neighborhood

Greetings Family and Friends from the Lasko’s

**Guest Post by Hubby**

It’s really hard to believe that another year has come and past. Once again Hubby has been given the gargantuan task of trying to summarize the year lightheartedly without completely boring you. Good luck with that. If you don’t want to be bored the following paragraph sums out Holiday wishes and we wish you a Merry Christmas

First and foremost, we wish each and every one of you a blessed Holiday and we sincerely hope that the upcoming year brings you happiness, tranquility, and riches in whatever order you need the particular blessing most. We are truly blessed each of you is our friend. You have all touched us in some way this past year, in little ways and big and many times when we least expected it. We thank you for your friendship and look forward to seeing, talking or emailing with all of you this coming year.

Every year I take this time to reflect and hopefully learn from the past year. This year’s lesson was to open our hearts and minds to those around us. Honestly between www.abrokencompass.com, my travels and our everyday experiences we have met so many remarkable people. I personally have realized that so many of our friends whom we take for granted are the most remarkable friends we could ask for.  Collectively I’ve learned so much, been mentored and have been provided so much support this year that I don’t know if I can adequately recognize each of you appropriately.
Here is where the bragging about the world’s most beautiful children begins.
Our Children are absolutely at the center of our life, those of you who know me know that a 2nd family wasn’t in my long range plan. That said having three daughters and having three children full time compared to my previous experience of having children shared between households has been nothing short of sensational, all of my children have expanded my horizons in ways that I never previously thought possible. I’m going to focus on the minors in our life, respecting my adult children’s privacy, and just add that the adult children are both doing well and as adults are working to find their way through life’s struggles.

The children at home bring bright new perspective to these aging eyes, and while I can’t honestly say having young children keeps you young. I will say that it keeps you reminded of what it is to be young at heart. All three of the girls bring joy and happiness to our lives, intertwined with moments of what were we thinking? Fortunately joy and happiness outweighs the what were we thinking on most days.

Claire- our oldest, is ten years old and starting the world of tweens. You know those ugly years that precede the actual most dreaded of times — the teens. I think this time is set aside by God to prepare us for the battle we are about to enter. Clothes are becoming a daily struggle such that we make note of what she left wearing vs. what she wears coming home. However Claire can be the most kind and caring of sisters and daughters and sometimes even shows patience with her parents. Claire loves Drama class, music and recently volleyball all of which seem to bring a calm to her when she is struggling with her life. However she still continues to remind us that she was ruined by the introduction of siblings in her life. Claire is also starting to develop an interest in photography which I am very supportive of . Even though it is early her fascination with life produces some interesting pictures, and if she continues I think she will be a decent if not great photographer one day. We spent a day with my friend Phil and his daughter Shanna this summer taking pictures at the Harley Museum, the annual kitefest, and our local lighthouse. Claire graciously then went on the other side of the camera and patiently allowed Phil, Shana and I to use her as our model as we experimented with some multi flash portraits at my favorite local park.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kate who is 7 (aka thing 1), is thankful and joyful and touches everyone she comes in contact with. An example that comes to my mind immediately is Kate thanks me for everything and at times you wouldn’t expect it. Seriously each time I do anything for her she immediately thanks me with a thanks Daddy. Whether it is pouring her a glass of milk, or helping her pick something up that is too heavy she sincerely appreciates and notices when someone helps her. Kate’s Achilles’ heel however is our beloved family cat,  seriously I believe Kate has some form of OCD where she cannot resist hugging the cat. Kate can be walking to you and if she sees the cat her memory of what she was doing is erased and she is immediately drawn to the cat, much to Beethoven’s dismay. Kate explains it as she just can resist how soft and cuddly the cat is. Kate’s loveable nature makes it hard for most anyone to resist her pixie like charm. I like to compare her to jello or ice cream after a really big meal- you know you don’t really  have room but just like the jello or ice cream Kate just finds a way to fill in the little voids in your heart.

 

 

Amy our youngest is five years old (aka thing 2)- everyone needs to have a child who excels in self-confidence and wit. Amy is ours, always there with a joke accompanied by a laugh that comes from her toes, we truly never know what to expect next. Tonight for example she was pretending to be a news reporter carrying her microphone, she approached me while I was writing this update. The interaction is typical of life with Amy. — Amy walks up to me holding her microphone and begins “Here we have Mr. Lasko she pauses to allow me to say hello, Amy continues “ Mr. Lasko what is it like to have a beautiful daughter she asks into the microphone?” Jamming the microphone to my face she turns her head to the imaginary cameraman, awaiting my reply. (Note: We are very careful in reinforcing that we love all of our children and we don’t have any favorites or place any of them in the status of being the most loved, prettiest smartest etc.) . I reply to her question “Why yes I do have a beautiful daughter her name is Claire.” Without missing a beat the microphone is withdrawn and Amy looks into the camera, and announces to her audience that she needs to apologize for my mis-speaking and that Amy is actually Mr. Lasko’s most beautiful daughter. OMG!! We have our work cut out with her, truly each night she demonstrates an uncanny nack of amusing us with one of her characters though there is becoming an Amy concentric theme we are working on adjusting.

 

 

Mom and Dad

On a more serious note we have had an exciting year, A week shared in Hawaii with my sister and brother in law, followed by a 5 day trip which my sister accompanied us on to Asheville to attend the Type A parent conference. We had a great time in both places and made many friends, extending our circle of friends as well as our horizons.

I could belabor our daily lives however honestly we had such a good 1st half of the year, we knew that there had to be a catch.

If you are a regular follower on abrokencompass you know that Mel has had more than here share of medical issues this year and actually leading up to this year. Mel had suffered from hyperaldosteronism, a condition where the adrenals produce more adrenalin than they should. Despite the obvious over stimulation the condition can be quite deadly and result in heart attack or stroke as the aldosterone depletes the body of potassium. Mel stopped responding to drug therapy and surgery was required to remove the offending adrenal gland. I am happy to say that the procedure has gone well and it is very nice to have my wife back without the huge hormonal swings the aldosterone was creating. My thanks go out to our family and neighbors for the support, meals and impromptu child care as we went through the process. Words cannot begin to convey the thanks and appreciation we have for all the help you have provided.

If only the story would end here. Melissa had participated in a breast cancer study earlier this year. Unfortunately when you get tested you don’t always get the results you are hoping for and she was diagnosed with hyperplasiatypia basically precancerous cells were found during the study. Combined with a strong family history of cancer, Melissa had a bilateral mastectomy on December 20th . Needless to say its not the type of Christmas or Christmas present we had hoped for, however it will reduce her chances of developing breast cancer by 60%. In parallel her Dr’s have also suggested that a oophorectomy or removal of her ovaries might be a second line in defense against estrogen fueled cancers, For the time being she will be monitored on a semi-annual basis if the testing remains negative we are hoping to close this chapter in our health journal.  We feel blessed however that these situations have been detected before they developed into full blown cancer.

 

We again are touched by the outpouring of support we are receiving as Mel works through the surgery and subsequent recovery. Our family friends, neighbors and employer have all been supportive of us and I am feeling lucky I will be able to create a work schedule around the need to become Mr. Mom for a couple of weeks while Melissa heals.

Our thoughts go out to all of you and wish you the merriest of Holidays and prosperous New Year along with our thanks and honor of being able to call all of you our friends.

Humbly,

With our warmest regards

 

Scott, Melissa, Claire, Kate & Amy Lasko…… Aka the ABC Family.

Share

{ 2 comments }