Thankful

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I've just been reflecting lately on all the things I have been blessed with and the things that I am thankful for.

Just a quick explanation in case some of the pictures don't make sense. 1. Jonathan 2. My boys 3. My wonderful friends 4. Our wiener dogs 5. Tea and Coffee 6. Window Air Conditioners (no more humidity inside!) 7. Reading/ books 8. Our town 9. The snow/winter (I miss it!)

:)

New Direction?

As I sit here Jonathan has just left class for the day. Yep, that's right. Jonathan just started taking graduate courses this week in order to get his MBA. It is a 2 year program (as long as he goes during the summer). He had been praying and thinking about it for a while and just decided to go for sure about 3 weeks ago. I've been scrambling to get the financial paperwork in gear, hello FAFSA once again. It hasn't been too terribly bad though. :) He currently has a 3 hour class on Wednesday nights and a 6 hour class every other Saturday morning. I think he is enjoying it so far.

So what does that mean for us and Ireland? Well, it looks like we'll be around for at least 2 years, until he gets his degree. I think he would really hate to leave it half finished, but we also know that if we are led to go, we are prepared to do so. I am hesitant to make any statements about where we will be in a few years, even a few months. Like Proverbs 27:1 says "Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring forth." We have no idea what God has in store for us in the next couple of weeks, months, and years. It will be exciting to see where He leads.

On a separate note. I don't know if I have mentioned before how sick Sophie has been. (Our littlest wiener dog) For the past month or so she has been real lethargic, feverish off and on, and really weak/stiff. We had taken her to the vet a few times and her symptoms were not making sense. We treated her for a UTI and that seemed to go away, but the other symptoms didn't. So yesterday when I took her back the vet suggested either going to a specialist, which gets really expensive, or trying the same treatment we did about a year ago when she also had some weird symptoms. Different from what she has this time, but still very strange and not pointing to one thing in particular. (We always knew Sophie was a strange one, we just didn't know it was in so many ways.) So last night we started her on a combo of antibiodics and steroids. This morning we woke to Sophie actually wagging her tail! She hasn't been doing much of that. She willingly went down stairs and she walks around without her tail tucked between her legs, which she has been doing for the past month now. I just can't believe how quick it worked. I'm trying not to be too hopeful incase she relapses after the steroids are done, but it's hard not to be when our Sophie is finally coming back.

Thankful

I think sometimes we forget in the hustle and bustle of Thanksgiving to actually think about being thankful. Well, at least I know I have done that in the past. So today I'm going to list some of the things I'm thankful for, feel free to add what you are thankful for in the comments section. :)

1. My God - for his ever present plan for our lives, for giving us life, for so many more things

Could we with ink the oceans fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above
Would drain the oceans dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
- From the song The Love of God

2. My husband - We've been married 6 and 1/2 years now, wow has time flown by. I'm thankful for his support, his companionship, his wit, his humor, his way with Ohlen, and his love. Oh and all the money he saves us by doing all sorts of things around the house himself, like car maintenance.

3. My Ohlen - He is 2 already! I'm thankful for his laughs, his tickles, the way he kept looking at me and giggling when I came home from Texas, the way he constantly gets me to work on my patience :), his inventiveness, his humor, and his love.

4. My Little One - I'm thankful for seeing his or her heartbeat, for the every so often flutter that may be from the baby, for the promise of a new life in our home, for the morning sickness stopping :), and for someday knowing that I will feel this baby's love. :)

5. My Family - All of them - they make me happy :)

6. My Friends - You know who you are - and I love you!

7. My Weiner Dogs - I'm thankful for the nice warm heaters when I want to take a nice cozy nap on the couch, or when I want to sit and read. I'm thankful for all the entertainment they provide, and how absolutely wonderful they are with Ohlen.

8. Maternal Fetal Medicine and Dr. Schmotzer (hemotologist) at Aultman - MFM is filled with very effecient and extremely nice people. I have found that usually if you are fast, it takes out of the friendliness, but not so here. I love being there for all my baby appointments and so glad they will be taking care of everything again. And I'm especially thankful for the 1 minute wait I usually have there to get in the room and to see a doctor, I don't even know why they put magazines around. Dr. Schmotzer - without him, I don't know if any of my pregnancies would end well. He takes care to make sure my blood is nice and able to unclot so I don't get a blood clot. He is a wondeful, caring doctor (although his wait time is much much longer, but I forgive him.) and I am very thankful for his care.

9. The less important things - snow, hot tea, honey, Christmas trees, Christmas shopping, short waits at Dr.'s office, The Muppet Movie (the only thing Ohlen actually likes to watch), Robert Jordan and his Wheel of Time series, cheap plane tickets that allow us to visit far off family :), clean water, Christmas music, having the mechanical skills to put desks together :), the zoo

Fixed?

"I'm not Baroque, so why did you fix me?"

I've often wondered why spaying and neutering animals is called being "fixed." Is being reproductively able considered broken? Food for thought.

Anyways... Sophie had surgery on Monday to end her reproductive abilities. She is doing well. She has some nasty looking stitches that will have to come out in a little over a week. So does anyone know exactly how you keep a dog from jumping on couches (when they are normally allowed to) and going up steps (when they are normally allowed to.). I've just given up. So far, she is fine. Did you know they now give you pain meds to give them. Kaiser and Amy never got to have pain meds. Some poor dog must have complained. :)

Weiner Dog Update

Well, we have finally made a decision about the wiener dogs.

We aren't taking them with us.

I did some numbers crunching and really looked into shipping costs and all the other costs involved, and it ends up it would still cost several THOUSAND dollars to take them over. It's so discouraging, but we know going to Ireland is the right thing to do.

So the wieners will keep on being American wieners and they will be very well taken care of. They even get to stay together.

I can't tell you what a huge load off our shoulders this is. To know exactly what we are going to do with them and where they will be staying. We will miss them so much; we will just have to cherish every doggie snuggle and lick while we can still get them.

What about the Wieners?

Before I answer the question about the dogs, another question that has come up alot has to do with the time frame for everything. We really have no idea. It all depends on when we sell the house. And then how soon Jonathan can find a job. So simply speaking, about a month after we sell the house, we will probably be off. It's really uncertain as far as specifics.

The dogs have been quite the topic of discussion between Jonathan and I. We are horribly attached to them and can't imagine being without them. On the other hand, it would be so much easier to move and live over there without them. We haven't come to a concrete decision yet. If we leave them, we would want to leave them with someone who wouldn't mind giving them back up when we are back. Also, we would want to keep them together, so that makes it even harder to find someone who would want BOTH wieners. So we have started the process to get them over there. There is a long list of things and lots of paper work that has to be done before they can go over. OR you can just take them, but then they have to be quarantined for 6 months, which would cost about 2,500 Euros per dog. So, probably about $7,000, plus 6 months separation. Not ideal in any sense of the word. So we are looking at OptionB.

The other options involves:
Getting them microchipped - check
Rabies vaccines - check
Blood test a month later to check for rabies antibodies
PAPERWORK
Wait 6 months
24-48 hours before lift off - tapeworm, tick, flea prevention

And there are many different regulations about what, when, where they can fly in. Crate size, Temperature of take off city. When they get over they have to go directly to a vet in Dublin to get checked out before they are finally released and then are happy Irish wieners.

Such a crazy set of stuff to go through. But Ireland - well all of the UK - have been rabies free for 100 years, and they aren't crazy about bringing it back. I just wish they would let you count the rabies vaccinations that they got before being microchipped, but that's not how it works. Oh well. This route should still be tons cheaper than the quarantine route.