Hellllooooo World!!!

Wow...it's been a while, and then some.

I am so excited to make Rhett's blog public again. We are finished with our settlement with the hospital and I know that both Andy and I are super excited to close that chapter in our lives and move on.

This hasn't been a path that I would choose for my worst enemy, but yet I wouldn't change a thing about it. There has been many many days that I have asked why me, why us, why Rhett? But when it all comes down to it, it's our life. It's my life. I am so happy that Rhett chose me to be his mom. That he chose us for his family.

As I said this has been a hard road. The kids and I have moved in with my mom, and Andy is living with his grandpa. It's been an adjustment to say the least. Hunter and Chloee are sleeping in bunk beds in my sister's room, and Hunters clothes are all downstairs in Dakota's room, and I got the luck of having my bed put in the living room.

Talk about NO privacy.......however, I do have the cutest little 4 yr old roommate on the planet, and I'm thinking that he is really enjoying that out of hardship, he HAS to sleep in the same bed with me. Cuz you know, there is really no other option.

I'm pretty sure we are gonna make it though. We're survivors.

Rhett is going to preschool, and he is loving it. I think that he loves the bus more than actually going to school though. He loves watching for it out the big window each day. He gets a note sent home each day telling us how his day went, how much he ate of his lunch and what he did at school. I can honestly say that he has never once had a bad day. Every day it is checked that he had a good day.

Which I kinda find hard to believe, since he constantly is being possessed by little deamon men who make him flush my iTouch down the toilet, dump out my mom's plants, put fruit snacks in the dogs hair, and stuff lettuce up his nose....just to name a few.

It's a good thing that he is insanely adorable and says, "I yuh you, mommy" so cute. Otherwise him and I would have words.



Dakota, Hunter and Chloee are all doing well. Dakota and Hunter are hitting that pre-teen/teen stage. Oh my do they fight. Like not arguing, but knock down drag out punches and kicks.

I just send them outside till one of them gets hurt. Then they come in boobing, and I get to say "I told you so." Muwahahahahaha!! I is an evil mommy.



Chloee is growing up so much. She has so many friends, and I have never seen a child that gets so many gifts given to her. When we moved she had 3 of her classmates give her cute little cards and gifts given to her. The whole class had a going away party for her the day she left. Then on her birthday, after not being in the class for 3 weeks her new friends all had a little party for her at recess complete with cards and gifts again. I love the way she just loves everyone.



I am doing well...given all of the circumstances. I have been battling some serious health issues, and am often left rundown and not able to do all of the things that I want to. I'll have 2 good days and 3 or 4 bad days. Such is life.

I look forward to blogging and catching up on our lives.

I leave you with the picture of Rhett that Andy drew of him. I am so impressed with Andy's work and the way he captured Rhett's features......

Wow It's been a while.......

Things seem to be moving forward in our settlement. We have sent pictures to our attorney, and now we are compiling a list of all of Rhett's medical providers as well as friends and family who are close to the situation.

I think I speak for both Andy and I when I say that we are so ready to have some closure to this, and that it can't come soon enough.

My heart aches everytime I think about how close we came to loosing Rhett. I know I need to be grateful that he is here and focus on the good, but the fact of the matter is, is that it will never go away and we will always remember that awful day.

There is alot going on in our lives, and if you don't have the address to our family blog you can visit it here.

Private Update....

I know I said this would go private Monday night, but I decided to give it a little more time. Like the end of the week.

In the mean time I am updating over here.

New Blog Link.....

Okay, so when this blog goes private, we are going to have a new blog. Here is the link to our new family blog that will stay public.

THE BIRD FLOCK

Also, I can only have 100 people to invite, and I must admit that I didn't know how many people out there read Rhett's blog.

So here's the deal. If you have been a lurker, and we don't "Know" you then please don't feel bad if you don't get an invite. The whole reason we are doing this is so that only people we don't "know" aren't reading the blog for the next few months.

But, here's the thing. With the new BIRD FLOCKblog I will be updating it more than this one anyways.

HAVE NO FEAR.....You will still get Rhett fixes. I promise. I will still update on his health and our trails and everything else in between.

So will you please update your link lists that go to Rhett's Journey so that people can find us? Even if you keep the title Rhett's Journey and just change it so it links to THE BIRD FLOCK I would appreciate it. I will leave this blog open until Monday night and it will then go private.

Also leave me a comment on our new blog HERE

Thanks a Million!!

Going Private.....

I want to get this out there for the next few days so that if you are a regular blog reader you can continue.

Due to circumstances regarding Rhett's incident, we are going to go private for a while until things are completely finalized.

It should only be for a few months, and I will start a new family blog that just will continue to keep those of you whom we don't know updated. It will be public, and I will still discuss Rhett and all things Down syndrome, and I still will be posting here as well. Just not for the world to see.

SO, anyhow if you would like to keep reading, please send me an email so that I can add you.

I will post our family link blog here as soon as I get it up and running.

Thank you so much for supporting us in this journey. I am so blessed to have such amazing friends. I look forward to the future when I can make this a public blog again.

Cheese????

Rhett loves to pull faces for the camera these days. I can't get a good smile out of him for the life of me. Yup, he's three.....and a total boy.

I love that he's just like any other little boy his age--just with a little extra chromosome that is filled with lots of extra love.

No matter what life throws at us we are always going to be the luckiest people on the planet because we all have each other.....and a little munchkin of a love muffin to make us laugh.



Oh, and remember the Jaw Breakers from when we were kids that were the size of a Baseball? I totally found them in the grocery store last night.

This is what Chloee looked like after licking off the first three or four layers..


Yup, life is good.

One last thing as a side note, we are getting rid of a million of Chloee's toys. Is there anyone out there who could use some really cute like new toys? Some games, some stuffed animals. I will take picts and you can email me if you would like the picts of them. If you live out of state I just ask that you help with the cost of shipping.

I also have some toys of Rhett's that we are getting rid of. I would love them to go to a fellow blog reader who is struggling.

Email is mom2rhett@hotmail.com

Happy New Year!!

We are closing a huge chapter in our lives right now.

Weare going to loose our home for the second time in a year and a half.

We are looking at moving into a 3 bedroom condo, but I think this is a good thing. The price for rent is right, and we won't have to worry about keeping up on home repairs that we don't have the money for, nor will we have to worry about a yard that neither Andy nor I have the time to work on.

I wish our credit was good enough to just refinance, but we have so many medical bills that went into collections over the years, it's just not going to happen. We are the type of people that always pay our rent and utilities first, and then medical bills. With our house payment ballooning to 2300.00 a month, well, I don't know anyone who can pay that type of a payment. I HATE adjustable rates. The bank has been so good to us, and they have tried to help us, but I know this is out of their hands as well as ours. It's okay though. I know we are not the only ones who are going through tough times.

We are hoping that by doing this, we will be able to build up a nest egg again. It is so frightening to me not to be able to have any type of money to fall back on when we have an emergency.

Yes this means our dogs and cat will go to new homes, but they will still be in the family. As far as Andy's reptiles, well we are super close to getting Rhett's Pet's off the ground. They will all have temporary homes until we get our store front going.

Some more good news is that my house is finally clean from the Christmas Explosion as I like to call it. I mean it's not like it was a total disaster. It's just that the kids presents were everywhere. Chloee had opened all of her barbies and just left the boxes in the sitting room, and it was driving me insane.

So that's what 2009 has in store for us. We are finally getting the settlement, and we will be back on our feet. How awesome is that?

Also, in February, I am going to be starting my photography, so if anyone is interested in having a photo shoot let me know. For the first few people I will only charge for the prints that are made up.

Eventually I would like to give back by going into homes and taking photos of families who have chronically ill children who can't take them to portrait studios to have their pictures done. But I need to get my business up and going first.

I have a dream though, and my I know that my dream will become a reality. It will just take time.

Thank you so much for those of you who have supported us through 2008. We are so blessed to have such amazing friends and so many prayer warriors for Rhett. I can't imagine our lives without you.

It's Okay to Cry....

Today has gone from bad to worse. It's just been stupid things, but sometimes I feel like I handle the major things so well that when the little ones start building up I loose it over something stupid.

I started out this morning with Rhett needing a bath due to his poopie issues. Now I'm not going to complain to much about the poopies, because all around he is feeling much better. We even snuck into the mall for about a half an hour this afternoon.

Anyhow after I got him bathed I came down and stepped in a rather large puddle. The dog had peed all over the kitchen floor. See she got pregnant by the neighborhood pimp that roams the neighborhood. Somehow he got into our backyard and did his duties with our dog. I wish I knew who this dog belonged to because if I did his owners would be getting these puppies as soon as they are weaned from mommy. Long story short she is a hound that is bigger than Rhett and she lives in the Kitchen during the winter and when she pees she makes big puddles. She doesn't pee very often, but she is the size of a house and due any day now so I can only imagine her need to urinate.

Did I ever tell you about the time I peed on Andy when I was 9 months pregnant with Hunter? Yeah, funny story there......

So then after I mopped up the pee, and changed my pants, (because you know, I am super short and ALL of my pant legs drag on the floor, especially if I don't have shoes on), I went up to do my hair and make up only to find that SOMEONE had thrown my brush and foundation into the toilet.

Okay, problem fixed, just throw a hat on and who gives a crap if the world sees all of my zits. I am beyond trying ot impress anyone.

THEN after getting everyone dressed and ready to head out the door, Rhett poops again. So I hurry and change him, during which he decides to kick his shoes into his poop, and I end up having to clean up those as well as his butt.

So I load Chloee and Rhett into the truck and start to pull out. I realize that neighborhood pimpy dog is behind my truck and will not move. I have to get out, grab him by his collar and pull him up onto our lawn. This dog is a husky, and is as big as our hound if not bigger. I tell him to move his ass or I'm sending him to the dog food factory. Chloee is screaming at me, "No mommy!! Don't do it!!"

Sigh.

So I hop back in the truck and by now I have just enough time to get up to the hospital for Rhett's swallow study. Remember the hospital is over an hour away on a good day with no traffic.

I get up past the point of the mountain, which puts me at the halfway point and traffic just stops. I sit in traffic for 25 min and only move maybe a mile if that. I can see that I am not going anywhere fast. So I call radiology and ask them if I can still come up or if we are going to have to reschedule. Of course since the speech therapists have to be involved we have to reschedule.

I get off on the next exit that I can. Then a light kicks in in my brain. Hey I am really close to the Mayan. Which is a fabulous restaurant where men in loincloths jump off of cliffs into a pool, and (lest you all think I am a sicko that takes my kids to pornographic restaurants), it's fun for the kids too because it's like a jungle theme.

I pull in thinking the day is already shaping up, (I mean, who doesn't want to see guys with six packs walking around in loincloths?) so I get Rhett out put him in his chair, haul Chloee out and walk up to the door. They are now closed for lunch.

AAAHHHHHHH!!!

So we ended up driving back to Orem and eating at the Spaghetti Factory. It was the only place I could think of that had Macaroni and Cheese besides the Mayan, and Rhett kept asking for "oodles" which means Mac N Cheese.

We walked around the mall for a little bit and threw pennies in the fountain. Rhett loves to do that,

Then we got home and I took one look at my house and started to bawl. See I have been home for over a week now. Then only time I have gone anywhere was yesterday when I ran to Wal-mart for a few things. I didn't realize how trashed my house is.
I have so much to do, and so much to get rid of, and I don't have the time or the energy to do it on my own.

Rhett looked at me, and put his chubby little hand on my face and said, "Mommy. Cry. OKAY!!!" So I guess he was telling me it's okay to cry.

I feel alot better now, and maybe just maybe, I can tackle what I need to. Or at least some of it.

Feelin' Fine.....

Today Rhett is feeling much better. After we got through the hacking up a lung first thing this morning and trying to yack up the mucous that was in the back of his throat it's actually shaped up to be a splendid day.

Rhett was bored while he was getting his afternoon feed so we had a photo shoot.

These are the results....







See, we are out of our jammies today!!

This is my way of procrastinating on cleaning and organizing the house after the Christmas mess. We are having a huge poker night on New Year's Eve, and my house looks like a war zone.

I am ready so ready to take down Christmas. Generally I try to leave it up until New Years, but I just don't see my tree handling another Rhett incident. I can hear it begging for me to put it away back into it's cozy tote, and not to be taken out again until Rhett turns twenty.

I am also super sad that the kids go back to school next week. They have been so good at helping me while Rhett has been sick. It's so nice to have 6 extra hands to help with those nasty diapers, and the suctioning.

But alas.....Life goes on......