Learning Lessons

This past week has been a pretty hard one, yet one full of lessons for me. The severity of Steve's sickness came as a big shock to both of us, but we were happy to find out that an ulcer can be treated with drugs and does not require any surgery. We have both been taking things one day at a time and have really been trusting in God through it all as I have posted previously of the lessons he has taught me the last couple of days. However as I was getting ready this morning and cleaning the house for Steve's homecoming, he called me. He told me that the doctors ordered more blood tests and that they found his blood count dropped to 74 and were really pushing for the transfusion to take place. They also said it would be at least one more night in the hospital... : (

After getting off the phone with him, I broke down, hard. I have been taking it day by day, night by night, however between picking and dropping the girls off with friends, driving to and from the hospital, fighting over meal times, and dealing with this puppy and his uncontrolled bowels. I felt like I was done. However there was a lesson for me in this as well, one that is embarrassing to share, but a realization I came to as I was curled up in the fetal position on my bed, crying like a baby. That I was being selfish and was limiting my God. You see, I am so utterly blessed by my amazing husband, who even as I write this my eyes fill with tears at the thought of him in the hospital in pain. He has already been through hell and back in the hospital through his accident, and then has to go through this. And still he is my rock, the one encouraging me and telling me he feels badly that I am alone with the kids and dog. And then I realized that this isn't at all about me, that my husband is as selfless as can be and that I needed to pull it together and really live out the words that God has been teaching me. You see, God and the words he speaks are fine and dandy when your feeling up to it and your within your limit, but your real faith is brought to life when things don't go quite as planned, and you limit God on how far you can push yourself. This morning I was at my breaking point, and though I did complain to my parents and some friends of my exhaustion, I truly need to learn to let go of my selfishness and to focus on others and their needs, knowing that God will give me the strength to persevere.

Philippians 4:6-7 "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." (NIV)

Psalm 28:7 "The LORD is my strength and my shield; My heart trusted in Him, and I am helped;Therefore my heart greatly rejoices,And with my song I will praise Him."

Isaiah 40:31 "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint." (KJV)

James 1:2-4 "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." (NASB)

The Kidlets

I cannot for the life of me capture a picture of all of them looking!!

It's an Ulcer

Today was a long one. This morning I was able to drop the girls off at a good friends house and drive into the hospital to meet Steve after he had a Endoscopy of his upper GI tract. The doctor did confirm that Steve has an ulcer in his upper GI. The day prior Steve was put on an IV to stop the bleeding from the ulcer and apparently that had worked, thankfully. We are unsure how long he had the ulcer for, but his hemoglobin (?) levels were at 82 when they should have been between 130-150 for a guy his age. So the doctor was preparing to do 2 blood transfusions on Steve. however this evening after the doctor read the risks to Steve, and giving Steve the option, Steve decided against the transfusion, as it didn't seem like the risk outweighed the benefit of doing it. Steve will hopefully come home tomorrow morning and will be home the next couple of weeks to recover as he is so very weak.
This has been a scary experience and through it all, the Lord has just been revealing himself to me, in words shared by friends and family, or through reading his word, or even this morning, everything on the Christian radio spoke right to me. That no matter what happens we need to keep our eyes turned to Jesus and to praise him in the good times and in the bad.
This experience has made me really miss family around us. however I have been blessed by the friendships I have developed here and the willingness of friends to give a hand no matter what.
I am so looking forward to having Steve home tomorrow and being able to take care of him, I just hope and pray that he can get the rest he needs in this crazy house/life of ours! And I am so thankfull that the doctors were able to diagnose so quickly!

Scared

So today Steve was admitted into the Duncan hospital. The last few weeks he has been exhausted and between re-doing the whole lodge for the Kaleo students, family life, getting a puppy and up keeping the house he has been continually burned out and exhausted.

This past weekend however things got worse at work, he was feeling light-headed, numbness in his legs, pounding headaches, and his face was ghastly pale. He went into the doctors (not ours) yesterday on his day off, who ordered blood tests and told him he thought it was internal bleeding, then sent him home. We had an evening of tears and prayers. The next morning he went back into the clinic to our doctor who had the results that his blood level was VERY low and that he should have been in the hospital days ago. So he was admitted into the hospital to under- go the scope to try and find where the bleeding was coming from.

The whole experience has been very scary and to see my husband, the man I love and cherish so scared is a very helpless place to be. I have shed many tears over the un-known of this situation, however even as I write this I am reminded of God's amazing faithfulness and how he always has a plan and works everything out for the good of those that love him. I KNOW it will be alright, and even though this is scary and hard to go through I have to just trust Steve into God's care. I love the God we serve, how even in the un-known and scary times of life, the Holy Spirit is there to comfort and fill your whole being with peace. So tonight as I go to sleep with my little girl (I do not like sleeping alone!) I will be praying for the love of my life, for divine intervention, healing, and answers to whats going on.
And may I always the remember this verse a dear friend shared with me this evening,
"Be still and know that HE IS GOD." Psalm 46:10

Walking!

Adessa started to walk for the first time yesterday at almost 14 months old! She has been close for months as she has been walking along furniture for awhile, but she just hasn't taken those steps all by herself until yesterday! I was outside with the puppy and Steve yelled that I needed to come in and see something. I came in and there was Steve 'baiting' Adessa with a piece of cookie!! It was hilarious! Adessa was panting and puffing and soo determined to get this cookie that daddy was taunting her with, and when she finally got it, she plopped her butt down and enjoyed her hard earned reward!!!

Puppy Love

Monday morning was the beginning of more chaos added to the Fitzpatrick household. Steve awoke Danika at 3:45am to begin their journey to pick up our newest family member. They had to leave that early because our little puppy was arriving at the Sea-Tac airport at 11:18am and they needed to catch the 5:15am ferry to get across. Apparently Steve said Danika talked the entire trip to the ferry, and on the ferry and then crashed on the other side for a little bit. They had quite the time finding the part of the airport to pick up our puppy, but once they did and saw him were both instantly in love. Danika had pre-named the puppy, Meeko. We had watched Pocahontas as a family and the little raccoon on it is named Meeko and Danika loved it! I also looked up the meaning of Meeko, it means- "great strength and very wise."

On the drive home Danika sang about how much she loved Meeko for about an hour and told Steve that she will call him 'Prince Meeko,' and when he gets bigger it will be, 'King Meeko!'

Danika and the puppy have so far been really good for one another as they wear each others energy down by running back and forth in the backyard. As for Adessa she is still getting used to him, but when she sees him her whole body shakes and she 'barks.' I am hoping their relationship will be better when Adessa starts walking as right now when she is cruising on all fours I believe Meeko sees her as a toy and chases her nipping her toes!

This little puppy is a little sweetheart, very calm natured and is always found sleeping at your feet! However this is day 3 with the little guy and I am exhausted!!! He has woken us up at about 5 am, each morning and I have been taking him out to do his business. This house training thing is also proving to be quite tiring between the dog and the 1 year old!!

But I do love him and hope this house training doesn't take too long!!! : )

Hockey is Life!

Warmland Community Church is the church our family has decided to attend and support. It is the church in our little town of Crofton that was established about 3 years ago. We were unsure at first about wether or not to attend it as we are used to mega churches and this one has a membership around the 300 mark. It is also a seeker friendly church which is something we are not used to. However since making the decision to make this church "ours" we have been blessed with many friendships and neat opportunities. This weekend as a fundraiser for the Warmland center that our church built here in Crofton, our church put on the "Hockey is Life" fundraiser.

There is a man in our church with some AMAZING connections and was able to bring Gordie Howe into town. Steve and I were fortunate enough to attend the dinner and gala evening and had such a blast! The food was amazing and there were HUNDREDS of items at the auction, tons of autographed photos and jerseys. We also purchased a balloon at the beginning of the program which had a number inside and that was the draw for the evening. And guess what?! I won the sought after autographed, framed Gordie Howe photo! I was sooooo stoked! I may even have squealed a little bit! I was able to go up to Gordie Howe and ask to get my photo taken with him, at which point things turned a little bit awkward! He grabbed me nice and close and asked if I wanted to go upstairs with him!!!! (we were in a hotel!!!) I turned sooo red and my jaw dropped!!! I was stunned! But laughing like crazy, I had a girlfriend there and she saw what was happeneing and was killing herself laughing as well!! Quite the memory!!!

The evening was a great success and people were being quite generous! We were soo glad to be a part of it. And to get all dressed up and leave the girls with the most wonderful girl from camp! Now on for tomorrow where I will be playing in the street hockey tournament to finish off this fun weekend! : )

Banquet pictures from a photographer friend!

Photos courtesty of Natalia Reardon, a good friend made at camp this summer! : )

Banquet Night

Last week of camp was youth camp and it was done up in style. The last night was Banquet night and it was quite extravagant, thanks to my amazing, talented husband who spent the entire day setting it up!!! It was also the time I had to say goodbye to some good friendships I built over the course of the summer.

I told Danika about the banquet and let her know that we were able to "dress up" for it. She was sooo excited thinking she could wear one of her princess dress-up dresses complete with her princess high heels. I informed her that it was not practical as she could twist her ankle in the camp field with the uneven ground and that even mommy doesn't wear high heels!! So after some pouting she complied and we went and found a "beautitutal" (how Danika pronounces it) dress from her closet.

However when we arrived at camp I felt a little bit guilty as her best little buddies came running up dressed as spider man and super man!!!

It was quite precious as the "super heroes" gave Danika a lovely yellow rose, and we took pictures of the kids all together. Talk about flash-forward to prom!!!

It was a fun, yet freezing cold evening with some delicious food and good company!

Camp Park

Since it is the last week of camp I thought I would capture some pictures of some fun at the camp park. I also took a video of Adessa and her new word, "Whoaaaah."

Concert Night!

We are into the last week of camp, which is the high school camp. This week has the oldest campers of the summer and the camp and staff go all out for it! During the concert night Steve has been rapping 2 songs. He did this last year and was asked this summer to do it again.

His rapper name is "Dub-T."

Last night was the last concert night of the summer. I was able to go to his first concert of the summer and it was so fun to see Steve up on stage and the kids going wild when he came out. Last night camp flew in a professional rapper from the States named, B. Reith. He put on a concert for the first part of the evening before he had to run and catch the ferry, drive to Seattle and from there fly to Chicago to put on a concert the following night. After he was off stage Steve and I went behind stage and had the opportunity to visit with him (and get pictures with him!) before he ran off. He was such a nice guy, so down to earth and just full of God's love. After he ran off, the Q-Town band came on. Steve came on for his 2 songs and people went crazy. I'm so proud of him! I am also so glad he gets to do this, he works soooo hard during the summer, so to see him up there being a part of the fun is so awesome.

Only a couple more days of camp and then its over! I can't believe how fast the summer went by.

Tonight Danika has her good little friend Jolie for a sleepover, as her family is moving to Salmon Arm on Monday! We are so sad to have to say goodbye to such wonderful friends! We have a busy weekend and then will settle down into fall schedule and looking forward to it! But for now we are just enjoying the last week of camp and time with our friends! : )