Concussed

Our trip to Utah was great, all except this part.

It was 8:00 in the morning, Jaron came in to kiss me goodbye, cause I was still asleep. Said he was off to the skate park. Around 10:00 I was taking a shower when I got a knock on the door. It was Kel. "Jaron's been in an accident", she said. I got dressed as fast as I could, while Kel called 911 and told them to get to the skatepark where Jaron was. 

Here are the facts that we pieced together over the next 45 seconds: Jaron fell at the skate park with his helmet on, he fell hard enough to knock himself out, he had thrown up, and he was showing signs of short term memory loss. Here's what we didn't piece together: we didn't know how he fell, and we didn't know how he managed to get his cel phone from the car and in his hands and have enough sense to dial my Mom's cel phone after he had just been unconscious. It only took a few minutes on the phone with Jaron, for my mom to deduce that Jaron was out of sorts and needed some help. That's when she called the house, where Kelly answered the phone and came and knocked on my door.

In the car on my way to the skatepark I decided to call Jaron's cel phone. He answered.
"Jess?"
"Hi sweetie, how are you".
"Um. I'm ok. What happened? Do you know where I am? There's a guy here I think you should talk to him".

We talked a little longer than that, but I knew he didn't remember much. I told him to lay his head down and stay still, the ambulance was on its way. "Why is the ambulance on its way? Did I get hurt or something?" He had no memory of what had happened. He passed the phone over to the man, I didn't even get the man's name. We call him Kip, because he reminded us of Kip from Napoleon Dynamite. Kip was nice enough to tell me he was going to stay by Jaron until I got there. "He's thrown up all over himself" he said, "and he's pretty out of it. I think he must have hit his head pretty hard. It's bleeding". 

The ambulence beat us to the skatepark by only a few minutes. When I pulled up, I ran toward the stretcher that was being quickly moved into the ambulence. As I was running up to Jaron I could hear him asking the paramedics "Am I ok?" with a shake in his voice. "What is going on? Do my kids know where I am?". It made me emotional to see him on the stretcher like that. The next few seconds went quickly. I wanted to go thank the man that had stayed by Jaron. He was about 10 feet away from me on the other side of the fence that went around the skate park, but I couldn't keep my eyes off of Jaron. Besides that, if I wanted to stick by Jaron, I had to jump in the ambulance now. Before I knew it we were on our way.

I could see everything they were doing from the front seat. I kept trying to call out to Jaron that I was here in the front seat. Everytime I said his name he responded the exact same way "Jess? Is that you? Hi. What happened?" He went through this same loop of conversation over and over again for the next 45 minutes.

When we got to the hospital I was very nervous that he had internal bleeding or a broken neck or permanent brain damage. I was praying so hard that wasn't the case. His goose egg on his left temple was bleeding a bit, and it looked a little scary to me. I felt worried, but at the same time I somehow felt he was going to be ok.

My siblings were awesome. Rich, Drew, and Kel were all there with Jaron and I. Danny and Aly showed up too. I think the doctor was impressed by the amount of support in that room. I was impressed by it too.  Danny gave Jaron a wonderful blessing, which I'm sure was part of the reason for the great test results from the CT scan which came back with happy results. No brain damage, no neck injury, and no internal bleeding, just a bad concussion. 

All the movement from the CT scan made Jaron sick so he was throwing up quite a bit at this point. I felt so bad for him. His head hurt, he was super nauseous, and he had no memory.  Jaron's pretty sure he cracked a few of his ribs too, and if he didn't crack it at the skate park he's pretty sure that a really hard sneeze finished what the skate park had started on the left side of his rib cage.



In the end, the husb is alright. If he wasn't sold on helmets before, which I know he was, he definitely is now. Who knows where we would be if it hadn't been for that 50 dollar helmet. Wow, 50 dollars.  What a cheap price to pay for the happy outcome it created on my Jaron's skull.

We were at the hospital for about 4 hours. He threw up some more on the car ride home. Rich's driving will do that to you. (Just kidding Rich). No apparently with a bad concussion vomiting can happen, expecially when the person concussed is being moved around. Once we got home Jaron went to sleep. He slept for awhile. When he woke up he felt like it had all been a dream. Unfortunatly for him, it was not a dream, and he realized this when he looked at his wrist and saw the hospital bracelet. His totem bringing him back to reality.

Now almost three weeks later, he is still sore on his rib cage, a little bit hazy in the head, and a lot a bit sleepy all the time.I'm sure that will all go away soon. I hope so at least.  The worst part of this whole thing is that he doesn't get to enjoy summer as much as he thought he was going to be able to, because he has to take it easy, but the good part is he is alive and well and is not a vegetable.

So, grab your glass. Hold it up high. Ready?

 Here's to helmets.

Grandma Boyd's House

 This rock (below) that Liv and Warner are standing on yielded many adventures for Pepper and Jaron growing up. They loved this thing. It used to have a cave on the other side of it that has caved in, which is too bad, but the kids still had fun exploring around on it.

 How cute are these little frogs from Grandma's garden?

 Aunt Linda and Aunt Becky with Liv and Warner.

 I love all the little Grandma Boyd touches that she has added to her garden. She either is given this stuff or buys it, and then she paints it to make it look cute. I love it. She has such a beautiful garden, which I imagine is pretty hard to do in New Mexico. I would like to spend a few days watching her and learning a thing or two from her about her garden. She gardens almost everyday, and is in super good shape.  I can't believe what good health she's in, as is my Grandma Pope who is 89 and gardens also for 2 hours a day. Man, maybe gardening is the key to staying healthy and strong and youthful.  Look at these lounging frogs. I love it.

 Boyd is named after this wonderful woman's family. It is Debbie's maiden name. So it was special to see his namesake holding him.

 Aunt Becky showed the kids a friendly little blue collard lizard. The thing was huge! Well, huge in my book. Warner was pretty excited about this little lizard friend.

I love that Grandma Boyd has this book. It's perfect. I'm going to have to look this one up and see if its still in print.

Let's see if I can get all the names straight in this picture. Starting from the top row left to right: Buster, Jaron, cousin Meagan, Aunt Becky, Linda, Michelle, Tom, and Michael ( I think). Second Row Grandma Boyd, Liv and Warner obviously. 

It was good times at Grandma Boyd's house. Grandma Boyd was very cute with the kids, and they especially loved Aunt Becky, who reminded them and me so much of Momma (to me) Grandma (to them) Brown, that it made us miss her even more than we already did and want to see her soon.  This family has a lot of love in them. I loved watching how they interact with each other in such a loving and serving way. They are good people, and we left their house filling fully loved. 

Also another quick thing I want to remember is when Uncle Tom was putting out his cigarette Warner was fascinated. He said to Uncle Tom "What are you doing?" Uncle Tom said "Oh, just putting out my cigarette" then leaning in closer to the burnt ash tray with the bud slowly burning out inches from his face, Warner said excitedly, "Can me try?"  It was so innocent and funny. Uncle Tom simply replied "Na kid. I don't think that's a good idea".  Good answer Uncle Tom.

Curly Sue

Girls are so much fun.

BEFORE:
 

AFTER

 

A visit with Grandmother Lola

We arrived on a Sunday morning. After spending just one day in Grandmother's castle, as I was tucking Olivia in to bed that night on a soft, fuzzy, pink pillow, inside of Lola's castle, Olivia said "Mom, I feel like a real princess. Do you feel like a real queen?"

Warner and Liv with second cousins Lizzy and Mary.

Liv, with some random girl that she had the guts to ask if she could ride in her four wheeler with her. The unnamed girl said yes much to Liv's excitement.

Cousin John and daughter Mary

Buster and Grandmother meet for the first time

Road Trip

Just got back from a road trip to Utah and New Mexico.  We clocked approximately 2600 miles, totalling up to 40 hours in the car. The kids were troopers and really traveled well. It feels good to be home, but I'm looking forward to sorting through pictures so that I can reminisce upon such a fun few weeks. We made it down to New Mexico to visit Jaron's Grandmother, and it ended up being one of the best parts of the whole trip.

Here is my first installment of photos from the trip:

We got out and stretched our legs at the half way mark to New Mexico. 

My sgraggle muffins were all to ready to get out of the car, throw off their shoes and run a muck across the red sandstone rock faces of Moab, UT. I'm thinking we are in need of a future week long trip to southern Utah. This was just a small taste tester, that left us hungering for more of the majestic desert beauty. 

 

   

 

 

Hiking with Liv and Warner

I want to remember hiking with Liv (age 5) and hiking with Warner (age 3). Warner used to be slow and kind of pokey, but who isn't slow and pokey when their legs are only 7 inches long? Now his legs are still only like 12 inches long, but he is not slow and pokey anymore. In fact, I would say he is some what of a speed demon.  He hikes the whole hike by himself, and most of the time his little legs are running and his head is down. He is almost always the leader of our group and we have to sometimes jog to catch up with him. 

On a walk with him today I commented on how fast he was. Liv and I were trying to keep up and he was probably 25 feet ahead of us and getting farther away. I said "Warner how'de you get so strong and fast?" and he said "Keecus I have to. Keecus Ine just stwong" (that's 3 year old talk for "Because I have to. Because I'm just strong").  Pause. "I dunno. I just did", he said. Great answer. 

Warner is really aware and proud of his growth. At random times through out the day he will stand up tall, put his feet together and say "Mom I gwode wast time (That's three year old talk for "I growed last time"). Look how big I am".  And while he waits for my reply he's looking at me nodding his head in reassurance. 

Liv is our little beauty hiker. She is constantly looking for things in nature that are beautiful and pleasing to her eyes. She is our one that will stop to observe a cute little worm for five minutes, or bend down to sniff a fragrant flower. She never finishes a hike with out a little bouquet in her hands of all the little leaves and wild flowers that she picked along the way. 

Hiking is my favorite thing to do with our kids.  Its free. It's refreshing. It's togetherness. It's excersize. It's beautiful, and its so peaceful.  We are all there together. It's so quiet. We stop and listen to the noises of the forest, and I just love it. 

Fountain Fun