44 Years

Yikes! Who would've thought we'd last this long. We must be two very tolerant and patient people.

Gram got what she calls good news and bad news this morning from Dr. Barhamand (her oncologist.) He told her that they haven't been able to detect anything significant enough to warrant surgery, but that she would need some very extensive time off of her leg in order for it to heal, although he said it would never really completely heal. She'll probably have to go back to Westbury for at least a couple of months. She seems very resigned to this, and is determined to do whatever he says. The thought of the pain she's experienced in that right leg is enough to subdue her. She knows that she will need a lot of care and isn't even clamoring to get out of the hospital yet. My heart aches for her.

I did something monumental, for me, the other day. I told my boss that I only want to work 3 days per week. This will begin next week, and I am feeling pretty good about the concept. I'd feel even better if I had some written confirmation from the Social Security folks, but I guess I need to have faith. It was confirmed when I applied online, and verified when I telephoned about a month ago.

Pop and I are planning to go see "Charlie Wilson's War" this afternoon and then have dinner at a Chinese place we haven't been to for a long time. Gotta' get home by 8:00 for an Illini basketball game :-)

Got an email from my cousin Linda Bond. Her son Andrew and his wife Joy had a baby girl on Christmas Eve. She was 8 lb. 10 oz. and they named her ------------ Ruby Vitina Bond. If anyone wants to see her picture, let me know and I'll forward the email.

Talked with Sue Weds. night. They're all doing OK, and it looks like Tim will be discharged from the Navy in perhaps March. Apparently they have so many men in his division that there's no room for him to stay in any longer. Doesn't make sense to me, but neither does anything else our government is doing lately.

I managed not to take any pictures over Christmas. I'll chalk it all up to the Grandma situation. One of the things I want to learn is how to manage pictures. Pop is the only one here who knows how, and I'm not sure that I'll be able to learn from him. 44 years and I know my limits.

Love to you all, and a happy 2008 as well. Keep in touch!

Mom

Happy Anniversary!

Dear Mom and Pop,

I always get confused for some reason as to the exact year you were married. Was it 1963? Regardless, you've been together a looooooong time and have a lot to show for it, not the least of which is your family who loves you dearly. It's a busy time of year, but I hope you get a chance to reflect on the highlights of your years together and really enjoy each other's company today.

Your loving daughter,
Julie

Merry Christmas?

With Gram going in and out of the hospital and back in again, it's hard to fully embrace the holiday spirit. Still, I hope you all had a merry Christmas and that Santa was good to you. A couple of well-timed snowstorms ensured that the Chards would be staying home for the holiday. We missed a couple of family Christmas parties, but we hope to do some visiting this week while Brandon's off work to make up for it. Meanwhile we had a cozy Christmas eve by the fire and a leisurely Christmas day by the tree. Gavin says thank you to DJ's family for the wooden toys, and to Dave & Missy for the blanket and killer Black Sabbath onesie. He also got a custom-made blanket from Mike and Mary Signer. Love and greetings of the season to all of you!

Back to Edward Hospital

Poor Gram! The swelling in her leg went from bad to worse. Dr. Kurt prescribed steroids which she started taking Wednesday in the hope that they would reduce the inflammation, but whatever is wrong in there did not respond. It's swollen from her hip to her toes, so yesterday she called me at work and I took her to the ER. They still don't know what the root cause of all this is, but they discovered that she's anemic and so she's already had 2 blood transfusions overnight. She'd probably welcome a phone call, since she was very unhappy about being in the hospital this close to Christmas. 1-630-646-0402.

What is everyone else up to this weekend? I'll be working both today and Monday. I'm thinking that Christmas decorating isn't going to happen this year in this house. I'm still planning on Dave and Melissa stopping by on Christmas morning for breakfast, although the plan that involves picking up Gram are now on hold. D.J., Michele, Chris and Sami will be coming over also, but I'm not sure what time. I haven't even decided what to have for dinner, but I'm leaning toward roast beef. Once again I implore you to cut me some slack. It seems like the situation with Gram has complicated my Christmas season for about 4 years now. Ever the optomist, I hope next year will be better. I will be working much less at Jewel and will have more time to getthings organized, cleaned up and prepared. I hope....

Wishing you all a blessed Christmas through all of this, I remain

Mom

Snow, snow, beautiful snow

Hello, family! I hope this post finds you warm and cozy with a frothy cup of hot chocolate nearby. Just thought I'd check in over here at woodworks since it's been awhile. We got a beautiful snowfall last night. Makes it feel a lot more wintry and Christmasy around here. At first I didn't think it was so beautiful because Brandon had to drive home through the canyon in it. Luckily he made it home safely - and luckily he made it into the canyon before they closed it. When he came out on this side they weren't letting anyone through. Good thing our little Honda has new tires!

Time for a few thank-yous: Thanks DJ, Michele, Chris and Sami for the cookies and the custom watercolor art! We were sad to have missed the cookie-making festivities and you're right - we really haven't had much time to bake around here now that Nana has gone home! And thanks Missy and Dave for the snuggly fleece blanket! We would have waited until Christmas to open it but since you sent it by fast mail we thought maybe it was urgent. And I guess it was because it arrived just in time for Gavin to snuggle in while he looks out the window at the snow (or maybe he's just looking at the dirt on the window). We put the little wrapped package from Uncle Dave (and also the ones from DJ's family) under the tree.

LOTS of love and Christmas cheer to all of you!

six days and counting

Long time no contact! Everyone must be busy with holiday stuff. I for one am grateful that we no longer have to spend so much time shopping for one another. Sometimes I feel very Scrooge-like, but I believe it's the way to go. There are plenty of worthwhile charities that can benefit if we feel like we need to separate ourselves from some of our cash!

Pop and I really enjoyed ourselves on Sunday afternoon at the cookie baking and decorating event. I'm really annoyed at myself for forgetting to bring our camera. Michele was a really good sport to host such a messy operation and then have to get it all cleaned up. She even took the kids sledding late in the afternoon when it was really cold.

Sunday evening we went over to the Spinn's house (north side of Staunton, 3rd house west of Coach). They had invited a lot of neighbors whom we haven't seen for quite a while. We drank some wine, perhaps a little too much in my case, which made it somewhat unpleasant to get up on Monday morning. At any rate, we had an enjoyable day last Sunday.

Gram has been doing rather poorly lately. Her leg is really painful much of the time, and her vision is deteriorating rather rapidly from the macular degeneration. I hope she'll feel up to joining us on Christmas Day. I'm not going to try to do anything Christmas Eve except go to church. We'll be seeing Dave and Melissa early, and hopefully D.J., Michele, Chris and Sami will get here in time to at least touch base with the Palatine contingent. What's happening in Utah for Christmas? I'm astounded that Gavin weighs 10 pounds already.

Time to hit the sack for an early start tomorrow. Pop is bowling tonight, as he does just about every Tuesday. He's also bowling Thursday this week.

Holiday blessing to you all!

Mom

SNOW

Snow snow beautiful snow.
Nothing quite like it in winter you know.

So grab your skis, snow board or snow shoes.
Your ice skates your sled or whatever you choose.

Put on wool socks and get into your boot.
Grab your down jacket and mittens to suit.

Put your worries behind you with desires unfurled.
Now you're ready to face that beautiful white world.

Go find you a trail, a mountain or hill.
Then trek, slide or ski or do what you will.

You can run with your sled and flop on your tummy.
And when you get cold drink hot cocoa that's yummy.

When you get tired with a chill on your face.
It's time to go home to a warm fireplace.

Pick up a good book or cuddle with a friend.
Be warm and relaxed until the night's end.

Snow snow beautiful snow.
Nothing quite like it in winter you know.

(Author Pop)

Look who's SEVEN!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHRIS!! We are thinking of you way out here in Utah and hope you have a fun-filled day. With love, Aunt Julie, Uncle Brandon, Gavin, and Nana & Papa

and away we shall go...

Pop and I are more or less packed, and we plan to be ready when D.J. picks us up at 7 A.M. tomorrow (thanks again, D.J.!). Today's weather was horrendous, with lots of ice and dangerous driving conditions, but the temperature is supposed to gradually rise overnight and the precipitation will just be rain. We haven't flown anywhere in a long time, and I'm nervous about all the security stuff.

Gram had a nice birthday. Thanks to all of you who called her and sent her cards and gifts. I took her to the Arboretum and got a wheelchair, then we had lunch at the Ginkgo Cafe and looked around at the decorated trees and wandered through the gift shop. Drove around the east side and then back home. Julie and Brandon sent her a digital photo frame that's loaded with about 40 pictures, so we can put more pictures on there eventually.

I'm sleepy and not very coherent, so will say goodnight. "Goodnight!"

Mourning

Melissa's Grandma Dorothy passed away this morning. This past week she was mostly unresponsive. We can be thankful that she no longer suffers. Details for the wake and funeral will be made available as soon as they become available. Please pray for her.

countdown to Thanksgiving

Today I have a day off - a free day - to do what would take a week. Just wanted to touch base with all of you. We've done nothing exciting, but Pop can say that he has completed the cutting of Christmas puzzles. After he cuts them, he takes them apart on the dining room table to count the pieces. After that I get to assemble them, but I fell behind. There were as many as 8 at one time. Pop actually worked with me on putting them together, so now they are all bagged and ready.

I talked Bob and Mary Ann, into coming on Friday instead of Thursday night, since I have to work 5-1 on Friday. No specific plans yet for while they are here. Their main focus should be to spend time with Gram. I presume they are leaving Sunday, so feel free to include yourselves into our weekend if and whenever you're able.

I hear that Dave is back from Seattle, and D.J. should have gotten home from Philadelphia late last night. But that's for them to tell us (hint hint).

Hope everyone has a good week.

Gavin's Blog

We started a separate blog for Gavin. You can check it out here:
http://gavinchard.blogspot.com/

Today was a rough day for little G - he got circumcised. Most babies get circumcised shortly after birth but with all the other stuff he was going through, his got postponed. Today was his 2-week checkup at the pediatrician and the procedure was done right there. Brandon stayed with him during it but I couldn't bear to watch so I waited in the lobby. Apparently he did great and didn't even cry! Until they pricked his heel and squoze his foot for 5 minutes straight to get enough blood for his "routine tests". He's been sleeping a lot ever since, which is probably a good thing.

Yesterday was a bit more fun - we took Gavin for his first hike! He slept through most of it but I think he enjoyed the fresh air and I KNOW the dogs appreciated the chance to get our and run around a bit.

Gavin Video - Take 2

The magic of the electronic age comes at you once again... But this time with Gavin's eyes open. Find a comfy chair for this one - and be thankful our camera only shoots 3 min of video at a time :)

Gavin video

Testing the video capability of the blog site. We'll get a video of him when he is awake.

Happy Birthday, big brother!

Dear DJ,

Hope you have a great birthday! Bummer when they fall on a Monday, but any day is a good day to eat cake :).

Love and best wishes from Utah!

Tristan Robert

Just got a phone call from Robert. Tristan Robert (a boy) was born today, Nov. 11, at 9:42. 8 lb. 5 oz. I think it's a neat name, but Pop says it sounds like a girl. Cecilia is very pleased with her brother and told Lisa "It's my baby, not yours."

That's the end of the line for new babies for the time being, as far as I know....

We're having a lazy day today. Pop is watching the Bears play a lackadaisical game. He spent some time cutting and seeding jalapenos and stuffing them with cheese. Tomorrow I'll buy some corn flake crumbs when I get off work, and we'll finish making the "poppers."

Gram seems to be doing fine, althought she's very tired and weak. I got her laundry and stuff squared away yesterday.

We're looking forward to meeting Chris and Sami and their parents at Famous Dave's tomorrow, to celebrate D.J.'s birthday.

We're enjoying and appreciating all the pictures and updates of Mr. Gavin Chard....

Update on Gavin

He's home!! We were finally released on Wednesday around 4pm. We were all ready to leave the hospital. Gavin really started eating well and his bilirubin numbers came down to manageable levels after 36 hours under the UV lights. It's a joy to have him at home where we can watch him and be in a comfortable place. He continues to do great and eats more and more at each feeding. We had him on the every 3 hour schedule for the first day as per recommendations from the nurses at the hospital. We're now moving to an on demand schedule where the little man lets us know when he's hungry. He definitely let's us know and is animated in his actions when he is hungry. It is beautiful to watch him and see his different faces and behaviors for different stimuli. Julie is a great mother and glows with love for her little guy. It really is amazing the amount of love one can have for their offspring.

Grandma Debby and Aunt Brooke and Uncle Kenny came up last night and brought us dinner. It was nice to see them again. Julie is grateful to Brooke for her advice and help for all things baby related. Brooke really has been great. She was the only one that sent Julie flowers (except for dad of course!) and she brought up a new, freshly washed outfit for Gavin to come home in. She helps alleviate some of Julie's fears and concerns about things that come up related to the baby.

Yesterday was a busy day for the new parents. We had to take Gavin in for a follow up test for his bilirubin. While we were out we took care of some errands. The little guy does great in the car and fusses minimally. Today we have a 1pm appointment with the pediatrician. They are going to take more blood for a battery of developmental tests and weigh and measure him and just do an overall check.

Here are some more photos for all to enjoy.

Love, Brandon, Julie, and Gavin

and now there are eleven...

Happy weekend, family. No doubt there's no news that tops what's going on in Utah this week. I'm so very proud of Julie and Brandon, and so very anxious to meet little Gavin. He's had a rough time, as have his parents, and seems faced with yet a few more days in the hospital. Here's hoping his appetite picks up and his family can all go home.

We're picking up the loose ends of summer. I still need to deal with a few more storm windows and screens. Pop's been clipping dead stuff out of the garden for weeks and is nearing the end. Just Swiss chard and Brussels sprouts left to harvest. I have buckets of green tomatoes, as well as a lot of ripe ones. After I post this, I plan to go up and make a pot of stewed tomatoes. We have lots of green and hot peppers also. The weather is supposed to get sharply colder by Tuesday.

Gram is recovering nicely from her bronchitis. Dr. Kurt got her on some powerful stuff that started helping right away. She's thrilled about little Gavin, and like me, terrified at the thought of all that he and Julie went through.

Got a call from my brother yesterday, offering congrats, which I offered to him as well for their new little Henry. He also told me that they're coming for Thanksgiving. It will just be Bob, Mary Ann and Julie, and they plan to drive down on Wednesday night. Can't believe that it's only 2 1/2 weeks from now. I'm formally inviting all of you who wish to and/or are able to come. Let me know if possible. I have a lot to do around here between now and then, and we're also preparing to go to Utah on the 2nd of December through the 9th, so we lose a week of Christmas preparation time. Pop is busily cutting the last of the Christmas card puzzles, and right now there are a half dozen on the dining room table awaiting assembly.

We had a very pleasant day last Monday, meeting the North Aurora branch of the family on the train, then taking the CTA to Navy Fear at Navy Pier. It was a beautiful autumn day and we wore ourselves out walking all over the place.

Note to my 2 boys: have you considered phoning your sister with some good wishes? Her cell number is 435-245-2837. She'll be at the hospital for the next few days, pumping milk and delivering it to the nursery every 3 hours, where it's currently being fed to Gavin through a tube into his stomach, until he starts feeling better and develops an appetite.

Sue and Tom have officially taken their house off the market and cancelled the contract to buy the new house in Hampshire. She's happy to be re-hanging her personal stuff on the walls that the realtor had her remove.

Pop's Pontiac is in the shop :( - he thinks there's a problem with the transmission but they can't seem to find anything wrong. Since we can't afford another car, it might become somewhat inconvenient but we'll be driving the PW when we have separate destinations.
Doesn't make any sense to buy another car to take us to jobs that pay less than a car costs.

Brandon, that was a super blog post on Saturday. Thank you so much for all the info and of course for the pictures of your little family. Julie told Gram that she gets tears in her eyes when she sees you holding Gavin. Joyful tears, of course!

Love to you all - hope to hear from some quiet corners of the world....

Mom

Gavin Kent Chard

He's here! Born at 3:33 am on Friday November 02 2007. Nearly 6 lbs (5 lb 15 oz) and 19 1/2 inches long. It took some doing to get the little guy to come out and meet us. Julie was only in active labor for about 8 hours, but her water had broken the previous day at 8 am. We didn't get to the hospital until around 4 pm and they determined Julie wasn't having very strong surges. The doctor was a bit concerned about that due to the risk of infection, however she allowed us to try to do what we could to get Julie to go into labor. We walked and walked and tried few other natural methods, but it just wasn't happening. The doctor gave Julie 12 hours then had to start her on pitocin to get labor to start. She was started on a very low dose, but that wasn't doing much so they bumped it up over several hours until the labor really started. Julie's surges started coming fast and furious around midnight and really got crazy around 2am. That was about the time Julie started thinking seriously about some pain meds, but by that time it was too late. Around 2:45 Julie got the urge to push and we called the nurse in and they checked her and found out she was dilated to 9 1/2 cm. So the doctor came in and things started getting really crazy! The baby moved down and started to come through the birth canal but got a bit stuck. His cord got pinched by the tight fit and his heart rate plumetted to an alarming level. The doctor said at that time that "this baby has to come out within the next 2 minutes one way or another", so she used a vacuum extractor to help Julie move the baby out. Additionally, the doctor had to do a "stem to stern" episiotimy to make room for the (not so) little guy. After much pushing and pulling Gavin finally came into this world. He was in a bit of distress coming out, so we didn't get to have him cuddle with mom as they needed to get his respiration rate up. I went with the nurse to the NICU where they put him on positive pressure ventilation to keep his lungs open and help him breathe. His oxygen saturation was good as was his glucose level, but there was concern about infection in the lungs and he was having a hard time breathing. Quite an emotional and exhausting chain of events. Even though Gavin was 3 weeks early, it was probably a good thing as the doctor said that if he was any bigger he probably wouldn't have been able to fit through Julie's pelvis.

Julie finally got to see Gavin around 10am later in the morning. They had the poor little guy all hooked up to sensors and IVs and respirators. They had to put a tube down his throat to his tummy to help ventilate extra air from the respirator. They ended up taking 3 chest X-rays to determine the cause of his breathing problems. The results of the X-rays is that he has what's called pnemothorax. Basically his lung partially seperated from his chest cavity and air got into the space between and caused him to have a hard time breathing. Apparently it is healing on its own. Pretty sad to see our little guy with all the extra hardware, but we knew it was for his own good. Luckily Gavin started breathing well on his own later in the day and they were able to take him off respiration and he's now breathing great. He is still on low dose glucose and on a broad spectrum antibiotic due to the chance of infection because of the ruptured membranes. Another problem they found is that Gavin broke his clavicle on the way out and that's causing him some pain as is the huge bruise on his head from the vacuum extractor. These pain problems are causing him to not eat well and this is the newest issue to deal with. He's not the best eater right now so they are keeping him until he starts eating better. This could take up to a week, but they think once his pain subsides he'll probably start eating better.

Julie is doing great. She was pretty sore for most of yesterday and had a hard time moving around, but is up and practically running around today! She is such the trooper. I can't believe she went through all she did with no pain medication. We are going to go "hotel stay" at the hospital until we can bring Gavin home. Julie needs to be here to try feed him every 3 hours, or at least pump milk for the nurses to feed to him.

We appreciate everyone's thoughts and prayers and know our little guy will make it through this. As the doctor says, all he needs is a bit of time and rest to recover from the trauma of the birth.

We'll probably start our own blog for Gavin, but we'll send everyone the link so you can stay up-to-date on his progress.

Brandon, Julie, and Gavin

BOO!!!

Well it's just downright scary how long it's been since I've posted to this thing. Happy Halloween, everyone! Not too much to report from Utah. We had a checkup on Monday and my doctor once again said that I'm having a "textbook" pregnancy. The baby is head-down and now it's just a waiting game. By the way, did everyone get the e-mail form Mike Harris with the picture of Henry John (being held by his big brother Anthony)? If not let me know and I'll forward it to you. I'm still working but starting tomorrow I drop to 3/4-time (five 6-hour days per week). I decided to do that a few weeks ago when I was feeling tired, but now I'm back to having energy again. Still, it's good for me to start weaning myself from work (and work from me). Hope you all have a spooooky day! I'd love to see some pictures of the kids in their costumes (hint, hint) :).

Good morning

Long lost mother reporting here. Had a day off yesterday but worked 7 straight before that. I thought I'd accomplish a lot yesterday, including a blog post, but here I am today. Last evening we attended an Edward Jones seminar about being ready for retirement. It was held at Home Run Inn in Darien, so how could we not go? I've already decided that I'll start taking my Social Security in 2008 when the income limitations become a non-factor. After that, I should be able to sharply curtail my working. I still like to work, but not too many hours, and not for the new front end manager we've got. I'll spare you the horror stories, but no one likes working for her, and she herself doesn't like working at our store. She's requested a transfer, but those requests aren't always acknowledged.

I made a (3rd) batch of jalapeno jam. This time I used the "less sugar required" SureJell and it jelled very well but only made 5 half pint jars. The first 2 batches of 2007 turned out to be hot pepper sauce and hot pepper syrup. Don't know what I'm doing wrong, but we'll use the stuff for something. Pop and I like hot pepper syrup on zucchini pancakes, which are still not out of season around here. We have a great many acorn and butternut squashes, so if you would like any let us know.

Today I'm taking Gram to Sears to have her new hearing aid fine-tuned. She's had a cold for the past several days, so I'm hoping to also get her in to see Dr. Kurt while we're out along Route 59. She's working on a Christmas letter to enclose in her cards, since it's so difficult for her to write. We'll get her laundry and stuff done today also, since I'm working the next 3 days.

Monday will be "Navy Fear," inspired by Sami seeing the commercials on PBS. Which reminds me, I went to the website and found the coupon to save $3 per ticket but I seem unable to print it. D.J., can you help out here? It will save the 6 of us $18. We plan to take the Pace bus to the train but still need to work out the times and stuff.

Dave and Melissa, I just saw your latest accomplishments this morning. What a lot of work you've done! It should look fantastic by the time you're finished.

Julie, thanks for sending the pictures from the shower last weekend. Only about a month to go and I hope you're not too uncomfortable. Thanks also for the NASA article. Pop sent it to a lot of people and he's gotten some wonderful feedback. I hope that Brandon is fully recovered from the bug that got him last week. Hope you avoided it altogether.

Pop is up and about, so I shall go grate zucchini for this morning's breakfast. Did I still not tell you about our mini-vacation and Pop's class reunion?

Sending my love as always... Mom

Basement Progress

I think last time I posted I mentioned about four steps that we would have to complete to get our basement back. Somehow that list keeps growing... probably has something to do with the fact that I know there will be no better time to do these things than when there is no carpeting to destroy. We decided to use wood baseboard and door and window trim and stain and polyurethane all of it. Last weekend with Melissa's help we were able to complete finishing about 200ft of boards. It was great family time :)

We are super happy with how the bar turned out except for the face of it didn't seem to hold the stain very well and is lighter than everything else we stained (it only looks darker in the picture because of the lighting). I can blame Peter for that... he had stained it and put a coat of polyurethane on it before I could see it. Should have used another coat of stain. So anyways, of coarse I'm thinking about stripping it down and refinishing it otherwise I might regret it for some time. Anyone ever strip polyurethane and stain and have some pointers? I might try that this weekend or lay tile or paint - can't decide :(

Here are some pics - notice in the garage on the bottom left of the picture all the finished boards stacked up. Only took me 24 hours and Melissa 12 to finish that phase... all in all it hasn't been all bad and gives me something to do besides play video games.

hope all is well!

Hey Birthday Girl...

Julie- have a wonderful day! Don't work too hard. Maybe you have the day off??? Do you have anything special planned?

Enjoy! :)

Mourning...

My world has been quite gloomy the past few days. My Grandma Grace (moms mom) passed away Wednesday night at 11pm. She was hospitalized under inpatient hospice for about a week and was transfered to a hospice house Tuesday afternoon. My emotions are bittersweet.

My Grandma Dorothy continues to suffer in tremendous pain with little relief. She has tried every pain med but one, which she will be trying on Monday. She has a pain patch that offers a smidgen of relief , but it's the only one that doesn't make her head spin. Please pray for her.

Busy bee Dave continues to work in the basement. The bar is up and will be stained on Monday. It's so beautiful! The style and router work is more than I could have ever dreamed of.

Speaking of squirrels, Chloe, Fuzzball and I watch one yesterday morning bury a nut in our front yard. Very entertaining.

Don and Peggy, you do look very relaxed in your pics. Glad to hear about your adventure. Thanks for the video of Dave and company. We had a blast watching it. Rob made a cameo.

Julie, hope you're feeling great. Your woodpecker story was thrilling. Good thing Chloe and Fuzz can't bring presents home for us...I would have freaked.

Crazy Squirrel

Sometimes it pays to wash the dishes. Like this afternoon, when I looked up and saw a squirrel climbing up our kitchen window and heard him jump onto the roof over the bay window. Chris and Sami arrived to late to see him climb up but went out to see if they could spot him running around. A few seconds later I heard a noise and caught a glimpse of the squirrel sliding down the window and take off, followed by two delighted kids. He escaped by crossing the street.

Have a great weekend all.

WE'RE BACK

We returned yesterday after 5 nice days of driving around Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa. Except for taking I355 to Palatine, we never drove on an interstate road. Dave is making considerable progress on the basement, but he worries me that he spends all his time working. I'm hoping that he and Melissa were able to take a little time this week and enjoy the autumn.

By Saturday evening we got to New Glarus, WI. There was an Octoberfest going on, so we wandered around for awhile and explored. Even had a brat for supper and listened to their entertainment. While walking down the sidewalk, Pop was wearing his orange Illinois t-shirt. A cop passed us by and said "Excuse me, sir, but I'm going to have to ask you to remove the shirt." Illinois had beaten 5th ranked Wisconsin that afternoon. The next night, the Bears beat the Packers so we really did a number on Wisconsin. Visited about 4 or 5 Wisconsin state parks and spent Sunday afternoon at the House on the Rock. There's a ton more to see there than when we were there many years ago. Does anyone remember??

The first 2 days we were gone it was really hot and humid, but it got better by Monday afternoon. We crossed the river and spent Monday night at Pikes Peak State Park in Iowa. A really neat place, situated high above the Mississippi with magnificent views. The Great River Road going south from there is quite scenic. Crossed back into Illinois and went to a couple of Illinois State parks, including Lowden, where the great Blackhawk statue by Loredo Taft is perched high on a bluff. Is that not where you guys went for outdoor education while at Madison?

We got home Wednesday evening and are trying to get back in the groove. The garden is still spewing out zucchini and yellow squash, but now the cold spell may put a damper on it. We had butternut squash soup for lunch, and will be having acorn for dinner.

Pop's 50th reunion begins tomorrow evening with a supper and get-together. The festivities go on all day Saturday, ending with a dinner at the Oak Park Country Club. The beat goes on on Sunday, when Dennis Law has organized a day of reminiscing for a lot of people who weren't part of the class of '57 but hung out with them.

Got our driveway sealed today. We had $90 we didn't know what to do with....

Tomorrow, Friday, I plan to spend a few hours at Gram's, doing her laundry and getting out some of her winter clothes from the store room. I also need to figure out what I'm going to wear this weekend. We might drive the PW into Oak Park Saturday, so we can change out of our football game clothes and into our evening clothes.

I shall return to my chores for now. Hope all is well and that we hear from each of you soon.

Love, Mom and Pop

Beautiful October

Greetings from the Naperville branch of the family. We're doing OK - old age brings a strange assortment of aches and pains, but most of them go away after awhile. Gives you incentive to get old, right?

We're planning to take a few days vacation, from Sat the 6th through Thursday the 11th. We shall be exploring southern Wisconsin, seeking fall color and fun hikes in various state parks. On the 12th, a 3 day marathon begins of reunion activities for the OPRF High School 50th reunion. We expect to see a whole lot of people we know from years gone by. We'll begin this Friday by meeting George and Linda for dinner, since they're coming into town a week ahead of time.

Gram has an appt. tomorrow (Thurs) afternoon at 3:00 to get her hearing aid. Hope it works well so we can proceed with our little vacation. We'll be missing the Devonshire fall festival on Sat. the 13th, but D.J., Michele, Chris and Sami will proudly represent us.

It sounds like Dave is feverishly working on his basement. We'll be stopping by on our way out of town Saturday to drop off Pop's biscuit joiner and some nail guns and nails. Dave is building a new bar, which I believe needs to be completed before the flooring goes down. He's off next week, and even Melissa has a few days off at the end of the week, so I'm trying to encourage him to break out of the basement and spend a day or 2 or 3 enjoying the good weather and the fall colors. We've had some gorgeous weather - warm days, cool nights, mostly clear skies.

We've tried to watch all 7 episodes of "The War" on PBS. There are a few episodes that Pop had to miss, so I recorded those and we'll probably take the video tapes with us. I fell asleep during parts of these, so I will be glad to watch them again. It was a really worthwhile series, in case you get a chance to see it.

I'm going to attempt to go to bed now, since I need to get up at 4 tomorrow. I'm not going to try to watch the first Cub playoff game which starts in Arizona after 9 P.M. Pop will leave me a note of the score. Go Cubs! Go Carlos Zambrano!

Fall Break

We decided that it was time to take a break from the stress of school and play for a while. We wanted to take advantage of the nice weather and changing colors while we could. So while poor dad labored, we played.

Our break started on Sunday with a very fun day at the Arboreteum with Nana, Papa and dad. Chris and Sami enjoyed playing in the stream and trying to build a dam. We went for a nice stroll around the lake before heading for home. On Monday we went to Tekakawitha Nature Center in St. Charles. We try to go there in the fall. Mom never plans on staying to long, but even with the map we get helplessly lost. This year we didn't get as lost. We had a good time exploring a creek bed and the river. Sami had fun making animal tracks with stamps while Chris worked on a puzzle in the nature center. Sami is quite the budding scienist and decided we should make a chart of all the animals we saw on our walk. So every couple of minutes we had to stop and pull out our chart and make a tick mark, put the chart away and the pencil away.

On Tuesday, we babysat for cousin Joey while Kathleen was in a gymnastics class. After class Kathleen and Sami ran around outside for a while. After lunch we went to a playdate with some kids in the babysitting coop. The girls terrorized poor Chris and then came running to me when he fought back. The war was called on account of rain. We went to Tae Kwon Do later that day and hoped dad would join us, but his allergies wiped him out.

We went to Bible study on Wednesday morning. Chirs and Sami got to play while mom and the other ladies helped package food for Feed My Starving Children. Not my children, but God's children. That aftenoon the kids and mom joined some homeschool families in packaging the food. Sami did not have a good time. Unfortunately, we were at a station with some people who were focused on working fast and not interested in having to help a young child. So she kept getting pushed aside. She really wanted to help but wasn't able. At one point she was doing well taking the packaged sealed bags and lining them up to be boxed, that lasted most of the time we were there, but then something happened to upset her.

Thursday morning we met grandma, grandpa and the cousins at Red Oak Nature Center. We hiked to the cave and then terrorized the animals in the nature center. We came back here for lunch and castle games. The boys played castle and the girls did leaf rubbings. We taped leaves on the long classroom table, and covered it with paper. They left and the girls from the park on Tuesday came over to be babysat. Bedtime was late but everyone was happy.

Friday dad got to take the day off of work and come to Jonamac Apple Orchard with us. Good thing too, because they had a huge cornmaze that we went through. Zach, Jess, Sam Peters and there mom were there too, but dad was the only one that understood the map. We'd still be there if he hadn't come along. It was a field trip though the homeschooling group and the older boys came back to herd the stragglers out, so we would have been OK.

Sami ended the week off with a bang, literally. Mom had to be at church early to read and dad was getting the kids ready to go. As they were racing to the car, Sami ran smack into the corner of the wall and cut herself right above the eye. Poor dad couldn't get the bleeding to stop so instead of church they went to the emergancy room. She was glued back together, hopped off the table and declared "that was fun". She and Chris were spinning each other on a stool while the nurse was telling dad how to care for his fragile child. She and Abbey (Missy Smith's daughter) were running all over the restaurant for Sue's party that night. Chris, not so happy at the party. His stomach was giving him problems. Halfway home, he threw up and no more problems. Both kids went to Chruch school today. Sami tried to hang from the coat hooks and Chris ate a burger at Fuddruckers this afternoon. The traumas of yesterday have been erased from their minds.

Unfortunately, we are back in school tomorrow.

32 Weeks and counting...!

Julie is 32 weeks today and absolutely glows! We went to the doc this morning and everything is just perfect. The baby appears to have turned and is now in the correct position so Julie won't have to stand on her head to give birth! Funny story: 2 1/2 weeks ago we went to the doc and she said the baby was breached, but that it wasn't a problem yet. The baby was giving Julie some problems by jamming his head up under her sternum and causing her pain in her lungs and shortness of breath. A couple nights later Julie had a "vivid" dream in where the baby turned and "it was so real, I seriously could feel him turn". The doc said the baby might do a sudden turn and that Julie would not feel the sternum/lung pain and shortness of breath as much. Lo and behold, after that "dream" Julie has been having less pain and less shortness of breath. It was confirmed today that he is head down!

Everything else is going great. We continue to ready ourselves (is it ever possible to be totally ready?) and our house for the big event. Lots of little things to take care, but the big things are more or less complete. I'm trying to convince Julie that we need a new vehicle "for the baby", but she's not buying it. There's also talk about moving to a bigger house, but that won't happen for quite awhile.

Julie had a baby shower last weekend with her girlfriends that was lots of fun. Me and a couple of the boys went to breakfast and came back for horseshoes and to crash the baby shower. We ended up tailgating at the USU home game that evening with some friends in the rain. Julie and girls went home while the boys stayed to get wet and watch the Aggies get beat yet again. What does it say about your team when the quarterback is also the punter?! I bet the Bears could even beat the Aggies--with Rex! Although the Aggies might actually could beat the Saints (stupid Drew).

Hope all is well with everyone. Julie is now on every two week visits to the doc so we'll keep you updated.

Love, Brandon

Harvest Moon

This morning the moon was so big and bright over the Wellsvilles that I just had to take a picture. Happy autumn, everyone!

The thrill of victory. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . and the agony of defeat

We had a great time visiting with friends at Pat & Michelle's house in Loa over the weekend. There were 12 entrants into this year's Cribbage Tournament. The entry fee was $10 and it was winner take all. Since a picture says a thousand words, I probably won't need to tell you who won and who got second place.

Vacation Pictures

OK you asked for it. Here is my attempt to post some pictures from our vacation.

Pic 1 Pop in St Charles, MO
Pic 2 Mom in Hannibal, MO

Chris at Bat

Thanks to all those wonderful testosterone influenced blogs. An honorable mention goes to Dave who added pictures to his entry. Way to go that extra mile. You can all pour yourselves a cold beer, sit back and pat yourselves on the back for a job well done.

By my calculation that's three down and three to go (we'll give a pass until December for the unnamed male) . The other two reside right here. I don't think I'm going to guilt DJ into contributing anytime soon. Chris has graciously agreed to try his had at this blogging thing. O.K. so I told him we could make this part of his grammar lesson. So, I will now be Baruch to Chris's Jeremiah.

Chris: You are the best. I love you alot. Will you please come visit us soon. We will have a lot of fun playing games. Yesterday we went to the Celtic Fest with Grace and we listened to some music, saw some people dance and even played some games. We played miniature golf. We took the train there. To get to the train, of course, we drove our car. A few days ago, Samuel came over. I was so happy because he would be bothering my sister and she bugs me alot. So I appreciated him bothering her so I could watch Cyberchase and Fetch. But it was the end of the week when they don't show Fetch and Cyberchase so I blew bubbles instead. We walked to his school and picked him up and walked back. That's all.

And of course, where there's a Chris there's a Sami

Sami: So, we played with Samuel and went to his school. When we got there we found him and we stayed and played for a while. I swinged a little, way up high. Me and Samuel played tagged but I didn't want to play anymore because he was way too fast for me. When he got here I gave him the presents I had for Jessica and Daniel. I showed him around the basement. I got mad when he broke my Tinker Toy design and broke one of the pieces.

At the Celtic Fest we saw kids about our age dancing. Dad picked me up and flipped me over his head instead of putting me on the ground. Grace was there. When we were on the train, Nana and Papa could have come because there was a stop at Naperville. So maybe they could come next time.

We go to church school. We open our books, the first time we got our books and we learned how to pray and then did some coloring in our books. I mostly used purple and pink. Today we got our folders finally. We got coloring books, I colored alsmost everything in it. When we were at church we weren't good enough to go to Chuck E. Cheese , but we were good enough to go to a McDonald's with a playplace. We ate of course and we played. There was one girl I wanted to play with. When we played my brother kept being mean. When she left I couldn't find anyone to play with so I just sat alone.

At the park the other day I leaned to hang on the jungle gym by my knees. We pretended to be in the circus.
The End.


Editor's note: Grace is the daughter of our friends Paul and Kim. She is 2 1/2 and a dear friend of both Chris and Sami who protect her like she is a queen. Samuel is about 2 months older than Samantha. His sister Jessica is 8 months older than Chris. They along with Zachary, Daniel and Joseph belong to our friends Matt and Michelle Peters. All is well here. DJ is working hard at his job, in fact he had to go in this morning and is very tired right now.

Take care.

Testosterone

Well gang here I am. Just call me mister "T". I was going to tell you all about our mini vacation but mom beat me to it. so I will just tell you some boring bird facts from 2102.

First: I installed a hummingbird feeder outside the kitchen window and in no time we had hummers sucking sweet nectar to our Oooos and Ahhhhs. Then while Rob, Lisa and Cecelia were here we had a hummingbird get trapped in the garage. It kept flying up to ceiling but couldn't find a way out. All he/she had to was lower his/her altitude and fly out the big door. I guess that hummers aren't to smart. So I went and got the butterfly net that I use for catching baby goldfish in the pond and was able to catch the little bugger. I reached in the net and brought it out and it just laid in my palm (I never realized how small they really are) and it didn't move so I started stroking it with my finger but it still didn't move. I walked out of the garage and held my hand up and it took off like a bat out of H. Rescue accomplished.

Second: we have a male Cardinal that is a regular visitor to the feeder. You may think "What's so great about that Cardinals go to feeders all the time" But this is a special Cardinal in that he is bald. He looks like a mini red vulture.

Last: Just yesterday we saw an albino sparrow at the feeder. How about that!!!!!!

Our lives are so exciting!!!!!

Hope you are all doing fine and we get to see some of you from time to time.

All for now Pop

Land of Lincoln

We're back from our five day adventure. We did our best to follow the old Route 66 as much as possible, but had to detour on Sunday night to get to Petersburg and Lincoln's New Salem State Park. We camped there and then took a stroll through the recreated village where Lincoln lived from about 1831 until about 1837. I think we were there about 25 years ago with Pat and Bud. Does anyone remember?

Monday we went to Springfield and spent half a day at the new Abraham Lincoln Museum and Library. Really interesting, informative, state of the art, entertaining. Also visited the state capital bldg. to see if any of our legislators were working on resolving the budget, but not much was going on. Saw a few other things and then continued down route 66 to Carlinville where we stayed at Beaver Dam State Park.

Tuesday we followed Route 66 to the Mississippi River, then started north on the Great River Road. Got as far as Hannibal, MO. Stayed in a campground there and went on a 2 hour dinner cruise on the Mark Twain Riverboat. Cruise was nice, dinner was not first rate.

Wednesday we did some more exploring of the town and then followed the river road north to just past the quad cities. Camped once more, this time at a forest preserve right along the river. Thursday we headed for home, this time following the old Lincoln Highway. Saw a neat windmill in Fulton, had lunch in Sterling, then visited Ronald Reagan's boyhood home in Dixon. Also stopped at the Fabyan Forest Preserve windmill south of Geneva. The Fox River has a lot of neat trails to walk along the river. We got home Thursday night. Spent Friday catching up around here and then went to Kyrsta Hokanson's wedding. They used to live down the street on Staunton for about 20 years. The Rottersman's and the Matzelle's went as well, so we had a good time. Stopped at a brew pub in Canterra between the wedding and the reception, then ate way to much at the reception at Cress Creek. This morning I weigh more than I have in years, so it's time to start paying attention....

I'm on my way this morning to Gram's, to do her laundry and whatever else she has in store. She was apparently sick all last week, after a couple of insect bites, one on the front of her neck that swelled up, got red and hard and made it difficult for her to breathe.

Our low temperature last night set a new record, but we don't think we had any frost damage. Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

A beautiful weekend

We're back! We spent the weekend revisiting our old stomping grounds in southern Utah. On Thursday we drove to Loa where we dropped off the dogs with our friends Pat & Michelle for the night. At that point I still had no idea what Brandon had planned for us. We drove from Loa to Teasdale (near Torrey/Capitol Reef) and checked in at the Muley Twist Inn B&B (http://www.muleytwistinn.com/). We changed into our "nice clothes" and went out to dinner at Cafe Diablo (http://www.cafediablo.net/) in Torrey. We had Rattlesnake Cakes for an appetizer and enjoyed live guitar music while we ate our dinner. On Friday we picked up the dogs and headed up onto Boulder Mountain. Tears welled up in my eyes when I realized that Brandon had reserved the Aquarius Guard Station for Friday & Saturday nights - the very same place where we stayed during the week that we did Castilleja aquariensis surveys together 12 years ago. As luck would have it, they just started renting it out this summer. Before this summer you couldn't stay there unless you worked for the USFS. And not only that, we were treated to hot and cold running water, a propane stove, AND a propane refrigerator! All luxuries that we didn't have 12 years ago. Still no bathroom, but the outhouse had a fresh coat of paint. Still no electricity but we had lots of candles to light up our Trivial Pursuit and cribbage games, and a woodstove to keep the chill off at night. We spent Saturday exploring Boulder Top and the Aquarius Plateau. Brandon got some good fishing in while I relaxed, read books, and explored. We also stopped to inspect a few of our old C. aquariensis plots. Joie and Brody had a great time running, swimming and chasing cows and we were all sad this morning when we had to leave. I'll put some pictures up on Shutterfly soon, but for now here are a couple of my favorites.

Look what we found :(

Just so everyone knows this is Dave posting on Melissa's account... just so I get credit :) so anyways here are some pictures of our basement post flood. We tore out the first 2 feet of drywall around the entire basement and this is what we found! We have been wearing masks, goggles and gloves during the whole affair. All in all it's pretty disgusting. We are thinking due to the abundance of mold that the prior owners must have taken some water and not done anything about it. So I guess we were lucky to have a reason to look behind the walls or we could have continued to live with this stuff.

We destroyed the bar today which happened to have an abundance of mold attached to it as well. Melissa would like to take advantage of this opportunity to change the tile around the bar, so tomorrow I will hopefully be taking my first stab at removing the tile that is down there. Should be fun. Melissa does get a lot of credit though as she is cleaning up the mess that I'm constantly leaving around and she is constantly mopping and scrubbing away the mold residue.

Once the old red tile is out we'll need to smooth the floor out again, replace all the drywall, then build a new bar, add the new tile, paint, then carpet. Then we can enjoy our basement again!

About time I guess

Ok, ok. It's nice to see everyone's post and what's happening in the family. Julie does a good job of keeping everybody up to snuff on what's happening in the Chard world so I don't feel I have much to contribute.

As you know today is our 10 year anniversary and I can't possibly think of another person in this world I would rather have spent the past decade plus with. I have been truly blessed with a wonderful wife who happens to have a great family. Thanks being the best in-laws in the world!

If I could guarantee that Julie wouldn't read the post I'd tell everyone what we are doing this weekend. But, it's been a long time in the planning and I'm hoping to surprise her. We'll fill you in on all the details when we return and possibly post a few photos now that I've done my first blog.

Have a great weekend!

Love,
Brandon

A darn good decade

Thanks, Mom! Looks like your heart was in the right place but maybe your fingers weren't ;). Today is indeed the Chards' 10th wedding anniversary. We're 'celebrating' toady by going to work and then going to our last hypnobirthing class tonight. Such is life when your special day is on a Wednesday. Not to worry - we'll be celebrating properly very soon. We're both taking tomorrow and Friday off of work and we're going...uh... somewhere. Brandon's got a surprise trip planned for us. I have no idea where we'll be going or what we'll be doing. The only question he's answered so far is whether or not we're taking the dogs with us (we are). Stay tuned for a post-weekend post to find out more.

Mom and Pop, I'm so glad you're sparrow-in-the-vent story had a happy ending! And Michele, I don't know how you manage to succeed at homeschooling but I'm VERY impressed! And way to go Chris on being Black Belt of the Week!

Our Labor Day weekend was festive. Six of our friends (3 couples) came up from SLC for our neighbors' 6th annual Chile Roast party. As great as it was to see everyone and to "hang out" for most of the weekend, I was glad when it was back to just the Chards on Sunday afternoon.

Have a great visit with Rob, Lisa and Cecilia!

Happy 10th Anniversary

10 Years!

Happy holiday

Michele already covered the Labor Day bases - good job! Pop is actually laboring at Ace today, while I labored at Jewel yesterday. Hence we haven't even noticed that it's a holiday weekend.

D.J. was our hero last week. The computer fizzled while Pop was reading his e-mail. D.J. diagnosed the problem as a power source failure and arrived the very next day with the part, which he installed. I didn't see him (I was laboring) but Pop says the poison ivy/oak left quite an impression on his legs and arms. It must have been a miserable experience.

Dave stopped by on Saturday to return the battery for our ace-in-the-hole sump pump back-up. We got to meet his friend Ryan who has been such a wonderful friend through all of the flooding and clean-up. They were on their way to a party at Steve's in Romeoville.

The rabbits have found their way into the garden, but we have yet to discover how. They have eaten all the leaves off the bean plants and have begun to work on the peppers. When I went out there this morning, there were 2 of them, evidently parent and child.

I thought we had a mouse in the house last week because I could hear scratching in the heat ducts in the crawl space. Pop heard it the next day and ended up taking the ductwork apart at the furnace, releasing not a mouse but a sparrow. It was quite an adventure as he/she flew all over the house from room to room. We finally trapped the little bird in Dave's former bedroom, opened the screen, and off he flew. Only minor clean-up was required. The best news - it wasn't a mouse!

We went to the Smith's last weekend to see Tim, who was home on leave. Also got to meet Trevor for the first time. Gram went with us and did very well with her walker. She's doing much better lately, except for Tuesday when she stood up to go into dinner, got dizzy and fell. No serious damage, but her knees have been giving her more trouble than before that incident.

The Smith's have their house on the market and have high hopes of moving into a new house in Hampshire, IL. Trouble is, real estate is just not moving right now, but I hope they get lucky.

Pop's new bowling league has started. He will bowl every Tuesday, along with his friend Bob Janus, at the Fox Bowl on Butterfield Road in Wheaton. He will only bowl occasionally in the Thursday league if they need a sub.

Rob, Lisa and Cecilia will be driving down to Chicago on Weds. Lisa will be tied up through Saturday morning, but Rob is planning to drive out here to visit Gram, and then us, on Thursday. Unfortunately, I have to work 1-6 on Thurs and 12-4 on Fri. He and Cecilia will stay the night on Thursday, then go back downtown on Friday afternoon. They'll come back out here at about noon on Saturday, but have to leave for MN by 5:00 at the latest. I'm hoping for suitable weather to take them to the Arboretum, where we can meet up with D.J., M., C. and S. The Children's Garden would be a good way to entertain Cecilia, since this household isn't very well equipped for such things. I'll have to figure out something to fix for lunch and/or supper for all of us that day. Another complication is that Pop and I are taking a mini vacation starting Sunday. We plan to drive to Springfield to see the new Lincoln Center, and we'll probably take our time and follow the old Route 66, just for kicks. What else we do is up in the air, but we need to be back by Friday for a wedding at 4:00. (Kyrsta Hokanson, used to be a neighbor, moved to Kansas several years ago, but they invited lots of old neighbors to the wedding.) At least we'll have a few days in the camper, look at scenery (cornfields?) and maybe get around to watching the last 20 hours of "24" season 3.

Wish you were all here so I could share zucchini, tomatoes and peppers. Dave and Melissa, best of luck with all you have to do to restore your basement. Pop and Dave talked about Pop helping Dave build a bar and Dave helping Pop with re-landscaping the front corner of the house. Talk about labor - it never ends.

Anxiously awaiting a testosterone fix.... Mom

Happy Labor Day to those who labor, have labored in the past , are preparing for the temporary end to their labor and to one who is preparing for labor of a whole other dimension.

We managed to survive the rain storms unscathed. Samantha was fascinated by the sheet of water streaming down the window at Tae Kwon Do. It tore her eyes away from the huge mirror that allows her to admire her cuteness during class. She decided that the rain looked like a waterfall. DJ beat the storm home by the press of the garage remote. He pulled in the garage, hit the button to close the garage and the celestial dam broke. Michele and the kids hydroplaned safely home from Tae Kwon Do.

A few nights after all the rain, Michele and the kids headed to the Fox River. Silly mom thought we could stand on the bridge and check out the water crashing over the dam and stare in awe at the water on the bike path and head for home and bed rather quickly. Lewis and Clark had other plans and we spent close to an hour exploring the area and throwing sticks in the river to see how fast they raced past. We got close to the banks, but no one fell in.

DJ is winning his war with poison oak. He is mowing the lawn now. Las weekend he was so miserable that Michele mowed the lawn. Ours and some of our neighbors. Property lines should be marked better. He took very good care of himself and reasearched a lot on the internet. As a preventative measure he is now orally injesting Poison Ivy daily. He takes small doses to build up his immunity to the poison, kind of like the hero in the Princess Bride.

We did a better job of surviving God's storms than Sami's storms during school. Commuters deal with road rage, we deal with school rage. Day one she got upset because school wasn't long enough. Most days now she gets frustrated trying to write letters and numbers. She has big time problems with the number 2. Our fault for naming her Samantha. The curve for the 2 is opposite that of an S. She can make a 2 and then her S's are backwards or she gets her s's right and her 2's are backwards. We've trudged our way through 2 weeks of school. Chris loves learning maps, but not so thrilled with reading. He does best when he can pick the books. Sami who a year ago determined that she can't do math, did 8 weeks of math in 2 days.

Chris was the black belt of the week in Tae Kwon Do a couple of weeks ago. The teacher picks one student who shows good black belt attitude and that student gets a black belt, leads the stretches and helps to teach the other students. He got the honor for practicing hard and showing perseverance. We are very proud of him.

Hope you all are enjoying the long weekend. Hope Dave and Melissa got good news from the insurance adjuster. This blog is still lacking in testoserone. If that doesn't change soon, I may have to go on a keystroke strike.

Hy from Hyrum

I'd like to start with a shout out to Missy for breaking the lull in our blog posts. Way to go, sis.

Not much news to report from here. The most excitement we've had was on Saturday when we scored a crib, dresser, rocker/glider, and pack 'n play at a yard sale for $85. Booyah! We've been looking at 'convertible cribs' that go from crib to toddler bed to full-size bed. There are some nice ones out there and you can even get a matching dresser and changing table if you want to shell out a thousand bucks. The stuff we got at the yard sale is in great shape and I love it that, 1) we don't have to worry if it gets a little scratched up, and 2) we're re-using instead of consuming more trees!

Funny the kinds of things that excite me these days ;).

water logged...

Our basement flooded Thurs. night with 5 inches of water. Don't know how he did it, but Dave morphed into Hercules and managed to save ALL our electronics, and the 2 pieces of furniture we'd miss most. Our washer and furnace are fine. Our dryer is toast. We were without hot water for 3 days. We imagine at least the bottom 2 or 3 feet of drywall throughout the basement will need replacing, the bar is destroyed, and the carpet, of course. The basement is so stinky. It's terrible. The adjuster will be here tomorrow AM. Good thing we increased our flood insurance 2 weeks ago. Our friend, Ryan is our hero. He rushed over Thurs. night to help Dave (I was at work), helping until 2 AM, and was here all day Fri. and Sat. He rocks!!!

My Grandma Grace is in the hospital. She had terrible chest pain Sun. night, and called the paramedics. She was as close to having a heart attack you could be without having one. She is having an angiogram tomorrow to check for blockage in her hearts arteries. She's really having a hard time being hospitalized. She thinks she'll never be going back home. She doesn't want to die in the hospital. So sad...

Grandma Dorothy is liking her 24/7 caregiver, as much as she can. She's a nice lady. Grandma is so very weak. She's having a difficult time walking , even with a walker. She now has a catheter in her bladder because she was retaining urine. She's been experimenting with pain meds now that she has full time help, but has yet to find one that will provide any relief. They all just make her very dizzy. She's so miserable.

Keep the prayers coming.

Don and Peggy, thanks for loaning us the battery. I believe Dave will be by Sat. to return it.

DJ, how's the new job?

Julie, thanks SO MUCH for showing me the blogger ropes. "B Connected" has been up and running a few weeks. We're having a great time.

Hope everyone is having a great week! :)

Lotsa Love,
Miss

Wood Family Photos 08/07

They're here!

I think I struck the enter key instead of the tab key. Perhaps that's how I keep posting only titles....

J and B got in on schedule yesterday. Came back here to freshen up and then went to Gram's for a visit and dinner and a little more visit. After that, we swung by Central Park for a bit of the season's last band concert. Julie even met a couple of girls she hasn't seen since high school. Brandon ran 2 miles this morning, in all the humidity. We had zucchini pancakes for breakfast and then Pop cut the grass. He's showering now, and we plan to visit Car Max. We've been invited to Molly's parents for dinner tonight. They're grilling ribs, so we're going to bring a couple of side dishes, no doubt incorporating some garden veggies. It will be great to see all of you here tomorrow. I wish it wasn't so blasted hot. It's not good weather to sit and enjoy the patio.

See you all tomorrow!

Sept. Visitors

Forgot to tell all of you that I heard from Rob last week. Among other things, he gave me their new address: 12013 Jenkins Street N.E., Blaine, MN 55449. They will be coming into Chicago because Lisa has a conference downtown. When that is over, they'll come out to Naperville and stay here, probably Friday and Saturday nights, Sept. 7 and 8. I hope that any of you who are able, will plan to spend as much time here as you can, especially Saturday. Weather permitting, it might be fun do visit the arboretum that day.

We had fun yesterday at Sami's party. Michele made yummy tacos and lots of beautiful salads, and a 3 layer cake that was infused with 3 flavors of jello. Those of us who were old enough especially enjoyed the berry lemon margaritas!

Pop is out there again today, helping D.J. with the kids for a few hours this morning. I'll be taking Gram to the eye doctor this afternoon. She's feeling pretty well lately, and doing better with her walker.

We're excited that Julie and Brandon will be here in three days. We're going to "dine" at the Devonshire on Thursday night. Friday we may look for a car. I'm still coasting with the Grand Marquis, but I don't want any more major problems.

Time to attack the spiders and dust bunnies here in the basement.

Love, Mom

Good News

We had a great time camping. Chris and Sami made some friends and learned how to catch frogs in butterfly nets. The campgrounds had a small playground and a manmade beach. They had a good time at both. Our only complaint is that the BNSF railroad was right next to the campgrounds. So all night we heard freight trains rumbling by. Poor Sami was awakened from a deep sleep the first night and screamed in terror. She was quite sure that train was headed right for her.

On our way to the campgrounds, DJ was contacted by a headhunter who had a very promising job potential. They set up a phone interview for that Thursday. From there he went to a face to face interview on Friday. The company was so impressed with DJ that they cancelled one other interview. He was offered the job yesterday as Michele was getting ready for her first day at Jewel. He will start on August 16. It is with a financial company in Oak Brook. We are all very excited.

If Michele gets motivated and orders Chris and Sami's school books, we will probably start back to school when DJ starts back to work.Hopefully, that will keep us from missing dad too much.

That's about all the excitement here. Take care

Yogi Bear says hi

Hello, Family! Just got back from a long weekend in the Yellowstone area. Brandon and I and the dogs rendezvoused with Brandon's older half-sister Heather (from Helena, MT) in West Yellowstone. Heather's mom and Heather's 6-year-old daughter were there too - as were her dog and our two dogs. We toured the National Park a bit (saw Old Faithful do its thing), perused the touristy shops, and drove up to Hebgen Lake for some swimming and doggie fun. We were supposed to get home last night but since it was Brandon's birthday I deferred to him when he suggested we extend our vacation and spend Sunday night in Alpine, WY - just the 2 of us (4.5 of us if you include the dogs and the little guy). So here it is Monday afternoon and I just got back to work. You'd think I'd be doing something work-related but mentally I'm still on vacation.

Melissa, I'm so sorry to hear about your Grandma Grace. She and your whole family are in our thoughts and prayers. Chloe too!

Hooray for camping! I sure hope it goes well. I'm a big advocate of getting kids unplugged and outside. Kudos to Michele & DJ for taking on a camping trip with two young ones. Michele, thanks so much for sharing Sami's ideas for acquiring food while camping. And your hypothesis for how fishing might go was not only hilarious but also spot-on. :)

Back to the grind.....

Making their Dreams Come True

Hi, all! This should be pretty short. We are packing up and getting ready to hit the road for our first family camping trip. Chris and Sami are very excited. Though, Sami was disappointed when we nixed her idea to fish and hunt for food. As graceful as they are, wildlife in Asia would here them coming. Fishing would be fun and exciting for all of five minutes. Sami would spend all her time playing with the worms and Chris would spend his trying to decide which worm he should use for bait.

We are going to Lake LaDonna in Oregon IL. We will be coming back on Wednesday. It was a last minute decision and hastily planned. We wanted to get it in before Thursday when Michele will be starting her part time job in the Jewel bakery. She will be working enough hours to qualify for health insurance. We figure with two little kids who know no fear and the outrageous cost of COBRA that a part time job was our best option.

Got to go pack. The plan is to leave at 1:30 when CAILLOU is over. Melissa, your grandmas and family are in our prayers. We are looking forward to seeing Don and Peggy at the Tom Chapin concert on Saturday, provided we survive camping.

Happy Birthday Daddy-to-be :)

Dave and I hope you enjoy your day! We're certain you have something fun planned. Hopefully, you will have as beautiful a day as we are having here in Chitown.

Dave and I went to Lake Geneva last Saturday with some friends. We rented waverunners. It was a blast! Can't wait to do it again.

I took Chloe to the vet a few weeks back for her follow up for the rash on her belly. It cleared up beautifully. The vet heard a heart murmur. She went on Monday for an echocardiogram (ultrasound of the heart). They found mild thickening of one of the chamber walls of her heart and her resting heart rate is high. The cardiologist said since it's so mild, repeat the echo in a year. She may end up being on daily meds to slow her heart rate down. We're thankful it's not life threatening.

On a bad note, my Grandma Grace, ( my Moms Mom) was diagnosed with leukemia on Friday. There is no treatment available for this type of leukemia. This poor lady has gone nowhere but down hill over the past 6 months being diagnosed with COPD, congestive heart failure, and, now leukemia. I think she is going to be put into hospice care this week, as her doctor said she has about 3 months to live. I hate when docs put expiration dates on peoples lives, but I understand it's to help people get their affairs in order. I just pray that Grandma Grace ends up being a miracle and lives a whole lot longer, just like my Grandma Dorothy has been and continues to be. Needless to say, my Mom is a complete wreck. Surprisingly, Grandma Grace is accepting the news very well. Hope she's not in shock. Any prayers you can send this way would be most appreciative.

Have a wonderful week...

Dreary Monday

It seems I just deleted a rather extensive message. Will I ever get to be computer competent?

Pop has gone to a wake this evening, for the father of the wife of one of his bowling buddies. I stayed home because I need to go to bed early in order to get up at 4 tomorrow. Weak excuse, no?

We're getting back to normal, whatever that is, after vacation. The laundry is finally caught up, and the piles of stuff all over the kitchen are diminishing. It makes me crazy to have clutter all over the table and counters, so I'm determined to keep after it.

The garden is producing, especially green beans, cucumbers, zucchini and peppers. Free veggies will be given to anyone who stops by! No ripe tomatoes yet, but plenty of green ones. We've gotten a little rain today and that should help things along. I tried using moth balls to repel the chipmunks from digging in all the flower pots. So far it seems to be effective.

The Devonshire's Ice Cream Social was a lot of fun. It was "girls" day for us, as Sami, Michele, Gram and I were the attendees. They had pony rides, a caterpillar crawl, an inflatable slide (Sami's favorite), a magician, and of course ice cream, corn dogs, popcorn and snow cones. We hope that Chris and D.J. had fun at the first meeting of their chess club.

I have a new front end manager starting this week. Hope she turns out to be as good as Laurie was. She was very understanding about whatever time I needed to take off.

Still haven't gotten around to shopping for another car. It needs to be big enough for Gram to get into and out of, but good gas mileage is another requirement. Any suggestions? Just before we left for Utah, it cost me $470 for a new water pump and hoses and cooling system flush. At least it's no longer gushing anti-freeze all over the garage floor.

I'm hoping that my boys will keep me up to date on the job market situation. I don't like asking all the time, but Pop and I are certainly interested and anxious. You're in our prayers and we hope for quick resolutions. Anything we can do, let us know.

This time I hope not to delete this thing, so I shall publish! Happy summer, everyone!