Patrick had a very nice birthday celebration yesterday. He received alot of Star Wars stuff he wanted, one being a miniature model replica of a light saber that now proudly sits on a shelf in his room.

He also received a new CD player that can play burned mp3′s as well. With his birthday money he received from his grandparents and his Ur- Opa und Ur-Oma in Germany he purchased a PS2 game and a Star Wars game for his Game Boy Advance.

We had pizza, cake, and then we watched the Garfield II movie. He is recovering from a cold, so with the exception of the coughing he had a memorable birthday.

We love you Patrick! – Mom and Dad

Our 2007 Ocean Thoughts Calendar can now be ordered from Lulu.com for $15.95 plus S/H. Lulu.com is a Print On Demand company. So instead of us ordering a bulk of calendars that might not sell for some reason, and being confronted with large upfront printing costs, it’s printed according to whenever it’s ordered.

Description:

This 2007 Calendar combines original coastal pictures of North Carolina together with many sensuous love poems written by the authors. This calendar is meant for every married couple that believes sensuality, passion, sex, and Christianity are not in conflict in the context of marriage. Tim and Heike are artists from the Topsail Island, North Carolina area.

-Tim

Yesterday, was a crazy day. We didn’t sleep well Friday night as our older 12 year old peekapoo dog, Gerda, had to go outside frequently that night. The next morning we could see she wasn’t doing well. We took her to the Animal hospital. $306 later, we found she had a bladder infection, and a bladder full of stones. She had this before in 2002 and had extensive surgery to remove them which cost us nearly 1,500 dollars for the surgery and her stay at the vet in Denver. Well, she’s back to this again, and we can’t afford to repeat the surgery again. The best we can do, is try to keep her on antibiotics to heal her infection and try to prevent more stones, and perhaps have her drink more fluids to see if she can flush some of the smaller stones. The Doctor advise adding a bit of salt to her prescription diet dog food to make her more thirsty so she’ll drink more. Keeping her on antibiotics might prevent more bladder infections from occuring, which in turn could keep the development of new stones from happening. Apparently, some small dogs are prone to this. Perhaps with this, we can prolong her life by another year or so. – Tim