Planting Flowers

Darren's grandfather passed away in Arizona. While he was away in the states, the girls and I had some fun times. The day you are viewing was Saturday. It started with my dad calling at 7:00 AM and offering to take us to McDonald's for a healthy breakfast! We had to be ready to go by 7:30...no small feat for all of us still being in bed. We made it. We went to McD's and then drove around town with my parents running errands. We were back by 9:30 and I was concerned because we had a lot of day left. So, that is when I decided we would go look for flowers. It really was the first nice day we had...so we headed up to near the bus station and bought Gerber Daisies, Roses, and Easter Lilies*. We then headed out near the world bus stadium to the "planting flower shop." There we picked up some Petunia's and some plants. The original plan was for us to come home and plant the plants together. However, the adjuma's had other plans. They decided they wanted to replant the flowers, so we did it there in their store and Kacy helped. Following that venture we drove to Subway got some lunch and had a picnic outside. When we got home we fixed our flowers. The girls also decorated the outside of the flower boxes.

The Gerber Daisy's were for me, the Roses were for our girls.

Kacy painting on our flower box.

Sara adding her touch to the flower boxes.

They enjoyed their art work and we ended up with a fun day and lots to tell Daddy about when he returned the next day.

*On a side note, Darren returned home after a week away on Sunday. We was just here a few hours when his allergies started acting up. He got really sick and was out of work for a day and miserable for several. My parents came over one night and we were talking about all the beautiful flowers. We were also talking about how the pollen gets all over the place from the Easter Lilies...it was about that time that we all got really quiet and started putting all the pieces together. 2 dozen Easter Lilies, Darren's allergies aggravated...needless to say my parents took the Easter Lilies home with them that day and Darren's allergies started improving immediately!

Fun at the Zoo with Daddy

On Saturday morning, Daddy took the girls for a little trip to the zoo while Mommy was gone on an elementary basketball tournament.


We rode some rides and saw some new attractions with the animals. One new addition was the rope bridge for some small monkeys to go from their inside habitat to some outdoor trees. They ran right over our heads.


Kacy copied the prairie dogs.


We had lots of fun looking at sheep and goats too.


And we even found a slide.





Kacy was so proud of herself because she went on a very fast spinning ride all by herself. She is getting so big!


Fun times!

Playing Around

Here are some recent pictures of Kacy in a new outfit and the girls just playing around the apartment...

Valentine's Pictures

Here are some pictures from Valentine's Day. Sara loves to copy Kacy and the 2 sisters are having more fun playing together.



Mommy helped them make Valentine's cookies (gluten free of course)...



And this is Sara's version of "cheese" for the camera.

Saturday Morning Fun

Thanks to a tip from one of Laura's students, we found a relatively obscure trampoline room on the top of a local department store (SaveZone). Although it was a little chilly, we had a good time and the girls loved jumping around. They also had some rides so the girls got to enjoy a merry-go-round. It was a fun Saturday morning.

Around Town

In last couple weeks, we have been to the large, local department store and a restaurant across town where we haven't been for several months. We were surprised at both places when they said hello to Kacy by name. At one restaraunt the manager came over and asked if it was Kacy and was very excited when we said it was. It is a bit humorous that she is a local celebrity and is known around town by name. Some places we would expect this, but not at these spots. It makes me wonder if there isn't some correlation to the 100s of photos people have taken of her...?!?

Darren's shoulder continues to improve. He went back to the doctor today. He has a pretty good range of movement and his strength is getting better. The doctor is optimistic and says he does not have to come back. He says that he needs to continue doing some exercises to strengthen his muscles and stretch his range of movement. However, he says if there isn't anything wrong that requires further examination, all should be back to full strength within the next 3 months. Most of the pain should be gone sooner. Time will tell.

Here are some recent pictures of our activities around town...

The girls are both loving their stuffed animals right now. They rearrange them and snuggle them at night.



Here is Sara playing with the necklaces and saying "cheese"! (Don't worry, we keep a close eye on here so she does strangle herself. The greater danger is "help" from her sister in dressing up!)


We found some cool sand toys for digging.




Sara continues to grow and do more stuff all the time, including climbing...

Oak Valley Resort #5...The rest of the story

So, Darren fell and dislocated his shoulder on a rather easy part of the slope after getting through the more challenging part...Kirk calls me up and tells me that they think he has dislocated it, but that they need to take him to the hospital for x-rays to confirm. The nearest hospital is ~15 minutes away and the ambulance had just recently left taking someone else so we would have to wait a little. I left our room and got to the clinic...Darren was in a lot of pain...the ambulance came and we jumped in it...Kirk was going to follow (there are many stories inside this story including the one of Kirk being lost with little to no cell phone, eventually leaving his car and getting in a taxi and then having to find his car later).

So, Darren and I arrived at the hospital. They had to do an X-ray which confirmed the diagnosis of dislocated shoulder. Then they asked him to lay on the gurney...he wasn't a fan of this, but once he got down he said that he actually had the first relief of the night. They decided to do this weight therapy, treatment thing...they tied a cloth around his upper arm and hung weights on it in an attempt for the weights to pull it back into socket (painful I know). They kicked me out of the ER at this point (which is amazing for Korea, because pretty much anyone is allowed anywhere). So, Kirk shows up about this point, without his car...he assesses the situation and sees that we will be a little while and decides to go find his car. He finds it and returns, right about the time the doctor comes out and says that they cannot fix Darren's shoulder here...we will have to send you to another hospital.

I went to tell Darren this and he was pretty depressed...he just wanted relief and was fairly confident that if someone would just fix his shoulder he would get relief. Anyways, we got into another ambulance (kirk following close behind) and went to the next hospital.

They took Darren away right away while I filled out paperwork. I know that I was already on edge from everything and it was now probably 12:30 at night, but the ER just about sent me over the edge. Bless all of you in the medical field. The ER was bustling with people we got all the paperwork filled out (with other drama that I can't include for brevity's sake...when this is already super long) and Kirk and I went back to find Darren. They had to do X-Rays again to make their own diagnosis. Then they said that they would put him out and fix his shoulder...

Just realize that all of the next events happen in the hallway of the hosptial in the ER. Darren is sitting on the gurney and they inject his will meds...the two doctors hold him as he falls over asleep. They then wrap a cloth around him and one doctor holds that from behind...while the other doctor takes off his shoe and using his foot as a brace on darrens underarms and starts pulling at Darren's arm and shoulder. I couldn't watch this part, but Kirk did...a few minutes into it I think I hear Darren moaning, Kirk reassures me it isn't, but as it continues he knows he can't deny it...so they give him another dose and then continue working on him.

A little while later they came and say it is fixed. They wrapped his arm up, which is another story, including side effects of the drugs and his IV being pulled out so there was a little drama there. All in all his shoulder was out for 3 hours, which apparently the longer it is out the more painful it get, which Darren can attest too.

We stayed at the hospital another 1hour and 1/2 until he was good to leave and then we had to find out way home...another adventure. We got back to our room at about 3:30 in the morning.

The end of the story...Darren's arm is much better! He is making improvements everyday. He is still very cautious with it and keeps it in a sling some and out of the sling some, but all in all he is doing very well. Thanks for following us on this journey and continue to pray for compelte healing!