One of our oldest traditions is sitting around and taking in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.  There are so many similarities to situations the National Lampoon movies promote, it brings a lot of comical memories back to everyone.  A specific memory I always remember is picking out a tree as a family.  Going out to a tree farm to cut down our own tree, my dad and I lobbying for a layered christmas tree, while my sister and mom lobby for the bushy kind.  Through many eventful discussions, we usually finally decided on a tree and made it home safe and sound.  Sometimes, not exactly the most enjoyable at the time, but certainly hilarious to sit back and think of now.  Its things like this that I want to bring to our family(maybe less bickering on the type of tree), but the family atmosphere that included hanging the lights, decorating the tree and enjoying the company of everyone involved.

This year my dad was noticeably absent, but Payton, Jess, mom and my grandma were all able to participate in hanging various ornements, reading Dora Christmas books(thanks great grandma) and of course whatever you’d like to call the top hat jess got for the tree topper(see picture below)

We also had a great thanksgiving celebration this year.  Jess’s parents were able to make it up from Walla walla, and joined myself, Jess, Payton, my mom and grandma to celebrate my 26lb turkey.  Yup, I made a large turkey this time around.  Payton did her best to help brine the turkey, but the priceless moment(s) involved her apologizing to the turkey each time she dumped brine over the top….”i’m sorry mr turkey”…I’m still not sure why she was so apologetic, especially consider she ate him the next day and offered no such apology, but such is the life of a two year old.

We had a few other memerable photos over the holiday with Barkley taking up residence on Pat(jess’s dads) lap.  Apparently he is the sofa for dogs.  As well as Payton passing out on Turkey day in my dads old Chair we put in her playroom.

Most of the rest of the year has been spent working, traveling for work(me) and Jess dealing with a classroom full of youngsters.  Recently, Jess has found a new hobby in regards to school.  While there have been massive cutbacks all throughout the district(and state), she found a little loophole for writing grants and has been quite successful so far.  She’s been able to attain multiple grants from local business’s and PTA board for items to use throughout her classroom and make her students experience much more interactive.  This week, a local credit union even came and presented her with the November Grant award on a big check!  Sadly, at least for her, she said she wanted to keep the big check but apparently that wasn’t part of the grant.  Anyhow, we’re proud of her looking for ways to help even during such difficult times in school districts.

I’ve been busy with work, traveling here and there.  Made it to NYC, Savannah, GA, Los Angeles and Seattle over the last 2 months.  Been a bit of a whirlwind all over the US.  Outside of missing family, it is nice to see different parts of the country, especially when it involved LA and the ocean.

We’re looking forward to the next few weeks of the Christmas holiday.  It’s my favorite holiday, and it continues to improve with a 2 yr old beginning to understand Santa and everything else around the holiday.  It will certainly be an emotional few weeks without Dad around, but we continue to focus on the many great memories we had over the holidays, rather than his not being here.  A few pictures from previous christmas family photos that will always bring a smile to my face, including one from last year where we wrapped up a mini plunger for his stocking!

We’re hoping everyone is having a great holiday season.

Love always,

Jon, Jess, Payton, Barkley and Maddux

Jess and I have been getting settled back into working F/T and having Payton back at day care 2-3 times a week.  It’s been a great experience for her, as she has an in home daycare ,and there are only a couple of kids there with her.  We like that she’s already learning a lot of great social skills by having the interaction.  She’s doing pretty well with most of her vocab.  She counts to twenty in english, and 10 in spanish.  She also spends way too much time walking up and down our stairs without the help of railing or anything.  She’s getting too damn old too quickly.  We’re very proud of how far she’s progressed though.

Work has been good and bad for both Jess and I.  She is still struggling with the many expectations placed on teachers, while getting her 4th pay cut in 4 years.  Pretty amazing how that structure works, but whatever.  We’ll see how long she’ll last if this continues down this road.  I was fortunate enough to travel to Savannah, Georgia last week for work, and loved it. What a great little town.  everyone was nice, the trees are amazing.  Everything about the place  seemed to be a great time.  Wish i would have had time to golf, but that will have to be next time.

Recently, Payton was explaining to us that she has new signing skills, so we put them to test on twinkle twinkle little star…..you’ll have to be the judge…..let’s not send her to american idol just yet……………………..

Hope everyone is doing well.  We’re looking at adding to the family sometime in the near future, so we’re going to have two of these little whacko’s running around.  BTW, no, Payton has not stopped growing.  She continues to grow off the charts…….there is always the next 6 months right?????????

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Things have been going well here.  Jess started school last week, which is always a stressful but entertaining part of the year.  I would imagine it’s rough for teacher and student alike, adjusting back to being back to work.  I can’t say I feel bad though, considering they just had the last 2 1/2 months off from work, but I can understand its a lot to take on in a short time.  Jess really likes her class this year, which is always good for everyone involved.  Their schedule is a bit odd this year with all the budget cuts.  They have reduced the amount of teacher days, and reduced salaries(again).  I certainly won’t get into some political rant, but I’ve yet to hear of a business model which slashes resources and salary and then expects to have exponential gains.  Can’t say that business model has worked a whole lot………Anyhow, it makes for a shorter school year for everyone.

July 31st, I started a new job with GSA. The job is actually working out of our Seattle office, which is a good situation.  It affords the opportunity for more work in areas I enjoy, while also giving me a little more flexibility in other areas within our business line.  It also allows me the opportunity to work at home.  I’m much more of a number cruncher, so this new position fits well.  It will require a few trips to Seattle to meet with my boss and other peers, but I can’t say I’m complaining about having to visit Seattle(I just don’t want to live in the Rain).  The job came at a good time with everything that has gone on the last few months.  It really has given me an opportunity to do more of what i’m interested in, as well as benefit my career.

My mom flew off to California today to take the last step in my dads burial.  He requested that a portion of his ashes be left @ the beach where he had intended to propose to my mom.  He had planned on proposing at a specific portion of the beach, only to chicken out because he thought he may lose the ring in the sand(due to it being dark).  He lated proposed under a street light near my moms house.  My sister, grandma and my mom sister will all be along to help her.  It will be another step in the process for all of us, and certainly for my mom.  The last few weeks have been really hard cleaning up all the paperwork.  Not to make a joke out of death, but if people knew how much paperwork there was to dying, you really would want to stay around as long as you could.  Everywhere you turn around you have to fill something else out.  I know that’s been a difficult process for my mom(as it is for everyone).  I appreciate all the support many of you have shown my mom. I know it means a lot to all of us.

We don’t have a whole lot of plans for the remaining portion of the nice weather.  I’ve been playing a lot of golf, we’ve been going to the pool a lot, and we continue to BBQ whenever the sun shines(which is about every day).  I don’t have a whole lot of work travel planned, so we’re going to stay around town and enjoy the few days of summer we have left.

Hope everyone is doing well. Here are a few more pictures of the little monkey…..

I’ll give you a bit of a back story on some of these photos. I didn’t want them.  Well, i shouldn’t say that. I wanted the candid shots, but I didn’t want many of the others.  Am I happy I have them now? yes and no.  Mainly because I spent a lot of time smiling for camera’s while I was crying inside.  It just didn’t feel right.  The ability to see friends and family, hold them, talk to them and just let them be there for us is all the memory I will ever need.  That being said, a few candid photo’s did come ot of the mix which were truly phenomenal.  These were the types that I did  want, as it was a true showing of the day, the emotion and everything in between.

Here, to me, is one of the most favorite photo(s) I’ve had taken in my life.  It wasn’t staged, i didn’t know there was a camera, but I can tell you exactly what I was thinking at that moment…pain, sorrow, weights being lifted off our shoulders, and finally protection.  My dad is now gone,  and my role will be to protect our family at all cost.

All the years, all months we watched my dad fight the good fight, and then there we were, all alone.  I can honestly say I haven’t grieved much about my dad.  I think i’m still learning that process, and i take it one day at a time.  Some days are great, others…..wish i could just go to bed.

Here are two other photo’s from the military service which were incredibly well done.

They hand off my dads plag to my mom, with a wonderfully scripted verse, thanking him for his serivice.

The last salute!

I’ve said this over and over, but I can’t thank the military team which was at the serivice.  That has to be an incredibly hard job for them to continue day in and day out.  They accomplished the service with class, precision and an attention to detail my dad would have loved.

I’ve learned a lot about myself over the last month.  The first is that he’s not here.  The second is that it’s much harder to have our normal weekly conversations with a photo frame(but i win any political debates  we have).  The third thing is that I thought I was prepared for it, but i wasnt.  I’m still dealing with that, and trying to figure out my way of grieving, and its been a difficult process. I’m slowly learning the process.  Lastly, that my wife has been supportive, helpful and trying to assist eventhough there isn’t a manual to helping me(or my mom) deal with each day.  She has been wonderful throughout though.

We all need our space, but especially for someone like me, I need my family.  Family lets you heal by talking about great stories of your loves ones. It keeps them alive in your family, the perfect way.  Memories last forever.  I can proudly say that my dad has been seared into my memory,  for many many many reasons.  That time, is something that can not be taken from me.

Love you dad, will continue to think of you everyday. .

We went to Paytons 2 yr doctor checkup yesterday, which is alway entertaining.  The doctor asked us, “Have you noticed her growing quite a bit?”…I said, “Not really, we see her everyday, so it seems normal”.  Of course he kind of laughed and said, “Well, its certainly a healthy amount.  She’s almost grown 4″ since January”…..oops.  At this point she’s just short of 3’1″.  It’s pretty funny considering Jess is only 5’1″.  So what age will she be sailing past her mom???  I’d imagine she’ll slow down growing sometime, but its still funny to see how fast she’s coming along.  I’m just hoping we don’t have a boy someday and he’s tiny and she’s really tall.  Talk about awkward.

Other than that, she had a great birthday, which included decorating her own cake.  I can certainly say that the whole “decorating” her cake thing, went much better in my head than it did in reality.  I went to the store and got these granule looking candies in neon colors.  I figured she’d love to put them all over her cake(which she did).  The only problem is that she got a little agressive with the shaker and we ended up with a whole LOT of it on the cake. Sadly, when we ate the cake it had the texture of someone throwing a bunch of sand on her cake.  She still ate a whole lot of it, so it sure didn’t bother her, but we were a little taken back by the sand in our cake.

Obviously, the elephant in the room all day was the lack of my dad. This was our first big holiday or family event without the big guy.  It was one of the hardest things I’ve gone through in my life.  He adored Payton, and would have loved nothing else than to be there for her to read her a birthday story(and then her to shut the book halfway through).  It’s hard to explain how to be happy, and to look at Payton and see where she is at 2, but still have that empty feeling that something is missing.  We all felt it, but I know he was looking down smiling at his little girl.

Dads funeral went extremely well, minus one thing.  We got everyone ready, suits, dresses, mini dresses(for payton); and were all bundled up to go.  We drove over to pick up my dads brothers, and were waiting in the parking lot for them to get to their cars.  While sitting there, I hear Jess in the back seat say “Payton, are you okay”.  Followed by my daughter projectile puking all over the back of the car.  We’re not really sure what happened, other than she had about 45 olives the night before and probably played far too much.  Either way, it was too bad, as Jess had to take her home and missed the services.

We had two services, one at the VA Military cemetery, and one at my parents church.  The first service was purely a military burial, which consisted of a small group of friends and family.  It was a beautiful service, consisting of 3 Navy personell and my dads paster.  One of the serviceman played taps, while two others folded the flag and went through the service.  After folding the flag, they knelt down and gave it to my mom.  I know this is exactly how my dad wanted his service to go, and we couldn’t have asked for a better day. We took a lot of pictures at the cemetery, friends and family, family and family, and I didn’t really know what to do.  Should I smile? I don’t feel like smiling, i’m standing in front of my dad(even if it’s just his ashes) and his flag.  Either way, I tried my best to smile and make the best of it.  It certainly wasn’t my favorite moment of the day, but I know i’ll appreciate having the pictures of all the people when I look back.

The church service was also fantastic.  We had many friends and family who showed up, and many spoke about how my dad has influenced their life.  I was particularly touched by a friend of mine who went through the same thing with his dad, but we were all in high school.  I look back and wonder how he handled all this, the maturity it took to deal with helping his family pull through, and how its been a great example for me to follow.  His friendship, and support through this has been truly amazing.  Its friends like these that remind me what’s good in life, and that you don’t have to be related by blood to consider someone family.

The rest of our immediate family was able to come over the night before the funeral for a big BBQ.  4 of my dads brothers and sisters, my moms sister, brother and mom, along with a group of other close friends, were able to spend a lot of time laughing and sharing stories, and just catching up.  It’s an old cliche, but it seems that we only get to hang out with each other at funerals and weddings, which is mostly true.  Life happens, and its hard to see people as much as we’d like, especially when many live all across the US.  If there is one thing I have learned from my dads sickness, is that you need to appreciate the time you have, not focus on the time you won’t have together.  While this may be the last get together for some time, we all took advantage of the experience and had a great night.

I can’t thank everyone enough for coming to celebrate my dads life, share stories, laugh and cry together, and just remind me why I love being with family.

As per usual, Payton spent most of her time chasing squirrels, pushing Papa’s wheel chair(him in it or not) and constantly asking him to read her stories. As was also the norm, she would only pay attention for parts of the story, then move on to bigger and better things.

Our family feels fortunate we could have such a perfect 4th of July memory.

Some of the details for Dads service are coming together. It appears we’ll be having the service on August 1st. While we would love to accomodate everyone’s schedule, it will be the best time for our immediate family to have the service. I’ll provide details as they become available early next week. We encourage anyone who wants to come to please feel free. Dad specifically stated he wanted more of a celebration than a funeral.

Each and every wall that doctors put up, he seemed to break down with reckless abandon.  Even in his last few months we were told on numerous occasions to only expect days, yet he pressed on with a courage and strength I could only hope to emulate some day.

Looking back from where I sit today,  many questions ran rampant through my head after my dad first came home and explained he was diagnosed with Terminal Prostate cancer.  Being in a world where so many instances feel impersonal, I felt this whole process would be one more step down a lonely road for all of us.  As things ended today, I couldn’t imagine how wrong my initial feelings turned out to be.

Support came from areas you’d never imagine. It started once my parents moved to Boise, they were fortunate enough to find a church which has been the backbone to my dads survival, as well as a sounding board for his ever growing faith.  I will never be able to thank the men who spent many hours reading, speaking and spending quality time with my dad, but I know that was part of his survival to live.  These men have helped my dad, and to many extents my mom, reenforce the path to his eternal home.

As odd as it sounds, the VA community living Center was one of the more humbling experiences of my life. It’s a surreal experience to see resident after resident speak to each other as family, even though many served in all corners of the world, at many different era’s of war.  The bond that each held is that of shared sacrifice, respect for their country, a sense of duty and most importantly a brotherhood that I can not begin to understand.  I don’t wish that my generation ever experiences the fear, pain and suffering that these men live(d) with, but I do hope we can recognize the sacrifice that each endured and take a minute to thank their service.

The long road home is different for every person, and every family. Ours felt like a never ending roller coaster.  Dads ability to fight always had us joking that he may outlive us all.  Even though his journey on earth ended today, I know he still will be there for me, my mom, my sister and the many people he touched through his ministry.

If there are any major regrets I will have over the next few weeks, it will surround Payton not being able to spend more time with her “papa”, and “papa” not being able to spend more time helping me become the father he was to me. I can’t articulate how proud he was of Payton, and how much joy she brought him.  One of the more touching moments revolved around a sticker book Payton had stored in my dads hospital room.  Each day she visited, she’d take 3 or 4 stickers and litter Papas hand with her gifts.  Tuesday night, Jess brought Payton down for one more session with papa.  Of course, she gave him a sticker to put on his hand. When he passed this morning, he still had his sticker on his hand which he refused to take off.  The proudest Papa in the world.

I’ve added a few pictures from the last few days, and this morning.  One of the more touching moments I’ve experienced was the VA’s handling of my dads passing.  After preparing his body and draping him with an american flag, residents from the VA gather and salute him on his way out of the building while taps is played.  They lived together, fought together, and die together.  I can’t think of a better or more fitting way for my dad to start his next journey.

Thank you all for the prayers, thoughts, and constant support over the years, and into the future.

The fourth of July has a lot of great memories for our family.  The first is that I got married on the fourth, so I better not forget that one.  I’m still amazed we were able to get married on the 4th(and not the 5th) after the bus carrying our entire family got lost that day, but we made it and we’re happy to celebrate another year together.  I can’t say this has been the easiest year, nor the easiest last few months, but I can’t thank Jess enough for being here for me and our family.  A lot gets lost in the mix when families go through cancer, but the support systems are the glue that holds everyone together.  While my mom has showed a lot of courage, jess has continued to support me through the many hours spent at the VA.  It makes for a lot of single mom time, and I can’t thank her enough for allowing me that time.  

Another memory is all the times that my sister and I drove out on the 4th to get fireworks from the indian reservation.  Our dad would take us out on the 4th, give us around $20 and let the dealing begin.  It was my first real chance to barter and I’ll never forget going from stand to stand trying to fill up my bag.  We got all kinds of fun stuff as the reservation could sell whatever they wanted.  I’ll certainly be showing my age, but “back when i was a kid” they didn’t have many of the restrictions on fireworks they do today.  That made for much more entertaining displays, but much more dangerous as well.  I’m thankful we were all able to get out of our childhood safely considering all the fireworks we blew up.

There were many fun experiences with fireworks, one of which will always stick out in my mind.  We used to get bottle rockets and light them all over our neighborhood.  One 4th of July we went to a BBQ and we all brought our fireworks.  We were trying to light off bottle rockets into a cow field out of a PVC pipe without much success.  Finally, my dad came over and showed us how to do it, and then decided to give us an example shot.  He lit the bottle rocket, aimed the PVC pipe and launched the bottle rockets out into the field.  If anyone has much experience with bottle rockets, the best way to describe them is controlled chaos.  You can point it in a certain direction, but in all reality, you have no idea where its going from there.  As my dad found out, aiming one direction and having the bottle rocket listen are two entirely different things.  Once it was lit, he aimed and shot it into the field.  It took a few turns and landed right in the middle of a few cows.  It did it’s little explosion and all the cows shot off in different directions.  It was a pretty funny result, which wasn’t his intention.  I’m sure he wasn’t intending to show his young son that shooting at cows with bottle rockets is going to be a good idea(b/c i would have sat there and done it all night).  Anyhow, it was a funny example of how much fun we had with fireworks growing up. We had a lot of other examples, many I can’t repeat for fear of prosecution, but we were certainly lucky to have made it out with all limbs and at least our house not catching fire.

We’ll be spending our time grilling, swimming and enjoying friends and family over the weekend.  We’re still lucky enough to have dad around for the holiday so we’ll be spending time down at the VA with him.  He wanted to go watch fireworks at the park, but the hospital doesn’t allow him to leave very often(fathers day being the only exception so far).  He seems to be doing well overall.  The VA Hospice has done a good job controlling his pain level. He’s been increasing the meds since he arrived. He started with a pain patch @12.5, and is currently at 75 along with breakthrough pain meds.  While the meds have increased, he seems much more comfortable and lively.  Its still a surreal thought to think where we were a few weeks ago, and how he looked and what the doctors said would be the outcome by the end of the weekend.  He’s been fighting this disease for many years, and apparently decided to continue the good fight.  We’ve been able to have a lot of great memories the last few weeks, and hope to continue until his body and mind are ready.

I wish I could explain how things have taken some of different direction. The people that were here that weekend could all attest to the end of the road, and to see him now are amazed(I know I am).  I’m sure that being in the right environment has been a great blessing to his health.   It has also allowed him to do some arts and crafts. He decided this week to make Payton a bird Feeder.  They used to spend a lot of time at the old house feeding birds, and so my dad made her two different bird houses. One is a feeder, and the other is a bird house for a next.  I’ve attached a few pictures of him giving her the feeder.

Payton, Jess and I are doing well.  Jess is on summer break and spending a lot of time taking Payton to the park, hanging around the house and doing various yard work.  I’ve been working and playing softball on the side.  Payton is just enjoying the summer.  She loves the sand box in the back of our house, the pool, the park and just about any activity.  Jess’s mom got her a bike for her Bday coming up.  While she hasn’t been able to pedal yet, she does sit on it proudly and sure acts as if she’s going somewhere.

I’ll update with some pictures from our Fourth of July BBQ later in the week.  I’ve added a few pictures with Payton and my cousins son Ben.  He spent time with Payton over the week he spent here visiting my dad.  Ben is an amazing kid who spent the better part of a week entertaining the heck out of a 2 yr old, something that most people couldn’t do, nor would they have the patience.  He’s a great kid, and somewhat crazy, because the day he was at the pool it was somewhere around 70 degrees….no thanks.

I hope everyone has a great fourth and spends time with family and friends.

I’d also like to thank all those that have served our country.  The VA is a daily reminder of the great men and women who have served our country(at great cost).  For those of you who are away, and those of you who are here with your loved ones away, thank you.

Instead, we’re starting over.  I don’t say that as a bad thing, as it’s a great opportunity to spend more time with my dad.   It’s just been a roller coaster of a ride and we don’t know how to feel at times.  It’s hard to explain everything which went on, as it still seems like a blur.  The basic idea is that the hospital provided my dad with a saline drip, which re-hydrated his body and essentially turned back the clock a “few weeks”.  If we knew that’s what they were doing would we have kept going? I don’t know the answer.

My dad has had the wish to not have any major steps taken to revive him.  I’m not sure where that would have fallen.  He went from being completely out of it, to somewhat back to normal, with the assistance of more pain meds.  At this time, he’s in the community living center(CLC) at the VA hospital.  I can’t tell you how relieved we are to have the staff the VA Hospice provides.  They have been more than accommodating to our family, explained as much as they could and provided a room which has another bed for my mom to stay.

Our meeting with the staff went well. They explained in detail what I briefly went over above.  They asked about my dads wishes going forward, and what we wanted.  We all want my dad to go peacefully, prior to the onset of major bone cancer.  The pain which happens during bone cancer is very hard to endure, and not what any of us want to happen.  The doctors told us to expect weeks, rather than months.  This isn’t a real surprise to anyone, its just sobering.

I know this process is full of “firsts”.  All of which will be hard to deal with.  I got blindsided by this the other day as I brought Payton over to my parents apartment to help clean.  As we pulled into the complex, she screams “PAPA, PAPA…”. It didn’t really hit me until we were in the apartment and she said “PAPA?”, and proceeded to run to each room, open the door and yell, “NOPE”. Then continued that process a few times.  It was then that I started to realize he’ll never come back to the apartment, or my house, or anywhere but the VA.  It was an extremely tough moment, and continues to be.

I know this process is going to be long, but I try to focus on all the time we have had, rather than the time we won’t have.  Even since last weekend, we’ve had some great moments that we never would have had, and for that, i’m thankful.

I’ll try and keep everyone updated as we go along.  I’ll also try and post a few fun things in-between the heavy posts.  I hope everyone is doing well.

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