Tuesday, September 8, 2026

     I have been working on quilts for people who got tested for kidney donation.  I finished the quilt for our daughter's donor last week but have not had a chance to gift it yet. I also made a pillow to go with it.

    The red whte and blue one is for a friend who went through the testing. The quilt from the scraps will go to our quilting group's donations to the Rayola Project

        Yesterday was very relaxing. Most of the family came over for dinner for labor day.  We were missing Michael, Anna, Keith and Karly, and Clay and Claire.  These days everyone is so busy that it's hard to find time for everyone at one time.

    We could feel fall in the air and the cicadas were singing non-stop.  Autumn is my favorite time of year. 

    It's hard to believe that in the last 4 years, we have had 4 graduations, Clay, Karly, Keith, and Claire.  Madison graduates this spring.  I wish time didn't go so fast.

 

Sunday, September 6, 2026

     

       Wow, it's been a few years.  I don't know how that much time slips by in the twinking of an eye.   You miss one day and it turns into months and years!

It's going to take me a while to catch up.

To start with, on May 22, Melisa received a kidney transplant from a dear friend of hers who was a perfect match.  Looking back on the whole thing I can see God's hand every step of the way

    On our 50th Anniversary, I received a letter from UofM telling me that I was not a candidate for donating a kidney.  I barely had time to process that when Melisa stopped by to tell us that a kidney donor had been found and it was her friend Shari. 

The day of the transplant, Melisa was still hoping to have a robotic surgery but the odds didn't look good because there was only one doctor who did those and she had issues of her own.  Well, the robotic surgery happened!!

     The surgery went well and Melisa did great for about a month and then started having intense back pain.  She ended up in the hospital and as hard as it was to see her go through that much pain, it was actually a Godsend.  She had to have a CAT scan and they found that the removal of her stent had caused crystals to form in her new kidney.  This could have been very bad.

Then she had to deal with the insertion of a new stent and they found she had a UTI and shingles.  Ugh

Well, the second stent is out, her back is healing and things seem to be moving in a great direction.