He's home!

Jon FINALLY got released this evening. He is so glad to be home! LOTS and LOTS of pain, but at least he's home! He'll be working out of the house for 6 to 8 weeks and receiving nursing care 'til he heals.

The Man is coming home this week!

Jon had his surgery late this afternoon and is painfully recovering. The doctor had to get creative with some reconstruction but was able to do all that he wanted, so Jon is now without the vacuum dressing that would have needed him to go to a care facility, and can come home as soon as he feels well enough. Maybe Tuesday, but definitely Wednesday. He'll be on IV antibiotics for 3 weeks and will have another surgery in 4 to 6 weeks to completely close up the wound. Things are working out for him to telecommute for work 'cuz he'll be home for 6 to 8 weeks. Thank you for your prayers and please keep them coming for a speedy and complete recovery!

Yellowstone..

I'm going crazy right now, so I thought another post about our vacation might do ME some good.

Last I told you about Napoleon Dynamite and Preston, Idaho. From there, we made it to my brother Ron's house in Rigby, then we headed up to Yellowstone for some camping. I LOVE LOVE LOVE Yellowstone! I can't get enough of its beauty. It was a little frustrating because I still hadn't recovered from my knee surgery, so we cut our camping short a couple days, but still got to drive through the park and saw SO many cool things...Old Faithful, elk, buffalo, got to play in the river, and even saw snow. Meghan was really excited to see all the waterfalls. She LOVES waterfalls just like her mom. We both even hiked to Tower Falls with my sore knee! Anything for a waterfall. The kids enjoyed playing in the river and we got "stopped" by a herd of buffalo teenagers and calves in the middle of the road. Jon took the pic below when they decided to move on and walked right by his window. This happened to him the last time we were here and the dude turned and looked right at Jon. This time they just ignored us and moved down the road. I enjoyed everything, but was disappointed that we didn't see any bears. I ALWAYS see bears when we're there.

(Top right is a herd of buffalo that blocked the road and walked right by Jon's window...no zoom used. Middle left is Ian and Meg playing in snow. Far right pic is some buffalo poop Ian found by the river.)

We had almost finished the loop when we came upon lots of cars pulled over. There wasn't an area where buffalo would fit, etc., so I told Jon (well I screamed) "PULL OVER...I JUST KNOW IT'S A BEAR...LOOK, THE RANGERS ARE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD...I JUST KNOW IT'S A BEAR!" How smart am I? Very. 100 feet away was a grizzly grubbing under a log for some snacks. It could care less that everyone was gawking at it, taking pics, pointing, etc., etc. It started wandering close to the road, so the rangers packed up and scooted everyone on. My heart was still so excited to have seen the grizzly when we came upon the bald eagle habitat. I had hoped to get a picture on our way out, but neither the mom or dad were perched up in the tree. (Disappointment - both were there when we entered the park - did I get a picture? NO.) About 2 minutes later, ALMOST to the park exit, we saw a couple cars pull over by the river. I looked up and there was one of the bald eagles perched at the top of a dead tree, all magnificent, looking across the river with a beautiful sunset beginning in the background. There was no place to pull over at that point, so my picture is a little blurred, but the "in person" view was absolutely fantastic. The kids were soooo excited. Meghan still talks about seeing it! This was a good trip, but we were glad to head back to Idaho...well, TRIED to head back to Idaho. We had stopped in West Yellowstone for some dinner and we were so tired when we started back. It was about 10 minutes later I noticed a sign that said "entering Yellowstone National Park". I thought maybe I had missed it the day before on our way up, because everything looked the same. About 10 minutes later Jon noticed the compass on our mirror was reading north and we should have been going west. We also came across a sign for Big Sky, Montana! After a quick scramble in pitch dark, we realized I had him take a wrong turn heading out of town. All was not wasted, though. After we turned around, heading back to West Yellowstone we saw a deer on the side of the road. Really cool! A couple hourse later we were back in Rigby. It was good to be back to my brother's comfy beds!

STILL in the hospital...

The doctor told us today that Jon will stay in the hospital over the weekend. Monday he'll take him back in for surgery to clean up his wound and hopefully partially close him up. The swelling has to go down in order to do that, so we're praying! If the doctor is able to do everything that he wants on Monday, Jon will be able to come home Tuesday. If not, he'll be released to a smaller, wound-care hospital that is closer to our house and will stay there through the end of next week. Please keep the prayers up! He's anxious to get home with his family and also wants to get working again, which he'll be able to do from home for a while.

Man Update...

It's been 3 full days since his surgery. His staph infection was downgraded to a "b", which I'm told is good, but it's still there and will be for a while so he'll be on a really strong IV antibiotic for about 3 weeks. He's in severe pain all the time and any movement sends him through the roof, so they've started giving him Atavan just to keep him calm, and have boosted his pain meds so he's pretty much somewhere else all day long. Example...tonight we were talking about the kids for a minute before I left and in the middle of our very short conversation he asked me if I was close to the mountain and did I get caught in the speed trap by the Knudsen's house. That's just ONE example. I could give several. So our week will be an interesting one.

Poor guy wants to be out of there so bad. It's so hard to see him suffer like this. The kids miss him so much. Max has been out of town so he hasn't seen Jon since July 6th. The other 3 haven't seen him since Friday afternoon and won't be able to until near the end of the week when he's more coherent. Meghan doesn't even get what's going on. Our neighbor asked her why her dad was in the hospital and she told them "because he broke his hip" (snicker).

Please keep up the prayers!

The Man is having some unwanted down time...

Time to take a break in posting about our vacation. I'll try to get more done this next week because we've got some beautiful Yellowstone pics to show you all!

Jon has been in the hospital twice this past week, beginning last Sunday. He has a severe infection that spread to his blood and required emergency surgery Friday after a follow-up visit at the doctor. He'll be in the hospital through next Friday and it's up in the air after that whether he'll come home or go to a managed care facility for a couple of weeks. Please keep us all in your prayers. The kids miss not having dad at home...I miss not having my husband at home...I hurt for him because he's in excrutiating pain and bed-bound for the next several days...the drugs and antibiotics he's receiving are giving him terrible reactions...this is emotionally draining on us all...we're worried about his leave running out at work...I'm exhausted from driving back/forth because he's at a hospital clear at the other end of town (although it's a VERY good hospital and definitely worth the drive)...AND between my knee surgery and this, our medical bills are piling!

Thank you Jessie, Erin, Shontell, and Melly for the visits, constant texting and prayers! I heart my friends! (even the haters...snicker)

Thanks to everyone else that has been praying, too! We totally believe in the power of prayer!

I'll keep you posted on his progress over the next week.

I Caught You a Delicious Bass...

We enjoyed 4 days in Park City...lovely, cool weather, fun on the mountain slides, barn discoveries, lots of pool swimmming, and river play. Started our trek Monday morning for Idaho Falls and traveled the back highways, yet again, in search of more scenery AND Preston, Idaho...home of Napoleon Dynamite.

Made it to the middle of Preston by 4:30 in search of the Chamber of Commerce to obtain a "map" of the movie sights. They closed at 4 (figures), but (snort) the cell phone store next door had a map. First stop was the playground for the tetherball scene at the end of the movie.

I STOOD WHERE NAPOLEON AND DEB STOOD!
The pole in the movie was in a tire, but this is the same spot.
Some loser probably stole the real one.
You wanna play me?

Next was Pedro's house. The crazy neighbor lady next door kept yelling at us to stop taking pictures. Yah, right. My family had my back.

On to Preston High and a visit to the nurse's office for some chapstick, then Rex Kwon Do's dojo. The Cut 'n Corral and Deseret Industries (which both really exist) are across the street. Bow to your sensei!

We only had enough time left to find Napoleon's house, which was way out in the fields, on a dirt road! No Tina anywhere in sight, but Kip was definitely inside on the computer chatting with babes. We also snuck over to the Pop 'n Pins for a quick game of bumper bowl...yessssss!
Your mom goes to college.

Sweet! There's the steps where Kip and Uncle Rico were sitting when Rico grabbed Kip's microwaved steak and pegged Napoleon while he's riding Pedro's bike!

Next visit we'll get the rest...pics of Rex and Starla, Summer, and Trisha's houses and the egg farm. They were all at the opposite end of town and we had to go.

Barns

Telling you about our trip is going to take a few posts. Since I love Love LOVE barns, I decided to start with this topic.

Our trip began two Thursdays ago, almost on time. We hoped to leave the house by 4 a.m., then when we went to bed so late, we decided to get up around 5 and be on the road by 7. We ended up on the freeway by 7:45, so not to bad for us!

This trip the kids were banned from bringing the Game Cube, Wii, their DS, Gameboys, etc., etc. We sat them down and explained that when WE were young, we traveled in cars on highways, NOT freeways (explained the difference to them), sometimes WITHOUT airconditioning, and we ALWAYS had a note pad and pencil for drawing and/or a word search book, etc., etc. This time we were determined to have interaction with our children and they WERE going to look out the window at the beautiful scenery God had provided, whether they liked it or not! Once they detoxed the first day, they were pretty good.

So, we decided we would travel the back country this time, ON the highways, NOT the freeways. We veered off I15 just past St. George and headed through Zion. BEAUTIFUL. Were my kids awake? No. Not until we reached the tunnel and had to wait 15 minutes for the one-way traffic. They only woke up because we stopped the car and rolled down the windows and they noticed the air was not on. Grrr. Anyway, they begrudgingly looked at the scenery. Luckily they stayed awake after that, because the drive up highway 89 was gorgeous.

Now, getting to the barns. Going the back way takes you through all the older, smaller towns. I love to find old barns to take pictures of, and I found plenty this trip. So many, I couldn't get them all. We'd be stopping every mile just to take a picture and it would have taken forever to get to our destination! Here are some of my favorites...

We're Baaaack!

4 kids constantly fighting...$0
1,600 miles round trip...$530
9 days of cooler weather and memories made...priceless

We made it back last night, late. I'll post details and pics this week!