Kevin's Blog

Here is a picture of our child from today’s ultrasound.   It was absolutely amazing to see his/her little arms waving at us.   Everything is well.

"bubba" 8 weeks

Ps 139:13 For you created my inmost being;  you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
Ps 139:14 I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Lisa, Sally, and I took a drive over Guanella Pass yesterday to view the aspen.   It was absolutely beautiful.   At the start of the road, we were a little unsure if we weren’t too early, but as we gained a little elevation, the trees were just beautiful and pretty close to their peak.   Here are a few pictures:

Lisa near the Abyss Lake trailhead

Lisa and Sally enjoying the aspen

Aspen on the Georgetown side of Guanella Pass

After the drive, we met Lisa’s sister Lori and husband Jon for lunch.   We then went and hiked through the Chatfield corn maze.  I thought that was a ton of fun.   It was a little different, and a little harder than I would have anticipated.   Compared to solving a maze on paper, actually being in the maze and not being able to see the big picture makes it a little harder.

Chatfield Corn Maze

Kevin

My brother David and his wife Toni welcomed there first child on 9/22 – Micah David.   We wish them congratulations, and thank God everyone is healthy.   Here is a picture of Micah, David, and Toni.

David, Toni, and Micah

2 items of great news.

1st, my brother Randy has been accepted as a donor for me.   He still has one final MRA test to verify his kidneys are similarly sized, and have normal blood vessels that would allow a relatively routine surgery.   But, that is a huge hurdle to have cleared.   I am so thankful that both of my brothers were willing to get tested and be potential donors for me.  Surgery most likely will be in December to correspond with Randy’s winter break.

2nd, is that I am going to be a Dad.   Lisa is pregnant.   Tentative due date is 5/5/2009 (our anniversary).   We are both very excited.   We have been trying for a few months now – but typically for a CKD-5 patient the odds are pretty low due to the chemistry in my body hurting motility, so this is a huge blessing that we are so thankful to God for.  It is actually kind of ironic.  Lisa had talked with some of her family about it and I think had pretty much given up on the idea until I got a transplant, and then, all of a sudden, everything worked out.  Lisa is hanging in there so far with the morning sickness most of the day that is occurring in the first trimester.   Here is a bad picture of an ultrasound (sorry – my scanner isn’t functional anymore) where you can see the little blob of cells that is our child (about 56 mm here).  We would estimate from the research that we have done that our child would have grown to be approximately 1 CM long today.  Lisa amazed me with a fact she found, and I’m sure I am probably messing up the velocity as I have a gee whiz moment thinking too much every time she reconfirms the rate to me, but I believe our child is growing by about 100 cells per second right now.   That is just a little mind boggling to me.

So, we praise God for these blessings, trust in Christ for our everything and especially now for all of the details to work out in the transplant and with our child, and rest in His love, peace, and grace and are assured that everything will work out according to God’s grace in all of this.

Kevin

I played in the Johnny Roberts Memorial disc golf tournament this weekend.   It was a lot of fun.   I played much better this time, but of course in hindsight see so many strokes left out on the course where I can still improve a lot.   First round a got paired with my friend Dave + 3 others.   It was at Johnny Roberts.   I played the course pretty conservatively and ended up shooting a 64.   I only had one bad hole, where I lost my favorite disc on a horrible shot into the creek.   Luckily, someone found it and it got returned to me.   Saturday afternoon was at Bird’s nest.   I probably had my best approach game here.   Approach shots are probably my strength to begin with – but I was on Saturday afternoon.   On probably 1/2 the holes I had a “gimme” putt after a fairly long approach.   I was playing on the top card for the recreational division, and most of the people in my group were much more skilled than me, but it was fun and I even managed to take the tee on a couple of holes.   I shot a 67.   Sunday morning, it was rainy and overcast.   We were back at the Bird’s nest.   We just played the normal course, and not a special tournament layout.   I started playing better once it warmed up, but had a few bad holes.   I ended up shooting a 67 again, but this was a much easier course this time so I wasn’t incredibly happy with that score.   Finally, Sunday afternoon was back to Johnny Roberts.   This was my bad round of the tournament.  I was tired, and my knee had gotten pretty stiff.   I tried to take the conservative approach again, but just didn’t execute well and had a lot of penalty strokes / bad holes.   I ended up shooting a 69.   Going in to the tournament, my goal was 4 rounds in the 60’s, so overall I was very happy with the result.

Kevin