Goodbye, Tala

 This has been one of hardest weeks we have had in a long time. Given all that we have been through recently, that is saying something. Tuesday night I was trying to fall asleep when my phone rang. On the other line was Emily and she was completely hysterical. She said something had happened with Tala and she was headed over, but it didn't look good.

Wednesday morning we learned many more details. Tala had had a heart attack. The EMTs worked hard to revive him but he had gone somewhere between 10-30 minutes without oxygen to his brain, but we didn't have a lot of information about the long term prognosis. I was supposed to leave around lunch time to go to my company's winter retreat. I talked to Emily and asked if I should stay home. She said there was nothing I could do and I should go. That turned out to be a terrible decision.

Before I could even arrive in Bend, I learned just how bad things were. Tala was showing no neurological response and while they are keeping him alive with life support, they had a DNR should he have another heart attack.

By that evening, his organs were shutting down and they decided to remove life support. Tala passed around 9pm Wednesday night, less then 24 hours after having the heart attack, and I truly believe he was actually gone long before that.

The next 36 hours were beyond miserable. My family was falling apart and I was stuck three hours away falling apart and trying to still participate in work meetings.

I finally got home on Friday afternoon. I wish I could say that things got better after I got home, but that was just the beginning and time to get to work. There is so much to be done from funeral planning, to dealing with the house, cars, business, and most importantly, supporting Kalani. To say that the community has rallied around Kalani is a gross understatement. He is being held up and support from every imaginable angle.

There is so much to be done, but we have a plan and we are working it. Various members of the family have very conflicting emotions about Tala and his passing, but I truly hope he is resting well on the other side. Until we meet again, Tala.

I'm sharing one of my favorite Tala pictures. This is the Tala I want to remember, Here he is painting little C.C.'s fingernails.

Thanksgiving 2025

 This week has been a blast! Truth be told, I am sad to see it come to an end. At the last minute, I convinced Jeremy to take the week off of work. Since the kids and I were already scheduled to be off for the week, that meant we had an entire week to play as a family.

The week started off with a bang! On Monday, we started the day with a trip to the Nike employee store. That is always a fun time for everyone except our bank account. After a brief stop at Costco, we headed home and CC and I went out for some special time. She didn't find what she was looking for at Nike so I told her I would take her to our favorite thrift store; Red, White, and Blue. We definitely made up for anything she missed out on at Nike. Once CC and I got home, it was Elsie's turn for some special time. I took her to the pool while Jeremy went to the gym

Tuesday was the day the girls had been looking forward to the most, the day we went to see Wicked For Good. While all the Clifford ladies could not wait to see Wicked, the boys were less than enthused. Instead they opted to go see Predator while we saw Wicked. Everyone was happy with their decision in the end. The rest of the day was pretty low key. I ended up taking Elsie to the doctor because she was still really struggling with her rash from her cast. We were able to get some extra strength cortisone cream and start getting on top of that.

Wednesday was Thanksgiving prep day. I got the pies made and made all the plans and preparations for the next day. We also went to the church for some roller skating, scootering, basketball time.

Thursday was the big day. The boys went and played football in the morning while I cooked and watched the Thanksgiving Day Parade with the girls. Once everything was cooked and everyone was cleaned up, we went to my parents in the early afternoon for dinner. It was an enjoyable afternoon and evening hanging with the fam and eating way too much.

Friday, the theme, as Mariah Carey would say, was "It's time!!!!". Down came Thanksgiving and up went Christmas. We did a final leaf clean up for the season and put up outdoor lights. Inside, the girls worked hard to put away the Thanksgiving decor and get out the Christmas decorations. By Friday evening, all that was left was the tree. That would come the next day.

Yesterday, Saturday, was tree time. It ends up being a whole day affair because the place we usually go is about 45 minutes away. We picked the perfect tree, got hot chocolate/cider, and wrote a letter to Santa. They didn't have the free crafts this year that they have had in past years, but with the insane prices all the places near us charge, it is worth the drive. We were then able to get it home, lit, and decorated before we ran out of day.

See? I told you we had a fun week. Tomorrow, it's back to real life, but this week brought memories that are not soon to be forgotten. Thanksgiving really lived up to it's hype as my favorite holiday.

Goodbye Cast

On Friday Elsie got her cast off! We had really been looking forward to this day. The days leading up to it had become excruciating. She was complaining about itchiness almost constantly. She was not sleeping and neither was I. I finally got her to start taking some allergy meds and that helped a little with the itchiness, but not a lot.

Friday afternoon finally came and we headed to the orthopedist. Maybe I should always plan doc appointments for Friday afternoons. They seemed to be on a mission to get to their weekend and there was very little waiting or down time.

Elsie was all smiles as we headed into the cast room. They told us they would take the cast off first and then we would do x-rays and go from there. You are not supposed to take pictures in the cast room, but they left us alone briefly and I snuck one. Shhh...

She was super brave when they removed the cast. My other two kids where much more nervous, but Elsie just wanted that cast off. She would have chewed it off in necessary. She continued to be all smiles throughout the removal.

Unfortunately, that is where the smiling ended. Getting a cast off is always strange and painful. It's hard to use muscles that you have not used in a month. On top of that, we discovered why exactly she had been so itchy. She had a pretty nasty rash under her cast. The doc felt like it was potentially a reaction to the surgical soap they used, but it was red, swollen, irritated, and oozy in some places. Between the pain and the look of her arm, she became very emotional. I tried my best to keep her calm and get her home as quickly as possible where we could wash her arm and give her some medicine. 

Since then, we are taking it one day at a time. She is definitely still in pain and choosing to not use that arm a lot. It is going to be a slow process, getting use of the arm back. We are also still keeping an eye on the rash as it is also still very much a concern. In some ways it's looking better, but I also think it has spread since the removal. I'm hopeful that was can turn the corner on that soon and if not, we may be back at the doc before the holiday.

And So It Begins

 This week marked the start of feeling behind for Christmas. I told Jeremy that I don't think I have ever been so stressed about Christmas before. I have bought essentially nothing yet and what is worse, I don't have a game plan for what I am buying. This is not a feeling I enjoy.

It kind of feels like everywhere I turn, I'm being bamboozled. Before I can even get to Christmas planning, this week was Carolyn and Jeremy's birthdays. Luckily, Jeremy and I are giving each other a trip/concert for our birthdays so there was not too much to do on that front, mostly just planning birthday meals. For Carolyn on the other hand, I spent a long time trying to think of the perfect gift. I finally came up with an idea, but it required an old meaningful photo. Unfortunately, the ones I had access to were too low resolution. I asked AI to try and clean some photos up for me. The result was comical. Needless to say, I was back to the drawing board on the gift and ended up with something much less heartfelt.

Yesterday, Elsie had a birthday party to go to. CC decided to come along and after we dropped Elsie at the party, CC and I went shopping. She and I found some amazing deals and I got some ideas for Christmas, but unfortunately, I couldn't really purchase anything with my little helper in tow. Turns out she has become really fun to shop with though.

I'm sure it will come together in the end. It always does, but this is exactly why Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, Christmas is too stressful.

New Treasures

What to say about this week? It's been a busy one, with lots going on. Last weekend, Merrick, CC, and I went thrifting. CC need a black skirt for her choir concert this week. While we did find a black skirt, Merrick scored big time. I found on the top of one of the racks, two big bags full of ties. This particular thrift store typically sells their ties for about $5/tie. These bags were packed with about 40 ties each and labeled $9.99. Merrick was over the moon. He decided he wanted to call his cousins and see if they wanted in.

What followed would best be described as a tie draft. They took turns, round by round picking their favorite ties. Merrick was definitely geeking out about the whole thing.

With her new skirt, CC was ready for her choir concert on Thursday. Choir concerts tend to not be my favorite experience, but this was short and sweet and she did great. She did look a little like she was in pain throughout the concert. Afterwards, she said she was really nervous. Luckily for her, she has lots of concerts this year to get over her nerve.

The week was capped off with some big excitement yesterday. Jeremy and I drove about an hour out of town to check out a car we were interested in. One thing led to another and we ended up coming home with a new car. We are now the proud owners of a new 2025 Nissan Pathfinder. I wanted a sunroof and leather seats. Turns out to get those features, we would need the platinum trim level. To say this thing is fully loaded, is an understatement. It's a big change from the Pilot. I don't know. I'm excited about the new car, but I'm still not sure I need all the bells and whistles. It may take some time to get used to.

Halloween 2025

 This week was Halloween. We started the celebrations on Thursday, with our church harvest party and chili cook off. Our costumes were a bit of a debacle. CC didn't get to be what she wanted to be because we didn't have time to go a million places and piece together her dream. Instead, she settled for wearing a costume we had at the house. We also were in a tight spot with Elsie when we discovered that her costume would not fit over her cast and we were scrambling to find something that would work at the last minute. It definitely was not the ideal, but we got in together in the end. 

Friday was Halloween and the kids had the day off of school and I took the day off of work. I thought maybe we would go do something fun, but instead Merrick had basketball practice and then went to hang out with his girlfriend. Elsie and CC were on the lazy schedule. It was pulling teeth to get them to get dressed and ready for the day. They said they wanted to conserve their energy for trick-or-treating.

At some point I did convince the girls to carve Elsie's pumpkin. We then roasted roasted the pumpkin seeds for a fun fall snack.

The weather had been nice during the day, but we looked at the weather and noticed that it was supposed to start raining a 7pm. We decided to push up our trick-or-treating timeline and go from 5-7pm. We had an early dinner of "Frankenpizza" and headed out with our cousin, Isabel, to hopefully miss the rain. Unfortunately, the rains had different plans. It started raining a little after 5 and pretty much rained the entire time.

Thankfully, I had thought ahead and bought some ponchos. It was obviously important for Elsie to keep her cast dry so she spent much of the night checking, adjusting, and making sure we were accomplishing that. It was wet, our costumes weren't our first choice, but they got plenty of candy, so I guess it was mission accomplished.

Black Cloud

 Last week, I reported that we had started to see light at the end of the tunnel. In hindsight, it turns out, that while it appears we were at the end of that tunnel, there was another one right behind it. This week has felt like a cruel joke.

Monday, Elsie came home early from school with a stomach ache. While CC's chest pain has been feeling way better, both girls have been battling some stomach issues. After a little TLC, Elsie was feeling a little better and everyone went to school on Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday was also my birthday and while I had to work and do all my regular adulting, it was blissfully quiet. 48 hours. We had 48 good hours and then the other shoe fell.

Thursday, just after lunch, I got a call from Elsie's school. They said she had hurt her arm at school and that I needed to come pick her up. When I got to the school, it was clear that she was in a lot of pain. I decided to take her straight to urgent care to rule out a break.

Unfortunately, at urgent care, rather than ruling out a break, they confirmed it. The said they couldn't cast it and we needed to head to the pediatric ER immediately. Because I am apparently living under a black cloud, I realized I didn't have enough gas to get to the hospital and I had to stop with my very distressed daughter and get some gas. I pulled into an overpriced station on the way and handed my card to the attendant, telling him to just put $10 in. He tried my card and it didn't work. He said I would need to go inside and talk to them. I told him I couldn't get my daughter out of the car and could I try a different card or different pump. He told me to scoot back and try the pump behind me. I tried a different card on that pump and it still didn't work. I don't know if it was their pumps or user error, but clearly a card wasn't going to work. Between Elsie and I, we had $4 in cash so I got $4 of gas a prayed it would be enough to get to the hospital.

We finally made it about 3:45 and the epic wait began. You would think when you arrive with an already diagnosed broken arm, that there would be some sense of urgency, but apparently not so much. We finally got in, they got her some pain med, and we did repeat x-rays. They told us that she needed to have surgery, but that couldn't happen until the next day, so they splinted her arm and sent us home. They told us to keep her as comfortable as possible overnight and report to the orthopedist at 9am the next morning. We headed home about 9pm (and got to make yet another stop for gas on the way). Oh, and because they didn't originally know if they would send her for surgery that night, they would not let her eat or drink anything all afternoon/evening.

Our waiting continued at the orthopedist the next morning. We were considered a "walk-in", but they did at least know we were coming and had a tentative plan for us. She had two breaks. One above her elbow that was not displaced, and one below that was displaced. After meeting with the orthopedist and discussing the surgery plan, we were sent to report at the hospital around 10:30.

We were told they had to work us in to the OR schedule, but it would probably be early afternoon and sure enough, about 1:15 they wheeled her off to get started. The first choice was to try and manipulate the bone into place from the outside. That was unsuccessful. The second choice was to insert a wire temporarily to push it back into place. That was successful. Because they were able to get it with "choice B", they didn't have to go with "choice C" or "choice D", which involved putting in temporary pins or a permanent wire or opening her elbow to correct the problem.

The surgery took a little less than 2 hours and then the recovery began. Elsie was in a lot of pain and pretty sad as she woke up. She was also pretty loopy. She kept pointing at the Trolls movie she was watching. When we asked her what she was pointing at she said "why is there two of them?". She was seeing double and it really made her upset. 

Eventually, we got her calmed down and only seeing one of everything and were able to head home and start the road to recovery. We came up from the basement of the hospital, where we had spent the day, and found a double rainbow welcoming us. It has been a brutal few days, on the heals of a brutal year, but I'm hanging on to that rainbow. Maybe the black cloud that has been over us will soon produce a rainbow. Closing in on 48 hours later, we have seen a big reduction in pain.

In the mist of all this drama, Merrick also had a big weekend. He had Homecoming. It was a rainy, windy, yucky day, but they still attempted pictures outside. They then went to a fancy dinner before heading to the dance. They stayed at the dance for about an hour before going to Merrick's date, Inez's house to watch a movie. At least Merrick had some fun this weekend.