Welcome to the start of school!!!

Our loyal fans may be wondering where the heck we have been!!! It's over two weeks since we last posted!!! It's amazing the earth hasn't split open and swallowed all of us whole!!

I can best sum up where we have been in just a six words....one short sentence. But first a story...

I was mowing the other day for dad (who by the way is recovering nicely), and I got a call on my cell phone. I didn't fully recognise the number (aka it wasn't a number that I had pre-programmed into my phone), however did think that the number looked familiar. So I turned off the mower and answered the phone. It was the nursing home that my grandmother is now staying in. It took several minutes of me saying "Hello!?!" to get someone to talk to me. It was Granny and the first words out of her mouth was, "You are alive!"

My response, and also my response to those who may be wondering where we have been, was....

"WELCOME TO THE START OF SCHOOL!!!!"

Seriously.....that was my response! :) I love my Granny, but one of the things that is weird is that some of our family members are having trouble realizing that for the rest of our natural lives come August , SCHOOL STARTS!! and with school starting, our lives get extremely crazy. However, things are starting to slow down a bit, so hopefully I'll be able to go visit Granny more often in the next several weeks.

Hope everyone else is doing well.

Jack

P.S. The phone conversation with Granny was good and we got to talk for a few minutes (I wasn't nearly as straight forward as I immediately was :)). I did get a chance to visit her a few days later, and it was good to see her.

Granny Update

Per Mandy's request and in an effort to let others know about the on-goings in our family I thought that it might be a good idea to update everyone on my grandmothers.

Nana (Fran's mom's mom) - Nana is doing really good. She is still working and she and her husband Bob are very busy with rentals, business, dr's appts, and other tasks that they have on their plate. Nana is a wonderful person and a blessing to our family. She has been so helpful to Francie and I (as have others) in getting settled in to where we live. She has had a wonderful Christmas and if the good Lord wills will continue to do the things in her life as she can.

Granny H (Jack's mom's mom) - Granny H has been doing good. My uncle and aunt from the Windy city came in for part of Dec. It's been good to see them since we haven't been able to do so the last several times that they were in. Since they were in it gave my mom (and her sisters) a break from having to take care of my grandmother. The timing couldn't have been better (see Granny D update for reasons), and for the most part Granny H has been doing wonderful. We did have a slight scare last week as her blood pressure was very high and she was complaining of a headache. With her history of strokes this was two things red flags that need to be dealt with immediately. Since it was at night (btw why does this always happen at night? Why can't people just get sick during the day when Dr's are actually in their offices?!?!?) we took her to the ER and after a few hours (3-4) and some new blood pressure meds they sent her back home with instructions to the family to keep a close eye on her blood pressure. Other than that things have been going good. Christmas time was a wonderful event and more posts on that hopefully will come soon. But all in all Granny H is doing really well. Granny D on the other hand......


Granny D (Jack's dad's mom) - for followers of our other blogs this might be somewhat repetitive, however I'll try to be as brief as possible (which for those that know me can be somewhat difficult). The last part of 2008 has been one thing after another with Granny D. Here is the timeline.....

Sept - my uncle (her son) passes away. Very unexpectedly and very difficult on the family and my grandmother.
Oct - Granny falls at a local restaurant and cuts her knee. No damage other than the cut which is about 6 inches long going across the knee left to right. 13 stitches are inserted to close the cut and Granny is sent home.
Oct (a week later) - Granny says that the stitches pop open. The story changes and still to this day is somewhat uncertain to exactly what happened. However whether they popped open or not she did admit to using scissors at some point in the process. Surgery is performed, infection is cleaned, cut is cleaned up, staples are applied, and a immobilizer is applied to where she can't bend the leg or touch the staples. She spends a few weeks in rehab for strength and treatment.
Nov -Granny with my aunt head to FL for the winter. During a stop at my cousins house Granny falls and the staples come loose. While in the hospital they find a spot on her lung. Scare is given that it might be cancer and we go down to meet the rest of the family just in case it is. The spot ends up being pneumonia and after a few more days she goes and stays with my cousin at her house. Dad stays with her to help with Granny and the kids. Before she leaves the hospital to go to my cousins the doctor takes the staples out. As you might have guessed, while staying at my cousins the cut pops back open and more staples are applied. After about a week Granny and dad come home.
Dec - Granny calls dad saying that she is dying and for him to come down immediately. Dad goes down to Granny's house (she lives next door to my parents) and they make the trip to the ER. Granny goes back in the hospital (4th trip since Oct) and is given treatments for the infection in her body. While there she gives us a scare on the heart and blood pressure. Making a long story short she finally gets to go back home a few days before Christmas. She's now been back at home for 8 days (at the time of this blog). And if she makes it through today, it will be the longest period of time she has been at home without having to make a trip to the hospital since she fell in Oct (at least according to Fran). We were able to find someone to stay with her during the day. This has been a HUGE blessing for her and the family. I try to go see her as often as I can, however with everything else going on in our lives it can make it quite difficult. Hopefully Granny D will continue to improve and be able to stay at her house for many more days, weeks, and months.



So there is the update on the Granny's. I hope that this wasn't too long, and I hope that each and everyone of you have a wonderful new year. Even though the end part of 2008 has been very difficult for my family, 2008 as a whole has been a good year for us. Fran became a Dr., we moved to our hometown, we have our health, jobs, a roof over heads, family, and many other blessings - we are so blessed to have what we do and I'm very thankful to our Heavenly Father for those blessings.

Happy New Year!!

Jack

Staying with Granny for the first time.

On Tuesday night Fran & I stayed with my mom's mom (i.e. my maternal grandmother or Granny H for those that are part of the family). Granny has been in…well…let's call it "fair" health for several years now. And like several people who are up there in their years, we have had to have someone stay with Granny during the day. However the last few years someone has had to stay with her at night as well. Because my grandparents were blessed enough (or crazy enough - you pick) to have six children, her children have been the ones to mainly stay with her at night. Lately because of other family member’s health issues, the ability of her children to stay at night has been limited to just a few of the kids.

Now that we are back in the heart of God's country, we are able to help out from time to time and stay with my grandmother. Last night was our first night to stay with her. To say that we were both a little nervous would be an understatement. Because what the heck would I do if something happened? How would I handle the situation? What if I didn't hear her in the middle of the night if she needed help? ALL of these questions, plus more, were running through both of our heads. So we thought, and prepared, and planned, and cooked, and researched, and prayed, and thought some more, and the day came. Tuesday. The day we elected a new president. The day we elected the country’s first non-caucasian president.

Now for those of you who don't know me very well I think of myself as a person who tries hard not to be prejudiced. However keep in mind my grandmother (who is almost 90 years old and not in the best health - mentally or physically) grew up in a time in which, well let's just say that she's 90 years old. And we stayed with her, on the night that we elected our first non-caucasian president.

To say the least it was interesting, I bet I heard the words “oh me” 27,000 times. Actually it wasn't that bad and neither was the evening. Wasn't nearly as bad as I thought that it might be (both regarding the election and staying with her in general). Fran made a wonderful potato soup for us (joined by my dad since Katie & mom decided that they needed to go shopping in a town about an hour away) and Granny enjoyed it so much she had a small second bowl. After dinner we spent most of the rest of the evening watching the election results. Granny slept through the whole night, and I know this for a fact since she snored 98% of the time, and in the morning she got up on her own, and gave us a kiss, and we left for work. Hopefully we will be able to stay with her some more in the future. I just hope that it's not on another election night! ;)

Love you Granny!