Getting There

It's going to be short today.

DeAnne's research paper is done.  Huge relief.  With that out of the way, we were able to work a schedule out for her to get her through the next week or so and put the rest of this class to bed.  Hopefully by this time next week this thing will be behind us and we can focus on Harrison and getting ready for his arrival.

I went to Dothan yesterday and spent the day with Memaw at Flowers.  She was doing a little better.  Towards the end of the afternoon, they decided to try and see if the procedure they did on Tuesday had helped her digestion and gave her a popsicle.  It was the first thing other than ice chips that she had ate in probably 2 weeks.  Hopefully, prayerfully, this is the start of the end of all this mess and she'll be getting back to normal soon.

And that's about it.  I'll talk about the weekend on Tuesday.  See you then.

--Paul

Crunch Week

We've made it down to the last two weeks of DeAnne's college class.  This is crunch week.  She has a quiz to do this week and her paper is due at the end of the week.  If she can make it through this week, she'll just have one more quiz to take and a couple of discussion board questions to answer and she'll be done.  It's going to be a long week and it's going to be tough, but I know she can get it done.

As I've said before, once we get through the class, we'll be down to finishing up preparations for the baby. DeAnne's about to start having showers, so we've got to get the rest of the baby's room cleaned out so we'll have somewhere to put all that mess.  On top of that, the furniture should be coming some time in the next week or so.  DeAnne's getting antsy about the furniture so I'm probably going to call and check on it this week.  I think she starting really get that nesting feeling so the biggest thing I've got to do is to keep her focused on her class this week and get through that.  Then she can turn the nesting loose and worry about the nursery.

We had a good Easter.  We rode over to Dothan and saw DeAnne's grandmother for a little while.  She looked a lot better.  She's at HealthSouth rehab now and once they get her back on her feet, I think she's going to be pretty much back to normal.

My grandmother was moved to Flowers in Dothan yesterday.  They're going to run another scope today and see if they can pinpoint the blockage in her GI track and once they do, we'll know more about what it's going to take to fix it.  We're praying that it's fairly minor and that it won't require majorly invasive surgery to fix.

See you on Thursday.

--Paul

The Song Remains the Same

I'm having a hard time this coming up with something this morning.  Nothing's really changed since Tuesday.  DeAnne's grandmother is still in the hospital in Opp and they've moved MeMaw to the Opp nursing home.  DeAnne's still doing class work.  There's just not really been anything that's happened since Tuesday.  We're in a holding pattern waiting for the air traffic controller to wake up from his nap.

The weekend is probably just going to be more of the same.  DeAnne doing school work while I do yard work on Saturday.  Sunday is Easter, so that should be awesome.  I'm really looking forward to next Easter.  Harrison will be about 9 months and should be stinking cute in a little Easter outfit.

That's about all I've got though.  Sorry that it's so short.  Hopefully next week will be better and I can find something a little more interesting to talk about.  Have a good weekend.

--Paul

More of the Same

Not much happened over the weekend.  The biggest news was that DeAnne made a "B" on her latest test and she made a 100 on each of the three projects that were due to be turned in by Saturday.  She was pretty excited about both grades and I was pretty excited for her.  She practically killed herself trying to study for that test so it was good to see all her hard work pay off.  The only bad part about it was that there wasn't much time to celebrate her victory.  The next test is now just a week away and her research paper is due in less than two weeks.  There's about three weeks left in the class and they're going to be intense.

One other really cool thing was that we had our 4-D ultrasound on Friday.  The girl that did it was really nice and really took her time to try and get some good pictures.  It was a good experience and the pictures turned out pretty good.  Harrison didn't really want to cooperate at first, he kept getting his hand in the way of his face, but eventually we got a couple of good pictures.  I've alway had a hard time looking at these things and telling anything about them, but I guess I just needed it to be my child it was a picture of to understand.  From all I can tell, he's a cute little booger.  DeAnne posted several of them to her blog, so if you haven't seen them, be sure to go there and check them out.

There's no real change with the grandmothers.  We ask that you continue to pray for them.  They moved my Grandmother to a regular room on Saturday and she seemed to start going back down hill when they did.  DeAnne's grandmother just continues to be in the Opp hospital and doesn't seem to be improving at all.  We know that the Lord will do what's best and what is in His plans, but at the same time, we're asking that he allow them both to see their great-grandson in July.

I'll see you back here on Thursday.

--Paul

Music Time

It's been a pretty good while since I talked about music, so I figured it'd be a good topic for today.  The other day, I got an email coupon for a discount on CDs from Amazon and I took the chance to pick up a couple of albums I had been wanting for a while.

First is Chris August: No Far Away (MP3 $5.00, CD $8.99).  I've been hearing "Starry Night" on the radio for what seems like forever now and I've always wanted to pick up this album just based off that one song.  When the new single, "7x70", started playing a couple of weeks ago, it kicked me into overdrive wanting this CD.  I haven't had the time to really listen to it like I want to, but from what I've heard, the rest of the CD is just as good as the first two singles.  August is nominated for several Dove awards this year and it's pretty obvious why.

Next up is Matthew West: Story of Your Life (MP3 $7.99, CD $8.99).  After having listened to this CD two or three times and reading the liner notes, I'm convinced that every single person should own a copy of this album.  When West got ready to record what would become this album, he asked fans to send him the stories of their lives.  He took those thousands of stories and read them and then wrote this album based off them.  The liner notes contain the lyrics for each song followed by a summary of the story (or stories) that inspired that song.  It's an amazing project that simply and beautifully testifies of God's love and grace and providence.  West covers a broad range of topics and in the end there's inspiration to be found in pretty much whatever situation you're facing.  You owe it to yourself to get this CD, and I would encourage you to get the actual, physical CD so that you can really read the liner notes.  On top of the stories, the songs on their own are really good.  Anyone that listens to Christian radio has heard "My Own Little World".  The rest of the album stands up to the quality of that single and even surpasses it at times.  Best $9 I've spent in a long time.

So that's the two newest CDs I've been listening to.  Have a good weekend and I'll see you back here on Tuesday.

--Paul

Tough Going

We seem to be entering one of those times in life when you feel like you're going to get buried by it all.

My grandmother, Memaw, is back in the hospital.  She's not been able to eat or drink the last couple of days.  Hopefully they'll be able to do some tests today and find out what's going on.

DeAnne's grandmother, Nanny, still isn't doing well either.  She's in the Opp nursing home right now but they want to move her to Andalusia for rehab.  They can't move her though because she's not even got the strength to stand up right now.

On top of all the sickness, DeAnne's class is still going strong and she's getting close to the point of getting behind on things.  On my end, the yard work that needs doing is starting to pile up.  Bushes need trimming, grass needs cutting and pine straw needs spreading.  Then of course, there's the baby preparations.  We still don't have the nursery cleaned out.  The furniture is supposed to be in at the end of the month and we've got to get the hutch and my old toy chest cleaned out and moved along with a pile of other things that need to be put away.

As much as I feel threatened by all of this, I know that we're going to be fine.  We're going to be fine because the Lord is in control and I'm trusting in Him to guide us through all of this.  Really, this is probably one of the greatest times of our lives.  Harrison is a blessing that neither of us can give enough thanks for and he's not even here yet.  Things are crazy and things are busy and our families are hurting from sickness, but how blessed are we that we have these problems and yet know that the Lord is in control and He will guide us through them.

--Paul

I Got Nothing

I don't really have anything to talk about today.  Sorry, but we're just kind of in a holding pattern until DeAnne gets done with this class and there just hasn't been anything going on the past couple of days and we don't have anything planned for the weekend.  I know, it's a huge change from a month or two ago.  It seemed like we had something every single weekend there for a while.  Maybe we're just naturally slowing down in preparation for the baby's arrival.  Who knows?

I'll probably be doing some yard work Saturday morning.  Pretty much every bush in our yard needs to be cut back.  It's going to take forever to do it, so I might as well get started.  The grass actually doesn't need cutting that bad.  I guess the couple of cold snaps we've had since I first cut it has kept it from getting wild. I also spread about four bags of weed and feed on the areas with the most weeds and that stuff has done an amazing job so far.  The only problem with it is that you can see where I missed because the grass is so green where I put it out.  It's better than having weeds though.

If I'm in the yard, you can bet that DeAnne will be inside studying.  That's probably going to be the mode of operation for the next four or five weeks.  Her next test opens up next week and she's already starting to worry about it.  Be praying that the next few weeks move quickly and that she's able to get through this class.

Have a good weekend.

--Paul

School Is Hard

If this class that DeAnne's taking doesn't kill us both, it'll truly be a miracle.  I don't know if it's that having been out of school for more than five years or that it's the totally online thing or just that it's a master's level course and it's harder than undergrad classes were, but this thing is kicking both our rear ends.  I've taken to reading the chapters along with her so that she'll have a person that she can have a fluid conversation with about the material.  Of course, I'm not a teacher and I've never studied any of this stuff before, but it's a lot of philosophy stuff about teaching and education and to me, a lot of it just turns in to a bunch of wordy psycho-babble that you end up boiling down to about one sentence.  A lot of it also seems fairly liberal and that part of it just crawls all over me and my conservative, Christian influenced views.  Things like corporal punishment and the sin nature of man are blatantly looked down on by the author of the book.  Thankfully, if we can just get DeAnne through this one class, she'll be able to get her certificate renewed and we can decide later if she really wants to finish her master's or not.  At this point, I'm not sure if either of us believe it to be worth the cost.

So that's my soapbox for the day.  We had a pretty good weekend.  DeAnne studied, I cleaned up some of the house, we spent some time with family and friends and we had our usual Sunday of church, grocery shopping and church.  Pretty standard stuff.  Hope you had a good one too.  See you Thursday.

--Paul