Prayers are being ANSWERED!!!!

We got the results on all three tests, the sinus x-ray, blood tests and the CT Scan of his head! Everything came back NORMAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We literally are breathing a great big huge sigh of relief!!!! If he continues to have bad headaches, we'll see a Neurologist, but for now, we're sitting pretty! So, keep praying for our sweet babies! Every day is a new adventure for us! Never know what's next! :) As you can clearly see! GOING TO BED! Jamie Rose was up every hour last night from 2:30-7:30 this morning! Needless to say I didn't sleep! Good night!

New Arrival!

So, the other part of our emotional day was we got a new arrival! The package was in PINK! Can anybody guess what it was!?!?! Alright, too many obvious clues.

We got a phone call this morning from our good friend who is an investigator for the state (she's the one that called us on Loren), and said she had our "baby" for us. Long story short, while we weren't even on the call list for another placement. We definitely feel the Lord orchestrating every last detail in this situation! At this point, we will have her for sure until June 4, but the situation is that there is a sibling that's already been severed from the parents and is in the middle of an adoption with another foster family. This foster family has been contacted to see if they want the "sibling," but when they were first contacted, they said, "no thank you." The state understands this and will find another placement if need be, but they like to give the siblings foster family the first "chance" in order to keep siblings together. They've decided to give the foster family until June 4 to be SURE about their "no" answer, then will accept us as a more permanant placement. So, please be praying that if she's meant to be ours that each piece continues to fall in place accordingly.

Her given name from her birth mother is Jamie Rose, before we picked her up we didn't know her name, but we had considered Tilli Rose. We're still deciding for sure, but we'll let you know once we know! She was born early morning on May 27, 2008, she's 6 lbs. She was positive for Meth, as was her birth mother.

Again, keep checking back on the blog to see more updates! Things are never slow here at the Baltzly house! :)

Laine's Cat Scan

It's been quite the day! An extreme in emotions, but I'll go into that further in a minute.

First, THANK YOU for praying for Laine today! Laine did REALLY well, but mommy fell apart. I didn't realize I'd be in the actual scan room while they were taking his scan, and honestly, I felt like I was in a Hallmark movie and I was the mother at the side of the sick child, and I seriously broke down in weeping. Laine was "in the donut" while I cried, and I was stopped before he got out cause I HAD to be the strong one!

Results will be read tonight and forwarded to our doctor tomorrow, so we'll be speaking with him tomorrow afternoon.

Update on Laine....

Laine had another bad headache today. Screaming, "Ooowie, MY HEAD HURTS."

With that said, we are scheduled for a Cat Scan of the head this coming Thursday at 3:00 PM MST. If you could, just say a little prayer for Laine (and mommy) at that time while they are scanning. I THINK Laine will be alright in terms of "fear" but lately he's been surprising me with more and more things he becomes fearful of, so we'll see. I told him it was like a ride at an amusement park (cause you lay on a bed and it moves you into the "donut" and back out again). He's never been to an amusement park, so I'm not sure how he'll interpret that! :) I tried! I've never been really good at describing words he's curious about or events he's wondering about.

Last week he had some labs done to test the liver, kidneys, etc, and they also tested for diabetes (his biological father, we know for sure, is diabetic), so we'll hopefully have the results on those before the end of the week as well. He also had an x-ray of his sinuses.

On a lighter note, Benjamin and I attended our first "official" school parent orientation tonight for Laine's new school! It's going to be SO GOOD for him! I'm so excited. The school is SO structured, they even require that all "families" volunteer for 12 hours throughout the entire year so as to participate and involve themselves in their childrens' school classrooms. They also require an actual homework time allotment to which we have to sign that we did spend that much time with our student! Pretty cool! It just makes for more respectful students (well, maybe not the older ones necessarily), and it is an overall well rounded committment of the parents agenda and I LOVE that! I think we're in for a great year! :)

I'll for sure have another update Thursday night at some point for you all! So check back.

Memorial Day....Remembering our babies!

Photos courtesy of my dear mom and sister who visited the babies' graves on our behalf. Thank you, mom and Aunt ShiSha!

Teya LeNae - June 20, 2003

Jobe Alan - April 14, 2004

Grace Priscilla - April 26, 2006 - May 8, 2006

Loren Walter - March 20, 2007 - May 7, 2007

Fun with family!

Ezra found David's glasses this morning! :)

Both boys woke up so grumpy today. We decided to put them in the "dunce" chair! :)

Opa with all the boys. Do you think the two younger ones are teething!?

MOVIE NIGHT! Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade! I made homemade popcorn! Yummy!

My brother Ben and my dad were both bachelors this weekend, so I invited them over for a meal and to hang out! We had a good midwestern meal of hamburgers, hot dogs, Granny's potato salad and baked beans! Yummy! Oh, and Cherry pie. It was perfect. Had so much fun!

It's SATURDAY!!!!!!!

I LOVE Saturdays, especially when Benjamin doesn't have to work.

Here are a few pictures from the last few days. I got the privilege of watching my nephew Jack! He's adorable! I love him so much! We also had some friends over for pizza last night and two of our boys are the same age and it's fun to see them play! They each have minds of their own. One wanted to pull, the other wanted to push from another direction!

ACCEPTANCE JUST IN!!!!!

YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FINALLY got an e-mail today that Laine was accepted into the Legacy Traditional School (LTS) Early Kindergarten program for this fall! WOW! Am I really a mommy of a kindergartner!? Can't believe it! I feel like I just got him! But I'm just SO excited for him! I signed him up last fall not sure when to enroll, and I finally heard today via e-mail. Our first "parent orientation" is scheduled this coming Tuesday night! Can't wait to go! I'll probably cry through the whole thing! :) While it's soooo exciting, it just means he's growing up too fast.

Here's the link for his school if you care to check it out.

http://www.legacytraditional.org/index.html

Updates......

Ezra BEFORE surgery. Waiting to go in!

Ezra AFTER surgery. Asleep in his own bed!!!

Daddy and Laine off to run some errands! Laine insisted on wearing a hat like daddy!

Thanks for praying! It's 11:02 as I'm writing this and we are home from surgery and doing really well. It's quiet here in the home! Kind of nice. It's Friday, so Daddy doesn't have to go into work this weekend and we can enjoy our family. As I write this, however, Daddy volunteered to take Laine in for his labs instead of making me take him in! I have to admit, watching each of these things be done to your four year old son is a bit disturbing. I'm really praying for the CT Scan. Laine, while a sweet and strong boy for all he's been through in his life has some very distinct and severe reactions to very fearful things, so we'll see how he does with the scan. Please keep praying about that! I'm going to lay down now, I've been up since 4:30 and I need a rest! Keep checking back, I'll have more updates as I know them.

Prayers Please!

Okay, so I don't NORMALLY do this, and some will yell at me for not doing this sooner, but I'm really asking for you to fervantly pray for some spoken and unspoken things right now. Though I may usually be "out of my comfort zone" with this, I'm really feeling overloaded doing this by myself, therefore, I'm sharing the following.

Tomorrow morning, or in 8 hours from now, Ezra will be having tubes put in his ears finally! While everything should come out JUST FINE, it still just always concerns me with anesthetic. He's had it before for his MRI and didn't have a reaction (other than the after feel they all feel), so I'm expecting the same for tomorrow.

Also, Laine over the last two months has been complaining of some pretty bad headaches. Some he complains about only once or twice during the duration, but a few he's been saying it several times that his head hurts. Those, the few, end up with him throwing up. Not until the second "really bad headache" came on did I start asking him a few more in depth questions and got some pretty clear answers back from him. His pain on the really bad ones is normally just on the TOP of his head in the middle, not necessarily "all over his head." The other headaches are ususally "all over" so kind of interesting. He also has had the constant urge of thirst and is drinking TONS, and has really been super hungary with different symptoms along with that, so all in all, we went to the doctor today. Today he had an x-ray done of his sinuses (not sure what they are checking for there), tomorrow he'll be getting some blood work done (including a check for diabetes as his biological father had Diabetes, that we know for sure), AND, they are scheduling him for a CT Scan of his head next week to make sure there isn't a growth causing unneccessary pressure in there causing him to throw up with these headaches. Doctor more or less said, "these symptoms are not that of a 'NORMAL' 4 year old growing boy, so we really need to get this figured out soon." All that said, PLEASE BE PRAYING FOR US! Please pray for a COMFORTABLE CT Scan and that Laine will not be afraid. Need I say more!?

There are several "other" things going on right now that I can't go into detail about that we're dealing with, so please just pray about those other things as well.

THANK YOU! I KNOW I CAN COUNT ON YOU GUYS!

Submitted with all my love!

Joanna

SWIMMING!!!!

Well, today hit triple digits AGAIN for us, not sure the high, I think around 110, but it was HOT! My great friend, Johnna, has a pool and invited us to come over for a swim to cool off with some other girlfriends and I of course didn't say no! :) However, I was extremely hesitant because with THREE boys, all under 4, I was a bit nervous about how this was all going to work out, but, I have GREAT NEWS for you all!

Laine, past history, swam last year, but swam with a life jacket on at all times after he thought he'd try the deep end without any adult near by and that was IT for no lifejacket. We went out THAT afternoon and got him a lifejacket and he still wears it every time because he's deathly afraid of drowning. Towards the end of last summer we were taking his lifejacket off with one of us holding him and trying to teach him the basics of swimming, i.e., kicking his feet, moving his arms, and keeping his head above water. He screamed and cried in panic and we got NOWHERE. Today, Miss Johnna helped Laine by teaching him how to swim with his lifejacket OFF from her to me and he did GREAT! So, we're making progress, but no where NEAR swimming without it on. Hopefully by the end of the summer he'll be swimming like a fish.

David! :) David, since we've gotten him, has screamed the most blood curtling scream when given a bath. He JUST WON'T HAVE IT! Not sure where this stems from, but anyway, today when we arrived in the back yard, he instantly grabbed on to me for dear life and SCREAMED hysterically, mind you, we've only just stepped one foot outside the sliding glass door. I decided that I'd get him some toys that he could play with right outside the pool, still near me and he played for a bit and got comfortable with that. Soon then I took his foot and had him just stick his one foot in the water so I could show him that still sitting on the side wall that his foot could actually still touch the first step. Gradually he finally got in the pool and sat on the first step and played almost an entire hour with the toys right on that first step! AMAZING! Truly AMAZING! This is a huge answer to prayer, NOW, if we can remember for the next time we take a bath! :) That will be the shocking point!

Ezra today made a new milestone! :) He too finally got in the water and floated around the pool playing with toys and splashing himself silly in the lady bug float! It was PRECIOUS! He giggled, laughed and played for almost an hour also. So neat.

I was so upset because I didn't have my camera with me and I wish so bad I had it with me. We'll be going back at some point to their pool I'm sure, so next time I'll take pictures and post them for you! :)

Sunday Sedation!

I feel like our family has a NATURAL sedation on Sundays! Aren't these the days we're commanded to rest? I LOVE my Sundays. Wouldn't trade them for ANYTHING! Only bummer about Sundays is that daddy goes back to work at 11 PM! Other than that, our Sundays are wonderful.

Today we went to Maricopa Community Church for Laine's AWANA Award Ceremony and they had a neat little program at the beginning of the service. We then stayed for the message. Opa and Oma were gracious enough to be there and so were Uncle Ben, Aunt Aubrey and Cousin Jack. We're just SO THANKFUL they are here for these special little events in our lives. We sure do miss our Aunt ShiSha though. Wish she lived here again!

Had lunch at Mom and Dad's. Mom made one of my very favorite meals, Spatzle and Pork. It's a German tradition they brought back with them. It's just a dumpling type noodle (homemade) with pork roast and gravy. Sounds simple, but SO YUMMY! Dad suprised each of us with our very own Spatzle maker! We were SO EXCITED. It's something you can normally only get over in Germany and both Aubrey and I have borrowed mom and dad's a few times! :) We will LOVE this very specific tool and get YEARS of use out of it!

This afternoon I've just been reading the newspaper in PEACE and clipping my coupons! :) Getting them filed. Ready for the sales! Memorial Day usually brings great sales on lots of things. Looking forward to this weeks ad.

I've posted just a few random shots that I thought were cute but didn't have a "theme" to post with! :) Need to run Laine now over to Cubbies for his End Of Year Party!

Nothingness!

I'm LOVING my day today! Today is Saturday, and we have not gone ANYWHERE! The car hasn't even left the garage yet! This is the best thing EVER! Need more of these nothingness days! Rest assured there will be more!

I did today, however, make something else I've been "craving" these last few weeks. Remember the good 'ol "creme filled doughnuts" that you could get from donut shops? Specifically for me, it was usually a Sunday morning with our good family friends, the Shepards, at Donutland. Mmm, mmm, mmm! I would get same donut, week after week and never grew tired of it! It was called, THE SNOWBALL! Any of you remember it!? (hint, I'd like to see some posted comments) Well, I tried something new again today! This is starting to be weekly thing. But I'm LOVING the challenges. Any other recommendations would be accepted! Ha! Anyway, the pictures show you that I was fairly successful and quite honestly, it was EXACTLY like the Donutland donut I used to grow up and NO DIFFERENT! Almost better! :) Or maybe that's because I haven't had it in a long time! :)

Still sick!

He found mama's hat and really fits it quite well! :)

This is where Laine spends a lot of time! He LOVES this chair!

Adorable! Need I say more!? :)

Still sick at the Baltzly residence! This is a buggaboo! Shew! Ezra will have his THIRD round of shot antibiotic tomorrow morning and he has a virus that causes blisters in his mouth and throat, so he is in a huge amount of pain and won't eat anything but sorbet (thank you, Oma), and drink Pedialyte. He's quite contagious right now, so we haven't really done much or gone anywhere these last several days except for the doctor and pharmacy. Here are a few sweet pictures of Laine from the last few days of staying in the house.

Sick Children!

Ezra is now the one running a fever! Tonight it was 102.7. He just laid there like a wet rag in my arms. For those of you who know Ezra, this isn't a very common thing. He is my thumb sucker for comfort, so we've rocked all night sucking oh so hard on our thumb. It's so noisy because he's sucking so hard, but SO PRECIOUS! I'm going to miss his thumb sucking when he quits. I've been super fortunate, he only does it when he's tired, in his crib, or falling asleep somewhere other than his crib. So sweet.

Piano Lessons

WE STARTED PIANO TODAY! We are so excited. It was almost as exciting as starting our first day of school (not quite so emotional for mommy though). We got a haircut, clipped our nails and dressed up for our first lesson! Won't ever forget this day! Thank you, Oma! He's started the Music For Little Mozarts kit and I think we're going to have SO MUCH FUN! We're giving Laine a keyboard EARLY for his birthday! Hope he really learns tons from this. Leave it to Oma!? That will get accomplished, no questions asked!

Alright, one more, sorry!

Laine with the 100 piece puzzle he put together today at Oma's.

Ezra playing. Do you remember those old Tupperware play sets!?

This is the last post now for probably a few days at least. Just trying to catch you up with each person and all the happenings! :)

Our dear sweet Ezra is doing so many things right now. He's the happiest little boy. God has BLESSED us with happy boys. Ezra is beginning to get shy and is really a mama's boy (until he sees his Oma, ahem). I love that! He's got quite the personality and will probably be our strongest willed child yet, but we love him. Here are a few from today, Mother's Day, to see how he's growing. He's still quite tiny structurally, only wears 6-9 month clothes still and is almost 14 months on the 20th of this month, but weighs 20 pounds! So, he's SOLID! Such a cutie! We are so thankful for him.

Laine is big into puzzles as you will see in the picture above! He LOVES hands on things and learns SO MUCH from being quiet with these types of projects. Drawing, painting, coloring, puzzles. We are starting to do more and more of these things. This is a puzzle my mom got for him and he does only over at Oma's.

AWANA

FIRST day of Cubbies in September 2006!!

Look at all those patches! Earned over two years!

Way to go, Lainers!

Last time we'll need our Cubbies bag. Next year it's another shirt and bag!

Laine is saying his last Cubbies verse for the year. Next year he'll be a Sparky!

Laine went to his last night of Cubbies! :( Next week is the Award Ceremony and final party. They'll resume in September! He LOVES AWANA! I'm so thankful for his heart and for this opportunity to learn God's Word and hide it in his heart forever. I often wonder how much he'll retain, but it's AMAZING what he remembers. So neat to hear! Best medicine for a mommy's heart! Can't believe he will have completed his SECOND year of the Awana Club! I'll attach a picture of him on his very first day of Cubbies two years ago! My how he's grown!

Bagels, anyone!?

Alright, so for anyone that knows me well, and I think everyone I invited to my blog knows me pretty well, knows that I LOVE my Asiago Cheese bagels from the infamous, PANERA BREAD! Well, since we've moved out here to Phoenix metro, we no longer have access to a fantastic Panera. That was one of the hardest parts for me when I moved, and the other day I got THE WORSE craving (no I'm not pregnant for you people that are thinking, hmmmmmmmm) for an Asiago Cheese bagel. So, what do I do!? I go to my never failing http://www.allrecipes.com/ webpage and look up a recipe for bagels and here's how they turned out! Let me tell you something! This was an emotional moment for me last night as I was baking them, I'm not kidding you, I seriously FELT like I was standing in a Panera Bread when they were baking because of the distinct smell! If someone would've blindfolded me, I would've guessed they brought me to a Panera! It was amazing! BTW, these are not from a frozen dough, I made them myself! :) It goes without saying that this will not be the last time I make these!

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!

Dinner at Opa & Oma's House

L-R: David, Joanna, Laine, Oma, Opa, Ben, Aubrey, Jodi & Mason

Uncle Ben & Nephew Jack

Aunt Joanna & Jack (Can there be a Happy "auntie" Day?)

The THREE mommies!

L-R: Laine, Joanna, Aubrey, Jack, Oma & Ezra!

Happy Mother's Day to my dear friends and family that are mommies today. It's always a mixed emotion day for me, reflecting on the many blessings God has so graciously blessed us with, but also on the many sweet babies that are waiting for me in Heaven!!! Okay, so yes, I've cried a few times today, honestly, but I have the most loving and caring husband anyone could ever ask for, AND I have an incredible immediate family right here in Maricopa that I can at least be myself with as well!

We went to Church of Celebration (COC) this morning and had a really cool sermon on "giving." No, not the monetary giving, but other valuable things in life that you can give such as your organs, and in the end it was tied together with how truthfully, we all need a transplant ourselves, a HEART transplant, and the only one we "match" with is Jesus! Isn't that so cool! It too ended with a story about Jason Ray (a former North Carolina mascot) that went to be at the NCAA tournaments and got killed (well, in ICU, in acoma and ultimately died a few days later) as a result of someone running him over off the side of the road he was walking. He, Jason, had a very close personal relationship with Jesus Christ and wasn't afraid to share it with anyone, and when it came time to his parents making that gut wrenching decision on whether or not to do life support, or what the plan was to keep him alive when he was really not even alive, they decided to let him go. Unbeknownst to his father, Emmett, he was listed on his drivers' license as an organ donor. That was hard news for his father to hear at the time of such great loss. Anyway, as a long story short, they got to meet the four people his life touched just by donating his four main organs, not to mention the tissue patients, but the liver, heart, lungs, etc patients all met a few months ago and all were truly blessed. Jason Ray's parents were invited to come speak at our church this morning, so that was so cool! Such incredible people! An incredible mom! Shew!


We then went over to my mom and dad's for Sunday lunch. Mom had invited a dear lady that teaches preschool over at Santa Rosa school. Mom does music in her classroom once a week and Jodi is so grateful. She has one son, Mason, four years old, that is autistic and her husband just left her 10 months ago. Needless to say, she had no plans for this Mother's Day so my mom invited she and her son to join our family for a special lunch. Mom had a card for each of us, and a vase with 4 roses in it at each table setting of Aubrey, Jodi and myself! So thoughtful! The kids LOVED playing and were exhausted and ready for a nap when they got home! As was mommy ready for a nice cup of coffee, her newspaper (well, ok, COUPONS) and a snack.

At the request.........

........of so many friends and family members, I am joining the Blog Bandwagon! Can't believe I'm doing this, but for as much that goes on in the Baltzly life, it can easily fill up fast. So, here goes nothing! :) We'll see how I keep up! Let's get you all caught up!

Today is Saturday, May 10. Benjamin worked last night (it's his weekend for "second on call" and he got called in to work), so he's sleeping a few hours this morning, but doesn't have to work tonight, so can't sleep all day. Third shift is for the birds! Don't ever recommend it for anyone that even remotely cares about themselves.

David is sick today with a fever. Preschool called me yesterday and had me come pick him up because he was running a temp at preschool and was fussy. He slept from 2-6:30 PM yesterday, then went back to bed at 7:30 PM and slept all the way to this morning at 7:30 AM! So, he's obviously not feeling good. Funny thing is that the fever is his only symptom. He is playing and eating normally, but fever is hanging on and when I got him home yesterday it was 104.1! Scary! Anyway, he and Laine are playing outside as I speak, so we'll see.

Laine had a nice quiet morning drawing with a pencil and paper. He loves to draw. And really draws some very nice things! Love it when he draws a picture.

Ezra, well, let's just say, Ezra is growing, and along with growing come TEETH! He's the teeth bear right now! Super fussy, but understandably so. He too is getting tubes in his ears for constant ear infections he's been having over the past several months, so between everything, he's just a needy boy. That's alright, I love him to pieces. Just can't get a whole lot done these days!

You're probably all wondering too about his adoption! The last thing I heard about his adoption is that his case manager who is supposed to complete his case since the terminations from the parents have been finished since last November, is going on an FMLA for having surgery in JUNE! So all her cases HAVE to be closed and finished before she leaves for that. That means by JUNE, before her surgery, she will have closed Ezra's case and labeled it "adoption" and she will have passed his file onto an "adoption worker" then to take over. That then will start our official process of his adoption. So, we'll see! We're anxious, that's for sure!

This should bring you up to speed for now! Thanks for your interest! Check back for more! I'll be posting a few pictures in the next few days!