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10 Years and Counting

Chris and I recently celebrated our 10 year anniversary. It is hard to believe how much we have grown and changed together in the past 10 years. I truly married my best friend and am so grateful to have Chris and his family part of my life. All if fun I put my wedding dress back on and we took a few pictures in the back yard! It fit once again :)



And 10 years Ago!!

Shared Blessings, Inc WON!!!!!

Shared Blessings, Inc. won the $5,000 from the River Valley Bank Community for a Cause charitable program! We are all SO EXCITED!! A very special thank you to all those that took time out of their busy schedules to vote for Shared Blessings, Inc. and huge THANK YOU to River Valley Bank for providing this amazing opportunity to community organizations like Shared Blessing, Inc.' and for being so incredibly kind and charitable. You have truly made a difference in the lives of children with special needs. The doors to Shared Blessings, Inc.  are opening thanks to all of you!

Watch for more information on Shared Blessings, Inc. Soon! We have recently started a Facebook page as well! http://www.facebook.com/SharedBlessingsInc?ref=hl

Next week we will be meeting with River Valley Bank for the presentation of the check. As soon as we do that I will be sure to post pictures!

Where does time go?

It has been a long time since I have posted. The great news is I have been busy with Shared Blessing, Inc which is why I have not wrote much lately. I decided I needed to take a quick break and get back on track with the blog too.

Where has time gone. I feel like the summer is flying by. Zak did 6 weeks of summer school and was able to swim at school for an hour each day. He is a BIG fish! He has been progressing so much. We have a pool at home now too. Zak cannot touch as it is 4 feet deep. We put him in the floating and he swims on his own. My brother got to see him and was so surprised how well he does. He makes us so Proud how well he has come.

Callie is still a little spit fire. She has taken up crawling a little bit. She will take several steps in a row now. She does not do it often but a little bit each day. Soon she will be all over the house. I cannot wait! She too likes the pool. Not quite as much as Zak, but she enjoys herself. This is her first year in a big pool. At the beginning she would cry when she got in (which she does with a bath too, so no big surprise). Now it is all of 30 seconds and she is happy. She loves to splash and spin in circles. We too are so proud of how well she is doing.

As for medical thankfully that has gotten better in comparison to the beginning of the year. Callie did have her 3^rd eye surgery for the ptosis (lazy eyelid) which the surgery itself was a success, however she did get MRSA (Staph infection very had to treat with first line antibiotics) in one of the incisions above her eyebrow. With the antibiotics that she had to be on to treat the infection she ended up with c-diff (severe diarrhea and other intestinal disease when competing bacteria in the stomach flora have been wiped out by antibiotics.). This was an ongoing issues for about a month and a half and thankfully is doing great now.
As for Zak, he had some retesting done for is immunity and is being watched for an antibody disorder. His levels were low therefore they gave him an injection which raised them and retested again. He responded well and his levels did increase. They will retest him again in a year and see how he does. Also, he had an adult tooth come in behind a baby tooth. We all wiggled it as much as possible and it just was not coming out. The dentist had to finally pull it just to get it out. He did amazing with it and did not even cry once.

This coming week will be a travel to Milwaukee for Callie. It was determined through her sleep study, scope and CT that she has a deviated septum and the surgery she had a birth for Coanal Atresia (nasal airway closed) is starting to close again on her right nostril. We are not sure what all that means yet so we are going to see a new doctor in Milwaukee that specializes in this. They will so a much more detailed CT scan and then we will meet with him. Tuesday we spend the day in Marshfield with both kids as they have their annual special needs clinic where they meet with several doctors and therapists to be sure we are following the proper care plan for each child and receiving the correct therapies. They also determine if they have any other medical needs or equipment needs. As much as I hate it since it becomes very apparent what additional needs they do have, it is very helpful to have a whole team working together to make sure we are getting the proper treatments for both kids.

Stay tuned - I hope to be better with my posts!

As for Shared Blessings, Inc. Lots of very exciting things happening. The Board has been very busy meeting trying to get all the paper work done to actually open the doors this fall. We have an amazing group of very diverse individuals on the board. We have started a Facebook page ( search for Shared Blessings, Inc). We are starting to work on a Fundraiser for the fall/winter. Watch for more details to come. The non-profit application is complete and ready to be mailed out. If you want more information on helping or being involved with Shared Blessings, Inc. please send me an e-mail at cateeters@charter.net

We need your help!

Build from the Heart (the project that helped to Build our family a handicap home with a Community room for Special Needs Families) is now complete! The home and community area are built and now it is time to open the doors. Shared Blessings, Inc is the name of the non-profit that will be starting in the Community room. This will allow a place for special needs children and their families to go for playgroups, support groups and ongoing education and relationships. Something much needed in our community.

River Valley Bank was one of the major Sponsors behind Build from the Heart! They are currently running a new program Community for a Cause. Giving away a total of $7,000! First place will receive $5,000 and 2^nd and 3^rd will receive $1,000 each. Shared Blessings, Inc has posted our video and made it into the top 6 nominees. Now we need your help! The video with the most votes wins.

 You can vote once per day for the next 3 weeks.

 Direct link: http://apps.facebook.com/contestshq/contests/222731/voteable_entries

To access the voting page search Facebook for River Valley Bank. Click on the icon towards the top is an icon C4C. Choose Vote now. Find Shared Blessings, Inc. and vote daily!!

Thank you for your continued support in helping up start the playgroups for the many families around Marathon County and surrounding areas sooner rather than later!

Birthday Pictures

We were finally able to get the kids Birthday pictures done. Callie - 3 and Zak - 7. Where does the time go? Both kids were a bit cranky during pictures and you would not know it by looking at the pictures! Photos were taken by Nicole Rae Photography in Edgar. She does a wonderful job with the kids!

National Nurses Week

It is National Nurses week! We just wanted to say THANK YOU to all of the AMAZING nurses that work with our children. We have been very grateful for 3 years to have the help of a wonderful team of nurses in our home. They all mean so much to our family and have made life so much easier. We really do not know what we would do with out them.

We also want to thank all the wonderful nurses that work with our children in the clinics and hospitals. We surely have seen our share of them this year.

It takes a special talent and personality to be a nurse. They all have touched our lives in different ways through out the years!

THANK YOU!