A great get away.

We took a break this week and went to St. Louis. It's a halfway point for my son and daughter-in-law in Arkansas, so they drove about 5 hours and we drove about 5 hours. We had a great time. We did the transportion museum, the history museum, the arch, the city museum, Ikea and all kinds of fun things, stayed in an air Bnb and played board games, video games and yard games. We cooked and ate it seems almost continually. We added a new vacation member, my daughter's boyfriend, to the group and he fits in perfectly. It was a wonderful trip. It's those moments when we are all together that make all the effort of preparing and packing and traveling worth it.

Happy Spring!

We're still hanging in there. We're gradually recovering our spunk from the issues of 2023, but it's not without lingering effects. My husband is still on oxygen from Covid. My daughter still has hip pain from her hip fracture. But, we're feeling pretty good about life and planning our summer. We are going to have a nice vacation with the kids from Arkansas and are adding our daughter's boyfriend in for this one. He's going to get to experience our family 24/5 (it's a 5 day vacation!). I hope he's ready for that, lol. The main part of this year that's been remarkable has been the weather here in Kentucky, we've had snow, flooding, snow and flooding. We've done a lot of emergency preparedness, but the flooding hasn't reached us and our power didn't go out (it's weird), so it didn't seem too disastrous here at our house. 

 My job has completely changed since we got a new program at work and eliminated the need for transcription, so I am back out on the trail, looking for a new job. It is not fun to do at any age, but when you are 60, it's worse. Trust me. And pray I find something! I need a place to hide out for the next few years that I don't simply hate, like I do my job now.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

I hope you have a wonderful holiday.

Trying to recover from 2023.

Last year was not the best for our family. We started out the year with me falling and fracturing/dislocating my elbow. We spent the summer and early fall with my husband being in the hospital and almost dying several times with sepsis, congestive heart failure, pulmonary embolism and covid. That was in August. In November, I got bursitis in my knee and ended up in a walker for 2 months. In December my daughter broke her hip. My husband and I have pretty much recovered, but my daughter is still going through it with orthopedic visits and she can't go back to work yet. At some point during the year, my son also sprained his ankle at work. So wow, have we seen the orthopedic doctors this year. So many of them! It's been crazy. Now I'm in the process of probably losing my job. It's just been really stressful. There HAVE been good times. We had a wonderful vacation in July in Tennessee. We've celebrated birthdays. We've celebrated the end of physical therapy (for now, Lol). We've had a lot of video calls back and forth with our kids in Arkansas. One of the kids has a new significant other. It's new, but seems to be going well. We've done a ton of thrift shopping, some gathering with friends and family, some board games and video games. We are hoping for a better year in 2025 and complete healing of all the body parts that still need it. :-O

Updates.

We've been in recovery phase since August. My husband this weekend has been getting out and doing all the maintenence on the vehicles and I am gearing up for next week's (!) combination Thanksgiving and Christmas celebration. I've been trying to think what to call it, Christ-giving or Thanks-Mas. We love a good silly name. We are cautiously optomistic about the future, though it has been kind of a rough year. I wanted to update in case anyone is still reading and say thanks for the prayers and warm thoughts. We really appreciate it. We've had the most beautiful fall ever this year so I'll share some pictures of that.

August 2023 - To Sum Up.

We had an awful time in August of this year. My husband got a small rash on his leg that very quickly, within hours, turned into cellulitis, and by the time we got to the ER a few hours after the rash started, to sepsis. Sepsis is treated with antibiotics and fluids. He had an allergic reaction to the first antibiotic (his first ever to a medicine) and went into fluid overload / congestive heart failure due to the fluids. That was on August 5th. After 10 days in the hospital, he was discharged home to recover. He didn't want to get up and walk on the leg because it hurt, so he spent a lot of time (too much, it turns out) on the couch. Then he got a blood clot in his leg and it moved from his leg into his left pulmonary artery. Pulmonary embolism. Second trip to the ER. Second time admitted to the hospital. This time, for only 4 days, thankfully. He came home on oxygen. So far, he's missed four complete weeks of work. I worked in between so I didn't miss quite as much. It's been so stressful and awful. I have seriously wondered if I will make it many times. To top it off, in between the two hospitalizations, everyone in our family got sick. My husband, daughter and I got COVID and our son got strep throat. We were all extremely ill. Right now, we are getting over COVID and waiting for the clot in my husband's artery to resolve on blood thinners. Please pray it does soon. I tell you all of this, to tell you something funny that I thought/did. I was walking down the hospital hallway that is about a city block long (no exageration) and I suddenly thought. "How am I doing this? How am I propelling myself down this hallway". (This was after hours and hours in the ER). I thought "It can't be food, because I haven't had any. It can't be water/hydration because I haven't had any. No coffee. It can't be sleep because I haven't had any." Walking some more. "Maybe it's prayer". Walking some more. "I hope it's fat cells". Another funny thing I did was to give myself a pep talk. Between the hospitalizations I was out doing some errands and seriously trying not to freak out over my husband getting more short of breath (it was the PE). I was giving myself a pep talk in the car, complete with hand gestures and facial expressions, a really good intense pep talk. What I was trying to say was "I'm not going to freak out. I'm just going to trust God" but what I actually said was "I'm not gonna (hand gesture to indicate freaking out). I'm just gonna (hand gesture to indicate trusting God". To me this was hilarious and I'm thinking if I can figure out how to do it, of getting a tattoo on my arm that says this. I'm not gonna. I'm just gonna. You have to laugh to keep from crying. Please keep our family in your prayers.

Book nook.

My daughter and I decided to make book nooks. I made this one for the Harry Potter books and she made one for The Screaming Staircase books.

Finally doing better.

My arm is healing. I've spent a lot of time in physicial therapy, so much so that I am closer with those people than with my own co-workers whom I never see anymore since I work at home. At first I only had about 30% of arm function and now it's probably 80%. I don't have as much strength in it but my range of motion is moving right along, thank goodness. Spring is here and I'm looking forward to getting back into doing things. Staying home and recuperating is something I am very tired of doing, that is for sure.