Anniversary, Old Friends, Wood Floors, Olympics and Baby Calves

Happy Anniversary to Kyla and Jed---four years. They celebrated Thursday by having dinner at Shoji's and Emmy stayed with Gram and Grandad for the night.

The maple flooring for the family room, kitchen, dining room was delivered Friday and Brian helped to unload most of it before taking off to Bend for the "Home Boy Olympics". From what I can tell....at least what he divulges to his mom, is that he and a bunch of other guys have gotten together for the past 3 years and team up in two's to compete in various "sport" activities. Those include golfing, pool playing, horse shoes, running, beer guzzling, etc. All I know is he came home with a hat that says "Home Boy Olympics" on the front and "Ugly" on the back. The other guys said that they knew Brian would look the best in his because he wears his hats backwards most of the time.

Saturday I had lunch and a long visit with a childhood friend, Jody Lewis, at Marie Calenders then made it home just as another Baker friend arrived , Susan Rich with her daughter Allison. Jed and Emma joined us for a swim for a couple of hours and then we BBQ'd chicken and had a good visit.

Sunday morning three baby calves were delivered and I mean babies! Two of them are 6 weeks old and the other is only 2 weeks old. That means we are bottle feeding twice a day for quite a while. They are really cute.....naming was pretty easy. Oreo is the baby....he is black and white. Buster is the middle sized one and Brutus is the largest, named for how aggressive he is.....he tries to eat his and all the others milk. Farmer wannabe Dave has to get up an hour early every morning to help feed because there is just one too many for me to do by herself. Well it looks like we are tied down for a while now!

MRI and Dr. Appointment

Kyla had an MRI this morning in San Francisco and then an appointment with Dr. Chang. The small spot of enhancement they were watching has increased in size somewhat. Dr. Chang said it can be a number of things. It could be tumor regrowth (we are praying that this is not the case), necrosis (dead tissue) from the medication doing its job (this is what I, MOM, choose to think it is) or it could be because Kyla finished taking the last of her Decadron (steroids for swelling in the brain) a week ago. Of course it wasn't what Kyla wanted to hear this soon.....she and we all wanted to hear that the scan is clean. But she is so strong....an inspiration to us all. We love you Kyla!! So she goes back to San Francisco in four weeks for another scan.

People are amazing! Another patient of Dr. Chang's and her husband donated airline tickets to Kyla and Jed for this trip. So they flew to San Francisco on Sunday and were home Monday afternoon. Much nicer than that 10 hour trip each way.

Emma stayed with Gram and Grandad and as usual we had a grand time swimming, feeding the chickens and reading Curious George about 1000 times.

New Little Niece

My sister, Kristi and husband, Pat had little Lexie Kay today by emergency cesarean. She is very tiny........only weighs 2lbs. 15 oz. She is two months early but is doing pretty good considering. She is breathing on her own and hopefully will keep getting stronger. She does have Dandy Walker Syndrome which they won't know the long term effects for a while. We are all praying for her and for Kristi and Pat. Congratulations and our love and prayers are continuing.

Birthday, Sky Diving, Adoption and an Egg

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JILL AND SHALON!!!! Shalon is the kids' cousin and shares a birthday with Jill. And what a birthday Jill had. Wade's gift was to sky dive so that is how Jill spent most of the day. She came home with some great pictures (see more pictures on the photo album page) and a video. Charo came to dinner and we had Jill's pick.....fresh crab dinner. YUM!

Jill and her instructor

Betty and chicks

Dave made a quick run to Cottage Grove to pick up some baby chicks. He came home with eight and that night we snuck them under Betty (well as much as you can sneak them under a chicken as she is pecking you for taking away her eggs). Well she was a little cranky about it and pecked them a bit but we left them there for the night. So the next day we opened the door and she hopped out and went under the chicken coop and stayed there hiding all day leaving the chicks alone. We figured that it wasn't going to work so we separated her from them and put her on the other side of the fence with Zoey and Patty. Well the next morning Betty was right back on the other side (must have flown over some way) and being ever so protective of those chicks. I think she is confused......four eggs turn into eight babies.....or she thinks she is a great double yolk layer. Sunday we found our first egg! So now Zoey is laying an egg every day!

Patiently Waiting

Betty is patiently sitting on those four eggs she came with. The due date is today....but no little chicks....not even a cheep or peck on the shell. We think we will have to trick her into adopting some baby chicks we buy....more on how that turns out later.

Kyla, Jed, Emma and Brian go to dinner with Charo, our friend from Spain, at Chapala's while Kelli has some friends over after work to swim along with Jill and Wade. Brian had to give a funeral to his plastic shark floater as it developed a small hole. Our hearts go out to you Brian!

Swimming and Baby Skunk

Last Sunday Brian and Dave drain the in-ground hot tub to prepare to fill it in. Because it is ridiculously expensive to heat, we hope to brick over the top and put a small round table and chairs under the gazebo. We then started the solar panel for the pool and got the pool ready for summer swimming. Monday Brian and Kelli try out the pool......feels great in this 95� weather. Tuesday evening Kyla, Jed and Emmy come out to cool off in the pool with Brian.

We are graced later with a baby skunk in the flowers close to the diving board. I guess there is a reason the the skunk in "Bambi" was called "Flower"!

Sewing, Painted Fingernails, Cherry Pie and Woody

Kyla, Jed and Emma come to our house to finish sewing Joanna's pillow together. Kyla did a great job cross stitching it, Jed did the sewing and Emma helped stuff....a family affair! Of course what would the day be like if Emma didn't color and Daddy didn't paint her finger and toe nails? Then home-made cherry pie and a kiss for Woody!

Fourth of July

Kyla, Jed, Emma and Kelli spent the morning of the 4th at the Harrisburg parade with Joanna and Anne Marie. Emma collected quite a bunch of candy....I think maybe we were kind of jypped as kids. In the parades we experienced the small amount of candy that was thrown out was fought after by about 10 kids in each place. The afternoon and evening found us celebrating at Grandma and Grandad's house (a.k.a. our old home). We had hamburgers, hotdogs, good salads and yummy desserts. We watched the fireworks which several of the neighbors always have. It is pretty darn good....someone spends a lot of money on those fireworks! Emma spent the day playing with Braedyn and Greyson and got to light her very own sparklers. Of course Kyla had to do the sparkler dance which in the past has burnt the linoleum in their kitchen. We also picked cherries to make a pie. Kyla has made jam with hers and also made a cherry crisp. That tree was loaded this year!

Appointment with Kokkino and Singing Like Shirley Temple

Kyla met with Dr. Kokkino today to assess how she was doing neurologically. Everything checked out and he is supposed to fax the results to Dr. Chang in San Francisco. She also got her new bike today (a belated mothers day present). They now have a seat for Emma to ride in so watch out for the Nagels!