August 7, 2012

It's been a little over a month since my last blog, but July has been excrutiatingly busy. So let's catch up.... 1) Alicia brought ice cream cake to celebrate her change of jobs. Next year she will be teaching at Altoona Elmentary. She will also be working on her Master's through Morningside College. The 2012-2013 school year will have all three of the Walker/Wilson ladies working for Southeast Polk. I will be at the 6th grade center for my 3rd yeard and Leah will be a 1:1 associate with a bd 2nd grader at Four Mile Elmentary (where I use to teach). 2) The weekend following the 4th of July Jim's niece and nephew and family came down from Minnesota and camped. All the kids went to our pond at the farm (which is filling extremely slow because of lack of rain and snow) to cool off. If you remember that was a very very hot weekend. 3) On July 9th my Dad had hip replacement surgery. He came home on Friday the 13th. That should have been an omen. The next day he developed huge water blisters on his leg. Because it was the weekend they just told him to keep his leg up and come in on Tuesday. They put him back in the hospital to keep his leg elevated 20 hours a day. He came home again on Thursday and was on bedrest with his leg elevated for the next 12 days. I became a part-time nurse; twice daily changing the dressing on his leg. I'm not changing professions. Anyway when Caleb came to visit on his first stay in the hospital, he took over great-grandpa's bed. Mom has been having pain for over six weeks and while Dad was in the hospital one night I took her to the emergency room. I'll just shorten that story by saying on Sunday, July 22 Jim and I transported her from the hospital to Courtyard Estates an assisted living facility that is strictly a Memory Care facility. It's been a difficult transition for her but on her good days she states the food is good, the people are nice and it's a nice place, just not home. It is a very nice place and another lady from Prairie City is there and that has been a very positive help.

Then came a bizzare wind storm. It didn't really seem like a wind storm, but it was windy outside. Jim and I were sitting on the front deck watching our maple tree blow around. It never rained. The next morning I looked out the window and saw our major shade tree on the west side of this laying down. Never heard a thing so don't know when it happened. Thank goodness the temps cooled down and on Friday night several friends plus David and Alicia and our next door neighbor came and helped with cleanup. We are blessed with friends. I brought Daddy out to watch to break up his boring days. So now I have one week left before I go back to work. Oh, I forgot, last weekend Jim and I went to Minnesota for the weekend. We visited his brother Roger on Friday. Saturday we went to the University of Minnesota Arboretum. That is a fabulous place and we highly recommend it; and kid friendly too. Saturday night we went to our favorite place, the Plymouth Playhouse to see the current Church Basement Ladies: A Mighty Fortress is our Basement. It never fails to delight and entertain us. Jim was told there is suppose to be a fifth play coming out next year. Something to look forward too. Because this was longer than my usual posts I didn't proof read it, so excuse my errors. :)