April has been a good month here at PG, considering what others are suffering. The workers (Lyle and Dale) have been here since mid March, so we consider them as “staff”. They are helping with many things here on the farm. We have bible studies and gospel meetings with only the residents and staff… but that’s wonderful compared to so many who are alone.
We do have a scare at the moment. Alice Oetken was taken to the hospital this afternoon with shortness of breath. Alice has a history of congestive heart failure (CHF), and has been hospitalized for it multiple times. She refused her water pill this morning (which happens often), and her legs are swollen, so we hope they will help her as they’ve done before. Of course we were concerned that it could be the virus! I spoke with the nurse and she says they are testing for CHF… they don’t think it’s the virus. I just (8 PM) called and spoke to Alice, she says she’s fine and wants to come back to PG! We hope she can, soon.
John had some down days with low oxygen levels. We were afraid he’d have to go to the hospital with CHF. But we gave him oxygen and nebulizer treatments and he improved… he’s now back to normal. Della was climbing down in a ditch to pick some wild flowers, fell had hit her head on a cement culvert. We took her to the hospital to get stitches in her head. They checked her neck and found a cracked vertebrae. After 2 nights in the hospital her daughter Chris brought her back to PG with a neck brace, and Chris stayed for several days. They had to quarantine in Della’s room for several days. Marybelle now uses a wheel chair most of the time due to pain in her leg when she puts weight on it. But she manages to get around on her own. Here’s John taking a nebulizer treatment, Della with Chris and Marybelle.
Nyana Thompson came back with Fern from North Carolina at the end of March. They quarantined for several days, and now Nyana is staying in the residence and working as a staff member. We’re glad for her help! Here she is playing the piano with Elton and then in the car with Penny.
There were 3 birthdays close to each other in April, Alice, Shawn and myself, so we had one lunch for all 3. A “friend” provided a special hat for me to wear!
We had a hymn sing one evening. We decided to work with some of the pecan trees, as a hobby, not a business. Lyle has sprayed fungicide twice already. There was a “drive by” at the assisted living center dad is living in. Here he is with some of the others, when we drove by. He seems to be doing okay with this lock down. He’s able to listen to some of the meetings by phone.
Spring seems to be a time for snakes. Here are 3 (dead) snakes. Lyle is holding a rat snake. The center one is a coral snake that the Milles found, and the last one is a small copper head that was near our garden.
We’ll sure be glad when we can have visitors again!
Ken