The Church Youth trip was a blast! We went to the Ft. Worth zoo which was great and saw an IMAX movie (only one of the kids almost threw up, so that was good too!) And you can't go to the Dallas area without shopping - we hit the Grapevine and Frisco Malls and shopped til we dropped! The kids were all great to hang out with and then as soon as we got home Steve & I raced to OKC to meet up with our family at the Circus! It was a pretty good Circus and the kids loved it! They got to ride elephants so they were in hog heaven! Until it was time to say goodbye to their cousins, then things got quite sad and whiney! Fortuantely, 2 of our 3 were asleep within 5 minutes of the drive home! Mak had to stop and get something to eat! Then she passed out too!

Sat was a great lazy day for us all! We barely moved until noon! Makenzie asked a few rough questions about Sydney - Why did God make Sydney like that? I hate that Sydney can't be more like us. Will Sydney ever get better? Why can't Sydney talk? etc...I sometimes struggle with these same questions and why we can't get any answers, how can I expect her too? I just told her that I don't know all the answers but I do know that God has a plan for each of our lives and that He gave us to each other for a reason too. And one day in Heaven when God has given us our new bodies that she will be able to run and talk and do all the things eveyone else will be doing and she will be able to tell Mak thank you for being such a great sister and for standing up for me when I couldn't do it for myself and for loving me when it was hard too. Mak thought about it for a little bit and thought that was ok and said she was looking forward to going to heaven so she could play with Sydney. We talked about how much God loves each of us and he made each of us for a very special task that only we can do for Him. So God made each us of very special and He knew what He was doing. Our job is just to love Him and let Him love us!! We also talked about praying for Sydney and asking God to help Sydney, so ever since then she has been praying for God to help Sydney learn to talk better and be able to run without losing her balance and to be able to play better! Too precious!

We have been enjoying the better weather and spending most of our time outside again, at least until this little jag of rain and storms! Which has been ok as Karsten has been running 103* for a few days now...the rest of us are fine, so it must be something we've all already had! Thank you God! Of course, while he was sick I let him sleep with us and last night we paid the price for that - trying to keep him in his bed was a nightmare! He is such a momma's boy! He's just so cute and sweet! At least he has finally given up getting eggs out of the refrigerator! (Again, THANK YOU GOD!)

Guess that's it for now...I'll try to get my pics downloaded sometime soon!

Especially for Mrs. Julian & Ms. Wilkerson

I owe you both such a huge apology! I allowed my emotions and a few well-meaning people (who like me did NOT know the whole story) get me all riled up and I threw around some thoughtless words when venting and I hurt you. I am so sorry. I should have known in my heart that you two would never do anything not in Sydney's best interests. You both have gone out of your way to take care of Sydney and why I jumped to conclusions without seeing the obvious (Sydney is a mike hog & wouldn't give it up without a major meltdown, so it would be better for her to go off the stage than to throw a fit in front of everyone - duh!) anyway...I am so sorry and hope that you will forgive me. I have no excuse except sometimes it is just so hard to be a mom to a special needs kid - as wonderful as she is, and I know she is! - plus, we had my sisters' kids all week and you don't mean to, but it's hard not to compare the "normal" twins with my twins when they are the same age and all. And it's not just what Sydney can't do, but what Makenzie is missing out on too. Most of the time I am fine with that. I know that I know that I know that God has a plan for all 3 of my kids and God gave them to us for a reason and vice versa, but occassionally you have a moment, day or week where you know this in your head but your heart just cries out at the injustice of it all. Then I pour it out to God (literally with tousands of tears) - and He comforts me and He takes away the pain and I feel His peace lift me up again. And I have joy again in the raising of my 3 kids. But in the mean time, I hurt you and I am so sorry. Please forgive the overly emotional, in the heat of the moment, don't mess with my bear cub, etc...words and know that we think you are the best! We love you and can't thank you enough for your kindess and the love you give our girls.

Long night last night...after a fun filled afternoon at the Hideout and pizza for dinner, Steve & I fianlly got the kids down and got to sleep around 11:30pm...then around 12:30 Karsten shows up in our bed with a little fever...by 2am he is smoking hot! His temp was 103.9! Very hot little boy! Fortunately the Tylenol helped (after 30min his temp only went down .7*! But within an hour he was much better!) Finally got him back to his bed and much cooler around 4am at which time Sydney turns on her lights and comes out ready to play! After putting her back down about 4 times it is now 6:30 or so...then at 7am Mak wakes up and says is it Morning Time yet?!?! I croak out NO and she actually goes back to bed for about 30 more minutes! Bless her little heart! Later when talking to Nanny she tells us they all slept in til around 9am! UGH! The good news is Karsten slept til noon and hasn't had a drop of fever since around 4am! He is bouncing off the walls today and you would never know that kid was so ill last night! Bad news is the blondies came here half way sick themselves and today Katie barely moved...she is now running a fever and coughing a lot. Always something going on at our house!

Steve, Syd & I met with DHS today about a program that helps people pay medical bills beyond what private insurance pays and when they make too much to qualify for Social Security Disability Income...pray that we got all the right information to them and that they will accept us! We spend around $10-12,000 a year on med bills beyond what our insurance will pay for...not cheap! This would be such a huge thing for us!

Tomorrow Steve & I leave to go on our church youth spring break trip to Dallas/Ft. Worth area! It ought to be a lot of fun! Then as soon as we get back home, we have to head straight to OKC to meet the kids & Suzanne at the Circus! Fire up! Saturday is a Brooks reunion in Blanchard and then Sunday Steve & I are getting to go to the Great 8 in St. Louis! Very exciting! Of course it would be better if OSU were playing, but still, it will be some great basketball!

The girls' program at school was too cute! They did so good and were just adorable! They kicked it off with a group song and then each class sang a song and then they finished it off with another group patriotic song and then a goodbye song! After each class sang, each child got to walk to the microphone and say their name (except for Sydney and that totally broke my heart & totally ticked me off but that is another story...) It was so fun to see which kids hammed it up and which ones were shy and which ones were bold & sassy! Makenzie fell into the sassy category!

Yesterday we went to OKC and met my sister & got her kids for the week! We took all 6 to the zoo and we had a huge time there! Steve & I went up early and got some new tennis shoes and Nanny & Poppy brought our 3 up with them and then Uncle Ga met us at the zoo! Freaky twin thing happened in the car on the way up when Nanny was asking which animal they each wanted to see the most...Karsten roared like a lion and Nanny confirmed that it was a lion that he wanted to see the most and then Makenzie said she wanted to see the snakes and that Sydney likes the elephants the best and she knew that for a fact because Sydney told her in her brain that she wanted to see the elephants! And you know, I totally buy that she hears Sydney in her brain! She's just been too right too many times...

Got to go, time to get everyone ready for craft/reading time at the Library...and Sydney ready for therapy in OKC...

Holy cow! Almost 3-4 weeks since my last post! So sorry!!!

The girls have been doing great in school! They have their kindegarten program tomorrow night so that should be fun to watch. Unfortunately Daddy is going to be flying and miss it...Fortunately, there will be a 30min "Kindegarten memories" video they will be showing that night, so at least we can buy that for him!

Steve & I just got back from Phoenix - we won a trip to watch the Hornets play the Suns (lost by one heartbreaking point...) and some fun R&R time! We got to meet a lot of great people and just had a blast! Nanny & Poppy took the kids to Tulsa as it was Katie & Rob's 6th birthday, so they all had a blast. The only down part about the weekend was our Cowboys lost Sat in a gut wrenching game against Texas...

Guess that's it for now, I'll try to do better about posting some pics asap!