Babies & Thunderstorms

Around the second week in May I took this photo of the back yard, after a lot of rain had turned everything green. Today it is greener still, and the plants in the background have shot up in height. Getting ready to leave town for 10 days poses lots of dilemmas: when to mow, who will water the pot plants, how will everything look when we get back? Our day lilies and hostas are all fully budded now and we will probably miss their most glorious flowering.

These very early yellow lilies bloomed in the front bed almost a month ago. Now some asiatic lilies and our stella d'oros are ready to bloom. The succession just keeps on going.


Speaking of lilies, we got to visit with Matt's niece Lily last Sunday, as well as her mom Michelle and daddy Matt H. This dimin- uitive little lady, born April 9, is thriving now that her mom is home and feeling better as well. She didn't wake up the whole hour we were there, not even when I held her!

Present at the ordination of our student pastor (see the Compton Rising blog) was Annabelle, whose grandpa is a minister and whose grandma was one also. Born in late February, she is a regular at church now, one of four babies born in the past year. (And we just learned that a 5th baby is expected in December. Wow!)

Not least is the newest baby in our extended family, Korey Jon'Mikal, son of Heather and her husband Corey. This photo was taken today on his first visit to the doctor after being released from the hospital last Saturday. Korey came into the world a few weeks early, on May 18, but seems to be doing well, and gaining about an ounce a day. He's up to 5 pounds and three ounces! Proud grandparents are Mike and Sandy. We are glad that all of Heather's complications of pregnancy have subsided. Now if she could just get some sleep--preemies have to eat often!

Another baby we are thinking about is Doug's nephew Luke Anthony, who had surgery for a heart defect today. He's just a little over a month old and that's a lot for a little guy to go through. Doug says Luke's prognosis is good, and we continue to keep him and his parents Mike and Lucinda in our thoughts and prayers.

We had some violent thunderstorms in the area this afternoon. Here we had a big branch come off the neighbor's cottonwood and land on the power lines behind the house, and it also knocked down another neighbor's service line to their house. After we called in and gave our address to ("if you want to report a downed line, press 2") it was about two hours before a crew came and pushed the branch off the lines. Nothing seemed to be broken. After they cleared a few more, they got our power back on, about 4 hours after it went off. We had taken our freezer contents to Mike and Sandy's since they had power. Then we ate out and came home to find power, so we went back and got our stuff and refilled the freezers. We lost about half a day of pre-packing and pre-trip work, so tomorrow is going to be kind of frantic, I think.

I will try to post on Wednesday but the next entry may well be from somewhere in Oklahoma or even Texas. We plan to meet up with Norm's cousin Joe in Tulsa and visit with him and Elaine. Then it's on to Irving, where the Linville sibs have planned a great weekend for us all. With any luck, next week we will be exploring parts of Southwest Oklahoma where my grandfather McElyea's family settled in the late 1890s and where my mother was born in 1913. It's the last leg of the 4 great grandmothers tour. So stay tuned and we'll see where we wind up.