October

Wow...time flies when your...alive! ;)

I know I left off somewhat abruptly with our trip this summer...mostly because I just couldn't get my head around going back and the changes.  I mean, I expected change, just not the ones I saw ya know!!!  So I will post some more pics in the next few blogs but for now just a bit of catch-up:)

We started the school year just fine..and by we I mean everyone else as I didn't actually have to start anything for the school year per se ...but it has been very nice.  Everyone seems to be happy with their teachers and classes and so far nothing too crazy with friends or homework so it has been a nice start!  Both girls have also had three weekends of volleyball games now and the 7th graders are really coming toegther as a cohesive group, I think playing together for the fourth year now is making a huge difference, they really work well as  a team and everyone just keeps getting better..AND..they keep winning!  The fifth graders are doing much better than last year but it is a mixed bunch with some new girls and some who this is the third year playing toegther and at this age it makes it very interesting!  That...and..we still struggle with serving and moving for the ball but, they played fantastically on Saturday even if they didn't win the matches, they won games and most importantly they played as a team..helped each other, called the ball and were getting it over in two and three hits...that rocks for a 5th grade team...now just to work on serving and we'll blow everyone away!

I have managed to not overly volunteer myself this year, but I am doing more big things than in the past, most likely due to the fact I am not helping in the classroom nearly as much this year..ok...not at all...it makes me sad.....and yet, it is a step that I knew was coming...I just thought it was next year!!!!!  However, I am really really glad Miss B has the teacher she has because she is being prepared...and otherwise, next year would have been just the worst for my happy-go-lucky-free-spirited-child-who-procrastinates more than her mother.....so instead I am having to find ways to fill my time elsewhere, so far it has been suprisingly easy to do!!!!

And now for something completely different....

I turned 3 yesterday! :) I am so happy to have made it here, especially as I have some numbness in my leg and due to where the numbness was, when I was in for a routine checkup with my Oncologist two weeks ago...she ordered a bone scan.  And then I spent the next seven days in a living limbo-land again...except...this time well...in some ways it was far far scarier because bone scans look for mets...and mets means death, no escaping, just prolonging...and...I have plans!!!!!  Now..don't get me wrong, the prospect of dying does not scare me, I dealt with that three years ago, and its not that there are tons of things I have to go see or do...what scares me about death...and honestly it makes me more sad than anything else..is what I would miss with the girls...that is what I hate, I want to be here for everything.  So I'm really not all that sure what happened that week..I should probably double check that I didn't sign myself up for anything!!!!  However, the bone scan came back totally normal(YAY and phew) and then after that more blood work and xrays that came back fine too, soooooo I'm going with it being residual chemo effects as what I am taking to get rid of that in my feet is also working on the leg now.....(which is what I hypothesised all along btw...)  Now, I am glad I have such proactive doctors who want to rule out the bad things, I really really am....but..I am also glad that I know my body so well, I think that will only help me in the long run.

And now we head into October...the month of pink....and I'm more torn than I have ever been about it....

I do know this, please do self exams ladies, take care of yourselves and if you think something is not right, have it checked, and guys too, men get Breast Cancer too.....early detection does save lives and knowing that and what to do is good...but...we need more...we need cures..and I do mean plural, there is no easy answer to any of this but I think most of all we still need to come together, that is the only way to really win.

Hope your fall has started off well!

Blog ya later-
K

Deadwood

Deadwood….I have watched the entire HBO series....it was super cool, yes, incredibly violent and full of quite a colorful vocabulary, but super cool and so yes, we did stay at the Bullock Hotel!


After a long day of dams, badlands, & national monuments, we rolled into Deadwood a bit tired and very hungry(there was also that time change..which was great..LOVED gaining an hour but...totally threw off our food schedule that day! ) Now, when I say rolled...I mean drove in our suv....not like the majority of the rest of the people who had two basic modes of transportation....either the two-wheeled kind(ok, an occasional three wheeler was seen too) or the kind with 6-8 wheels (ie campers/motorcoaches) ....that was...interesting.....

To say that we stood out is...well..an understatement to be sure! But it was a complete paradise for people watching and, as we were exhausted...sitting outside eating our burgers watching it all go by worked perfectly! Truly..if I hadn't known Sturgis isn't until August...it would have been hard to convince me of it there!

The hotel was super cool! Except for the first floor(and tvs)..I could imagine myself back in time..not that the first floor wasn't nice, it was, it just had all of the slot machines~not quite the same as card games from the past, alot...brighter!!!! The room was lovely and we had an actual key...with the coolest old timey fob ever! The beds were good and I slept quite well...until 6 am...when the sun came up....that kinda stunk........but it got one of the best lines from the trip...L said, "Ugh..it's too bright, turn off the light!" Someone replied, "That's not a light, it's the sun!" L's response...... "Well then somebody turn off the sun!!!!"

I nearly fell out of the bed I was laughing so hard :)

But we got up and had an excellent breakfast downstairs. It was quaint and would have been awesome in the fall or winter, the fireplace was huge!!! and delish....but..I loooove breakfast food..I just hate cooking /&..... ok, really just cleaning in the morning! Then we went up the block and took some old timey pics. It was really quite fun and the girls totally got into it as they got to hold guns and it was kinda scary how totally casual they looked doing that…hmmmmm…plus they rocked the serious faces, L didn’t even want to smile in the fun ones because then you would see her braces and they didn’t have those back then!!!! (Yeah..no idea where she got the so very literal side of her from at all….)

After that excitement, we continued west and saw Devil's Tower! We even hiked around the base and touched it!!! I kept waiting for music...... And oddly enough there was some…I kid you not!! First though we saw the tiniest little owl ever!!!! And then a guy playing a mini keyboard…but oddly enough he was playing Star Trek..really…and then when he tried to play the Close Encounters notes….he couldn’t get the last one right…weird huh????

Then we went a bit to the southwest...home....through the Bighorns first...that was....well...it made me do my mountain giggle, as the girls dubbed it! It was so wonderful to see the snowcapped peaks and to watch as they grew ever bigger on the horizon and then completely filled the windshield! They were truly a beautiful site and the drive and the snow too!  And the snow...well let’s just say there was a lot still…and it was in the sun….at lower elevations even….hmmmmmmmmmmmm.  But it was nice...I “remembered”....ya know…I could feel it in my bones..in my soul :D

Anyway...this concludes today's post..as the true homecoming deserves one all on its own!

Devil's Towe as we approach!



The 'back' of it while on the hike.




The 'front' while on the hike.





Tiniest baby owl in the very center!

Blog ya later-

K

South Dakota

Where to start....well I suppose I should start at the very beginning... a very good place to start...sorry, it just popped in there and I couldn't help it!


Anyway, it was a good start! Early, but not too early, and fairly smooth except for the cat who knew something was up and kept trying to escape the house to join us! Other than that, it was a good drive through four states in record time which ended in a very strange hotel with a nice room but that had no actual number on the door.....

The next day we got up and at breakfast the girls met a nice older man who told them about a dam that was releasing water on the MO and it was just a short side trip(under 30 miles round-trip from 90) so we figured why not...wow...WOW...it was...powerful...and made me once again question the wisdom of trying to rein in mother nature and the inevitable consequences that come from that...and I don't just mean floods! Anyway, it was a sight to see and I am glad we did :)

We then traveled through the Badlands, wow…the vastness of the “carving” of the land allows for the name to completely make sense…who wouldn’t get there and go, “Holy cow…what IS that???Looks bad….” :P and then into the Black Hills….they really do look black! We went to Mount Rushmore first and it was by far the busiest day of the trip as far as encountering massive amounts of people and cars…crazy!!! and Crazy Horse which were both...well...the sheer scale was...big...just big..... It was hotter than all get out and the lack of humidity was actually stifling…weird right????

We ended up in Deadwood.....but that is actually where I will begin tomorrow b/c that is where we stayed and it has its own storyline for the day!

So all in all days one and two were very nice and full of only pleasant surprises, which I really liked!

Big Bend Dam, S. D.



Badlands National Park



Mount Rushmore

Crazy Horse

Hope you all are staying cool!!!
 
Blog ya later-
K

Summer Journey

Hello All,

I hope you have had a nice first half of summer!

We have been to the west and back!!  A big circle through Iowa, Minn, SD, WY, Idaho, Utah, CO and KS and awful lot indeed!

We saw amazing things from man-made(and still making even) wonders to wonders carved by nature over millenia!  It was fantastic!!!!  I can already tell it is going to be posts full of exclamation marks but I just can't help it...it was incredible!!! ;-P

Each night Ed & I wrote our highlights from the day into a notebook and then compared, it was interesting to see what we agreed on and what different things we had too!  We took three cameras and at points had all of them taking shots of a specific site/wonder/view so it has been a visual feast to go back through and organize everything and I admit, I'm only halfway through!  I have also been gardening a bit!  We came home to a weed farm.....luckily there were also our plants in there and all things considered they fared quite nicely!  So I have been weeding and then setting up trellising and some more weeding...oh and trip laundry...all in the hottest segment of summer we've had in a while...fun!  :)

So I have decided to do this in segments and today we shall start with the basic numbers!

3591 miles

15 days
14 nights
10 hotel rooms
8 states
6 National Parks
4 National Monuments
2 Window deer...as in they slept outside our window!!!!
1 coyote
1 car accident(not us! )
1 truck blown off the interstate
1 ambulance called to the interstate for a non-accident medical emergency(again not us!! )
0…yes…that is a big goose egg…nada, zip, zilch, zero injuries to K..or anyone else!!!!
Best. Trip. Ever. EVER!

Blog ya later,
K

One day.....

One day…..pink will only be for princesses.


That is the best way to sum up my feelings at the moment. If you aren’t aware, which you most likely aren’t unless you are directly involved in a cause or fight right now, there is a HUGE brew-ha-ha happening regarding pink, specifically various organizations of pink. There is the huge movement amongst this new group of women who are being diagnosed with breast cancers. It spans across ages and races and sometimes I think even rationality to encompass almost anyone you can think of. It is a backlash against the corporate overlords who have risen from the dust of these various organizations to now control these behemoths and are sending them in directions that the movement does not like.

It seems self-defeating to me. The objections range from “your name is projecting the wrong image” to “you are only funding research and prevention…what about a cure?” (You & Your being the companies/organizations they are criticizing) Now don’t get me wrong, I want a cure…but here’s the catch that they are either not aware of or not willing to acknowledge…there isn’t just one kind of breast cancer and therefore there isn’t just one cure…and who gets to get cured first?????? Well I vote for me and my kind because it has no other “help” but maybe we should do the one that is the super quick one that is almost too late too often…..or maybe we should just focus on the one that has the biggest subgroup and say screw you to everyone else…..see where I have issues here????

Yes, I do desire a cure and much more funding and research for that but…don’t be too quick to knock prevention and awareness…so many people have found their lumps on their own, and yet I wonder, would they have if it hadn’t been drilled into our brains to do BSEs…hmmmmm???That is not the only program that is run through some of the big groups either and perhaps you have a small group but in my town it’s huge and they gave away $3 MILLION last year in grants to amazing projects, I worked on some and know about many of the rest and it is truly needed things including prevention and CURE research and activities. AND if the groups’name is catchy and gets to a certain sub-group of women…isn’t that worth possibly offending your sensibilities??? If you do not like them then do not support them or do not participate in their activities/fundraisers but stop the bad-mouthing, it’s unbecoming of ladies. AND …yes, breasts in our culture are sexual...deal with it!!! They were to you before your cancer and are you so self-righteous as to not even acknowledge that?????? Should they be, no, but that is not something any pink organization created, they merely used the existing “vehicle” to promote their ideas and wares. If you want to tackle breast sexuality I think y’all are barking up the wrong tree and need to stop the infighting and look outside the group for that one, but I digress….

Actually not so much in the simplicity of that statement, stop the infighting. None of us, NOT A SINGLE ONE, wanted breast cancer or wants anyone else to get it either. We are really all on the same team here REALLY. You all need to change the way you are viewing the playing field and realize that some of us are catchers others are pitchers and some are just waiting in the dugout for their chance to shine, but we are all on the same team. ALL OF US. If I were your mother I’d put you in time outs!!!!

And so that is why I am tired of pink, well one of the reasons….I really don’t like it either, have never been a pink kind of girl…a mauve or rose but not pink ;)

I have just passed the three year mark since diagnosis which is huge but not where I start counting from…of course everyone is different and I am lucky in many ways that I had the whirlwind treatment and only have a four month space between diagnosis and complete removal and remission so I choose to wait for that date to truly celebrate because in my mind I was not a survivor until it was gone and I had survived and was continuing to and thrive, but that is JUST FOR ME, that is only how I qualify myself and technically I don’t even like the label survivor, I think it is a misnomer, aren’t we all surviving being here every day????? My point is, we are all unique creatures, thank goodness, and every journey is different and so we should stop being divisive and come together…..right now… and make it so pink is only for princesses again and the sooner the better.

Have a great weekend and Happy Father's Day to all those out there:)
 
Blog ya later-
K

Summer

Sooo summer has started off with a typical whirlwind of zaniness around these parts! :)

We are only two weeks in but it has been non-stop parties for Lex(seriously, she's been to one all three weekend since break began...it's starting to wear me out ;-P ) and we spent the first week celebrating B's turning the big 1-0..double digits baby!!!  Then this past week we went up to the lake to spend time with some of the cousins which was super fun......and exhausting!!!  And then back for Komen yesterday which was also super fun...and exhausting!  This year we had a mardi gras-esque theme and handed out about 1400 pink beads necklaces...it was a very interesting study in people and crowds to see that happen...I just watched and smiled and the kids loved it(which was kinda the point, and it gave them something to do ;) ) It was great to walk with my wonderful friends on the team again this year and I have decided to do it as a walking team really only through year five.....the early morning get up is just too insane for this night owl!!!  Sooooo if you want to walk on my team...you only have two years left....after that we are going to become team "Sleep In" & still sign up and raise money but just have a party the night before wearing our shirts and then sleep in instead!!!  Sounds like a brilliant idea to me ;)

Here is once again the iconic look down the street at the throngs of people participating...always makes me catch my breath....




Yep...that's people as far as the eye can see.....

  Have a great week all...

Blog ya later-
K

Whew...

We made it!!!  Through a whole school year of insanity!  I now have a 5th grader and a 7th grader....ok..I'm not actually sure I like the sound of that.....hmmmmmm...not gonna dwell on it now as I have a whole summer of fun to get through first! :D

Anyway, we mananged to make(literally construct), fill with 6 inches deep of dirt and plant 7 garden beds this month for a whopping total of 700+sq ft of garden space....me thinks you all might be getting veggie offers in a few months.... ;)  It has been quite fun, even the hard work part, as we feel quite gratified to have been able to even do it and so far everything seems to be growing even!!  Woohoo!!!!

If you'd like to follow along we have made a blog specfically dedicated to that...which I am trying to keep up with more often as I am including alot of pics to show progress and it is A Greener White House   .

But for now we are just trying to recooperate from the year of not nearly enough sleep for me and waaaaay too much drama-rama for girlies...who knew hormones & school pressure would be so crazy!!! :))

I would love to be outside enjoying the sun finally, the weather has been quite insane these past few weeks and now alas we are at the mercy of the 13 year cicadas in these parts and the incessant din is making me long for a concrete jungle..for a little bit anyway!

I hope you have a had a nice May and wrap ups to school years and that tomorrow you take the time to honor, remember and thank if you can, those who have served for us and especially those who have died while doing so. 

Blog ya later,
K

PS...Miss B will be in double digits in a few days and I am not freaking out about that at all...cause it's just not true....right???? sigh... :)

May already????

Happy May!

Although I don't think the April showers are quite done yet....but they do appear to be bringing pretty flowers all around!  The girls and I roadtripped to KC to see a niece's first communion and it was a great time had by all!  My girls got to play with the cousins and the cousin-in-laws who they have met off and on through the years and it made for a wild and crazy Saturday with a bit of swimming at the hotel pool thrown in!  I had a great time talking with the bro & sil, bro's in-laws and sil's sister, he really picked a wonderful woman to fall in love with who has a great family and they've created a great family together too!

I got to sit and hold my nephew in church while he read through the hymnal and then played with my watch, which he borrowed for the night(and that is my present fyi for his bday coming up~no-one else get one!!! :) ) and it was so nice to have a little person to snuggle with...sigh....that and he says my name so cute...looove it!

Then we drove home....on I-70.....in the rain....super fun..NOT!

And now we start the countdown....technically they get out on the 27th, which means 25 days left and then... if you count actual school days..Lex has 17 1/2 and B has 16& 1/2 left due to fieldtrips and F&F day!!!  I guess that is what you get when you start in the middle of August!!!! However, I will say that getting out before Memorial Day is pretty sweet....I hated having to go back to school for a week and a half to two weeks after that every year when I was kid.  I guess you can't have it both ways!

Anyway, hope you all had a nice ending to April and a good start to May :)

Blog ya later-
K

End of April

Wow!  Two weeks come and gone.  I wish I was able to say that I was just so super busy that I couldn't blog....which is true in the sense of having normal craziness happen and tons of rain.  But that was pretty much it.  We did have some really good food however and saw a few pretty flowers so I've decided to post those for you all to enjoy!  Hope you haven't been swept away by the April showers and storms and that we all get to enjoy the upcoming May flowers:)



Chick cake balls




Ham & Bean Crockpot soup




Triple Chocolate Cakeballs




Work Station




Pretty yard flower :)

I hope you all have a wonderful last week of April:)

Blog ya later-

K



Zoom

Well this first full week of April zoomed by!

The weather was quite nice and allowed for beautfiul times outside for both the Juniors meeting at the start of the week and April Showers drop off on Saturday.

Other than that it was a somewhat uneventful week!  I did enjoy a wonderful lunch with a very good friend at a very cool place~ Mr. Harry's Carnival Foods in Ballwin.  It was sooooooo nice to get a fix of funnel cake without having to battle fair ground crowds!!!!  I will have to head back to try other things and the especially the shaved ice when it gets warmer! (for good, it was one of the cooler days ofthe week when I went to lunch.)

We did break ground on our various garden areas on Saturday.  And I battled and defeated(yay) these bushes that somehow migrated from our back fence to the front corner of the house.  They seem to just grow...and that is all...I suppose if you wanted a nice tall hedge of leafyness along the edge of your yard in the summer they might be nice but not in front of your house at the corner that gets full sun!!!  I am thinking that will be a great spot for a sunflower or three, actually :)

Hope you all had a nice first week of April and your weather wasn't too wildly shocking!

Blog ya later-
K

Hello April

Well, I'm not quite sure how March can be categorized weather-wise...as it kind of came in and went out like a lamb but with a lion right after or before it...so to speak...at least around these parts anyway.  But it is over and April is here and it started off just dandy in my book!

Friday night we were all able to go see the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra with choirs perform the soundtrack of The Lord of the Rings; Fellowship of the Ring while we watched the movie and it was amazing, unbelievable, wonderful, and incredibly mind-blowing.  The girls were so impressed with everything(they had already seen the movie so that was not new) but the music, musicians, Powell Hall, the people, the "grown-up-ness" of it all.  It was truly a night to remember :)  And I saw my oncologist there which just makes her even that much cooler in my book!

Sat. was a pleasant but windy day and so we plotted out new areas for gardening in the front and back.  Now we are just waiting for next weekend and hopefully no more freezes to actually dig up the land and then plant.  Sunday was beautiful! Almost 90, windy, but it was a warm dry wind so it was fine to be outside as long as you stayed clear of any dead branches!!  We strolled around the neighborhood and got some nice vitamin D and then sat in the warm sun and admired the garden-plots-to-be.  It was lovely.

So April is off to a wonderful start and the weather here has not been too crazy, except for the roller coaster temperatures, but that's normal for spring!  We'll see what this first full week brings us.

Hope you all had a lovely start to April too.

Blog ya later-
K

Twelve years....

Twelve years ago on a beautiful Palm Sunday at 3pm CST I gave birth to an amazing creature, my fairy Faye!! :) Today that same child woke up a sweet 11 year old and ended the day technically only a year older but it seemed far more than that as she now has braces and the ‘tude that comes with them!
Actually she was pretty great considering she’s had a rough few weeks of 5 teeth being pulled and now this! It just was strange to see my little girl(who is now skyrocketing towards being my height) have a mouth that is changed…full of metal as it were, because…the endgame on that is beautiful teeth but a teen and everything that comes with it and that is just too much, tooooo much!

 Other than that we are just rolling along here…spring and spring breaks have come and gone…and April is right around the corner! Feb. flew by just like the months before it! It started and ended with awful stomach bugs for me…hmmmmm…..but it was filled with great things including an amazingly, wonderfully, awesome Conference for Young Women Affected by Breast Cancer…in Florida….at the end of Feb…it was glorious! Then March has come and gone with weather insanity that just keeps on going, witness the snow on my lovely magnolia blossoms…..sigh…..





Snowy Magnolia Blossoms.....sigh, pretty and yet....



 I am excited for spring and warmth to be able to plant things…the oregano and peppermint in the front bed are already blooming and will spring back from this cold spell easily so beware, there is VERY pungent goodness when you come to our door now :) If anyone local would like some organic heirloom seeds to plant this year and let us harvest seeds from….let me know, we have a lot of seeds of a lot of plants! (I kinda went crazy;) ) I am also ready to shed some layers! That and I already put away most of the winter clothes!!!!!

Anyway…that’s it for now…hope you all had a nice end to winter…if only technically!

Blog ya later-

K

It's gone!

Das Boot I mean!!! I was given the all clear by the Dr...well, by all clear I mean I can go without the boot and do PT and then start to get back to normal, no marathons quite yet! But I can drive!!!!!  That is so nice.  Frankly,  it couldn't have come at a better time!  Starting this weekend, the crazies begin...again.

First we have the bowling for the "neighborhood" GSs and dads with over 500 signed up this year...it has been an interesting test of my logistical skills and mastery of Excel to get them all in lanes!!! ;-D Then we have regular scouts and then Trivia night...which we are going to do very very well at this year....I just have a feeling... then the rescheduled PJ party(thanks winter storms for cancelling the first date again this year) then a half day and holiday weekend and then I'm gone for a conference and then it will be March!!!

It all just seems to be flying by..again...wait, maybe it just never stopped doing that and I just was caught up in the whirlwind myself!  Anyway, it has been a nice couple of weeks of forced relaxation.  I didn't really leave the house except for errands of the utmost importance and the rest of the time I spent doing ...well..mostly GS stuff and surfing the web.  I just decided to start off 2011 a bit slowly, okay, I had to but still, I embraced the idea :D  and then last week happened and the kids had two snow days, I got rid of the boot and reality set in!  Now the next month is insane and then it will be March and Lexi has already registered for classes for 7th grade(ack, gasp...shudder...) and that means that B is headed for 5th grade and the end of an era....(double-ack, gasp, ...breathe in through the nose....out through the mouth...)

Ok, I think I'm just gonna go get caught up in the whirlwind again and then I won't have to think so hard about all of those things! ;-P

Hope everyone is surviving all this crazy weather everywhere....be safe.

Blog ya later-
K

Out with the old...

and then it appears we do it again!

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas holiday.  We got snow and had a good time with lots of family over the break.  With only one small tiny, teeny, minor really, inconvience....I rolled my ankle again.  On the steps over the break and have ended up in a boot!  It is of course the same foot as last year, the right...and therefore it is quite hard to drive, so I have been mostly housebound which has been fine asI have managed to keep myself busy with other activities as always, but I thought I would check in and show you a selection of pictures from the past few weeks:)



SNOW!!!



Yummmm :)





'Das Boot'

And so that is how my end of 2010 and start of 2011 has gone...

Snow :)

Yummy hot drinks :)

'Das Boot' :(

 and so more yummy hot drinks :)

Blog ya later-

K