April 9 -June 3 2018

It's been quite a couple months.  We spent a lot of time seeing a lot of doctors trying to figure out what to do about Chris's back pain. He was finally diagnosed with a chronic pars fracture at the end of March after six months of pain and physical therapy.  The decision is behind us, we opted for surgery.  We decided to try a pars repair surgery rather than a spinal fusion.  So far, all is well and Chris is recovering very well. It will be 6 to 9 months of rest then PT, but our hopes are high for full recovery and his return to a normal active lifestyle.

Of course we had Chris's 13th birthday during this time and Stephen's promotion from eighth grade to high school. Stephen will be attending a private Catholic school, well known for excellent college admissions, academics, encouraging philanthropy and gentlemanly behavior, and athletics: De La Salle HS in Concord, CA.

Just to keep things interesting, I broke my wrist on the day of Chris's birthday party (with a sleepover mind you!), five days before his surgery, requiring my own surgery the day Chris was discharged from the hospital.  Oh yea, and Stephen went to a basketball tournament that weekend as well.

I'm hoping for a nice calm, healing summer break!  Y'all can come visit us, because Chris and I aren't going anywhere!  Oh yeah, we have been re-doing our backyard since February, the pool should be ready by the end of June! So that would be a good time to come!  I can't promise that there will be any plants yet though, or furniture, but there should be a hot tub!

We celebrated my girlfriend Pam's birthday with a painting class! An instructor "Directs" the paint and we do what he says. Sometimes it comes out good, sometimes not so much, but it's always fun!

Here is the new retaining wall in progress.  It's done now and looks amazing.

Stephen hanging out with his buddies at an A's game

Kitties had a vet visit. Poor Boots is on a diet. Poor Bear had to have three teeth removed. Moral: Don't take your cats to the vet!  Kidding. Apparently Bear was in a lot of pain, and we didn't know. All is well now.  Except boots is still fat, I'm not sure where he's finding food!

The boys and I belong to a philanthropy organization called boys team charity.  Here is Chris with his buddies volunteering at a Special Olympics event.

Early one Saturday morning I took a break and drove out to half moon bay. Sometimes you just have to do it! It's gorgeous there. A little cold, but beautiful.

For Chris's birthday, Steve took him and his friends out to dinner with ice cream sundaes and then the boys all came back for sleepover. Chris has already outgrown his gaming laptop, and got some whizzing new desktop gaming platform for his birthday. He loves it, and it is something that he can use while he recovers.

Stephen and his buddies going to the promotion party at school.  This is a good group of kids. You can generally find them hanging out at our house after school on Fridays till pretty late at night.

My boys. Stephen is in his Spartans De La Salle sweatshirt!

Awards night at school. Stephen stole the show with five awards, including this one,  the Principal's award.

Here is Chris pre surgery.

Here is Chris and I post surgery at home

Stephen's promotion ceremony.  He's taller than his father!

Here is Chris, post surgery, with a friend both gaming in the "boys cave".  I never thought I'd be so grateful for video games, but it's something that Chris likes to do, with his friends,  they can do it over the Internet at anytime a day,  and I'm grateful.

And just for fun, here's my brother Matt with Nick Swisher, who apparently is a pretty good baseball player  ;-)

Happy summer everyone! Be safe!