The Congdons

About three weeks ago we had some really nice weather and we decided to take the girls to the zoo before the weather turned really hot (good thing we did-it's been above 100 degrees most of the week). The girls were super excited to go to the zoo.

Friday was a pretty hot day here, and while Robbie barbequed our dinner, we got the girls in their swimsuits and hooked the hose up to the sprinkler for some fun. The girls weren't sure what to do at first, and they didn't want to get wet, but once they started getting sprayed and cooled off, they couldn't stop!!



When I came out with the camera they all came running towards me-they all wanted to make silly faces for me.



My three silly girls-I sure love them and their unique personalities!!

About 2 1/2 weeks ago, we had our first visit (and hopefully our only visit) to the local ER. We were supposed to get a really bad storm later that day, and the local weather was already warning us that we were under a high risk for strong, multiple tornados. After what happened in Joplin, MO, the company that Robbie works for sent out a tornado prepardness file through email and Robbie forwarded it to me.

Since I have never lived in a place where I've had to worry about tornados, I started looking through the pamphlet Robbie had sent me right after breakfast. The girls were running around and playing when Georgia tripped and fell head first into a kitchen chair. I was sitting right there so I saw what happened, but I thought it would just be another bump. Nothing could ever prepare me to hear Gwen screaming that Georgia was bleeding.

I felt so bad (and still do) that there was nothing I could do to prevent it. They run all over the house (and all over outside) all the time, and all of them trip over their feet and fall. Sure, I could've tried to stop them from running around, but like I said, they do it all the time, and running is what kids do. Grace still trips over her feet and bumps and bonks and scraps herself all the time. It still kills me though that I couldn't prevent her feeling all that pain and having to go through what she did.

I grabbed a washcloth and held it against her head to stop the bleeding, and with the other hand I called Robbie and told him he needed to come home from work. I then called a really great friend who lives just the next street over from us and asked her to watch the girls while we went to the hospital. While I did all that Gwen and Grace, being very concerned for their sister, went upstairs into Rob's and my bathroom and got a bandaid and neosporin (spelling?). Even though we couldn't use it, they were sweet to think of their sister.

My friend came over with her kids and did more than I asked-she took all of us over to the hospital (which is 5 minutes away-hooray for the closeness!!) so we could meet Robbie there, and then took Gwen and Grace back to her house, where they had lots of fun making toothpick kabobs for lunch, coloring, and just playing. Thank you, thank you, thank you Lacie-you are amazing!!

Georgia meanwhile got checked in, looked at by a nurse, and had a visit from the doctor all within about 20 minutes. Because it was such a straight split, and because the skin seemed like it would go back together without any problems, they used a glue that they said is equal to getting stitches. They also used a numbing ointment instead of using a needle to inject numbing stuff into the skin around the split (which is what they did when I had to get stitches 10 years ago). I am soooo glad we didn't have to deal with any needles, because she didn't even like the doctors and nurses touching her arm, much less messing around with her head.

She did really great though, and even though we were told to keep a close eye on her so she wouldn't rub or pick the glue off, Georgia never even touched it. The only time she rubbed the skin up there was to get her hair out of her face, and so we kept her hair in pigtails for at least a week, from the time she got up until she went to bed at night. She really did amazing.

These next two pictures are really poor quality-I had to use my phone because our camera wasn't charged, and my phone doesn't take the greatest pictures. This is the day after her accident.





I took this photo tonight. So far this is what her scar looks like. The doctors told us the glue would start peeling off within 5 days, but it actually took about a week, and I didn't peel the glue off at all-I just let it come off on it's own because I didn't want to peel the scab off with the glue. Turns out, when the glue came off on its own, it took the scab with it anyways. When there were big pieces just hanging there I would use their baby nail clippers to trim it off, and the final piece fell off earlier this week. With the glue and the scab on, it looked like the gash had actually healed completely back together, but there is actually a little dip in the skin where her scar is going to be. As disappointed as I am that it's not a smaller scar, it looks tons better than the big gash she had, and for that I am grateful (and it looks huge in this picture because it's close up, but when compared to my thumb there, it's really not that big at all).

She's doing so good though-didn't have a concussion at all. We also had to prevent her from bumping her head hard, to prevent her head from splitting back open, so I had to watch her closely for about a week, and we also put a body pillow up against the wall of her toddler bed so she wouldn't bump her head on the wall, and made a second bed on the floor between her bed and Gwen's out of all the stuffed animals, extra pillows and blankets that the girls have, high enough that if she did roll out of bed she wouldn't hit her head on either her bed or Gwen's. I still feel bad, but as Robbie put it, you can't always protect them from everything, and I am really grateful that it wasn't anything worse and that she didn't have any other side effects from it. I'm so grateful that she's alright and that the Lord seems to be looking out for our little Shmoo.

Just wanted to stay how proud of Robbie I am. He gave up what he wanted to do this past weekend and volunteered to be part of a work team from our ward. All the work teams went to Joplin MO to help in the clean up efforts. After all the stories I've heard from people in our ward who know someone who lives in Joplin, and from the stories Robbie brought back, I am grateful for a husband who was willing to serve someone in need. If it had been us that had gotten hit by such a strong tornado, I would hope that someone would come and help us out.

I am also glad for a really good friend who's husband also went. We got together Saturday morning to let our kids play at the neighborhood park, and again after lunch to make cards with our kids, and I am grateful she let me watch her kids while she went jogging-because my kids calmed down and had fun playing with other kids instead of being with boring old mommy!! Thank you so much!!

So I guess every year in Tulsa they have a big arts and crafts festivle called Mayfest. They shut down all the streets of downtown Tulsa and people come and set up booths to display and sell their art/craft. There are also multiple stages set up all over for performers and food vendors. It sounded like a lot of fun so we decided to go.

We ended up parking near the Kids Zone that they had. There was a stage set up there for family/kid performers, a booth sponsored by the geological society and museum that's nearby where the kids could participate in an archeological dig, a magician, a man making balloon animals, a huge bubble blower, and multiple booths set up by the Tulsa Childrens Hospital. The girls had a blast at that one. They had little white teddy bears that the kids could color on with fabric markers. After the kids finished coloring their bears, you took them to the next booth where each of them got a pink canvas bag with a coloring book and crayons from the Childrens Hospital, and they got to name their bears. After naming their bears, they went to the next booth where they "xrayed" the kids bears (a pretend xray machine and a pretend xray picture-it was really cute) and the kids could choose which part of their bear was hurt and they wrapped that part up. The last booth they got to go to was sponsored by the NICU where the nurses from the NICU had preemie diapers out for display and talked to the kids about the tiny babies they take care of, and how some of them were only as big as the bears they were giving the kids. They also gave each of the kids a baby bottle filled with jelly beans for their bears, and they had toy doctor kits out for the kids to examine their bears.

These are the girls bears. Gwen decided to give her bear blue circles around her eyes, and named her bear Flower, and decided that Flower's leg was hurt and that's what needed to be fixed. Gracie named her bear Cookie and had to make sure every inch of her bear was colored with different colors, and decided that Cookie's arm was hurt and that's what needed to be fixed (and then later pulled the bandage off in the car on the way home). Georgia isn't too creative with naming her stuffed animals yet...she named her bear Bear. She did a good job coloring Bear, but got bored after about 15 minutes. She too decided that Bear's arm was hurt. The girls had so much fun with their bears (and still do).



We had giant corndogs (Gwen's request) and fresh lemonade for lunch, and then wandered around and looked at all the booths. There were some things that Rob and I really liked, but they were really expensive, so we didn't end up buying anything. We did get ice cream though, and right before we left the girls noticed that the State Farm booth was doing face painting, so we stood in line for that and each of the girls sat patiently while they had their faces painted.

They had a big sign up showing what designs they would do. Georgia had a really hard time deciding what she wanted. At first, she wanted a spiderman mask painted on her face (which we didn't think she would sit for). Then she started going back and forth between spiderman and having elmo painted on her cheek. Finally, right when it was her turn, she decided that she wanted to be a pretty princess (which is something she says every time she wears a skirt or dress-"Mommy, I a pwetty pwincess!"). They had a bunch of different princess paintings to pick from, but since Georgia was having such a hard time deciding, they just gave her what they called the Star Princess Tiara. Georgia loved it.



Gracie had a hard time deciding too, but it was because she really wanted her face painted like a zebra (there was a tiger, cat, dog, and panda, so I guess she thought maybe they'd do a zebra too). We kept telling her there was no Zebra, so finally she decided that she wanted a green gecko painted on her face to match her green shirt. She too loved her gecko.