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| Canyon LOVES art class. This semester it's on Thursdays which is also horse therapy days. He is worn out on Thursdays. |
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| Unfortunately he ages out after this semester and won't be able to attend next Fall. |
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| I hope they expand to adults soon! |
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| Sahara is preparing Jared's next gift box. It takes 20 days to get there so planning ahead is needed. What's in this one? His freaking play station 4 per his request. Also several shirts. I sure hope it gets there ok!! |
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| Jared's uncle has cows. Sometimes the mama cows don't accept their babies. They either starve, get trampled as Jett' s brother did, get accepted by another mama cow which is rare and take a lot of time, or get bottle fed. |
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| Canyon and Jared's cousin's daughter, Adrianna, got to help out tonight. |
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| I didn't realize Jett and Rosa were so small. |
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| Looks like she's getting out of here right on time. 4 cops just shows up at the neighbors. |
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| Eventually they arrested the guy there for selling drugs. |
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| Almost cleaned out after 3 days of back breaking moving. |
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| Used up all of the storage room plus took 2 1/2 truck loads to my house. |
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| Locked up til Jared gets back. I don't look forward to unpacking that unit then but happy to have her home. |
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| The ENT in town suggested we see the ENT at Children's Hospital. Canyon has a 13 year old tube partially still functioning in his left ear. His right ear, the ear drum is collapsing and sucking inward. This is causing his little ear bones not to vibrate right and some hearing loss. He has 2 prescriptions for now and will have a recheck in a few months. They aren't recommending tubes again because he has had several and each time scar tissue is left. This also causes hearing loss. However, the doctor was really concerned with Canyon's sleep apnea. His sleep study from 5 years ago shows he only gets 20-25% of the oxygen he should be getting at night. Possibly another dreaded sleep study may need to be done, but for sure we are looking at a c-pap in his near future. |
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| Sahara was trying to get Canyon's mind off of the ear appointment (his least favorite of doctor visits) with funny filters. |
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| He also had to have his ears looked at through a microscope and to bribe him to do it was the promise of a hamburger afterward. Hey, whatever it takes!! |
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| On February 1st, Jared boarded the first of three planes packed full of National Guardsmen and women, headed to Africa. 1 month down and 9 to go!! |
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| Spent some Christmas cash and gift cards. Got an area rug and matching door rugs and a faux fireplace/heater cabinet. |
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| Also a couple of wall art items because the walls were so blank after taking the Christmas decorations down. Sahara is getting ready to craft. |
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| Had this old stereo for 12-15 years, maybe longer. Getting rid of it because it was a system hooked up to the tv with surround that just wasn't sounding as good as it could anymore and the radio part wouldn't tune into stations clearly. #countrylife |
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| Anyway, when picking it up it rattled so I took the speaker off the back. Look at all the treasures that Canyon stashed in there through the years! |
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| Jared and Jordan are being deployed tomorrow. January 1st 2017. We celebrated New Year's Eve first at Nanny and Poppa's house with a farewell dinner for them. Then we headed to the Old Bank for drinks. Happy New Year! |
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| The next morning Jared and the rest of us headed to Malvern, Arkansas and Jordan headed to Mena, Arkansas. Jared's mom, dad, and stepmom stayed with Jared for a couple of hours. Then they had to head across state to Jordan's ceremony. |
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| From the National Guard website... Soldiers from Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion of the 153rd Infantry Regiment, 39th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, said farewell to their families and friends today after a deployment ceremony held at the high school football field in Malvern, Arkansas. Approximately 700 Soldiers from the 1-153rd Infantry Regiment left the state of Arkansas. They will conduct a short period of training in Ft. Bliss, Texas, before they deploy to the Horn of Africa to support operations, exercises and security cooperation programs under U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM). |
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| We were fed pizza while we were there. Lots of sitting around and waiting. |
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| Finally the buses arrived, four of them, and all the bags were loaded up. We had to say our final goodbyes. |
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Big longer bye for Sahara and Jared. There were some tears. |
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| We watched as he got on the bus and took his seat. They were served boxed Subway dinners and ate them there on the spot. They got a couple of goodie bags with snacks and treats for the road. And then they were off. We're expecting to see him back again somewhere around Canyon's 19th birthday. It seems like so far away hopefully the time will go by fast. Safe travels Jared. We will miss you!! |
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| Thank you Papa and Nana for the wine selection! 😊 |
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| Thank you Sahara and Jared for the salt lamp and dinner! 😊 |
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| Thank you Canyon for lunch! 😊 Thank you Brian and Mel and the kiddos for the well wishes and card. 😊 Thank you Kristy and Bob and the kiddos for the gift card and love! 😊 |
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| One of Sahara's Christmas toys was put to the test. She got a Cameo. It can make decals or monograms for just about anything. |
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| After the decal was made she applied it to Jared's Yeti. |
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| It worked! |
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| Next she made one for her Yeti. I get to design my own so maybe that will happen this weekend. :) |
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| Yea! Nana and Papa came to visit for Christmas! First up is a visit to Arkansas Wine Country. |
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| We visited four wineries and this was the first time that Sahara got to taste test! |
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| We had a nice lunch at the Weiderkehr Wine Cellar Restaurant. |
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| Cutie pups by the tree. |
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| Sahara nominated me for a free cake from a local place called The Cake Place. I was one of the runners-up and won a Christmas cake! Thank you Sahara! |
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| Christmas morning! We had to wait for Jared and Sahara to come over to open presents. |
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| After presents we had cinnamon rolls and fruit and then we went on a walk with the dogs. After a little while we started our Christmas dinner. We had ham, smashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, pickles and olives, cranberry relish, rolls, green beans, pie and cake. Yummy! |
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| Today we went to Little Rock to the Clinton Presidential Library. |
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| These eggs were funny. Sahara snapchatted them and put the filters on them so they were even sillier with antlers and elf hats. |
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| I tried to get us all coming down the escalator together. It really didn't work out though. |
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| Outside the library is a walking bridge. It used to be an old railroad bridge but now it's just for people. We had to hurry up so that we could see the barge going underneath. |
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| It was very windy but unseasonably warm today. |
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| About a mile away we visited the Old State House Museum. |
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| Lots of construction going on out there. They tore down an old bridge that was 94 years old I believe. And they're building a new one. |
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| Nana signing the guestbook. She should have put in the comments section that when she walked into one of the rooms she still smelled the cigar smoke from one of the old congressman who must have traveled through there before. She told the guy at the front desk. He said, "no no don't tell me things like that. I have to come back here!" |
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| The next day we went to Hot Springs to the Mid-America Science Museum. |
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| Canyon loves to play and jump around in the big net like it's a trampoline. It's kind of scary. |
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| Sahara was dragged to the center unwillingly. |
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| We created some pretty creepy versions of ourselves by adding other people's eyes, noses, mouth etcetera. |
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| Beautiful sunset on the way home! We played lots of games of hand and foot, sticks, golf, boulderdash, and battle of the sexes. We also went on a walk with the dogs to the Bona Dea walking trails. Sort of celebrated Misty's birthday early. Went to the movies. And most importantly, drank a lot of wine! 😄 Thank you all for the gifts and calls! Have a Happy New Year!! |
