Life is Busy Out From Under the Rock

First of all, let me assure you that I did NOT crawl back under my rock. I've just been really super busy, probably because I did spend so much time under said rock during the last month. So what have I been doing? Glad you asked . . .

1) Helping my mom and dad. Just helping with daily life at the house and I took my dad to therapy a couple of times.

2) Tutoring. Yup, it's been a full schedule, 3 afternoons a week.

3) Shopping. Yup, it's that time of year again and who wants to wait until the last minute.

4) Brian's aunt just moved out here, so we have spent some time with her.

5) Hockey. After not going to any games for a couple of weeks we went on Wednesday night.

6) Acupuncture. Seriously, it takes half a day to drive there, have the treatment, and drive home. Oh, and stop for a little shopping on the way.

7) Pukey, poopin' Pie. No, I haven't been baking. Our sweet Molly is sick, sick, sick. She got really sick last Wednesday night and got me up out of bed every 30 to 45 minutes for several hours. Finally I spent the rest of the night on the couch. And the next night too. The first vet visit resulted in some pills to shove down her gullet. It didn't work very well. That brings us to yesterday, and another vet visit because she refused to eat (and hadn't eaten in over 24 hours) and wouldn't even eat the tastiest treats we made her. So now it appears that she has a $600 tummy ache. And 2 more medications to take. Oh, and they gave her fluids since she was dehydrated. We are still waiting for a few more test results, but so far everything looks good. And she is eating again. But pretty much just scrambled eggs. Hopefully she will be ready for turkey in a few days.

Oh, and that brings me to Thanksgiving. We are hosting again this year and there will be about a dozen of us. Brian is in charge of the turkey, stuffing and green bean casserole. He is on-call over the 4 day holiday so I really hope that nobody has a heart attack and spoils their holiday as well as ours. Eric, Kari and the munchkins are arriving tomorrow and staying until Saturday.


Oh, and here is my dad at therapy one day last week. He is gaining so much strength. He is learning to transfer from his wheelchair to the mat table using a transfer board rather than the lift like at home. He is also learning to balance himself using his arms. He has some abdominal, or core control, but it is very slight so everything he does is with his arms and shoulders. It is very tiring, but he works his tail off 3 days a week at therapy. He is also able to move his legs a little bit. Using his hips he can move his knees together slightly and he can draw up his knees just slightly. My dad is really working to get better strength and control in his hands. Each extra little thing that he can do is just huge and can lead to great things for him. Last year my dad was released from the hospital the day before Thanksgiving. We had to feed him his dinner. This year he will be able to feed himself, and he is strong enough that we will be able to remove the sides of his wheelchair so that he can come all the way up to the table. He has come a long way since last year, and for that we are very thankful. My parents are coming over for Thanksgiving dinner. (For those who don't know, last year my dad fell and broke his neck in 3 places. He is now a quadriplegic.)

Thanks so much for all of the kind comments and emails that you have sent to me welcoming me back. Even Brian tells me almost every day that he is so glad that I am back. And a special thanks to Sunny, Kristen, and Baby Step for passing along the Blogger Flame of Fortitude to me. It was very thoughtful.