Spring Miracles

Spring has brought us such a lot of nice surprises and miracles!

In March Brent's mom was diagnosed with a type of early Alzheimer's. I absolutely love Brent's mom! I can still remember the very, very first time I met her... because I remember instantly knowing she was someone I really, really admired and wanted to emulate. Brent's mom is one of my favorite people and I always look forward to anytime we get to spend together. I love that she has always treated me like a friend, even when I'm shy or awkward. I love when Brent shares his childhood stories about his mom because I love the way she handles things and I so want to be the type of mother that she is. I love being around her and getting the opportunity to watch how she embraces life and people and she inspires me over and over to become a better person... and to just relax and love the little, fun, happy things in life. Although Julie's diagnosis was a heart-break to all of us it has also been a blessing. I think she loves finally knowing what has been wrong, and luckily she has a type of Alzheimer that starts at the back of the brain... so she still has great memory (way better than my memory is).

Another surprise bit of Spring news was my brother was diagnosed with Colon Cancer. Once again, this was NOT our favorite news, but it has brought with it miracles. I have been reading Gerald Lund's book "Divine Signatures" lately and in his book he says:

"As a popular saying goes, 'Coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous.' But in my experience, it is just the opposite. What we call coincidence is God's way of letting Himself be known. Sometimes, the Lord sends His blessings in such a highly unusual, dramatic, or precisely timed manner, that it might be likened to a 'divine signature'. It is as though the Lord 'signs' the blessing personally so that we will know with certainty that it comes from Him."

This is how I feel about Kris's cancer. Kris has had some bowel/groin problems since October. (If you want a good laugh I would recommend reading his website entry from 10/29/2010... my favorite part is him throwing-up on the side of a road near a group of people having a fun campfire outing...). Anyway Kris has been to a few doctors to try and get his problems figured out. Doctors thought it was one thing then another.... some doctors were nice, others were a little grumpy and thought Kris was being a bit dramatic about his pains. With some of Kris's bowel problems he was having what HE describes as a FAIR amount of blood with his stools... most of the REST OF US would consider the amount of blood to be CONSIDERABLE. Anyway Kris took a picture of this blood so he could show the doctor how much blood he was loosing. That picture really helped to move things along. Kris had some more tests done which continued to mystify the doctors even more. Finally they had Kris undergo a colonoscopy. WHAT FUN! A colonoscopy saved my brother's life. :) Right away they found a tumor that had grown around the entire diameter of the colon and had spread a little to Kris's bladder. Right after his colonoscopy Kris had some more scans and tests done and was then set up for surgery by the end of the week. Kris now has about 1 foot less colon than he did a few weeks ago... but he is recovering super! He got to spend about 2 weeks with a catheter, which didn't look fun, and I'm guessing it was not the most impressive "show and tell" item for co-workers and schoolmates or friends... but luckily the catheter is finally out also. Tests were done on like 40 lymph nodes recovered from around the tumor and ALL of them came back cancer free (which is a SUPER miracle). What a miracle that Kris didn't give up when he had grumpy doctors who didn't know what was wrong with him! What a miracle that the doctors could find this tumor now before it got any worse and what a miracle that the cancer didn't spread. Spring surprises we are grateful for!

Another Spring surprise... our peach tree has blossoms! We try to keep our tree pruned, but really we have NO IDEA how in the world to prune. We also try to keep our peaches thinned out a bit so the tree doesn't get TOO loaded down with peach weight in the fall. Well last year our poor peach tree was extremely loaded down with peaches AND a massive storm blew through the neighborhood. Once the storm was over about half of our poor peach tree had broken off! It was the saddest thing to see such massive branches just lying there on the ground! I thought the poor tree had lost so many big branches that it might not bloom this year... if it lived through the winter. But the tree lives on AND apparently might even have some fruit this fall for us! Yum! This was a spring miracle to me!

Our last Spring surprise... BRENT IS ALMOST, ALMOST, ALMOST DONE WITH SCHOOL!! There is indeed a light at the end of the tunnel! Wahoo! I haven't seen him much over the last two weeks. He's been getting home around 2-3AM... or else sleeping in the car at school. He has been working super, super hard on his final project and I totally admire his endurance and his dedication to get as much done before his deadline as he could... and to do his best. His project looks awesome. I know the selection of his project wasn't his favorite (he really wanted to get assigned to one of the other groups doing more exciting projects) but I am so impressed with his ability to still come up with fun ideas to make this project exciting! I got to attend his presentation today and loved getting to hear him explain his concept and ideas for this project. I think he is basically the world's greatest architect and i can't wait for him to graduate in a few weeks! (And... if you are looking for a fun outing, all the Architecture Graduate projects will be on display at Trolley Square beginning on Friday through the next week.)