Still cancer-free :-)

Today has been quite the day. It started off with saying goodbye to Abby's teacher as she goes on leave to have cancer treatment. She's a wonderful person and we wish her the best.

Then after dropping off Abby and heading to school, I ran out of gas. That's always fun in a rural area. Luckily Josh was able to come and help me. I am so blessed to have a husband who not only fixed my problem in the cold rain, but didn't complain about it and even better...made me laugh! Unfortunately by the time that was all taken care of, I missed class. I really hate missing class.

Then I had my appointment. She didn't feel anything in my neck. Yay! Also, she is no longer worried about my lymph nodes. Yay again! I have become less worried about them myself, but it was good to hear that we are no longer focusing on them in scans. My blood pressure was good and I'd lost a few pounds which was super surprising to me with all the stress I've been feeling. I was able to convince her to put my scan off until August. Since it's a week of going to the hospital everyday, $10,000 worth of tests & shots, and not feeling so hot...I really didn't want to do it during the school year.

After my appointment Josh took me out to lunch for Mexican food which was so nice. :-)

Free coffee!

Hurry, they only have the dark roast left.

Yikes, it's stripes!

Abby got her short leg cast yesterday and wasn't able to choose just one color, so the awesome guy who did her cast made her a custom stripey design.


She has to be in this one for about 4 weeks, hopefully not longer than 6 weeks. During that time she still cannot bear weight on her left leg. After that she'll need some physical therapy. I feel sad for her, but also happy that she's healing well.

This photo is super pathetic, but here's my Abby....with her broke leg and doing her breathing treatment for her asthma. :-(

My Valentines

I had a nice Valentine's Day despite it also being the anniversary of the shootings at NIU. I had my moments of being sad about that, but I kept the focus of the day on my family.

The day started off with me getting a delivery of 18 roses from my husband. Although he's brought me flowers countless times, he'd never sent me flowers, so this was a first. It was very sweet. Especially because I'm sure he wrestled with the cost of doing it that way. I appreciated it very much. Abby also made us all valentines cards before we woke up which was very sweet. I love the things my children make more than any other gift they could have given me.

I got to have coffee at Caribou with Amanda and her adorable baby girl. It was really nice to see them and have some girl talk.

I made the kids and Josh Valentines cards. I also made each of the kids a stuffed octopus. I am not very talented in the sewing department, but I think they turned out cute. We also made some heart cutout cookies which Abby enjoyed decorating and the rest of us enjoyed eating. We ended the day with a heart shaped pizza and champagne for dinner. It was a very nice day.

Here is my day in photos...














Being silly, wearing one of Abby's bows...

Remembering...

At this time a year ago today I was just learning of the shootings at my school. Jessika was calling me to ask if I was there. I was flipping on the tv and seeing with horror that my school, where I had just been, was on tv and some disturbed man was killing my classmates.

NIU is doing a lot of memorial things today, but I cannot bring myself to go. I know that if I do, I will spend the rest of the day crying and being sad. I have and will spend today thinking of what happened last year. But I also want to be happy and move on. I love being a Huskie. I'm proud to be a student at NIU. I think the best thing we can do is to move on and be successful. To remember that each day is precious and to fill our lives with love. Even knowing that, I do feel sad and weepy remembering... And really how could I ever forget? I didn't know the people who were killed, but I am thinking of them today and the families who miss them.

So I may not make it over to campus today, but my heart is there. I am thinking of my fellow Huskies. Forward Together Forward...keep moving on.

Change is good

I am thinking of changing my blog title. Although I'm proud to be a cancer survivor because it means that I'm alive and I've beaten cancer, I also don't to focus on that part of my life. It has it's place in who I am and probably always will. My diagnosis and treatment was a very trying time in my life. I sometimes find it easy to feel sorry for myself about how being diagnosed with thyroid cancer at age 29 changed my plans for my life. I still have some days where I feel angry or sad, but as time goes on I have less of those days. I need to have even fewer of those days. Yes it's true...something really sucky happened to me, but I want to move past it. So I think a change is in order.

So if you have an idea for a new title for me, please leave it in the comments. I'd love to hear any suggestions.

A day in the life

I thought it would be interesting to chronicle a typical day in my life. I've seen it done on other journals/blogs, so I thought hey, why not!? Plus I haven't taken photos in awhile and was itching to do so.



6:45--Wake up and make sure that Evan is going to the bus stop rather than still sleeping. Start getting me and Abby dressed, etc.
7:30--Wake Josh up so he can shower. Give Abby her nose spray and breathing treatment. Be forced to watch Penelope Pitstop...it's Abby's choice.


8:00--Throw the chicken for tonight's dinner in the crock pot.
8:30--Take Abby to school.
Big sigh of relief...now I'm alone. Have breakfast and coffee while checking email, facebook, etc.
Breakfast today was cinnamon toast and coffee...

Do homework.



Do laundry.

Clean house.

Take Gracie outside and feed her. Here she is waiting for her treat after going potty.

Meet Sandy for lunch. I don't do this every day obviously, although it would be nice. LOL.

Go to class. Fight to stay awake since I've made myself hypothyroid after running out of Synthroid and waiting for more to arrive (finally did yesterday...Woot!) On the upside, it was so beautiful outside today. I really enjoyed my walk to class.



On the way home from class, stop in town and run an errand.



Get the mail, take the dog out. Spend about 20 minutes relaxing before Evan gets home from school.

Pick up Abby from school.

Check online to see what Evan's homework is and if he has missing work. Find out that he has a missing assignment and proceed to listen to 2 hours worth of protests and whining out of him while he tries desperately to avoid privilege loss.



Finish making chicken tacos which were super yummy.



Clean up dinner dishes.

Start up more laundry.

Declare that I need a few minutes to myself. Grab some Baileys & Milk and scoot upstairs along with Gracie to veg for a few minutes.



Watched Peanut's Valentine's Day special with Josh and Abby.



After Josh puts Abby to bed, watch Scrubs and do more laundry.

It was a busy day, but the important thing is that at the end of it...this who I get to be with...

Leg update

We took Abby to the orthopedic doctor today expecting her to get a short leg cast and instead found out that she will not be getting that for 2 more weeks. She is expected to then be in that cast for 4-6 weeks. So we are looking at a month longer than what we were originally told to expect. There isn't any specific reason why it's taking longer, just that her bones are still healing.