Mid Dec-Christmas

December 13
Today, dad went to Dr. Baker for a quick check up since he’s no longer on hospice and to check his weepy eye. He remembered Misty, the nurse, and Dr. Baker real well. He said, “Hiya Doc!” He weighed 91 pounds with shoes, a coat and some coins in his pocket. I can’t believe he once weighed amost 10 pounds less than that!

After getting upset at Trevor, Carl and Ryan and talking to them for more than an hour the other day, he’s had 2 really tired days. He’s been going to bed sometime around midnight to 2 every night but I noticed sometimes gets up in the middle of the night or early in the morning. Sometimes the fireplace is going and the paper is inside but he’s in bed, once he was sitting in front of the fire in his robe. He looked really cozy.

It’s been hard to get him up and out. He seems pretty content just resting. But when he goes out he’s very alert and seems interested in everything. After the Dr apt at 4:30, we went for a long drive to look at the lights: Christmas Street, the zoo, downtown… It was too cold to get out and go into the zoo today but maybe when David is here. It looks really cool! He really likes the lights a lot and keeps looking for the neighbor’s lights to go on (they often don’t turn them on). He can’t see much of the one’s Ryan put up on his own house, so I think we’ll try to get some in the bushes or around the window.

Dad woke up around 7am had all the lights on and was looking around for people. He kept asking about “that guy whose staying here (Ryan)”. He sees his work truck out front and is trying to figure out what its for. He thinks Ryan is an electrician. Ryan made extra hot cereal this morning; dad liked it and ate it all up. He saw a lady running past his house and he waved at her and said “that girl whose running..she must be really healthy; she must be really strong”. He’s been talking a lot lately.

Dec 16
David came in on Friday morning. Dad remembered him and seemed happy to see him. He especially rememberd Marty, David’s dad. They looked at a photo of him and dad said, “oh, he’s your father!” We met Patty, Dan, Mamiyo, Sarah and Veronica for dinner at Golden Dragon. It was fun. Dad was like his old self. He held mamiyo’s hand and ate a lot of food and insisted on paying for part of the dinner. He gave a quick nod and wave when people thanked him. He likes being gracious. We took hin to Park City to get out of the inversion and he seemed to have fun looking at all the shops. Ryan and David put more lights out on the bushes and dad said, “oh good! “ We left some inside lights lying on the ground near the window and when we got home from shopping, he had draped the lights on the lower windows, like two Christmas trees. He also helped put up the tree. He had a lot of energy that day and worked hard on the tree. But then the next day he was pooped all day, went to bed on his own around 11. The next day (today, Monday) he was up but didn’t want to change out of his robe. It snowed over night and he was disappointed this morning. I tried to get him out to the Senior Center to pick up his raffle gift but he said no one drives on a day like this! Maybe tomorrow? We took Trevor to see a movie. We hope to take Blake on Thursday.

Tuesday

We picked up his gift at the senior center and he was really surprised and happy that he won a basket of stuffed animals. Afterwards we went to the barbershop and David got his haircut. Dad got a kick out of watching him. Then we went to the Museum of Natural History. That was a great place! But I think he was anxious to get home to enjoy his winnings. He was really obsessed about how to position the animals, including the ones he already has. And took a long time arranging everything just right in front of the window. And he was really giddy seeing them all together. I had to take a lot of pictures just to get the right shot (they had to fill the photo). And we put lights around his window and everything looked so pretty. He laughed really hard when he saw all the lights and stuffed animals in the window. I haven’t heard him laugh this hard in a long time.

Later this week (can’t keep track of the dates), we drove around to see the lights at night and ate dinner at mt. Fuji. He recognized it and said, we’re close to home. Ron came over another night with a carrot cake and we sat around drinking whipped cream vodka which we found in the cabinet. Ron stayed a bit too long for dad. He kept looking at me, then finally he told Ron “you better go home; you left your lights on…next time…” It was really funny. On Christmas eve, at 10pm, we took dad to another lessons and carols service at the Episcopal church down the street. He seemed interested in everything, especially the kids. People were nice to come over and shake his hand. He liked that. He’s been going to sleep before midnight lately. But he wakes up briefly in the middle of the night sometimes. Once he was at the front door when the newspaper delivery person came by around 5ish. He walks around opening doors then goes back to bed. But he’s been waking up around 9 every day now. One day we were able to get him all settled by 10am and then we took off to go skiing. He was still sitting on his couch at 5 when we got home. But it seemed he really enjoyed watching TV all day.