June 10, 2008

I felt an update on our family was long overdue. Last year about this time we were moving into our new home, here we are a year later and a lot has happened. First of all it feels good that this is Johns last month of his first year of residency, four more to go!

The weather is warming up and I have to say that our first Buffalo winter wasn’t to bad and I actually quite enjoyed having snow on the ground that would last more than a couple of days, and it was neat to see what Niagara Falls looks like in the winter.

John continues to enjoy what he is doing, although the schedule is nothing to be desired. He is on-call every 3rd day and if he is lucky he might get one full day off a month. He is doing general surgery right now and according to the laws, they are supposed to get one 24 hour period off per week and their idea of 24 hours off per week is that John will come home at 8:00am, after being on-call for 24 hours and getting maybe an 1 ½ of sleep, and they will tell him he doesn’t need to be back in until 8:00am the next morning!! He is worn out, sleep deprived, and will be glad to have it over. In some ways, I look forward to having him back on Orthopedics, at least he will be home most nights even if he does get home at 9:00-10:00pm.

Even in my husbands sleep deprived state, he finds time to do his crazy projects. His latest and my most feared was that he decided that our trees in our backyard needed to be trimmed… now these are no small trees they are roughly 5 stories high and the branches that needed to be trimmed were huge. When they had the infamous October storm here last year, a lot of the tree branches fell and some didn’t make it all the way to the ground, they were actually stuck on other branches of the tree. So John decided he would make home-made tree climbing spikes, which he did and attached them to his old brown boots. He wore a long sleeved shirt, long pants, wrapped dish towels around his legs and harnessed himself to the tree with just a rope that went around him and the tree. He forgot his hand gloves… and oh yea, a hand saw was attached to him with a pull saw waiting down at the bottom of the tree that I was to lift up to him when he got high enough. Once he got about 10 feet high, he reminded me that falls from about 10 feet have a 50% survival rate… yep, I was feeling right comfortable about this. I had the nurse next door on-call and the phone in my hand. So, he climbed about 3 stories high when he lost his right foot spikes but somehow he succeeded in getting the two large branches down and made it most of the way back down when he lost all traction and slid down the tree like it was a pole, did I mention he forgot his hand gloves. Our neighbor came out to try to help him out and stayed the whole time that John was in the tree. He said to me, “it isn’t every day that you get to see a doctor up in a tree.”
The birth of Emily has been the highlight of the year. She is so cute and is beginning to smile and coo. She has her 2 month check up this Friday. We had her blessed this past Sunday and Grandma Sue and Grandpa Hugh were here for it, it was such a treat to have them here.

While Grandma and Grandpa were here we took a trip out to Palmyra and toured some of John’s old mission in Lyon’s NY, which was his first area. It is also the area where Solomon Chamberlain, my great, great, great grandfather lived. His story is important to our family and to early church history. Brigham and Phineas Young stayed in his home as they traveled through, and some of the first church meetings were held here. It was fascinating to visit the home and to also learn that the old Erie canal was just across the street from his home. I knocked on the door and met the guy who lived there, he told me that a professor from Brigham Young University was interested in the house and that the church had thoughts of purchasing it, we will see.

Jack is doing well and is in his last few weeks of Kindergarten. I can’t believe that he will be in 1st grade next year. He is reading well and even had his first spelling test, which he passed with flying colors. He is looking forward to the summer as he will be starting ice skating up again, swimming, soccer and baseball. He is a big help around the house and absolutely adores baby Emily. He has a wonderful thirst for knowledge and loves to teach others what he has learned. Here he is with Lydia and one of Lydia’s friends from down the street, he is telling them all about the Titanic.

Lydia is doing well; we just learned that she was accepted into the Universal Pre-K program that NY State offers. So, she will be going to preschool 5 days a week 2 ½ hours a day following the school calendar next year and it is free for us (well I should say that the high taxes we pay here pay for it). We feel so blessed that she was accepted! She is wearing her glasses more religiously now and so far we have only lost one pair, let’s hope we don’t loose another! Lydia has just finished the first few months of ballet with the American Academy of Ballet and she did a great job in her recital. If any of you watch So You Think You Can Dance, the studio she goes to is where finalist Neil Haskell was trained. So far, I have been very impressed with their studio. For the summer, we will take a break from Ballet and she will start ice skating with Jack along with swimming lessons. Lydia is adjusting well to the new baby and loves to talk to her and give her kisses. Although, I did catch her in my office cutting her hair, not sure if it was an attention getting stunt?? I was devastated, because it has taken so long to get her hair long enough to put it in little pigtails. She cut both sides off and gave herself a mullet.
I am doing well and have recovered from having my third C-section. Emily is such a joy to have in the house. She is waking up, on average, only once a night now. I am still helping with the monthly radio show our stake is in charge of; our next few shows will be Emergency preparedness and family history. I have also been called to the Hill Cumorah Pageant Public Relations Committee. Our house is the Buffalo depot for the printed material that goes to the wards and such. I am also in charge of answering all of the e-mails that come in about the pageant and will be spending the night up in Palmyra with another committee member to be there on media day that starts at 5:00am. That won’t be fun, especially with all three children.
John and I have been to a couple of Black Tie dinners which were fun. One of them was for the 5th years graduation, a friend of ours that is graduating this year told a cute story in his short speech, he said that his daughters now 10-years-old and 8-years-old came down to his office and told him that they were not going to eat any more apples, when he asked them why they said because “eating an apple a day keeps the doctor away”. That gave me some insight on how Jack and Lydia might feel when we get to that point. It is hard to believe that when we finish residency they will be 10 and 7 ½ - years - old as well.