Renewed Faith in Mankind

With all of the problems with the economy, crime, seeing the kinds of things we have on Television, the kind of music we have available, the language used by our youth, and the need for greed that seems to dominate our society; it is times like Friday night that I wonder how this can all be so. This past Friday was the fundraiser for David. It was AMAZING!! The teachers showed unity and spirit as they performed their acts; the students, parents, and community members supportively laughed and applauded even the most ridiculous things; people enjoyed time together at the dessert buffet; and they opened their hearts and their wallets to support David (and me) in our efforts to get him walking again. It was tremendous! Not only was enough money raised to pay for the leg, but there was enough to pay for his therapy co-pays and some medical bills too. The Band Boosters kicked in $1000 from their popcorn sale and the teachers were able to raise $1000 on their own as well. David and I are still in shock at the show of support. I guess it is easy to forget that we are not alone and sometimes you just need to ask for help. To be honest, that was a very difficult thing for us to do. We didn't feel right to ask others to help us when everyone is struggling in this economy. But, the thought of him not being able to move forward with his life was harder to accept than the act of swallowing our "pride" (which is what I have been told it is) and accepting the goodwill of others. We have always given freely when we could and never felt anything but joy in the giving. But, the gratitude we feel to those that helped us reach our goal is something I can't even describe. Thank you to everyone for the support, for teaching me to ask for help, and for renewing my faith in others.

Eden The Donut Queen

A lot of people have been asking me... "How do you feel?" or "How is the pregnancy treating you?" and the general answer is GREAT! Truthfully, it's been pretty easy. The only thing that has been strange (my husband thinks it's hilarious) is that something that I have never really liked to eat is the only thing I seem to crave. Yes- the title of this blog kind of gives it away... a donut...and not just any donut... a Raspberry filled jelly donut (I hate raspberry anything)! I crave it in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening... all the time. Being the good little pregnant lady I hold out until I just can't take the craving anymore, stretching the time between donuts to days or a week if at all possible, but the need for the sweet becomes too much to bear and I end up getting a donut at least once a week. David thinks it's funny to watch me eat something I normally wouldn't touch, but from a guy who will eat a bowl of oatmeal with meat in it for breakfast I am thinking he doesn't have much room to tease me. So, all is well in Donut land (at least she wants something that's only 60 cents). Hoping all is well with all of you too!

Rod Chronicles Part 1- The Gallactic Costco

So I wanted to tell people about my last few days starting with a couple of days ago when me and my wife went to "The Costco." I refer to Costco as "The Costco" because Costco is much more than a warehouse discount center. It's more like it's own planet. This becomes even more clear when you have to navigate it with "one" leg. I remember the days when I use to walk through Costco with "two" legs, I used to get overwhelmed by the sure magnitude of the place, overwhelmed by all the great things sold in the place and overwhelmed by all the things I wanted to buy dancing in my head. Oh, have things changed. So my wife and I walk into Costco and the first thing one of the kind Costco people say to me is, "Do you want to use one of the motorized carts sitting over there?" I promptly respond with a "Do I look like someone who needs the motorized cart?" Of course, the Costco worker looks at me with a slightly confused look on his face, but won't dare say anything else. So he stands a side and away my wife and I go. And into Planet Costco I stumbled. As soon as I was reminded of the sheer enormity of Costco; I knew I was in trouble. Now, let me make this clear. I'm a very hard-headed individual and no one forced me to crutch along "Planet Costco." If I would have turned to my wife and told her that I couldn't venture any further she would have smiled and said "Okay let's go home." She's a good wife; she's always looking after me. So we started going down the first few aisles and slowly anxiety of being there started setting in. But somewhere between picking out ground beef and grabbing some frozen fruit for smoothies all those memories of picking out cool things to buy from Costco were replaced with "Get me the hell out of here!" I was tired, I was agitated, phantom pains were in full zapping mode. I told my wife the count down was on. We hurried on, grab the things we needed and checked out. We made it back to the car. I survived "Planet Costco." Ask me if I would use the motorized cart on my next visit; I would smugly say, "Do I look like I need a cart?" This blog went I little longer than I thought so stay tuned for another "Rod Chronicle." I have some cool things coming up and I want to let you in on some of those things. One more thing, I will be the proud father of a baby girl. Can't wait to see you Eden! More on her later...Stay tuned...

The Fundraising Event

So, here is the finalized plan for the Fundraiser: There will be a Teacher Talent Show hosted at our local high school at 7:00 pm on Friday February 20, 2009. Tickets will be $10.00 each and we are hoping to sell 400 total to pay for the prosthetic. There will be a free dessert buffet available beginning at 6:00pm for those who are there to see the show. Hope to see you all there!