Ken & Beth Bratt

I know I have not blogged in like forever...and I apologize.  I do not have any pictures to add but will write a short update now.

I will work backwards from today.  I am home from work because I had to have surgery this past Monday.  Nothing really major, an umbilical hernia (they called it an "incarcerated umbilical hernia) which I have actually had for years, but this past weekend it got increasingly larger, VERY painful and began to turn red.  I was able to get into he Dr.'s office Monday late morning and by late evening I was in surgery.  Overnight in the hospital and home late Tuesday evening.  Out of work for the week!  Speaking of which, I have 95 calendar days left until mandatory retirement!

Speaking of surgery, Beth's mom had to have emergency surgery about a week and a half ago on her abdomen and Beth is flying out next week to spend a week with them.  Her dad had suffered some problems to his head and arm from a fall a few weeks before Beth's mom's surgery and Beth's sister, who lives close, could use a break.  It is nice that Beth is able to go and I am happy to see her spend some time with her folks.

And, speaking of surgery, at the end of July I was traveling with the church youth to go on a pioneer trek when I noticed my left eye was blurry.  It continued to remain blurry so I called the Dr. who ordered me to an opthalmologist right away.  Sure enough-I had a tear in the retina.  Have no idea how it happened, retina just tore-but if left untreated it could tear right across the back of the eye and cause blindness.  Nice.  So I had laser surgery to suture all around the tear so that it could not progress any further.  No pain involved but if someone ever tried to torture secrets out of me by hitting me with a blinding light in the eye...I would spill my guts in about 10 seconds.

And of course I have been a regular at the chiropractor over the last couple of months for back issues.  They seem to be doing pretty well though.  Geez, I love getting older.  As someone, whose name I cannot recall (another sign of aging?) said, "If I knew I was going to live so long, I would have taken better care of my body."

Other things going on...Jordan, our youngest comes home in just 35 days from his mission.  We are really excited to see him and have him here, even if only for a couple of months until he leaves for school; Emily, our daughter, and her husband Rob are expecting their second child in February.  They have one, James Kenneth who will be two next month.  Ethan and his clan are doing well, we hope to see all of them at Christmas in Phoenix.  Aaron, of course, is still serving his Spanish speaking mission in the Phoenix area and is doing well.  

Going back over the past few months, Beth and I did an overnight on the motorcycle to Palmyra and had a wonderful time.  Beth also went out to Phoenix for almost three weeks to take care of James while Emily and Rob went to Hawaii.  Rob's younger brother got married there and Emily and Rob took an extra week.  With James being watched by Beth it was like a second honeymoon (and if you count backward from when Emily is due...well, nevermind).  Beth had a great time bonding with her grandson and while she was there Ethan and his family came down for a few days so Beth got to see all of her grandchildren.

Didn't do a lot of motorcycling because of the back problems and because the weather has been very wet.  Also, we had my great-nephew, Derek for about a month and a half while his mother, my niece, took care of some issues she needed to address.  Beth spent a lot of time with him on school work (he is 11) and some berry picking and had him enrolled in swimming classes in town for a couple of the weeks. 

Not much else to bring you all up on, that I can recall right now.  I won't promise to update this more often (although that is my intention) because I have made those promises in the past with obvious results.

Hope everyone who reads this is well, leave a comment if you get a chance.