Smiles

Katelyn has a strong dislike for taking pictures. Here you see some examples of classic Katelyn pictures. It is rare indeed to get a shot of her looking at the camera and smiling.

Dallin on the other hand seems to like having his picture taken he just needs a little encouragement to smile so we are always prompting "say cheese!" and that's what he does.

so last night I was in charge of Family night and I decided to have a lesson on smiling... I'm serious. This has become one of my major contentions with the kids and it shouldn't be but I really would like to have more than two cute pictures of the million and one pictures I take. so we talked about smiling and how it makes people feel good when we smile at them and then we played a game of hide and seek, the kids could hide anywhere in the house and when they were found the got their picture taken in their hiding spot and then ran to a new hiding spot. it was great! The kids had fun and we got to practice taking nice pictures.

Katelyn's philosophy on Ouchies

Yesterday Katelyn tripped and fell on the cement and scraped up her ankle pretty bad. today while we were driving she said,
"I can't wait to see Emily and tell her all about my new ouchy."
Then she stated in a very matter of fact voice,
"Mommy, when you get ouchies you have to show them to your friends and tell your friends all about it, because that's what friends do."

Grant must have quite the grip.

the other day while we were driving to pick up Cameron at the airport, Grant was reaching to hold Dallin's hand, Dallin seemed to be completely oblivious to it so I said, "Dallin I think Grant wants to hold your hand" he replied, "but Mommy I can't hold his hand because if I hold baby Grant's hand my fingers will fall off!"

A Dallin Moment

last week while I was bathing the kids, Dallin was singing at the top of his lungs, enjoying the sound of his voice echoing around the bathroom when he stopped all of a sudden and said "mommy, we better be quiet or the Holy Ghost will get us."

birthday

my birthday was relatively quiet this year, the kids had doctor appointments and we saw an armadillo at the park. we think it must have some sort of disorder because it wasn't remotely scared of us, and believe me three kids can do wonders in terrorizing any crawling creature. personally this was my first armadillo encounter, I've driving by a few who didn't quite make it across the road and seen a few in zoos but this was my first "out in the Wild" exprience. It was pretty cool and would have been much more enjoyable if Grant had been content to watch from a distance, but he really wanted to pet it.

the rest of the day went went well, The kids were excited to help me open presents, (new shoes) and the best part was the carrot cake.

your eyes are not deceiving you, this is indeed the carrot cake birthday cake Cameron and the kids made for me, I would like to say it was mostly the kids who created the frosting design but most of the credit goes to Cameron. the kids did let loose with the sprinkles. isn't it fun!

the biggest reason I am posting this is because my sister requested a picture with my growing hair. pretty impressive huh?

I had my first appointment with the radiologist. everything went well, I had been warned beforehand that she was "scary" so expecting the worse she seemed fine to me. she explained a bunch of things that I had heard before, so nothing new, they highly recommend radiation because of the size of the tumor and my age, I will have radiation everyday for 5 weeks, I can't lose or gain weight during that time, (so sad, I really was planning to put on a few pounds this month.... oh wait maybe that was last month... ) it will feel like a sunburn, you know, the usual stuff I had never heard of before I started this whole process. it should be great times. can't wait to start.

Cameron has his Tampa interview tomorrow, they invited us to go to a dinner with the residents tonight, Amy Sharp came over to watch the kids, she is amazing! but the boys were both screaming as we were walking out the door. unfortunately as we were going down the steps I realized I forgot my hat, but I couldn't go back and get it because I couldn't make it harder then it already was for Amy or the boys, so I went without. my hair is starting to grow back but it's certainly not at the stage where I'm comfortable going to an interview dinner without something on. oh well, it went fine, and I think it was more disturbing for me then anyone else in the room. I think most people can tell I wouldn't choose to have this crazy short hair but you never know...

Rambling

it's 9:30pm and I should be going to bed but I wanted to feel like I accomplished something, plus Cameron is out of town and I took a nap today so I don't think I could fall asleep right away and I don't want to lay in bed wide awake listening to every creek in the apartment and every noisy neighbor outside. so here I am rambling.

I went to the gym for the first time since the beginning of November, it felt good to go back, I just wish my kids would cooperate with me. sometimes actually getting out of the house is a chore but if I don't then by lunch time the kids and I are stir crazy but then it's too late because after lunch is naps and that's not a good time to leave the house. I so was determined to get out but it was a struggle. lets just say I finally made it to the car with both Grant and Dallin in my arms screaming, them, not me, though I was close.

I have been a beast the last few days. It seems like the slightest things irritates me. I think it's because life has been a bit crazy with the holidays and now that we are home we've been up late and so we are all grumpy. well mostly the girls, the boys have been great except for this morning. When Katelyn gets upset with me she tightens her fists, pushes her arms down stomps her foot and says is a growling voice "augh! I'm not happy with you" I'm not sure what to do with her lately, she is not very nice. Last night one of her best friends Emily invited us to the circus and Katelyn refused to sit by her. which of course hurt Emily's feelings. so I took Katelyn aside and explained that this was a special night for Emily, it was her birthday and she got to invite one friend to the circus and she choose Katelyn, so She needs to be extra super nice and help Emily have a special day." after our little talk she looked up at me and said, "but mom I can't sit by Emily, I have to go to the bathroom." I don't think she is trying to be a mean person. She did similar things with her cousin Lauren while we were visiting Miami. I'm not sure what to do about it.

Dallin is being very sweet on the other hand. His only flaw is that he wants to be held all the time. he is by far our cuddliest. He is such a good boy, he plays well with Katelyn and he plays well with Grant. He has a slight obsession with eye color, he is constantly telling us, "ta-lyn has blue eyes just like baby rant has blue eyes too. I want to have blue eyes too, Brown eyes are yucky!' I'm not sure where he got that idea. so now every time he talks about eyes I tell he that brown eyes are beautiful. I think he is starting to believe me a little, but today while we were at the YMCA, he was looking at himself in the mirror and said, "mommy I think my eyes are green now, look mommy my eyes are a little green like yours are!"

Grant is getting big, we are working on weening him from the bottle, he only has it at night and when I'm desperate in public, which is not very often. I didn't give him one tonight and he went to bed really easy, but then 3 minutes after I shut the door he started crying, I think as he was laying their falling asleep he must have been reviewing the day and realized that I skipped a step in his bed time routine. He is a sweet baby who is quickly losing his babyness.

I am excited for Cameron to come home tomorrow after Church. unfortunately he is likely driving to Gainsville that night because he has interviews there Monday and Tuesday. and then he has one out in CA and then i think he is done, I should be starting radiation by that time. fun times!

well I've rambled enough, I need to get some sleep so I can stop being such a grouch.

Guess who got a new Camera for Christmas....

That's right. Cameron is amazing! All I wanted for Christmas was a SLR digital camera, I have an SLR film camera I got when I took a photography class 4 years ago but that was pre-kids and now film just doesn't cut it. unfortunately the digital cameras are expensive, but the kids are getting bigger and I would love to capture some cute pictures of them while they are still young and adorable.

Somehow Cameron pulled it off and he did it with out me suspecting a thing... sort of.

A month ago after being on the computer for a while Cameron got up at announced, "I have gotten your Christmas and birthday presents for the next few years" that made me suspicious until I was searching for something under the bed a few days before Christmas, honest I wasn't looking for hidden presents. While not being able to find what I was looking for I did run across a box for a GPS, another of my top Christmas wish list items. This was mostly for Cameron's sanity, because I get lost every time I blink, and unfortunately I have to blink. and he has gotten too many desperate calls for help and directions while I am on the road.

so then I figured that the GPS must have been the expensive gift Cameron had referred to. Despite my slight disappointment I realized that a GPS is probably a better gift anyway because we will be moving somewhere this summer and it will come in handy.

well come Christmas morning I got both. Cameron had Ordered the GPS months ago and had been using it to go to his interviews, sneaky... I just figured he was amazing with directions from the Internet. He even let my sister use it while she drove to Naples to drop my kids off. they were both very sneaky.

SO now I am a proud owner of a SLR camera and a GPS. Thank you Cam!

Arriving Home

Days of Thanksgiving

My Mom and Sister were here for Thanksgiving Amy and Mom both had to leave the day after Thanksgiving so we decided to stay in Tampa and then drive down to Naples to see the kids after they left. it would be nice if Tampa and Naples were less then 3 hours away but that's ok...

Cameron's Cousin Jen invited all of us over to her house for Thanksgiving dinner. We had a fantastic time. We always love spending time with them.

the day after thanksgiving we joined the crowds and went shopping I wish we could say we found some amazing deals but truthfully we ended up returning nearly everything we bought. sad huh? After our unsuccessful shopping spree we drove to Naples and joined the festivities there. fun times! It was only at this point that we remembered to pull out the camera.

Katelyn and her cousin Lauren love being silly together. They insisted on having matching hair, and who wouldn't?

We decorated Grandma's Christmas tree after thanksgiving, the kids had a great time "helping" some were a bit more helpful then others, but they were all cute.

On Sunday morning we took advantage of having everyone in their Sunday best and snapped some pictures with Cameron's great Grandpa Bennett.

Of course we had to take a family picture while the cameras were out.

I know the wigs not doing much for me but hey it's better then nothing... believe me.

surgery

Surgery went well. we arrived at the hospital at 5:15ish in the AM.. That's early even for a morning person. Once we got there we checked in and waited. This soon became a theme for the day.


After an hour or so they moved us into another room and we waited. Then they called me up to the desk asked us to turn off our cell phones, and follow them to a triage type place, I changed into that oh so flattering hospital gown and... we waited. one by one the doctors who would be operating on me and putting me to sleep came by to introduce themselves and say hi. It was nice and all but I'm convinced that it was an attempt to trick me into thinking that I wasn't waiting so much by breaking it up into segments, it would have worked but we had a watch... very useful for those type of situations.





finally at 8ish the Anastisgiologist came back, put something in my IV and I don't remember anything else until I was in the recovery room, apparently I was unconscious for much longer then needed, I should have told them that I don't need as much Anastasia as most people because I don't drink alcohol and it's really effective on me. the benefit was I wasn't in any pain, I mean not any. In fact I wasn't ever in as much pain as I expected to be. I this I can contribute some of that to nerve damage, because I still don't have much feeling under my left arm. once the Anastasia wore off I did have some pain and it lasted for about 2 weeks after coming home from the hospital but it wasn't too bad.





I spent the next week recovering at home with my sister Amy. we had a great time watching movies, going on short walks and just hanging out. my mom came up the day before Thanksgiving and unfortunately had to leave the day after Thanksgiving... she took Amy with her. it was sad.

curly sue

we decided to try curlers in Katelyn's hair, she loved it! she insisted I do it the following night too, of course after that she was done and didn't want those curls anymore. but it was fun while it lasted.

Discouragment

Most days I feel fine, I don't feel ill and when I notice that sick looking person walking past the mirror or looking back at me in pictures I dismiss her as someone else. But every once in a while when I wake up at night or am alone and have time to think about this situation I find myself in I feel sad, upset and angry. I don't understand why, when everyone else my age is concerned about trivial things like how to lose those 10 extra pounds gained during the last pregnancy or How to get a two-year-old to use the potty correctly, that I have to consider things like bilateral mastectomies and worst, recurrence. my Grandmothers dealt with breast cancer in their 70s so it wasn't a foreign concept for me but, I feel a bit cheated out of 45 years of my life. I have so much planned in my life, so much to look forward to I don't want breast cancer to define me. I am tired if it being the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing at night.I would like to have my life back, thank you very much! I would like to take care of my chldren without needing the help from family and friends, not that it's not appreciated, I would just like to not need it. I want to be th one that Grant is walking to as he improving that skill, instead of hearing about it on the phone.

A trip to Utah in November

My older brother David found the girl of his dreams, a school teacher no less, and they got married November 14th. of course we couldn't let them get married without us so we flew out to Utah to join in the festivities.

of course to get there require traveling for over 8 hours. the kids did surprising well on both flights. they were so excited to be on a plane that they played well for the first flight and so exhausted that they slept on the second.

we stayed with my friend Sheryl while we were there. my kids were instant best friends with hers so it worked out well.

Katelyn and Kara were inseparable, but I can't count the number of times Katelyn turned and asked me, "what's my friends name again?" even on the last day of our visits I'm sure it was at least 20 time. so I guess she's not so good with names.

Grant loved having Trevor around. Trevor wasn't so sure about these people coming and sleeping in his room, eating his food and sharing his toys.

and though it was brief I also got to see Brianne and her family.

We also met up with Jessica my old roommate and her husband Jake. She and Dallin made chocolate chip cookies... yum

This is the best family picture that was taken. it's no small feat to get the kids all looking at the camera let alone smiling, we'll take what we can get.

Dad and Mom with the groom.

They stood in the receiving line for a VERY long time, thankfully the rest of us got to enjoy walking around eating ice cream.

These are the girls in my family, Carolyn Stephen's wife in Green, Becky next to her in the back Mom next to Becky, Sarah in the middle, Amy next to her, and me in front trying to make it look like I"m not in pain. I was squatting so that everyone could be seen and it took a VERY long time for this picture to be taken... I'm not sure why...

The kids had a great time throwing the rocks around. this is Katelyn trying to look sweet and Innocent after I asked them not to throw them anymore.

my nieces Katie and Chris adored my little kids.




just as we were ready to bow out of the reception early and put our kids to bed, the music started and we just had to dance, we ended up staying through the entire reception, it ended at 10pm and Cameron had to be at the airport the next morning at 6am.

We had a great time in Utah and can't wait to go back.

Home again

I got home from the hospital today and I feel pretty good. I haven't needed to take much pain killer, in fact I feel better then I did when I got the biopsy done.... of course I was in way more pain then I expected for that one... All the nurses wanted me to stay in the hospital with them, but despite their efforts to tempt us with chocolate cake and the oh so flattering hospital gown, we decided we would be fine on our own. we got home today around lunch time, my sister Amy had lunch and a clean house ready for us when we got here. Cameron's mother has the kids at her house this week, we thought it would be best not to have them around to jump on me when I got home. so we have spent the day eating ice cream and watching movies... it's been great!
my hair is starting to grow back. right now it looks like fuzzy old man head but it's something. my eyebrows and eyelashes have refused to make their reappearance. I'm sure they are waiting for a dramatic entrance. meanwhile I have discovered fake lashes and I may never go back to the real thing. the fake eyebrows need some work though, they look a little... aaa... fake.

Surgery

One more step done in the process of breast cancer. Elisabeth had her mastectomy this morning and her medport removed. There were no complications and she has a month before she starts radiation treatments. So hopefully she can enjoy the holidays and begin a new wave of attacks with the start of the new year. Thank you for all the support.

Grant's first birthday

Our little baby turned one. It's crazy how fast kids grow. just a year ago he was a tiny itsy bitsey little thing that slept, ate and cried. now he is tiny little thing that moves. He is always on the go. He hasn't started walking yet but makes up for it by crawling faster then most kids can run. he is a happy little guy who smiles and laughs easily.

So what does one do on his first birthday?

First things first, play/destroy blocks and animals with Katelyn and Dallin

when that gets old he moved on to more exciting things like mommy's cell phone. Eating is a

constant thing at one. His pants were soon sacrificed to a blowout diaper such is too often the case.

Cameron was on call that day so we joined him for a birthday lunch celebration at a park near the hospital. Dallin and Katelyn were much more excited about Grant's gifts then he was.

we fed him his favorite meal of spaghetti-o which always grantees a bath to follow.

To celebrate we met Abe and Julie in Orlando and played with them Friday then on Saturday we went to Disney World.

We had cupcakes and it was so easy we may never go back to cake.

Everyone enjoyed the frosting and a few of them actually at the cake too.

One of our favorite rides of the day was the race cars. Grant and Dallin went with Cameron and Katelyn and I went together.

Grant's favorite thing was eating our map. he has a great time.

a few days later we celebrated with Bill and Louise.

We love our little Grant.