After
many years of countless negative results, I failed to get excited while Lisa
went through the process of completing the test. To our shock and excitement,
the test came back positive. It was after 10pm on New Year’s Eve, but we wanted
to be 100% sure before we got too excited. Lisa found a clinic open and we
raced to have another test completed.
Three years ago, Kellisa
and I had a week open for adventure. We decided to spend our time down in the
Palm Springs area to explore some new areas while making a return visit to
Joshua Tree National Park. Thanks to COVID, this would be Kellisa's first flight
in 50 months, by far the longest she ever went without being on an
airplane.
We had such a great time, we thought we would share our guide to the Palm Springs region again for our readers.
This
is the mysterious story of Kellisa’s 25th surgery which took place in
February 2025 at Suter Roseville Medical Center. The surgery lasted three
hours when the surgeon told us it should only take 60 minutes.
October 2024 – Kellisa had her first riding horse therapy session in more than 10 years and loved getting back in the saddle. Unfortunately, she started complaining of pain in her hips shortly after the ride. We took her to the doctor when the pain didn’t go away after a few days, and pain relievers weren’t helping. Tests were run and a few x-rays were taken. Nothing was obvious as far as her pain in the hip area, but in the corner of one of the x-rays, the radiologist saw something they couldn’t explain. A dark area of the stomach led them to believe a foreign object was “trapped” and would require further investigation.
In
late November 2025, our family kicked off the Christmas season with an
unforgettable afternoon at Sacramento's Golden 1 Center to see the Trans-Siberian
Orchestra perform The Ghosts of Christmas Eve.
While the music was spectacular, what stood out just as much was how easy the
arena made the experience for Kellisa, proving that accessibility and
world-class entertainment can go hand in hand.
This wasn't our first Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert. Lisa and I had seen the band back in Jacksonville in 2010, but that experience was cut short because we had to leave halfway through to relieve the babysitter. Fifteen years later, things were very different. Instead of worrying about getting home early, we were able to enjoy the concert together as a family, sharing the experience with Kellisa and Egypt. It was a reminder of how quickly life changes and how special it is to create new traditions together.
