Brett's Dad was in the hospital

Here's the email that Karla sent concerning what's been going on with Al:
Good Morning to you all!
Some of you have heard that Al took a trip to the hospital Saturday late afternoon. While working outside all day on putting in our new patio in the heat and humidity Al started not feeling well. After complaining of shortness of breath and feeling tired came inside and rested for a few minutes. When he did'nt appear to be feeling any better, I took his blood pressure and it was 78/43. So I took him in and found out that he had also been feeling nauseous and chest/left arm pain. After running numerous tests, they figured that a combination of new blood pressure medication, dehydration and working out in the heat all day brought this on.He is feeling 100% better now (actually was starting to feel better after a couple of hours in the ER and was frustrated that he had to spend the night in the hospital). He has to monitor his blood pressure but other than that he can go about his normal activities.
Praise God that it was not any worse than what it was and that he allowed me to take him to the hospital!
Many thanks to those who have been keeping us in your prayers!
God's Peace to You All
Karla

Madeline is goofing off!

How Madeline got like this, we do not know! But she was having fun with those cloth rings!

What's in a name?

So, we get a lot of questions on how we came to Madeline's name and what we call her. Well, when Madeline was born, we had two names in mind: Madeline Olivia and Emily Leeann. When we were talking to her and looking at her, we said both names to her. She didn't respond to Emily. But she did respond to Madeline, so we went with that name. A pretty simple approach, we thought.

As for how we came to Madeline Olivia- We have no known family members with either of those names. We both decided that we will not name any children that we have after anyone in our families or anything like that. On Erin's side of the family, there are way to many juniors and so we did not want that! We both really liked the name Olivia, but we know a family where their last daughter's name is Olivia. We didn't want her to have the same name as their daughter. When we came up with Madeline, we liked the way that it sounded with Olivia.

With all of that, what do we call her? Madeline. We decided that if she wants to be called Maddie at a later time in life, that's her choice to make. So, we are calling her Madeline, otherwise why give her a name and not use it?