So I lied.

(The top picture is of my kids at church. We had a couple minutes to spare so I thought I would actually get a picture of them looking dressed up.

The next picture is at the beach in San Diego our first night there for a bon fire)

I seriously thought I would get back into blogging. I wanted to. But I have to be realistic. I am too busy for it. So I decided to be practical and just do it little by little.

The last couple of months have been great. But also a little worrisome.

Kate was diagnosed with a blood disorder/disease called ITP. It is when your body thinks that its platelets are foreign and destroys them. We found this out because in the end of June Kate was covered in little tiny red dots. They looked like red freckles. I assumed it was a rash and called my neighbor that is a nurse to ask her what she thought it was. She ended up calling me back and asking me if Leukemia was contagious. I was stunned to say the least.I called my mom and said, "Mom, remember when I had leukemia? Did I have little red dots all over my body?"

She said, "Yes, petechiae. You were covered in them." (Petechiae are the red dots all over. They are little bruises from broken blood vessels).

I then told her Kate was covered in them too and I took her to see the Dr.

At the pediatrician, the Dr sent me straight over to get blood work done, thinking she may have leukemia. I was a wreck. My mom met me at Primary's and we did the necessary blood work. When we came home I began making a salad for a Relief Society function that night still hoping Kate was fine and nothing was wrong.

About 30 minutes later Jason called me and told me that he checked Kate's results and went to talk to the oncologist at the clinic that Jason works at. I knew it was bad that Jason would go and talk to the oncologist before calling me.

I hung up with him and the pediatrician called me and told me to go straight back to the hospital and re run the tests. She also told me that the oncologist would meet me there.

I was in a total state of shock. The Dr thought it was very possible that Kate had Leukemia. I was scared.

Her second blood results were even worse than the first. But luckily, the hematologist/oncologist thought Kate didn't have Leukemia, but did have ITP. So we started her on steroids and treated her aggressively for 3 weeks. Then we tapered them down and continued to draw her blood each week.

Kate relapsed after being off the steroids for 8 days. It was another scary moment for me to hear the Dr tell me the news. We were leaving for a family vacation to San Diego in a couple of hours and I thought I had better start cancelling our plans and making arrangements. Our original plan was to leave Kate at home with a babysitter, and Carson. Then we thought we would all be staying home. Then the hematologist called and told me to go on the trip. That we would do another round of steroids and if she still doesn't improve then we will go to the next option. Which is admitting Kate to the hospital.Today was Kate's first blood draw being off the steroids. Jason already checked her counts and she is great. Her count is 240,000. Perfect. When Kate was diagnosed her counts were at 3000. When she relapsed they were at 5000. Anything below 10,000 is at extremely high risk for spontaneous brain hemorrhaging and internal bleeding. It was a very stressful few weeks for me with having Kate at such a high risk for something so dangerous.

But I feel like my prayers were answered. As they always are. Why is it always so shocking to know my prayers were heard?

So for now, I will keep my fingers crossed and hope she stays right where she is. This is just something we will have to watch and keep our eyes open for. Eighty percent of people go into remission in 6 months, without ever relapsing. I really hope that Kate will follow suit.
Anyway, during these last several weeks I also was able to go to NYC and visit some of my best friends. Gina, an old friend from Pittsburgh was living in New Jersey for the summer so a few of us decided to make a trip out of it and go visit. It was Gina, Brooke, Libby and me. So fun!!!!
We went to eat some seriously yummy food, saw shows an shopped. We ended up seeing "Jersey Boys" and "Billy Elliot". I loved Jersey Boys, but didn't really like Billy Elliot. Probably because our seats were HORRIBLE!!! We got scammed. Live and learn I guess.:) But getting to eat at the Doughnut Plant a few different times made it all better. :) Oh how I miss those doughnuts.Then when I came home we left for San Diego the next week to have a fun family vacation with my entire family. Well, minus Carson and Ellie. And Ben, Jocelyn's husband. We ended up taking Kate because of her relapse. And Ellie decided on the last minute that she didn't want to come. I tried talking her into it and telling her how much we would all miss her, but there wasn't anything happening with that. So, she stayed home with the babysitter and had a wonderful time. She had play dates, went to the mountains to have smores with the babysitters family, and got to have movie night every night. I think she had more fun at home than if she came. :) San Diego was awesome. Kevin had Mitch and Nate for the summer and it was a blast. We went to the San Diego Zoo, the beach, swimming, shopping, out to eat, played catch, went to the beach for bon fires, took a tour of Poway, went to our old ward in Poway, the Mormon Battalion, Old Town Mexican food, La Jolla Shores Cover, and the list goes on. I loved it!!!!! And I especially loved getting to do something with my whole family. It was fabulous.
And now the summer is almost over and I can't believe it. Where did it go?!!!!! I'm sad to see it end, but also a little happy. I'm excited for a normal routine to come back into my life!!! I can't believe Jackson will be in second grade. WHAT?!My little Noah will be in Kindergarten. I still need to get him his uniform and figure all that stuff out for Challenger. I'm going to miss having him home every day. He makes me laugh so hard!

(Noah's last day of preschool at Challenger)

Ellie will be in preschool 3 days a week, all day. I think it will be perfect for her. She needs more to do. She's too smart and gets a little bored with following me around all day. Little Elle!(Ellie's last day of preschool at Challenger)

And now I am going to have some serious time for just Carson and Kate. I can't wait!!!! Talk about 2 of the funniest little kids EVER!Now I'm all caught up. Almost. Did I even attempt to talk about Hawaii? That's lame. It was the BEST vacation I have ever been on. I WILL post pictures. Maybe. :)