Two days since my last post! Hopefully this one will not be so long. But I've taken so many pictures and I'm not consolidating them into collages this time, so it probably will be long anyway. Sorry!
Thursday afternoon I picked Hunter up from school for the first time since last September. He was so excited, thinking that I would be taking him to my house. But that was not the plan for that day. I was also picking up Austin. After I had both boys and took them home Hunter and I had a "play date" at their house. That was his term for it, haha!
First he wanted me to come up to his bedroom. I sat in a corner while he piled all his stuffed animals around and on top of me!
Then we went downstairs to play "school." He was the teacher "Mr. Stauffer" and I was the student. We had art class.
We went outside for a while and he showed me his swinging skills.
Of course I had to get a picture of the rhododendrons while I was that close!
We finished off our play date on the screened-in porch and had fun with nerf guns. How I love sitting on that porch!
That evening J'von graduated from Columbia High School and we were able to watch via Frank's live stream.
Columbia is right along the Susquehanna River, and the high school is on a hill. I love how you can see the river behind these students after the graduation! They tossed their caps in the air soon afterward.
Also that day was Bianca and Sammy's last day of school. Bianca got the Silly Story Teller award, haha!! I love her unique humor! Sammy got a distinguished honor roll award!! That boy is going places! He just completed fourth grade. In their district the fifth graders move to the middle school, so this was his last year at the elementary school. I saw a video on the school's Facebook page of the other students doing a "clap out" for the fourth graders. What a great idea!
Last evening there was a very important football game scheduled. Yes, football in May! Each year the Manheim Touchdown Club hosts a tri-county all-star game featuring "the best of the best one last time" - each of them seniors. J'von is one of the players! A football game at Manheim Central where Frank and Ray and Bjorn each played in high school!! Too good to miss! However, the weather was a iffy, with a thunderstorm forecasted for the evening, so it was rescheduled for this coming Tuesday. Right in the middle of the work week, yikes! But at least Destiny has off that day and will be able to go. She wouldn't have been able to go if it had been held Friday evening.
So my afternoon and evening were free after all, so guess what? Hunter came to our house!
We had fun playing Junior Scrabble. I don't think I ever played this game following the rules before. But we followed the rules.
At the end of the game we had just the right amount of letters to complete each word on the board.
Then we went outside for a while to the little playground behind our house.
I had my reading glasses on top of my head and he wanted to try them! He looks cute in glasses, hahaha!
Another picture of these flowers behind my house.
When Grandpa got home from work they played for a while. Lots of silliness!
After dinner Hunter and I did floor puzzles. First the United States puzzle that Sammy and Bianca love to do each time they are here. I didn't get a picture of it till he was cleaning it up.
Then we got out the new world puzzle I recently got on Amazon. Each of these puzzles is a Melissa and Doug product. But this one was very disappointing and I will be giving a bad review on Amazon. The pieces are not as sturdy, they do not lock together well, and they were actually a bit warped. It was almost impossible to keep the puzzle together. Each time we bumped it with our knee or elbow it would shift and come apart. Very frustrating. It looks nice, but that's about the only good thing about it. Hunter was disappointed it didn't have the names of countries, haha!! He wanted to see China and Mexico.
All these boys! Last evening Jeremy sent a picture of Brennan after having eaten ice cream.
I said, "Who does that remind you of?" And he knew I meant him. Jeremy was the messiest eater! In fact, one year when my sister-in-law Deb Stauffer needed a picture for a benefit auction poster, which included a soft ice cream machine, she wanted a picture of Jeremy eating an ice cream cone. We obliged, hahahaha!!
And that's all for today! I haven't seen Elizer these past two days except via FaceTime. So no pics of him this time!
Each time I catch up on this blog I decide that I am going to write a short post each evening before I go to bed like I used to do back in "the old days" before Facebook. And each evening it does not happen. So once again, here is a long catch-up from the past week. Like I always say, I do this mostly for my own memories.
First of all I want to share this beautiful picture all by itself. As I came outside our church on Monday evening, this was the view from the parking lot!
Speaking of our church, they made a big decision this week. After buying land down the road several years ago for the purpose of building, they are finally ready to go ahead! The old building is so very limited, and a new multi-purpose building without steps will be a tremendous blessing for our people and for all the community outreach the church does.
Last week one day I worked outside pulling out/cutting off all the daffodil and tulip stems the whole way around the house. I raked up piles of stems and weeds everywhere and Dick gathered them up and took care of them when he got home.
I was dismayed to see that our pink and yellow rose bushes that were so prolific last summer seem dead. We googled and cut the stems down till we saw white instead of brown inside them. Friends have told us that the ice storms we had this past winter may have killed them because of how the ice can freeze around the roots. Thankfully the low-spreading rose bush that Sam and the kids gave us last summer is doing well as is the knockout bush. So far no blooms though.
I got a belated Mother's Day card in the mail from our daughter Miki in Sweden. She has outdone herself AGAIN!!! I cannot imagine how she does such detailed work! You gotta watch this video!
One evening last week I stopped in to drop something off at Destiny and Alex's place, but it was late and I could not stay long at all. Dear Elizer!!! He made me cry, because he really wanted me to stay and play with him. He was trying to lure me to the toy box, even patting the floor beside him and saying, "Sit." Destiny said he cried when I left. So did I.
So the next evening we made up for it and had him here for a few hours. We had so much fun!
Saturday promised to be a hot day, and it was already hot in the morning. I had my coffee on the porch and pondered the day. It turned out differently than I had pondered. Destiny woke up with a horrendous migraine. She gets them occasionally and this was by far the worst. She got really scared when her hands and face were tingling and numb. She called off work, of course, and went to the emergency room. We decided it would be best for me to be there with her and Alex to stay with Elizer.
Emergency rooms are a horrible place to be. There was a LONG wait for an available bed in the emergency ward. She was in so much pain sitting in that wheel chair and sometimes she could not help but cry. Finally after several hours a bed opened up and she was hooked up to an IV. She was able to sleep, which is so necessary for migraine relief. The wheels turned very slowly and it was almost 5:00 pm when she was finally discharged with instructions to make an appointment with her primary physician. Her headache was not as severe, but neither of us had eaten anything all day. I had a bad headache too by that time! We stopped at the Taco Bell drive-through on our way to her house.
I did not post anything on Facebook because I didn't want to make a bigger deal than necessary or embarrass her. I prefer if no comments were made on Facebook about it when I link this post to Facebook. She's doing fine now and has an appointment with her primary care physician on Monday. Hopefully she can be prescribed something to either help prevent or more quickly bring relief to her migraines.
After I took her home I took Elizer for a walk. We love listening to the birds in the woods behind their house.
On Sunday Destiny felt much better but was not allowed to go to work because the ER doctor had written a work excuse through Monday. Waaaahhhh!! But that meant we could do something fun. She had never seen our favorite lake at Bald Eagle State Park. So we packed up the stuff and a picnic lunch and headed there for the late afternoon and evening. I was hoping Anthony and Lori and the boys might be able to join us, but that didn't work out this time. Instead her next door neighbor lady and daughter joined us. They have become good friends.
When we arrived we laughed at how Elizer had fallen asleep with his legs crossed! He immediately wanted to go to the playground, then we took him to the water and he loved it.
Such a beautiful place!! But it wasn't long till dark clouds and wind were threatening.
We were planning to eat our picnic on our blanket by the lake, but we decided to be safe and went to an available pavilion. It rained a bit and it was quite windy while we were eating, so we were glad we had made that decision.
He liked the big boy swing. His hair was blowing in the wind!
When we drove from the pavilion back to the playground there were not many other cars there, so Dick kept Elizer on his lap. Oh my goodness, that boy thought he was really something! So cute!
Destiny always has Mondays off because Auntie Anne's is closed. But I was busy cooking for Anthony and Lori when she texted me that she wanted to take Elizer somewhere to see animals, but didn't know where. I posted something on Facebook for suggestions and a friend from church told me to check the Penn State barns. That was a GREAT suggestion.
I was with them the whole time via FaceTime. It took her a while to figure out where to go, but she persevered and finally found the beef and sheep barns. Elizer had never seen farm animals in real life, but is crazy over them in books and videos, so he was so excited when he could see them up close and personal!!
I knew that the manager of the sheep barns is Wendell Landis from our home area. Dick and I know his parents. When a guy came to open a gate for Destiny and Elizer she asked him if he is Wendell, and it was him. She said, "My grandparents know you." I ended up talking with him via FaceTime. Hahahaha!! What a small world!
He told her where to go to find some pigs. Not far from Beaver Stadium! At first the pigs were pretty far away from the fence, but when they saw Destiny and Elizer they came walking right over!
Later I picked up Austin from school and took him and their dinner to their place. What a treat to go up their private road and see the rhododendrons for the first time this year. They are late blooming, so this was just the beginning. Ofcourse I had to walk around and get more pictures.
On Tuesday morning I caught this cute pic of the birds outside our living room.
On Tuesday evening I took Elizer for a walk again. He loves being outside! His face totally melts my heart!
Yesterday when I picked Austin up from school he asked if I had time to go to the pond with him to look for frogs. I did have time to do that! It was a good frog day! He caught four or five. He likes to catch them, hold them, stroke them on the chin to calm them down, and then release them back to the water. He really loves frogs! I think that's sweet for a 13-year-old boy!
Sometimes getting them from the net is a challenge because they jump a lot and they're slippery!
Look how he strokes the chin.
Of course while I was that close to the rhododendrons I had to get pictures of those as well.
When I came home I walked around the house to get pictures of some of our flowers. It's such a great time of year!
I also took another look at the rose bushes and I think there might be hope for the yellow one! There are green leaves at the bottom!
In case you forget why I don't want to lose this one, here's a picture from October 22nd! I love yellow roses!!
Today I will be picking up Hunter from school! We're both excited about that. He's been going to the YMCA after school, so I haven't gotten to see him.
I would like to leave this post with that beautiful picture, but it would be wrong to not acknowledge the horrific school shooting in Texas this week. SO MUCH PAIN AND LOSS!! Knowing the pain and dysfunction in the 18-year-old shooter's life is extremely sad, but he should not have been able to so easily able to buy those guns. I've seen friends say things like "guns don't kill, evil people kill," and blame it all on our "Godless society." PLEASE!! I doubt those same people would think that England is less "Godless." My friend Sherilyn Jameson shared this, written by Pete Grieg, a native of England:
Two school shootings since 1850??? Have you seen the long list of school shootings in our country just in the last 20 years??
Dick is a hunter and he owns some guns. So I'm not anti-gun. But I'm anti "gun worship"!!
That school in Texas was for grades 2, 3, and 4. Our granddaughter Bianca is in grade 2, grandson Sammy in grade 4, and granddaughter Jada is in grade 4 as well. That makes it dreadfully real and horrible.
This past week did not end up at all as I had planned. But first I'll start with the things that did go as planned.
When we got home last Monday from our trip to Jeremy and Mike's in Portland I had a LIST of all the stuff I had to get done before Sunday. Some of it was regular weekly stuff, some of it was catch-up, some of it was exciting.
Destiny and Elizer came over after we were home and we went grocery shopping together, which we love to do. We always have fun. Elizer is always so cute and funny.
On Tuesday I took a long time to update this blog and to work on the music choices and bulletin for Sunday's worship service.
That day, after several unsuccessful attempts at buying a stackable washer and dryer from FB Marketplace (in Elizabethtown and Hershey, which was a scam!) Destiny found a set EIGHT MINUTES from their house for almost half the price of the others. After work Dick met Alex and Destiny to pick it up. I went to Sam's Club to pick up a rotisserie chicken and a salad and met them at the house.
I took Elizer for a walk while they unloaded the appliances. We walked on the trail behind their community to the playground equipment at the neighboring community. Those sliding boards were slippery metal and he loved them.
It turned out that the cord on the dryer had the wrong end for their receptacle, so the dryer sat on their kitchen table till the next evening.
On Wednesday I cooked for Lori and Anthony and picked up Austin from school. I love conversations with him on our ten-minute drive and I love seeing the progression of Spring as I go up their private road.
Back home again I took a picture of these late blooming tulips along our side walkway.
Dick and I went over to Destiny and Alex's place after dinner. Dick had gotten the right cord for the dryer off their non-stackable dryer in the storage unit (which they are trying to sell). While he was working on that I had fun outside. The neighbor has a fun blow-up that Elizer was loving. She also has two little girls.
After Dick got the right cord on the dryer, he, Alex and Destiny lifted it up there on top of the washer. There had been bi-fold doors in front, but they had to be removed. She'll probably hang a curtain. She was eager to start her first load of laundry, but as we watched it we didn't see or hear any water. She suddenly realized that they had not turned the water knobs behind the washer!! Waahhh! Thankfully Alex was skinny enough to wedge himself in there and turn them on!
On Thursday morning I woke up before my alarm with a bit of a sore throat. This happens from time to time and I always start my regimen of Zicam Rapid Melts and Ricola honey and lemon lozenges with echinacea.
I had my six-week appointment for a finger prick (because I'm on warfarin) and I mentioned my sore throat at both the check-in and the lab. No one seemed concerned. I felt confident it would be gone by the next day as has always been the case in the past four years since I've had a cold.
I had several exciting things going on!! Weeks before I had scheduled our first choir practice for that evening!! That afternoon I worked on choosing which easier songs we would work on. We were going to be singing on Sunday morning and all of my altos would be missing for one reason or another.
The other big thing was the States competition in Florida. Sophie had been so sick since Regionals the week before, and we had been praying so much for her. They made the decision to not let her run the 400 which is always scheduled between the 100 and the 200. That would give her more time between events.
I got a message from Jenn that Sammy would be in his first concert that evening, playing his xylophone. I so desperately wished I could be three places at once!! I still didn't know how I was going to watch Sophie and run a choir practice at the same time!!
As it turned out her 100 was right before choir practice started at 7:00, so I ignored the chatter and watched it on my phone. She came in fourth, which is unusual for her, but the competition is so stiff at this level, and her time was actually better than at regionals where she came in first!
George took this video and shared it with us.
Here she is on the stand. So proud of her!
Her 200 was right after our choir practice was over, so we got to watch that too on my phone. She came in fifth, but again with a better time than at regionals. Bless that dear girl! She needed to go home and get well after all that!
Meanwhile at choir practice we had a GREAT time!! I wore a mask and told them that I had been using all my remedies for a sore throat and that I was sure it would be gone by morning. It was so fun to bring out those choir notebooks which had not been opened since March 2020!!! I handed out the easier songs I had picked and we went through all of them. We chose "You Are Holy" which was made popular by Michael W. Smith about 15 years ago.
After practice we went over to Destiny and Alex's place to give her the prescription I had picked up for her while she was at work. We went in and were chatting. I mentioned my sore throat. She said, "Do you want to try one of the free COVID tests that I got?" I decided to try it, feeling confident it would be negative. She got it out, carefully read the instructions, and we did the test. She told me to set my phone for 20 minutes according to the instructions. About two minutes later she looked at the strip and yelled, "GRANDMAAAAA!!! YOU ARE POSITIVE!!!" I said, "You are kidding!"
We left soon afterward and I tried to process all this implied. I had just been with the choir, which this time included Pastor Lynn who is still being treated for cancer. She also wore a mask, thankfully. And of course Dick's diabetes makes him more vulnerable, so there was that concern. Destiny texted her boss and he told her to not come to work the next day. UGH!!! All because of me!! I felt horrible!! I knew I probably contracted it on our trip home Monday. It was such a long day of travel with the seven-hour layover in Detroit, and we couldn't wear masks all the time. We had to eat and drink. We had hung a long time when we ate that wonderful breakfast at the airport. And how did I get it and not Dick? We were together all the time!
I slept in the guest room that night and was sad to wake up with a sore throat again. Dick and I each took a home-test. Mine was again positive, his was negative. His boss told him he could come to work. Destiny did a home test too and was negative, but her boss said she had to go to a test site to get another one.
I got busy informing all the necessary people. First Anthony and Lori, for whom I would ordinarily be cooking on a Friday and also picking up Austin from school. Also Pastor Lynn and the choir and the lady who subs for me at the piano. Our plans for the choir to sing were scrapped. And for the third Sunday in a row I would not be at church. I felt horrible, horrible, horrible.
I called my primary physician. She wanted me to get a monoclonal antibody infusion, for which the first available appointment was Monday in Bloomsburg, which is an hour-and-a-half from here! When I was on the phone making the appointment, the person asked me if my doctor wanted this because I have a pre-existing condition. I said, "I don't know. I guess because I'm 70? Or because I have A-fib sometimes and am on a blood thinner?" She said, "OK." Actually, maybe because she's well acquainted with Dick's diabetes.
Anyway, after all that was squared away I found myself with time to relax. I took a long bubblebath in our jetted tub.
I continued my regimen of Zicam and lozenges and lots of hot tea, added more vitamin D, Emergen-C, an expectorant. I was very thankful that I am vaccinated, but I admit I was terrified of potential chest congestion because of my brother's death in October.
Dick went over to Anthony's after work to fix a mower blade and then did some mowing, so that was a good way for us to distance ourselves. I put a mask on when he came home.
I went to bed with a fever that night, still a sore throat and a headache.
On Saturday Dick went over to Anthony's almost the whole day. It's turkey season, so he spent a lot of time in his beloved hunting shack, which he calls his slice of heaven. Later he finished his mowing there.
I caught up on our banking and bookwork, enjoyed sitting on the side porch, and caught up on This Is Us while I folded our laundry.
I was feeling better when I took this picture in the afternoon.
But by evening I was coughing more, had a fever again, and felt burning in my chest. And I did not feel great at all when I woke up Sunday morning. I looked up ways to relieve chest congestion and one of them was putting a towel over your head while you breathe steam. I had been purposefully breathing steam each time I drank my tea, but not with a towel over my head. So I did that several times on Sunday.
After watching our church service online, I took a long, hot shower and did my hair and put on makeup and got dressed, hoping that would make me feel better. And I kept doing all the remedies. About mid afternoon, while Dick was out in his shed doing some organizing, I decided to go for a walk around the house to look at our flower beds. I had not been behind the house in weeks because of our trip.
I found this big gorgeous hosta and some interesting tulips.
I also found very overgrown everything. The cool rainy weather in April, followed by our trip, followed by a busy week of catching up meant that all the flower beds were out of control. Ugh!!! I couldn't help myself. I really was feeling better, so I got a clipper and got rid of all the half-dead tulip and daffodil stalks in the front flower beds. It felt good to be in the sun.
Actually it was one of those days of sun, rain, sun, rain. For a long time afterward we sat on the front porch watching and listening to the rain. It was so nice.
Later we went to fill up the gas tank in my van. Dick drove and I sat in the very back seat with my mask on. I told him I felt like a prisoner being transported, hahaha!
As we approached the Weis Markets gas station he kept exclaiming about the amazing rainbow ahead. But I couldn't see it from the back seat! As he pulled up to the pump he said the rainbow was right behind us, so he opened the hatch so I could see it and get a picture. It was so vivid!
He got a few groceries then we stopped by Destiny and Alex's place. They had just gotten home from running an errand. We did not get out of the van, but had a fun little conversation with them. How I wanted to kiss that sweet face!!!! He looks bigger every time I see him!!
I went to bed last night and woke up this morning feeling SO MUCH BETTER!!! I do not have a sore throat or a headache or a much of a cough or a fever and hardly even a runny nose! I did another towel-over-my-head steam "bath" this morning just because it feels so good. I think it must be a really good remedy. I really think going for the infusion today is unnecessary. But it's scheduled and Dick is taking off work this afternoon to take me and he really pushed for me to get it, so I will. I'll be sitting in the back seat with my mask on being transported to Bloomsburg, lol!
And now Destiny just texted me that she finally got her results from her test on Friday and they are negative. She missed three days of work because of me and I hate it. She will definitely get paid for Friday, but still waiting to hear from corporate if they'll pay her for the other days. I pray they do since they are the ones that told her not to come in until she got the results.
So tomorrow morning it will be five days since the start of symptoms, which the doctor had told me was the length of quarantine. I will be ready to break free, woohoo!!
