Jack and Bill... Brother Survivors... or is that Livers? :-)
Jack helping in the garden. This is digging some kind of hole.
In front of the van they rented to come down. (They are bringing us some "stuff"!)
Eating noodles at David's! (We always call it David's so I can't remember the real name! LOL It's the Chinese restaurant in the Fountain District )
Grandma Doris (Jack's Mom) and Jack.
Jack enjoying the sun on a trip to the mail box.
Watch out, here he comes! :-)
Jack with his Bible study Buddies. Sorry Gentlemen, I don't know all your names, or I would label you!
Armed and Dangerous!
Greeting Bill, also a Survivor, on a recent visit at church.
Making Plum sauce.
Picking plums in the yard.
Jack gathering the hazel nuts off the ground.
Driving the tractor in the yard.
Snoozing on Facebook (?) LOL after a long day.
Another tractor shot.
Greeting at church.Now, I will attempt to paste Ruth's letter in the space below if Blogger isn't too ornery! Okay, Blogger will not accept a paste. Let's see if I can hit the highlights...
Jack had a successful tube replacement (after experiencing significant pain) on September 25th. They used a new type of feeding tube and that has been much more comfortable. The feeding tube must stay in place until Jack is able to eat on his own and maintain weight. This will take awhile and you can remember this in your prayers for him. The doctor also gave him a new kind of pain medication that also helps with increasing his appetite and Jack has been "practicing" for travel, by dining out and trying foods.
The last visit with the chemo oncologist went well. Basically Jack is in "surveillance mode". In other words, "wait and see". No secret cameras watching his every movement as Jack joked! But he will have a scan again in December and they will "scope" him in February. The first two years are critical with stomach cancer.
Slowly Jack and Ruth are re-learning how to live. Much has changed and yet much is the same. They are just figuring out new ways of doing old things, or learning new routines. Please pray for them as they adjust. Sometimes after the crisis is over, that can be the most difficult period in other ways. I haven't experienced Cancer but I do know this to be true in other types of grieving and crisis experiences. Ruth has been encouraged by a verse (which she doesn't know was a favorite of mine that I clung to for several difficult years in the 1990s) lately:
See, now I am doing a new thing; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:19 NIV
So, Mom and Jack ask for your prayers as they travel, especially for Jack's strength. (And I might add his endurance once he is here with the kids!) They are driving a Uhaul down, so graciously to bring two pieces I inherited... an oak veneered roll top desk made by Uncle Ray, which will find a new home in my kitchen, and one of my Aunt's paintings which hung over the fireplace at my Grandma's for years and will do so in our new home as well! Since it was cheaper to get a Uhaul than a van, they are bringing some other things as well (since Jack is so great at finding free/cheap stuff... we gave him a "wish list"). Please pray that they will not have snow in the Siskiyous!
We are really looking forward to sharing our new home with Mom and Jack. It was quite surreal to be excited, making an offer on our first house while Jack was recuperating from major surgery in Seattle. There was such a strange mixture of joy and grief. We will be having Tim's sister and her husband over and enjoying an early Thanksgiving on November 7th. After all we have a LOT to celebrate, especially Jack's LIFE! This will be the first time since being married that I will have celebrated Thanksgiving with my family! I'm very excited.
Thank you all if you read this far and God bless you for your faithfulness to our family. We all love you. And we are so thankful for YOU!!!
