Dodged a Bullet

Thanks to everyone that showed concern or wanted to help with Randy's physical health this past week. This is how our week has gone -

On Sunday he felt real nauseated and sick, so he couldn't even stay at church. On Monday he drove into work, but felt so bad that he came back home and I drove him to the doctor. The doctor did an examination, including an EKG. That showed that he had probably had a heart attack sometime in the past. So, he had blood tests done and saw a cardiologist on Thursday.

The cardiologist performed another examination, had more blood tests done, did another EKG, and had him do a stress test. Everything still looked like he may have had a heart attack, so he had him go in this morning for an angiogram.

He was at the hospital downtown before 6am and they did an angiogram where they go up through his artery and look inside his heart. Everything looked good so they didn't have to insert any stents! What a relief. They still have to find out what is going on. His kidneys have a high level of creatinine, so they want him to have ANOTHER blood test and an ultrasound of his kidneys next week. Hopefully they can get this figured out quickly. Thanks again for all your caring thoughts!

Odds & Ends

The last few days have been kind of busy around here. On Saturday afternoon, there was a baby shower for Laura Parry at my house. She is my niece (married to my sister’s son) and this will be her first child. My sister’s girls were in charge and did the food and decorating. They had a lot of children’s books placed around that they gave Laura when it was all over to start her book collection for her baby. The food matched several of the book titles and was real cute. I guess they got the idea off of Pinterest.

Laura, Audrey, Amelia, Rita, my mom

Audrey, my mom, Eliza

 Dylan has now been on his mission for one year now. It’s hard to believe. His letters are pretty amazing. In every new email from him, I can see the tremendous growth that he has experienced so far. I’ve heard that during the two years that a missionary is serving full-time he experiences 6-7 years of growth, as compared to someone that does not serve a mission for 2 years. I believe it. I handed out postcards in Las Vegas to some of my nephews and nieces, gave one to each of my brothers and sisters, gave one to my mom, gave one (or sent in an envelope in the mail) to each of my other kids and their spouses, and gave some to the young men/leaders in our ward. Hopefully he will receive 20-30 of these postcards this week. The other side says “Happy Hump Day.”

My youngest daughter, Ingrid, has 2 Visla’s (dogs). They had a litter of 7 puppies last year. They got a male and female so that they could breed them, but they don’t want to have litters too close together and they still have to have their hips checked before the puppies can be certified by the AKC. This time, when her female dog was in heat she went down to Topeka and took the male dog – to keep them apart. They accidently got together the night she got back however, and her female dog just had a litter of 6 puppies! They are really cute, but I hope they don’t drive her nuts for the next 2 months until she sells them, since she is expecting a baby of her own at the end of the year.

Saturday morning I went to watch my older daughter, Heidi, run in the dirt and mud. My niece, Eliza, and some woman police officers and their families also ran. The course was 5k and had various obstacles throughout it including climbing walls, tires, mud and bubbles. They were running to support the fight against woman’s breast cancer. This morning she sent me a text showing that she had a huge rash under her arm and down her side a bit. She doesn’t know where it came from. A couple weeks ago she had cellulitis in her leg – she thinks it may have been from a bite.

Tyler started back to school today – he has less than a year until he graduates and he is SO ready. He finished up his internship designing websites, and now has a job that pays for his tuition working for the school newspaper doing layout for the sports section. This will be more good experience to put on a resume – his degree is in graphic arts.

Tyler Photoshopped

 My oldest son, Jesse, was interviewed on a radio show this morning. He has a comedy show coming up in a few weeks and there has been a lot of controversy about a poster that they were using for it. He will be interviewed on television (the Ralph Hipp show) the night before his show. Then in a month he and his wife are moving to Texas.

Randy has not been feeling well off and on for several months. When we were in Colorado and on a walk up to where the kids were rappelling, he had to lie down because he felt so bad. Then when he was packing up after a music gig at the beginning of this month, he felt real bad again and had to sit or lay down. He couldn’t stay even for the first hour in church yesterday because he felt so nauseated, so he went home. He still felt bad this morning, so I drove him to the doctor. We were there for a long time, but finally after having an EKG, it was determined that he had probably had a heart attack recently. A HEART ATTACK!! So, he has to go in and have blood tests tomorrow morning and see a cardiologist on Thursday. 

So, that’s been my life for just the last several days!

What Happens in Vegas. . .

. . . gets reported in my blog.

This past weekend Randy and I drove down to Las Vegas, Nevada (Henderson, actually) and stayed at my sister Becky's house. Her son, Michael, had just gotten back from a mission for our church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) where he served for two years in Honduras. So, we went to see everyone and hear his talk in church. My two brothers along with their wives, and my younger sister along with one of her children were also able to be there. My oldest sister, Connie, stayed at home and looked after our mother.

Derek, Terry, Becky, Wendy, Karen

 On the way down I snapped a picture of the Virgin River as it meanders through the mountains between Utah, Arizona and Nevada. There was hardly any water in it at all, just a bit of mud. I remember a few years ago when it was bursting it's banks and caused major flooding in St. George, Utah. But, since the United States (especially the western states) is experiencing one of the worst droughts in decades, the river is barely visible in some spots. Pretty sad.

As we arrived in Las Vegas, we were able to drive to the LDS temple there and attend a session. It is beautiful. I didn't care much for some of the terra-cotta colored walls inside, but most of it is wonderful. The Celestial Room is especially gorgeous. It's always nice to visit a different temple and feel the same spirit there.

Then we went to Becky's house and visited for a while before meeting up with my brothers and sisters at a restaurant for dinner. The food was good and the conversation was great. When we were finished we all drove back to Becky's house and ate cake - my youngest sister had a birthday on Sunday. Then my two brothers and my younger sister went back to their hotel. I guess they all got rooms at the same hotel, but it was kind of funny that they made their reservations at different times and ended up with their rooms all next to each other! Randy and I stayed at Becky's house.

Dave, Becky, Rita, Terry, Becky, Karen, Randy

Randy, Courtney, Wendy, Dave, Becky, Rita

The church meeting on Sunday wasn't until 1:00pm, so we got to visit a lot during the morning. Several of Dave & Becky's nieces and nephews were in town, as well as all of their children except one daughter and her family.

Becky, Terry, Wendy

Zach, Jeff (Audrey's father-in-law), Courtney, Jack, Caydence, Rita, Becky, Derek

Mystery man, Jack, Laura, Eliza, Addilyn, Michael, Randy

Eliza, Addilyn (Zach's daughter), Michael

 After we ate lunch we all went to church and Michael did a great job on his talk. Since we didn't get out of there until almost 2:30pm Nevada time (or 3:30 Utah time) and we had a 7 hour ride home we left quickly and headed back. The trip home was pretty uneventful except for a few showers that we drove through. Since the temperature gauge in our car had said 119 degrees most the time that we were in Nevada, the rain was pretty welcome.

The biggest downer for the weekend was to get home and find that someone had gotten into Randy's truck while we were gone - he found both doors unlocked and not closed tight. They had rifled through his glove box and taken his digital camera and a pair of binoculars that he had behind the driver's seat. He uses them both for work. I found that the Honda had also been opened on the passenger side door. Since both vehicles were locked when we left and nothing was broken I figure they must have had some kind of master key that opened any vehicles doors - scary.