The Bob saga continues.....

Dad went to his Oncologist appointment today in Charlotte and he laid out the plan of attack. Dad has to have another CT Scan of the liver to re-evaluate the 4cm spot that was seen prior to surgery. If it is at 6cm or larger then it has to come out, if not, they will continue to watch it. Next step is infusion pump (port) in the chest, chemo every 2 weeks for 6 months. He also has a chance to go into a FDA approved trial if he qualifies. All based on pathology report from surgery.

Dad is headed to Duke Tuesday for a 2nd opinion and to also see how far off the 2nd MD is from the 1st. Dad says he is tired from worrying. Thanks to everyone for keeping us in your prayers.

A Day with the Boss...

Emilee had asked about a month ago if I could help her with some mini-shoots that she had scheduled at the NC State Arboretum. I said 'of course'. After all, being the Marketing Director, she doesn't let me out of the office much to do some 'fun' stuff. It was a rather cold day and the last weekend of the NC State Fair. As I pulled up to park, the Arboretum parking lot wasn't open so I parked on the street. Emilee showed up a few minutes later. We got the gear and headed out to pick our spot. Its one of Emilee's favorite and there were lots of photographers there already.

One person had set up the mini-sessions with Emilee, but due to some issues, I think we ended up having 5 families show up. I went to the entrance to meet the 1st family and the street was becoming filled with cars. We were still a ways away from the Fair, so Im not sure I would want to walk that far. ha ha.

One by one, families came and went. I had an absolute blast helping Emilee out. Even though we were scoping out the other photographers. We will make sure to look them up when we get home. Check out the competition, you know! But of course, I know who my favorite is. Really because shes married to my husband! I hope I get more chances out in the field!

A quick photo with me and the Boss! Notice the lovely EmileeBeth Photography sweatshirts. Remember, if Im breathing....Im marketing! You can have your very own for only $35.99!

October Birthdays....how special

Lauren wanted to have a costume party for her birthday party. I moved the date to later in the month, that way, most kids would have their costumes. We picked the weekend before Halloween! Lauren invited some kids from school and we made lots of 'scary' and 'gross' food.

We had cookies, cupcakes, Spring Hill Bakery cake, devilish deviled eggs, dried scabs (cranberries), witch fingers, eyeballs, and all kinds of 'cool' stuff.

Of course you can't have a Halloween party without Halloween Oreos....and believe it or not, the Super WalMart didn't have any. We had to head to Target to get them!

Mr. Bones, doesn't usually have eyes, but Allison like our squishy eyeballs, she decided to give him some. I tried to find a coffin shaped box to put him in while he was covered in black tortilla chips but we couldn't find one, so we used this huge tub and had cheese dip with severed fingers and salsa to go with the chips, aka dirt.

The devilish deviled eggs turned out wonderful. I found a trick about getting the 'bloodshot' effect on the eggs. I was so excited after I had peeled them. They really looked real. Then I used green food coloring to color the egg part...so it really looked gross! The kids loved it!

Allison made the signs for me...and covered them with a blood-like red ink. Oh, yeah I almost forgot the poisonous apples. How could I forget those?

Everyone came dressed up and everyone had a great time and were already telling Lauren to make sure they were invited next year. Im glad. We had tons of food left over, but I can guarantee there wont be much of the birthday cake, after a few days. Next year, we need a haunted house the kids can go through.....

A Whole Lot of Happy...

Mom came down for Lauren's birthday party, but it also coinsided with the NC State Fair. Who can resist the Fair? Not us, thats for sure! So I had already bought ride books and admission tickets in advance. Chris was in Tennessee so off we went. Of course, heading to the Mini-Doughnut lady first, but along the way, there were many sheep and cows made from High Schools that were made 100% out of recycled parts. The above sheep was made from computer/phone equipment. It was crazy how good they all turned out.

I did manage to get a picture of the girls with mom. And Allison actually kept her tongue in her mouth. Our 1st stop was of course the Mini-Doughnut Lady...Always our 1st stop. I really need one of these machines at my house. Well, actually I would end up weighing 700 pounds but they would sure taste good.

The weather was great and we were sort of rushing throughout the hours that we were there. We had the NC State Fair, and Lauren's birthday party to accomplish today so we were going to be busy from the time we got up.

Couldn't help but take a picture of the new Wake EMS truck..ha ha. I think I need a new job.

We passed through the education/vendor buildings and found this apple place. I had never seen so many differently decorated apples. They were all Granny Smith apples but each was coated with different toppings and each had their own special name.

The girls each picked out one, and mom bought some fudge and an apple from the same place. They would be great gifts. They are from North Carolina but don't have a store front, you have to order everything online. I did get one of their cards.

Mom got a kick out of this shopping cart. Of course, I told her that I need this size of cart and someone to pay for all the food I could put in it. I told mom she could take a picture back to WV and tell them its a redneck shopping cart. ha ha

We finally got everyone on the Ferris Wheel. Allison wasn't too excited (she never is) but she even went with Lauren, mom and myself.

Of course, passing through all the 'houses' that Lauren had to go through, I thought seeing this one, I was at work! And we all know which hospital Im talking about, right?

And Lauren even got Mom on a ride. They both had a blast! Lauren and Allison both rode tons of rides. I had bought 8 ride books, based on Parker & Brianna coming. They didn't come so the girls were trying to use up 8 books of tickets. We weren't going to be there all day, because of having the birthday party later, so we were literally moving fairly quickly through rides, but still didn't end up using all of them. I had told the girls we would come back Sunday (the last day of the Fair) to try to use the rest of them!

Now onto the food.....

Aside from everything else Mom ate, we turned around and she had the famous Turkey Leg in her mouth. Obviously it was good!

Lauren dipping in the Fried Oreos! She loved everything she ate as well! We did have a great time and I was glad Mom got to come! We did rush, so maybe next year we will take more time and get to eat more! There was a Whole Lot of Happy thats for sure!

Is 97% complete enough?

The goal for this weekend was to get the dining room completed. Its about 97% complete, which is satisfactory for me. I had 3 boxes left over from the living room, Chris had stopped and got another box, so I figured that would be enough. I wasn't sure why we had so much left over, but Chris thought we may need more, but since we had so much left over from the living room, I was hoping that the 4 total boxes would be enough.

I picked up the nailer from Home Depot and we got started on the floor mid-day Saturday. We realized that we were definately going to need more flooring by the time we got half way done. Chris left to get 2 more boxes while Allison & I went and mowed the lawn.

We opened all the boxes so we could mix up the different colors together. One box was really light and the last box we opened was a more 'carmelized' bamboo color. But that is what makes flooring so unique, especially when you use something like bamboo, there would never be another pattern like what you put down.

As you can see the difference in color was huge, but after laying it out and stapling it to the floor, it really goes well together and even though the lighter color is almost white, when mixed with the darker colors, it doesn't stand out as much and looks great!

This floor was quick and fairly easy to get installed. Only one vent in the floor and with some left-overs from the living room, it went fast! The floor looks awesome! I need to touch up some base board stuff and find a new light fixture this week, but other than slapping the final coat of pain on the ceiling, this room with be 100% complete and I can move on to the next room on the list....which will probably be the downstairs bathroom!

Dad update...

Dad had his follow-up appointment with the surgeon today. Staples removed and everything, from a healing standpoint, looks good. He did get the pathology report back on Thursday. Seems as if 7 out of the 22 lymph nodes that were removed were bad. The surgeon is referring him to an oncologist for some rounds of Chemo. He should find out Monday when this appointment is, which I am assuming should be this week. He is still to follow up with another CT Scan in a month or so for the spot on his liver. Please continue to keep him in your prayers and thanks to everyone that keeps checking on him!

Rehab....Round 2

Lauren was all smiles with the heat they applied, prior to her 'exercises'. She had been doing good at home with the 2 pages of exercises she had to do. I knew today, they would probably 'measure' her range of motion and see what she could actually do.

She loves the blue stuff. Its Carolina Blue...that's why. ha ha. She still has alot of visible swelling in her wrist area. Her arm is doing fairly well with flexion and extension, however the movement of the wrist has alot of work to do.

These measurements she did not like at all. She did 4-5 different exercises that measurements were obtained and hopefully over time, she will gain full range of motion back.

She did get a little stomach pain and said she couldn't see and she was getting a little sweaty. She sat down for a few minutes and Mary Margaret got her a glass of water. I think she is nervous about thinking of moving her wrist. She did have it in a cast for 8 weeks and now the thought of moving it when it looked like it did, would probably make me a bit nervous too! But hopefully we will keep moving in the right direction.

29...again....

29, what an awesome number! I think I actually have my kids believing that if you don't have a birthday party, you don't get older. My birthday always seems to start off with a positive attitude and me being in a good mood...which seems to always change and by the end of the day, it ends up being a day which I would just as soon sleep through.

I always look at how I do birthdays for everyone, and I guess there just isn't anyone else in the world like me! I guess for some people, thats a good thing. Not sure this world is big enough for two of me! Probably not!

One of the best birthdays I ever had was when I turned 29, of course. I had worked that day and got home to the kids singing Happy Birthday, a cake, flowers and cards and presents. A friend had gotten the girls a card-making kit, cake and presents and the girls had a blast making a ton of cards. It was a total surprise. A birthday I will never forget. And nothing that I had to tell anyone. He just did it. Totally amazing!

I can never count on Rod to take the girls shopping for my birthday, even though they ask him to take them, I can never count on him for anything like that, including Christmas. Actually I take, that back, he did take them shopping the year before last! You would think that since my birthday is the same date every year, that maybe before the day before my birthday he would do something. This year, he called me on Monday (Oct 12) and said he was going to take the girls shopping on Sunday (which was the day before) when they were at his house, but forgot and Monday he got up and went fishing all day and forgot. Christine actually asked him if he had taken the girls and that is when he remembered that he hadn't.

I guess because he isn't a mother he doesn't get that feeling I get. Yet, he gets Father's Day presents, birthday presents, Christmas presents, without fail. Not one year has gone by that he has not gotten presents and cards from his kids. It's a sinking feeling. And by this time, I am ready for the day to be over. I end up hating the entire day. The best things I had today were tons of Happy Birthday's from all my Facebook friends that I have found. Most are from High School and people I grew up with. THAT alone made my day.

Independance has its downside, thats for sure. I love being by myself, and sometimes when I think that I would love to have someone else around, birthdays come and then it quickly reminds me why I will be by myself. Because, it will never end up like I want it to. Which alot of time I think that about life.....

Immunizations anyone?

As you can tell by the pictures, my kids definately aren't up for check-ups. They both new they were going to get some 'shots' but as you can see, they weren't too excited. Allison has about 6 she needs to get over the next couple of years. We opted for 2 today for Allison and 1 for Lauren. Both got the chicken-pox booster and Allison also got a TdAP.

I love Sunrise Pediatrics! Dr. Fennell we found in the Kaiser network when Allison was born. You rotated through pediatricians, and we had been through about all of them when we lucked upon Dr. Fennell. Within a year, Kaiser was breaking up and Dr. Fennell informed me that he was opening his own practice. We were so excited. Luckily Allison didn't need another MD visit until the next year, so that when we did have to schedule her next appointment, his new office was open, and so Sunrise Pediatrics was born. We have been so lucky to have him and he has watched the girls grow over more than a decade. He is so wonderful and caring and I never feel rushed. I would recommend him to anyone~!

More home renovations...

The dining room renovations continue. I did get the ceiling done (well, about 97% done) and finished patching holes and imperfections in the wall. Then I got started on the primer. It ended up being gray because the walls were such a dark red, the gray will soak up some of that color and not require me to put on 42 coats of paint.

I did put a good 2 coats of primer and it coated well. Found some imperfections between coats, fixed that and kept on going!

I didn't cover the maple flooring. Its coming out and bamboo is going down, in order to match the living room floor. I loved the maple, until I moved the buffet and found out how much the floor had darkened from the original color that the floor was. There is a huge window that sun does not directly come through, however the flooring had actually darkened. The flooring underneath the buffet was light and the original color when the floor was put down about 4 years ago. Which was close to the color of bamboo but the rest of the room was a darker, more obvious difference in the flooring in the living room. I am pushing to get this done as Lauren's costume birthday party is October 24th, so it has to be finished by then. Wish me luck!

Road Trip to Carolinas Medical Center

Not that we had this Road Trip planned or anything, and actually it would be one that I would prefer not to have to take. Dad had a physical and routine colonoscopy done which showed a malignant tumor in his ascending colon. News that I found out about as I was sitting waiting to get off the boat in Florida. Not news that I wanted to hear. This was my Dad! When I got back to Raleigh, I had him send me the biopsy report and I talked to a friend at work who said that they would probably have him in surgery within two weeks and that everything that showed up in the report, was good (as good as it could be). Dad followed up with a surgeon and sure enough, had surgery scheduled for October 6th. First case in the morning so we were going to have to be there by 0530.

We got there, checked in and waited. Dad got called back to pre-op and we waiting until they had him ready and then we got to go see him before he went to the operating room. He was in his beautiful blue gown, IV started and now the waiting game. I think Dad would have preferred to be knocked out, rather than wait. We didn't stay long, so that Carolyn & Vicki could come back. They weren't back there long before he was off to surgery. We knew they were planning on taking 8-10 inches of colon out and surrounding lymph nodes. Approximate surgery time was 2 hours with another hour of recovery.

As we entertained ourselves in the waiting room, the lovely dog therapy lady came by with a Greyhound. Im not really much of a dog person, but I love greyhounds. I think probably because so many of them are euthanized every year. I guess I feel like I am saving their life? Anyways....she was cute, very well behaved and obvioulsy, posed for a picture with the crazy people! ha ha

The surgeon came to talk to us at 0937. Wow, under two hours and already out to talk to us! Yeah! He said he had taken 10 inches, didn't get a chance to look at the spot on his liver due to a build up of scar tissue but from what he saw he felt very comfortable about what he got. He anticipated him being in surgery for about an hour or so and then they would call us to meet him in his room.

They called us after about 90 minutes and told us we could head up to his room. 5131 (5 North), we sat in there for awhile and we were told his blood pressure had become elevated and that he would be up shortly. More time had passed and after about another hour I went to the desk to ask them to call and find out why he was being delayed. I found out that the RN was receiving report from the PACU and he would be up soon! As we waited and heard someone coming down the hall, I went to look. That didn't look like my Dad, but I can't see (even with my contacts) so I thought, boy anesthesia has sure changed him. As he rolled toward me I realized that wasn't my Dad. Thank goodness. But within a few minutes he came around the corner and they were wheeling him toward us. Now, that was my Dad. I'm sure he was just as glad to see us and we were to see him!
We were at the end of the hallway, which is kind of nice, no unneccesary traffic, no nurse station noise, no elevators, extra doors, etc. He was able to move from the stretcher to the bed on his own. They got him settled, as we waited in the hallway, hooked him up to his PCA pump and then we got to go back into the room.

He pretty much, was in and out of sleep most of the day. We attempted to entertain ourselves once again. We went down for lunch and left Dad alone for awhile.

Pam, fell asleep in the recliner, which I did obtain a photo of her mouth opening wide enough to catch a large mouth bass, however as I laughed hysterically, she took the camera and deleted the picture. But the picture remains in my head...I still laugh!

Dad did get to eat ice chips, and he is a very compliant patient. He was doing his incentive spirometry on Day 1. He will do exactly as you tell him.

Since the write-on board on the wall wasn't filled out, I helped out my filling out my board.

I should have put Nurse Ratchet but Nurse Betty was the first thing I could think of. Actually I was trying to find the name of Kathy Bates in the movie with the author who she captures and tortures but I couldn't remember her name. Hamburgers of course, because Dad was wanting one before he went to surgery! All in all he had a pretty good day!

I headed back to Raleigh around 1700. Lauren's birthday was tomorrow. Ill keep you posted!

Surgery or no surgery...THAT is the question

Our post-cruise 2-week follow up with Dr. Barrie was for Monday, October 5th. We knew the plan was to get her arm, x-rayed again and go into a short arm cast. That would give her movement of her elbow, and we were also at the deadline of seeing if the wrist had remodeled enough to not have to go through surgery.

Cutting the cast off is always fun. Lauren still doesn't have a grip on the anxiety that comes out every time. But we finally got it cut and we left her arm in the bottom half for support.

Not sure why this picture uploaded in the wrong direction ( I actually uploaded it twice) but you will have to deal with it. Lauren went to xray and then I made a great attempt at washing her arm and hand off in the sink.

Dr. Barrie came in and said we were all good. No more cast at all. We skipped right over the short-arm and went to NONE! Dr. Barrie did send us to physical therapy (which luckily is in the same building) for a splint and follow up. Next follow up with Dr. Barrie is in one month! I never thought we would even be out of a cast until Christmas! Couldn't believe it!

Lauren is going to Rehab...

Physical therapy that is!~ After finding out no surgery and no more cast, we headed over to Mary Margaret for splint application and to schedule some follow up physical therapy for Lauren. Since we had choices in colors of casts, we found out now we have choices in velcro for spints! Lauren chose green of course!

Mary Margaret measured and made a splint just for her! Its amazing, how they take a piece of hard plastic and mould it to fit her exact arm/wrist area. We all knew Lauren was 'one-of-a-kind' but we seem to be constantly reinforcing this. ha ha

Now, it seems, Lauren has homework. Two pages of exercises to do. Im not so sure she was liking this now. But 3 x per day and follow up in a week.