All good things must come to an end

***WARNING! Potentially graphic photos for the weak at heart!***

Well, today ended the stay of our little aquarium friends. The adventure began last fall when someone at church gave us a few goldfish that had been left from a big BBQ, and I decided to let Kirsten try her hand at being a pet owner. Two of the fish died, but one thriving goldfish, of whom she named BB, survived and flourished.

Her excitement over BB was contagious, and I soon found myself taking a trip to the pet store with Kirsten, and purchasing a much larger home for BB... along with rocks & a castle & some new friends!

As with many pets to parents, I grew tired of the upkeep of the tank. It's hard enough sometimes for me to keep up with the dishes, let alone keeping a fishtank nice & clean! Needless to say, I felt quite guilty last week when I looked in the tank and discovered that BB had died.

I felt responsible. I hadn't been cleaning the tank for about two months now, and I found myself often wishing they would just "disappear." (I had been feeding them every few days, though... I couldn't keep myself from doing that!) Kirsten was sad that BB was dead, and we flushed him down the toilet. She was hoping maybe he'd wake up when he got to the ocean. I said, "Maybe!?!"

This evening Kirsten told me she had to show me something in the fish tank. It was Froggie, laying flat on her back. She had died, too.

Kirsten tried to figure what was causing her beloved pets to die... maybe they ate some of the rocks at the bottom? Maybe something in the tank is making them sick? After we said a few kind words and flushed Froggie, we came up with an idea. Maybe if we flushed the rest of the fishies down, they would be able to go live in the ocean and be happy! And they wouldn't catch whatever was making the others die! We were saving them! Excited about the adventure they'd have (you know, like Dori & Nemo!), she hastily encouraged me to gather up the remaining four: Spot (the catfish), Rainbow, Flag, and Tiger.

We lovingly placed them in, told them of the adventure before them, and Kirsten wanted to do the honors of setting them free! After a flush or two more to help propel them to the ocean, I was amazed at the adorable smile on my little girl's face. In that moment, we both were happy to the core... I got my wish, and she became a hero.

Surgery is scheduled

I went ahead and set the date for Kirsten's surgery. Her next "nose job" (if she was old enough to understand, she'd totally be laughing at that comment!) will be on Tuesday, August 14th. That's only 3 1/2 weeks away. Too many pros seemed to outweigh the cons on the list for now, so we're going ahead with it. Matt's only major concern was how Kirsten felt about it. We asked, and she said okay! She's such an easy-going trooper with this. I think the fact that she won't be stented this time around was a plus factor to her. So... we'll keep you updated!

On a much lighter note, today is Kirsten's last swimming class! I'll be sure to post some photos & stories about that soon!

Decision time

We've got to make a decision, and it's not coming that easy for us! Basically, we need to decide if we're going to have Kirsten go thru another surgery on her nose. If we do so, it'll be next month sometime, as we'll want it done before school starts back up. Short version: Kirsten was born with a blocked nostril ("choanal atresia" or we just abbrev. it to "CA"). She's been thru numerous surgeries to open the blockage (mostly it's bone), but it's always closed back up (and fast). It's been 2 years since the last procedure, and that one was the "last resort" surgery that "always" seems to work. Except with our little super-healing powered girl. Within 2 weeks of the stent's removal, bone grew back.

So, we need to decide what to do. I posted more about this on our webpage about Kirsten, so feel free to read there for details & a new photo (of the CT images).

We ask for your prayers, too, in this matter. We just want that clarity... that peace that only God can give us to let us know we're making the right decision. Then again, we felt that before... but we just have to keep on trusting!

Twice the beauty

Yesterday I was working until 8:00pm. At around 7, we noticed it seemed a little dark outside, as if it was going to rain. Sure enough, some light rain fell. Well, when we were getting ready to leave at 8, my friend Marie went to lock the front doors and called us over to look at something she saw... a double rainbow! The top one was a little faint, but when we went into the back lot to get into our cars, we could almost see the entire stretch of both rainbows! It was BEAUTIFUL! Amazing!

Shard attack!

As I was heating up some soup for Kirsten this afternoon, I decided to put some dishes soaking to wash. I grabbed a few glasses from the dish rack to put away, and when I was turning, one slipped out of my hand. It was a heavy glass and it must've hit the end of the counter (where a metal edge is) because it just shattered into what seemed to be a million pieces! After a frozen moment of shock at what happened, I noticed blood dripping at a rapid pace from a fingertip on my left hand. Kirsten rushed from the other room & I told her to stay out of the kitchen. She was scared to see me bleeding (and from the loud noise of the glass breaking), and I didn't want to turn my head around to look at her. Why? Because I was pretty sure I had some glass on my face, and I didn't want to scare her with that potentially bloody sight! I told her to go wake up Matt, who had just gone to sleep about 5-10 minutes before this happened. I advised him to slip something on his feet, he did, and then he gave me something to wrap my finger in. He started blotting at my face, but I asked him to stop because I was worried he might accidentally push any glass that might be there further in. I looked down before heading to the bathroom & it looked as if a small rodent was butchered right on the kitchen floor! There was a lot of blood! (I was partially amazed at how brightly red it was, too!) Anyway, I gently pulled a few shards of glass from my face & then rinsed off my legs & feet in the bathtub. I changed my shirt (tiny sparkles were all over it) and went to see how it was going in the kitchen with Matt's clean-up job. He cleaned the majority of things, and I thanked him kindly & sent him back to bed. I had to sit and collect myself for a little bit... that really freaked me out! As I was sitting on the couch with my throbbing finger, I was trying to calmly talk with Kirsten, easing any fears she had left. Suddenly I was aware of a new sensation... something sharp in my throat when I swallowed! Oh no! I ran to the bathroom, shut the door, and proceeded to make myself throw up. Yes, dumb idea... I didn't realize that until after I did it! Well, nothing came up, including blood (meaning there was no blood), so that was a good thing. I called my brother Paul (he's my medical consultant on many things!) and he asked me some questions to assess things & gave some suggestions. All ended up fine, and now my throat just has a little sharp pains from the dumb vomiting.

It's evening, and I'm still a little paranoid about this. When I rub my face, I do it very gently, just in case. Even just an hour ago I found another tiny little shard of glass on my jawline. It was like the glass had just exploded... so many little pieces all over the place, including all over me! I was attacked by shards of glass! Shard attack! LOL (Good thing I can laugh about it now!)

Oh, and I did do a more thorough cleaning in the kitchen. Some bleach on the floor took care of the pool of blood that was staining it (and it was splattered quite far, too!?!). No more appearance of a murder in there! I even found some glass in the dishpan in the sink, which I expected. Hopefully I found it all... I'd hate for Kirsten's little piggies to find any by accident one day!

As usual, here's some photos to caption the fun...

that's the thick glass (well, it's a duplicate of the one broken)

that's a small view of my fingertip (middle finger) - the glass cut thru my nail, too (the bleeding stopped quickly enough and it doesn't even hurt anymore!) (Well, until I bump it! I am a bit clumsy!)

and there's a few circled spots of where I was bleeding a little on my face. Praise God that there wasn't any glass in my eye! It was close, but a miracle happened & it didn't get inside! (I think God knows that I've had enough issues with my eyes! LOL)