Dan Graduates! Annika Graduates!

Yes, it's been a busy few weeks for us! The week Megan went into the hospital was also the week Dan graduated from North Park Theological Seminary with his graduate degree (Masters of Divinity) with honors! Pictured: Dan with his parents (I'm assuming you can figure out which one is his mom and which one is his dad...Dan's the one in the middle!) Annika graduated from kindergarten this morning. Dan was unable to attend due to his internship at a local hospital for his chaplaincy requirement for school--so I was photographer and videographer...Lauren was with to help with equipment. Here is Annika receiving her diploma from the principal, Mr. Lucas. And Annika dressing herself... Annika practicing her role as Bell Ringing Girl at Uncle John's wedding: Lauren finished preschool well and is looking forward to summer fun. She and Annika will be attending VBS next week at the Covenant church down the street where Lauren had preschool. She has her first friend birthday party to go to on Saturday at Jens' house. (He was the one she was going to marry until Jonas gave her flowers.) Emily is still defiant while being a great hugger. She is addicted to TV although she also likes books like Thomas (the Tank Engine) and Barbie. I have a pic very similar to this one of me... Megan is doing well. She wants to feed herself now so baths are a more frequent occurrence--like three times a day. We're still working on getting her sugars regulated, but she is doing fine. Thank you so much for your prayers!! As for me, I've just finished editing my fifth book. I'm becoming more comfortable at pushing back and I'm still learning about the subjectivity of the English language...rules from 15 years ago have changed... I picked up a new freelancing client through a coffeehouse magazine so now I'm going to become an expert on the candy business! Very cool! God is good--all the time! We still don't know where we are going to live come September, although Dan has a few leads on senior pastor positions. We're not too concerned. We just don't want to have to move all off our stuff twice!

Annika also had a birthday in-between--but those are all on Dan's computer. Feel free to email and harass him to get them on here!
The Wheeler Clan at Uncle John's Wedding, May 15, 2009.

Annika's Graduation: One of the songs her classmates sang recounts (literally) numbers in English, Spanish and Korean. She had a very ethnically diverse group of classmates.


This is proof that Megan can walk; she just refuses to do so.

Wow! A second blog posting in May!

Megan was released from Children's Memorial Hospital yesterday, Memorial Day, around 4 p.m. The doctors (we had four--one attending, one resident, and two others) were comfortable enough with her blood sugar results we were seeing with the new amounts of insulin Meg was getting so now we're home.

Megan seems to spike in the early afternoon and drop during the wee hours of the night. The drops at night now are not as drastic (one night her sugars were registering 60--incredibly low for her since we began measuring) but the midday highs require an additional shot of insulin.

She's in good spirits and doesn't whimper too much when we have to draw blood to measure the sugar levels or when she gets the shot.

The docs can't pinpoint when she got diabetes, but they're pretty sure she got it when she had a virus. The body's soldiers were sent out to fight the bad germs, but through a case of mistaken identity, attacked pancreatic cells. After a full onslaught, the pancreas could no longer produce insulin. So, I'm correcting myself a little here. Meg didn't necessarily have a weak pancreas--just confused lymphicites.

She is also walking like a marathoner at long last! She's had the coordination and muscle for it--but she doesn't have Emily's fearlessness. But today, she found the courage to leave her walls behind. She was busy walking up and down our long hallway by herself--with no bribes, which is good--since Grandma Barb really can't use Mountain Dew with her, anyway.

Lauren and Emily are in Minnesota with the grandparents this week. Emily misses Daddy. I'm hoping Meg will at least be a Momma's girl. The other three aren't unless they're extra-tired.

Besides Meg being in the hospital, it was a busy weekend at our house. Dan, at long last, graduated from seminary with honors no less! A great improvement over his undergrad years! We're very proud of him. All but Meg got a pic taken with the graduate. Now we just need to have him gainfully employed...not too much word on that front, yet.

This month also saw my brother John get married. So, at long last, I downloaded the pics to my computer. I'll try to get them formatted and attached, maybe even some video. Again, no quotes. I haven't had time to take notes...