Mart Seat of Wisdoms

 My experience with catholic school has been Saturday mornings and 2 weeks in the summer attending Catholic classes taught by strict nuns very strict nuns.

When Bryan told me that he and mary were going to send the boys to a private Catholic school, I thought oh oh.

Well I love this school. I love that the boys are thriving, making friends, getting a great education, including religion and they are all getting straight A’s. Most I love that family’s are included - encouraged to participate.

All Saints Day

Each year the third graders dress up as a chosen Saint and families are invited to attend mass with the kids. This year we got to see Owen dressed as Saint Michael the archangel. 

Greeting the public

The 3rd graders lined the hallway entering the church while we entered
for mass.

Owen and his class

Proud grandparents 

Grandparents Day

Each year we are treated by the kids to visit their classes, meet their teachers and spend sometime learning about their life everyday at school. We got to visit Owen’s and Luke’s classroom, meet their teachers and saw the desks where they spend the majority of their day. Roger is in 7th grade and travels from classroom to classroom. He did take us down to his favorite, the science lab, where he helps caring for the class turtles. 

Luke’s room

Owen’s room

The we all went down to attend mass with all the kids who had grandparents there that day. When all the kids stood up and sang and blessed each of their grandparents - I gotta tell you it tears me up.

Attending church service

The Nutcracker

Each year the 5th grade puts on the play The Nutcracker. This year Luke was selected to be a clown. He’s played the part perfect. Though it was a little difficult to figure out which one he was.

Top of the pyramid- they all fall down

Luke gets carried away

The clowns were my favorite part of the play. Just saying.

Our little clown

Mom and Dad

Yes, I love this school.

And last and the best. Luke’s 5th grade basketball team brought home a first place trophy in the tournament last week.

Front and center in the showcase

He took the shot (he’s number 25) to take it into overtime when his friend (the other Luke in his class) got the winning shot.

I’m glad Bryn nd Mary found this gem of a school where they teach and care for my grandsons.

 

Morton Arboretum

 I have been wanting to go to the Morton Arboretum ever since Bryan and Mary took the boys and they couldn’t stop talking about it. That was before Covid and the world shut down of everything. 

Time gotta away from me and other things seemed more important. I saw a TV special on the new exhibits “Of The Earth”. Sculptures made out of nature resources. Before the summer was over I vowed to get there to see them. 

Tuesday was a perfect fall day and I asked Sharen if she wanted to go. Both Mike and Dup were working. She said yes - I bought the tickets and we spent a beautiful day walking around the park.

I’m glad I waited till the trees were coloring too. It was so beautiful.

We strolled thru the gardens and saw a bunch of flowers still blooming. We walked around the lake were they had a scarecrow contest for the scouts (both boys and girls)

We had no idea where the 6 sculptures were so we decided to hop in the car to find them instead of wandering around clueless.

Hear

Strata

Oculus

Ona

Check out the eyes

All the materials used for these sculptures was found in the park. So interesting to see. And they encouraged you to touch them.

Check out the blue skies. It really was a gorgeous day. As we drove thru the park (all on one way street)we saw random chairs. We got curious so we pulled over to see why. OMG the views were crazy. So much color. 

We stopped to eat the snacks we brought and to take in the scenery. 

We promised each other that we’ll come back in the spring. They have a daffodil field! I bet the colors and the smells are just as beautiful. Maybe we can find that 330 year old oak tree next time?

It was a very good day.

TAVR

 Transcatheter aortic valve replacement.

Mike’s valve stenosis has gotten to the point that he needed valve replacement. We knew this time was coming, but we were hoping for more time. His cardiologist put us with a group of doctors in his office. They call themselves the “valve team”

Their sole responsibility is to help patients with valve replacement. Mike has had open heart surgery 6 1/2 years ago, so opening him up a second time was not ideal. They recommended to us the TAVR procedure. It’s a fairly new process where they do all the replacement thru the arteries in the arms and legs. 

He went though many tests and his “team” decided he was a good candidate for their procedure. It is a one day surgery and one night stay in the hospital. I was very nervous, more than his open heart. I read all I could. When they talked about lol that could go wrong stroke (5%) pacemaker (1%) I just wanted them to shut up. I don’t want to know…

Model of heart with the valve

The more they talked the sicker I got and The more Mike was on board to get it done. 

Turns out Mike was going to be a celebrity for the day. He was Sherman Hospital’s 200 TAVR procedure.

People around the hospital were excited - me, I was having panic attacks. Come on Karen, you been thru this before, get it together. 

The day started at 5. Surgery was scheduled for 7:30. If everything goes as planned it should be done by 9:30. They took him back into the Cath Lab and I went outside to calm down. I was never so happy to see Sharen walking across the parking lot toward me. I was literally walking in circles. Then I got a phone call from Bryan to say he was 10 minutes away. He’ll be right there. I was so happy. I needed them.

When I didn’t hear from his doctor by 10:00 I seriously was sick to my stomach. I don’t know why I was thinking the worse, that’s not usually me. I guess because this surgery was new. 

Around 10:30 he finally called told me Mike did really good and was in recovery. They had to pivot from the arm artery to the leg artery for the camera and that took some time.

Valve team

Cath Lab crew

After surgery care

Floor nurses

 I had to take the photos off the nurses phone, hence the fuzzy. Sherman is going to be showcasing Mike and his doctors. They already interviewed Mike. Who, of course, praised the hospital and the procedure. His open heart, he was in the hospital for 10 days and house bound for 2 months. 

It’s been 2 weeks. He had his 1 week checkup and it went really well and he is free to take longer walks and drive. The focus is on his arteries healing, one wrong move and he could bleed.

His heart is working like it should. No more dizziness, no more lightheadedness, no more shortness of breathe. It’s crazy how much better he feels. The problem now is getting him to go slower. I can handle that.

Don’t fence me in

 The fence across the back of our property is not ours. The large estate behind us had this fence going around the whole property. I liked the rustic charm. The owners passed away and sold the acreage to builders. The fence slowly rotted and started falling down. Mike and I repaired the section behind us many many times.

The property was separated into lots and soon large houses were built on tiny lots. One of the owners/builders decided to build a HUGE house on the lot behind our neighbor. I hunted him down and asked him if he would mind us replacing the run down fence. 

He told us to go for it. We agreed to take down the old fence and he agreed to dispose of it. Win! Win!

Our only problem - we had a tree right smack in the middle of where the fence would go. He let our tree guy come in from his empty lot on his side of the fence. This guy could be a jerk about all this, but he was such a nice guy. First step tree comes down. I was so happy they didn’t have to come in our backyard with the trucks. Luis was happy he could get it all down from his bucket truck.

We got an estimate we both liked and ordered the fence. Yippee - I was getting a new fence.

It took about 6 weeks for the material to be ordered, which was good I had some plants to move. I lost bout 2.5 feet of garden, which I am ok with. Better yet, now all the electric and cable wires under ground are behind the new fence.

Fence posts are cemented in

Day 2 the fence goes up.

I love the new fence. 

GK Golf Outing

 Genoa Kingston school district does not charge students to play sports. All kids wanting to play sports are allowed for free, and it doesn’t matter how many sports they want to play.

Mike and I have 2 grandsons who played. Dylan played football and ran track. Logan played football, basketball and baseball - again all for free.

When both Dylan and Logan showed an interest in playing golf Mike thought it would be a great way to spend time with the boys and to support this great tradition of free play!

Proud Grandparents 

This year was our 3rd year playing. This was also the year that both boys were old enough to have alcohol. What fun we had… I told Mike it was fun to watch them drink while golfing. Oh, the memories that brought back to us. The more they drank the better they got. Logan’s drives were so long I not only didn’t have to hit my drive, but I stayed in the cart till it came to chip (if we weren’t on the green) and putt.

Logan knows I love the smell of a good cigar.

This one’s for you, Grandma

So we got to the green for longest putt for women and our best ball was closer than the longest putt made. Dylan said “Grandma we don’t have to use that one, let’s use one farther away - you can make it” I laughed at him, but then Mike and Logan both agreed to use the farther one. So I stepped up thinking I had to do this for these guys. We used all their shots to get to the green the least I could do is putt one in.

Well I made it and, for the second year in a row brought home the trophy.

Longest putt trophy 

We had a great dinner and the boys went off to finish their evening at the local watering hole and Mike and I went home and crashed in front of the TV. It was a Great time with our GK athlete grandsons.

Landscaping

 When Bryan and Mary bought their house 12 years ago the curb appeal was lacking. The lady who lived there was very old and her front flower bed (I’m being very generous calling it that) was just white rocks.

Drove me crazy, so Mike and I picked up the majority of the rocks and I shared some of my perennials with them.

It was time for some improvements. Mary and the boys were visiting St. Louis so Bryan and I took on the task of updating the front. Mary likes things simple and clean, so deciding what we were gonna do was easy. The hard part was getting it done.

We spent one whole day digging up the flowers.

The Before

Most of the flowers I brought back home with me. I always have room in my backyard. I did move some to the other side of the porch where the sun don’t shine and it was just dirt.

Bryan moved the top layer of border stones to the sidewalk and started power washing. 

The stones came out beautiful,  but at closer look the sidewalk was filthy. 

He dug up the bigger plants and I worked on the daffodil bulbs. I had a 5 gallon bucket FULL of bulbs. I’ll be planting them in my yard come fall. 

Power washing the first layer

I worked on the weeds and Bryan washed the layer of bricks that were buried in the ground. We noticed that the sidewalk and front porch could use a good washing too. I finished weeding while Bryan got to play with his power washer and cleaned the front of the house, the front porch and steps and all down the sidewalk. I think he was having fun.

A trip to the Home Depot and we had weed control landscape paper and 3 bushes to go with the 2 azaleas Mary’s mother had bought.

To be planted later

We decided to take a days rest and finish later.

I was not happy with the small plants available for the price in Chicago, so the next day I went to my HD in South Elgin and got bigger bushes. 1/2 price too.

Mike joined us for day 2 (thank the lord) so while Bryan and I went back to his HD and returned the tiny bushes, Mike raked and moved the left over rocks for a smooth, level flower bed.

Mike and Bryan planted the 5 bushes.

Right where I told them too

Time for the weed control. I acted like I’ve done this before, but I haven’t, I just watched a guy on YouTube. 

After some small disagreements between me and Bryan - he won one, and I won 1 - the weed control got cut, pinned down and border stones repositioned.

Bryan did trust me on the mulch and bought the 8 bags I wanted.

Just Enough

The front looked so good. It was great spending the time with Bryan doing something I just love to do. I was sore in every muscle in my body, but I’m so proud of what we did. He tells me Mary and her Mother both loved it. The boys thought it looked good too.

Paducah

 On our travels Mike and I would always travel THRU Paducah, never stopping. I would see signs for The National Quilt Museum and comment I really would like to visit it.

Our vacations are always in September (birthdays) and February (anniversary) - well I decided to plan a weekend trip to Paducah to go to the museum in June. I found a really nice VRBO on a lake with a hot tub. Mike has taken an interest in fishing - Yay.

 We re  so close to Metropolis so of course we had to stop in and take a picture with Superman. 

Superman pose

We found a grocery store to pick up a few things along with some bait and venture over to the lake house. The place was amazing and very  secluded and had the most awful road to get there. We picked up a screw in the tire (which I had fixed when we got home).

3 miles of dirt

Mikes first stop was the hot tub. And I head down to the fishing dock. This place had 3 docks. There was no boats, jus a few kayakers and creatures.

This sucker bit Mike

This vacation was all about me, so our first stop on Saturday was to Hancock Fabrics. I made a quilt 3 years ago and have been searching for a back to match. I could have just used black, but I wanted something different.

Perfect match

I found it! Not 2 minutes into the store. I told Mike I was gonna walk this whole place anyway - 66,000 square feet of cotton quilting fabric. He followed behind me pushing my cart. They had a “husband section” where other men sat - not Mike.

Now to see this museum. What a disappointment. It was more a gallery than anything else. No history, just artists quilts. I found 1, just 1, that I liked. Way too artsy for me.

One I liked - traditional 

Artsy and large 

Well now I can say I went. Would not recommend it.

We decided to check another state off our “golfed there” list. Kentucky! Kentucky in June is hot. Like 90’s everyday hot. We had the course to ourselves. No locals are going to golf in this heat. Our car said 108 when we finished. Couldn’t find a shade spot in the parking lot.

I don’t like bridges of any kind. To get to this course we had to cross over the Ohio river - we were staying in IL. The closest bridge was this one. The speed limit was 25 and it was all metal.

Erector set

Not a fan

Then we get on the course and we come across this one. I was driving. Let’s just say I got us over the river, but my ball did not make it.

Not a fan

Despite the heat, waking up to a flat tire, Mike almost getting his thumb bitten off by a alligator snapping turtle and the awful museum we had a quiet (no TV or people), relaxing (hot tub) catching lots of fish getaway.