Hopefully, My Final Word on this Subject

Today, Lucas took a swim test at the YMCA. If he passed, he would earn a Green Band. The green band enables them to swim wherever they want (in whatever depth) without me having to be with him. The test is that he has to swim 25 yards (the length of the pool) without touching the bottom or lane lines.


He did it! I wasn't worried. He has been swimming that distance all week. Multiple times. Back and forth.

Pretty good for a kid that drowned less than 2 months ago. The other kids are little fishes too. Libby isn't quite green band material, but she'll be taking a couple more rounds of swim lessons this fall. We aren't done.
School starts on Monday. Lucas will be starting Kindergarten. I don't wonder what his answer will be when asked what he did with his summer vacation. The answer is Swim.

Snuggle

My word, these kids are cute! Libby doesn't actually like cuddling while she sleeps (much like her mother). But Lucas would be completely content to just sleep right ON TOP of you. And all night long. Don't bother trying to slip out, either. He'll find you. And smother you with his "love."

Where Do We Go From Here?

I think I've decided to keep blogging. I know I hadn't posted in six months. I'm not going to apologize. My heart just wasn't in it.

Even if no one reads here, I'm okay with this. I need this for me. So, I'll post when I feel like it, and won't when I don't.

Today is for picture sharing. I finally downloaded pictures from my camera, which hasn't been done since November 2012. I'm only going to share the most recent stuff right now and maybe I'll come back to some of the older stuff... maybe.

The husband decided to join me in my Triathlon Fun. So, we've already done three races this season and we have at least three more scheduled. He's a machine. It's so awesome to ride or run or swim together during training! Best. Date. Ever.

 Just a current picture of all of us. This particular picture was taken at the Orlando Florida LDS Temple. I have big hair.

 Another picture of us. Please remind me that Abbie is now too tall to stand in front of me in pictures. Curses!

 Picture of Lucas taken four days after he nearly drowned. He is obviously in perfect health.

 I have taken the kids to the pool almost every day since we got home. It makes my mother-heart hurt but it must be done. I refuse to allow my children to have fear rule their actions. All three of the younger kids are enrolled in private swim lessons. They will learn to swim, damnit!

Ha! And then there's this girl. What a perfect little nerd! ZOMG.
And finally, a video to put your mind at ease (if that's even possible).

The Full Report

Where do I start?

Last week, we stayed at the Marriott Sabal Palms Resort in Orlando with my husband's entire family for a family reunion. On Friday morning, the women of our group decided to go shopping at the Outlet Malls while the men would take the kids swimming at the resort pool. We left around 10:30am. 

At about 11:20 I received a phone call from by brother in law, Marshall. He very calmly said (something along the lines of), "Alissa? There has been an incident at the pool. Lucas went under water. He is not breathing. There are emergency people here working on him right now." We immediately took off for the car. I had handed my phone to one of the other women as I hyperventilated my way through the maze of an outlet mall. Before we could even reach the car (maybe three minutes later), Marshall called my phone back and relayed the message that they were able to get Lucas breathing again. I immediately dropped to my knees in the middle of the mall. I was not okay. 

We got the information that Lucas was being taken by ambulance to Dr. P. Phillips Hospital with Matt. We got in the car and took off for that hospital. As soon as I arrived I noticed Matt getting there at the same time. I ran to catch up with him. As it turned out, Matt had run into our hotel room to get his wallet and the ambulance had taken off without him. Which was fine. Fix my baby. The resort had immediately offered a towncar to take Matthew to the hospital. The wrong hospital. The ambulance had taken Lucas to Celebration Hospital. Both my ride and Matt's had dropped us off and left. So, we were stranded at the wrong hospital. I was able to get ahold of our car and had them turn around and come back. 

Finally, we arrived at the hospital. As soon as we did, they took us to Lucas. He was sleeping. I walked over to him and fussed and rubbed him for a moment and called his name. He woke, opened his eyes and started crying for a second and then went back to sleep. Within a couple of minutes, my husband and his brother, David were able to give Lucas a Priesthood Blessing. They placed an NG tube up his nose and down his throat into his stomach to remove the contents of his stomach. He had swallowed a lot of water. He started screaming. These are good things. He cried for about twenty minutes saying over and over, "Take it out of my throat, you're hurting me, please!" I am told that the fact he was talking so quickly after was a VERY GOOD SIGN.

From there, we were transferred (again, by ambulance) to the Florida Hospital for Children (Walt Disney Pavilion) Pediatric Intensive Care Unit. Best hospital ever. By about 5pm Lucas was waking up enough to request a movie (and food which he wasn't allowed to have) and by 9pm, they had removed the NG tube and was allowed some apple juice. All miracles. 

The next morning they took him off of oxygen and he was on room air only. Around 10am they allowed him to have a bowl of Fruit Loops. By 11am, we were cleared to go home. We left the hospital at 1:05pm. About 25 hours after it all started. 

We don't know how long Lucas was underwater for or for exactly how long he had not been breathing. The doctors estimate that it could not have been more than a minute or two (too long in my opinion, obviously). My husband was at the other end of the pool when it happened. He was swimming with one of our other children. Lucas is a very adventurous kid and had been practicing underwater swimming in an area of the pool that was three feet deep. Where he could touch. He does not know how to swim by himself. He wears a floating device when we go to the pool. He had been wearing it, and took it off. My husband told him several times to put it back on, but Lucas is Lucas.

Lucas doesn't remember much about the incident. What he has said was that he was jumping up and down in the water. We think he just wandered into an area that was above his head (he's not very tall). 

HERE IS OUR MIRACLE:

Lucas was pulled from the water by Dr. Robert Kazim and his sister Dr. Debra Kazim who just happened to be 1.Staying at our resort 2. At the pool at that moment. Dr. Robert is a Pediatric Anesthesiologist. His sister is also an anesthesiologist. I am told if you want anyone in the entire hospital doing CPR on your kid, it's a ped anesth. My pediatrician started crying tears of joy when she heard. The Drs immediately started CPR on Lucas. Chest compressions, breathing, everything. They saved his life. It is estimated they did CPR for about 5 minutes when Lucas started breathing again on his own. 

I am also told that of the adults at the pool that day, over half of them were Physicians. 

My son has a host of guardian angels watching over him. Our Heavenly Father has just made it abundantly clear that my son is a very important person and that He has something special in store for him. 

I know that a lot of you who will read this are not of my faith (Latter-day Saint - Mormon) but I need to take this opportunity to bear testimony.

I know that my Heavenly Father loves me. I feel of His love every single time I look at my son. I know that He has brought my son back to me for a reason. I know that I need to be doing a better job as Lucas and ALL of my children's mother. It has been made clear to me that other things in this life are not important. Nothing is as important as these little people we are raising. I know that my greatest joy in this life and the next will come from my family and I need to be making a greater concerted effort to make them my first priority. Things don't matter. Money is unimportant. Fame, fortune: irrelevant. 

I also know that the Lord has given me the amazing gift of seeing the way His hand is working in my life. I am so grateful. I have never felt more loved. When I look in the mirror, I see myself, but I almost don't recognize myself. I look like a different person. All things in my life will be forever colored by this incident. I see things through the lens of the near-death experience of my son. No one in our family can ever be the same. 

We are different. We are better. And we are working to become people worthy of the blessings that we have ALREADY been given. 

I'm sure there are things I have forgotten, but for me the main point of all this is that MY SON IS ALIVE and GOD IS GOOD!

A Little (or a Lot) of Perspective.

Today, my son, Lucas, drowned.

But he is going to be okay.
We are staying at a resort hotel for a family reunion. I was not there. I was shopping. SHOPPING. While my son, quite literally, died.

And then was brought back to life.
In what I know to be the biggest tender mercy from my Heavenly Father, there happened to be 2 pediatricians at the pool at the exact time it happened. They are the ones who discovered him. They pulled him from the pool. Started CPR. These doctors saved my son's life.

My life will never be the same.

Lucas is currently at our local Children's Hospital. He's living it up with all the jello he can manage and every Disney movie at his fingertips. He is going to be okay.

What have I learned?
Things don't matter.
People do.

My husband is an amazing man and I love him so so much.
He is my rock, but sometimes I need to be his rock.

The Lord has big things in store for that little boy.
And for our family.

Nothing you do in life can prepare you for something like this.
And everything is different after.

My son is alive.
God is good.

Strange

 It's totally normal to eat bubbles. I know I did it when I was a kid. You did too. I'm sure of it.

Though, I am fairly certain there are no pictures of me that are quite so incriminating and frankly, strange.

Lucas Adam, 4

In commemoration of Lucas's fourth trip around the Sun, I decided to celebrate with a photo shoot. But not a proper one with nice clothes, no. I'm way too lazy for that (I should change this blog's name to "I'm Too Lazy For That"). It was more of a "Hey, you have an unstained shirt on. Let's comb your hair and go outside!" Expectations are low here, folks.

 But don't worry, I did not fail to capture his charm.

He's one devilishly cute little boy, no?

 Yes, yes he is. 

I fear I'm in for some girl trouble. That is, if he ever breaks 100 pounds, which I sortof doubt.

 But don't worry. It wasn't all seriousness. We managed to capture the real Lucas too.

And some of this too. 

With some waterbending (a la Avatar: The Last Airbender) thrown in for good measure. 

Did I mention that this photoshoot lasted all of four minutes. Because it was 90 degrees outside. In April. Screw you La Nina. 

At any rate, we celebrated his birthday in the proper fashion. With "rainbow cupcakes with orange frosting". And I'm writing this down here so I won't forget. Lucas was SO cute. He sang to himself. So cute.

 His only other birthday request, "A glowing red light saber so that I can be a bad guy like Darth Vader."

Thank goodness Target had his weapon of doom on sale for $10!

 We've already had to replace the batteries twice. Heaven help me. 

Innocent

Sure. Right. This kid is almost always up to no good. I heard once that toddler boys who were particularly difficult turned out to be easy teenagers. This MUST be true. It's what keeps me going. It's a good thing he's so darned cute.

He is four today. May age four be a turning point in our relationship. Please.

Routine.

The way things go around here is what I like to call casual.  Other people call it lazy. I'm okay with that.

 I'm up with the school kids (and often the littles) by 7am. I spend the next hour hustling and yelling, reminding and harassing. By 8am the big kids are off to school and I have just the littles.  Shamefully, I usually turn on the TV and nap on the couch (yes, lazy). But on this particular morning this week, the light was just right and the little ones were being agreeable. We sat at the table and finished our immediately after breakfast snack of pound cake and apples. Healthy? Eh, whatever.

 Their joy at having my undivided attention was obvious. 

And it made me realize that I need a new routine. One where I spend more time making sure these two littles know that their Momma loves them more than she loves her morning nap. I know. Those are big words. 

  But so is my love for them. REALLY BIG.

 Lucas will start a half day preschool in August and while I am positively giddy at the idea, I'm still sort of baffled at how he went from a tiny little mini baby to my tiny little mini child. 

 The good news is that these two are thick as thieves. 

 Which is another reason I'm having to give up my morning nap. This week alone I woke up to find them: 

1. Eating sugar direct from the bin by the teaspoonful. 

2. Dumping 1/2 gallon of Kool-Aid on my freshly mopped floor.

3. Eating chocolate cupcakes.

4. Coloring on their sister's homework.

5. Playing games on my Kindle Fire. 

6. Riding bikes in the garage.

I think I should be more concerned about who is going to keep Libby entertained when Lucas heads off to school. I can't possibly keep up that pace.

And for your viewing pleasure: Video proof of their relationship.

We be Piratin'

Every year I feel an intense amount of pressure to come up with handmade costumes for each of my children.

Why do I do this to myself? The answer is that I just don't know. It's totally unnecessary. And yet, every year... here we go.

 Miles decided on a pirate. That is, after I talked him out of Super Mario (because I know that at least 3 of his friends were being Super Mario... I prefer at least a teensy bit of originality... sorta.) He took his job seriously. There were a lot of "Ahoy Mateys!" and "Shiver me timbers" going around.
And Matt took his job of fashioning a Spanish-style sword very seriously.
Here's a closer shot of the hilt:

The hat was fabulously easy thanks in large part to a tutorial my sister sent.
I also made the vest and sash, but lets be honest... nothing special there. Overall, it was Miles's overacting that made this costume awesome.

 

And because, if one pirate is good, then two is great, right?

 Lucas loved it. He has been telling everyone for the last week that he's a pirate. A bad one.

But how could a pirate this cute, be bad?

Avoiding Inundation.

Yes, we went on a vacation. Yes, it was fabulous. I'm going to try to slowly blog about all the wonderful and fabulous things we did, but it'll probably a post/day about it until I'm done.

For starters, this was a road trip.  Is there really any other way to do it with five kids? We certainly can't afford the $2000 in airline tickets just to get to my parents. Plus, if we travel by car minivan we can stop wherever the heck we want.

Our first stop was in Roanoke, VA where Matt's sister and her family live. We dig them. They tolerate us.

 There we met up with Hannah (above) and Emily (below).

Emily and Lucas pretended to be friends when everyone was looking. But when everyone was preoccupied with all the delicious food Audrey forced us to eat, they were just plain brutal to each other. It's been over a week since we saw them and Lucas's scratches have finally healed (not even kidding!). But don't worry, it wasn't all Emily as we caught Lucas biting her several times. Our only consolation was that they were equally matched in meanness.

She looks real tough, eh?

Printed. Or the lack thereof.

I have to admit something embarassing.

I have never had pictures of Lucas printed for our home. Gah! Can you believe that?! What kind of mother am I?

Since he's now 2, I'm guessing we'll be keeping him, and I think it might be time. And while I'm at it, I might as well get some printed of the other kids, too.  Maybe I'll even try to get a family picture... maybe.

Either way, I'm having this one printed at least an 11x14. Love this crazy kid. And his big teeth too.

Wordless Wednesday: Brotherly Love

That's How We Roll

Easter Weekend was a great one but I'm the type of mother that doesn't remember to: 1. Take pictures of the adorable skirts I made for the three girls using the Lazy Days Skirt methodology (with some tweaking). 2. Do any sort of Easter Basket for my kids whatsoever.

My children. They will survive. My ego, however, may not.

This Easter, however, was a threefold celebration. You see, Saturday the 3rd represented 2 years since I gave birth to the wiriest little string-bean of a boy.


Saturday was also the beginning of my faith's General Conference where we spend two days receiving counsel and instruction from our worldwide leadership via satellite broadcast. It's wonderful.

And of course, this was all taking place on Easter Weekend. So, we needed to find some time to celebrate the sacrifice and resurrection of our Lord and Savior. Throw it all together and it sounds like we had need of a party, eh?

So, on Saturday we invited some of our friends over to do just that. There were 29 people in attendance. 19 of those were 10 and under. Yes, folks. That's how we roll.
We sent the dads to the back yard to hide the over 400 eggs we had. The moms took our horde to the front lawn to occupy their time. It looked sorta like this:

I admit to loving the chaos of all those kids... as long as I'm not the only one watching them.
Once all the eggs were hidden, we first released the "Littles" (5 and under) to find some eggs. I use the term "find" loosely. It was more of a picking up of eggs off the ground.

Then the big kids were released and made short work of the rest of the eggs. Once the kids has stuffed themselves full of candy, we brought them inside and sang a quick "Happy Birthday" to Lucas. It was followed by one of my favorite things in the entire universe. CUPCAKES.

This may have been my favorite Easter/Birthday/Conference Weekend ever.

She Fits

Miss Libby Mae (as she's known round these parts) has made a seamless transition to our family.


She naps with anyone who'll hold still (thus excluding Lucas).

And she tolerates Lucas. Even if her expression in this picture does indicate fear at his presence.

Standard Fare

Lucas has really softened to Libby’s presence in our home. What a relief! I was truly concerned for her safety for quite a while there.

 

He really loves his “Bibby.” He’s terrifically sweet with her. Every morning he comes running into our bedroom and cries, “Bibby!” in his most excited tone. He jumps up on the bed and begins assaulting her with kisses. Kisses on the head, on the cheeks, the eyes, the hands and her tiny toes. Especially the toes.

But while Lucas’s change of heart concerning Libby’s eatableness edibility ability to be eaten is great, that’s not what this post is about.

It’s about this kid.

He’ll be two on Saturday. TWO. Ho-LEE Crap. My baby has suddenly turned into a sassy, little, dirty-faced toddler. And like all the toddlers I know, he has a favorite past time.

Watch closely while I demonstrate.

Yes, folks. It’s the nose picking. But no… that’s not enough. Keep watching, please.

  “Ooooh! I got somethin’! Let’s see what it looks like!”

“Oh yeah, that’s good stuff!”

I told you, typical.

(Poor Libby, she has no idea how gross her brother is!)