The Big 4-3

Yesterday Wayne and I celebrated our 43rd wedding anniversary! We went out to dinner...by ourselves and enjoyed a nice meal at Greek Brothers. Amazingly, I don't think we talked about the kids or grandkids once, although we talked the entire time. Guess what subject dominated our conversation....you guessed it! Health, or the lack of it...ours and friends. We spoke of the many people we had recently learned had cancer, where they were being treated and how it was going. What a sad thing to have to admit. We ended this date with a quick trip through the grocery store.

Here's one of the photos from our wedding album. It's after the ceremony at Taiton and we're being driven to the Magnolia Tea Room in El Campo for the reception. My dad and mom and Aunt Ludene are in the front seat of the family car. The reception, by the way, set my dad back the grand sum of $300. Such a deal!

Carlee on the move

Just ten days ago I said that Carlee could only roll to reach her destinations. What a change since that time! Now she's almost manic in her attempts to traverse the distance from one place to another. At this point, it's still the military crawl..."She walks, she talks, she caaarrrawls on her belly like a reptile," but she manages to cover a lot of ground, with a lot of vocalizations as she's doing it. In this video, she sounds like she's saying, "I got it! I got it!" about a ball that she got, lost, got again and then abandoned on her way to my foot.

Sweet Carlee

Carlee is 9 months old now. How time has flown! She can sit by herself, but only after someone has helped into that position. She hasn't figured out how to crawl. Instead, she rolls. She has an idea of where she wants to go and rolls back and forth, adjusting as needed, until she gets there. She also hasn't tried to pull herself up. Until last week, if you tried to get her to stand, she would slowly lift her legs into a sitting position...while being held in mid-air. She must have some fabulous abs!

This video looks like she's doing a little sleight of hand with the balls that come out of this "gumball" machine. She handles them so effortlessly.

She loves the pumpernickel bread song on one of the Barney shows and watches intently whenever we play it for her. We can always get her to smile when we sing it to her. Carlee loves her big sister, Kate. Kate is very sweet with her and is very good at making her laugh.

It seems like I'm always talking about the bigger kids, so that's why I wanted to let you know a little about our sweet Carlee.

12-19-07 Update on Wayne

Wayne had several appointments at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center on Tuesday, beginning at 8:15 AM. We got there a little after 7, early enough to have a breakfast of pancakes, bacon, fruit, and coffee at the Waterfall Cafe before the first appointment. We went to two appointments, ate lunch and then had two more appointments in the afternoon.

Good news! The surgeon had the pathology report on the specimens submitted after surgery and everything was free of cancer cells. So, he will not have to undergo chemotherapy or radiation. We were very happy to get that news. The doctor will see him again in four months as a follow-up, but things are looking good.

Other developments: the pacemaker doctor recommends that he see the pacemaker surgeon to be checked. He thought everything was fine at the last visit, but he noticed something this time that he wasn't able to correct. The doctor said he isn't in any danger, but since he can't make the pacemaker perfect, he would like the surgeon to check it out and decide whether or not anything should be done.

Wayne is doing very well. Over the last 2 1/2 weeks, he seems to have turned a corner and has gotten out of the house before 7 AM every day and has been working on Robin's little house just about every day. He's sleeping well at night and feels pretty good. Thanks to all of you for your concern.

When we were ready to leave M.D. Anderson, we paid for the valet parking and then waited...and waited...and waited for them to bring the car. We were told that they couldn't get the car to go in reverse. I had backed out of the garage that morning, but that must have been all she wrote! Anyway, they pushed the car out of the parking spot and it would go in Drive, so we headed home with me driving, nervous as a cat. All I could think about was having the thing give up the ghost on Hwy. 90, or the Sam Houston Tollway, or the Southwest Freeway. We left the hospital at nearly 4 PM, so there was plenty of traffic. The problem would occur when the car hit about 20 MPH...it wasn't shifting, so it was making lots of noise, but not doing much until it would get up to about 26 MPH, then it would shift and be almost normal. There were a number of lights that we had to stop at, so it was a tense time for me. I imagined every little sound was the transmission about to quit. Wayne, meanwhile, had the sports section and was paying little attention to anything else. It was quite a relief to get past all the busy traffic areas and be running at a more consistent speed. We left the car at the barn and Wayne took it to a repair shop this morning. By the time I got home from eating out this evening, it was back in the garage, sporting a brand new transmission. Guess I won't get a new car for Christmas.

Christmas Program at the CDC

What a treat today! Wendy came by and picked me up to attend the Christmas Program at the CDC. In the video, Gage and Zane are the two in the middle wearing red shirts. Ha! Near the end of the video, Zane loses his grip on the jingle bells and they fall to the step below the one they are on. As Zane leans over to try and reach them and you can see Gage put his hand on Zane's back to keep him from falling forward. My hero! And, if you listen, you can hear me exclaim, "Oh!" at about the same time. It was a nice program, with cameras flashing like mad and most of the kids singing their hearts out. A few of the little ones were having a hard time. It was just luck that Gage and Zane were sitting together. Sure made it easier for taking photos.

Decking the halls

Well, I finally got the Christmas tree finished. I drug it out of the closet a few days ago and assembled it. It was a bit easier than the past few years when I had squashed all the limbs back together and stored it in the original box. Last year I bought a Christmas tree bag (probably at the Container Store) and when it came time to take the tree down I separated it into the three sections and put it in the HUGE bag. It was a chore to carry it the 20 feet or so and push it to the back of the closet under the stairs, but it was certainly easier to put it back together this year. Thumbs up on the tree bag.

It's a pre-lit tree and as I was correcting the branches I noticed that a section's lights were out. Luckily, I found the missing light socket right away. Unluckily, I didn't know whether or not extra lights had come with the tree, or where they were if they had been included. So, I just took a bulb from another section that wasn't so visible and put it in the empty socket. As I got to the bottom of the tree, rearranging the branches, voila!, there was a packet of extra lights taped to a lower branch. The company was pretty skimpy with the lights on the top section...my only complaint...well, not quite the only complaint. The other complaint is that the top section's branches are "weaker" and don't hold much more than a very small ornament. But, it's a pretty nice tree for one that cost about $70 or $80.

I don't usually have the television on during the day. I am too easily distracted and will end up sitting down and watching TV rather than tending to whatever chore I should be doing. But, for decorating the tree, I thought I should at least be listening to music. I found a channel of 50's and 60's music and danced up a storm as I decorated. My bad... I must have been the one person who paid no attention to who sang the songs back in those days. So, today, I would dance and decorate for a couple of minutes and then have to walk to the TV to see what the name of the song was and who the artist was. Slowed my decorating down quite a bit.

But, the tree looks great! If I do say so myself. I'm always happy with it when I'm done. It's a very eclectic tree...all sorts of ornaments, many of them gifts from friends and family, a lot of them made by me (I was a whiz at baker's clay ornaments.) I have some that look like little Tyrolean people that are really nice. I started making them in about 1975...but only did it for about 3 years. Then there are also purchased ornaments. One of the items I added in the last couple of years was pretty clever (and cheap!) and adds a lot to the tree. I bought a pack of Christmas colored glittery pipe cleaners. They were all different colors...silver, red, fuschia, blue, green, and gold. I wound some of them around a wooden spoon handle so they made little spirals. Some I left about 3 inches long, others I pulled out a little longer. I just place them wherever it looks a little dull, in the crook of a branch, for instance. Some of them I left straight and just hook them onto the tree, maybe toward the inside of the tree, just to add sparkle. Even very young children could help you make these easy decorations. I don't think you can do much to mess them up.

Enough of this...I need to go shop for food. I invited all the kids over for tacos tomorrow and don't have any of the ingredients here.

This old dog can learn new tricks

As I was folding towels a couple of days ago, I suddenly realized that I had spent almost 43 years taking great care in making sure the tags on the towels were on the inside of the folded towel, not sticking up like a little tongue wagging at me. What a waste of my freaking time! I would actually unfold a towel or wash cloth and refold it to have the tag out of sight. The previous day I was at Walmart and saw a clump of white washcloths, 18 for $3.50, which I promptly threw into my basket. You really cannot have too many 19 cent white washcloths. Personally, I like cheap washcloths better anyway. So, now I'm folding all these items and after carefully dealing with the tag on about 3 of them, I had my moment of clarity. I immediately got up and went to fetch the scissors and cut the tag off every towel and wash cloth in sight. Talk about freedom! Do I live on the edge, or what?

From now on I intend to have the scissors with me when I fold towels. And not just to cut off the long strings that wrap themselves around other items. Don't tell me you can't teach an old dog new tricks!