Happy Birthday, Jonathan!!

Jonathan is 5 years old today! What a way to celerate a birthday--on vacation, surrounded by extended family! Jonathan was 2 weeks overdue when I was finally induced. I told him this morning how glad we all were that he finally decided to make his grand appearance 5 years ago today! He was my biggest baby too--9 pounds, 6 ounces.

We had hoped to get Jonathan's cast off this morning. Bob spent a lot of time on the phone last week with Tricare and Bethesda, trying to get a referral to a civilian provider out here to do it. But Bethesda took forever to get their referral in, and so it hasn't been processed by Tricare . . . the usual sort of thing you expect from Tricare. Bob and Jonathan are at the doctor's right now (1:15 PM MDT), but I think it will be VERY expensive if we get it done without having the referral already in hand. We're considering taking the cast off ourselves. Don't laugh! It's stinky, and it's already been on a week longer than it should have been! We won't be home until middle of next week, so it will be awhile until we can get back to Bethesda. We might stick him in the bathtub and see what happens . . .

Whatever we decide, we are still going to try to make it to Yellowstone this evening. When we leave my aunt's house, we'll be out of computer contact for awhile. After Yellowstone, we are heading over to Mt. Rushmore, and then we'll eventually make our way back to Amy's house for 2 days, and then on home. And on the way to Amy's we will try to pick up the PSP from Golden Corral, that is, if we can find it again, and if they kept it for us, like they said they would!

**Update** After long conversations with both Tricare and Jonathan's PCM doctor at Bethesda, she authorized him to go to the emergency room to have the cast off, since it was way past time. They did x-rays there and discovered that only one of the bones in his lower arm is fully healed, so they are going to put on a new cast. The old cast was so loose, and Jonathan got his arm caught in the screen door a few days ago, which caused him a lot of pain. That might have been enough to jar something loose. The new cast should fit better for now, so hopefully that will do the trick. I told Bob to at least wash his hand before they put the new cast on! Jonathan was in a lot of pain once they cut the old cast off, so hopefully they won't make him wait too long. It's now after 3:00 local. I'm not sure when we'll get to Yellowstone, if at all today.