August 

What a month!

The first day of August was our official moving day. We got the keys a few days earlier and rented a U-Haul to move in the plants and yard furniture and boxes from the garage. The moving truck came on the 1st and we moved all of the house things in.

The first night of having the keys, before our moving truck came, Jessi and the kids and I stayed the night on the floor of our new living room.

Three days later, John, my Dad and son John were working in the shop making room for our trailer to fit in.  The shop has a second floor storage space that needed to come down for the trailer. John was on a ladder and fell about 15 feet onto the concrete floor. He had to be transported by ambulance to OHSU Trauma ICU. He had two skull fractures and two bleeds on his brain. He stayed 4 nights in the ICU. He was sent home for a day, but his headache was so bad that I was told by the hospital to get him back in for another CT. It showed more swelling, so he had to be taken again by ambulance to OHSU and stay another night in the ICU. The pain in his head was horrible for weeks. Slowly it has gotten better. He finally will eat and can sleep pretty well at night. After 6 weeks, he can do most things, but has zero energy.  That is frustrating to him because he has so much to do around the new place. 

Jessi insisted that I not go home to sleep. The kids had notes for Grandpa on my pillow when I arrived. I was checking on texts and looked down at the foot of my bed and there was my sweet audience.

John (son) had a friend, Vinnie, from Salem that came up and helped the guys get the shop finished and they moved the trailer in for a surprise for his Dad when he came home. It was a huge burden off me to know that it was all done.

The kids had welcome signs posted for Grandpa's arrival.

John's progress each day. I think the biggest challenge for me was trying to get him to eat.

Dennis made two trips up to check on his Dad's progress.

I am so thankful for my kids and parents for all their help through this time!  Offers from friends and family have been sincere and I would have asked for help if I had needed it, but these guys came through so well, I didn't need anything more. 

Two other huge jobs that we knew would be a temptation to John once he was home was removing the awning from our patio and tearing down an old tractor shed. The kids all pitched in, along with my Mom and Dad and we got it done. I just didn't want to risk John going out there on his own and having another accident with this one barely healing.

Before and Afters

The last two weeks of the month, Jessi had to return to the school for work, so we had the kids here with us. We did the annual school clothes shopping, took Arianna birthday shopping and played here a lot. Below is where I found my rubber spider... the kids keep me jumping.

Josiah has been doing all he can to help Grandpa around the place, mowing, weeding, and bringing in the trash cans. 

Years ago, I took a class at the college and grafted a pussy willow and gave a start to my parents. They planted it out back by their swimming pool, which is now their fish pond area. Last winter, it split and fell in two directions, but not all the way to the ground. It was broken and leaning in awkward places against a fence and there was no way that it could be taken down by my Dad, even with help. He ended up hiring a team to come out and remove it. They had to bring in a special lift to get to it. It provided good entertainment for all of us, but left a huge gap where it had been.

Great Grandpa gave the kids tractor driving instructions which was a huge hit!

Arianna turned 10!!!

One evening while cooking dinner, I noticed a lot of water on the kitchen floor. I tracked it down to the faucet leaking. With John all laid up with a cracked skull, it was up to me to unhook it for him to see if it could be fixed. Of course the whole thing was sealed up and could not be fixed, so I drove to Home Depot and bought a new one, came home and installed it!  Myself! He provided moral support and I even let him check if I had everything tightened up enough, but I could not allow him to do the job he hates the most in his condition. Even if he did like plumbing, that is not where his fragile head should be, under a sink like that. Besides, I was pretty proud of myself and I really did not like that old faucet anyway!

The kids had one last adventure with me at the water slides. It was so fun! Lina was afraid to try it at first, she really gave it her all the first two times she made it part way up the stairs and came back down. After watching the other two a couple of times, she finally made it down all by herself. From there on out, I could not get her to stop.

John finally felt good enough to try eating out. We met up with my parents at the golf course and enjoyed a nice view of the mountain while we ate.

Sunrays through the sprinkler.

One of the prettiest sunsets I have seen, right from my own front yard!

We are in the final weeks of waiting on our new addition!!!

Last January when we left Africa early because of the plane accident, we expected that would be the end of Africa. But Roane Travel has been amazing to us through all of it. First off, with all of their help in getting me home asap when we received the horrible news. They sent a gift basket of cookies with their condolences. Later, they informed us that instead of just writing off the rest of our trip, they would give us credit to return and finish. They did not have to do that because we had not purchased travel insurance. At first we didn't think so, but after thinking it over, we decided to try it again in the fall. We booked for September. When John fell, I figured we would have to cancel. But the doctor has given the go ahead with travel for him. She felt that it would give him something positive to look forward to and that it would not hurt him at all to fly. So next Tuesday, we board a plane to Tanzania! John does not do well flying under normal conditions, so I am praying that he can handle it with the added head problems. Once there, he can relax and recover with no yard work calling him to get outside. 

Tanzania here we come!

It  is just three days away from becoming September and here I am just now posting July!

We started the month off with the 4th of July celebration at our house with a BBQ. After that we went to Jessi's place for fireworks. 

I always love how kids line up the fireworks getting ready for the big show. This year it was up to Josiah to light them off now that Josh is off to the Marines for the second year in a row.

The next weekend was Mom and Dad's 67th anniversary. We celebrated with them at Salty's.

John put in a few weeks putting in one side of the Veras fence. The kids helped along the way, staining and putting it up

We officially became home owners again. (the main reason my July post is so late getting posted)

Lina loves doing cartwheels. The more she does them, the better she gets.

We went to Salem and had dinner and a walk with John and Rachel.

My jade plant, otherwise known as Jade, started out 42 years ago as a leaf that I started from a plant from Fullerton California. John's Mom brought the leaf from Uncle John's place. I got it to take root and it has grown so well over the years. As it got bigger, it was harder and harder to get inside for the winter.  She has fallen over and I thought she was dead, but then she took root again. She has gotten sunburnt and lost most of her leaves, she somehow always finds a way to pull back through. She even bloomed around Christmas. Well, we moved her to Salem to John's place when we sold the Sandy house. Their house was too dark for her, she wanted light. So they moved her to Rachel's classroom at school where she perked back up. Once we moved back, they brought her back to our place. I put her in the garage with my other plants for the winter. She was doing just fine until I put her outside for the summer. But summer was so late in coming...it rained and rained. I thought maybe too much water on her was not going to be good. Finally I put her back out. She wasn't looking too good. One day I noticed she was leaning over. I pushed her back up and she came right off. I was so sad. When I looked at the stump, I noticed it was total mush. The soil was like a swamp. It had not dried out at all from all the pre-summer rain. So I did surgery on her. I cut off two main branches and put them in new soil. I scrapped out all the mush in the stump and put it in a pot. Her leaves are beginning to plump up again. I don't know if she is growing new roots, but for now , there is still hope that she is going to make it...along with two more new plants.

We finally were able to get up to the lake and try out our new kayaks. The kids went with us and showed us all about it.

Here are a few shots of the other family that they sent me. Josh spent 8 weeks in Hawaii with the Marines. Alexis had to stay at their place in California while he was gone.

Emily and Matthew and Baby on the 4th of July.

John and Rachel went to Washington state.

Gabe, Daniel, Dennis and Abby. Gabe has been in a few concerts with his violin and a play.

and now to work on the August post!

June went by so fast that I almost forgot to post!

Spring flowers were pretty amazing, even though I was drenched with rain in this wettest spring rain ever, I managed to get a few photos.

I brought a start of this plant home from Jimmy's place in Oxnard. I kept it in the garage under lights all winter and am so happy it is blooming so pretty. 

The rhody in the front is so huge, it is as tall as the walnut trees. The girls and I had fun with the carpet of blooms.

These rhododendrons are all here in the yard.

The bunnies are making their appearance after the winter...and bringing their new babies.

School is out, so we get to spend more time with the grandkids. Of course for Josiah, that means fishing.

Arianna loves finding me hearts.

Josiah still loves his garbage trucks. He figured out a way to hook a basket up to the front of the little car and then went around the yard picking up the piles of recycling that he had set up all over the place. He has grown so much that his legs don't even fit in the car, but that does not stop him.

I took the girls in for polish.

It took a while to get it done, but we finally managed to get Jimmy to the lake for fishing. Josiah had been looking forward to this since we moved him up from California, but with school and covid and our travels, it just took a while to work it out.  It was a fun day, to top it off, Jimmy actually caught a trout!!!

We had a crafting day, nothing better than getting to play with power tools.

Just when I had given up on buying a house in the middle of this house buying nonsense, we decided to go take a look at this one. It seemed OK, nice big one acre lot, small house, a covered shop to park the trailer. I told John it was the best we had seen so far and if he wanted it, he would be in charge of calling Erick. Within minutes of getting home, Erick called...'are you really ready?' I didn't even know John had actually sent him a text saying we wanted to bid on it! The next day we found out we  won the bid! I guess we are homeowners again. It is a really tiny home, I am going to find out what sizing down is all about.  But the yard is going to be fun...a clean slate to make my own. (well, I guess I have to share it with John too)

Father's Day, Lindy and I bought Dad a kayak. We plan on taking them with us on a few day trips.

Mom has joined the smart phone world!  No more punching 3 letters for each letter in a word with her flip phone. She already has an iPad, so it will be an easy transition for her. The kids are already having fun sending her photos and keeping her up to date.

John and I celebrated our 48th anniversary!

My heart rock collection.