Update on my father in law

"We went to see my father in law today. He seems to be doing a little better, and his breathing is not labored any longer. They did a bunch of tests today to confirm that he has a blood clot in his lungs and still has one in his leg as well. The doctor came while we were visiting and confirmed that he has a pulmonary embolism which it affecting his left lung and partially affecting his right lung. His blood oxygen level is above 90% which is good, although he still needs to be on oxygen. The doctor stated that the first 72 hours are the most dangerous, so each day he stays alive should improve his situation. He is on heparin and they are going to try to get him on warfarin although he had some problems with warfarin six years ago. He still tires out very quickly. The expectation is that it will take at least 2 weeks for the clots to re-absorb, and it will be at least 6 weeks until he will be able to have the hip repair surgery completed. Reading about pulmonary embolisms shows that they are very common and very dangerous. In the US 600000 people per year will have them and of that group 100000 will die. However, those who die usually die in the first 30 to 60 minutes. That means each day improves the prognosis. Please keep lifting Bill up in your prayers as well as his wife Wilma and their family. This is a very trying time for all of us."

Prayers requested

I am not really sure how many people read this blog, but if you read it and believe in Jesus Christ, please pray for my wife's father. He is in hospital with a blood clot in his lungs. This all started a little more than 3 weeks back when he went in to have a hip replacement that was loose and infected fixed. Since the surgery he has been in hospital. Yesterday he was doing very well, feeling good, and progressing well with his rehabilitation, then today this clot happened and he had to be moved to another hospital. We don't have much details beyond him having the clot and being quite ill. My mother-in-law is very concerned. Please pray the God's glory will be seen in this as he sustains them and us through it. Also, please pray that if it is God's will, that he will bring healing. Thank-you.

Still Amazed

Once again I was amazed at how fast our son is growing. It seems that almost daily he develops some way. Yesterday he would only scoot around the floor pulling himself with his hands. Today he is using his feet to push while pulling with his hands. Annette told me that he can even stand in the bath-tub when there is no water in it. To top this off he is starting to show some problem solving attempts. Annette blocked off his access to the dog bed Riley sleeps on to keep Justin from doing his favorite thing, crawling up and grabbing Riley's paws. When Justin encountered this barricade, he tried to figure out a way around or over. He even started to try to crawl around it. Two days ago he wouldn't have done that. As I said, it is amazing how quick he develops.

Early Morning thoughts

One of the strange things that has happened to me since the birth of Justin is that the time I wake up in the morning has moved much earlier. I say this is strange because with Annette nursing him, I don't have to get up early since I cannot feed him. Yet, I still find that I am regularly up at 6am. For me this is weird because I still have difficulty getting to sleep before 11:30pm. Needless to say this has left me rather tired. Over the past couple of days I have been ill as well with aches and pains, a sore throat, and headache. Thankfully, the worst of it was on Monday, and since then I have been feeling better each day, although I am not over it yet. I can still feel it there in the background although fading.

RSS feeds

Over the past couple of days I have discovered the joy of RSS feeds. If you don't know what an RSS feed is you can look here RSS Links What I have done using them is added my most recent blog entry to my personal web-page as well as adding a page to my web page that gathers together the RSS feeds from various blogs that I read frequently. Sadly, not all of the blogs I read have RSS feeds, or if they do, they don't make it know what the address for the feed is. So I encourage all those who have blogs to set up an RSS feed. If you are with livejournal you already have one. If you are a paying user of blogspot you can set one up in your blog settings, but if you are not a paying member, you can use Feedburner.com to get a free RSS feed for your blogspot blog.

Dark, cloudy day

Today is yet another dark and dull day weather wise. None of us got much sleep last night. I could not seem to sleep more than an hour before waking up feeling uncomfortable. Whatever bug had gotten in my system leaving me feeling physically miserable all Monday is still active. Annette was woken up by Justin almost as frequently. In fact Justin is the only one who seems to have lots of energy is Justin. Oh to be a baby again.

New Years

As is our practice, we both ended the old year and started the new year in worship with our church family. What stood out to me this year was that we worshiped together with the local Christian Reformed Church this New Years day at an evening service. What I found amazing what how the message preached by the pastor of the CRC fit so well with the morning message that I preached at our New Years Day service. Both were calls for us to live as God has called us to live. My focus was on Paul's words in Philippians 2:5, "Have this mind in you, which is yours in Christ Jesus." I pointed out that those who believe in Christ are to be transformed by that, so that they have a view of the world and their lives that is in keeping with Christ following the pattern he gave of humility, obedience, and love for the glory of God. The evening service focused of how we are to live as the family of believers, bearing each others burdens and gently restoring one another when we sin. My prayer is that we will see this sort of world view fill our congregation, and my own life.

Not the most pleasant part of being a parent

This weekend is usually one of my favorite of the year. We have our morning worship service, followed by a lunch together as a congregation, followed by our annual Christmas program. However, such was not to be the case this year. Oh, the day we pleasant enough. The Christmas program was quite good, bringing together Christmas and Easter, but I was not very comfortable. You see, on Saturday night my baby son decided that my one eye was fascinating to him, and he reached out with his sharp little nails (talons would probably be a more accurate term) and scraped my cornea. Off to the hospital I went to have my diagnosis confirmed. Sure enough, I had a bad scratch to the cornea, and it was quite big. I expected them to put on an eye patch for 24 hours, as that is what they used to to, but no longer. Now they put a whole host of eye drops in the eye that is scratched. The first one is to relax the eye, and it immediately takes away the pain, and dilates the pupil so you can't see clearly at all. The next is a pain killer, and finally an anti-biotic. The good side of this is not having to wear a patch. The bad side is I had to preach with one eye that would not focus at all. That meant reading scripture and all the rest by closing the bad eye so I could see to read. Even looking at the congregation was uncomfortable, and eventually resulted in me wishing I was just home in the dark. The meal as usual was great, and even the Christmas program was very good. However, my eye was a major pain the whole time. Even typing this I keep my one eye closed. I am very thankful that I am at least a passable typist :) The great part is that in all of this God gave what was needed to proclaim his word. In spite of the discomfort, the Lord's day was still a good day to be with his people. Now I just need to remember to keep my eyes away from little baby hands :)

Who would have thunk it?

David Palmer

Which 24 Character are you?
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Christmas Light's Will Never Be The Same

The Lights of Christmas Story

OFTEN ACCUSED OF ILLEGAL GATHERINGS and creating social unrest, house church pastors in China face arrest, persecution and imprisonment. When imprisoned they are forced to do hard labor – making bricks, mining coal, putting together cigarette lighters...and even assembling Christmas lights. The same Christmas lights we use to celebrate the Savior’s birth are being used to punish Chinese pastors who have risked everything to share Jesus to the largest people group on earth – it’s a story that captures everyone’s heart who hears it. Instead of boycotting these items, house church leaders in China have asked that we use our Christmas lights as reminders to pray that they have the strength to stand firm for the Savior during their suffering, and for the Lord to protect and care for their families. The Lights Of Christmas Story PICTURE THIS! A COLD, DARK PRISON CELL IN THE NORTHERN INTERIOR OF CHINA. The cell is only 20' by 20' and occupied by 40 prisoners. One of these prisoners is a Chinese underground church pastor in his mid-40s, sentenced to a three-year prison term for preaching the Gospel of Christ. At 5:30 a.m., after being allowed four hours of sleep, a swift blow awakens him to his back from the boot of a communist prison guard. Pastor Stephen is allowed to have one of the two bowls of soup that will be his food for the day including the one small steamed roll he is given each day, he will consume perhaps 500 calories. Now all 40 prisoners are taken to a room and put in two lines facing each other and forced to kneel. In front of each prisoner is placed a box containing unassembled Christmas lights. The guard viciously barks out the command and Pastor Stephen quickly grabs the empty strings of lights and begins to assemble them. He takes the tiny individual light bulbs and threads the two small metal wires extending from the glass through the plastic holder and bends them into place. Before long, his fingers are raw and bleeding. Then he puts the bulb into the fitting on the string of lights and clamps it into place with his teeth, as prisoners are not allowed tools. His quota for the day - 5000 bulbs. Work will continue for 16 to 20 hours or all night if necessary. If the guards are unsatisfied with the speed or quality of the work, he will be beaten mercilessly. Such is a normal workday for this humble servant of God. When he is taken back to his cell, he recalls the many verses of Scripture he has memorized and thanks God for His faithfulness in spite of the hardship. Then quietly he begins to sing worship songs he has hidden away in his heart and he begins to pray for the well being of his family. Tears of thanksgiving begin to roll down his face as he ponders how blessed he is to be considered worthy to suffer for Christ. Blessed because he is a part of the underground Church of China - the largest Church in the world, numbering over 80 million believers. A Church that is vibrant and passionate and deep in the things of God. A Church that is paying a great price for this great turning to God with persecution and suffering. For more information on this click.

Me?! Hidden Talent?!!!

As I was jumping from blog to blog I ran into this one. I can't say that I think it is correct, but maybe my hidden talent is hidden from me :)

Your Hidden Talent

You have the natural talent of rocking the boat, thwarting the system. And while this may not seem big, it can be. It's people like you who serve as the catalysts to major cultural changes. You're just a bit behind the scenes, so no one really notices.

What's Your Hidden Talent?

What Bible Translation

You scored as NASB - New American Standard Bible. You are intelligent, responsible, and understanding. You strive to do your best possible in all areas of life and are generally quite successful. You do not mind being different and sometimes taking risks, but you simultaneously find no virtue in completely doing away with the past. NASB - New American Standard Bible 55% NWT - New World Translation 45% KJV - King James Version 35% CEV - Contemporary English Version 20% NRSV - New Revised Standard Version 15% What version of the Bible are you? created with QuizFarm.com

I'm Rerun, how about you.

Which Peanuts character are you?
You are Rerun!

Thoughts after a week

We are a little past a week since Justin was born. The week has been filled with highs and lows. The highs of having Annette get stronger and come home, of Justin feeding well and growing, and of parents who are so very willing to help. But then there are the lows--lows of self doubt, wondering if I can be the father my son will need, lows of exhaustion from a fussy baby who won't go to sleep, and lows of wishing my wife was recovered from everything and knowing it may still be weeks before she is. None of this has been helped by the heat-wave we are going through right now. Day after day of hot, humid weather starts to take its toll as well. Yet, I don't think I would trade any of it, except the hot weather, for anything. As hard as it has been, it has also been good. It has been and continues to be a learning experience on how to balance work and family. My hope is that as the days go by, the learning will progress and will turn into some joy in the doing of all this.

Baby Pics

Here are a pic of Annette and our baby, and one of our baby.

Baby On Board!

We have a baby boy, Justin Matthew, born July 6, 2005; 9lbs11oz; 23 inches long! I was not going to post this tonight, because I was absolutely exhausted. As you can see from earlier posts, this all started Monday night, and with everything did not finish until Wednesday late afternoon (early evening with waiting for Annette to come out of surgery) So from getting up early Monday after a tiring Sunday and not a very good sleep, I am Annette have been awake for 60 hours or so except for an hour here and there (no more than 3-4 total) We are both exhausted and that contributed to the whole story of what happened. I went to bed after sending out and phoning the absolutely vital announcments, but then a neighbor called about an hour later and woke me up so I cannot get back to sleep. So what was our three days like? It was one of the best and worst times of my life. Labor for Annette came and went again and again. She worked so hard, and it was so special having a home birth. However, when she got stalled at 8cm dilation and twice her contractions stopped, our midwife said we really needed to get her some assistance. We went to the Clinton hospital to have an Oncytocin drip given to her to get her contracting and dilating at 7:30 or 8am Wednesday. By this point we were all tired, but the drip worked great and she started to have good contractions and dilated until all that was left was what is called an anterior lip. That is still not all the way to 10cm, but it soon thinned so it could fit over the baby's head and Annette was allowed to push. She tried as hard as she could. She pushed and pushed, but she was exhausted. I was so proud of her and tired to help her as much as I could. She worked so hard for the three days that we had been in labor. By the end, she just could not go on, and even then she pushed. I had tears running down my face as, I think, did everyone else in the delivery room, but Annette was done. The shear amount of strength she showed was amazing. I always kneww she was strong, but she did the labor of three women, and even in the face of exhaustion, she kept trying until the end. The baby came very close to being born vaginally, but we were out of time and energy. So, we opted for a c-section. God truly gave me a wife who is amazing. They got the c-section organized quickly, and got me and our midwife, Susan, gowned up so we could be there with Annette. But, once again things did not go as planned, the epidural did not work, and they opted to use a general anestetic, and we were not allowed in. Through all of this my feelings were flying all over. Pride in Annette. Sadness and disappointment that our hopes of a home birth or even a vaginal birth were gone. Anger at myself for not being the supporting husband I should be, and even though I know better, anger at God for how in his providence he had our hopes and all that work of Annette dashed. It took me a long time to get through all this, and I am sure I am not through it completely yet. The c-section went well, and soon they came with a beautiful baby boy. The problem was I was so conflicted at that moment that I can't say I enjoyed it as much as I would like. Yes, he grabbed my heart right away, but at the same time I felt so . . . so . . . I don't know. It took a while and some tears before I realize that I just need to put it all behind me. Then things became so much better, because Justin is a really great baby. God in his providence has given me someone who grabbed my heart. My prayer is he will grow up not just healthy, but as a person who truly loves and puts his trust in Christ. May God give Annette and I the grace we need to raise this beautiful boy. So as I type this through my tears--tears of sorrow, tears or joy, tears of thankfulness for a wonderful wife and child--I can say the last three days have been some of the best and worst of my life. I would never exchange the experiences of going through labor at home with family around us for support. In my opinion this is one of the most amazing times of fellowship a family can have. I would not, even though part of me wishes it had been different and we had the baby at home, exchange the long period of sharing as much as I can, Annette's labor. Seeing her strength. Holding her. Encouraging her. And all the rest. That too was amazing. And I was so thankful that we had the option of a c-section. The nurses, doctors, surgeons, and all the rest were great, even when I was far from happy at the time. Finally, that little baby is beyond words for me to describe. Now comes the recovery. Physically for Annette 4-6 days in hospital. And then emotionally and all the rest for both or us as we deal with a very stressful three days. Now I need to see if I can sleep.

Labor away!

Well, Annette has been having contractions since Monday night. We were very excited when she reached 8cm dilation, but then after a couple of hours of hard frequent contractions, she had not dilated more, and the baby's head had actually moved up from the cervix, and for about 30-40 minutes there were no contractions. Baby's heart beat was strong, but this could be bad. It could also just indicate that the baby needed to reposition before labor could continue. So Annette went into a position to assist that, and as we lay there for half an hour, I prayed. I always find it amazing how while at first I simply said God get the baby repositioned, after a few minutes of praying my prayer was, God this is in your hands, and you have given us many good things, you do what you know is right, but if it be your will reposition the baby. Happily it seems the baby repositioned well, and labor started again and is even more intense. As of this writing, things are still progressing, so hopefully my next entry will be the announcement of who our new baby is.

Labor Started!!!!

Labor started last night about 9-10pm. Annette started to have more regular contractions when we were out walking the dogs at Pinery Provincial Park, and after we got home they got more intense and more frequent. We asked the mid-wife to come to see how things were going, still not sure if Annette was starting into labor or not. When the mid-wife arrived at 9:30 or so, she found Annette was having good contractions and was 3cm dilated and the baby's head was fully engaged. Since it would take all night for her to fully dilate, (increase of 1cm/hr would be very fast, .5cm/hr would be more usual) she told us to sleep as much as we could. Needless to say Annette did not sleep much what with the hard contractions, and I didn't sleep much because, well, this is exciting and my mind keeps running over what is happening. Things are continuing, and we will phone our parents soon so they can come down. Going into labor was an answer to the prayers of many people. If she had not, we would have had to seen an Ob for a consult and could have ended up having to have the baby in hospital if they said we had to induce, which is not what we desired. But thanks be to God, everything is going naturally!

Still waiting, but something seems to be happening

The count is at 15 days overdue and counting. However, yesterday and today Annette has been having some strong contractions. Yesterday they were quite far a part (55 minutes or so) and did not always follow a regular pattern. Then they seemed to slowly disappear. Today, Annette woke up with lots of energy, and we had a good day together going to a local plant nursery that has a half price sale, and then going to the Pinery to walk the dogs and enjoy the lake. At first Annette only had very infrequent contractions, but as the day progressed they became more frequent. Now they are quite strong and much more frequent. Maybe, just maybe the baby is ready to make an appearance :D

No baby yet.

Well, we are still waiting. Annette and I went to see our Mid-wife again today, and she did a fetal stress test to make sure that everything is ok with the baby. The test showed that the baby is doing well, moving a lot with a good heart rate that matches up well with his/her movements. She also did some other tests and told us that Annette's body is good to go, but the baby's head is not right against the cervix. When the baby's head is against the cervix, labor will probably start. Hopefully for our sanity and sleep that will happen soon. On another note, today was Canada Day. While I cannot say I am pleased with the things our current government has done, especially their redefining of marriage, I must say I am still happy to be a Canadian. It is truly a wonderful country with some great people. God has blessed me to have me born here.