A Cure !?!?!

My family is Loved!
Lane Michael is Loved!
This morning my aunt called me…she does from time to time but usually with a purpose. This morning she called to ask if I watched the news last night…well, no as a matter of fact I didn’t…I’m not a news watcher…what’s up? She was half asleep when she heard the words Juvenile Diabetes, her ears perked and suddenly she was awake…the following story was pulled from Yahoo but is the basics of what my aunt heard last night…I’m so excited…could we have a cure!?!?

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Two popular leukemia drugs, Gleevec and Sutent, kept lab mice from developing type 1 diabetes and put 80 percent of diabetic mice in remission, an international team said on Monday.
Both drugs -- Gleevec, or imatinib, made by Novartis AG and Sutent, or sunitinib, made by Pfizer Inc -- worked by depressing the immune systems in the mice, which maintained normal blood sugar levels even after treatment ended.
"There are very few drugs to treat type 1 diabetes, especially after disease onset, so this benefit, with a drug already proven to be safe and effective in cancer patients, is very promising," Jeffrey Bluestone of the University of California, San Francisco, said in a statement.
"The fact that the treated mice maintained normal blood glucose levels for some time after the drug treatment was stopped suggests that imatinib and sunitinib may be 'reprogramming' their immune systems in a permanent way," said Bluestone, whose research appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Type-1 diabetes affects an estimated 5 to 10 percent of the 20 million Americans with diabetes. Also called juvenile diabetes, it has different causes from the more common type-2 diabetes that is linked with obesity, poor diet and a lack of exercise.
Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease caused by the destruction of insulin-producing cells in the pancreas.
Both Gleevec and Sutent inhibit tyrosine kinases, enzymes that are needed for cell communication and growth and are linked with inflammation and immunity.
Bluestone and colleagues wondered if these drugs could block some of the same tyrosine kinases involved in the development of type 1 diabetes.
They tested the drugs in mice predisposed to type 1 diabetes and found that the drugs kept the mice from developing diabetes.
They also tested them in mice with the disease and showed the drugs put the disease in remission in 80 percent of the animals after only eight to 10 weeks of treatment.
They said the drugs appear to block receptors of a tyrosine kinase not known to be involved in diabetes. This enzyme, known as platelet-derived growth factor receptor, or PDGFR, regulates cell growth and division, and also plays a key role in inflammation.
"This study opens up a new area of research in the field of type 1 diabetes, and importantly, opens up exciting opportunities for developing new therapies to treat this disease and other autoimmune diseases," Dr. Arthur Weiss of University of California, San Francisco, who worked on the research, said in a statement.
(Editing by Will Dunham and Eric Beech)
http://health.yahoo.com/news/reuters/us_drugs_diabetes.html

Prayers Answered!

Last night I got a call about 4:00 saying our friends 21 mo little boy had just had a cattle gate dropped on him, so a third friend picked me up and we headed to the hospital! It was very scary for us, I can't imagine what they were going through, he had turned ghostly white and his breathing was off...he was gulping for air! After all the tests (x-rays and ct scans) we were told he's going to be ok, he has a large bruise on one lung and he's being watched for fluid build up but other than that, he's doing well! Our Prayers were definitely answered last night!

Christmas Shopping and Good Friends...

I love Christmas shopping…it makes me happy, thinking of what I know about the receiver of the gift to find the most suiting gift possible. Last night I went shopping for a couple of my nieces and nephew…I know very little about them, I know their age and hair color, I know basics which are true about 85% of all girls or boys that age. The girls are both very mature for their age, love High School Musical and crafts…10 is a hard age, they’re right between too old for toys and too young for clothes/shoes/accessories, so I went (two good friends in tow) to ToysRUS and scoped out the goods, relying heavily on our limited facts and their experiences in their families…and what we found was good maybe not what their Mom and Dad would have chosen but good none-the-less. For H we got a H S Musical Mystery Date game, very fun and something all her friends would play too. For M we got a hair streaking kit, with 10 color choices, she can streak her hair for a party or just to play and then wash it out that night…I was going to get an airbrush tattoo kit for her but then my mom reminded me that my brother and his wife are REALLY against tattoos…so that may not have gone over so well! And for N (the only boy) – he’s 7 or 8 (not real sure) loves all things Army, video games, and Legos, a boy…way easy for me…either boys are easier or I just don’t have any girls – either way, I was so excited when I found the perfect gift that I didn’t even call my Mom to confirm, I just bought it and knew it was wonderful…on my way home I finally called my Mom to tell her about it…turns out it was the perfect gift…so perfect that my sister (his Mom) had actually already bought TWO for him! So, I will go exchange it for some military Lego set…one that I bought for my boys and now sits in my upstairs closet waiting to be needed…hm.

Tithing

I don’t tithe. I wish I did, I wish I could. DH doesn’t believe in it. I do. I believe that if God can provide for me a good job (that pays for all of my needs) the least I can do is give back just 10% of what he has given me. So recently our interim pastor gave a very moving sermon on the value of our money, how it changes us, how it is a weed in the garden but how we can make it work for us. My Aunt Landa also told a story of a family that had to choose between the winter coat that their child wanted and tithing, they could get a different coat, but not the one he wanted. On Sunday they wrote their check and with tears in their eyes, they tithed. After church a friend stopped them and said they had a bag of practically new clothes for their son, her little man had outgrown them before he had a chance to wear them. Among the clothes was THE coat he wanted. It was exact and it was still new. So recently Todd agreed to up our giving, we nearly tripled our giving and fall just short of tithing. It’s upsetting to think of what we used to give and have the ability to give…I don’t see a difference in our finances after we upped our contribution. We still have enough for our bills, to live comfortably on and are still left with some to put away! The thing is, Todd’s pay has been half the usual amount, work has been slow and during that time we should have been strapped, we should have lost some of our savings and we should have wondered if we would make it financially, but we didn’t. Instead we paid $500 extra in medical bills, we paid extra on our credit card and we saved a little…we got a little nervous but every Friday I write two checks before I do anything. One to daycare and one to church, and with that I ask God to bless my family, my decisions and of course my wallet. I don’t worry…well I do but I don’t lose sleep over money, I know that if hard times hit, we aren’t ready but we serve God who isn’t surprised by any of this, and he has plans that are his own, not mine to know, but his. So every Friday, when that paycheck shows up in my account, it’s with a joyful, not fearful heart, that I write that check.

Household Rules!

Every house needs rules...if Nanny 911 and Super Nanny have taught us nothing else, it’s that a good set of rules, specifically designed for the family, will turn behavior around. Well, my family doesn’t necessarily have a behavior problem, in fact I have rather well behaved children. We’re past the terrible 2s and the even worse 3s and with 5 came a great new stage of development. The kids became low maintenance, and have developed into real people, with the capacity to have individual thought and their own unique personalities, both wonderful in their own right…but also with 5 came new challenges and because they are now capable of joking, teasing and arguing. None of these have ever been a problem…until recently.
Todd yells…I used to be quick to raise my voice until I realized that it wasn’t getting me anywhere and was only antagonizing the behavior…my DH while well intentioned, thinks that our children should mold to him and if his solution is to yell, they should respond appropriately, by doing as they are told. It doesn’t work, especially with Lane Michael. Lane responds really well to being given options. (I.e. if Lane is yelling about not eating his supper, I will lay out his options “Lane Michael, you can 1. Stop yelling, eat supper and not get into trouble, or 2. Continue yelling, get into trouble and then eat your supper. I would prefer if you stop yelling and eat your supper, it is the best option for you and eating would prevent you from getting into trouble. What are you going to do?”) Ethan responds to being told once and then if that doesn’t work, insisting he look us in the eye and listen to what we are telling him to do. But some how we had to stop the yelling that continued to plague our home. So, this week, Todd and I sat down together, worked up a set of rules that we feel will keep our family on track and then set up consequences to breaking said rules...we have seven family rules, all of which we have recently had a problem with. Last night we sat the boys down and went over the rules and consequences. Then we put them into practice. It was SO nice to be able to say “boys, you are breaking rule number 3. Stop it, if you don’t you will get a time out” There was no guess work, no questioning what would follow if they didn’t obey me…and no need to yell.

Holidays Approaching...

Ok, with all of the holidays among us, I thought I should reflect on our Christmas traditions, what we did in the years past and what we'll do this year, what we'll continue and what we'll start (I love traditions)!
Halloween:
1. party at Aunt Luanns (plus trick or treat in Cridersville)
2. trick or treat in Wapak with friends and family
3. decorate the house with orange lights for the orange light district competition

Thanksgiving:
1. spend the day at Grandma Sweets with the Schwieterman family (everyone spends the week before Thanksgiving talking about a menu and then everyone always brings the same thing they've always brought and if anything changes, everyone complains very loudly)
2. celebrate Grandma's birthday at the Thanksgiving get together
3. everyone (all of the out of state livers) tries to make it to Grandma Sweets for Thanksgiving because not everyone makes it to Christmas

Christmas:
1. October 1st no one can shop for themselves...the boys cant spend their allowance on themselves and we can't buy anything that isn't a necessity
2. Black Friday shopping (we also go thru catalogs before then looking for the best deals)
3. Saturday following Thanksgiving and Black Friday is spent in pajamas watching Christmas movies the group includes Becca Bailey Eli Lane Ethan and me...we eat popcorn and snack all day long...we watch Christmas cartoons and classics, I look forward to it for months
4. starting Black Friday all I listen to is Christmas music!
5. we go to Missouri in the middle of December for a weekend to celebrate Christmas with the in-laws
6. Progressive dinner with the Schwieterman's...we have appetizers at one house, salad at the next, main course at the next, dessert at the next and end the night with a cookie exchange...we have a good time...we didn't do this last year but I would like to this year...even if it's with my friends instead of family...either way, it would be a blast!
7. Dec 24th we have a big candle lit dinner
8. after the candle lit dinner we spend the evening baking from scratch, we make cookies, breads, cakes...you name it!
9. leave cookies out for Santa
10. the boys always shop for each other, they get each other one toy that they know they other will like...they also get us something, they pick it and are always horrible at keeping it a secret!
11. the kids all get Christmas PJs on Christmas Eve that they get to open...they're for good luck, my Mom buys them and ships them to the families she won't be with on Christmas Eve
12. Christmas Day is spent at Grandma Sweet's house, eating, playing games and just being together
13. We decorate the tree on the Sunday after Thanksgiving and invite my Mom over for dinner and to watch the kids decorate the tree
14. We read 'The Night Before Christmas' right before the boys go to bed on Christmas Eve
15. We talk about the real meaning of Christmas as often as possible without taking the fun out of Christmas

I'm sure there are more...I just can't think of them right now...what are your traditions?

Fi$her Price

Taken from a friends blog!

"Okay, so this just proves how low people can go. Fisher-Price has a doll out called Little Mommy Cuddle and Coo. Well it coos and laughs and then it says "Islam is the light". How freakin nuts is that!!!! This is America right?? This isn't a Islamic nation or anything right?? Then why in the heck are their toys on our American shelves that says something supporting another country? Well I can tell you this, I won't be buying Fisher-Price!! What in the heck is happening to our country??I couldn't get the video onto my blog, but go to youtube.com and type Little Mommy Cuddle and Coo."