Saturday, December 15, 2018

Merry Christmas 2018 Updates

Hello everyone. They say no news is good news and, well, they sure are right!

Abby's been doing really good. It looks like the knee surgery worked and she walks around, dances, slides on the kitchen floor and is acting like a pretty normal teenager -even has some teen-angst sometimes ;) Overall, she's been doing really good. She still loves creating and has lately been spending time with a close friend who also shares her love of LEGOs. They build some pretty cool stuff. She is also back to playing the Cello and we're excited to see what other interests she will start to pursue this coming year.

Anna rarely slows down. She loves to be creating, making, cooking, drawing, coloring, making slime, or any other artsy/crafty thing. She still plays piano and is also in a weekly music group (with Abby) called Half-Step. They get to sing a bit, do some instrument workshops She did piano and dance and tried guitar this summer too!

Lily is still singing a ton and playing guitar now in the church middle school youth band. For the band she needed a guitar so we let her pick out a nice acoustic steel-string guitar over Thanksgiving while Tiffany's Mom (Vicky) and Dad (Robin) were in town. Robin is a great musician and helped Lily pick out a nice guitar with a pick-up and a built in tuner/equalizer. She loves it and is doing really well with it. She also has a great voice and it's great to hear her sing with others now.

All of the girls are doing some school at home and some out of the house, mostly math classes. Anna and Abby are both in Algebra and Anna was very proud that she is getting good grades. She texted me one day and said, "Dad, I'm getting an A in Math!!!! Can you believe it, Me! an A... in MATH!!!!" The message also came with a lot of emojis.  Lily gets the extra benefit of being able to still go to the Friday Home School Enrichment Program -that I, Mark, run in Greeley on Fridays. She's doing some art, music, science and other fun classes and it's nice to have her with me on Fridays.

Speaking of school, Abby and Anna are transitioning to having more and more school out of the house. This semester they only did math but next semester they will take Geometry, Biology, and an Art class at a local charter school.

We also have a Japanese tutor who is helping the girls (and Tiffany too) to learn Japanese. All of them have gotten about 1/3 of the way through a college-level language textbook already. Their goal is to be able to test out of the language for high school credit. Also, they'd like to go back to Japan for a trip someday and be able to order some good sushi or ramen. It is a hard language but they all love it and our tutor is great too.

As for me (Mark) I'm doing well. I've been traveling around the country helping schools implement new innovation labs and makerspaces, mostly at independent private schools. I've also been writing innovation and creative-thinking focused activities for use in schools, community centers and corporate settings. I'm planning on launching an Innovation "cookbook" of sorts with lots of activities to help people unleash their inner creative in the early spring of 2019. I'll let you know about the launch when it happens. I'm pretty excited about it.

Tiffany just sits at home and eats bon bons now.   Tiffany is hard at work everyday teaching the girls and putting up with me ;). Though most our free time goes to driving the girls around, she has found some spare time to learn to knit and also goes on walks with friends during the week to stay connected. Home school (and driving them all to the half-time schools for math and such) still takes the majority of the day up but it's been great to have some much time with the girls. 

Actually, now that the medical stuff has calmed down, and that the girls are older, we both have a lot more time go out on dates or out with friends. It definitely has been a nice change.

Thank you all for following our journey and for all of your support, prayers, and friendships!

You can follow more of our daily posts and life (mostly via Instagram now): Mark @schreiberm & Tiffany @tiffanyschreiber

Have a Merry Christmas.




Saturday, May 19, 2018

Knee Surgery Monday... hopefully

Long time no typing but I wanted to give you a short update.

Abby is doing ok. Off steroids for the most part but the year of high-dose use has taken a bit of a toll on her bones. It's call AVN Avascular Necrosis (bone death due to lack of blood supply).

The good news is it is only really bad in her right knee (minor involvement in both ankles but no pain yet). There is a 60% chance of healing (or a miracle... pray for that). She's been non-weight bearing for about 6 weeks in a wheel chair and crutches.

On Monday she'll get holes drilled in the dead part of her knee (aeration of the dead tissue) to increase blood flow and help it heal. Unfortunately she has a cold right now so we aren't sure she will be able to get anesthesia with a cold. If not, we'll have to postpone the surgery until June which will be hard for our summer trip plans in early July.

So, pray that she can get over this cold or that her knee will heal fine without surgery. Or both!

Thanks all!

M