Update About David!

So it`s been about 7 weeks since David`s accident. Like I mentioned in my other post the first 2 weeks were up and down and just crazy. We really thought we were going to lose David. But he fought hard and he got to a point where they decided he wasn`t in critical condition anymore and they moved him to another ICU unit. This was when Richard and I were in Vancouver. He still wasn`t fully awake, but he was opening his eyes more. Jill even sent us all a picture of a selfie she took of her and David. It made me so happy! He was smiling. Not his huge smile but a smile none the less. Happy day!

Look at that awesome smile!

Here was his first smile on camera!

Then they moved him up to the Trauma Unit, still in the Foothills Hospital. He was now fully awake. They had taken the tube out of his mouth and put in a trach before he was moved up to the Trauma unit. But this prevented him from talking. We were all so worried about whether he was going to know any of us. Well he recognized his wife, Jill, first thing. That made us all so happy.

The weeks have flown by since he's fully woken up. He is a fighter and was determined to do all he can do to get better. They had him up and walking (with lots of assistance) that week. I seriously did the happy dance at home when Megan sent us the picture. So exciting.

David walking with help. So exciting to see this tho!

We were so excited to be able to go see him again. The kids and I took off Friday after school and after I drove bus. I packed our stuff and away we went. We went to Cody and Em's and had supper with them and let the kids play and have a good time together. Their new house is smaller, so we were going over to Lisa and Brian's to spend the night.

These crazy girls got the boys and dressed them up!! Ha ha! So funny!

We headed over to Lisa's house. We have never been over to their new house before. We got there and the kids were excited to see their cousins. Jazzi was holding her cat, Bella. Brianna was super excited to see a cat and went to hold it and it hissed at her. The cat was a crazy, evil cat. No joking. I told the kids to leave it alone and I started hauling all our stuff downstairs and was setting up beds and things. I turned to go upstairs and this crazy cat (which I didn't realize followed me downstairs), attacked me. It pounced and wrapped it's paws around my leg and was hissing and trying to bite me. It kind of freaked me out. I finally got it off my leg. But the evil cat followed me wherever I went. Then when I turned around to leave it would attack me. It did it at least 4 times. I started carrying a blanket and it would attack that instead. The kids saw it attack me upstairs and it freaked them all out. It scared DJ so bad that he wouldn't leave my side and I had to carry him everywhere. He would start screaming. Once Lisa's client left, I told her what the cat was doing and asked her to put it somewhere. She told us we had to leave it alone. Ummm, yes we weren't bothering it, it was stalking us!! ha ha! So she put it in the pantry. But the problem was, Spencer would go get it out. So before bedtime, we put the cat back in the pantry and shut the door. Then I shut the door to the basement and put the kids to bed. We were all super tired. I fell asleep too. I woke up later, to hysterical screaming on the top of their lungs. I jumped up and ran into the bedroom where Brianna and Cadence were screaming and jumping on their beds. Cadence got up to go bathroom or come to me (not sure which one) and the cat was right there and the cat hissed and attacked her and Cadence turned to run and ended up twisting her foot and jumped onto the bed. She was so traumatized, I couldn't get her to calm down. It took a while. With all the screaming Lisa came down and snatched the cat. Good thing....cause I was ready to throw it outside to the coyotes (I could hear them outside). Seriously....I hate cats....especially this one. I was confused how the cat got down there....it was only 5:30am. But everyone was awake. I found out later that Spencer got up and let the cat out and came and let it down stairs. Oh my! I wasn't feeling that great and super tired. But all 7 kids were up. Lisa went back to bed. It was a crazy couple of hours. Between kids screaming whenever the cat came too close. It actually jumped on DJ and he went hysterical too. I started packing everything up and getting ready to leave. I was planning on leaving the kids there during the day so I could spend the day at the hospital, but plans changed. There was no way my kids would stay there without me. Lisa had clients coming all day.....so that wasn't going to work. So we left there just after 9:30am. I told her we would stay somewhere else that night.....I didn't feel like repeating the same night again. I was grumpy and tired!! Ha ha!! I can laugh about it now.....kind of!! ha ha!

Here's the evil cat. Ha ha!

So we went over to Cody and Emily's and I fed the kids breakfast and we finished getting ready for the day. The kids had fun playing with their cousins without worrying about a crazy cat jumping on them. Mom and Dad came and we followed them and Tiffani and we had lunch and then headed over to the hospital. The kids were all so excited to finally be able to see their Uncle David. We took them in two at a time. They were all super shy, because he looked different then they expected. Plus he couldn't talk. He smiled and waved at them. They were able to see him the next day too and we got a picture with him and the kids. It was exciting to see David interacting with us. Even if it was with hand gestures and writing on a white board. It was great!

Here are my kids and Shaylee with David!!

David did write a lot of things on the white board. If he had a question or just wanted to say something he would wave his finger in the air and we would grab the board. We got a little loud a few times and the nurses got after us. So hard to be quiet when there's so many of us wanting to be with David. But I'm glad we were able to spend some time with him. Steve and Stacey and the girls were there too. We stayed at the same hotel as them on Saturday night. That was fun. The kids had a blast swimming together. Mikah and Shaylee just took my kids and watched them at the pool. Loved that! It was a great weekend.

Brianna and Cadence busy drawing their Uncle David some get well cards. This was in the waiting room.

DJ holding his cousin, Emmett!

The next week I came up by myself on Friday. I was able to spend the whole day with David. I got there around 10am. Jill and her brother, Sam were there for a bit. Then they took off to go shopping. David was talking now. They had taken out his trach. There was still a hole in his neck, but they had it covered with tape. I went with him down to his swallow test. We were waiting in the hallway for a porter to take us down. I was standing by David showing him pictures on the ipad. His memories were still all over the place. So I had put pictures of his wedding and a few other things on my ipad. I could show him a picture and ask questions about it and he was able to answer. I showed him a picture of him and Jill with Grandpa Pitcher. He was super excited and said, "That's my Grandpa Pitcher." I agreed with him. Then he looked at me very seriously and said....kind of in a whisper, "Is he still alive." I told him he was and he sighed really loud and said, "Oh good, I really want to see him again." It was a little comical! He cracks me up. Well as we were talking a doctor came up to me and asked if I remembered him. I told him I did (it was Dr. Dunhum....he was David's dr when he first came in). He shook my hand and then David kind of looked up (he was laying on his bed), and said, "Oh hi." Well the look on Dr. Dunhum's face was pure shock. He was blown away. He looked at me and said, "wow"! He had tears in his eyes. Which made me kind of tear up. He looked at David again and then me and said, "Wow" again. He was so shocked. Then he introduced himself to David and told him who he was. David looked at him and said, "I'm sorry, but I don't remember you." Which we all laughed. Dr. Dunhum asked David a few questions, like what's 49-7, and David would answer. He asked David where he lived and David answered, "Calgary and Cardston." I looked at David a little confused and he looked at me and said, kind of in an annoyed voice, "Well we do, cause Jill moved us out of our apartment and all our stuff is in Cardston." It was really funny! It was so neat to see Dr. Dunhum again and he seemed so happy too see how well David was doing.

David helping Sam itch his back!

I absolutely loved spending the day with David. I felt bad when he was doing his swallow test. It was very hard for him and he was so tired. I was starting to feel a little annoyed with the people making him do the test. But I held my tongue. He was finally done, and they told him he failed it. I felt so bad for him. They told him that he could start having ice chips to practise his swallowing. As I was walking back with him I told him I was sorry that he couldn't have real food. He looked at me and said, "I'll start with ice chips and end with ice cream." Then he smiled big. It was so funny. He has always been so positive. We got him back into bed and I tucked him in and he was sound asleep. I ran to the cafeteria for lunch. I came back and sat down and was reading on my ipad. One of his room mates was being super loud, moaning and groaning. It woke David up and I could tell he was a little annoyed with the guy. Jill and Sam came back and David told them, "Man that guy is so loud. It's so annoying." But he said it so loud. We all shushed him as we were laughing. Some of the things David said would just crack me up! Then he got the giggles and we were all laughing. David could not stop. It was really funny! I finally said goodbye. It's always hard to leave him. I gave him a hug and told him I had fun. He told me he couldn't believe I stayed that long! Which we all laughed about again!!

Taking a big bite of blue jell stuff!

Swallowing while they are watching it on the monitor.

David and me, just before I left!

Since then, he has been moved up to Rehab. He is now eating real food and is loving it. He is walking by himself with a cane. It's been amazing at how well he is doing. He gets day passes and can leave the hospital for a bit. He's getting stronger and stronger. What a miracle he is. I'm so thankful that he is still here with us. What a blessing.

Vancouver Part 3!

So this was the first time that we have ever left our kids for more than 2 nights. I was a little nervous at first but it turned out just fine. By Thursday, I was missing them all a bit. Plus I was beat!! Ha ha! Wednesday was a fun day but we did a LOT of walking and it exhausted me! So we decided to take it a little easy on Thursday.

We took off in the morning and went downtown to go check out the Convention Center and we walked around there and went to a cool 3D show of "Flying over Canada". It was super cool! We saw the Olympic Torch there too.

We had lunch there and then headed back to the hotel. We stopped at a Dollar Store and got a few things we needed and some treats. Then we went back and watched TV and had a nap. I was so tired!! We decided that we were going to go to a movie that night. So we just relaxed the rest of the afternoon and then headed out to the movie theatre. We had supper at the Spaghetti Factory which was across the street from the Theatre. Then we went over and watched our movie. It was a perfect, relaxing day!

Our plan for Friday was to get up early....hence why we had a relaxing day on Thursday too! We were up by 7am and walking out by 7:30am. We headed toward the ferries. Good thing we left early because traffic was crazy. Our ferry was leaving at 9am and we got there just before 8:30am. We got our ticket and pulled into line. Then we walked over to the market place and got some breakfast and headed back to the car and ate there.

We started loading the Ferry at about 8:45am. It was super cool. We were on the upper deck with our car. It was cool to look out the side and see the ocean and other boats. We decided to lock up the car and head upstairs. I've never been on a Ferry before so it was cool to walk around and explore.

Our car in the Ferry.

Then the Ferry pulled out and we were headed toward Vancouver Island. We stayed outside for a bit then headed inside. We checked out the gift shops and then sat down by a window. That didn't last very long though. The motion was making both of us a little sick. So we went up to the observation deck, which is outside. The cool air helped us not be so naucious. We stayed up there for the rest of the time. It took 1 1/2 hrs to get to the Island.

The ramps going up.

The oberservation deck on the Ferry.

We passed another Ferry boat.

\My handsome husband!!

Going by little islands.

\The other Ferry boat!!!!

We drove off the ferry and headed straight to the Butchart Gardens. We really wanted to check them out. It was overcast and lightly raining when we got there. We grabbed some umbrellas and started to walk around. The gardens are amazing. Everything was so green. It was so cool to walk through it all. I'm sure it looks even better in the spring time. But we really enjoyed walking around. We were probably there for over 2hrs.

Richard posing with his umbrella!! Ha ha!

Look how stunning the gardens look.

Me by a tree that was starting to blossom.

Cool fountain in the pond.

Me on a carrosel horse!!

This was the rose gardens. This would be cool in the spring and summer. These arch ways would be covered in roses.

The Butchart Cove lookout.

Love how green everything is.

Then we took off for Victoria. We didn't have any concrete plans so we were just driving around, checking things out. We found the Fisherman's Whorf. It was so cool. People live in there houses right there on the water. Anyways, we noticed people were getting ready to go whale watching so we decided to join them. We paid for our tickets and got into our gear. Then we waited for the boat to show up! Then away we went. It was pretty cool. On the way out, he drove us along the coast and we saw bald eagles (a bunch) and some seals sunning on rocks. We got pretty close to those. It was neat. Then we headed out to the open ocean. It was a bit rougher. We cruised around and all of the sudden he gunned it and whipped the boat around. He found 2 porpoises. It was super cool. They came and jumped right up beside us. Really neat. We didn't see any whales but it was still a fun experience. We headed back right as the sun was setting. I took a ton of pictures!

Walking down to the Wharf.

Richard and I in our very fashionable outfits! They were very warm!

Richard loved the water Taxi!! Ha ha!

The cool looking floating houses.

There goes the taxi!

Us in the boat ready for our adventure!

We sat in the back of the boat.

Our boat driver and guide name was Brett. He was super nice.

If you look closely you can see the seals between the two big rocks.

They are the white spots.

Cool picture of the sky....before the sun started setting.

OK here are a whole bunch of cool pictures of the sun setting. We were flying along in the boat, so some of the pictures show the spray from the boat. It was so pretty watching it set over the ocean. Loved it.

 

Cool dude, Richard!!

We went by the light house on the way back. You can see the owners standing on the rocks. They were waving at us. They live there year round.

It was an amazing experience and I'm so glad we went. By the time we got back we were both starving. We found a fancy seafood restaurant and decided to try our luck with that. There was a spot open. So we went in (even though I felt very under dressed)! Oh well! The food was absolutely amazing. We really enjoyed ourselves. Then we looked at the time and panicked. We told our waiter that we had to make the 9pm ferry. So he quickly got our check and we paid and ran out. We flew along the highway and I accidently told Richard to take the wrong exit. Oops. I realized it as soon as we went off. But Richard kept asking where we were on the GPS (I had turned it off at that point cause I thought we were almost there). It was a stressful moment, but we turned around and got there with 3 minutes to spare. They had to lower the gate of the ferry so we could drive on. We were the last car on. Talk about cutting it close! Sheesh!

We were both exhausted. We went to the upper deck and walked around and I bought a few souvenirs for the kids. Then we went back down to the car and lowered our seats and fell asleep. We woke up when the semi in front of us started moving! We were back! It was a late night.  But a really fun day!

The next day we got up and got ready to go. We took our time and packed everything up. We decided, we didn't want to take our chances with missing our plane. We lucked out twice and didn't want to try again! Ha ha! We got there early and had breakfast and then went through security and waited at our gate for quite a while. But we made it. Then we found out we were sitting in the front seats (can't remember what they call them). But they have more room and we got free food. Sweet! It made the flight even better! Ha ha! So there's our Vancouver trip. It was a blast. But we were both ready to come back home and see our kids! Glad we were able to go!