Hi everyone! Thought I would catch up since my last post. To start off Andrea landed in the hospital on a Saturday morning about 2 weeks ago. She woke up wheezing and coughing so since her counts were already extremely low it was a direct trip to stay overnight! She wasn't sad of course since she loves to spend the night.... I'm not sure I could totally agree but, we do end up sp Rending some quality time together so we might as well make the best of it! Troy loves to go up and there and meet new people. To those who know Troy that wouldn't be shocking! He met at least 2 new families who had been recently diagnosed with the same thing as Andrea so we did our best to encourage them.

Here is Andrea in the ER...very impatiently waiting to go up to "her room"



We were soooo excited to get to see Bridgett who we hadn't seen in months!! She was Andrea's nurse for the day and that was great! They both had their Cardinal outfits on so we had to get pictures!!

Andrea and Bridgett

Me and Andrea just laying around! Andrea was really upset that night and wanted me to sleep in bed with her. Does this look like a bed built for two?!!

Andrea loves to go to the playroom and do crafts. She doesn't really appreciate the mask but is willing to put up with it if she can do what she loves to do best....create!

We got to go home on Sunday evening so it was a short stay!

Lauren's 15th Birthday was on the 21st of this month. I am still trying to come to grips with my "baby" being old enough to drive now! She is an awesome daughter and we are so blessed to have her!~ Tyler, Travis and Andrea were in Illinois with Nana visiting cousins so we decided to go out to eat at Texas Roadhouse. The guys of course wanted to make Lauren crawl up on the horse saddle and endure humiliation but, I put my foot down!:)

Alex was totally into the peanuts...shell and all!!

Luke and Ben are looking a little on the bored side here, I think Lauren was opening her presents.

Alex and one of his favorite people...Josh Boardman

The beautiful Birthday girl!

We have had this old dead tree in our front yard and Troy decided it was time for it to come down. Unbeknowns to us there was a mother racoon and her 4 babies living inside. When it fell the mother ran off and one of the babies was hurt really bad. You would have thought that we had just seen one of our family members injured! We tried to help it but it didn't make it. Troy and Luke gave it a decent burial...there were several tears shed and we had to move on. I know you make think we are strange but, I guess we just consider all of God's creation to be just that, God's Creation! My men are all "real men" but I'm very thankful they have tender hearts from the oldest to the youngest! That evening Troy took the mother a plate of food...Grill pork steak, baked potatoe and french bread. He told the kids that he felt really bad and the food would by no means replace what had happened to her baby but, he sure did feel bad!

There it goes! It looks so much better in our fron yard now!

Yesterday was Andrea's scheduled visit to go to St Louis for her monthly IV chemo. I decided to take Emily Boardman and Alissa Jones ( Andrea's cousin ) along for the day! Andrea was so excited to have her best buddies going along. They all spent the night together and were up bright and early, ready to go! Nana and Mammaw came out to stay with the rest of the gang here.

Here are the girls with Nana

Out on the front porch ready to leave.... I know I am biased but aren't they just the cutest things?!!

The girls with Bobby ( Andrea's nurse that she has every time she goes to the Costa Center)

Andrea, Emily and Alissa in front of the hospital.

I have my sisters 3 kiddos with me this week while Troy, Lauren and Luke are in PA at Penn View campus days where Troy is speaking. This means I have 7 kids ages 9 and under...we are having a great time and it especially made my day when Tyler and Jillayne told me today that they were going to fix lunch for everone! I was so proud of them.....they made lunch and even cleaned up their mess!!

Their finished product!

The little "angel" :) Looks like he might have a trick up his sleeve!

That pretty well sums up the last few weeks for us. Andrea got a really bad report as far as her blood counts go yesterday. She pretty much has no immune system right now. This usually lands her in the hospital at least for a few day so we would appreciate prayer that God will keep her safe!! With Troy and our older kids being in PA ( only 16 hours away :) ) , my mom having Bronchitis/Sinuitis/Pneumonia, and me having my sisters kids while they are moving from Illinois to Alabama it isn't an ideal time for this to all be going on!!! But, I am constantly reminded that God always works "all things together for good"!!