We Love You, Grandpa Ricks!

Well, right now I feel so many different emotions on so many different levels that I am overcome and it is all coming out my eyes.

Kyle's Dad had a stroke on Christmas Day and has been in the hospital for the last two days. We have been receiving play by play updates about his condition from loving family members who have included us, though far away, in what has been going on. This afternoon, things took a turn for the worse and Philip passed away at about 11:00 Eastern time tonight, right after he was able to hear goodbyes from his children who were in other states.

While Kyle was telling his Dad his final "I love you" and "goodbye" I was struck with several different thoughts:

How can you even express to your father how much you love him? How, in just a few short seconds, can you make the words "thank you" encompass an entire lifetime of sacrifice and love and example and love?

How, with just words, will we acquaint our boys with their grandfather's wisdom, and courage, and steadfastness?

I am forever indebted to Philip Ricks for raising the man who is the father of my children. How could I ever repay him? All we can do is continue his legacy... We will. We are.

Kyle's brother told us on the phone, just after Philip passed away, that "there is an overriding feeling of happiness here." He said, "It feels very hard, but yet very RIGHT." We all feel peace that God was involved, that the doctors did the best they could, and that things will be okay. Mom is, as always, an incredible rock who is trusting that the Lord will strengthen her.

I am astounded by the almost tangible love I have felt expressed between all of us during the last several hours. I consider myself truly blessed to be part of a family full of so much faith, strength, selflessness, optimism, and love.

We will miss you, Dad. But we will see pieces of you in each other, and in our children. We will share funny memories and great stories and laugh and cry as we remember you. We will savor the joy that we feel when we're together, and thank you forever for it. And when we hear the angel choirs at the second coming singing barbershop, we'll know they put you to good use up there. :) We love you!

Here is what I think Ethan would say if he could:

Dear Grandpa:

Thank you for all the 4-wheeler rides and for letting me follow you around while you work. Thanks for letting me climb on your tractors and on your "Frank." (harvester). Thanks for all the times you came up to me and said, "Hey, Ethan!" Thanks for all the tickles, hugs, and Sunday dinners. Thanks for teaching my Dad how to be a real man--I'm gonna try to be like you when I grow up.

Love, Ethan

A few what we've been up to's...

1. I LOVE storytime and bedtime. I found a great list of kids' Christmas books and requested as many of them as I could at the library. Since we got the tree up we have been reading stories by the tree and then turning off all the regular lights to sing carols by the tree. When Ethan is all snuggled up in a blanket with me singing "Glo--o--o--o---ria" with me I am pretty sure life doesn't get any better than this.

2. We got to see lights at the zoo! And trains, and penguins, and the holiday dolphin show. We are sticking around Indiana this year and so we are making sure to capitalize on as many special Indy sights as we can.

The downtown Central Library is also AWESOME, by the way, in case anyone was wondering.


3. Ethan is very excited to see if Santa will bring him a Monster Truck. I think I might be even more excited.


4. Kyle survived finals! And now he has a few more days of seeing patients and then a nice little break. Only three more semesters of life in Indiana and then off to who knows where...

5. Jake is a climbing maniac. Onto the chairs, onto the table, up onto the toilet, up onto the couch, into the dishwasher, grabbing blind cords, grabbing blinds, grabbing knives, falling off things... I love that little guy. And sometimes, he drives me absolutely bonkers. I'm always ready for naptime, but I'm also usually ready for him to wake up and come play. :)
He likes to put his hands up in the air when we say "Touchdown!" which Ethan also did at around his age. Somehow, though, he actually thinks it means "all done," so sometimes when he wants to be out of his high chair he puts his hands up and says, "TA dah." It's hilarious and adorable.






6. We have our first ever Ricks Family Jesus Box. My mom did this with us as many years as I can remember--you wrap a box and but a bow on it and it is a present for Jesus. As you do nice things for other people throughout the month, you write them down on little pieces of paper made to look like presents. Then, on Christmas morning, after breakfast and before opening the post-Santa presents, you unwrap "Jesus Box" and go around and read the nice things everyone did! I am looking forward to instating this tradition in our family this year. :) Love you, mom!

7. Kyle and I are surprising each other this year for the first time ever since we got married. Usually, since spending money is such a novelty we each have a very specific and rather picky list of what we need to buy, so it has seemed silly to try to buy a surprise gift. This year, we let go of all that and we have surprises under the tree. I wonder what they could be...?!?! I could get used to this. It's fun!

8. My last A1C was 7.4--the highest I have ever been. (a number that helps you know an average of your blood sugars over about 3 months.) The higher the number, the worse prognosis for all the bad things diabetes can do to your body over time. I've been trying my hardest, but pregnancy, nursing, and being done nursing have really required constant change to my basal and bolus rates. Long story short Kyle and I are on a quest to get tighter control and re-find the right ratios. This is an in-depth, time consuming, detail oriented, discipline requiring, life consuming, please get all the holiday treats away from me kind of an endeavor. It's about isolating variables and testing what happens when you don't eat, when you do eat, while you're asleep, etc. to figure out what you need to change. My dad said a lady in his ward who is now blind told him, "I didn't control my diabetes. I didn't know that this is what would happen."
This is a giant pain. But it beats going blind and losing feeling in my feet.

9. Some friends gave us some hand-me-down clothes for Ethan including some spider man pajamas. They were a huge hit.

10. Life is good. Tiring, crazy, chaotic, frustrating, and yet fulfilling, inspiring, peaceful, and full of small miracles. I love how Christmas returns you to the familiar, yet always brings something new each year.

I cried in the car today to Amy Grant Singing:

"I know it's true, time doesn't stand still
Many things can change, but we know some things never will
The memories we share, the songs we always sing,
The mystery of life; the hopefulness this season brings.
And I have a dream or two--maybe they will come true..."

It's a miracle every year all over again.

Ethan Mageethan

Check out this handsome guy! Is it just me, or does he look at least 8 years old in this picture??!?!

Well, Ethan's latest craze is figuring out words that rhyme. At lunch yesterday, we sat and ate and he would say, "what rhymes with...bars?"
"Um, cars, mars, ours..."

[big grin, and lots of nods.]
"What rhymes with...say?"

"Day! Say! Play! Pray! May! Lay!"

This went on for about at least 20 minutes.

And he's asking--do wind and window rhyme? Or do they just sound the same?
What a cute kid.

Kyle asked Ethan the other day, "are you ready to read stories?"

He said, "Yep. Ready bom beddy."


Here are some of the latest and greatest other things he has said lately:

I listen to Dave Ramsey on the radio sometimes and when he is talking about people and their choices to put things on credit cards they won't be able to pay off, and get into houses way bigger they can afford, etc. he calls it STUPID. Ethan and I have had to discuss why Dave Ramsey is allowed to say that word and it's been a fun way to talk to him about being smart with money. I said, "well, it would be nicer to say 'that's not very smart," but Dave Ramsey can say stupid because that's what it is to rack up tons of debt on a credit card. So one day Ethan said he wanted to pretend he was Dave Ramsey and I said, Okay. A few minutes later he screamed,

"That is so STUPID!"
and I gave him the hairy eyeball.
He looked at me innocently and said,
"But I'm Dave Gwamsey!"


Also, thanks to Dave Ramsey, one of his favorite things to do in the car is to say,
"Ready to scream debt free, mom?"
"Yep."
Okay, mom... 3, 2, 1..
I'M DEBT FWEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!"

Oh, how I wish we were really debt free. :) I think by the time we pay off all of our dental school loans we will probably have to call in to Dave's son to get to scream it on the air. :)


One night, as we were sitting by the Christmas tree talking about Jesus being born, I reminded Ethan about when Jake was born and we talked about what he remembered, etc. We talked about babies coming out of mommies and he said,
"But how are babies born? There's not a hold big enough for babies to come out."
My first thought: Yeah, you're telling ME, kiddo.


[as we were sitting down to have a treat after a Family Home Evening where we acted out the Christmas story with his little manger scene:]
"I say unto him that we shall have a treat. And it will be called Ice Cream."


"I was gonna watch the helicopter movie, but I changed my mind. I put on my 'Honey, I Shrunk the Kids' mind."
[just for the record, he abosolutely LOVES that movie. I have been Amy and he has been Nick for like 3 weeks now, and likes me to dance with the mop and rescue him from the "yucky water." His stuffed dog has been Quark, and his super soaker is the "shrunk machine." I love how imaginative the movie is, but I'm not all for the rude comments and attitudes of the kids. I don't really need my 3 year-old running around saying, "blow it out your shorts, Ron." So we're trying to act out the fun stuff without really watching the movie again... and I thought Disney would be safe!]

One day Ethan was having trouble zipping up his jacket. He was on the stairs, and I was up changing Jake's diaper. I heard him, very calmly, state his problem and then say,

"I'm going to say a prayer."

I can't remember the exact prayer but it was short and sweet and to the point. I came down to help and he said,

"Heavenly Father answered my prayer."

How cute is that?
Later that night, he told Kyle:

"When I can't do something, my mom gets sends to me by Heavenly Father to help me."

Oh, the volumes I could fill with all the hilarous things Ethan says. That'll have to do for today. Stay tuned...

My sarcastic advice.

So my awesome friend Rachel posted this on her blog a little while ago:

"I truly admire people who are healthy. And I don't mean people who are on a diet--I mean people who have a consistently healthy lifestyle, who don't gorge on french fries, brownie batter, and doughnut holes every chance they get; people who eat fruits and vegetables--and actually like it; people who have no problem saying, "No thanks!" to the cookie tray that's passed around at church gatherings, not because they are trying to lose weight but because they recognize the dangers of eating excessive sugar, and they take care of themselves.

I WANT TO BE ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE.

The question is...HOW??? How do you change who you are?? How do you change what you value and crave? How do you change your entire lifestyle?

I need help. Please give me advice."









And this is what came out when I went to post a comment to respond.

Oh and as a preface, let me just say 1. I don't claim to be the healthiest eater on the planet and 2. this is meant to be mostly funny, slightly informative, and I guess a teensy bit self-pitying. :)

Okay, here it is:
You know, if you really want to “change your life” and become a health nut, boy do I have advice for you—Become type I diabetic! The greatest part about this disease is that it takes all the fun out of eating of almost any kind, but especially of anything with high sugar or carbohydrate content. So normally if you look at a plate of brownies you will begin to salivate and think, “wow, those look so good!” But if you are lucky enough to be type I diabetic you won’t even get to the salivation point anymore, because when someone says, “would you like a brownie?” this is what will go through your head:

“Well, if I were going to eat those I would need to prick my finger and draw blood to check my blood sugar. If I’m over about 160 it’s gonna be a bad idea for today because I’ll only get higher if I eat them. If I’m at a good blood sugar I could maybe go for it today, but I’m not sure exactly how many carbs would be in one. Most boxes of brownie mix have about 12 servings of about 35 carbs each, but most people don’t cut their brownies into exactly 12 pieces, so I would have to guess. So, I can guess somewhere in the neighborhood of 35 carbs, which I will need to put in a square bolus since the fat content is fairly high and that slows the digestion. Okay, so, 35 carbs, so that means I would need about 1.3 units of insulin, and I’ll probably set the bolus to deliver over an hour and a half so that it will match the slowed digestion rate. If there are actually more than 35 carbs in one, then I will be high in a few hours which will make my eyes burn, give me a headache, and be overall bad for my body and my future health. If there are fewer than 35 carbs in one, then I will be low in a few hours which means I will get hot yet sweaty, shaky, feel incredibly irritable, possibly dizzy, and like the whole world is closing in around me and my brain is getting covered in saran wrap. Then I’ll have to check my blood sugar again, and then eat glucose tablets to get it up quickly so I can resume normal life. If I need to drive somewhere in the next little while low would not be good. When I’m low I have a tough time taking care of my kids. Okay. So she just asked me if I want a brownie. Um….

“No thank you.”


So the trick is that you have to view all yummy food as a potential blood sugar spike. Then, as you get educated about what high blood sugar can do to your body—kidney failure, blindness, neuropathy, gangrene, etc.—you will look at the brownies and think:
“Dialysis.
Braille.
Seeing Eye Dogs.
Amputated fingers.
Um, no thanks.”



So that oughtta really help for the saying no aspect, and then as far as changing your entire lifestyle and who you are, man this diabetes thing will do it ALL. You will get to either give injections or be tethered to an insulin pump 24/7 that you get to re-stab into yourself every 2 or 3 days. You won’t use future exercise as an excuse for gorging on junk food because half the time when you exercise you will have to eat as many calories as you burn, just to keep your blood sugar from going low. Or you’ll have to stop sooner than you want to because you can’t see straight and you feel like you’re going to fall over. AND, you will get to spend tons of money on insulin, pump supplies, and testing strips, and a lot of time with doctors, endocrinologists, diabetes educators, and dieticians. Once you have an entire section of your bookshelf dedicated to manuals—all of which you have read and marked-- about diabetes management and nutrition, you might find yourself eating a little less junk food. If you’re like me, anyway. The girl who used to buy a bag of E.L. Fudge cookies for a road trip and down the whole thing. Man, those were the days. 

Oh, and just for the record, I let my body overrule my overanalytical brain tonight and I ate 2 cookies at a friend's house and a few small spoonfulls of cookie dough. And, you guessed it--I got low, and kept my boys awake way later than I was planning to because I couldn't drive home until I was lucid. Worth it? Shrug. Sigh.

Sunday: Stomach Flu x2

Kyle and I both caught the bug at the same time.
Saturday night, around bedtime:
"Wow, I don't really feel good."
"Yeah, me either."
"Nauseous?"
"Yeah."
"Hmmm, well, maybe I'll see you in the middle of the night!"
"Yeah, goodnight."

2:30 a.m: leaning over twin bowls. Cute, huh?


And in the morning, talk about an adventure in parenthood.
Jake, following us around, whimpering for breakfast.
"Do you think you can cut him a banana, honey? I don't know if I can handle it. I think I'm about at an 8 right now in terms of throwing up."
"Okay, I'm only at about a 6, so I'll do it."
start cutting the banana...lean over the bowl for a minute or two....keep cutting... I love Jake, I love Jake, I love Jake...

Suffice it to say it was a very LOOOOOOONG day. And of course we survived--but man, that is NOT on my list of things to do ever again. Thank you, Tiffany, for taking Ethan to your house for a little while that night so he could finally hang out with someone with enough energy to play with him!

And, my favorite quote of the day, from Kyle:
"I can't think of anyone I'd rather throw up with than you."
Awww, shucks. Thanks, dear.

Oh, and just for the record:
Tuesday: Stomach flu x1--Ethan got it after we did. In the middle of the night he staggers into the bathroom and cries-- "my tummy wants to come out!" Yep, that's a pretty good description of how it feels. He was a trooper, and I think we're all on the mend.

May next week bring shorter days and more adventures outside the house. :)

Unchronological account of Halloween...

Yeah, it's December. I know. But either way, this is one cute duck, huh?

And, a mysterious, stealthy, and super fast DASH!
Ethan made sure to tell everyone that he was "Dashal Robert Par" and for at least 2 weeks before Halloween Ethan would say "We're the Increbidohs! I'm Dash, and you're Violetmysister, and that's Mister Increbidoh and that's Jack Jack." (I'm not sure why he didn't have me be elastigirl, but maybe he thinks force fields are cooler than super stretchy legs?)




Halloween was before daylight savings and it was so warm and so light that it almost felt like we were having a nice summer evening and letting the kids dress up just for fun. :)

Ethan's friend Trace was Elvis. Hilarious and priceless.

Trick or treat!

Hanging out with friends! (notice the lollipop. always the lollipop. Ethan is very aware of the difference between Halloween and every other day. He shovels those lollipops in like there's no tomorrow. Because, well, tomorrow mommy will say, "nope.")

And Jake and Indie were lost in a very deep conversation...

And, my favorite...

The INCREDIBLE stunt--Dash climbing up the doorway!

Yes, that IS the incredibles theme song you are hearing in the background.

And yes, that is Ethan saying, "I'm proud of myself!"