relief!

at least somewhat.  many things have either resolved totally or are close to resolution right now in terms of my stress level.  

1.  concerts at school are over, with one more at the local church next friday, but that will be fun!

2.  Lou update:  all brain function is normal.  He meets with the neurosurgeon tomorrow and barring anything different from the NS, all of his strokes have been caused by an irritation of his brain by some of the left-over blood that had leaked and caused his surgery on thanksgiving.  not all of the blood was drained, and what was left was expected to be absorbed by his body.  i guess it was basically making his brain itch (michele, you can correct this if it needs to be corrected.)  when i talked with my mother-in-law this evening after my concert, she sounded so relieved and relaxed.  

3. tree season is nearing an end, and we finally have our tree.  it needs to be decorated, but it's in the house.  this is a long month.  

4.  i found a sitter for saturday night so that jeff and i can go out just the two of us for my birthday.  i used to babysit this girl years ago.  now she's taking care of my child.  to every thing (turn, turn, turn) there is a season, huh?

one more full week of school before christmas break.  mom has chemo (#3 of 4) a week from today.  i'm so ready for break!

An unstandard Thanksgiving

boy, has this been an interesting weekend.  filled with the wrong kind of excitement.  thursday morning, we get a phone call from my mother-in-law saying that my father-in-law is in the ICU at the hospital with bleeding on the brain.  he had been in the hospital since wednesday night and  was going to be going into surgery thursday.  we got dressed and headed over, first dropping owen off at jeff's sister's house (she has two little ones so wasn't going to go, plus her husband had the car seats in his car).  when we got there, papa was in good spirits, and about 95--97% himself (aside from being a little grumpy and drugged).  surgery was scheduled for 11 a.m.  the took him a little before 11 and we got to walk nearly to the OR with him.  they told us to expect 6 hours from the time he left his room until he got back.  as it was thanksgiving, we were the only ones in the surgery waiting room.  around 1:30 or so, maybe 1:45, the doctor came in and told us that everything had gone great.  papa was in recovery and would be back in the ICU between 2:00 and 2:15.  three hours was so much better than 6.  needless to say, dinner that night was cancelled.  we went to jeff's sister's house for shrimp fajitas.  they were quite yummy.  

papa was moved from the ICU to a regular room friday afternoon and came home last night, just in time for Thanksgiving dinner.  we are all very thankful for him this year.  if the bleed had been quick instead of over a period of weeks, we'd be planning a funeral.

owen had a first at dinner last night.  he ate some of everything on his plate - turkey, stuffing, baked beans, green been casserole, mashed potatoes with gravy, and a roll.  the turkey, stuffing and green beans had ketchup on them, and he thought the turkey was chicken (misled by mommy, but it worked!)  he also had apple pie for dessert.  this has been a very long road getting owen to eat what the rest of us are eating.  i think we've finally made it.  it was so exciting last night to see him eating what was put in front of him.  

we are now in tree season.  papa can't do much but take money and walk around the lot this year, per doctor's orders, so jeff has stepped up to the job of running the lots on-site.  he's been doing this most of his life, so he's ready.  the tricky part will be convincing papa that the lots ar in good hands with jeff and his brother, scott.  we're wondering if this might not be the last (or second-to-last) year of trees.  jeff wants to do it one more year after this year to make it 30 years of selling trees.  time will tell.  it will be nice to have my husband back this time of year when they finally do stop doing the trees.