Kidneys are important "little" organs.

After a visit down to Primary's yesterday we learned that Wynn's kidney condition is not getting any better. In the last 6 months he has not shown any improvement. The doctor gave us 3 choices to consider. 1) Fix both now, 2) Fix the right side now (worst side) and wait on the left side, or 3) Wait six months on both and go back to option 1 & 2. Hydronephrosis is graded on a scale of 1-4. Wynn's left side is a 3 and his right side is a 4. The doctor told us that his collegues would probably think he was crazy for allowing us to consider waiting six months as the chances of it improving, now that Wynn is almost a year old, are minimal. His major concern is that Wynn does not have a fall-back kidney.

UPJ obstructions are fairly common as far as congenital abnormalities go, but the above picture is not entirely correct as Wynn's kidneys are bilateral, meaning hydronephrosis on both sides.

The surgury will involve a 2-3 night stay in the hospital after a pyeloplasty--or removal of the obstruction site, tube placement for drainage, and reconnecting of the ureter, which will take 3-4 hours in surgury. I believe it is done laporoscopically through the abdomen on both sides, but I'm not 100% sure.

The doctor told us to expect a 3 week recovery time where pain medications, and I'm guessing pain, will cause issues with feeding, sleeping, and activity. Wynn will continue his follow-ups after the surgury to ensure the blockage as been fixed. The doctor told us to expect his kidneys always to be large. "After owning a mini-van, when the family moves out, it doesn't automatically turn into a sports car."


Due to the extent of recovery time the doctor is allowing us to wait until August to go ahead. He said, "If I needed it done tomorrow, I would be twisting your arm." He felt August was acceptable.

In the radiology waiting room Wynn played with Charlie--a little girl undergoing chemotherapy. Despite her mask she tried to put everything in her mouth. He also met Hailey--confined to a wheelchair, but excited to wave at Wynn and show off her new shoes. Everyone has their own unique set of challenges, and luckily Wynn's appears to be treatable with minor inconvenience.

Many hands make light work...but a tractor makes it even lighter.

Brian and I had 24 yards of gravel delivered to our house to spread between the boxes...with a wheel barrel and shovel. For those of you who don't understand yards of gravel, about 2 yards would fit flat in the back of our truck.

After a week of barely making it through 12 yards (and almost an entire tube of Bengay) and looking down the barrel of needing to fill every box with dirt, compost, and mulch, I was beginning to think that we would never had a garden. Arrives Dad who realizes that a tractor (thanks to some friendly neighbors) would improve our chances of having a garden. 24 hours later all the boxes were full and the gravel was mostly spread. I wanted to cry tears of joy.

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Windy Days make you grateful for the pretty ones.

You know it is spring in Idaho when the wind is blowing and there is manual labor in store. The project this year is garden boxes. With such a large garden area, I didn't want to spend my entire life weeding, so garden boxes seemed a natural choice and just as much a landscaping component as functional garden.

Each garden post is fastened with half of a t-post and gravel. Each t-post had to be sledged in...Dad and I traded off. Dad kept saying "When I nod my head, you hit it," then chuckling to himself. By day two I finally caught on--get it, don't hit his head, hit the post! Ha! I did almost get taken out with a rubber mallet during sprinkler installation, better the rubber mallet than the sledge hammer!

Sprinklers = Evil 2-ft walk behind trencher. Do you know what makes a trencher worse? Trenching in the freezing wind and rain. I asked the men at the rental center if they give a discount if you are dumb enough to rent the trencher in the rain--they didn't think I was too funny. We learned that 2 people pulling and positioning the trencher is more effective.

The beautiful boxes. Like little army barracks they lined up quite nicely thanks to Dad's painstaking measuring. I'm more of a cut twice measure once sort of gal, but it's a good thing Dad is slightly more accurate.

Saturday, Brian and I placed the railroad ties. Because of Dad's accurate effort, we couldn't have them looking a skew. I am happy to report that they are all level and exactly 3'9.5" away from the garden box line.

"Lavell, Pose!...Good boy."

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Little boys and big boys love tractors. What a good Grampy.

"A day that makes you grateful to be alive"

looking south from the hill on 300 east/100 north dirt road...slowly starting to look and feel like Spring.

If you look closely, you can see the barn in this above pic.

That was my Grandma W.'s comment today as we drove to the house for Sunday dinner. I took her on the 100 North road in Jerome onto a dirt road that goes up and eventually connects to 300 East where we reside a few miles north from that spot. At the apex of that dirt road, you can see the entire Soldier Mountain/Sawtooth/Pioneer Mountain panorama. It was--finally--a beautiful Spring day here, and the promise of warmer weather is on the way. My brother Chris and Grandma joined us for some of Meg's chicken enchiladas. Watching this next video makes me feel like sharing my Grandma's same comments from the title of this post. What an awesome heritage these little kids--and us not so little ones--have.