June 2016 Update

I’m slowly healing and making small gains every day.  Today I was able to cut my own fingernails for the first time since I broke my wrist last month.  It’s such a small thing, but significant in my mind.  I’m still typing and doing most things with my left hand only or minimally adding my right, but I’m noticing more flexibility and use in my right hand.  I’m in a removable splint now so I can shower, and the pins were removed earlier this week, so that wound can heal.  It felt better immediately once the pins were out, and taking them out really didn’t hurt at all.  I was afraid it might because the skin had swollen almost completely over the head of one of the pins, but my doctor was very gentle in working them out.  I now have a wound to care for at the pin site, and I think I have the splint for four more weeks at least.  I have pictures I can text to anyone who likes to see rather gross things, but I won’t be posting anything more graphic than x-rays here.  If you want to see the gross pictures, text me.

Xray showing the Y-shaped plate and the pins

My removable splint

Now that we’re done with the medical news, we’ll get on to the rest of the family news that’s fit to print.

Levi is playing baseball again this summer in our community league.  I don’t know their record, but I’m guessing they’re around .500.  Several of us have gone to his games, and I always enjoy them and try not to be one of those obnoxious parents, especially since his coach is a friend of mine from church (Mark Holcomb).  I haven’t gotten ejected from the stands, so I guess I’m doing OK.

Hazel loves watching Uncle Levi play baseball!

The week before Memorial Day, the whole family (Krista and I, and all our kids and their families) spent the week in Virginia Beach at a rented house.  It was tons of fun just spending time together, even though my activities were limited by my wrist.  We played at the beach, sat by and played in the pool, played board games, had four-square and euchre tournaments, and Cody organized another Mole game like he did two years ago at Outer Banks.  We also took turns cooking our main meal each day, which explains my weight gain.  I am blessed (cursed?) with a family of excellent cooks.

At the beach

The water was cold, but that didn't stop Mat, Levi, and Cai!

One of our amazingly delicious meals

Brother/sister love

On Memorial Day, Zach and I marched with our CAP squadron in Batavia’s parade.  OK to be truthful, Zach and the other cadets and senior members marched, and I drove the CAP van behind them.  No, my job wasn’t to keep them moving, but just to show what organization the marchers were from.  It was easy to drive one-handed since I was only going about 3 MPH.

Normal driving is still a bit challenging for me, although I can do it.  But since my usual commute takes me from the west side of Rochester where I live to the east side where I work, my boss agreed to let me work from home a couple days a week until I’m more healed.

Hannah’s birthday was on 6/6.  Those who live here get together at Ella’s house each Sunday night to play games, so we celebrated at our 6/5 family game night.

This summer, Zach and I are going to the CAP New York Wing Leadership Encampment, as we did two years ago.  Zach will be cadet staff working in Services (food prep and clean-up).  I will be a Character Development Instructor and help in Administration (check-in and –out, records, etc.) and anywhere else I can be useful.  We went to required training this past weekend at the Air National Guard base near Schenectady where we’ll be meeting.

Kortney and Mat celebrated their 2nd anniversary on 6/13.  I just realized I never announced here that they are expecting their first child in October.  I was supposed to do it last month but wimped out with some lame excuse about it being too hard to type.  Anyway, my birthday is 10/19, so I’m voting for a birthday grandchild, but no pressure, Kortney.  In case you’ve lost track, that will be grandchild #4 for us, with Ella and Cody’s second child due in about a month.  I did tell you about that one, didn’t I?  Yes, in March.  Nice that we can look back on the old updates on the web.

To end, some cute grandchild pictures:

Hazel loves ice cream!

It's fun to be tall!

Where's my magnet to play with?

Until July!

May 2016 Update

Due to an injury to your update typist, this update will be very short since he can now only type with his left hand.  On 5/5 I was playing evil dodge ball (aka sole survivor) with the cadets at CAP, when I slipped and fell backwards, catching myself on both hands.  I broke my right wrist and sprained my left.

The break is in the end of the larger bone (radius). The end is broken off and split in two

I had surgery on it Monday 5/16 to insert a fancy Y-shaped plate and two external pins.  The pins will be removed in about 4 weeks, but the plate will be there forever.  My Dr. said it shouldn’t set off metal detectors.  My kids said I should have asked for adamantium claws while they were in there.  Yesterday was pretty rough from the pain, but I’m feeling much better today.

The only other month’s excitement was my son, Cai's, birthday on 5/5, my son-in-law, Kevin’s, birthday on 5/14, and voting in a presidential primary for the first time in my life where my party’s candidate wasn’t already decided.  My choice didn’t win, but as Abigail told me she saw on Facebook, it doesn’t matter who is elected president because Jesus is still King!

Until June!

April Update 2016

We had a very nice Easter with family at our house after our Sonrise service, church breakfast, and Easter Worship.  He is risen indeed!

We’ve started doing some testing on Windows10 at work.  So far I like what I see, although we aren’t yet to where we are using it every day.  The test results have all come out passing, so we should be able to start moving people over to it later this year.

God is very gracious to us.  Here’s proof:  This year, Krista and I didn’t work with our Journey teens (Awana’s program for 9th – 12th graders).  Their leaders were Scott Anderson, Jon Burghardt, and our daughter, Abigail.  However, we wanted our whole family to join them for Summit, the annual national competition, because Krista and Amelia had earned their Citation Awards for completing all of the Awana books from 3rd – 12th grade, and we wanted to be there to see them get that award.  Since the Journey team was small this year, we offered to take everyone in our van.

Jon was in Michigan on business and planned to meet us there.  The night before we were to leave, Scott came down with fever, chills, and vomiting.  He is in remission right now for leukemia and so is on immune suppressant medication, so when he gets something like this, it is a big deal.  He ended up going to the hospital with a bacterial blood infection, and was in the hospital the whole time we were gone.  God’s grace #1:  Scott is doing much better now, and is back serving at our church again.

Krista and I had been to Summit several times before, so we knew the routine, pretty much.  We made the trip to Vienna, Virginia (near Washington DC), without incident (God’s grace #2), and got the teens all registered for their events.  The teens with us were our son, Zach, and Ben and Hannah Holcomb.  Scott was the coach for their quiz team, but Jon had taught them the lessons, so we thought he could coach since Scott couldn’t make it.  Abigail had been at the quiz practices, but hadn’t really worked with the material other than doing it herself several years ago.

The next crisis was when we found out Jon’s project was taking longer than expected.  It turned out he wasn’t released until Saturday, which was the last day of Summit, so he couldn’t come at all.  So, Abigail was thrown in last minute as the quiz coach, being the only leader who had been with the teens at all.  But she did a great job (God’s grace #3) coaching them, and the team did very well, making it to the Gold round before being eliminated.  They also participated in volleyball and Awana Games with other churches, and they had a lot of fun meeting those teens.

Pennsylvania Welcome Center on the way down

Studying with the team from Syracuse

More studying

Volleyball

Chatting before quizzing

Ready to quiz

Coach Abigail

Crushing the multiple choice questions

Ben correctly answering a speed question

Former teammate, now opponent, Lissa Phillips, answering a speed question

Hannah correctly answering a speed question

Gold medal round awards

Yes, they're real!

Awana Games basketball relay

Hannah slides in for the win!

Ben rounds the last corner in the agility race

That blur is Zach

Balloon relay

The Games team

The Goofy team

Krista Matthews, Citation Achiever

Amelia and Krista Matthews, Citation Achievers

All the Citation Achievers

At the Washington Monument (OK, not really)

Amelia loves George

The Holcombs at the White House (again, not really)

More White House silliness

Doing the Lovell, a Summit tradition (ref. Apollo 13)

We spent Sunday morning at the Udvar-Hazy Center Smithsonian Air and Space Museum near Dulles Airport.  It was a fascinating museum with lots of great exhibits and fun things to do.  When we were finished there, we made our way home.

The team in front of the Space Shuttle

Amelia and Amelia (Earhart and Matthews)

In the observation tower

Digging the glasses!

God smoothed things out for us this whole weekend (God’s grace #’s 4 and following), from the hotel reservation, traveling, registration, making connections with people we needed to find, and on and on.  We are so thankful to Him for caring so wonderfully for us.  He even had our hotel be within a couple of blocks of a Chick-Fil-A!  As I said, God is very gracious to us!

Chick-Fil-A!

To finish this month’s adventures, this past weekend, Zach and I went with our Civil Air Patrol squadron to Wright Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, to visit their museum.  It was a lot like the Udvar-Hazy Center with cool displays and fun things to do.

Getting ready to leave for Wright-Patterson AFB Museum

Pictures we had taken at the WPAFB Museum, this one with B2 Stealth Bomber and F22 (?) Raptor

With Air Force One

With SR71 Blackbird

We went bowling on base after the museum tour

Now I get to stay home for a while (whew!).  I’m looking forward to a normal week of work followed by a normal weekend of family and worship.

Talk to you in May!