In our Family The Past 2 Months...
* Ben was having a real hard time (mentally) with the darker days, less sunlight and working nights. His therapist suggested a get away to somewhere warmer and lighter and so he, dad and Nathan booked some last minute flights to California with an overnight stop in Las Vegas. The boys stayed at The Excalibur hotel and thought it was really cool! They walked the strip, saw the Bellagio Fountains and waited 2+ hours for a (super expensive) buffet - which they said was worth every penny! The next day they made it to LA and their first stop was Six Flags!! Since it was a Thursday in December, there were zero lines and not very many people so they could ride the coasters as many times in a row as they wanted! Before they came home on Sunday, they hit the Santa Monica Pier (which was the boy's favorite part!) and they hit some beaches, shopped and ate yummy foods! Thankfully, the trip did the trick and helped rejuvenate Ben!
* THANKSGIVING... We had a really nice Thanksgiving this year. Joseph, Sarah and Silas arrived and spent the holiday weekend with us. We structured it like we did last year with each person being in charge of their own dish (from start to clean up!). Dad smoked us a turkey and Joseph and Sarah did a ham so those were our main dishes! We had Grandma and Grandpa Vogt come after dinner and enjoy some dessert with us. The next day (Black Friday), Dad took August, Joseph and Sarah and went to the Boise State game and mom and Lexi went shopping at the thrift store where everything was 50% off! Sadly, Aubrie was sick and stayed home to rest.
* The first weekend in December, mom and the girls signed up to volunteer at the Meridian Tree Lighting and Parade through Just Serve. Ben and Seth decided to come watch the parade and so did McKendra and the boys. It was a very frigid night and the boys were a bit miserable by the end of the parade and they headed home. The rest of the kids and mom gathered around the tree and awaited the countdown and fireworks!
* To keep the holiday festivities going, we hit a couple of light displays! We went to the Indian Creek Winter Wonderland display in Caldwell. There's a cute little path to walk through the lights along the creek. As we were walking back to the truck, we saw a cute little cafe that we popped in to warm up with hot cocoa and muffins. The second display we went to was the Scentsy lights. The girls and I went to this one alone while the boys were down in California.
* We also have had some Christmas Party's! The girls had some friends over and decorated Gingerbread Houses, played games and hung out while watching a movie. The following night, we had Stephanie and her girls over for our annual Christmas movie get-together! It looked a little bit different this year since mom was on her pre-op liquid diet but we still ordered pizza and Aubrie made her famous sugar cookies and delicious butter cream frosting. Mom had a protein shake and sugar free jello! Hahaha
* Of course there were several Boise State home football games! It was Aubrie and Lexi's turn to go to the "Black Out" game but Aubrie was too sick to attend so Lexi took her friend, Paityn. The day after Thanksgiving, Joseph, Sarah and August were able to attend the game and then Aubrie was finally able to attend a game with dad and went to the Championship game! There's always lots of fun energy and memories to be made at the games!
* Well, the end of the year certainly ended a bit different than I had expected! Dad and I have been working with Idaho BMI since this summer to take back our health! There were dozens (literally! Like close to 30 appointments and tests and labs and evaluations, etc) that had to be done before even submitting to insurance to be approved for surgery. Typically once your packet has been submitted to insurance it takes close to 2 weeks to be approved... however mine was approved within 2 days! I then got a call from the surgery scheduler and they informed me that there was one day left open before the end of the year and that was on December 20th! That was only in 13 days from when I got the call and you have to do a 2 week pre-op liquids only diet to shrink your liver. I told them I'd take it but felt all confused if I should do it then (or if at all!). So I immediately went to Heavenly Father in prayer and basically said "Ok, this is it! I've got a surgery date set and I need to know if this is the right path for me and what I should do - eeeks!".... I felt such a peace and calm (and excitement) come over my body and I KNEW this was what I needed to do. From the moment I got up off of my knees, all confusion, doubt and nervousness left and I was soooo excited and happy and had the mental mantra of "Bring it on!" Honestly the 2 week pre-op liquids wasn't too bad and I was so excited for the surgery that it helped me get through all of the Christmas party's and goodies that had been dropped off at the house by sweet neighbors and friends. The morning of surgery, dad got me to West Valley Medical Center and we were checked in by about 8:30am. The nurses were all so wonderful and took great care of me! Surgery got moved up (from 1:30pm to 10:30am) and we were back home by 3pm. The procedure went great and the surgeon was very pleased. My recovery has been going very well and dad and the kids have all been taking such great care of me!
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Spiritually Speaking...
- This is the RIGHT thing to do… AND the RIGHT timing
- Trust in the Lord and his timing
- Even though it is the right thing to do, it will still be scary as we step out into the unknown
- But as we come together in couple (and personal) scripture study and dive more faithfully into family history and rely on him to guide us with personal revelation, this will be a beautiful journey!
- He WILL light the path before us on what we should do and pursue
- Remember all of the miracles he has done for us in the past - more will come and continue to come
- The more we turn to Him (in scriptures, prayer, family history, and pondering) the more he will turn to us, and Quick will be the process
- Don’t let our relationship with the Lord slow down once the miracle has come
- Keep the habits we’ve started – he needs us!
- Search all avenues – even ones we think are dead ends
- Life will be even better!
- Be open to all opportunities
- Be a support to John, and let him know that as we rely on the Lord, we can get through anything!
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