Catching Up

July 14th - Monday - Hot and Humid

I can not believe it has been over a month since I have posted to my blog, but everyone has been telling me it has been a long time since they have read any thing about us.

I guess, after we had our accident, there was so much to do, and I just couldn't do a lot of it.  Michelle volunteered to help me, so we went to work between appointments with Dr. Nespola and Dr. Joe, and we got the decks stained, along with the sidewalks and picnic tables.  She did a lot of the staining when we weren't here, and she really did a good job and I certainly appreciated the help.

The back steps and sidewalk after Michelle stained them

Lou and I attended the Charleston Alumni Banquet in June, it was a great meal and a good time to get reacquainted with classmates from years ago.  I wish more classmates from the fifties would attend.  George Reibe was good enough to bring along a picture that he had taken of our old second grade classroom and he brought copies for everyone .  We all agreed it was a shame that it was torn down and not donated  for historical keeping.

Our Program for the evening

 

                                                              Our Second Grade Classroom

We also celebrated Matthew's third birthday in June, we always enjoy his, as we go to Melissa's house which is located on the Laurel Festival route, we enjoy a picnic lunch, presents, then move to the front yard under the canopies that she and her family have provided and we enjoy the parade.  This year, Travis, Noell and Wyatt and their newest member of the family Dara  attended as did Maegan and her girls.  It was great to watch all of the kids scramble for the candy that was graciously thrown from the floats.  It was a very nice afternoon.  We all enjoyed celebrating Matthew's third birthday.

The cake and desserts

One of the "planes"

Sending the Plane down the slide with  Grandpa

Travis and Dara

Part of the parade and Wyatt waiting for candy

Father's Day brought Ande and Dennis to our church as a surprise to her father and then we went to the Penn Wells Hotel for brunch.  It was a nice way to catch up on family news and to enjoy a quiet meal together.  Their oldest son John was able to join us for brunch also.

Brion and Janet were on vacation in North Carolina and picked Lou up a whirly airplane for the yard and he was delighted with it and couldn't wait to get it home and into the yard.

J-3 Airplane

At the end of June we had reservations for two weeks at Ives Run, and we have nothing but rain, we we waited two days before going, as our RV was in the barn and it was sparkling clean.  We arrived at Ives Run on the 26th of June after Lou had an appointment with his eye doctor and I had a MRI of my hip.  We had just had our yearly physicals on Wednesday, and Lou was scheduled for an Adenosine Stress Test and a Carotid Ultrasound.  It  promised to be a busy week.  We attended Emma's 11th Birthday party on Wednesday night and made plans for she and Abby to stay overnight with us two nights at Ives Run.

On  Friday night we went to Big Flats to the Soaring Museum for Lou's employee picnic and that was an enjoyable evening.  He got to see lots of old friends and most of the Schweitzer men and to introduce them to me.

Saturday we came home to cut the grass and when Lou opened the little barn door, he found a puddle of oil on the floor and that meant that there was a leak in the rear axle of our two year old John Deere.  It was past 1:00, so the garage was closed.  Our lawn looked like a hay field!!.  I did laundry and we watered flowers and such before going back to camp.  Sunday, we went to church, then on to a graduation party for Matt Sampson, which was a basket of mixed blessings, got to see many old acquaintances, but found that Matt's grandma was in critical care at Williamsport and indeed did pass away the next day and we attended her funeral on Thursday.

The girls did come on Monday and was it ever hot, really too hot to enjoy outside activities.  We tried to fish, but soon was just too hot to enjoy standing there. Emma had received a new fishing pole from her Mama and Papa and she was anxious to try it out.  Lou got it all set up for her, but it was just too hot to enjoy using it.

A little breeze, but still hot

We played different card games and enjoyed being inside during the hottest part of the day and did go swimming one afternoon.  We went over to the information center and Emma was impressed with the cage of Rattle snakes as was I until I found out later that they were all collected from where we were, in fact they had found four while we were there.

We took the girls home early Wednesday morning, and Lou went for his stress test and I went for my appointment with Dr. Joe.  We have found out that all of Lou's tests were fine, which we are very thankful for.  He had stents placed ten years ago, so we feel that a negative stress test at this time is a very good thing.  Thursday I got a much need perm and then we went to Irma Sampson's funeral which was done very nicely.  Her family had a great part in the planning of it, much music and sharing.

That evening, I started feeling sore all over and ran a high temp that I couldn't get down below 100.6 with Tylenol.    This continued all day on the fourth of July and on the 5th I told Lou I needed to go to the hospital and that is what we did, I spent the day having CAT scans, blood work and still the problem wasn't solved.  It was determined that I had cellulitis and I was scheduled for more studies at 6:30 Monday morning and an appointment with Dr. Nespola.  My temperature continued on Sunday and I stayed in bed.  Monday when I got up, the pain I had in my stomach was gone and my temperature was normal.  All my studies were normal on Monday with the exception of my liver studies and they were "off the wall".  Dr. Nespola believes I had a virus that attacked my liver.  I repeated my liver studies today to see if they have returned to normal.

Much to my disappointment I missed the Torpy picnic and fireworks, The Johnson's Annual Family Picnic, and seeing Spencer that was home from the service  before his next appointment.  Krista, Steve and Matthew came down to camp with us and I didn't even get to enjoy that.  I simply stayed in bed, didn't even raise my head off the pillow to watch the fireworks.  A miserable holiday.

We came home on Tuesday to find that our telephone did not work and the repair man had been here and could not fix it until next week, our lawnmower came back and it still leaked oil, so they had to pick it up again today, so we decided to heck with all of it, we are off to a SMART muster to  Timothy Lake for four days, maybe this will go better than the last trip.