Mama Pitt is doing well!!

Mama Pitt is out of the Hospital. She's staying with Cheryl and Steve for a little while. Cheryl has been a saint; making phone calls all day to doctors and hospitals and such. She makes sure Mom isn't being over medicated. She is such a blessing and we are so thankful for her. For now Mom is resting and taking it easy. Thank you so much for all your prayers and love. You are all so amazing and I am so grateful for friends and family such as you.

Mama Pitt

We had a bit of a scare today.... I woke up this morning and got ready for work as usual. Loren and I had decided to drive seprately to work today since I had a dentist appointment after work. So Loren left for work while I finished feeding animals. I looked at my phone and noticed I missed a call from my brother Steve. I checked the message and it was Steve telling me that Mom was in the hospital. She had fainted in the bathroom and they took her to the emergency room at Orange County Medical Center. I frantically called Tara trying to find out what was going on. She told me where Mom was and that she had been put on heart medication last night that didn't take and they were keeping her in the hospital at least until tomorrow. I called in a sub and got in the car. I drove to work and dropped off Loren's lunch and went to the hospital. I see her and I give her this look like, just what do you think you are doing to us? She started laughing and said "Well I thought this was going to be nothing and I could just call you when everything was over and say ....'So this is what happened', but I guess I was wrong." Just like my Mom to think nothing of it.
She has a heart arrhythmia. Her heart is pumping constantly like she is exercising, but she's laying down. Today they gave her some calcium channel blockers to slow down the calcium being sent to her heart that over works it. They said they are going to put her on alpha and beta blockers to help keep her heart beats in check. She will have to be on medication for the rest of her life.
My siblings and I are so blessed to have such an amazing Mother. She is so strong, loving, caring and like we have always said LITERALLY has a BIG HEART! The Doctor told her she has an enlarged heart. He explained it like getting grey hair and wrinkles. It's inevitable with age. The doctors were impressed that she has never smoked or drank and are grateful that they are only dealing with an enlarged heart and nothing else. We are grateful for the word of wisdom.
We are praying for her. Thank you so much for all your prayers as well. We have such an amazing support system and we are so blessed to have so many wonderful family members and friends.

Jana and Loren Ribbon Dance

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Update on the Howards

So I realize that I post fun things that we do, but not so much about how we are doing on a daily basis. So here it goes. We are doing very well. Loren and I are both healthy and happy.
I am taking an online class; Exploring Lifespan Development. This is not a pre-nursing pre-requisite, but I do need it to graduate. I just received a letter from Santa Ana college telling me I have moved up to 713th on the waiting list!!! WOO HOO!!! I'm still awaiting letters from CSUF, CSULB, Cerritos, and Goldenwest. Work is going great. These pictures are our new school pictures! Awe... how cute. Look at Loren's beard. I hated it. He shaved.... FINALLY. He would always try to rub his face against mine. Life is busy with work and school. Loren is playing softball 2 nights a week and our nephew Chad just joined his Monday night team. It's fun having Chad there. He's a very good softball player, so that's a plus for the team. I go to watch the games when I can.
Some of you may or may not know Loren has switched doctors from the ones he's had ever since he was diagnosed with CF at age 5. The CF doctors over at CHOC have kept Loren since they knew his history and St. Joseph's was right next door so it was easy for us, if Loren ever needed to go to the doctor's to have his CF doctors right there. The doctors decided they were not going to take adult patients anymore and we needed to go see Adult CF doctors now. Loren was very sad to leave his 2nd family, because they've always been so great with him. A couple weeks ago, after a battle with insurance, we went and met with the new CF doctors and staff over at Long Beach Memorial, which by the way is SOOOOOO much closer to home. We got to our appointment at 3:30 and didn't leave the hospital until 8 pm. The doctors saw us, the nutritionist,the respiratory therapist, the GI doctors and the Social Worker. We were so impressed! We thought we had it good with our old doctors, but these ones went above and beyond. They were amazing. They made us feel so comfortable. They checked Loren out and the first thing they said to him was that he would live a normal lifespan. Even though his parents would always assure him of this, no doctor had ever told him that. He was always given statistics. Seeing the look on his face was humbling. He was teary-eyed sitting on the paper-wrapped patient examining bed. The doctors talked to us about children and told me if I ever had any questions to feel free to call them anytime. When we left the doctors office we felt like crying, laughing, dancing.... just celebrating!
The school district, as of Oct. 1st, changed our insurance provider so now we are trying to get all of that worked out before he goes back for his second visit.
We are getting excited for the Holidays because we get to spend more time with our families and friends. We feel so blessed with such an amazing support group. We don't know where we would be without them. We love you all so very much and we are excited to be able to keep in touch with all of you! Thank you so much for your love and support.

NKOTB were definitely HANGIN' TOUGH

In June, a friend of mine was throwing a bridal shower for her sister and asked if she could have it at our house. I told her I didn't mind and that I would help her with it. The shower was wonderful and went as planned. She told me she was going to buy me a little gift for helping her out, to which I responded "That's not necessasary!" She, however, didn't listen to me and showed up at my house with NEW KIDS ON THE BLOCK tickets. I was so excited. I wanted to see how this would go now that I knew they were back (in full effect!!).

Last wednesday Jodi, her sister Amy and I went to the most AMAZING New Kids On The Block concert. We were screaming like little girls along with all the other 30-year-olds that surrounded us. The girls that were next to us were going crazy with their crying and hugging each other. It was so funny I had to get pictures of them. We couldn't believe how much fun we had. We felt like kids all over again. Too much fun!

The boys had a rotating stage in the middle of the crowd (in the pit) and it was so much fun to see all these girls going "hog-wild", pushing their way to the stage!

These were the girls sitting next to us. They were hillarious!!

This was how packed Staples Center was! It was nuts!!

Jack Johnson

I surprised Loren with a date night on Friday night. I put the date on the calander and told him we were having a date night and to not plan anything. He said ok. When Friday came he asked where we were going and I told him it was a surprise. In total Loren form, he gave me that look "You know I don't like surprises" so I asked him, would you rather I tell you now what we are doing and of course he said yes. So I pulled our concert tickets from the freezer... because that's where we keep concert tickets, so that if the house burns down we won't lose our concert tickets ;p. I held them up so that he could see and he gave me one of his irresistable smiles and said REALLY? We're going to Jack? I said Yup! He gave me a big hug and told me how excited he was. We went to dinner at Savannah's on the beach and had Lobster tacos and went to the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater and had a great time. Jack's songs have always reminded us of one another since we were dating and so it made it that much more special. Here are a few pictures! Love it!!

White Trash BBQ

Do we know how to have fun or what? So Loren (aka Cletus Driftwood) and I (aka Lurleen Driftwood) decided to have some friends over for a White Trash BBQ last night. I don't think we understood how funny this was going to be, but it was a blast!

People came dressed up and ready for some good ol' times. We got out our air hockey table and had some tournaments as well as Apples to Apples (you can never go wrong with Apples to Apples). BBQ'd up some burgers, dogs, and steaks and had people bring whatever they wanted to drink.

Loren had gone on the computer and made signs for the recyclables. Glass, Plastic and Cans. He also made signs for the Bathroom, and the Front Door. Priceless!!

Before people came I was getting ready and Cletus comes in and says "Hey Lurleen, you need some bruises and a black eye!" So he brought in his football under eye stuff and gave me a black eye and some bruises. We were giggling the whole time. He took some mustard out of the fridge and gave me some spots on my tank top. He then proceeded to black out a couple of his teeth. We were laughing like little girls in the bathroom. The doorbell rang and I grabbed my camera! I wasn't ready for what I saw, but I was laughing all night long.

The hair award definitely went to Mark and Christine with their mullets. Too funny! The costume awards went to Chris and Michelle Beauchamp.

The party girl of the night was 5 year old Zahra. She was cracking us up. She was playing air hockey, dancing with me in the kitchen and was ready for any conversation that came her way. She was a crack up. ( For those of you who remember she was our flower girl at our wedding) Too Cute!!

Nothin' like a white trash BBQ!!!