Where's my best friend?

So I was doing the dishes and Joseph comes running in and asked "where is my best friend?" Thinking that I had misunderstood him I was sorting different ideas out in my mind...What's a best friend? Who is my best friend? Having none of that really make sense to me, I asked what he had said. His response was "where is my best friend?" Being that the only people in the house were immediate family his question confused me. He finally answered by replying "my football!" He had misplaced his football and was trying to find it. He got a nice leather football from Grandma Crofts at Christmas. Needless to say that he loves it. Every night we find him tucked in bed cuddled up with his football. After all, what more could an active eight year old boy like than a football?

The fun of having children

Does this contraption look familiar to anyone? If you know what it is, and have used it before on a child, then I have sympathy for you. In the past seven weeks, we have been to the doctor with Spencer a total of six times. If you take the time to do a quick bit of math, that almost averages out to almost once a week. Between the co-payments for the doctors office and antibiotics we have spent lately, we have spent a small fortune. So you may be wondering what is wrong with Spencer. Our first visit was on the Saturday after Christmas and we took both Jacob and Spencer into the doctor because of pink eye. Turned out that Spencer had ear infections in both ears, and continued to have them every time we went in. It was seriously looking like we were going to have to put tubes in his ears. Amazingly enough, or just enough serious prayers, we went back last week and were told that his ears are clear. (For the first time in almost two months.) I was shocked. I was finally coming to accept that we would have to have it done. The doctor then went on to tell us that the next time he gets sick he will probably end up with another ear infection and that is it. We will then be making an appointment with an ENT. So pray for no more ear infections for the little guy! Now returning to the picture. The second visit we paid the doctor was because of extreme wheezing. His oxygen level was borderline (not good). We were sent home with a nebulizer. We spent the next week giving Spencer treatments with albuterol. Lets just say that holding an eighteen month old for seven minutes is definitely not my idea of fun. It took both Mat and I to do the task. Doing it four times a day for several minutes was hard on all of us. This picture was taken about five days into his treatments, he started to pick up the top part and play with it, when it was not on. One night I was not home to assit Mat in the actvity before bedtime. Mat gave him this little pep talk about how he could do it, etc. He entertained him, played, sang songs and from then on it was amazing. After being on the nebulizer for about nine days, we finished it, returned it to the doctors office and all was well for a week or so. Then he started to wheeze again. So once again we took a trip back to the doctors office. This time he wrote us a prescription for one and told us to go purchase one. Chances are that his respitory problem will happen every time he gets sick this winter. So if anyone out there needs a nebulizer in the future, we have one! I truly hope you never will need it! Spencer does so well with it now, will sit and will even turn it on himself! It has also been a great time to just sit with him and play and sing songs.