What is it about July?

If you look back over my summer posts the last couple of years you'll see a theme. There seems to be a blogging wall of sorts that I hit every July. So here I am again, watching the calendar turn to August and I wonder where this month and all of my good blogging intentions have gone.

No, I don't wonder. This has been the busiest, most demanding month of my life. It's laughable to think that I have all five kids home from school for twelve weeks and yet for some reason refer to it as "summer vacation".

Where to start?  The two separate hospital stays with Spencer, trying to figure out the right medication to knock his infection? Or maybe the "little" family gathering of fifty for dinner in my backyard. Perhaps the days were swallowed up by the fun we had with out-of-town grandparents for a week. Or the cousins who came for a visit. I vaguely remember squeezing in two family reunions and airing out the guest room for company as well as a quick overnight camping trip to make up for the cancelled plans when we were ordered back to the hospital. But that just brings me to the middle of the month.

The dust was finally beginning to settle enough to see into the next week when, masochists that we are, we packed our trailer for six days in Jackson Hole and Yellowstone. A perfectly lovely break from all of the craziness that has become my life. But fate, laughing at my audacity to dare to relax, has paid me back with a vengeance. We arrived home Sunday and I hit the ground running to ready our home for the biggest event of our summer--a four day family reunion for no less than forty-two loved ones--hosted by yours truly. Every list was made and every minute accounted for so that the precious nine days I have to prepare would not be wasted. And where do I find myself tonight? Sitting in room 26 of the Primary Children's Emergency Department, that's where! After five weeks of IV medication, Spencer was declared free of infection and the PICC line was discontinued. The home health nurse arrived a few hours later for the routine, ten-minute procedure to remove the line. Well, we should head to Vegas now because we have made it a hobby this year to beat  all of the odds. What are the odds that the PICC line would get stuck 3 cm. from the exit and require an overnight stay (knock on wood that we're outa here by noon tomorrow) to remove it? Probably about the same that  my healthy five-year old would develop cardiomyopathy and need a heart transplant in the first place.

No one could accuse me of having a boring life...