Update

Thursday, January 28th, 2010 ~ Well hopefully this picture
won't gross anyone out...just wanted to give you all an update.
My healing is moving slow. I'm ready to feel better but my body
is definately not. As you can see, my incision area is really bruised
tho the swelling is slightly going down. This is where the drain tube
was put in. It's still sore, which is to be expected and I'll have the
stitches removed this coming Wednesday.
I had a post-op visit with oral surgeon Dr. Hinze yesterday. He
said the incision area looks good and removed some inner stitches
and flushed my mouth. We discovered I do have some bone fragments
out of place on the lower left side that will need taken care of but for now
his main concern is for me to get better. He said the terrible headaches I've
been having may just become a regular part of my life now. The low-grade
fevers I'm having he said is a good sign. It means my body is still fighting
the infection. And the pain when I breathe is something we'll moniter.
My body was under seige and really had to battle a serious infection, which
it's still trying to do. It is going to take considerable time before I'm well and
feeling like myself. It's frustrating. I'm tired, sore, weak and to be honest, mad.
Mad that this happened and that I had to go through this. It is devastating not
only physically but financially and has been hard on Bernie and the boys' as well.
I really never imagined this would be the outcome of what was supose to be a very
routine procedure of having my wisdom teeth removed. It's going to be a long haul
for sure!

One thing that helps though is the wonderful, caring friends
I have! Dear friend and neighbor, Tonya, went ABOVE & BEYOND
and brought over this delicious meal for an army last night!! Roast,
carrots, potatos, salad, dinner rolls and brownies!!!! WOW!! You
should have seen the boys' inhaling it! I was actually able to eat
a little bit as well and it tasted good to have 'real' food!

Then this morning, friend and neighbor Mike delivered
another delicious meal for us! Ham, potatos and a green
bean casserole!! He made us a wonderful meal Monday
night too! The kids said they haven't eaten so good! Wait...
are they insulting my cooking??? Anyway, can't say enough
how much we really really appreciate all of the wonderful
meals and how blessed we feel to have such amazing neighbors,
in both directions! I've lost 10 lbs now but at this rate I'm in
trouble! :)
Thanks again to all for your thoughts and prayers!

Wisdom Unrecognized

Tuesday January 26th, 2010 ~ This is me this morning after
a very long week. This is the 'aftermath' of having my wisdom
teeth pulled last Monday the 18th. I had the 2 bottom wisdom
teeth and 2 other bottom teeth pulled. It was a hard procedure, with
them having to break a piece of my jaw and remove the tooth in
several pieces. I went home in a lot of pain and it just got gradually
worse. While I expected the procedure to not be pleasant, I never
expected I would experience so much pain, spend 2 days in the North
Platte emergency room, 3 days in the NP hospital or have 2 surgeries
to repair the massive infection I developed!!! The whole ordeal was
very surreal, I could not believe what I had to endure. In this picture,
you can somewhat see I have a some bruising and am still swollen. The
white bandage on my neck is from my second surgery yesterday morning,
where drain tubes were removed. I have stitches inside my mouth and
outside on my neck so I am very very sore. Hopefully this is the beginning
of the healing process!

This is a picture Bernie took on cell phone Saturday late afternoon
when I came out of my first surgery. I was so swollen and had a bandage
all around my face and had to be on oxygen to keep my vitals up. I was
really unrecognizable. The first surgery was to scrape some of the massive
infection out of my mouth and to insert drain tubes into my neck. I spent
2 days of laying in a hospital bed with them in my neck, very uncomfortable
and very painful. I had 3 days of continuous i.v. antibiotics and fluids as well.
The entire staff, er staff and nurses and operating staff at North Platte were
wonderful and Dr. Hinze, oral surgeon, was amazing in repairing the damage
done by Dr. Lashley. Unfortunately for Dr. Lashley, I was the second case in a
week! Another area man was in the hospital at the same time I was, experiencing
the same exact thing!!........... I will say no more about that at this time...

These are now the medications I am on. I take up to 4-7 pills at
a time, 3-4 times a day as well as having to keep my mouth
flushed after I eat. Eating........ya, well, thats not happening!
I've had mainly broth, jello and oatmeal this week and even
that was painful to eat. Needless to say, so far I have lost 8lbs
this week! Great, but not the diet I was wanting to experience!

A big thank you to all my wonderful friends
and family for all of the care and concern!! It
means so much!

I had several visitors and received so many wonderful gifts
and beautiful flowers!! Sister Teresa came to the emergency
room Saturday to see me before I went into surgery and sat
with Bernie while I was in the operating room and was there
when I came out. Sunday, Mom, Dad, Jenny and Becky stopped
by with beautiful red tipped yellow roses and a sack of goodies,
including a new lounge outfit, lotion, book and magazine. They
were shocked to see me, I really did not look like myself. My
friend Tonya also stopped by to see me, and brought me a yummy
fragrance plug in. Sunday evening, Grace brought the boys' up to
see me. I dont think they were quite expecting their Mom to look
so bad. Monday morning when I came out of surgery,
I had 2 deliveries, a beautiful pink rose and balloon from friend
Monica and a beautiful spring basket from my 'friends' and staff at
Paxton schools. Sister-in-law Lisa also stopped by to visit and brought
me some very pretty roses. She said I looked "pretty"....LIAR! Sisters
Jenny and Teresa stopped by again too. Bernie got me some beautiful
flowers and a balloon too. What a trooper he was!!! He missed several
days of work and stayed with me every minute at the hospital, having
to sleep in a very uncomfortable chair and having no sleep right along
with me. He's the greatest!!! THANK YOU honey!

Dr. Hinze released me last evening. Needless
to say, Bernie and I were both glad to be headed
home. When we got home Grace was taking supper
out of the oven and doing laundry! How nice! I really
appreciated that! She held down the fort while we were
gone and helped with the boys'. We hadn't been home15 min.
when neighbor and friend, Dana brought food over! Her husband
lovingly prepared a delicious meal for us that we'll have tonight.
What neighbors! :) We so appreciate everyone's thoughtfulness!!

I go back to Dr. Hinze's office tomorrow for a follow up. Hopefully
things will still look okay and that the infection is going away. I'm
not sure what I would do if I had to go back to the hospital again!
I'm ready to put that behind me and to start feeling better! It's
going to be a long process tho so I'm just trying to take it easy and
take my medicine and do what I'm supose to. This is all certainly
NOT what I expected or ever imagined I'd go through. I will keep
you all updated. Thank you again for prayers and concerns! Love you all!

Junior Varsity BBall

Friday Jan. 15, 2010 ~ Hopefully you're not
getting tired of basketball pictures! Tis the season!!
Friday the Wallace Wildcats traveled to Tiger Territory.
Garrett started the JV game and played almost the entire
game.

Garrett played a great game. He made about
8-10 pts., I lost track, including this lay up.

This would've been a great lay-up too.....

but the ball got stuck!!

The Tigers won 50-28! Way to go Paxton!

Sat. Jan. 16, 2010 ~ Lucky for us, it was another

home game, though 3 days in a row of basketball

and 16 hours of sitting = BLEACHER BUTT!!!!

Tonight we play Creek Valley.

Garrett did a great job of getting down the

court to stop this basket from going in!

Another win for the JV's! Awesome job team!

Garrett after the game with 'girlfriend' Tori.

Isn't she a cutie?!! :)

Grandma Grace also made it to the last 3 games

with us. She enjoyed watching and the boys' were

glad she came to cheer them on.

Tyler's Jr High Basketball Game

1.14.10 - This afternoon we traveled to
Hershey for Tyler's 2nd jr. high bball game.
He started in the 'B' team game.

Tyler is a great player. Go #33!!

Tyler had a great shot and scored a point
in this shot! Go Tyler!

'B' team won 22-10!! Great job Tigers!

Tyler had a lot of playing time in the 'A' game also.

He did a great job on defense and made #15 travel in this shot.

Throwing the ball in....buddy and teammate
Connor had a bloody nose for most of the game.

Another great game and another win for the Tigers!
Great job!

Tyler's Fans!! ( We didn't know Cade popped in behind us)
Grandma Grace came to watch too.

Hunting over Christmas break

Here's a few pictures of the boys' hunting
during Xmas vacation. Tyler shot this coyote
and Garrett shot the pheasant on this outing.

Tyler bagged this pheasant on a snowy day.



Garrett and Cousin Joe spent some time
together pheasant hunting while Joe was
home for Xmas break.

Basketball Action

We're back into the swing of basketball
action after Xmas break. Friday night,
Jan. 8th, Paxton hosted Maywood. Garrett
saw lots of JV action.

Garrett scored 6pts during this game.

While going for a lay-up, Maywood's #5
came up and knocked Garrett's feet out
from under him. All I got was Garrett
whaling through the air.

Paxton clearly won this game! Go Tigers!

Garrett saw quite a little Varsity action too.

Another win for the Tiger varsity team! Great job guys'!

Sat. Jan 9th, '10 ~ We traveled to Hershey
today. Garrett played a great JV game.

Even in the JV game, we were out-matched
playing against a team who usually plays much
bigger teams.

This was a tough loss for the JV... The boys' played hard,
despite the score they never gave up.

Garrett got some Varsity playing time
in tonight too and had some good plays.

But, another tough loss for Paxton. At one point it was 21-18
so we started out keeping the score pretty tight but Hershey
was netting 3 pointers left and right and the score got away
from us. Bernie and I did end up on North Platte's KNOP-TV
news tonight tho cheering on our Tigers!! :) Go Big Blue & Gold!

Deep Freeze

Mother Nature provided the perfect subjects
for me to use my new camera on. We had
several days of frigid temperatures and a
beautiful frost. The sun came out though and
melted everything so I'm glad I took these
when I did. Enjoy!

Tyler's First Deer

Here are some pictures of the proud hunter
with his first deer! A 4x2 mule deer! Great
job Tyler!!

A nice looking deer for sure and a great
one for his first one! He had a lot of fun
deer hunting with his Dad. It had been
several years since Bernie's gone deer
hunting so he enjoyed it too.

Time for jerky!