In a new Christmas miracle (ahem), I actually got our annual “Christmas” newsletter written, printed, in the envelopes and INTO THE MAIL before Christmas! Some years, this event has occurred the week after Christmas (last year), in early January (several previous years), even February. One year, I thought since I was so late I’d make it an Easter newsletter. That holiday came and went, and by June I decided I was SO LATE I’d just skip it and try to do better the following year. So you can see that this is no small feat! Of course, I will never, ever be able to match my friend Gayle, whose letter and card always arrive shortly after Thanksgiving! I may try, but she’ll always beat me, and I look forward to seeing how early she gets ’em out every year <ggg>.
I thought I’d share some of the newsletter here…. the photo above is the one at the end of the letter and was taken a couple of evenings ago. I probably should have included one of the umpteen-zillion other shots taken trying to get them to sit still and behave…. how many years until they do? At least a dozen I think… For regular readers, you’ll recall all these events, as I think they’ve all been in the blog!
The Smith Family Chronicles, 2007 edition
We are looking forward to 2008, since 2007 has been a roller-coaster-ride. The year started out well, with Joshua coming in 5th in the state in his weight class in middle school wrestling, Eli earning his green belt in Tae Kwon Do (Korean) karate and yellow belt with stripes in Isshinriyu (Okinawan) karate, Paul starting out as a white belt in the Isshinriyu dojo, and Sarah’s quilting career taking off quite nicely. In March we added a new member of the family: the world’s most adorable pug, Pigwidgeon. Eli has always wanted a pug, and for his birthday he got one! ‘Widgeon is named after the hapless Weasley family owl in the Harry Potter series, and he makes EVERYone grin — the whole neighborhood loves him.
Just a few weeks after summer vacation began, things took a decided downturn. Paul had torn something in his shoulder and was scheduled for rotator cuff surgery on Tuesday, July 17th. An hour after Paul’s pre-op appointment on the 16th, Joshua decided to dash to the library. He tore down the hill to the T-intersection at the bottom; when he tried to slow down, the brakes didn’t work properly. He cranked the handlebars to make the right turn as hard as he could, but gravel at the bottom of the hill made things worse and he veered across the yellow line, directly into the front left quarter-panel of a Jeep going the 35 mph speed limit.
Miraculously, and probably with the help of an entire host of angels, he suffered only a severely broken left leg—all three major bones broken, the tib-fib into a compound fracture—a gash on his head (he was NOT!!!! wearing a helmet!) and scrapes and bruises. A friend of Joshua’s who lives near the accident scene heard the crash and called to tell us Joshua had been hit. Paul and Sarah flew down the hill in suspended terror until they saw Joshua sitting up, clutching his left leg, surrounded by helpers including a nurse practitioner who was passing by who was phenomenal—and we don’t even know her name to tell her how much her competence and calm helped us all.
After what seemed like eternity, an ambulance with a patient in the back stopped and dropped off an EMT. The EMT took one look at Joshua and before even kneeling down to examine him, got on her radio to call Life Flight to helicopter Joshua to a regional emergency center since the degree of injury was too much for a local hospital. The poor young woman who hit Joshua was devastated—Paul and I both went over to let her know he would be OK. Later, her dad told us she said her eyes and Joshua’s locked over the hood of the car—terrifying! Fortunately, Joshua only remembers thinking “oh this isn’t gonna be good” as he saw the car approach, and then sitting up and the pain in his leg—he has no recall of being hit.
To make a long story a bit shorter, Joshua endured four surgeries in seven days, including the seven-hour operation two days after the accident to insert a rod into his thigh and apply an “external fixator” to his shinbones. The “ex-fix” was six screws about 6 inches long drilled into his bones, with rods on the outside to keep the bones in position. The pressure from the swelling tissues was so great the surgeons had to do two fasciotomies, basically long slices from knee to ankle on both sides of his shin; without this, the pressure on the tissue would have caused it to turn gangrenous and die. Paul and Sarah rotated spending the night at the hospital: one of us was with Joshua 24/7 for the 3 weeks he was in hospital. Eli was a major trooper throughout this ordeal, and was always helpful and cooperative despite having to ride to and fro for 3 hours nearly every day.
After nearly a week, Joshua slept all day. Between the morphine and other heavy-duty IV drip painkillers and blood loss, he had become severely anemic. He ended up needing two transfusions. After a second week, it was time to close up the fasciotomies, requiring a skin graft from Joshua’s left thigh. Another week of rehab and healing followed. Once the skin graft was pronounced “good to go”, Joshua was released to home, three weeks nearly to the hour after the accident.
August was quiet except for Paul’s surgery and being able to go to the Maine Air Show (in September) and see the Blue Angels aerobatic team—awesome! After two days home, Joshua got fed up with the slowness of the walker and gutted his way to walking with crutches and healed with the speed of youth. Paul’s recovery has been remarkable, amazing his physical therapist and doctor! The local quilters were awesome, several coming to us with meals to feed an army, but instead we ate them with appreciation for their love and compassion. And quilters around the world (on Sarah’s e-lists) sent get-well quilt blocks to Joshua, who will have a huge new quilt as a result.
School began, life assumed some normalcy, and Eli played on his first soccer team. He proved to be a quick study once again—his proud Mom and Dad think he can excel at anything he sets his mind to! And we’re proud he was selected for Horizons, the gifted student program, for the fourth grade. Eli also competed in Maine’s biggest martial-arts tournament as an Isshinryu student and took 2nd out of 26 kids in kata (forms), and 4th out of 26 kids in fighting—way to go Eli! Joshua’s leg hardware came off in early November in his sixth and hopefully final surgery (there could be one more in about a year if the rod inside his femur bothers him and needs to come out). He will heal completely!
Sarah’s quilting is going gangbusters! She had two articles published in Quilting Arts magazine this past year, the top quilting magazine for art quilters. As well: two projects were selected to be in a book to be published in May 2008 called Quilting with Beads, the Frayed Edges (Sarah and four friends) had a month-long show in the gallery space at the beautiful Camden library, and (drum roll please) she got a contract from AQS (one of the three largest quilt publishing houses) to write a book! The book is tentatively titled “Unraveling Threadwork,” and is about using thread on the surface of a quilt: appliqué, embellishment and quilting by machine. She had hoped it would be out in Fall 2008, but the hurly burly of the summer may cause the date to slip. Sarah’s teaching is also taking off, with three big-time teaching gigs in 2008 including at the HUGE AQS Quilt Show in Paducah, Kentucky.
In early December, Sarah traveled to California for her mom’s 89th birthday! We are all hoping that Nana will be able to move to Camden (on the waiting list for the retirement community there) in 2008. Joyce, Sarah’s beloved sister in law, came up from L.A. Sarah’s half-brother Tom J. passed away at the age of nearly 75 in late June, and Sarah had been scheduled to go out in July for the celebration of his life. Joshua’s accident changed those plans, so we were all thrilled that the three remaining “Maleady’s” were able to be together.
So that’s it for a crazy year! We are all looking forward to a less-eventful 2008!
With love, cheer and good will,
Paul, Sarah, Joshua and Eli
And the many critters:
Zeus, Tyger, Hannah, Thumper,
Yeti and ‘Widgeon
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