Keepin' up with the Jones'

To catch up on what we have been doing lately...do you really want to ask? Other than getting the girls ready for school (which has been quite the task), we have celebrated Zoey's birthday, enjoyed the Demolition Derby as well as other events for the Summit County Fair, lost a first tooth, injuries from work, braved a hot dog roast in mom and dad's backyard (1st fire since the accident), celebrated my birthday with girls day at Swiss Days, and finally got Maizy to ride her bike without training wheels. It has been a busy month to say the least.

Here are a few shots of Zoey's party-she has changed so much over the last few months. It is amazing what a smart and beautiful little girl she is turning out to be.

Here is Casey's eye injury from work. He threw a box on top of something and it chucked a piece of wood at his eye. Luckily it was just bruising and a cut with no eye damage.

Maizy's first tooth. Still not sure if it was meant to come out or it got loose from her supposed injury at the dinner table where she just started crying while eating a hot dog and her gum had split down and was bleeding.

One of the most challenging things has been trying to figure out how to get one kid to morning Preschool and back in time to get the other one to afternoon Kindergarten (which we were forced into-grrrr). Trying to figure out carpooling for both Preschool and Kindergarten has also been interesting. Our week will be crazy but the girls are loving school so far. Zoey has Preschool Mon and Wed from 09-11. We somehow have to pick her up, drive the 15 minutes from Henefer while stuffing something for lunch in Maizy's mouth since she has to be to school by 11:15. Possible??? We're not quite sure yet, but we are trying.

Here are a few pictures of the girls first day of school. Maizy is here with her friend Isabelle.

Last, but not least...Maizy riding her bike without training wheels. I had been trying to convince her for months that she doesn't need them. Every time someone even brought up the fact that we should take the training wheels off she would throw a fit...tears and all. Today I convinced her-after tears-to try one off. After riding with just one for a while and showing her she didn't need it, she finally let me take off the other one. DRAMA for nothing and she is so excited!

So much has happened in the last few weeks that it might be hard to keep this short and sweet! For once, Casey and I have had time off together, but only because I have been on vacation from work for 2 weeks (one week planned, the other not planned-continue reading). We went on a fun day trip with fabulous friends to Bear Lake. I have only been there once in my life and that was when Maizy was a baby. It is such a beautiful place with cool, shallow water for the kids to play in. My girls have turned into fish this year-I couldn't keep them out of the water. Thanks to Curtis, Kari, Jami, Cindy, Mandy and all the kids for a great day, including ending the day with a fabulous dinner at Maddox-mmmmm!

We took the kids to see "How to Train Your Dragon" at the dollar theater. This is the first time we have braved to take all 3 kids to a movie. Maizy has been before, but neither of the other 2 have experienced it. I thought it would be fun...WRONG! Zander was horrible for the last 2/3 of the movie. On top of that, Maizy and Zoey took at least 5 potty breaks. Needless to say, I didn't see much of the movie so I am really glad we went with the dollar movies. I don't think we will be trying another movie until next year.

Since Casey had to return to work, I took the kids camping to the Uintah's with my parents. The kids were surprisingly pretty good for the majority of the trip. My parents were wonderful hosts-as usual. My kids love to go 4-wheeling, so that was the entertainment for practically the whole trip. My parents also have lots of fun games to play (golf game that you throw golf balls on a string, frisbee, etc.)

Beware-story below may be disturbing!

We stayed just 2 nights. We were taking a break from packing up on Saturday morning. Me and my parents were sitting in chairs in the shade about 10 feet away from the fire pit. The kids were playing. Zander walked towards the pit and picked up the "stir" stick for the fire. It was last used the previous night for the fire. He started grabbing the end that was "dirty" with ashes. My mom told him to put it down since it was dirty. He started backing up. It all happened in fast-slow motion. I know that doesn't make any sense, but there is no other way to explain it. All 3 of us started screaming at him to stop but before we could even move, his heel caught one of the rocks surrounding the pit and in he went backwards. All of us moved so fast. My dad was first there and tried to grab him. I was focused on Zander so I had no idea why my dad fell backwards until later. He had grabbed the monkey harness that was on Zander, but it broke. It sent my dad backwards onto his butt, but unfortunately left Zander still in the hot coals. I was there right after my dad. All I remember is Zander was screaming and I had to get him out. I grabbed his leg and just swung him. Again, I don't have a great recollection of how I did it, but according to my parents I swung him pretty fiercely, but still had a hold on him. Within seconds, I had all his exterior clothes off that could possibly still have ashes on them and my mom was right there dumping water on him to get the ashes off him head and hands. He was shaking and screaming and he wouldn't stop. You could see and smell his hair covering the majority of his head was singed and in some places gone. His right ear was bright red and blistering already and well as some areas on his hands. My girls were screaming-although I also don't remember this. It was horrible. I knew he needed medical attention, so I cut off his soaked shirt and loaded him, Zoey, mom and me in the van and headed out. Maizy stayed with dad back at camp. On the way out, we saw a deputy. He was absolutely no help and didn't offer anything to us, so we continued on to Evanston, which was the closest hospital I could get to to get Zander some pain meds as he continued to scream. I drove quickly (okay way illegally) through bikers that were having a race around Mirror Lake Highway. He screamed the entire way. Once at the hospital, they almost immediately gave him some Lortab, which all my nursing friends know that that takes a good 20 or so minutes to kick in-he screamed the entire time. Where the wounds involved his face and hands, they didn't want to touch him-which I didn't want them to either. I just wanted pain meds and then to be referred to Primary's. They contacted the burn unit at the U. After his pain meds kicked in and he was sleeping, they wrapped his hands as the burn center instructed and sent us on our way. Did I mention that the previous day my phone battery had died so I could call no one. Casey was home sleeping with head phones on, so no phone call in the world was going to wake him up. I had to call my father-in-law and have him go to the house to get Casey up. In my craziness, I forgot to give him our garage code, so he had to break into my house to get Casey up. They were waiting for us when we got home. Ben took Zoey so my mom could go back to camp and help my dad and Maizy pack up. Casey came with me and Zander to the ER at the U where they were waiting for us. They gave him some immediate release morphine and scrubbed him wounds to get all the blistered skin off and clean them up. 2nd degree burns all over his right side of his head, some burns to the back of his head, as well as burns to his left thumb, and right hand. Luckily there were no burns on the palms of his hands. All the damage is mainly on the back. His ear is the worst. The wounds look mainly superficial, which is good. His ear is going to take a few weeks to heal since it is cartilage. There is a couple spots they are concerned about that may need grafts, but they are hopeful they will be fine. I can't help but think there are certain times and places. I don't think the injury was planned, but for some reason I had him fully clothed with long pants and a jacket that morning. I had been contemplating taking them off since it was getting warm, but hadn't done so yet. Being fully clothed only left his hands and head exposed, which is the only areas that were burned. He also had the monkey harness on. If you are not familiar, it is a small stuffed monkey that sits on their back with buckles on the front. It usually has a leash so you can keep kids in tow, well I was using it on the trip to keep Zander strapped to me on the 4-wheeler. I believe this also saved him from further injury. Otherwise, his neck and more on the back of his head would have been burned. I have no idea why he had it on. We were planning to go for a 4-wheeler ride, but not at that current moment. Who knows. We have been doing dressing changes and scrubbing his wounds at least twice a day. The poor kids...and poor mom/dad. It is horrible to hold him down and scrub those areas you know are so sensitive. His hands look pretty good and so does his right temple area. His ear on the other hand still looks gross, although the swelling has gone (it was at least twice the size of his left). He has been such a trooper through it all. We had an appointment with the burn team on Wednesday. They are still concerned about a few areas, but only time will tell. At least we don't have to wrap his hands anymore, just bandaids. Tomorrow will be one week and I still don't remember a few things from the accident. My poor mom has been having vivid nightmares every night about him falling in and his screaming. I feel bad that she is still reliving this. I hope she gets over that soon. I don't think we will be having fires for quite a while! The pictures below are of the first day on the ride home and then the second day. They really don't look that bad in the pictures, but they sure looked horrible in person!

On a much happier not, as of today, I have grass! Other than not having the sprinklers done in the backyard, I can proudly say...we are done! We were only planning to lay sod on the front and side but had left over, hence the grass that I have to hand water in the back! This has been the longest and hardest project for me. I love my husband, but he hates being outside and hates yard work, so to get him to help me with the yard has been a battle. Take a peek-I am so excited!