Aleah's Eye Surgery

Aleah looks THRILLED to be at the hospital...she HATES this place...can you tell?

Aleah is now changed and dressed in the hospital P.J's and Booties!  CUTE!!

She was asleep when I was called back to the Recovery Room where they told me she had stirred a little bit and the anesthesia was wearing off!

MaryAnn was helping Aleah warm up to her by giving her a doll that she got to color a face on!  She clung to that and it certainly helped her get through this trial of hers!   We'll make Thank You's for each of them and send them to Primary Children's this weekend...they deserve some appreciation!!! 

Eye Surgery is complete and Aleah gets a special ride to our car...COOL!

January 14, 2011
Aleah, as you may remember has what's classified as Hypotonia (low muscle tone) and I also believe she has what's called, Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) which means that her brain doesn't make the connection to form sounds like you and I.  With these problems, come a few more but which all relate to her low muscle tone throughout her whole body.  So, now you may understand why she had a problem with her muscle in her right eye.  They call it a palsy.  We have taken her to an eye doctor ever since my Uncle John (a retired Opthamologist now) said that she had the problem and would probably need surgery.  He referred us to Primary Children's in Salt Lake and we've been going there off and on for the past couple of years.  The doctor wanted to wait until she was older and more cooperative and when there was a greater success rate (which he specified would not be until she was at least 3 1/2 years old).  She will be 4 next month and so we asked him over the phone if he would be ok with scheduling the pre-op in preparation for surgery which he agreed to do.  So, we scheduled it at the end of last year.

Aleah was supposed to be at the hospital at 11:15 a.m. this morning but when I was making fruit cake, she snatched a gumdrop and ate it...you have to understand that she had to fast from midnight last night and was really hungry.  I called the doctor and they told me that since she ate, they had to bump the surgery time back.  So, then we weren't to be there till 1:30 p.m.  After the In-Processing was completed, MaryAnn (a family aid) and Chris Chen (the Anesthesiologist) took her back to the surgery room about 3:00 p.m.  Dr. Dries (Aleah's Doctor) came in the waiting room about 4:00 p.m to tell me that all went well during the surgery and I was able to go back to the recovery room at about 4:30 p.m.  We finally left about 5:25 p.m. and got home right at 6:00 p.m.  It was such a smooth and quick surgery...it was nice!  Not that we'd like to do it again or anything!

Now, there only seems to be some reddness on the white part of her eye and perhaps a little swelling. The patch that she put on her eye wasn't necessary but I asked her to put it on so she wouldn't rub her eye.  When she woke up, she was rubbing it and I had to keep telling her not to do that.  She was SOOOOOO thirsty after waking up as well...they refilled her sippy cup 3 times!   

She is fairly happy and doing well.  Thank you to all those that prayed for her and those that thought about us today!  We appreciate such kindness and love!  We know that Lord has blessed us with such a WONDERFUL and BEAUTIFUL daughter who constantly brings smiles to our faces...she is the happiest kid in the world and know that our Heavenly Father loves and took GREAT care of her through this ordeal.  We have so many blessings that we cannot even count them all!   

Ladies Tea Party

This has become a new Nebeker Girls tradition of having a Tea Party whenever we are altogether.  So, after our day of shopping on Monday after Christmas and catching some good sales, we went back to mothers home and made little cucumer and meat sandwhiches, sushi, chips and fruit.  We ALWAYS have to wear one of mom's hats...though I think she needs better and more wide selection!

Our Nebeker Boxing Day Recital

There is so much talent in the Nebeker Family and since Cheryl's son is taking lessons from his mom, he needed some motivation for his practicing. This Boxing Day Recital was thus created to encourage her kids to practice in order to perform it in front of all their cousins! It was a nice recital with representation from all the families!

 Chantel, Cheryl, Charise enjoy singing and playing the piano together!  This picture was taken a few days later.  We always used to sing and play together for hours!

Ashlynn plays the piano to start the Recital!

Charise sings "Wexford Carol" a capella to welcome everyone to the Recital



Chantel and Reed Wilkinson sing and play the guitar.



After the recital we enjoy just visiting and playing the guitar together.



Stevie (who HATED practicing the piano and after only a couple of years of lessons quit) actually played a hymn on the piano for us...WAY TO GO Steve!

 Jacob played "Deck the Halls". 

 Shelley and Paul Schneider perform a clarinet and harp duet...beautiful!

Cheryl with son, Payton perform a beautiful duet together.



Qaiden shows us one of his wrestling moves called the "arm-trap" he learned after his Little Vikes Wrestling Camp this fall...Payton was the guinea-pig!



Rachael performed, "Love Is Spoken Here" and "Fur Elise".



The Sanger kids entertain us with "Jingle Bells" complete with bells!



We sang and harmonized to the "Bamboo Song" after mom and dad sang the 1st verse.

Cool Playground!

Monday, December 27th

The men all went skiing today and so us ladies dropped the kids off at moms where she hired a babysitter to watch all the grandkids and then us girls went shopping for a few hours! It was nice to not have to shop with kids! We later went home and fixed our only little tea party for lunch! After this, we decided to take the kids outside for some fresh air and get them good and tired! I think it did the opposite effect because they all stayed up way too late that night while we all played games!

Mom's enjoying the cool teeter-totter with our little ones!

This playground is not far from my parents home in St. George and has the coolest equipment on their playground...I have never seen stuff like this but we spent quite a long time here.

cool swing- Jacob/Payton and Ashlynn/Rachael

Boys will be boys!

This was my favorite of the equipment...Qaiden tries it too!

Rachael on another cool aparatus...this was her favorite!

Rachael with cousin, Payton

Can we swing again before we go home?

New Year's Eve/Day!

We spent New Years Eve making homemade pizza, playing the Wii and playing games (Ticket to Ride, Hand and Foot, etc.)

I showed them how we do our pizzas at our home.  We had baquettes cut up and put a white bean paste or spaghetti sauce on top, cheese and then meat, veggies, etc.  Everyone enjoyed making their own creations!

Toasting in the NEW YEAR 2011!

It's our Nebeker tradition to go outside banging pots and pans when midnight strikes...so, 12:00 came and time to wake up those in the neighborhood...HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

African Christmas 2010

Boxing Day African lunch...made by Dad and Mom...we drove that morning down to Hurricane, and arrived just in time to eat this delicious meal!  Thanks mom and dad for a wonderful memory of our African Christmas!!!

Dad marinated the chicken in coconut milk and other seasonings and cooked the whole chickens over the grill...YUMMMMM

Mom explains how the African people eat...that green stuff looks kind of nasty, but it's called Matapa and is very yummy greens cooked in broth and served with crushed peanuts over rice.

Aleah and Qaiden enjoy their dinner at the kiddie table.

All the adults eat our African meal in the dining room.

Time to gather in the family room for my parents African presentation of their mission and giving us some African attire to put on!  We all got bags full of animal goodies/ puzzles, jewelry, coloring books, etc.  It was a fun-filled evening!

Grandma and Grandpa (holding Aleah) enjoy reminising on their experiences in Africa.

Richard and Luke wearing the traditional african shirt and pants.

Home for the Holiday's 2010

 Christmas Eve dinner was complete with turkey, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes with gravy, buttered corn, homemade stuffing (which was cooked inside the turkey), and pomegranite sparkling cider and a black current sparking cider.  It was DELICIOUS!!!

Jacob's gifts which included some of the following: Wii Sports Resort game, 3 Ski passes through the Kaysville Rec. Center programs up at Snowbird Resort (included bus transportation, lift tickets, 2 hour lessons each Saturday, etc. for $150).  He just left this morning (January 8th) for the first session...I sure hope he likes it!  He also got some children's books, socks, a harmonica (from our friend, Nan), a black duffle bag, and an Eagle Bay hoodie.   

 Rachael's gift's included a mini ipod to listen to her favorite songs, Wii Dance 2 game, some childrens books, gloves, an Eagle Bay Elementary school shirt, a nice pink wallet, a pink scripture bag and flower clips for her hair, etc.

 Qaiden's gifts included a large Aircraft Carrier complete with airplanes that launch off of it and which makes noise and moves across the floor, a punching bag with gloves, some childrens story books, socks, an Eagle Bay t-shirt and a pet dog that looks as if it is breathing from our friend, Nan. 

Aleah's gifts included a nice purple winter coat, a doll house with magnetic dolls and clothes which she LOVED!!!, as well as a cute bug collection apron, net, plastic bugs, magnifying glass, etc. from our friend, Nan.



 Aleah thinks she will go outside to catch some bugs now!

FUNNY MOMENT:  After eating our yummy Coddled Eggs, bacon and toast breakfast this morning, we all gathered in the living room and this year it was my idea to open all our stockings first.  Well, we let the kids get their stockings and empty them out to see what Santa brought and low and behold, Qaiden looks and finds nothing...oh, no, there is something in there...a LUMP OF COAL!!  He was so devasted but had to capture the moment as I tried to supress a huge smile.  I told him after taking the photo of course, that Santa wanted to play a trick on one of the kids and knew Qaiden would be able to handle it better than the other kids.  I guess I didn't think he'd actually cry...  I then told Q that Santa hid his real stocking full of stuff behind the Christmas tree.  He cheered up after that, but was a really funny moment for me as you can imagine!

Santa brought our family some electric Oral B toothbrushes which are working out GREAT!  He also brought us a Wii remote charging station so no more batteries are needed!  I got some silicone muffin/mini muffin cups...so no more greasing necessary and easy to clean..YEAH...thanks Rich.  He also got me DoTerra Essential Oils which is the start of me getting in to better healing methods.  I HATE medications and don't like to go to the doctors at all!  All they like to do is prescribe medication to everyone!  So, thanks Rich for those and Nan for ordering them for me.  Rich got a croquet set and some snow winter thermal pants and a notebook computer laptop.  It was a nice Christmas together as a family.  That night, we got all packed up and left Sunday morning at about 8 a.m to drive to St. George for a Boxing Day celebration at Cheryl's & Dan's home in Hurricane.  See next photos for the Nebeker African Christmas!