Christmas 2023

 

Knee update

 Progress!  Good progress.

PT started on Friday. He did really well! The therapist assigned him.only four exercises to do, three times a day. That evening, We had a fun "Goodbye" visit with Damian,Tandy and girls. They head to Texas on Saturday.

Mike can do stairs! Step, together, step, together. 

Mike has a small appetite! We've been enjoying nutritional meals AND yummy treats from neighbors. Hmmm, candy and cookies and nuts-- oh my!

Mike can do some of the Physical Therapy by himself. But I do help him to make it easier and obtain a greater range of motion. It worked well on his shoulder, so we are hoping for the best on the knee.

The bruising on the top of his thigh is evident now. I think it's from the tourniquet they use for surgery. I'm sure the rest of his knee will blossom soon.

He's totally off the opioids pain killers and just using Tylenol and Ibuprofen. Good progress. Not using walker.

Not sleeping much at night. Drinking plenty of fluids keeps him hopping up and down frequently. It's a bother.  (But GREAT exercise!) And his bowels have started functioning, so he is a happy camper. Pun intended.

We went for a drive this morning to get some fresh air. But it turned out he was NOT comfortable sitting in a vehicle, so we didn't stay out long at all. But at least it was a change of scenery for him.

Progress every day. We are so happy and SOOOoooo very grateful!!!

Knee replacement, Day 3 and 4

Day three. Not nearly as good as previous days. He can hardly move his leg and had to limp around with his walker, in much pain.

By end of day 3, he was having a skin allergic reaction to one ( or more) of his drugs. There are so many!

That's not even all of them.

He CAN still get up and around to use the toilet, but the opioids have taken hold of his bowels and stopped that...so he's uncomfortable.

The frequent icing seems to work, as we have removed all the outer wrappings down to the surgical dressing. No bruising yet, but I'm sure it will come. 

His leg looks nice and tan from the orange-ish disinfectant cleansing solution from surgery. It takes a few showers before that is all gone. His bandage is 8 1/2 inches long!

Morning of day 4, Friday the 22nd,  we are waiting for a call from home health and surgeon about continuing/ stopping one or more of the drugs.  On his own, Mike has decided to take ibuprofen for pain rather than opioids. It IS his drug of choice and works well. Only they told him to stop that, and put him on Eloquis for a blood thinner ( $400 co-pays on that puppy!!!) rather than baby aspirin. . . it's kind of complicated.

Last night's discomfort with the neck/upper chest rash/irritation was partially solved with a shower and Benadryl. But Thursday morning, after removing outer Ace bandages and gauze wraps meant we ADDED compression stockings. Do you know how HARD those are to get on? Can you imagine how hard that was for me to do with my weak and faulty thumbs? Ouch. Just, ouch. No more showers for him! Haha. Not really. But if it's just for soothing a rash on his upper body that he needs, I think I'll be helping with a sponge bath rather than remove and replace those ghastly things.

On a more positive note, he's discovered that Tramadol definitely does give him anxiety, so he's not taking those any more. We actually played a few hands of cards together Thursday evening to occupy his brain while that anxiety was working it's way through. And I played solitaire while waiting to rotate ice packs (which pretty much was my job all day long). I even won. Once. And I finished watching a Christmas movie with him, too, last night. He has to frequently change positions, and I'd been listening to most of it ( the movie) while I was relaxing and playing cards between ice packs, so we finished watching the movie together on the bed. That seemed an almost normal thing to do. 

Progress. Baby steps. Still hoping and praying for a good outcome overall. This afternoon the physical therapist will come to meet with Mike and we will see what THAT entails this time.

And early Friday Morning finds him walking ( for now) without walker, which means his pain is less at the moment. It changes hourly.

Pre Christmas Visits/ Surgery

 We also had Gail's family here overnight, but no photo.

Four generations.

All these years, and we never EVER noticed the Christmas 12 Days of Christmas glasses were INCORRECT! No wonder they were "Free with purchase" giveaways. The eleventh day is NOT "Ladies Dancing". 

On the twelfth day of Christmas,
my true love gave to me
Twelve drummers drumming,
Eleven pipers piping,
Ten lords a-leaping,
Nine ladies dancing,
Eight maids a-milking,
Seven swans a-swimming,
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden rings,
Four calling birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree!

More than one of those glasses are incorrect.

Monday Night, Tandy accompanied me to see and hear lovely Christmas music at my Church by Lex de Azevedo and his Christian Choir. Lovely.

And then-- Poof! Just like that Mike has a new knee and is back home in good condition. Whew!

That's a LOT of meds! 

December hiking

 Babies and doggies and red dirt, Oh, My!

Started my morning off early with steak and eggs with Mike. Gail, Seth and Johnny came to spend the night last night, so we had a brief visit with them last night, but They left before I returned from hiking.

I drove to New Harmony to carpool with Jessica Henshaw, our Ladies Hiking Group leader at 8 a.m.

On my way to her home, a huge flock of wild turkeys crossed the road right by me. I've never seen so many at once.

Pretty cool. There were MANY more than just these. 

We exited at Washington, headed down to the Grapevine and the Dino Cliffs trail. Pretty area. 5 other ladies, two more dogs and one baby joined us. We were 7 total.

It was very cool. I had on multiple clothing layers and didn't shed any of them.

Enjoy the views!

Toward Pine Valley mountains

Looking back down toward Washington and St George. It's been hazy all week.

Proof I was there.

The parking lot was so full!

Me and my hiking buddies for the morning, Coda and Milly ( Jessica's dogs).

St. George Temple rededication

 December 10, 2023

I attended the rededication in 1975, and now, after more renovations, expansions and restoration, it was dedicated once more. 

Elder Holland spoke and dedicated the structure, along with other speakers. It was broadcast to my stake center. I loved it. 

Also, ( from Facebook) :

"Drat. DRAT!  After getting all psyched up, super cleaned, prepared, Mike's surgeon is sick and knee replacement surgery is postponed. Mike said he may not get up the nerve again to do this again. Ha.. Hibicleanse shower, clean sheets for nothing. ☹️ Guess we WILL  go watch another Christmas movie tonight. ( Although clean sheets are always nice ..  but I just changed them a few days ago.) And he avoided crowds at church today ( and germs), missing the St. George Temple rededication today, too. Speedy recovery to his doc, poor guy."

We find today that it will rescheduled for the 18th. <Sigh> And here we go again.

Christmas decos 2023

 I've never put up two Christmas trees before. This is the first for me. I made a lot of trips up and down my stairs today. I have determined that probably I have too much Christmas stuff. But this year I expanded a little and tried my hand at spreading it out a bit more. Just a bit.

Some nativities stayed on the LR book cases.

I have a fairly new hanging in the kitchen. Oh, I have Christmas towels out, too.

 Here's a few skeewampus things on the dining room wall. Those will need some refining.

Under the china cabinet has a few decos. That's my Grandma Sorensen's ceramic candy dish I have adored since childhood.

I added a holly garland to to back of the sofa. And a little Christmas pillow.

Front door wreath.

Behind the front door. 

Ho, ho, ho!

And my tree is LOADED. Wooden and rustic metals, stars and gold beads. Plus the "Baby's First Christmas" ones. I guess I should hand those off to their owners, eh? There are a few travel ones, too. But I didn't find my Alaska wooden one from Laura. 

Snowmen on the top of the bookcase.

Some Christmas trees on the piano. Others are on the mantle.

Poinsettia's on the windowsill.

And here's the kitchen/ dining tree. All white lights, silver ornaments and silver bells with silver beads and white snowflakes.

I quite like it! I put my collection of tins under it

I love this Santa pillow Tandy gave us one Christmas! 

Poinsettias, pine cones, poinsettias, ofChristmas trees and a red rocking horse keeping our Tiki god wood burning stove company.

I feel like I'm done --inside. Tomorrow will maybe be outside lights.

And I need some fragrance and some music and we're set. Oh . . . Yeah. Gifts. Should maybe get working on that. :-/

Winter travel to Vernal, UT

 After my Friday morning shift at the temple on December 1st, and because I got to leave a bit early, Mike and I headed up to Vernal. We knew it was going to be kind of dicey, weather-wise. And it was. From Cedar to Provo it was pretty good. But up the Provo canyon? Oh my--it was something. We saw trucks sliding, pick ups and  some cars going way too fast, trucks with trailers trying to brake inappropriately. Even we were kind of irregular as Mike attempted putting the truck into four-wheel drive high while he was driving. He thought he had done it before. But it insisted that we slow down to 20 mph or less to make the switch. Not an unusual request; however, when there are pickups hauling big trailers behind you, you don't really want to do a lot of slowing on an icy, slick, slushie road! And it was icy and slushie and snowy and cold.

Once we got out of the canyon, it wasn't too bad. Even up through Daniel's Canyon it was pretty tolerable. We had good visibility and did  not have much snowfall, and not wet or slippery roads! Same thing through the strawberry reservoir area. That area can be notorious for storms and wind and snowy roads. We were abundantly blessed and experienced none of that. We did make pretty good time getting there. Once we got to Joe and Jannae's house, we had a chance to visit with them before it was time to go to Marvin Capps's baptism that evening. Scott Liebhardt had called Mike a couple of weeks ago to say that Marvin Capp and his stepson were being baptized. Marvin and Mike and Scott and others hunted together for years and Mike was really, really tickled to hear that happy news. And he definitely wanted to be there! So I got a substitute for our Sunday Primary class and we headed up. It's a long drive. About six and a half hours on good roads. That's why we wanted to leave earlier in the day for a 7:00 p.m. baptism on Friday night. We wanted to make sure that if we had to creep along at 30 miles an hour in a snowstorm, or wait for roads to be cleared, that we would be there on time. We did climb through Provo Canyon between 30 and 40 miles per hour, but the rest of the time the roads were fine and we got there quite early.

Marvin has been married for about 4 years to his wife Nancy. She has three children from previous marriage, and this one son, whose name I don't recall, has some special needs. He is about 14 or so. He and Martin were both baptized Friday evening. Scott baptized the young man, and Koda baptized Marvin. They were both confirmed that evening after the baptism. Mike confirmed Marvin a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints. Mike was so tickled to be able to do that. Apparently, Marvin's parents, who have both passed away, were ready for HIM to be a member of the Church and help THEM get sealed together. And they let him know! I think the baptism was very well attended. Scott and Teresa's family have been good friends and supportive of Marvin during this time of his learning about the church, and deciding to be baptized. It was time.

Mike's other motive besides visiting with Joe and Jannae and attending the baptism, was to visit with other family members there. So that is what we did all day on Saturday. We saw my old roommate, Lynna Martin Kendall. And Gary, her husband. We also intended to deliver homemade apple cider to these folks, so we did that, too. Along with some raspberry jam. :-)

We had good visits with Scott and Teresa Liebhardt, as well as their son Koda, daughter-in-law Marlynn, a few of their kiddos. Ben and Kelly were working and away driving truck, so we did not see them but we did see Ben's wife, Tracey ,and delivered some juice. Those Liebhardt's have a farm/ranch. Chickens, pigs, cattle, sheep, dogs, cats. . . I did not take a single photo of THEIR pork and beef, but they kind of looked like this. 😊 Ha. All but the last Photos are compliments of the internet. We enjoyed seeing their animals. And we brought SUNSHINE from southern Utah with us. They hadn't seen sun for WEEKS! That, my friends, is one reason we live in Cedar-- no inversions and plenty of sunshine.

We got to spend a little time with Mike's sister Sally and her husband DeVere Ostler. We saw a nephew, Ren Anderton, and a few of his grandkids. We saw Mike's niece, Tara Jo. None of their kids, however.

We also passed along greetings from our current Temple recorder, William Jolley, who lived many years there and knows many of the same folks.

It was a lot of driving back and forth and back and forth across town, but we got to see quite a few. Missed a lot, too. But it was fun to visit with those that we did get to see.

We brought Chinese food home to Joe and Jannae and ate dinner with them Saturday night. When Mike initially called Joe to ask if we could stay there, he said we were welcome to stay there, but we would have to cook. He had just had his cast removed from a broken wrist the day we go there. And we were happy to accommodate their needs! Joe is single-handedly being caregiver for Mike's sister Jannae. It's been  2 years since she had her stroke. Joe said she is capable, but we can see that she does have many limitations. It was fun to visit with him in the evening. And I should not say " single-handedly". They have some wonderful children who do a lot of caregiving, too. Some live locally, some travel to be there with them for weeks at a time. They are good kids.

The next morning was Sunday, more snow storms heading in. Their Church wasn't having a regular sacrament meeting because it was their Stake conference. True to our family tradition-- Go on vacation, try to go to church, and it's Stake Conference! :-)

So we just got up, ate breakfast with Joe and Jannae, and drove to Nick and Kaylee's house in Herriman. We were very VERY blessed and avoided major snowstorms going in this direction, too! Wet roads, some flitting snow, but overall good roads and visibility . No ice or slush.

 Kaylee and kids had just come home from Church when we got there. Nick got home later. We played and read with grands, got to watch Rachel's community theater production of "Encanto" on DVD. Kaylee fixed a lovely chicken pot pie for dinner. More games, books, jammies and time for bed. Days go fast. 

Monday morning, Mike and I had tickets for the Orem Temple open house. So pretty!

Home to Cedar after stopping for lunch in Beaver at the Creamery. I can check that off my list now. We tried going there after the eclipse, but it was so packed and crowded. Ridiculously so! Today it was not at all.