New hairdo

Saturday I was transformed...well, at least my hair was. I now have white-blond hair with dark blond roots and it's rather "punk"...sticks up in lots of places. It's a fun do and elicits lots of comments. Nancy and I went to the Seinyard for lunch after I got it done and people sure looked! Nancy liked it so much that she's going to get hers done like it this Saturday!

After lunch we went to a really special nursery, "Just Fruit and Exotics". We didn't have enough hours to see everything. Nancy bought a pear tree and I bought a banana, a couple of pepper plants and some seeds. We'll go back!

The puppies are growing up! They are just as bad as ever, but are hitting the puppy paper most of the time or going outside to potty. Hope this gets better and better!

Mother has her good days and bad ones. Saturday after we finished our running around Nancy got a call from the center Mother's in. It seems she's learned how to propel her wheel chair with her feet and was running from outside door to outside door opening them and setting off the alarms. Nancy fixed that by putting the breaks on...simple fix, you'd think the staff there would have thought of that! She was also hitting and scratching and spitting. That's our momma!

Today a young fellow is coming to do some major clean up on my yard. He's going to get the dead wood out of my trees and hedges, remove some plants and till me a garden. How exciting! This is mighty late to be putting in a garden, but better late than never!

Some pictures

The first one I'll try to attach is one I took of Mother a week or so ago before her last move. The rest are just fun ones, maybe even the kitchen...who knows? Well, here goes....

They aren't in the order I down loaded them in...I'll have to work on this. The shots of the kitchen don't really do it justice. The blender in one of the kitchen shots is the same blender I've had since Christmas 1965! Still has all the original parts and works like a dream every morning when I do my protein shake! The one of Jazzy is after a hard session of trying to dig under the patio, that's why she's covered in mud. The cats eating are, in order, Goodness, Bandi, Mercy and Smokey...cute shot I think!

Just a continuation...Mother

Friday, was it only yesterday?, Nancy was able to finagle her schedule at work and got off before 9am. I met her at her house at 10am. It was a dark and stormy morning. We went to the last nursing home Mother was in as our first choice, and without any groveling (which we were prepared to do) she was accepted back and we were able to move her yesterday! Thank God.

Nancy and I went over and told Bert the wonderful news (however, he said he didn't remember them saying in the meeting the day before that she would have to move and that we should try to do it quickly). We told him that we really thought this was best for her and he didn't have to worry about the move, we'd pack her up and make sure she was moved comfortably.

Well, we had lunch and then went to pack Mother up. (Do remember that it was storming this entire time & we shared one umbrella.) Every place we parked had rain water running through it and puddles and we were both in sandals. After the first and only run with the one umbrella we just dashed and dodged the rain and by the time we got to Mother at about 1pm we were both quite wet. The van didn't come for her until after 4pm. By the time it arrived I had packed her things (a large suitcase, a valise we couldn't even zip, a big shopping bag and a couple of small bags) and we'd walked her to the rose garden and Nancy had checked the ETA of the van often. We kept Mother entertained (I do think we even sang) and in good spirits the entire time. She didn't know about the move or need for the move until we told her. That was touchy, but worked out okay. We got Mother outside and her things in the car and just waited. We were all so tired and ready when the van finally arrived. I rode with her and Nancy followed with all her things which I hung up or put away when we got there. (Bert's paying extra for a private room.) Nancy called Bert and let him know the move was over and when he got there we passed the torch and left.

It was after 7pm when I got home and arrived to a house full of hungry animals and dog poop.

Nancy called and we rehashed the day and both being sooo tired it didn't take us all that long. When we hung up the dogs and I went to bed! I was asleep shortly after dropping my head to the pillow. Nancy called a little after 9pm and told me she'd gotten a call from Uncle Buddy and told him about the move. She'd told him the night before what the committee had said about needing to move her and what we'd hoped.

anyhoo...

Nancy went to see her this morning early and called around 9ish to let me know that Mother didn't remember anything about why she was in there or how long she'd been "sick", but other than that she was okay. Well, a couple of hours later she called back, the nursing home had called and Mother was creating a major disruption. She was screaming "Daddy" again and again and again and again, etc.. So Nancy called, asked me to bring fried chicken and went there. When Nancy got there she could hear Mother screaming from the front door and people were talking about her. She even screamed in her face! Well, by the time I arrived they were outside and things were rather level. I almost blew it when I castigated Mother mightily, but Nancy made me stop and Mother forgot and we ate fried chicken, french fried and slaw and fussed over Maria and just visited. Took her in around 3:30. Stayed with her until close to 5pm. Was almost 5:30 when I got home.

I hated the feeling that we were feeding into her tantrum and even though she promised not to do that anymore I don't believe her. She gets what she wants when she does things like that.

Hungry puppies and a house full of puppy poop!

Leah Jane called and was going to have wine and cheese and crackers at Norma's and would I join them and I did (you know I usually don't)! Really needed that. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I'm holding my breath that we don't get calls tomorrow!

Take nothing at face value!

Well, it seems that Mother will have to move yet once again. Bert was so wrong to move her out of the last place. This past Sunday Nancy and I found her living will and her appointment of medical surrogate and her blanket do not resuscitate order. Nancy is the appointed surrogate and we have been running on the assumption that Bert was, because he told us he was. Had we found this sooner she would never have had to do this last move. Nancy and I are meeting later this morning and visiting several long term care centers. We are hoping to get her back into the last place, but that's a long shot.

Oh, the reason she'll have to move...we, Nancy, Bert and I, had a meeting yesterday with the evaluation team at the place she's in now. It was to have been a 15 minute meeting and ended up lasting almost 2 hours. The one thing they did say was that Bert was told when he moved her there that there is no opening in their long term care facility and that there is a very long waiting list and that when her 100 medicare days were over she'd have to move. The director spent a long time explaining how the remaining 54 medicare days are bargaining tools and the more we have available to bargain with the more likely we are to find a place for her. Isn't that the pits?!

We are sooo dry here. My yard is crisp...but at least I'm saving money on the mowing! It's been over 2 weeks since we've had rain and I am watering containers, but can't afford to water the lawn. Thank goodness none of my neighbors are watering either...I'd stick out like a sore thumb! We had rain in the forecast for last night, but it fizzled out before it got here...it's in the forecast for today and I will take my umbrella to Tallahassee, but I'm doubtful.

The puppies are baaad! Jazzy and Maggie have done away with all of my basil and are tunneling under the patio. They have about 20 feet to go...I suspect they'll be surprised when they get to the other side and are still inside the fence! I'm planning to fill the starter hole with gravel and maybe cement. Don't know what else to do...maybe pepper in the hole.

A change in life style

Beginning this week I'll only work 4 days a week, from 7:45am to 2pm. I'll be off on Fridays. How nice is that? I got my first Social Security check last month...not enough to live on, but with a part time job I'll be just fine...no frills however.

Mother's Day

Nancy & I met at the nursing home yesterday at 9am. Mother was still in bed when we got there and hadn't had breakfast. She said she didn't see any reason to get up or eat, but would since we were there. We sat with her for breakfast and then went out to the putting green/rose garden and visited for a couple of hours. At one point Mother introduced us to an aide as "her two pets"! We got tickled. Went to Berts house after that and stayed until 4.

When I got home at 5 the house was a total disaster! Can't leave those puppies that long. There were little pieces of styrofoam everywhere...no idea where they came from...and puppy poop!!!!!

The highlight of my Mother's Day was a call from Rosie. She is so centering and bright.

Yesterday

I visited with Mother for about 5 minutes yesterday. She was just frightful, angry and very verbally nasty. After just a few minutes of it I told her I had to go let Shirley out and left. Spent about 30 minutes with the head nurse of the unit and then she & I went down to the therapy department to talk to them about Mother. It seems that most days she refuses to even go to therapy and when she does, she doesn't do anything. Things are just not working out for her there. Today they are having a psychiatric evaluation done on her with the probable out come of moving her to a psychiatric facility.

Mother update

Mother was moved Wednesday. Thursday morning I had such a feeling of dread or fear or something and by the time I got off work it had really intensified. So I headed to Tallahassee. I'd never been to this new place and was thrilled to find it about 15 minutes closer than the others. When I finally found Mother she was in her wheelchair sitting at a dinner table with 2 other women and their caregivers. She had her hands folded in her lap, her head down and was crying. When she saw me she thought I was there to rescue her. She said the place was evil and they wanted to kill her...wouldn't touch her food as she was sure it was poisoned. I spent a little over 3 hours with her. Took her outside and talked with her about where she is and why. Met her new speech therapist and was able to talk with her alone and told her of Mother's fears. Bless her heart, she made sure to tell the head nurse who made a point of spending time talking with Mother with me there. Mother had been refusing to take her medicines and did finally while I was there. She had calmed down a lot by the time I left.

Nancy went to see her yesterday and got there in time for her lunch. She actually ate quite a bit and was fairly calm.

I've got to run as Nancy is coming this morning for breakfast at 7:30 and to see my kitchen.