What! Why? How?

Back in August, Steve had a "yearly physical" in order to earn a $25 gift card from his insurance company (we had already missed the $50 window).  From the extensive questions plied by the nurse, an X-ray for a chronic hip pain and an MRI for chronic back pain and weakness was ordered.  The X-ray was normal but the MRI showed significant narrowing in a portion of his lower spinal canal and a bulging of one of his discs.  This was all revealed to us by an orthopedic surgeon.  Solution?  Surgery.  Which is how Steve ended up at Honor hospital on Shea in Scottsdale Tuesday morning for an operation on his back.  His condition is sometimes called stenosis of the back.  The official description of the surgical procedure is "L4-5 Posterior decompression fusion with right transforaminal".  I just looked up "transforaminal" and that doesn't really describe the removal of bone buildup that the doctor did to open up the spinal canal.  While the hip X-ray showed no problems, the doctor believed that his hip pain was caused by the back issue.   We both realized that this was a pretty drastic action to do while on a mission but Steve's condition was not going to improve and was only going to get worse.  The pain caused him to awaken at least once (often twice) every night to take pain medicine.   The plan was two days in the hospital and at least two weeks recovering at home before returning to the mission office.  Steve had it set up so he could access his work computer from home and he always has his cell phone on him to field calls from missionaries.  

So, surgery was scheduled for mid-day Tuesday, September 11th.  The procedure went well, according to Dr. Field.  Steve came home Thursday mid-day and now he is just healing and getting stronger.  While he was in the hospital, I did a LOT of driving.  Anthem is north.  The mission office is west.  The hospital was east.  Each a 30-minute drive from the other.  I was at the hospital all day Tuesday, not returning home until after 9:00 pm.  I went twice on Wednesday with the mission office and a trip back home in between.  And, then on Thursday, I went from the mission office to pick him up, drive him up to Anthem, and then back to the office to finish the day.  

Aside from this big news, there is not a lot to report.  I did find a scorpion in my sink on Wednesday morning.  And, I believe he had been hiding in a scarf.  I am shaking out my everything more diligently ever since!  

I have watched a lot of movies this week.  I rented and finished the last 30 minutes of "Avengers: Infinity War" on Tuesday.  (I watched most of it on the plane last week).  I re-watched "No Reservations" on Netflix on Wednesday.  On Friday, Steve and I watched "The Stray" and "Blast from the Past" on Saturday night.  Two were re-watches (No Reservations and Blast From the Past) and they never get old.  "The Stray" was pretty good.  It is an autobiographical tale written and directed by Mitch Davis, the LDS film-maker who also did "The Other Side of Heaven".  And, "Infinity War" was quite powerful.  

Steve pre-surgery (I made him grin like that)

Steve post-surgery and post-recovery just hanging out in a
"holding area".  He was finally getting to eat again (he ordered a tuna sandwich to be delivered to his room - which it was.  But, then it sat in his "unprepared" room for so long that had to be re-ordered when he actually got to his room because it took so long to be cleaned and and ready)

Steve leaving the hospital on Thursday.  Yes, that is a walker....

The front of the hospital.  Steve's room window is the one on the top far right 

 

My unwelcome visitor

Farewell to sweet Sadie

Our poor little Sadie went to heaven last Tuesday.  Her sweet little body, with three legs that couldn't work, was just finished.  I made a quick trip to St. Louis to be with Beckie and Steven as she left this world.   I flew out Tuesday morning, Beckie picked me up from the airport.  And then we went to Kyle and Micah's house where Beckie is temporarily staying (since her landlord sold her home out from under her and she quickly needed living quarters).  For the rest of the afternoon, I just held my little dog - who was so emaciated and clearly in distress (panting, unable to settle).  Surely she recognized my scent but she was too much in pain to acknowledge me.  But that was OK, it was just good to hold her one last time.  Steven arrived around 4:30 and the vet came at about 5:30.  She was fresh out of MU vet school and was so capable and sweet.  The process went smoothly and we laid her to rest in a little doggie paw print cloth bag that I had made and Steven took her back to Columbia to be buried in our back yard.  Beckie was such a tender caregiver and I am so grateful for her sacrifices for Sadie.  

But, before he drove back, we all gathered at a BBQ restaurant on Delmar for dinner.  Emily and kids were already there.  Joe came a bit later.  

I spent the night at Emily's and had a wonderful Wednesday morning with her and Noah, Lucy, Quinn, and Larkin.  Noah and I played piano duets.  He played his cello.  I taught him how to play a part of the Imperial March and he figured out the rest.  We took photos out in the back yard.  I picked three vine-ripened tomatoes from Emily's garden to bring back to Arizona.  I basked in all the green.  And then, it was time to drop the kids off at school and take me back to the airport.  It was such a short trip but it recharged my batteries for the rest of our mission.  

 

 The rest of the week just flew by.  I didn't sleep well the night before Labor Day because I was thinking of all the loose ends that needed to be tied up at the office before I left on Tuesday.  So, although the office was closed on Monday, we went down anyway to take care of some things.  We combined that trip with our weekly grocery shopping.  Thursday and Friday were, not surprisingly, quite busy as I caught up with baptism reports and final preparations for our transfer on the 11th.  We did manage to relax in front of "Black Panther" on Friday night.  Saturday, yesterday, we went to the 9:00 temple session and then we entertained Jim and Karen Ravert (the old BYU friend who is serving in the Tucson mission) here at the house with lunch and they taught us how to apply Roots Magic and Puzzila to our family history efforts.  They left at 4:00 and we spent the rest of the day tying up more loose ends before the next big event - Steve's back surgery on Tuesday.  Stay tuned.....

The last gasps of August

Happy Labor Day weekend!  Hooray for 3-day weekends.  

It is hot here....still.  But, psychologically, having August over feels cooler.  You have heard of S.A.D.?  Seasonal Affective Disorder?  People without enough sunshine in the winter get depressed?  Well, I think it also works with summer heat.  People with too much heat get depressed.  I had a little bit of that in July.  I really don't want to experience another Phoenix summer - ever. 

Thankfully, the air conditioning situation has been resolved.  They actually installed a small air conditioner in the seminary classroom.  And, they replaced the old, poorly functioning thermostat with a nice, easy-to-understand programmable one.  And, now we are all comfortable.

The backyard bougainvillea is in bloom again.  So pretty!

The mission office looks like a used truck lot.  These are all being de-commissioned.  You can imagine the paper chase Steve is going through to make it so.

With new cars comes the need for new mission key chains and so I ordered 500 of them with a brand-new Arizona Phoenix Mission logo to arrive on Friday.  But, guess what?  They printed the OLD logo instead.  Thankfully, they will rectify the problem and we will get our new logo.  And, now we have 1000 new key chains.  Enough to last into the millennium!

We had my cousin Dave Fraedrich and his wife Shelley over for dinner last night.  It was great to catch up.  Soon, I will need to arrange another Fraedrich cousin gathering - once the snowbird cousins arrive.

I went to a dermatologist on Thursday to have her look at a spot on my cheek.  She took a small biopsy and we'll know in about a week if it is something to worry about.  I am certainly NOT worrying about it now as I've had Sadie on my mind this past week.  Her life is drawing to a close and I am flying to St. Louis on Tuesday to be with her as we let her go.  Beckie (and Kyle and Micah) has been so good to deal with her physical ailments these past few months and I am so grateful for her sacrifices to take care of her. 

August is winding down

Apologies for not blogging last week...Steve and I were visiting my sister in Payson all weekend.  We went up on Saturday morning and I got it into my head to try a radically different route - one that would take us due east and then south on Ft. McDowell road to meet up with the beeline highway right at the casino.  It started out fine.  We drove through beautiful north Scottsdale "boondocks" consisting mostly of high-end homes in gated communities or high-end homes on acres of desert - winding around low desert mountains with high mountains in the distance.  It was a lovely route.  Towards the end, we came to a fork in the road - the left one road dirt and the right one blacktop so we figured to go right.  Wrong.  It did ultimately get us to Fountain Hills and Shay boulevard and the beeline - the usual route we take - but it was a bit longer.  Evidently, Ft. McDowell road is dirt for part of the way through the reservation.   So, now we know.  The rest of the drive continued to be lovely.  There has been enough monsoon rain that the roadside was decorated with blooming poppies at the lower elevations and lots of green grass growing on the hills at higher elevations.  

In the afternoon, I had hoped to go wade in the Verde River near Payson but big rain clouds and cracks of thunder changed our minds. (recently, a family died while playing in a Verde River tributary due to a flash flood from a monsoon thunderstorm) So, we just relaxed and visited at Juli's house.  Jesse came over for dinner that night.  Kat was not feeling well so she didn't come.  On Sunday, I played my cello with the Carlysle family singing just like we did back in June down here in Anthem.  The Carlysle's grandparents live in Juli's ward which is how we got this "gig".  Grandma Darla Carlysle also owns a little shave ice stand that she takes to the Saturday farmer's market so we were sure to make a visit as soon as we arrived.  

The week leading up to Payson was a zone conference week with vehicle inspections.  For the first time since being here on our mission, I helped Steve with these inspections and I can't believe he endured them for a full year without me.  They are quite physically demanding - particularly the summer ones with the heat.  I am so glad I could help him and I will from now on, for sure.  Tuesday was up in Flagstaff with delightful temperatures which made it a good place to start and for me to learn the routine.  I inspected the interiors while Steve checked the exteriors.  All week we arrived at 8:00, usually with missionaries already there and waiting for us to unload the bins of rags and shop towels, cleaning solutions, and oil and other fluids.  They work their magic on their vehicles and are finished by about 9:40 when they head in to the church for the 10:00 conference.  That is when Steve and I start our inspecting.  He begins on one end, I on the other and, once we are completely finished, we compare notes and make the awards.  First place gets to have a license cover that says "Golden Plates - cleanest car in the zone".  And, because Steve, the cookie king, is in charge, first place also receives a golden paper plate of cookies (cookies of their choice). 

So, we did this Tuesday through Friday.  We enjoyed another beautiful drive to Flagstaff through the green mountain landscapes.  What a contrast to Memorial Day weekend when we went to Petrified Forest and ALL the forest land was closed due to extreme fire danger.  This monsoon season has been particularly wet, thanks to many prayers all over the state.  Wednesday through Friday were down in the Phoenix valley and it was HOT.  AND, humid due to the monsoons.  By the end of the week, we were just completely worn out.

The first photo is us up in Flagstaff - the second one in Phoenix.  We used a mission truck all week as we had a bunch of stuff to haul.  It was a Nissan Frontier and it made me miss our truck, Davy.

Speaking of monsoons - the clouds we see every afternoon are just stunning.  Too bad they don't generate wide spread rain.  But, generally, at least a few parts of Arizona get rain every day.

After an intense week of zone conferences, last week was quite a bit calmer from a mission office standpoint.  We even enjoyed a birthday carry-in on Friday for Jenene Poulson.  And, on Saturday, we stayed home and entertained guests for both lunch and dinner.  Stephen Hogenson was a missionary who finished his mission July 31st and we agreed to store his bike and his two violins and a bunch of books at our place in Anthem because he and his parents were coming right back to Arizona for a tour before fall classes started.  So, they came for lunch and left with all his belongings.  And, we had Jenene and Gerald Poulson over for pizza dinner.  

Steve and I did baptisms at the temple Friday night and I got to dabble in water coloring Saturday afternoon.  I painted a desert quail.  I am enjoying learning the medium of water color because it goes so quickly.  I can start and finish a painting in one sitting, unlike oils that take weeks to do.

The BIG news happened last Thursday morning.  After a visit to our primary care provider up here in Anthem a few weeks ago where Steve mentioned his back and hip pain and how it keeps him up at night, an x-ray and an MRI were ordered.  The MRI showed enough anomalies in his back  that Steve was referred to an orthopedic neurologist which is where we found ourselves Thursday morning.  And, the diagnosis is a narrowing of the spinal cavity in a particular spot so Steve is scheduled for surgery on September 11th.  We are to plan on at least two days in the hospital and two weeks of recovery.   He will work from home as much as possible.  Oh, and the week before, he is scheduled for a colonoscopy. Another day out of the office.  Wow. 

August randomness

School started this past week so that meant seminary did, too.  The classroom turned out perfectly

....with one rather large hitch.  For some reason, the air conditioning doesn't work well in the new room.  They put duct work into the garage portion - they actually put in a larger air conditioner to handle the larger load but the room stays quite warm.  Brother Loveless, the teacher, has to crank the thermostat down to 67 degrees and open the privacy door that was installed between the classroom and our part of the house to make the room comfortable.  Only it makes US very uncomfortable.  Our part of the house is just freezing and with the door open, there is no privacy as we go about our morning routine.  The problem has been reported so they are "working on it".  A couple of other glitches popped up at the house this past week.  The garbage disposal has stopped working.   And, we came home Friday to water streaming out of the irrigation hoses in both the front and back yard.  Can you see the tiny black hose?  

The box that controls the irrigation cycles also looked like this

It didn't look like that Friday morning.  We have no idea what went on during that day but the end result was a box pulled off of the house and uncontrolled watering.  We left for Tucson Friday night and by the time we returned on Saturday, the water was off but the box was not fixed.

The Tucson trip was to visit with Neal and Clair Lambson again (we stayed at their apartment Friday night) and on Saturday, we attended the temple together along with Jim and Karen Ravert.  We knew Jim Ravert back in our BYU married student days.  He was married to Patty at the time.  Since then, he divorced her and he met Karen and they live in Tucson and they work as a Church service missionary in the Tucson Mission Office with Neal and Clair.  It was so great to see him again.  One of the main reasons to go to Tucson this time was to visit a miniature museum after lunch and the temple but we ended up going over to Jim and Karen's instead to learn about some pretty cool family history programs.  We'll hopefully get to the museum sometime before we leave next summer....

Neal, Clair, Karen, Jim, Steve, me at the Tucson temple

Speaking of missionaries, this is what Steve's part of the office looks like nowadays.  

Bikes everywhere.  New bikes waiting to be assembled for newly arrived missionaries, bikes packed up waiting to be shipped home to leaving missionaries.  Bikes waiting to be picked up for missionaries newly assigned to bike areas.  Bikes needing to be repaired.  They have even spilled over into our back patio!

Two of these are ours, but the rest belong to missionaries who have recently gone home and are supposed to be returning to visit the mission and pick up their bikes.  Our spare room has even more missionary stuff to be retrieved. 

This all belongs to Elder Hogenson.  Can you tell that there are TWO violins!  And he doesn't even really play violin!  A church member gave him one of the violins.  It was in an unplayable condition but he fixed it up.  And, he bought another inexpensive one off of Amazon.  He is teaching himself to play.  Those are all of his books that he couldn't fit into his suitcase. (shades of Steve at the end of his mission.  He had to ship home several boxes of books that he'd bought while on his mission)  He and his parents are coming the end of August to pick everything up (one of the bikes is his). 

Other mission office happenings:  Elder Wall turned 19 on Friday and we had a carry-in to celebrate.  Poulsons brought taco salad and I made a chocolate pie (gluten free crust, of course).  And, I helped Steve get this brand new Nissan Rogue. 


I had a doctor appointment on Thursday to follow-up on my blood work.  I am happy to report that my cholesterol level is below 200 for the first time in years.  And, my A1C was just one point higher than "normal".  Yay for me. 

I finally called "uncle" with my vegetable garden and pulled everything up.  This is what the cherry tomato plant looked like

And this was the harvest I got every other week or so...

It was pathetic.  Not worth my time or the water.  GONE!

The basil, on the other hand, was thriving but I just couldn't justify the water so I harvested all the leaves and it is gone, too.

Speaking of plants,  This is what a prickly pear fruit looks like.  

And I will close with some photos from the week:  a beautiful monsoon-created sunset, a hot air balloon over Anthem, and the sage in bloom in front of our house.

It's August!

Here is a photo of our house I took on our Friday morning walk....

On our Monday morning walk, I found a semi-ripened saguaro fruit on the ground so I took it home and cut it open.  Isn't it fascinating inside?  I don't know when the optimum time is to harvest a saguaro fruit.  And, I did learn that, like the cactus, the fruit is protected meaning you have to get a permit to pick it.  I hope fallen fruit doesn't fit into that category!

Monday night, we had a huge monsoon storm blow through and it took down the outdoor curtain on our back patio.  We are lucky it didn't take down any trees in our yard.  It sure wreaked havoc on a lot of other trees in the valley, though. 

This past week was a Transfer Week.  We sent 20 missionaries home on Tuesday morning (one went back to Mongolia and another to Tahiti) and we welcomed 23 missionaries later that afternoon.  This was our largest incoming group yet and they barely fit into the conference room for in-processing.  One sister is a visa-waiter.  She will ultimately go to the Philippines to serve her mission.  Two missionaries were returning - they had gone home for assorted reasons and were coming back to finish their mission.  And the other twenty were newbies.  Transfer week is always a shuffle-up-the-mission time what with closing or consolidating areas or opening new areas.  Steve and Elder Poulson, the housing coordinator have to scurry around to accommodate all these changes.  Missionaries needing bikes, new TiWi cards, cars being shuffled around the mission, apartments being closed or opened, missionaries needing beds and other furniture.  And, very importantly - keeping the supply closet stocked because the office is a flurry of missionaries all week.  Those who don't get to come very often because they serve in far-away areas like Flagstaff, Prescott, and even Buckeye come in and restock.  Transfer weeks are always a little crazy...

But, Steve and I did get to relax some.  We went to the mission home Wednesday evening to socialize at a Shake and Bake (President makes shakes, everyone brings baked goods).  We watched "The Natural" on Prime Friday night.  We visited the Musical Instrument Museum yesterday afternoon.  

I have never seen so many old and new instruments in all my life!  We were there for three and a half hours and only got to half of the museum.  Our poor bodies couldn't handle walking around the rest.  Below is a photo for my Harry Potter kids...

And here is Steve standing by the octobass.  (and he thought hauling my bass was a pain!)