Bullets

• The sun was out today. How-way-you-yah!!
• There were no trees down in the driveway this morning. How-way-you-yah!
• The wrist was much better today and I'm actually using that hand for miniscule tasks.
• We were convinced last night and this morning that Dexter was about to die. He's nothing but skin and bones, literally. And fur. Not eating or drinking much at all. And he purred when we bathed him last night leading us to believe he is delusional. When I got home from work he ate a little dry food and about 8 treats. Then he jumped on the counter. We are no longer convinced of his imminent death.
• Got a call from school today saying J was laying on the floor crying with his stomach hurting. He was crying so hard that he couldn't talk to me. Basing it on his flair for the dramatic and his inability to tolerate any kind of pain, I figured he probably had gas due to his extreme consumption of ham over the past 5 days and his liking the bean soup I made last night. T went and got him and brought him home and put him to bed. He rested for an hour and then was up and looking for food. When I got home he wanted to go outside and dig for treasure while he waited on "deener". I'm glad he's fine but I wish he'd spare us the theatrics. I guess I need to take him down to audition for a play.
• Notice the caps in this post? Yeah, I'm using both hands but it's getting sore and I need to go.

Again

It happened again. Two more trees down again this morning. T couldn't even get out. I was supposed to go to therapy this morning but the town where that is is having lots of power outages and roads closed due to flooding and trees down. I will call before i go. This pic is after T clipped off what he could before the clipper broke. Sigh...

the big reveal

Well, I went from the big cast like thingy to this;

Much better, yes? of course yes. I go back tomorrow to begin therapy. it already feels better just being out of the big wrapper. I must say, it is gross, even if it is my own appendage.

The yellow stuff is betadine. I have a rash. There is writing on it in multiple places. The stitches are out now but it's still ugly. I won't post any more pics until it looks better. Can't wait to freak J out. Muhahahaha.

Happy Anniversary

Today is our wedding anniversary. 24 years! happy anniversary, babe! you never cease to amaze me. I love and admire you.

we have had a rough month. with dexter being sick, gary passing on, surgery, fleas, A's car dying and the stress of needing to get some things done around here and the weather and equipment not cooperating, it's been difficult. Speaking of weather, check out this pic of our driveway this morning.

yeah, that would be a tree. in the drriveway.

dexter has not been eating or drinking well at all. but he has been fiesty. here's a pic of him behind the microwave. which is where he is right now.

i'm looking forward to getting this stuff off my hand today and finding out "what lies beneath". i will miss the protection of all the layers though. gotta go.

He is risen!

He is risen indeed!!

we had an awesome day here. it was sunny and in the upper 70's. glorious. we enjoyed the service last night and the service this morning. then family came over, brought good food, the ham was great and the company greater. here are some of the eggs the kids did. yes, they are 18 and 13 but they still like to color eggs and their friends do too. as long as they want to, we will do our best to make it happen.

the egg dye-ers. e, a, a's boyfriend and j.

beware. these next pics are of dexter and he's just a shell of the cat he used to be. his eyes are particularly difficult to look at. t had him at the vet again yesterday and she is completely stumped. now he's back on steroids and steroid eye drops, which t had to get at the regular pharmacy. we see a little improvement today in one eye. it's so sad. bless his heart, he has spent so much time going to the vet lately he just decided to climb in and sleep in the carrier.

feisty old cat that he is, he managed to get up on top of the fridge. i don't know how he did it and it scares me for him to jump down but i am a bit proud of him.

and now, be prepared to be overwhelmed with cuteness! is this not the cutest cat ever?

oh how i wish i could sleep like they do.

curl up somewhere in broad daylight, put your paw over your eyes and sleep away.

i am supposed to get the stitches out on tuesday. i am ready to get this monstrosity off my hand but a bit nervous about not having the protection of it too. it still feels better if i hold it up. wonder when that will stop.

a is on senior trip this week. she had a lil meltdown friday when her transmission went out on her car. her boyfriend may work on it this week since he didnt go on the trip. t has plenty on his plate so it would be appreciated. we shall see. we are trying to get several projects done around here and nothing is cooperating.

Celebrating

how are you celebrating easter? we r going to a large church service on saturday eve and a small church service on sunday morning. i will not be playing/singing for that service. sigh... a will be leaving for her senior trip that afternoon and my family is coming over. i will put a ham in the crockpot sunday morning and everyone else will bring something. now if i could just get my house clean. i still have boat seats and a cat carrier in the office, prom dresses laying around, the poor old cat and 4 people making messes and only one hand to clean up with. sigh.. i wouldnt trade it tho. those are the changes, subject to plan.

yay

due to inability to type with both hands there will be no caps in this post.

jt was promoted to specialist (e4) and was 1 of 14 soldiers on his base to be recommended for sniper school. woot! way to go, jt! we are proud of you!

j is doing his math homework by himself. i have prayed all year for this.

i worked today and made it. i am tired and a bit sore but not too bad. my stitches itch which i guess is a good thing. but dang. they are covered by an inch of stuff. i scratch the outside of the wrapping and it vibrates to the stitches. it helps minutely.

dexter was running a fever again so he is on dif antibiotics now and his eyes still look terrible so he has dif drops now too. he has also lost a lil more weight. but he is still alive.

a is getting ready for her senior trip. fun times!

Post-op

 Sorry about that very brief update on "D-day". Surgery went well. The doc told T that my tendons were very swollen making it a bit difficult. For those who want to look it up (dad) it was De quervains syndrome and the procedure was de quervains release. I also had the volar ganglion cyst removed. I have a rather large bandage.

Best I can tell there is a layer of gauze, some kind of padding, a splint and some moe gauze and a stretchy bandage. it's about an inch thick in parts.

I did ok Thursday eve until I posted that update. That was the beginning of 24 hours of sick. Yuck. This is how I spent Friday.

We finally decided that the prescription pain meds were to blame. I stopped taking them and my stomach is very happy with that decision. Saturday was much better.

Poor T has had his hands full with his pukey post op wife and the poopy post antibiotic, still on eye drops, older cat. He was with me Friday all day other than to run to the drug store to pick up anti-nausea meds. I think he was glad my mom was there for that sick episode. And he now knows that there are some important details that can't be overlooked when putting a bra on your wife. Ha!Yesterday G came over for a while and T worked on the boat. I think he was glad for the break.

A's job is going well. J is at the neighbors today. I'm managing pain with tylenol and keeping my arm elevated over my head. If you know me in person and see me with my arm up like that, just remember that its better than me throwing up on your shoes. ;)

In Memory

T's cousin Gary passed away yesterday morning. He went to bed and never woke up here. While we are sad for those of us left behind we are thrilled that Gary's body no longer holds him captive. He has experienced complete healing in the presence of God. We love you Gary.

Gary with his daughter at his parent's house. How we cherish that time spent with him.

All of us sitting around the table that evening.

J with "Uncle What's-his-name?"

D-day

Update; surgery is over. went fine. tendons were very swollen/irritated. had a block, like an "out of arm experience". like the mayor of whoville. feeling is coming back. doesnt feel good. ifeel puny.

Today is the day for the surgery. It's not until this afternoon so I have to go all day without eating or drinking. That stinks! I'm doing ok. But I did dream about food and wake up hungry, of course. I also woke up and told T that I wish we could fast forward a few weeks because I want this done but I don't want to have to go through it. There's a lesson there, I'm thinking.

Yesterday evening us "Colorado Ladies" got together finally and tie dyed our shirts. One of our jokes while there was, "Got oxygen?" and we found these shirts but they only had a few left and they were all white. We decided to buy them and tie dye them. Of course, J and A tie dyed too. A wants to "open" hers herself so we don't know what her's looks like yet but here is J's and mine.

This is K's. I really like hers a lot. She wishes you could see the words better but I think it's cool.

This is G's. Somehow hers didn't soak up as much color but she likes it anyway. It's so fun to tie dye and see how they turn out. It's like a surprise. I may get another shirt and do it again today with the left over dye. Since I'll probably be loopy it could be real interesting.

T sat down with some coffee this morning. Misty jumped up in his lap and made herself comfy. She is the funniest, sweetest cat.

Yay!

J's team won their first game tonight, 18-7. J didn't get a hit but he got walked and made a run off of that. Yay!

A made donuts tonight and didn't start anything on fire. Yay!

The donuts are good. Yay!

A also found a dead baby squirrel upstairs. That's not a "yay". But at least it was dead. That part's the "yay"!

I have no idea what's up with us and the squirrels around here.

Dear whatever...

Dear Whatever I Accidently Vacuumed Up Today,

I don't know what you were, but I'm sorry. Apparently I have inherited my mother's talent for vacuuming up unusual things.

Rest assured, you did not go without a fight. You made a lot of noise.

I could go through the dirt in the bag but I really don't want to know what you were that bad. Please don't poke a hole in my vacuum bag as some sort of retaliation. And watch out for that stick pin I know I vacuumed up. Please don't let it poke a hole in the bag either. Thanks.

Sincerely,
Me

More hmmmm...

...we have added eye drops to Dexter's medicinal arsenal. Just another torture device as far as he's concerned. I will be giving him the (hopefully) last dose of antibiotic in a few minutes. Eye drops to follow.

It's standardized testing week for J. He loves it. He gets to go play with all the other kids who don't do the standard standardized tests and then he gets his ESL modified standardized tests read to him, guaranteeing one on one attention. And no homework. What's not to like? His parents are not fans of standardized testing but he is. At least for now.

A came home from school yesterday and fell asleep. She got up to eat and went back to bed. I guess staying up late and getting up early for work did her in. She was quite chipper this morning though.

Yesterday was warm. I wore shorts and short sleeves. Today, not so much. Back to pants and long sleeves. But I think the rain has finally stopped.

Must clean the house today. Here I go. Right now. Getting up to get things done. ....right now...

Hmmm

~~~I feel so bad for Dexter. He's doing ok but still not himself. His conjunctivitis is worse again too. It makes us all squint when we look at him. I hate giving him meds. He fights me a bit, which is good. I'm just tired of doing it. It makes me feel bad because he hates it.

~~~A started her job this weekend. I guess it's going pretty good. This morning she said, "Welcome to (insert local fast food restaurant). May I take your order?" The problem is, she named the wrong fast food place. Hahahaha!! A's friend E also got a job at the same place. It will never be the same.

~~~I'm excited and a little bit nervous about the wrist surgery. I've waited for 2 months to get it scheduled, going through this test and that test and a steroid injection. I'm so ready to get this done and move on but hey, any time they put you to sleep and cut on your body it's going to make you a bit nervous. It seems like a lot of the symptoms are actually related to the tendon issue over the ganglion cyst issue. Can it really be cured with a little snip? I'm praying it's so.

~~~I lead worship this morning. I enjoy doing it but it's a little nerve-wracking too.

~~~Last week was a weird week. This week promises to be weird too. Hmmm.

~~~Can anyone tell me why blogger refuses to publish my posts without my paragraph breaks?? It's very frustrating. Double hmmm.

Ahhh! Look! I figured it out. Something about updated settings. Now if I only knew what I did. Hmm....

Such is life

See that tiny little bump in this blurry picture of my wrist? Hopefully at the end of next week it will be gone. There is also a tendon on the side of my wrist that is need of "release", whatever that is. I'm ready.

Remember my last post with the pics of strange things on my counter and table tops? Yesterday the GPS was sitting on the counter (don't you keep yours on the counter?) when it turned itself on and told me to turn left. Odd. I'm glad I recognized it as the GPS voice or that could have been scary. A friend told me I should have listened. It may have been leading me to a pot of gold. A suggested that I not listen to the voices.

Well, not only do I have boat parts on my table, I have them in the music room/office floor too. We are going to reupholster these parts. Can you spot Dexter in J's baseball stuff? Speaking of Dexter, remember that diarrhea I mentioned? T and I had to soak some off his behind this evening. Yuck!! Poor cat. I was wiping with a washrag (which I threw away) and didn't realize I was down to skin. Poor, poor cat. Poor us, too. T only gagged 4-5 times.

A made cupcakes yesterday. She's been wanting to make a yellow cake from scratch and found a recipe that was a cross between a yellow cake and an angel food cake. It was a light, fluffy batter. Which probably would have worked ok as a cake but as cupcakes they puffed way up.

And stuck to the pans.

And ran all over the oven. And started on fire. It was very exciting. A stood there and said, "Oh! Oh!" I called for T, turned off the oven and got out the fire extinguisher. Most of the bigger stuff was burned up by the time T got there and he just blew the rest of it out. Yes, he blew the fire out. Which proves that he is full of hot air.

I vacuumed the ashes out of the oven.

And these are the larger charred pieces that we scooped out.

Never a dull moment around here. And such is life.

"I can see clearly now...

...the rain is gone." It's a bright sunny day here after all the storms and rain that blew through yesterday. It was really windy before the storms and they came in fast and hard. I don't know how much rain we had for sure but it was a lot. It made a little grand canyon in our driveway. It was already started but it's really something now. A had to ride the edge to get her little car down the driveway. Currently Misty is "helping" me type and the dogs are growling at each other for ownership of a dead rabbit that they dragged home from somewhere. Just a regular day here. Speaking of regular days, when we came home from our trip I took pics of our table and counter and asked my friends/family who else they knew who had a fish and a boat motor part on their kitchen table...(the paper bag is a bottle of barbecue sauce) I got answers like "you", "only you", "us" (from A) and "it could be worse". Then I sent them this one and asked, "...and tangerines and fossils on their counter?" I got answers like, "yup, only you", "you do get some strange things on your counter and table", and "yup, it could be worse."

Dexter is doing ok. He is eating and drinking a little. He developed diarrhea over the weekend. Sigh...I asked the vet if there was anything we should do about that. They just said to make sure his bottom is clean so he doesn't get "stopped up". Ewww!!! That was fun. Here is a pic of Dexter's pharmacy, also on my kitchen counter. He is only on two meds, antibiotics and steroids, but he has to take 4 bottles of the antibiotics. He is on his third. The two in the back are empties.

And just because this cat has more personality than some people I know, here is a pic of Misty. She is so incredibly cute. J's attitude yesterday and so far today has been great. And he did his math by himself last night. For the record, he is rocking his 6th grade math (which was 8th grade math a few short years ago) better than half his class. He just has a lapse in the long division area. He's clueless. His ESL teacher, bless her, pointed out that he learned multiple digit adding and subtracting, borrowing and carrying, multiplication and division all in about 7 months. No wonder he has a lapse in one of those areas. What he's getting this year is one thing building on another so he's doing well and don't tell him but next year they will just let him use a calculator for the long division. I also asked her about his reading and she said he's on target for his reading level, not for his age but for his reading level. He does things similar to her other ESL students. Thanks Ms. N!

Weary

• I am weary. I am weary of my precious old cat being sick. I'm tired of his meds, him not eating or drinking and being miserable. I feel bad for him and just wish his old body would kick this thing.


• I am weary of older adopted child attitudes. Must we always hit rewind, click, play, rewind, click, play?


• I am weary of older adopted child schoolwork issues. Would it have been so bad for him to come home before the "4 years into the process" mark? Why did we have to wait so long and why did he have to get so far behind in schooling? Will he ever retain anything?


• I am weary of the wrist cyst and whatever the right wrist is now doing.


• I am weary of some other issues in life that I will not mention here.


• And since I'm weary of all that stuff and the Bible says to count it all joy, I will do a thankful list. I am thankful that J did 100% better at his baseball scrimmage yesterday afternoon than he did at his practice Friday night (we took the neighbor boy along and there was no way J was going to look bad in front of him). I am thankful for jobs, a home, and cars that run. I am thankful for being able to go to church with my family yesterday and out to lunch. I am thankful for the laughter in the midst of the weighty matters of life. Like J's lost in translation yesterday when he asked for some "trembled cheese" (grated cheese).


• (Ok, do I have some sort of setting wrong that blogger won't "publish" these with the paragraph breaks that I type in? Anyone know?)

Bullet points

(Edit-I promise I put these in separated points. Blogger is stupid sometimes.) Bullet points. I know you love them. Here goes; ~Dexter was having a bad day again yesterday. He wasn't eating or drinking. I took him to the vet and he ate for them. I got a sample of the food they gave him and then got both the dry and canned food he likes. Senior shmenior. I will feed him what he likes. ~I was proud of Dexter for eating last night and then I gave him his meds and he yacked it all back up. Sigh... ~I let his food settle for an hour or so before I gave him his meds this morning. So far, so good. ~J is constantly struggling with homework. I am tired of repeating every grade with him as he needs help on everything. I did it once, wasn't that enough? ~J continues to crack us up with his lost in translation moments. The other night he was studying religions for social studies. We talked about Hinduism, Christianity, Buddhism, Confuscionism and Islam. By the time he was done with them they were Historyism, Christininanity, Bootyism, Confusionism and Islam. ~I have to leave in a couple minutes for praise team practice. Yes, in the middle of the day. How refreshing. I'm pumped. ~The MRI the other day was the nicest MRI experience I've ever had. I sat in a reclining chair with pillows all around me and my arm in a little MRI tube. Radio station of my choice was playing over the speakers. I go Wed. for results. I would like them to remove the cyst. ~Next weekend A has her first day of work at her new job and J has his first baseball game of the season. ~Gotta run.