Conference Call

Thanks to Sam, we (all of us girls and I think Micah and Sam were in the background- not sure about Daniel) talked to Ron. Audrey and Sam got him on the phone, then mom and I joined. Then Annie, then Ashley, then Alison. We all got to hear all of the (gory) details of his surgery. It was 10pm here (8pm in CA and 9pm in Utah) and 11 am in Beijing. He also had three of his co-workers in the room. I'm not sure they could hear us, but they could at least hear Ron's side of the conversation. I'm not sure how he felt about the whole thing, but it was fun for the girls. I'm sure it was good for Ron to hear each voice (even though he did most of the talking :) I think his co-workers probably got more details than what they would usually get in a conversation with him. On another note, to have all of us girls as his audience, it was tough to get much sympathy from 6 women who have been through childbirth, Csection, gall bladder removal, hysterectomy, spleen laceration, cancer removal, and joint replacement.  hehe These "guys" just don't have much opportunity to experience blood tests, CT scans, IV's, bowel problems, nausea, and surgery. All jesting aside- Ron (and all of us) are feeling very grateful that he was able to get quick medical attention. His situation was very serious and in need of immediate attention. We are hoping for a quick, uneventful recovery.

Clinging to my Cell Phone

It was a night of clinging to my cell phone. Ron left on the 3rd of Sept. to go to Beijing, China for a month. Last night I received a call that he was in a hospital. They were doing tests, thinking he had a problem with his appendix. At the time of this call they were getting ready to take him to another hospital for a better test and possible surgery. Since I am a novice on such experiences, I hadn't even asked the name of the hospital. And I had a vague idea of what hotel his was staying in, but not specific information. Within a few minutes, I had sent text messages to three of the girls, an email to Mike, and a phone call to Annie. Within an hour, thanks to Sam and Aud (and thanks to email, google maps, google search, and the Internet) we had determined the hospital, the hotel, and email addresses for three branch presidents there. Branch Pres. Johnson (Beijing First Branch) replied, saying that the Elders Quorum pres. worked at ConocoPhillips and someone would go to the hospital. (that didn't happen before the surgery, but I'm sure someone will be going there soon). Thanks to google search, I was able to find the Beijing Marriott Northeast and the phone number on the website matched a number in my call log, on my phone. (that info. helped us feel like we were in the correct part of Beijing for the hospital and the church branch). Then we waited...
We thought we were going to get a call about the test results in a few minutes, but that turned into 2 hours. Then surgery was scheduled and a 1 1/2 hour surgery with 30 minute recovery room, turned into 4+ hours. Finally about 7:45am (here- which was 8:45pm there) I talked to Ron. They had removed his appendix and part of his large intestine. He will be on antibiotics for 5 days and probably be in the hospital until Monday. I don't expect to hear anything else now until later this evening, when it will be Thursday morning there. I sent mom to work and I am going to (try to) go back to bed for awhile- it was a long night :)

Budget Problem !

Here is something that one of my friends posted on FB. It's one of those "not so" funny things-

U.S. Tax revenue: $2,170,000,000,000


Fed Budget: $3,820,000,000,000

New Debt: $1,650,000,000,000

National Debt: $14,271,000,000,000

Recent budget cut: $38,500,000,000

...

Remove 8 zeros and pretend its a household budget -

Annual family income: $21,700

Money the family spent: $38,200

New debt on credit cards: $16,500

Outstanding balance on credit cards: $142,710

Total budget cuts: $385.

The Highlights of my Weekend

The bridal market was in Dallas today. That was a perfect excuse for me to go see Sam, Audrey, and Eli. I drove there on Saturday evening, arriving late, and we stayed up until almost midnight. Sam and Audrey had BLACK and yellow balloons, and gave me a video webcam for my birthday. On Sunday they cooked some great shrimp tacos and panna cotta with raspberry sauce (for dessert). Since Annie is trying to convince me to not eat french fries- that may not be a problem. On Saturday evening I ate some french fries that had so much salt on them, I was afraid I was going to OD on salt. (Probably cured me from ordering french fries again :) Tonight I ordered a hamburger without lettuce and onion. Normally I don't order any dessert, but I ordered an apple pie. Good thing, because after the hamburger, I was trying to get rid of the onion and lettuce taste. I should have checked my order before I left the restaurant- my hamburger had only lettuce and onion on it :) I maybe cured of hamburgers now too.

(both Saturday night and tonight I was eating in the car. I got 9 hours of quality(?) driving time in Ron's car).  

I spent about 9 hours at the bridal market. I ordered prom dresses for spring. Also a few accessories, a few shoes and some other dresses.

Here are the highlights of my weekend...

(besides, these are the only pictures I took ) hehe



This picture is for Al, so she can see how cute the flags are that she made for Eli's room.



I Must Say...

we are hooked on the blogs. I realize that we are putting alot of family info. out there in (inner or outer :) public space- but it is amazing that our kids can move half way around the world and right away we are connected. We are able to see out their front window, see their day at the beach, and see Nicholas on his first day of school. We can stay updated on "unusual" things and "every day" things. We can see celebrations. We can see inspiration. We can see old friends and new friends. Technology is amazing.

This and That

A week ago, we had 8 towels hanging in the bathroom. A week ago, we had all the bedrooms full and Ron and I slept on the sofa bed. A week ago, we had toys every where, dessert everywhere, luggage everywhere :) 

Then Sam, Audrey, and Eli went home. Then Mike, Carrie, Nicholas, Ryan, and Cheerio went to Angola. Then Ron went to Beijing, People's Republic of China. Now there is only my towel hanging in the bathroom, I guess I can sleep in whatever bed I want, the toys are put away, the dessert is (almost) all gone, and the luggage is gone.

The only things that I enjoy when Ron is gone, is I can eat whatever I want, go to bed and get up, whenever I want. Last night I went bed about 10pm and got up at 7:30am. I had "this dream" that I got up at 3:15 and drove to the airport at 3:30, then returned home at 5:30 and went back to bed. Oh... wait a minute I really did do that- Ron's flight was at 6 am. hehe

I had a busier than normal week. I helped with a Young Women's event on Wednesday evening. Some of the girls modeled dresses from my store. We displayed some of the wedding dresses and I gave a talk for part of the program. On Thursday evening we had our quarterly Relief Society meeting. I had several responsibilities for that. Both events turned out well. On Friday I took a day off from work. I thought Ron had the day off too- but it turned out that he needed to finish up some things at the office and he needed to go play basketball at noon.

When Mike and Carrie and the boys were here, Ryan played with our "bouncy car" and our "ball pit".  Nicholas went swimming.... in the hot tub in the air conditioned porch. It was too hot to do anything outside :)

They Made It

Mike, Carrie, two kids, a dog, two car seats, two strollers, a couple of back packs, a couple of carry ons, a cooler of meat, and about 30- 70 lb. bags, all made it to Luanda, Angola.

What an adventure.

(These pictures were at our house right before they left. Mike has pictures of their Luanda house on his blog.)