Well hello everyon!  It's been a long time since I've updated this website.  What can I say.... busy, busy, busy.  You know it's difficult to decorate your house before you leave for Hawaii, purchase all your gifts early, then pack and off to Hawaii.

Hawaii was great this year, and Johnson and I were very excited to renew our wedding vows there after 10 years of marriage.  Our anniversay was on December 27th, but we celebrated the gift of a lasting marriage, and the survival of a difficult year.  We were so happy to more than double our fundraising efforts this year for Team Diabetes!  We suffered a bit of exhaustion in August and thought we'd stop fundraising after $18,000... but as many of you know, our second cousin Aaron (15 months old) was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes this past September, and that was the inspiration and extra motivation we needed to host our final "Score One for Diabetes Charity Ball Hockey Tournament" which helped us to get closer and closer to our $25,000 goal for 2007. 

We sent out a call to Baxter Corporation (makers of dialysis equipment and solutions, and whom we proudly spoke at their 50th Anniversary Party in June) and they came through for us, helping us not only to reach, but to exceed our goal!  Johnson's brother Ian (owner of Stealth Corporation) also help us over that great hurdle, and in the end, we can proudly say that $27,000 was raised this year through Team Diabetes for the CDA. WOW!

While in Hawaii, we met many people whom we've grown closer to through Team Diabetes.  We got to know the BAD BROTHERS (Brothers Against Diabetes)... these guys are awesome and we enjoyed hanging by the pool with them, and a few dinners out together too!

It was also an extreme pleasure getting to know Jay Thompson and his wife Deborah.  Deborah practically carried our youngest daughter Taylor, piggy back for a big portion of the 10km marathon!  Thanks Deborah!  Taylor grew quite a bond with Deborah, and she enjoyed watching Deborah make silly faces at her!  We will all get together soon and relive the memories!

I was VERY fortunate that my sister Johanna (Jo-Jo), who recently married in August, came with her new husband Jerry to Hawaii, and hooked up with us the afternoon after our marathon.  That was really special for all of us, as many of you know, Jo-Jo took care of our girls and came up from Vancouver to Ottawa for three weeks and played mommy and daddy to our two girls, while we under went our kidney transplant!  In saying our goodbyes in Hawaii, and parting our ways, I'd like you to picture this...my sister has now left to catch her plane... one piece of our luggage is too heavy and we must re-pack, and Johnson's is lugging everything to the side, while his three girls (Stephanie, Taylor and I) are crying uncontrollably cause we will miss Jo-Jo and Uncle Jerry terribly!  Taylor shouts at dad, and says "All you care about is the luggage, but we are sad because we will miss Aunti Jo-Jo!"  Poor Johnson... he now must stop what he is doing and console us!

We did manage to hook-up once more inside the terminal, as we ran to Jo-Jo and Jerry's gates and were able to kiss them both goodbye again!  This time with no tears!

We left Hawaii at midnight on Sunday, and arrived in Ottawa at midnight!  We flew from Hawaii, to LAX, then to Toronto, then to Ottawa.  There were hundreds of people and luggage at the Ottawa airport at midnight, and I was confused?  Apparently we had 52 cm of snow that weekend, and many travellers were stranded for days in Ottawa.  I couldn't wait to get back to see all the snow I'd need to plough, but to my extreme delight, our amazing neighbours had cleared the way for us!  Thank GOD!

You can see from some of our Hawaii photos, the HUGE pile of laundry I needed to do upon our return!  Many we were tired, and our schedules were all off with the time difference.  We all stayed home on Tuesday, and it was back to school for the girls the next day.  Early Wednesday morning, at let's say 3:00 AM the girls woke hungry, and we all had a picnic on mommy's bedroom floor, eating hummus and pita, and watched a bit of TV until we got sleepy again!  What fun!

We all had an amazing Christmas, and Johnson and I hosted his family on Christmas Eve.  What a difference a year makes!  Last year we were all alone, went to church early at 7:00 PM so that Johnson could be home and connect for dialysis by 8:00PM to ensure he could get up early enough to watch his little girls open their presents from Santa!

We have been so blessed this year!  We found out we were a match and could go through with our kidney transplant, we had a rough go of it in the hospital with Johnson's new kidney taking 2 weeks to start working, and then home to recouperate.  All the family chipped in and helped us immensly.  Then in May it was back to work for me, and Johnson shortly followed, going back to work in August.

All of us are doing well, however, Johnson has had a bad cough ever since comming home from his transplant.  We as well as the doctors felt it was an allergy from our doggie Tasha, so we gave her away.  (BROKE ALL OUR HEARTS)  However, this was to prove a slight improvement in Johnson's health, but his cough persists, and is worsening day by day.

He's been through many tests, seen lung specialists, had CAT scans and X-rays of his chest, yet they can find nothing.  This Tuesday January 29th, my Johnson will again meet with the lung specialist at the Hospital, where he will under go a lung biopsy.  They will make him very sleepy with an IV, spray his throat with some horrible tasting stuff to numb it, and go down with a camera to check out what's going on.  They will take cell samples, view his vessels etc... Johnson is just hoping to get his cough over with as soon as possible, as it exhausts him daily, causing headaches etc.  I must say... I don't think I've been as supportive as I could have been with this cough.  It's been getting on my nerves for some time now.  It's hard to watch the one you love, hacking all over the place all the time.  It's not pretty!  I'm sorry my love, I should be more supportive!

2008 has some new New Years resolutions for me.  I will be limiting my fundraising this year, in order to spend some quality time with my family... that, plus, Johnson says I'm going to KILL him with all the work I give him to help out! He says to go easy on him, he just had a kidney transplant! HA HA!!

My new MSN message says "It's all about me!".  This is another resolution I have made to put myself first!  After 2 years of taking care of everyone else, it's time to put me first.  I'm soon joining a gym (something I've never done in my life)... after all, I hit 40 last year and the body needs a few improvements!  So I'm going to take some time for myself (I'll feel guilty each time, as only mothers and wives can), but I'm going to do it!

I'm going to spend more time with my children whom I can't seem to get enough time alone with.  Rush, rush, rush....  Just as we left for Hawaii, we got the crazy notion to get our unfinished basement done... so we hired contractors, set them to work, and left for Hawaii!  When we returned it was all done, and this past weekend we finished all the painting ourselves, and the carpet arrived this past Saturday!  Yippee! 

All weekend Johnson and I worked our tails off, taking everything out of storage, purging and re-organzing!  WHAT A HUGE JOB!  We were up until midnight last night, finally taking all our Christmas decorations down and putting them away.  This week we prepare for our Stephanie's 9th Birthday on Thursday.  Friday night is her sleepover party where she will have 6 other girls come on over to enjoy her new basement!  I can't wait to put them all down there!  No more dance music on the main level!

Today I left for work, got around the corner, hit a manhole, and PUFF.... flat tire!  AHHHHH!!!!  So it was back home to await roadside assistance.  Now they have put my spare tire on, and I'm off to work shortly.  I support Canada Post's internet page, where clients login to our Business Centre to do electronic shipping, but apparently it's broken.  I've picked a good day to be working from home!  HA HA!!!!  I've been on the phone all morning, testing the login function externally.  When it's up and running, I'll head off to work.

If anyone happens to read this today, please keep Johnson in your prayers tomorrow, and pray for him to relax, and for everything to go smoothly.  Pray for good results, that we may finally know what is wrong with his lungs!

GOD BLESS YOU ALL!

Kendra