Terrific Thursday

Good snowy morning everyone,

I thought I should blog for you faithful followers and prayer warriors who know that we went to Chicago again yesterday. We so appreciate all of you. I hope you don't get tired of hearing us say that because we never get tired of your loyalty and support of us.

We did indeed go back to Chicago yesterday. John picked me up (yes, he's driving) from work on Tuesday afternoon and we drove to Streator and spent the night with his sister Gaila. His other sister and a couple of nieces came over yesterday morning and spent some time with us before we left for our doctors' visits. It was a nice visit and a good break before going on. We headed to Chicago about 11 for our 1:15 appointment.

We had to wait a short period of time on Dr. Akst, the vocal cord doctor. He did a video test of John's vocal cord and talked to John. He thought he had gotten quite a bit in there, but John thought he could maybe use a little more. The doctor said we could do a touch up and we could either come back at a later date or come back after John's eye appointment and do it yesterday. John decided to go ahead and do it yesterday. We went on to see Dr. Lin to get the stitches taken out of his eye. She decided not to take the stitches out since the eye was partially open. She thought it was better that it was at least a little closed and she said she could see where the corneal abrasion had been, but it didn't look worse. We see the other opthalmologist in Mt. Vernon on Tuesday.

We then went back to Dr. Akst's office and he did an additional "touch-up" to John's vocal cord. John's voice is quite strong now. He said it's a little tight but more than likely it will loosen up. We just hope it continues to help his swallowing, because that's the most important thing. It was about 4:00 when we got out of there and we decided to come on home since Chicago was supposed to get about 12 inches of snow and we were supposed to get a significant amount.

On the way home, Cejae had called and said she stopped by the house and it was 47 degrees in here and she thought we were out of gas. I had asked John to check it on Tuesday, but he forgot. Anyway, being the lovely, thoughtful daughter that she is, she had called the gas man at 6:00 and he was coming out to give us gas, light the furnace, etc. It is wonderful to live in a small town where people care and to have such great people looking after you. When we returned home, everything was in order and warm. Thank you Cejae and Pete Anselment.

I am headed back to work this morning. It has been a little difficult to get back in the swing, but John is doing so well. In fact, he had parked his car down by the road last night in case we couldn't get out and unbeknownst to me this morning has already walked down and moved it up by the house and given me the weather condition report. God has truly blessed us in so many ways! Thank you again for all your prayers and thoughtfulness. We love you and thanks for continuing to read.

John and Cathy