Pecan Grove (www.pecan-grove.net) Pecan Orchard and Senior Residence

September has been a cooler month, mostly because of the much needed rain we’ve been having. We finally managed to get our pecan tree irrigation system working, the day it started raining!  These cooler days are great, especially for those residents who enjoy their early morning walks!

Fern has been concerned with a growing pain in her left arm, the side most associated with heart problems. She mentioned that it was radiating to her chest as well, so Salena offered to take her to the hospital. She was reluctant to go because of the long wait times, but was worried enough to finally go. Here is a picture of an exhausted Fern after having waited hours to finally get a bed.

They ran several tests on her and found spondylosis on multiple levels of her cervical spine. This means the nerves are being compressed and causing the arm pain. The doctor recommended physical therapy and she has been responding well to the therapy and chiropractic treatments. Fern was pleasantly surprised by a few visitors this month. Dub and Cindy Johnson long time friends of Fern came to give the residents hand made quilts and masks! How thoughtful! Here is a picture of Fern and the Johnsons as well as Fern smiling while talking with an old companion Sherdenia.

Fern was not the only resident to get a few visitors either.  Old friends of Pecan Grove: Samuel and Conchita Valdez along with his brother and sister-in-law Noe and Malena came for a brief visit with everyone. Ty Nordics parents, Gary and Sharon stayed with us a few nights while preparing for their granddaughter Shanaye’s wedding.  Gillian and Wendall Wilson came to visit Ronald.

Elton’s daughter, Karen Cleveland is in town for his 104th birthday next month. More of the family will be joining us closer to the day (Oct 10th). His son David will be traveling with him to Georgetown English the following week. Here are a few pictures of father and daughter hanging out together and sharing one of Elton’s prized possessions: chocolate!

We told Karen we didn’t have the normal number of pictures for today’s blog post, and she sent us some she’s been taking:

We visited Mr. Gilbert today.  He was in good form.  He was SO thankful to receive a workers list from Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.  What a wonderful spirit.

Not all of our guests this month have been human. Fall is bird migration season here in Texas and this month we have had several unique species show up on the grounds. Kenny decided to dust off an old humming bird feeder and hang it back up. Within hours it was swarming with guests! Here are some quick shots of them landing to drink.

The residents have really enjoyed being able to watch them flit overhead. We also have a pair of bald eagles nesting near the pond and several egrets that like to fish from the shore! Ken saw what looks like a hawk while mowing. Here are a few pictures we managed to capture.

All of the residents are doing well but are anxiously waiting for convention. We’re all getting our covid booster shots… and looking forward to Georgetown.  Some will go to GT Spanish. Most will go to GT English.

Kenny & Ken

For most of August we had 10 residents!  After today we’ll be down to 8 again.  Marie Mounce left for a few months and Flo Satterfield is leaving today.  Flo may return again next summer.  Here are the 10 residents and 2 visiting workers (Jennifer and Mona).  In front: Lois Culver, Alice Oetken, Marie Mounce, Fern Duncan and Ronald Elliott.  In back:  Elton Cleveland, Jennifer Brown, Esther Duncan, Mona Reece, Della Bolt, Flo Satterfield and Marilynn Frye.

August has been a hot month! We spend most of our time battling the heat and mowing what seems to be endless grass. We also celebrated several birthdays this  month, most notably Jack turned 88 and Fern turned 91! Here’s a picture of Fern and her cherry cheesecake birthday cake at PG.

She was having trouble with her phone before her birthday so we made sure to have it charged and her voicemail empty for those who would like to call her. We understand that it may be hard to reach the residents sometimes due to bad signal, so we suggest that if you cannot get them on their cellphones please call PG and we will be happy to hand them the phone. She was in good spirits after the many calls and cards were received! Jack has also been doing well. He went to meeting with us on his birthday, and to Olive Garden afterwards for a little treat. Here he is holding up his birthday plate written in chocolate.  The second picture is another day when Ken and Kathy visited him at The Wellington where he lives in Conroe.

As we mentioned, Marie Mounce left us already to go on convention rounds. She had just enough time to get settled in and comfortable before her brother Clarence came to whisk her away to conventions. Here is a picture of them just before they left for Rogers Arkansas.  Marie intends to return full-time in November after conventions and visiting relatives.  The third picture is of Flo Satterfield listening to Elton play the piano.  She enjoyed having him play for her.  The third picture is of Gilbert Reese in the nursing home in Conroe.  He’s doing fairly well there and is happy.  He often tells us that he’s receiving “better care than I deserve”.

Covid-19 has been raging again here in Texas, so we staff have been preparing for it the best we can. Salena had us learn the proper way to enter and exit an infected resident’s room as well as go over safety precautions we may need to implement. Here is a photo of the staff fully dressed in PPE, ready to take on the virus!(hopefully we will never have to use this!).  We have implemented some restrictions again… visitors and staff are asked to take their temperatures when they enter, and wear masks inside the residence.  We do some distancing as well.  But we aren’t discouraging visitors!

Ken and Kathy traveled in the eastern US for a few weeks in August.  We’ll include two pictures that seem relevant to PG.  The first was taken at Newry PA 4 days after convention, of Leah Bolt, Barry Barkley, Mary Bolt and Kathy.  Leah was at PG several years ago and is one of only 3 residents who have left PG and are still living (not including Flo and Marie)!  They are Leah, Dad (Jack), and Gilbert.  The second is Ken’s sister, Ronda, with her husband, Mike Rosamond, and his sister, Steffanie, in Arkansas.  Ronda and Mike lived at PG several years and Ronda was the manager in the residence.

Thanks for your interest in PG!

Ken and Kenny

Marybelle Armstrong continued to decline and passed away peacefully the morning of July 5th.  3 days before, on July 2, her nephew John Armstrong came to visit.  She was having a fairly good day, and they were able to visit about old family stories.  Here’s a picture of her with John, and a page from her funeral pamphlet in Delta Colorado.  There was another memorial service for her here at PG on July 28th.

There are videos of her funeral in Delta and burial at Cedaredge at:  Link to funeral home

Lois Culver has had problems with dizziness and weakness.  She has had 4 hospital stays, two in a general hospital where they did all kinds of tests (and found nothing) and 2 in a rehabilitation hospital where she received PT and OT.  Kathy happened to see a piece of paper on her tray in the rehab hospital that mentioned dehydration.  I asked Daron Griffin (a visiting chiropractor shown later) if dehydration could cause dizziness and weakness.  He assured me it could… so we had her start drinking a lot more fluid and giving her cell salt pills.  So far it seems to be working!  She’s significantly better.  It’s amazing that 4 hospital visits couldn’t find anything they could tell us about!  Here she is in the rehab hospital walking with assistants :).  The second picture is of Lois today.

Elton’s granddaughter Leah and Daron Griffin, and their daughter Isle visited from GA.  Both Leah and Daron are chiros.  Jeff and Patricia Oliver from Richmond TX also visited, shown here with Ronald Elliott.  Another medical story… Ronald had a pain in his lower back for years.  Five years ago he went to the hospital and had MRIs, x-rays, etc. done.  They found nothing, so they gave him pain medication.  In recent months it got worse, to where he couldn’t lay down in a bed because of the pain.  We took him in again and they did a series of tests… nothing.  I asked Daron to see if he could help.  After two treatments the pain was almost.  Daron encouraged Ronald to do some exercises, which he does, and so far so good.

Randy Satterfield brought his mother Flo here to stay for a couple of months.  So we have our 34th resident in 12 years!  Currently we have 9 residents.  The upper right corner link to resident information tells about all 34.  Also Gloria Reese came to spend some time with uncle Gilbert in the nursing home, and to visit her fellow Minnesotan, Kathy.  Gilbert has continued going down since being in the nursing home.

On the 4th of July Kenny and Salena put on a fireworks show.  Brendan Furrow’s parents and niece, Ron, and Anna Furrow and Aubrey Short visited from Ohio and were here for the fireworks.  Neville Lee from Cedar Park came also.  Esther Duncan and others enjoyed Roman candles.

Merle Watson (NY) and Cinda Taylor (CO) visited Fern.  Ron Wolf and Robert Findley from Fort Worth visited Marilynn.  Jo Ellen and Chris Hertz visited from La Verna.  Here they’re shown with Alice, Esther and Ronald.

Salena arranged a “garage sale” for the residents.

Thanks,

Ken

In relation to our previous mid June post, Gilbert is doing about the same in the nursing home.  He is content, thankful, and always says he is receiving better care than he deserves.  Marybelle has declined significantly in the personal care home.  Clarence Roachell was taken from the hospital by his family back to his garage apartment in Livingston where some of us had gone to meeting for years.  He passed away June 25th.  His 5 children were able to be with him there, which was sweet. Although on oxygen and weak, his mind was clear. Here is a photo of his family gathered around his bed.

Unfortunately, we had to take Lois Culver into the hospital again today.  She became dizzy and unable to walk.  This has happened before and she managed to improve and return to PG.  Hopefully that will be the case this time.

Going back to the beginning of the month, we have had a myriad of different visitors and activities. Della was visited by her children and  nephews.  It was a family reunion, Pecan Grove Style! Here are some pictures of her with her two nephews and their wives: Charles and Angela Strong, and Ron and Karen Strong. Next is a picture of her with her three daughters: Henrietta, Della Mae, and Chris. Finally a picture of the whole family, minus Chris.

Recently, Brian and Rich have been holding small Wednesday afternoon gospel meetings at PG. Mostly attended by those of us out here at PG and a few of the local friends. It was Rich’s idea that one of the workers would speak in Spanish for Anita’s sake. He had been asking one of our Spanish speaking residents (Marilynn and Ronald) to have this part in the meetings. They had thought to end the meetings because it was time for Rich to go to Hotchkiss convention. But, we received word that a visiting brother worker from California, Jon Wright, would be in the area. He came in one day later with his friend Loren Smit from Texarkana. That allowed us to have half Spanish meeting on that Thursday instead. Here are a few photos of Jon, Loren, and a few residents.  We had another half Spanish gospel meeting today (June 30).  Emma Perez helped the brothers.

Elton had the pleasure of being taken out by a few of his dear friends: Ed Lloyd, Jim Eubank, and Al Perkins.

Several of our Spanish friends came with Emma Perez for a visit. The Saldana Family: Eloisa, Emiliano, and Emmanuel. As well as another couple of friends Luisa Contreras and Ana Lidia Munoz.

We were also joined for a few days by two sisters from Kentucky, Anna and Alda Blackemore. They knew Esther well from her time spent in their field. Alda informed us that it was her 69th birthday! And that she had chosen to spend it with us. How nice it is to be thought of as a birthday hotspot!

Before Marybelle left us she had some kind of malfunction with her left hand. We are not quite sure if it was a partial stroke but her hand became curled up and very weak, to the point of non use. Here she is getting an in house x-ray done to find out the issue. Unfortunately, due to her constant drowsiness and failing legs we feel as though taking her to meeting on Sundays may no longer be an option.

Thankfully there are many here who love her, so she gets visits and fellowship regularly.

Gilbert had been quite clear when someone visits. He has short term memory trouble, but he recognized Elton and asked him if he was going to play the piano! (which he did)

Lastly, today was Clarence’s funeral in La Porte, TX.  We had a memorial for him at Pecan Grove yesterday. His son-in-law, Mike Krengle, had the idea of asking some to share their memories of Clarence. Several took part and it was a touching memorial. Here are a few pictures from yesterday.

Here’s a link to notes from the memorial service:  Memorial Service at Pecan Grove for Clarence Roachell

Thanks for your interest in PG!

Kenny

A lot has happened already in June with 3 residents not being at PG now.

Gilbert’s dementia has gotten a lot worse and was making it difficult for the staff.  He had some infection issues, so was taken to the hospital.  Once the infections were dealt with, he was moved to the Park Manor nursing home in Conroe.  Unfortunately he was put into a isolation wing because of covid.  Once they understood he was vaccinated, the said they would take him out of isolation, but they don’t have a room!  So… hopefully this week he will be moved to the “clear” section of the nursing home.  In the mean time only Wayne Overby and myself can visit him.  Here’s a picture of him a few days ago in the isolation room.

Today he was telling me how wonderful his care was, and how fortunate he was at his age (97) to be taken care of so well!  His mind seemed a little clearer… he wanted to be remembered to some at PG.  Other times we’ve visited he had no idea where he was.

Marybelle has been getting worse gradually for a long time.  It finally came to the point where she couldn’t transfer from the bed to the wheelchair as well, and was ending up on the floor sometimes.  Her needs were beyond what we could continue to meet.  Hospice searched for a nursing home, and found a personal care home in Conroe called the Tuscany House.  We looked at it and realized it wasn’t the quality of Pecan Grove, but it sure was better than a nursing home!  So we took Marybelle there.  This morning we brought her to the Opel’s meeting in Conroe where we now go.  Here are pictures of her leaving PG, with the residents and staff that were present gathered around her.  Then a picture of her, dad and Salena at the Opel’s this morning after meeting.

I took her back to the Tuscany house and took this picture of her with the man that runs the house, and of her room, which is nearly as large as the room she had at PG.

Sadly, she’s not a happy camper.  But this morning it was clear that our decision was correct… she is far beyond what we can care for.

If anyone wants to send mail to Marybelle or Gilbert, please send it to Pecan Grove, and we’ll get it to them.

Lastly, Clarence went to the hospital Friday because of blood in his urine.  He was moved yesterday to a different, rehab hospital.  They haven’t found the cause of the problem yet, but Clarence is doing well.  Here’s a picture of him today:

He still has his humor, and his mind is fairly clear (his short term memory has been bad for a long time).  He understands why he is in the hospital and isn’t complaining.  Hopefully they resolve the problem and he’ll be able to return to PG.

We’ve had several visitors already… lots to report, but will leave that till the real blog update at the end of June.

Ken