Life’s Curveballs

This week has been a good one. I’ve spent quite a bit of time home with my girls, playing games, skating, and what not. It’s also been a bit emotional and more than a bit tragic.

Yesterday (Thursday), Aaron (my brother-in-law) called me and said that we needed to go and see my Uncle Randy in the hospital. Apparently he was having problems breathing in the morning and asked his wife to take him to the hospital. They went in at about 5:30AM. Aaron and I got to the hospital at around noon. Randy was certainly having problems breathing. The doctors thought that he had double pneumonia. He’s had heart problems for a while now, apparently with one of the valves.

My Aunt Janene seemed especially shaken up. She’s gone through quite a bit, to say the least. Aaron and I left a blessing with Randy and we left feeling pretty concerned about him, but also pretty good. We figured that he’d just get better and come home. Apparently later on (about 10pm?), he went into cardiac arrest. I spoke with my mom this morning and she told me that he had died. I was shocked, frustrated, angry, but, most of all I think, concerned about his family and just sad. They have gone through much.

Randy was such a loving, giving person. He was always willing to help, always wanting to help. He was very active in the disabled community in Phoenix. He did a lot of speaking, singing, counseling, and consulting, trying to help people cope with their disabilities and work through them. He was successful in what he did — people really seemed to like him. But more than that, he just loved people. Through all of the struggles and issues that people go through, particularly in family situations, there was no doubt that he loved you. He loved his family dearly and would do nearly anything for them. And I think that the love was returned and the respect mutual.

Randy will be sorely missed.

The day after

Abigail and Grace love their roller skates. It’s a riot watching them. Grace’s have a little safety, don’t-let-the-wheels-roll feature on them, which means that she’s basically walking around on them. Abby’s are real roller skates, so she’s flying all over the place. Grace thinks that she’s able to do it better because she’s just been “practicing more.” We’ll let her have her satisfaction for now.

We went up to Mom and Dad’s again today because Auntie Catherine was over there doing everyone’s hair. Julie said she was due for a cut and my fro was just starting to sprout, so we went up and mooched. Grandpa suggested that we take the girls to Chuck-E-Cheese tonight, and there’s no going back once both grandpa and the girls have it in their heads. Lucy was a hoot. She was so tired that she fell asleep in her seat about 200 yards out of the parking lot.

I think I’m going to get a digital camera, and while I’m at it I’ll upgrade my printer. Here’s what I’m going to get: Canon PIXMA MP800 All In One Photo Printer and Canon Powershot SD550 7.1MP Digital Elph Camera with 3x Optical Zoom. I can’t really afford either one of them, but I’m pretty raging about the camera and bag being stolen the other night. I guess it’s my way of thinking I’m tough. That and I’m hoping for a decent bonus come March.

Update: Well I bought them. I got a free 256MB SD card with the camera and a $50 rebate, so that helps. Of course the SD card I had that got stolen was 1GB, so quite the difference. I’ll be posting pictures when I get the stuff. The camera should be here Friday, the printer hopefully sometime next week.

Feliz Navidad

Well, Merry Christmas. I was a great day today. Fajitas was as good, as always, last night. I could eat the shrimp all night long.

I went to get the video camera out last night to get some candid shots of the girls getting ready for Christmas and for bed. We couldn’t find it anywhere. To make a long story short, we realized that when the van got broken into 2 weeks ago, the losers stole our camera bag, with the video camera, digital camera, and a few tapes in it. I had Abigail and Grace’s most recent ballet recital tape in there, the Polar Express fun, plus a few others. I also had a SD card in the digital camera with about 600 pictures on it. I would have given the idiots the camera — I just want the tapes and pictures. I guess we learned a lesson about taking the camera out.

So I got out my old-school video camera this morning and took some video of the girls on Christmas morning. They got bikes, skates, dolls, clothes, and all kinds of fun stuff. They were pretty excited. I got Julie some diamond earrings (that I bought on eBay!), and she gave me 3 of the most beautiful pictures I’ve ever seen — of my 3 girls, of course. I’ll scan them in one of these days and post them.

Someday I’ll even get a decent digital camera. Now that my old, cheap, free one got stolen, maybe I’ll get a new one. Let me know if you have any suggestions. I’ll most likely get a Canon of some kind.
We went over to Mom and Dad’s tonight and had dinner with everyone. It was a good time. My grandparents really enjoyed themselves, I think.

It’s also Julie’s Dad’s birthday today. A Christmas baby! Happy Birthday!

Christmas Eve

It’s Christmas Eve. Some friends, Ryan and Sherri Steele, have this brilliant idea to take other people’s children on Christmas Eve afternoon to make cookies and what not. We think it’s the greatest idea we’ve heard in a while.

We’ll be going over to Fajitas tonight for the Elcock family traditional Christmas Eve dinner and then back here for a quiet Christmas Eve with hot chocolate from Julie’s new favorite toy, the cocoa maker. Should be exciting. Then supposedly Santa Claus comes later tonight. We’ll see . . .

Update: In case anyone out there cares . . . while the cocoa thing is great, it’s incredibly loud. You would think that the geniuses who came up with such an idea would have the sense to not make it sound like a jet engine when the thing kicks on. Really just a minor inconvenience, but a very unnecessary one.