Summer 2008 - July

Well it has been a little while since I last posted, so I thought I would bring things up to speed.

David graduated from Kindergarten last month and found out that his little circle of friends will be with him in First Grade next year. This includes his two girlfriends. I found out he even talked a First Grader into giving him her phone number while he was standing at the bus stop one day. I have a feeling we are going to have a little trouble with that one. Speaking of First Grade, school is starting back up again in just a few weeks. I guess with them switching from a year-round format to a modified regular school year he gets a shorter vacation this year. Either way, I know he is really looking forward to it. Apparently the big thing for him is he is going to be eating in the cafeteria. We'll see how he feels about that after eating there a few times.

Andrew continues to grow like a weed. The kid is tough. He has a habit we are trying to break him of, he likes to hit things with his head. I have no idea why. He will walk up to me and starting banging his head against my arm. The other day I got tired of it, so I pointed my elbow at his head. He promptly thwonked it, said "Ow" and grabbed his head, then proceeded to do it about five more times before it became too painful. Hard-headed is an understatement. He's wearing "big-boy" underwear all the time now, and we are all proud of his accomplishment. Especially me. No more messes, or at least not as many. He is, of course, still obsessed with Thomas the Tank engine. His favorite "outing" as a family is to go to Toys 'R Us where they have a Thomas train table set up and all the Thomas toys. They even sometimes have special Thomas play days where he can chug the trains and listen to a Thomas story. Not a day goes by that he doesn't suggest we might be able to go to Toys 'R Us. His birthday is in a couple of weeks and it looks like it will be another blue-and-red-tank-engine-fest. Both boys are re-discovering Veggie Tales and enjoy singing along with those songs and any other praise songs I can come up with. They have no idea that most of these songs I am teaching them were old when I was little. "Somewhere in Outer Space/God has prepared a place/for those that trust Him and obey"

Lisa is still soldering on. We have made a renewed effort to get the house in a form that is presentable for guests to come over. It is pretty lonely for her when she can't have any friends over, and right now it is halfway decent. She works harder than a lot of able-bodied people I have met. It looks like Social Security is going to come through and label her as 'disabled'. It was pretty funny the letter they sent telling what they thought she was able to do at a job. She could stand for 30 minutes a day, but only for 5 minutes at a time. She could only sit for 30 minutes a day, and that was only 10 minutes at a time. I think she can lift 5 pounds. So, anyone know a job where she can lay down most of the day and not lift a finger? That is the only one Social Security says she is fit for. LOL. We also have what we think is going to be good news from the hematologist. It looks like the blood clot she developed last year is gone, and we are expecting her to be taken off the blood thinner soon. From what we can tell this should've happened nearly a year ago. It is true that you have to stay on top of your treatment, Doctor's these days just don't have the time to personalize like they used to. We are hoping this will bring us one step closer to surgery and recovery.

I am doing pretty much the same. I am still at Avaya and have now broken my record for staying at one job while in the state of Colorado. I am also approaching my record for living in one house and have possibly broken that. Is it possible I might have settled somewhere? It is too early to tell, but let's not give up hope. My contract here is up in October, but they might extend it for another year, so that is a good thought to have. I have been working on my poetry quite a bit and just the other day wrote a decent sized praise song in spanish. Must say, I was pretty proud of that. Mostly I am just working at doing my job and making our family the best it can be for Lisa and the boys. We have instituted "Family Fun Days" and on one of my days off a week, we try to spend most of the day doing something fun, and inexpensive. Trying to make those special memories for everyone. We had a lot of fun on the Fourth of July. Our little green space in front of our house seemed to be in the middle of 4 or 5 fireworks displays and we spent the evening spinning around, trying to see it all at the same time. It was a lot of fun.

Well, that's all for now. Hope you and yours are enjoying life.
God Bless,

Jeff

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