Amy had a major surgery on February 8th. A colectomy. WOW!!!! What a way to start the year. The Doctor did some pathology report on 104 Lymph Nodes. One came back Stage 3 cancer. So surgery #2 on February 13th, which involved a permanent ostomy. Amy spent six weeks of recovery at her parents house to be close to the Wound Care Clinic and her Doctor. It was a slow recovery process but very successful. Ricky brought Erik & Mikayla EVERY weekend to visit. That was always something nice to look forward too. She returned back to work part-time in April then full-time the first week of May. Chemotherapy began in April and will continue through October. A few treatments have been postponed due to blood count numbers being too low and two being critically high. We have added alot of helpful foods and vitamins, and as of today, Wednesday, July 28th, she is "half-way done". YAY!!!! Due to the health issues she put in her notice at work. Her last day is Friday, August 13th. This will allow for full focus on her health and resting to keep these numbers looking good. :o) As a family we have also decided to homeschool our children this year. We are all looking forward to the new routine and Christ-based curriculum. (Especially Erik)
Well, that is a brief explanation of the huge event that started our year off.
The week of June 13-19 we traveled to Vail, CO. It was gorgeous. The mountains, the temperature, and the animals. It snowed on Monday. Snow and June do not fit in the same sentence in Missouri. It didn't snow a lot, but just the fact that it snowed was cool. (no pun intended) :o) Ricky and the kids went hiking, we all four went horseback riding. The kids swam alot and played racketball to their hearts content, and we just enjoyed some R&R for a whole week. We played cards almost every night and taught the kids how to play Hearts and Spades. It was a blast. Below are a few pictures. More will be posted soon. Hopefully, I can get a little more regular on posting to this Blog. Sorry for the delay.
Erik & Mikayla riding a horse (an iron horse)
Ricky & Erik before the horse ride
Erik & Mikayla on the Chipmunk Rock
Chipmunks at one of our stopping points
A view from our back door