All-Stars Baseball Update - June 29

Well, I just couldn't stay away a full week!! I figured you'd all want to know, so maybe I can just post some baseball box scores for you after each game...

The Wimberley Little League 9-10 year-old All-Stars played their first playoff game tonight and WON, 7-1! The kids played some inspiring defense in the field and had one great offensive inning that secured the win. Frank played some outfield, and then went in as relief pitcher in the 4th inning. He had five strike-outs in three innings, plus 2 RBIs in two at-bats. We all agreed that every kid had some outstanding play to contribute to the win, and that makes baseball fun to watch!

The boys play again on Saturday at 5 p.m. in Kerrville; however, Abby, Arby, and I will be headed to College Station early in the morning for a dog agility trial. So...we should still have much news to share by the end of the weekend....

Good night!
-the Linams

Linam Family Update - June 24

Did you catch the new title? It's actually Abby's suggestion. Over the last few weeks I've been struggling with how much "you really want to know," with respecting Abby's need for some privacy, and, as you know, with finding time to write! But it was a conversation with Abby this weekend that made me see that it's time to move forward and leave some things behind.

I can see that, more and more, she's dealing with her accident and the effects that it has had on her life, and she is moving forward. She knows that she's "sick" of therapy, that she doesn't like hospitals (she's not looking forward to the minor surgery scheduled for July 30 to remove a part of her feeding tube), and that she still has problems with her memory, but you know what? Mostly, she knows that she just wants everyone to treat her like a "normal kid." When she told me that this week I knew it was the answer to some of my questions, and, together, we decided that this blog should now just be the story of our family. (And I decided that I'd go to bed earlier and just offer you a weekly update on Sunday evenings...!)

And so, here's the weekly "wrap" on our family news. As Frank was finishing his final day of basketball camp on Friday (he received the camp award for "Team Player," an honor of which I'm very proud), I took Abby to her therapy session. It was my first time to sit in on a session, and it was pretty insightful. The therapy, which uses a program called "Interactive Metronome," requires Abby to perform several motor tasks rhythmically following a tone generated by a computer. It's a "cutting edge" treatment approach and, in many cases, has been shown to improve the brain's efficiency or processing speed, along with benefits to memory and many motor responses. All I can say is that it's challenging (which seems to be important in brain therapy)--I did a terrible job when Abby's therapist let me try the simplest of the exercises! Similar treatments have also been used to counter cognitive declines associated with aging, so maybe I need to sign up for more sessions!!!!

Finally, I want to close this post with a huge "thank-you" to those of you who have been reading this blog for so long. I am humbled that you have poured out your care on us and on Abby. Your love and prayers have held us up and helped heal Abby to this point. Although right now she is weary of being the "girl that was in the accident" I will never stop telling her of the people who cried for her, prayed for her, cheered for her, and shared our great, great joy. As your reward, I want to share these two photos--one from October, 2006; one from Vacation Bible School last week. I think they say it all...Praise God.













Love,
Lee Ann, Gordon, Abby & Frank Linam

Abby update - June 21

How did it get to be 11 p.m. again?????????????????? I was hoping that, with the first day of summer officially here, it would finally be lazy and leisurely. No such luck...

Frank did have a relatively "easy" day, with only basketball camp going on. He even managed to win a ribbon today in the "Around the World" shooting contest. Winning prizes this year has been a little harder than in the past, as he and his friends got "moved up" to the middle school age group, so there are some much older (and taller) guys he's going up against.

Abby put in the complicated day today, spending the morning with Taylor, the afternoon with her youth group (unfortunately, the river tubing got rained out), and the evening with Merlin, her horse friend at AWARE. Probably only I saw it as complicated, as I think she enjoyed it all!

Well, even with it being the longest day of the year today, the sun has been long abed, so I think I'll sign off...Happy Solstice to you!
-Abby & Frank's chauffeur

Abby update - June 20

Abby's not home right now (she and Taylor are spending the night at the Vests' tonight), but I bet I know what she's doing right now. Wonder how many times it takes to memorize She's the Man in its adolescent entirety...? Oh well, after so many months of work, the girl deserves a week of fun!

Abby did take time to do her civic duty today, as she worked her shift as a Junior Volunteer at the Wimberley Village Library. And I got a big hug from Susanne Beard, the head librarian there. Susanne has loved our kids for a long time (I tell everyone that she even loved Frank as a wild 18-month-old running around her Story Time sessions, when most librarians would have been tactfully suggesting that perhaps we come back "next year..."). The library staff and volunteers are truly another of the "families" that emerged when we needed their support, prayers, and love over the last year, and it has been joyous to celebrate Abby's return to one of her favorite spots with them. We continue to pray that reading will once again be one of her primary loves...

And, yes, Frank is still quite happily holding up to his ambitious athletic schedule. Tomorrow's an easy day. They get the day off baseball practice, so it's just 7 hours of basketball on his agenda!

Hugs to all of you,
-the Linams

Abby update - June 19

No news from Abby and Taylor tonight, because this is where they are:

These two great friends have been having a great time together the last few days, including watching She's the Man seven times! Being around Taylor makes Abby very happy, and I appreciate her very much for that...

Frank's been having fun this week as well. Talk about stress--four hours of baseball and seven hours of basketball per day, with the remainder spent with two 13-year-old girls, but he's holding up well. The Wimberley 9-10 Year-Old All-Star team is looking pretty good! They get to prove their "stuff" in their first game next Thursday.

And, on the home-front, an update for the Linam Extreme Home Makeover Team: The fish are finally back home! One of the creative touches that Gordon and Mike Oldmixon dreamed up was carving out a place in the foyer wall to inset the saltwater tank, and, after many months of modification and system design, the tank is back in place, complete with water and fish. Thanks to Gordon's colleague, Kevin, for babysitting our fish and corals all those months!

One project down, a few dozen more to go...
Life is full...
Lee Ann, Gordon, Abby & Frank (& Taylor)

What A Fun Day!

Hey everybody! It's Abby & Taylor again. Boy we had a fun day. The only thing that wasn't fun was therapy.

Well, the fun started when we had to take Arby to agility. We were stranded there for over 30 minutes waiting on my mom to come pick us up. After that we stopped at a drug store to get some drinks. It was funny because I had to help Taylor pull 3 cups apart that were like glued together. When I tried to put them back in I kinda broke the cup holder and dented the cups. Of course Taylor was just standing there laughing at me. Then the owner of the store came up and said," You broke my cup holder huh?" We were kinda scared at the moment but then he popped it back in place and just kinda walked off laughing.

I was in the mood for an icy and I just couldn't decide which flavor I wanted... so I put a little of everything in it. The lid was almost overflowing.... but it gets worse. The lid starts leaking and the icy starts coming out. So I'm there trying to fix the mess I was making by sucking it up (not off the floor). Taylor, once again, was laughing even harder at the site of me cleaning up my mess. The owner said," Man! You still on the icy? You wanna mop it up?" He was just joking though.

So now we're home and tired! We watched the same movie 3 times today and are about to watch it again so we will have watched it 4 times today. The movie is really funny... it's called " She's the Man". You should watch it! It never gets old... no matter how many times you watch it!
Well, we have to go get ready for bed quickly so we'll have time to watch the movie so talk to y'all tomorrow!

Abby & Taylor

hi!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Abby's blog viewers! This is Abby and Taylor (Vest) my best friend. We're here to give you an update of our own again. Well, today I did the usual... which is work with Arby, wishing I had a horse, and getting annoyed by my brother. The fun started when we met Taylor at the Corral. The Corral is an outdoor movie theater. The moon was very pretty tonight.... along with all the stars around it. The movie playing was Shrek the Third. It was pretty funny. Well, we don't have much planned for tomorrow except for interactive theropy, hanging out with Hannah (one of our friends), and having a fun day!




thats all we can think of so farewell till tomorrow night!

Abby & Taylor

Abby & Linam update - June 11-16

Gordon's birthday dinner at Fazoli's
What a lot can happen in a week! Gordon turned 4_, The Spurs won their fourth NBA Championship, and we survived (and even mainly enjoyed) all the activities of our week. Abby and Frank had a great time at 4-H Arts and Crafts Camp (we really have some wonderful people to work with our kids in this county!), and Frank enjoyed his week of Vacation Bible School. He and we were very nostalgic to think of it being his last year as a student in VBS--where do the years go? To further add to the nostalgia, on some evenings when Gordon and I couldn't attend, Frank rode to VBS with Amber. It just doesn't seem like very long ago that Amber and her brother, Steven, were riding to VBS with me and Gordon, singing all the songs all the way there and back, stopping for snacks at the Tetco convenience store EVERY night, hoping on Sunday morning that they might be the big Schlitterbahn ticket winners...now Amber's working in the nursery and giving our kids rides to VBS (as for Steven, I don't know where he was last week!!). Since the time passage is inevitable, I guess all we can hope is that, as our kids grow up, they keep making that trip back to VBS to touch other kids lives...Abby was doing that too this week, as she and some of her friends helped out with the Bible stories on some nights (in between her agility practices, dog show practices, riding therapy, speech therapy, violin lessons...)
Trey crowns Abby with the VBS "cornucopia"
Now, on to the next round of memories--Frank started practicing with his All-Stars baseball team yesterday. He'll have "two-a-days" next week, in addition to basketball camp all day. Sounds tiring to me, but 11 hours of sports per day sounds like a dream to him. Abby has invited Taylor over to spend the week, so I think I'll turn the blog-writing over to the girls next week. Stay tuned--Taylor and Abby have a way of spinning a tale!!

Hope you all had and have a good week as well!
Lee Ann, Gordon, Abby, and Frank

Abby update - June 10

Okay, now that the Spurs held on to win Game 2, we can move on to blog and bed. We've just tucked in our own Manu and Tim (Abby and Frank chose #20 and #21 jerseys respectively for birthday gifts last year), and I think I'm going to follow "Pop" to bed pretty quickly...

Today was a very special day at church. It was our pastor's last Sunday, but the church was able to vote today to call his son, our current youth pastor, to serve as senior pastor. Both of these men and their wives have given so much of themselves to our church and its people, and, in the past year, they have also offered our family much love and support. Thanks, Pastor Jerry and Pastor Jeff.

It was also a special day because Frank played a selection on the piano during the church service. He did a good job on a peppy version of "Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho." Abby would say it was a special day because the teens had a swim party after the pot-luck lunch. Gordon would probably say the pot-luck was special...

We did need our day of rest and relaxation today, because the rest of the week is going to be mayhem. Abby and Frank have 4-H crafts camp each morning and VBS at night. That's in addition to two therapy sessions, a violin lesson, 4-H dog project practice, agility practice, riding therapy, volunteering at the library, and pitching practice. Gordon has meetings out of the office on three days, while I have two workshops to prepare for and teach, plus we're both helping a little with VBS. I'm just warning ya--blog posts might be a little intermittent this week...!

Needless to say, we still welcome your prayers--and, as we pause to catch our breaths, we'll offer up some for you as well...

Love,
Lee Ann, Gordon, Abby, & Frank

Abby update - June 9

Gordon, his dad, and I all celebrated getting older today. It's inevitable (Wayne's birthday is today, while Gordon's is on Monday), so we figured, why not eat cake and homemade ice cream??? It was good to be together.

Afterwards, the Wimberley Linams all headed down to our favorite swimming hole on the Blanco River. Swimming at that spot again was one of those dreams I clung to during those long days in the hospital, so being back there together, snorkeling for fish, throwing rocks for Arby, enjoying the generosity of our river friends, the Buses, was an answered prayer (and a very enjoyable one, I might add!). Then, this evening, we watched a horse movie, Ruffian, on TV. I remember being Abby's age and being heartbroken by the tragedy of this great filly who had to be put down. I'm sure her horse-obsession fires were stoked again, but sharing those emotions together were priceless...

So, I'll just leave you with an image of our very special swimming spot. The photo was taken back in November when Abby was still in Warm Springs during one of my rare trips home. The river was clothed in autumn then, but today it was very alive with new life. Just like us...

Love,
-the Linams

yippee! it's summer!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello fellow citizens,

This is my 1st week of summer, and I've enjoyed it. I'm liking it, and I wish all year long was summer! I'm very excited because we'll go to Arizona with Aunt Linda! This week I spent the night with Taylor Vest. It was fun, other than we were trying to avoid a stump in her go-cart and hit one! We tried to get it off, but there was a rattlesnake, so we hiked back up to her house. Luckily, the dogs were with us!

Tomorrow Grandma and Grandpa are coming here; it's his birthday. I am excited! ooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


The End!
Abby

Abby update - June 6/7

Sorry for no post yesterday. It was my birthday, so I set an easy pace (well, except for the early morning commute to Austin) and just enjoyed some of my favorite things—eating Greek and Thai food (not together!), reading a novel, floating on the river, and spending time with my wonderful husband and my two loving children. (Abby and Gordon even made me a breakfast pastry and a birthday pie!). The hugs I received were the best gift I could imagine, but thanks for all the well-wishes many of you sent my way!

Today was another good day, as Gordon and I enjoyed the cool morning at the lacrosse fields (a red-tailed hawk showed up today to chase all those parrots!) and Abby spent the day with Taylor. Frank even received a “Camper of the Day” award at camp! Afterwards my office provided more pie (no scales allowed during this week…). Tonight Abby started riding again at the therapy riding center. She pestered me nearly every day about horses during May when riding therapy took a break, so maybe getting back into the saddle will help meet her need for an equine “fix”…! Girls and horses…I guess I can’t complain, ‘cause I know a young red-headed girl who used to pester her parents the same way…

And now, Abby tells me I need to be downstairs watching the Spurs beat Cleveland with them, so I’d better sign off.

Go Spurs Go!

Lee Ann & the rest

Abby update - June 5

Just a quick update tonight, as we arise early again tomorrow for the lacrosse commute--Frank's continuing to enjoy it--a lot! I stayed at the fields all morning working on some items--wavering between pride in Frank's improving skills and worry at the number of boys who ended up lying on the grass, clutching some body part that had been hit with a stick...

Gordon and Abby stayed home today and had some good father-daughter time, I think. This afternoon I took Abby to her violin lesson, where someone else's heart was moved to reach out to Abby. Abby's violin teacher, Paula, had written to a music professor at Vanderbilt University who makes teaching aids for violin, requesting to purchase a bowing aid that might help Abby stabilize control in her bow arm. When Dr. Plummer heard Abby's story, she wanted to send Abby one for her own use. Today Abby was able to practice with it, and I was so grateful for both Paula's and Dr. Plummer's thoughtfulness. Violin has been very stressful for Abby lately because of the tremors in her right arm. Just having something like this might prove helpful and might help Abby to feel that she do something positive to try to make some improvements. As Paula said, I think we need to add a dot in Nashville for Abby's prayer map...

We closed out the evening with a practice session for the 4-H dog show. Amigo was once again excellent at the long down-stays (lying down is his specialty...!), while Arby showed remarkable self-restraint in his when a ball bounced across his field of view. Abby and Arby are going to work on a musical freestyle routine for the show--we'll let you know how that's progressing...

Now I think I'll go work on my down-stays...8 hours would be nice, but I'll settle for 7...
Love,
-the Linams

Abby & Frank update - June 3/4

When we went to bed last night the wind was blowing, the rain was pelting, and the power was off (sorry--no blogging), but we awoke (early) this morning to a great day!

Today was the first day of Frank's lacrosse camp in Austin. I'm afraid he likes it--afraid, because it takes a long time to drive to the UT lacrosse fields, especially in morning traffic (and maybe a little afraid because they gave him a whole bunch of burnt orange stuff--naw, maroon's still his color!). No kidding, he really had a lot of fun, as you can see...(he's the long-legged boy in black shorts, white jersey, and white helmet-- in their "armor" all of them tended to look alike today!)


Waiting for some action








Frank makes a move...







It can get a little rough out there!









One tired lacrosse player







Abby and I had a good time, too. It really was a beautiful, cool morning. We walked all the way around the athletic complex and had an amazingly good birding experience--seeing scissor-tailed flycatchers, ash-throated flycatchers, mockingbirds, grackles, killdeer, doves, and, believe it or not--parrots! I'd known that Austin is home to a feral population of Quaker parrots (aka monk parakeets), but it was still quite a surprise to find out that the piles of woody debris high up in the lights of the field were nests for hundreds of parrots! It just made me and Abby "home"sick for Australia and all its parrots...

Abby also started a new therapy today (although I've tried to avoid that word, I didn't really manage to fool her). We've learned of an innovative therapy called Interactive Metronome that uses rhythmic responses to improve brain processing time and organization. The therapist at Austin Neuro Clinic who offers this, Linda, described it as "physical therapy for the brain." IM has shown improvements in test scores, reading comprehension, attention, even athletic performance (that last attribute has been the biggest "carrot" for Abby). The treatments will involve two trips to Austin per week, but I've promised Abby that we'll try to tie them to fun activities like movies, visits to friends, agility practice, etc.--We just really feel that it's an opportunity that fits our availability this summer, so we'd like to take all the chances we have to move forward.

So, please pray for us--as we negotiate Austin traffic again (every day this week for lacrosse), for Abby to be able to enjoy her summer even with a little therapy, and for continued improvements--from IM and from God's hand...

Thanks for praying and for letting us ask...
Lee Ann, Gordon, Abby and Frank

Abby's Friday and Saturday News

We are having a Pirates of the Caribbean weekend. We watched 1 and 2 on DVD, and we are going to see 3 tonight at the Corral. I'm really a Pirate [fan].

I took Arby to the agility field and the vet, and we've been pet-sitting some friendly kitties. Frank as always is being a PAIN. I hope the movie is good tonight.

Farewell,
Abby Linam

P.S. News from Mom--Frank found out this weekend that he's been selected for the Wimberley Little League All-Stars team. Looks like our baseball season isn't over yet!!