school setting? What if she didn't have to worry about those lows that I know she's scared of? What if she could actually concentrate without diabetes sneaking in and robbing her thoughts? When we got home the other day, she cried and I wasn't sure what was going on. She told me she was scared. Scared?!?! Scared of what?!?! She is scared she is going to go low at school and there will not be anyone around to care for her properly. (**tears**) We went through this before and for some reason she's feeling insecure again. Not sure what happened unless it's from what happened at lunch on Thursday or something else going on. Somehow I have to figure out how to give her that security back. I'm thinking we might need another teacher conference with her included. It's not the highs that scare her because she can function and treat those but when you have those lows and you feel like you can't care for yourself on your own when thats what you've been doing then I think it worries her. She's had a couple of lows in the 50's recently and she knows that I can treat them for her but they've been those lows where she just sits there and closes her eyes and lays her head back. I know it weighs on her mind...what if that happens and Mom isnt there to treat them? She needs to know there is someone else that CAN treat them for her at school....OR maybe thats just one more reason we need the cell phone!

I got her progress report today and she seems to be above level on everything and I know there are days she struggles with getting things complete because her brain is fuzzy or shes just too exhausted to do them and yet I still wonder what her full potential COULD be? I looked at her days missed... 6 out of 36. Now in all fairness, she did have surgery for the tumor and a broken arm in the middle of all of this but there are days like Friday and today that sneak in and it makes me sad. Last year she missed 24 days and still ended up on Honor Roll!


Now...in the middle of all of this...I took her back to the orthopedic doctor. Her broken arm is not healing as fast as it should so she has to stay in the splint for 3 more weeks...bummer! So we come home and she is walking up the front steps and she trips going UP the steps and hurts her leg and then she gets in the bathroom to pee and she falls into the wall and hits her face. YES! I immediately checked her blood sugar and she was HIGH and now she's got a beautiful black eye!So was it the confusion and loss of balance from being HIGH or was it just Kacey being clumsy? I won't ever know because she doesn't even know! LOL...I told her she better stop getting hurt of Dept of Social Services was going to be knocking on our door! That made us both giggle. :)

Ohhhh and a bit of exciting news... I WON! I WON! I WON! Yes...I won the contest over at Nicole's blog, We CARAlot Blog for the PJ Giveaway. I'm so excited! I entered the contest for Kacey so as much as I wanted those blue circle jammies for myself...I ordered them for Kacey :) She was so excited and I let her choose the ones she wanted. THANK YOU Nicole for drawing my name and THANK YOU to Komar & PJs For The Cure for allowing those special D-Moms to hold the Mega contest! :)

Secret Santa Extension Time

It has been brought to my attention that there are some website problems with Elfster. Due to those problems, we have to extend the sign up deadline. The original deadline was Nov 15th but I am extending it 2 days to allow those D-Families that were not able to sign up some time to get registered. If you haven't signed up and you want to participate then please view THIS POST to link to register and view the rules. DEADLINE is Nov 17th!