November 14, 2017

Annual Cochlear Appointment

November 14, 2017

It still seems like summer in Brownsville

Every time I write one of these blog entries, I think, "I can do another one in a few days.  There is nothing special going on."  And then a month goes by and I wonder when I could have worked in time to do an entry sooner.  This has been another month of busy times.

Late in October, I went to McAllen for several days to care for some of our grandchildren.  Their parents were out of town and had taken the three youngest with them.  The oldest is away at college, and the other grandmother had taken two of the young boys on a special trip.  That meant I only had the second oldest of the boys, who is a senior in his home schooling, and the two oldest girls.  The two boys who had been with their other grandmother returned after a few days, so the numbers went up, but I think they were exhausted from their trip and were pretty quiet.

Fabric art designs

 

The grand children with me had chores and some school work to do, so they took care of those responsibilities.  The biggest "glitch" we hit was oversleeping on Sunday morning.  Due to my hearing or rather my lack of hearing, I depend on someone to wake me each day.  The appointed person overslept.  The girls got ready in record time, and I got the three of the children to Sunday School and church.  I did not make it.  It would have taken me too long.

While there, I had assorted places to take the children.  One had voice lessons, there were many church activities, and a guitar lesson for the oldest girl.  The oldest boy went along since he and the teacher's son are good friends.  There was some shopping that needed to be done and I kept busy just keeping up with who needed to be where, and when.  I did some sewing and finished the binding on a quilt for our youngest grandchild who lives in Dallas.  The kids all spent time practicing piano and playing outside with the kittens and dogs.

One of the kittens in McAllen at our son's house

 

When I got home from getting to spend time with them, I had to do a little house cleaning and laundry to get ready for Ron and me to go to Houston for my yearly visit to the audiologist.  We left very early in the morning on November 1 and on our way to Houston, stopped in El Campo for me to do a little shopping at one of my favorite quilt shops.  Once we got to Houston, I spent two hours going over an assortment of issues with my Cochlear equipment.   I still do not have all my needs met, but we made some progress.

When we finished there, we headed to downtown Houston and to our hotel where we stayed for two nights while we attended the annual International Quilt Festival.  It opened on Wednesday evening for Preview Night.  We had about 5 hours to spend shopping and I made good use of the time.  Ron sat in the lobby reading and holding on to my purchases that I would bring to him before going back for more.  The weather was perfect while we were in Houston.  It was clear and cool.  Each day we would walk to the Convention Center (about a mile each way) and then I would walk miles as I shopped at the 1,100 booths, overflowing with fabric and assorted supplies for quilters.

Thursday we both spent the day on the show floor, again with me shopping and Ron hauling my purchases around.  He was so kind and helpful.  On Friday, Ron took a class of maintaining Singer Featherweight sewing machines.  I am fortunate to have three of these precious machines manufactured in the 30s and 40s.  Each had belonged to a special family member and all need maintenance and he agreed to take the all day class.  He said it was a great class with an excellent teacher and he would have liked to have another day in the class.

Friday evening when he finished his class, we left Houston and he drove us to Austin where he spent the next two days in a class to renew he flight instructor's license.  He was not as impressed with that class.  He has to take it every two years and in all the years he has been taking it, he was most disappointed with this class.

While he was doing that, our youngest child, Stephen drove to Austin early Saturday morning and picked me up to go to Dallas with him for a longer visit with our youngest grandson than Ron could get.  Our little grandson is now 9 months old and so much fun.  He is a very easy baby and happy almost all the time.  We enjoyed time just watching him play.  He had just learned to pull up and stand on his own, the day before I arrived and he was eager to show off his new skill.  We had a good time just relaxing and visiting and resting my feet after miles and miles of walking the previous few days.

A new quilt for Caleb

 

Sunday morning Stephen picked my up at my hotel and we all went to church.  We had been celebrating his wife's birthday and their anniversary.  Our visit fell right in between the two special days.  Late Sunday evening Ron arrived and enjoyed time with our grandson.  Stephen is off from work on Mondays so that gave us extra time to spend with them.  In Dallas the leaves had turned to beautiful fall colors, but I didn't take time for photos.

It was a long drive home and we arrived about 1:30 a.m. Tuesday morning.  We were both "dragging" for several days and we caught up for the trip and adjusted to the time change.  It was so good to be away for a while and we both enjoyed our activities.

I have had some of my Cochlear items replaced in the past few weeks and I am still needing to do some more.  I sound processor they sent me was to be already programmed to my specific needs.  I put it on and heard nothing.  I thought it was just not programmed.  They replaced it and the same thing happened.  Later I switched to a new coil and cable on it and  it worked.  It is either the coil of the cable that is bad.  I had just had those replaced and now I need to have them try again, since the new ones don't work.

Sun setting and beautiful clouds 

 

This weekend I was sick all weekend with bad allergy problems.  By Monday I was feeling better but had lost my voice.  Today it is better, but not great.  This is my "allergy" time of the year.  Everything makes me sneeze and makes my nose run.  Yuck.

I thought I would mention that on our trip, we saw some Hurricane Harvey damage, but not too much.  People we talked to were having serious allergy problems and will all the water that they had along the Texas coast I think there is mold and mildew everywhere.  In El Campo a lady told us that a few miles away, debris had been stacked in the median along the interstate highway for miles as they wait to find places to haul tons and tons of limbs and household items that could not be salvaged.

Beautiful sky